It feels strange to say TGIF and yet, with Aron working full-time at the hospital, there’s still excitement about weekends over weekdays.
The temperature is rising swiftly here and so the kids have been doing more swimming in the afternoons. The bees have been, too—which means Hudson and Skyler are constantly trying to rescue them in spite of my cautions. Hudson was stung yesterday—and again today. Skyler came running in yelling five minutes later that she just pulled out her tooth. Always exciting! We’re doing our best to keep the Spanish practice up with videos and class conferences, and have dropped off from some of the other online offerings we as more schoolwork moves online. The junior version of Ticket to Ride is now something we do in pajamas while I have coffee. Dinners have gotten more creative, but lunches have gotten more routine. Most days I just point the kids to the PB&J materials. Eggs and cheese quesadillas, which they named “Mamadillas,” are the other go-to (a little like this).
This week’s theme has been “distance learning.” This is the first week of it for us and all of the WebEx meetings and Google Classroom mazes are definitely taking some getting used to. I thought this image of our six-year-old clutching her stuffy, “Stripey,” getting a lift from a makeshift booster seat, and watching her kinder friends and teacher (and her own face in a box) for the first time captured the mood. Not pictured: mom sitting to the side tearing up when the kids talked about their feelings.
What were some of your highlights this week? We went on some great nature walks, finished puzzles (well, one only had 999 pieces out of 1000, but close!), caught up on some favorite TV shows, and baked. Wendy Mac (a national treasure, along with Mac Barnett, in my opinion) streamed into our home and I read Little House in the Big Woods aloud. The sun is out and I’m going to trim the kids hair and then we’ll go for a bike ride. This week was “spring break” so Aron had the first half of it off from work and it was such a nice change to share the days with him.
On the other hand, a friend I follow on Instagram posted today about missing the eye-contact, the “smile eyes” (smize? Tyra?) in the grocery store—even when standing apart—and it got me a little down: The NIMBY (Not-in-My-Backyard) callouts on the Next Door App are getting nastier. I see policing for such a range of benign activities on social media. It’s not exactly an encouraging environment for sharing. And the backlash against (sure, sometimes tone deaf) celebrities who try too hard to commiserate feels so yucky. Thank goodness there has been no social unrest along the lines of that in movies like Contagion, but I feel like I’m starting to see little bits of unrest in how people are treating and judging each other.
So I needed this lovely pick-me-up today. I’ve seen so much goodness and generosity around the world, but all it takes is a few grumps to make the situation seem sour. Cheers to kindness!
What links are you enjoying this week? Here are some of note…
