Back To School Pandemic Style!!

 Going back to school definitely deserves it's own post this year.  2020.  The year of horribleness.  So many kids only have online school this year.  A lot of districts who are letting kids go to school are only doing in-person school a couple of times a week, or part of the day.  Fortunately, we live in a district that is doing full day, in-person school.  Hallelujah!!  Now that certainly doesn't mean school is just happening like normal.  This year school means wearing masks all day, sanitizing your desks after every class, sanitizing your hands before and after each class, teachers wearing masks, and lots of prayers that people don't get sick and schools can stay open.  I'm enjoying every second of the days when all of my kids are at school.  I know there's a really good chance that covid cases will be too high and we'll be back to online learning.  And it's just a matter of time until one of my kids gets some kind of cold and has to stay home from school.  So I'm not taking for granted a single day when they're all gone.  There were many times during the week where I just stopped and enjoyed the silence of my house.  I could feel my soul getting stronger in the silence (a sign of a true introvert).  It had been SO LONG since we had to abort life.  So long.  I think I was starting to lose my mind.  My family thought I was losing my mind.  Jake had started asking me if I was ok.  No, I was not.  The good news is, after a week of some quiet time, it looks like I might be able to stay sane a little longer.  Phew.  It was definitely touch and go for a second.

This year not only brought pandemic craziness, but Kate and Sage both started at new schools.  Kate's now at the high school and Sage is at the middle school.  No more elementary school for us!  Crazy!  I think Sage has had the hardest time adjusting.  I don't blame her.  Going from elementary to middle school is a big change.  I so wish we could just skip middle school.  It's mostly horrible.  Don't worry though, I tell Sage she'll love it;)  She's not convinced.  I thought the kids would complain more about wearing masks all day, but they seem to be taking that in stride.  By the end of the week they were sick of it, but it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be for them.  Sage had some good times on the bus.  Our district is short 7 bus drivers, so they combined a bunch of routes.  The first couple of days of school there were 3-4 people on each seat.  Definitely no social distancing happening.  We've had record breaking heat the last couple of weeks.  Gratefully the schools have air conditioning.  But not the buses.  On the first day of school Sage got almost all the way home and the bus driver realized she needed to pick up the high school kids.  Rather than drop the kids off she turned around and made them ride all the way back to the high school.  Where she realized that the high school kids had already been picked up.  Poor Sage was on the bus for like 40 minutes.  Roasting to death.  That almost did her in.  Kate lucks out and gets to catch a ride to school with Zack.  No more buses for her! (definitely a bonus this year)  The nice thing about this year is I think the kids are so happy to be interacting with people all day the complaints about school have been minimal.  Pandemic blessings.

Anyway, I'm celebrating our first full week of school in almost 6 months.  Please, please bless that there are many more to come.  Please...

6th grade!  How is my baby so big?!

High School!

11th grade.  I barely got one picture of him.  Let alone another with a mask

July Happenings

July killed me.  Not sure why, but it did.  I'm so so glad it's over.  I'm even posting about it sooner than normal so I can just be done.  It's not like it was a horrible month.  We had fun.  We did stuff.  I guess all of the pandemic everything finally caught up to me and I've had enough!

We celebrated birthdays for the boys.  Zack turned 16 and managed to get his license a week after his birthday.  Not too bad in pandemic life.  I think he really loves driving by himself.  And I really love that he can drive himself.  Like it's pretty awesome.  Jake had a birthday.  They're both so low key about birthdays it makes it hard to make things exciting.  We had grandparents come up on Sunday, the day before Zack's birthday, so we could celebrate both birthdays.  Zack got a car for his birthday.  It's a white 2000 Jeep Cherokee.  He was excited as I think he was trying to figure out how to save money for a car.  Even though I'm pretty sure we told him he was getting one.  So that was his birthday present.  That he got before his actual birthday.  So on his actual birthday he went to work.  Which must mean he's getting old.  Zack has been working full-time this summer framing for Jake.  It's pretty grueling, hard work.  Especially in the heat.  He's exhausted when he gets home.  And then two days a week gets to turn right around to go to mountain bike practice.  He's a trooper and a tough kid.  I'm glad he's learning to work hard and earning lots of money.

I think the biggest news of the month is that we finally got a boat!!  I'd mostly given up hope.  Let's just say the stars aligned and the right boat came available here in Midway.  It's yellow and the people we bought it from used to own a honey business, so it's name is Bumblebee.  We've only taken it out a couple of times, but so far we're loving it.  We've had some funny stories of trying to figure things out.  Mostly involving me.  Like it took me 5 attempts to get the boat on the trailer the first time, so that was awesome.  And then one time I couldn't get it to start.  Tried over and over.  Jake was looking at everything, but we couldn't see anything wrong.  Jake was of course expounding on how horrible boats are and this is why you don't get a boat.  I was about to flag down another boat when Jake realized I'd left the boat in gear, not in neutral.  We flipped it to neutral and it started right up.  I will never live this down.  We're trying to figure out surfing.  We have no idea what we're doing other than that I watched a few Youtube videos.  So we're pretty much clueless.  But the kids are loving it and that was the plan.

We had a big family bbq at our house when the Balls were in town.  It was great fun to have everyone here.  There were a million kids, lots of adults, and lots of chaos.  Just how it's supposed to be.  And our family's dream came true when everyone stayed to light fireworks!  It was a Christmas miracle!

Zack's new car.  He won't let us name it.  He has great plans to fix it up.  Nothing has happened yet

The girls insisted on shoving this huge floaty in the car to go to Red Ledges.  Sage and her friend were stuffed in the back.

Waiting for Memorial Hill fireworks

Kate made her first cheesecake.  We need to work some kinks out, but I was pretty impressed!

We hiked to Stewart Falls

I got home from mountain biking and Sage ran out and said turn around!  A balloon just landed!  We need to go find it!

Zack took all of the grandparents for a ride.  Not sure how they all fit.  It was pretty awesome

My boys really like to pose for pictures

Kate and Sage spent a long time working on this.  Apparently it's hard

Bumblebee!!

Pandemic license

Early morning boating in the cold

Zack always wants to go faster on the tube.  I remembered this tube being bigger since our kids were so little.  We've since purchased one that more than one person can fit on.

Our theater was full!  This made me so happy!

We let off lots of fireworks.  Great fun!

Thinning the apple tree at the office

Early morning hike to Bloods Lake