March

Remember before the world stopped and we could go out and be free and visit people and go to stores and out to eat and go on dates and not all be together all day every day? Me either :) This Social Distancing/ Sheltering in place business is SO WEIRD and unlike anything that I've every experienced. At first I was super anxious about Tim going to work every day and getting exposed to COVID 19 and then bringing it home to me and the kids. Now I don't worry about it near as much (I don't know if that's good or bad). But instead I think about when and if things will go back to normal and what normal will look like. It's nice to have the kids home in a lot of ways. They love to be together and play really well half of the time and fight the other half of the time. They are pretty good about doing a little bit of school every day. They have never been big "what are we doing today/where are we going" kind of kids which I am super grateful for, so that hasn't been an issue. But we miss visiting Grandma and Grandpa and playing with cousins. I miss having a break from them and I'm sure they feel the same about me. But all things considered, we are all doing pretty good and we are doing it. We are social distancing. We are growing and stretching and learning and it's good and it's hard and it's super interesting. Anyway, before things went weird, this is what life looked like.....

We tried the green shakes at McDonalds (I thought they were pretty gross and tasted artificial, but it was a fun try.).

We attempted to get all our energy out before bedtime riding scooters in the backyard. Tim was working. He's been working a lot of evening shifts. 

Molly had some great bathtub hair.

And Jack has perfected his "cheese" grin.

The lot across the street from us is still totally empty and we had a couple of friends over for a last minute play date. 

We took the boys lunch at school (Peter's lunch was earlier and we didn't get a pic)

Costco before everyone started hoarding toilet paper and other weird things.

I hosted a favorite things party and assembled my first charcuterie board with the help of a friend.

It looked pretty amazing and my friend is the one who physically made the board which was also pretty amazing.

All the friends at the party.

Jack has been working on lots of new fun tricks. 

Whitney and I got to go to the temple and then out to lunch. It was an amazing breath of fresh air to spend so much time with my sis.

The Bachelor finale happened and this Meme is a great description of how I felt about life and things just kept getting weirder.

We met my parents at The Habit to "kick off" Spring Break which technically is still going on. We got shakes and Fries. I love living close to them and that we can include them in random little outings like shakes and fries at The Habit.

Oliver put himself in the high chair at The Habit.

Jack tried to avoid the high chair at The Habit.

I took Molly scooting while Tim took the boys on a bike ride....Molly loved going through the mud and at one point lost her shoe in the mud.

She was so funny about it and didn't make much of a stink when I told her to just put her dirty shoe back on.

Oliver picked all of these beautiful wildflowers.

Snuggles with this cute baby!

Jack has been loving the play house and likes to crawl through the window.

Peter loves his lizard, Bob. Sometimes he takes Bob outside to walk around in the grass. 

Logan came to town for his birthday. The three of us when for a hike and did some social distancing walks and lunches outside. I always love when he's in town.

Sweet Oliver's fish "Little Blue " has been on deaths door for a while now. He "let him free" in the canal. This is his last picture with Little Blue.

Jack has decided that his high chair is more of a jungle gym than an actual high chair. It's the worst! 

We have been seeing more love birds int eh back yard which is so fun. I love these beautiful birds. 

Jack has become a climber. He climbed up on top of this car and balanced up there all by himself. His climbing is extremely exhausting for me and Tim. I really feel like we can't leave him alone for one minute cause if we do....

he climbs up to the island and eats an apple. Look how proud he is of himself!

One day we went and got the kids got free lunch from the school for something to do. They decided to eat it outside. Look at my four little ducklings!!

Friday night pizza and movie night. Jack will not be left out of the fun!

My mom brought me a Dr. Pepper and Jack stole it!! He seriously thinks he is so big!

Yes, I did get us Crubl cookies. But this is to show you Jack's broken mobile. He busted it and I decided to take a minute and put it back together. 

It felt so good to finish something!

Molly rediscovered this dress up dress and wore it for a couple of days in a row. She wore it on a walk to my parents house.

This sums up how I feel about life right now. 

It's weird, but it's also very beautiful. I have these moments where I can sit back and look at all of this and just feel so blessed and so happy and so lucky. Even among all the chaos and uncertainty. 

Jack has also discovered that he can use the black stools to access wherever he wants. So naughty!

I made French Bread for the first time.

Jack  once again avoiding the high chair. 

He loves sitting with the big kids. 

Look. At. Him!! Just drinking his milk out of the bowl like he's 8

"Cookies? Don't mind if I do!"

Tim and his goggle face from the hospital.

My beautiful girl at the breakfast table.

Please note that he moves the rug out of the way to make pushing the stool easier. Look at him just so proud. He wanted to do the dishes I guess?

Sitting right in the garden!!

Oh life!! The truth is, my life was already pretty exhausting before this all went down. Now I just get to stay at home more which is fine with me (most of the time). And my kids are pretty good....most of the time. I'm super grateful that Tim still has a job and my heart goes out to all of the people who's jobs have been affected from this crazy pandemic. Times are so crazy and while my emotions and mood are on one crazy roller coaster ride, I have high hopes that we will come back stronger and better from all of this. 

