Back to School

Last Wednesday was the first day of school for the boys. They went on Wednesday and then were home the rest of the week. It was a strange day to say the least. Zane is being driven to school by Rowan's first grade teacher, who lives in our neighborhood and now teaches fourth grade. His school starts at seven thirty in the morning so he was up early and gone by seven. This meant that Rowan, Thatcher, and I had almost two hours to hang around the house before taking Rowan to school. One of our compromises with letting the kids go back to in person school was that we would try to not have them ride the bus which means I'm doing car line drop off and pick up for the first time since Zane started school.

Here I am at six thirty in the morning, covered in boys, terrified to send these kids out into this crazy world, questioning all the decision.

First day of Fourth Grade, in the middle of a global pandemic, in a brand new school. Just a normal first day.

So we have a plethora of masks that we've bought from various places which means every morning the boys get to pick a mask to wear and then pack at least two backups in case their mask gets wet, lost, or they just get bored with it. I don't know. They have lanyards of different colors that they get to choose from as well, which helps them not have to keep track of them when they take them off. It's a weird world, but they have enjoyed having masks for different moods. I assume we will lose a lot along the way. When they get home the mask and their clothes all go in the wash when they walk in the door.

Here is Rowan, two hours before it was time to leave for second grade. He was much more nervous than his brother, which goes without saying. He opted for the pizza mask for day one.

See these eyes, these are his sad, scared, brave eyes. Rowan had a brave face on all morning, right up until we were in the car line waiting for drop off, that's when he fell apart. "I miss Zane. I can't do this without Zane mom. He knows everyone. He's friends with everyone. I don't know anyone. I'm not friends with anyone." I had a quick five minutes to try to reassure him that he did not have to be Zane. He didn't have to know everyone, he didn't have to be friends with everyone. He didn't have to chat up every teacher and have everyone know his name. He could just have a few friends and just know the teachers whose class he was in. He didn't in fact have to be Zane he could just be himself and he was awesome and brave and would do amazing.

After we got Rowan off to school T and I went to get donuts, a yearly first day of school tradition for us. T was sad that his brothers were gone but got over it quickly.

Zane's teacher sent me this picture mid day which I wasn't sure was a great sign. He doesn't look too thrilled, but he claimed to have a good first day.

After T's finger injury he forgot how to hold a pen so we've been working on relearning this skill while we work on learning our letters and numbers. That little finger doesn't like to bend to much, but it's been getting better over the last few weeks.

The teacher that is going to be bringing Zane home most days had to stay late on the first day of school so I had to go brave the car line on the first day of school. It was complete and utter insanity. I got there at the time school was supposedly being let out. The line didn't begin moving for twenty minutes, then it was another twenty or thirty minutes till I actually had Zane in my car. The car line at the new school has a round about built into it. If I had to do this every day I would legit lose my mind and eventually just cave and put him on the bus, germs be damned.

After the round about I finally made it to the front of the school. As I pulled up there was a see of fourth and fifth grade children, arms length apart, masks on, in a hundred degree heat. It looked like a scene from a post apocalyptic movie. I burst into tears at the reality life that our poor children are having to live through. How can this be real life? 

Zane's school got out at two twenty and we were on the road by three fifteen and headed to Rowan's school to get him. I spent hours in the car line that day. Things have gotten better, but day one was rough.

Here is Rowan after his first day of school. He was drained. He had a good day and was happy to see his friend, but it was just a lot to deal with. 

Usually the first day of school is all excitement and then the following day you get up and do it again trying to fall into some sort of routine. Wednesday night I found myself planning the next day, what time to leave, how to make things go smoother, only to remember that they weren't going back to school until Monday. It was a very strange, anticlimactic feeling having just one day at school followed by being back at home. 

Thursday and Friday of last week were technically virtual school days but neither boy really had any assignments beyond trying to figure out how to use the website that virtual learning would be taking place on. They had some videos to watch but that was all. For a month we'd been working towards August 19th, the first day of school. School starting was this magical date we just had to make it to then things would seem normal again. Then we made it to that day and nothing really changed. We were still home, bored, trying to find things to do. It was just more of the same and everyone was very frustrated.

