dates

One on one time is pretty high on our priority list. We were on a roll and getting out to do some creative things together—cooking classes, escape rooms, axe throwing etc. However, these current stay at home orders have forced us to change up our date nights once again. We are just getting creative in different ways.

We have done multiple hikes (and snuck in a zip line experience to use a Groupon).

Lost Dutchman state park is gorgeous!!




















Squish the eye kiss.

Another night we went on a ten mile bike ride to pick up dinner. (And ran into these boys of ours out on a bike ride of their own on our way home)

Back when gatherings of fifty were still allowed, we attended a beautiful wedding for Eric’s high school friend.










We have also been trying to be more creative and consistent with mini date nights with our kids (no more than 20-30 min). Round one of dates with each of them was to lay on a blanket in the grass at the park across the street to stargaze. Some really great conversations happened under the stars. The most memorable stargazing experience was with Kacin though when the sprinklers came on and we had to jump up and run out of there before we got soaked. Round 2 dates may have included a car and parking lot...

Eric also had to protect Kyler when he had a date one night. When she came to the door, he answered it with a thermometer in hand, an extra mask, and hand sanitizer to sanitize her down and enforce social distancing measures. She was a good sport about it and we all laughed.

I think one of the most important ingredients to any healthy relationship is play. We need to have time to relax, laugh, talk, and enjoy each other—just have fun together. Play is essential in building strong relationships. 

home church and general conference

It has been over a month since we have met with our ward congregation in a church building to worship and take the sacrament together. This is by far the longest stretch of time in my whole 35 years that I have not set foot in a church building. Sometimes I think I should miss it, and I do, but this unique and special opportunity to truly worship together and partake of the sacred sacrament emblems as one family inside the walls of our own home has been such a beautiful experience that all I feel is gladness for this chance.

Kyler and Kacin prepare the sacrament so reverently each week. Perry and Layla even like to pitch in to put the water in the cups or carry the plate of bread to the piano bench that we use as a table. 

We rotate responsibilities during our sacrament meeting—taking turns as chorister, speaker, or offering the prayers. After our sacrament meeting we have primary/Sunday school with primary songs and a short lesson. One week we told stories using our flannel board. Brinna was so engaged with this activity (sorry we can’t keep clothes on her anymore...).

We just had a very special general conference. It has been 200 years since the First Vision and so we had a unique conference to focus and celebrate the Restoration of the gospel of Jesus Christ. We watched all five sessions together at home. There were some amazing messages and the strongest spirit. We participated in the Hosanna Shout together and listened to the new Proclamation of the Restoration of the Fulness of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. 

My favorite talks off of the top of my head were those given by Sister Jones and Sister Bingham.

The talks aren’t available to read yet, but this is something I tried to write down from the message from Sister Jones. She included a conversation she had with President Nelson and some primary children. This  is skipped around a bit, but you will get the idea of the powerful, simple truth that is taught here.

“ Is it hard to be a prophet? Are you like really busy?

Of course, it’s hard. Everything to do with becoming more like the savior is difficult...

The Lord loves effort. Because effort brings rewards that can’t come without it.

It takes effort, a lot of hard work, a lot of study and there is never an end. That’s good. That’s good. We are always progressing.

We keep practicing. We are always progressing as long as we are striving to always follow the Lord.

Our commitment to progress brings eternal rewards.”

I can not wait until the talks become available to read. I study them so much better when I can see them.

Eric sent me this picture he took from a moment during conference. We had a back rubbing train of sorts going on here. :)

We also took some lovely bike rides between sessions. It has been gorgeous weather.

Kacin also took conference weekend to work on his backflips. He is so close to sticking a standing backflip.

How grateful I am that within the walls of our home we can hold our own church services and feel the spirit, partake of the sacrament, and draw near to our Savior in worship. I am grateful for a living prophet who received the revelation to make the recent changes to Sunday services that has allowed this to be such an easy transition for our family and for his organization of a beautiful general conference.

April fools

Kyler’s idea of a joke was to replace our toilet paper with rolls of duct tape.

Layla’s idea included lots of sweet gifts.

Layla and I brainstormed at lunch and we decided to take an empty Little Ceasars pizza box from our lunch and fill it with a treat instead of pizza. We would leave it on our cousins doorstep and they would be totally tricked when they opened the pizza box!

So that’s what we did. We filled the boxes with donuts from Bosa. On the inside of the box, Layla wrote April Fools!

They ended up dropping one off with cousins and the other one off at a friends house.