Strange Times

Things are super weird right now right? Dare I say weirder than September 11th? Which that was the last thing that was this impactful to me. What is going on now is going to make a big fat appearance in the history books. There are just SO many unknowns. BUT despite all the weirdness we are actually doing pretty good around here. Trying to maintain some form of normalcy. We've established a pretty good routine with the kids at home. Tim's taking a lot of precautions when he gets home from work....putting clothes straight in the washer and getting straight in the shower. Not bringing his shoes into the house. Cloroxing everything. We are only a full week and two days into this Carona COVID-19 virus situation with social distancing and stores closing, restaurants only doing take out, and places like the movie theatre closing. It's super surreal. I will say that time has slowed down significantly, something that I actually enjoy. When Tim is home, we are both home and I feel like I see him more. The kids even seem to be doing ok with adjustment. No major complaints and Molly is the only one who has complained of missing friends and dance class.

Last week was Spring Break. Any plans we had to see movies and go on adventures were pretty much cancelled. We did a couple of fun things as a family, but it was really just a chill week at home. Fortunately we all kind of like to be home (my boys especially), so it was just fine.

If anything kills me right now, it's going to be Jack. The interesting thing about my situation is that I still had two kids before school got cancelled so I was busy with kids anyway. Now I just have older kids to help entertain the youngers which is actually kind of nice. Anyway, Jack is just up to no good! He can climb onto everything, he empty's all the drawers, if you say his name when he is doing something naughty like emptying a drawer, he just empty's it faster. I figured out how to climb up the tall slide outside which totally stresses me out. He also thinks he big like the other kids and he does not want to be left out of anything. Love him, but heaven help me through the next I don't know 6-12 months?!?

He climbed up on the table and laid himself down. I'm half expecting to find him hanging from the light fixture one of these days.

At Grandma's climbing to play the piano

Also at Grandma's, climbing into the cupboard

I ordered these books for Oliver and it was the perfect timing. He's done with the first one. Only five more to go.

We've gotten a lot of rain the past couple of weeks and these are fun little weeds that have popped up all over the desert. I love the little yellow round blooms.

Our first night of Spring Break we swapped kids. We got Piper and Whit took Oliver.

These two are pretty sweet friends.

The had fun collecting rocks and examining them together.

We took a beautiful walk to the park. The weather has been amazing!

Jack looking adorable in these goggles.

Peter got a legit bonk playing outside. You can see the dent from where he actually hit. 

Found this stinker sitting in the garden bed. He's already pulled out TWO of the tomato plants out there. 

Molly and I went for a walk. She LOVES to stand in this awful teapot. It was "art" that the city provided years ago. It's just awful.

Looking cute in Dad's glasses.

Also stinking cute!

I took Molly on a scooter ride and Jack on a stroll in the stroller....

While Tim took the big boys on a hike. So proud of both boys for making it to the TOP!!

Just making the biggest mess with yogurt!

Donuts at Grandmas. This was the last day we went inside her house before Tim went back to work after a few days off and we decided that we probably shouldn't go into her house in case we've got bad germs. We're all pretty sad about it.

A delicious lunch that I've been having pretty often. Avocado, tomato's, fresh mozzarella cheese, olive oil, vinegar glaze from Trader Joe's and Everything but the Bagel seasoning from Costco. 

SO GOOD!!

This is what Tim wore his first day seeing patients after everything hit the fan.

Jack likes to climb up to play the piano. He also climbs up on to the keys and play with the lamp. What are the chances that lamp is not going to break?!?

Jack also gets himself into sticky situations like this. He got himself stuff under the stool and had no idea how to get himself out. 

Last week we hiked the treasure loop trail out in the Superstition Mountains. 

It was a beautiful hike.

Jack was such a good sport on my back.

Molly fell and hurt her hands and wanted Tim to hold her the rest of the hike. He's so sweet and obliged. 

The desert can be so beautiful!

Sweet hikers!!

Tim and I and our little moochers.

The boys love finding places that would make a great place for forts.

New safety goggles for work. He kinda looks like Jack.

Oliver went for a FIVE mile run with Tim. So impressive!!

We wrote happy messages and pictures in sidewalk chalk for the passerbyers to enjoy.

There have been some of the best memes that make me laugh pretty hard.

Oliver has been making some great stop motion movies that are so fun!

The kids started doing "school work" yesterday and today. So far so good.

They get to do educational screens which they love. Oliver started working on a typing course which I think will be really great for him.

This is how I found Jack at one point yesterday. Do you see how far off the edge of the table he is hanging?!?!

Yesterday we went for a walk to the park and Oliver climbed all the way up to the top of the tree. I think this should make me more nervous than it does. 

Molly wanted to climb the tree too! She settled for sitting on the branch. 

Dinner without dad (I grilled which always makes me so proud of myself). Look at cute Jack peaking out from behind me. Dinner without dad almost every night this week. Heaven help us!

Jack post dinner and dessert. Bath is a must after most meals.

Tim sends me lots of stuff about COVID so I've got lots of graphs showing up in my photos. 

Jack came out of Oliver and Peter's room making this face while holding this light saber. How funny is that?? He knew exactly what he was doing. 

Day two of "homeschool" we do a 30 minute reading time in the morning which is golden! The kids have been such good sports.

Today Peter read to Molly and then Molly "read" to Peter.

Jack's "Cheese" is just the best!!