Zane's working on typing skills since most of his work will need to be typed and turned.

Rowan did have an art assignment to make a creation that represented art to him. This was his creation and he even put on his Mizzou jersey for his Mizzou Alumni art teacher who he so dearly misses.

We once again came to blows over technology at the end of the week leading to another technology detox. I don't know why we can't find a happy medium where we can watch some technology without it being the soul focus of everyone's life, but it just doesn't seem to work that way. So over the weekend we were technology free and that's when the most creative, most fun, most unique things seems to happen. Last weekends project was a robotic bug track. Mom had ordered us replacement robotic bugs for the Bugs in the Kitchen game. They came as a pack of five, perfect for racing. Zach, being Zach, designed an intricate, complex bug track, complete with ramps, tunnels, and spots for a crowds. Zane added sponsors from whatever food we happened to have in the pantry, most of which isn't brandname.

Yep, there is a baseball game taking place in the middle of the track.

It was loads of fun and we've raced bugs everyday since. Who would have thunk it?

I worked and Zach managed the in person school drop off and pick ups. When I texted to see how things went Zach said they both had a good day and said everything was fine. When I got home at eight o'clock a flood of feelings and emotions came flooding at me from all the children. Rowan feel into a puddle of tears about all sorts of random things, ending in he missed Zane and he was sad that he couldn't go to school five days a week. It took us a while to get to that point. First he had to go through every sadness that he'd witnessed from any and all his classmates. The poor child feels all the things, of all the people, so very deeply. That's currently a lot to handle. It took a solid hour to get everyone's hug sacks full and all their feelings sorted out so we could go to bed. The managing the emotions alone is a full time, exhausting job, to say nothing for all the at home schooling things we have to manage now as well. 

Tuesday I home with T while the boys went to school. Nap time when they are at school feels purely magical. I have tried to nap both days I've been home and they've been at school, but can't fall asleep because I'm just too excited for the silence. Tuesday I went through pictures in full silence. Silence and stillness is what I miss the most. The calm of those two hours, alone, in my house has to fill me up for the rest of the week of craziness. I will never take this time for granted again. It's a pure joy to have days with just T and it's unbelievable to have two hours of silence. 

Batman and I braving the car line. Also I randomly where bandannas like this now because there are no rules and it keeps my hair out of my face.

Wednesday was our first real attempt at a virtual school day at home, with a set schedule we had agreed upon over the weekend. As per our routine we had planned to start with our normal exercise time. We had a bike ride planned but Zane immediately rode his bike into a trash can, just like in all the comedy movies. It was hysterical, but he was legitimately hurt. He was bleeding from his hands and legs and had this giant bruise, so exercise time was cancelled. The day went down hill from there. 

There were a lot of technical issues, there were a lot of 

Last Day of Summer 2020

 I cannot begin to describe the amount of heartache and stress that went into trying to decide what the right decision for this school year would be. The literal sleepless nights, racking my brain, trying to weigh out the emotional and educational needs of my children with our family's physical safety during a completely uncertain time. There was no good answer. There was no right answer. It is the night before school starts and I am still in no way sure I've made the right decision. As it stands they are going to school Monday and Tuesday and will virtual learning Wednesday through Friday. I am also confident that if it was the night before starting a semester of fully virtual schooling I would feel the exact same way, not sure that I had made the right decision. The situation is completely impossible, but here we go. 

Yesterday Zane and I went to meet his teacher at the brand new fourth and fifth grade center. I cannot begin to explain just how huge and stunningly gorgeous this new building is. This was thrilling and absolutely heartbreaking all at the same time. It's a giant school, with four big wings, two for fourth and two for fifth grade. Each wing has sixteen classrooms, with four teachers working as a pod/team.  Each wing has a big central lobby and it's own library. The building is probably easily four to five time the size of my high school. It's a gorgeous, huge building with all the bells and whistles, most of which they will be unable to use. The halls should be crowded with excited students, but instead they will be mostly empty, students smiling faces covered with masks, and everyone worried they may get to close to their friends that they really just want to hug. 