Layla’s pranks did not stop there. While I was reading in my room, she told me to come out because she found something. A box of donuts was left on the floor by more door. Then Eric jumped out and scared me. But the real trick was when I opened the box of donuts and there were actually no donuts to be found. It was filled granola bars, candy, and a banana. Tricky!

Layla was on a roll. 

She left a cup for her big brothers and a note that told them to have a nice big drink before bed. When Kyler went to take a drink, oranges fell out of the cup instead of the cool water he was expecting. Fooled!

She had one more trick up her sleeve.

When Kyler and Kacin went to bed, they each found a small gift on their pillows.

Layla wins as the biggest trickster on this April Fools day! 

(I really like the way she thinks about this holiday..:) )

our homeschool rhythm

When we headed home from California after our first week of spring break, we came back to social distancing/quarantine conditions. As soon as word got out that schools might be closed for awhile I got pretty darn excited about the prospect of homeschooling for awhile. And the wheels in my head started spinning and viola! A homeschool plan for 5 kids ages 2 to 16 was born.

(the basic plan with revising notes)

I will start by saying that my kids are used to a homeschool plan every summer and usually during spring and fall breaks as well. (Never this intense, but still). So when I presented a plan to them it really wasn’t a shock. I’m certain they were even expecting it and glad that I came through for them.

We started out homeschool routine before the official spring break was over. Perry thrives off of a schedule, and so do I. And I wanted to give us a few days to ease into it and work out any adjustments to my original plan so the next week we would be ready to go.

So day one we went through the routine all together but kept each activity to 15-20 min. I explained how it would look on the real homeschool days—how much time they would normally have, what the expectations and options would be, etc. Perry joined us for the whole thing and that was a treat to have him there reading, playing games, and drawing with us.

The next two days we tried out the plan for the full day, but stayed really flexible and relaxed about it. I learned it would be best to make a few changes to the time that we started and our afternoon schedule. 

Now we have completed two full weeks of homeschool and we have found our rhythm. Some days the most important lessons we learn are how to resolve conflicts, but an education is an education for life.

Our day looks like this:

8am-8:30am : wake up, eat breakfast, chores

8:30am-9am : Seminary/spiritual (come follow me as a family, personal scripture study, study general conference talks, do seminary assignments, read the Friend magazine, explore the church website/videos)

9am-9:45am : Writing (handwriting, journal, compose letters and emails, language arts lessons, grammar, editing, spelling)

9:45am-10:45am : Outside/PE (exercise, ride bikes, go on walks, jump on the trampoline, sidewalk chalk, collect bugs, etc)

10:45am-11:30am : Math (lesson, worksheets and then play board games with each other)

11:30am-12:15pm : Create (art-drawing, painting, coloring, music-piano, singing, recorders, dancing, building toys-kapla blocks, marble run, magna tiles etc)

12:15pm-1pm : Lunch (eat, clean up kitchen, break)

1pm-2pm : Reading (independent reading, language arts lesson, vocabulary, poetry, read aloud)

2pm-2:30pm : History (history program all together, read aloud, research, history videos on topics we pick from you tube)

2:30pm-3pm : Science (experiments, cooking, games, health)

We stick to the schedule each day, but we stay flexible and try not to stress about it. (Mostly I have to remind myself of this...). The schedule is built to make sure we have enough downtime, academic time, alone, sibling, and family time, fun, productivity, and lots of choice and control over our own goals. It gives us a chance to have valuable experiences that we don’t always get to have with our normally full days of school and sports. It gives me time to meet with individuals while the others are working independently. 

Phones are supposed to be put away during our school day, but I have to keep reminding some people about that. 

Thursday’s are our cleaning day. So lessons and outside time might be cut short and modified because we have a list of extra chores (bathrooms and floors) that we divide up to get done at some point during the day.

Friday afternoons we gather for poetry recitations and storytelling. Eric tries to join us for those, so that’s a bonus.

Perry’s day looks slightly different than the rest of us. At first we had an awesome respite worker here every morning to work one on one with Perry and that was amazing. We have been without him for the last few days and, while we are making it work, we are hoping our respite provider can come back soon. Instead of his day being run by a time schedule, Perry is given a check list of things to do each morning. His list includes something from every subject the rest of us do during the day. However, he has the flexibility to do things in whatever order he wants to and however long it takes him to do it. Usually, he works really hard so that he can be done and have his screen time right after lunch. Or when respite was here and he had total one on one time, he got done even before lunch. When respite isn’t here, we have been dividing up his checklist so each of us takes time to work with him on one thing. Brinna even takes a turn to be Perry’s companion with things like building toys or outside time.

