Tales from the Pandemic 5

It's now been 24 days since our life has drastically changed and we've been at home pretty much around the clock.  The kids and I have gotten into a routine.  I've been waking up around 7:00am and start my day with a 5 mile walk with Lucy.  Lately, Ian has been joining me on these walks and its quite nice.  When I get back home, I shower and get dressed.  Make something for breakfast and have one or two things I want to take care of at the house.  Before I know it, it is 4:30pm and I start on dinner.  I am amazed actually how fast the time is going.  My days are all the same and it is the wildest feeling to wake up and not have any clue what day of the week it is.  I am not kidding when I say, I wake up and as I am lying in bed, I take a few moments to figure out which day of the week it is.  When you don't have to be dressed and out of the house by a certain time or anytime!, it plays on you mentally and all the days meld into each other. 

I have this magnetic whiteboard on our refrigerator and each evening, I put all the zoom calls scheduled for the next day.  On any given day, we have 4 to 6 zoom calls for everything from Samantha's reading tutor to Ian's dance classes.  Even on the weekends, our days are filled with zoom calls.  Each day is basically the same.  Wash, rinse, repeat.   If I don't list all these out on a daily basis, I know we will miss logging in on one.  

Ian is the most productive of all of us.  He seems to be busy from the moment he wakes up to the time he goes to bed. He is enjoying getting 12 hours of sleep each night. He has been able to take a class online that is needed for graduation and got it out of the way.  This was a huge win when FCPS announced they were going to push up the start date for all those kids who wanted to take it over the summer and have all this time on their hands now to do it.  

Sam has periods of going stir crazy and will start whining, like nails on a chalkboard.  Ugh.  Jeff and I realized she was in a very bad routine of waking up around 11:45am/12:00pmish, staying in her pajamas all day, and not eating anything for a long time after waking.  Of course this would make anyone grumpy and not so fun to be around.  It took us 3 weeks before we realized, no more.  Now Samantha gets up by 9:30am, even if we have to wake her up, which most mornings we do.  And she needs to be dressed and her teeth brushed before coming downstairs.  Before any electronics or tv, Sam has to do either something academic, creative, organizing or cleaning.   So far, so good and it has helped her mood improved, even getting dressed each day makes a world of difference. 

Jeff has been working from home and has set himself up at our dinning room table each week day.  While it would be better if Jeff had a separate office in our house (with walls!  With a door!), it is not possible and the kids and I are doing our best to give him space. 

Lucy is living her best life and has made out the best of all of us.  Besides the 5 mile daily walks, she likes to lounge on the back deck for a good portion of the day. She'll adjust her spot between wanting sun and/ or wanting shade. We don't let her have access to the backyard when we are not home, so that is definitely not a problem now and she can be out there for hours and hours on end.

The kids bedtimes have all but disappeared.  We are definitely more relaxed and have very little structure, other than when a zoom call is scheduled.  It amazes me how easy it was to get to this point and adjust to our new normal.