I meet with Layla multiple times a day for mini-lessons. We meet for about 15 minutes each time during writing, math, and reading. History and science are also done together, but history is a family lesson and science is usually just me and Layla, but sometimes the others join in, too. Sometimes Layla is given a specific task for writing or art, but mostly she decides what she wants to do during those times (actually, it is rare that I direct her during create time at all).

(Layla working hard to prepare her poem for the week)

Kyler and Kacin are given a list of assignments from me. But they have the flexibility to do them when they need to, as long as it all gets done at the end of the week. They do stick to our schedule of when we do what for the most part, but some days they change things a bit. I check in with them in the morning and throughout the day just to see if they need help with anything. Usually while I am working on math with Layla one of them is sitting at the table with us so I can help them too as needed. But mostly they are completely independent during the day. We all do history and read aloud together. And then this week we have started having a check-in at the end of the day and so they tell me what they have done during the day and their plan for certain things for the rest of the week. 

Our curriculum comes from multiple sources.

The Good and the Beautiful is our resource for handwriting, language arts, history, and some of the science. (I use some of their free stuff, but I also ordered a couple of things as soon as I knew school would be canceled for a few weeks at least. Luckily, I caught a 15 percent off sale.) I also use a random assortment of books and activities I have from our summer brain quest books and from when I was teaching. We got some papers  and work books from the elementary school teachers so I can pull from that if I want to as well. The older boys get on google classroom to access assignments from their HS teachers. I still give them some assignments from me in language arts and history, but mostly all of the high schoolers assignments come from their teachers. And whenever they have their own goals or projects they can incorporate those. For example, Kyler decided on his own to keep a Covid-19 journal and so he writes in there each day during his writing time.

(When we picked up Layla’s workbooks from her school and saw her teacher)

Little Brinny gets a lot of attention from the six people who surround her and love her the most. She wanders between all of us joining in on the activities, games, art, and toys that she wants to. Sometimes she sits at the table working on her “writing” alongside us. Sometimes she plays on her own or reads her books. She always finds someone to take her on bike rides each day.

I do not get as much time during the day as I used to to get things done, to study, and to rest. Some days that is hard. But Eric is great about taking the kids out in the evenings to give me a little quiet time when I need it. Overall, I love every minute of homeschooling. 

We have found a good rhythm and this homeschool schedule is working well for our family right now. 

social distancing

Have we all become extras in an apocalyptic movie?

Walking through grocery stores these days is so surreal. And pretty eery. The shelves are empty. Shoppers walk around wearing masks and gloves. Over the intercom, a public service announcement comes on reminding us to maintain social distancing (6 feet or two carts) from people. Signs are posted.

We wait in lines to get into Costco because they limit the number of people who can be in the store at one time. And if we don’t get there hours before they open (HOURS), we have no chance to get toilet paper.

Yes, sirree. We are living in a creepy movie. 

We all miss our friends and gathering in small and large groups. And we wonder when (or if...) life will return to “normal.”

We are finding creative ways to interact with each other. Technology is a blessing. We play Jackbox games, Risk, and Minecraft online. We talk with friends (even my toddler!) over zoom, FaceTime, and Marco Polo. We hold medical appointments, foster care licensing appointments, church firesides, YM activities, and seminary classes over zoom. We exercise in classes online. It’s kind of a miracle that even with all this social distancing we can still be social and carry on with so many aspects of our lives.

Air hugs! 

at home during a pandemic

social distance,

they say.

hunkering down at home 

with time 

to

collect bugs

ride our bikes for our hours 

discuss the Cold War

hike the mountains

kayak in our pool

take our baby dolls on walks in their strollers

pop all the popcorn (cheese, peanut butter, and caramel)

play nerts

sit in a mermaid tail blanket watching The Little Mermaid

build realms on Minecraft 

read books on the trampoline 

learn about the history of toilet paper

read scriptures as a family without missing a day

cook homemade dinners

paint all the colors of the rainbow

draw yoda and the hulk

build amazing structures with kapla blocks

play the piano

jump on the trampoline

go fishing 

gaze at the stars

walk through the neighborhood

fly kites

drink chocolate milk

do science experiment after science experiment

.

I know outside these walls 

the world has been shaken up,

Inside these walls,

Are we spoiled?