Zane was excited to see the new building and meet his new teacher. His teacher is Mrs. Reece. She seemed completely lovely. She is a brand new teacher who just moved here from Kansas after getting married last month. She is twenty eight years old which means she will have no issues figuring out the virtual learning platforms. She is excited to be there and cannot wait to get started in her new career she worked so hard towards. I cannot imagine this being your first year teaching, but I think she'll do great. Zane was ecstatic to find out that his best friend somehow managed to end up in his class. Zane also found it quite comical that he has a solid two inches and probably ten pounds on his new teacher. This years theme at their school is National Parks and his class, or maybe pod, is the Redwoods so he's spent today learning all about the Redwoods. This is all right up his ally. 

I was able to take Zane to lunch, just him and I, after we met his teacher. The whole morning he was nothing but completely positive and excited about everything. I asked him if he was worried about anything and that it would be ok if he was scared about starting school. He then admitted that he was nervous and that most of what he was saying was a lie, but that he was just trying to have a positive attitude. He reminded me that we have to face our fear and that we can do hard things. Needless to say I was a bit of a crying mess. I don't know how he has become so grown up. Zane's life journey hasn't been easy and it has made him strong, wise, and braver than I am. I'm in awe of his optimism. He was one hundred percent born this way. Zane is always excited about everything. His default emotion is happiness, optimism, and energy. It's a gift that I don't have, but that he was thoroughly blessed with. His bar for pain and hard things is set extremely high. This will serve him well and I pray the world doesn't break this sweet spirit.

Yesterday afternoon my house was full of emotion. The boys fought and argued and fell apart over stupid things. I am well aware the reasons they were falling apart were not because we couldn't mail the letter Zane wanted to or because they had to do the dishes. I know tensions are high and I can't imagine their stress level, heading into a school year where they have no idea what their days will look like. 

Today was Rowan's turn to go meet his teacher. His teacher had actually called to introduce herself yesterday, which is a much better way to do things. This by passed the herds of people trying to find their child's name on tiny lists on a wall. We had a set time to come meet her so the hallways were basically empty. I was teary eyed as we walk through the school, seeing all our beloved teachers. We wanted to scoop them all up in big huge hugs, after months of missing them, but we couldn't. Zane desperately wanted to go so he could see all his favorite teachers, but that was strictly prohibited. Everyone sent him his love and we all held back tears. Rowan's teacher is Mrs. Hanneman, who I've met before and hear wonderful things about her. I told her that Rowan is my anxious little empathetic little feeler. He feels all things for all people, God love him. She said she was the exact same way so hopefully they get along well. 

It was a sad only having one boy at Prairie Vale now. For the rest of the grade school journey they all three will be in separate schools. Zane cast a huge shadow, so everyone knows Rowan as Zane's brother. But Rowan is his own little amazing person. I'm happy for him to get to step out of Zane's shadow and have little personality stand all on it's own. 

I also got to take Rowan to lunch afterwards. Thanks to my mother for graciously staying with the other boys so I could have this time alone with them before the school year starts. Rowan, unlike his brother, has a default emotional setting of worry, sadness, anxiety, and worst case scenarios. This is more familiar to me than full out optimism, but still somewhat foreign. I've learned so much about this little man over the past year which hopefully helps me parent him better. I learned that he needs all the hugs and all the reassuring. I know that he is absolutely terrified of messing up or doing something wrong because in his mind that means he's not a good person. This is all extremely familiar to me because this was my father's personality.

So Rowan needed to sit beside me at the restaurant for the whole lunch. He needed to be hugged and patted pretty much the entire time we weren't eating. He had lots of questions and concerns and we addressed them all. He said he is scared to talk to new people because what if they are mean or don't like him. We talked through it. He's worried people won't wear their masks, he's scared there won't be recess, he's worried about where they will eat, what they will learn, and on and on and on. The laundry list of fears that is running through all of our heads Rowan put into words. Sadly, I have no answers to any of these questions. No way to reassure this sweet boy, because we just don't know what is going to happen.

This is what reading time dissolved into today. Rowan is excited to start school, but just can't get past how much he's going to miss me for the eight hours he's at school. I keep reminding him that I am frequently gone to work for entire days and he does just fine.

This afternoon we had one last baking time with the boys. 

Our usual first day of school tradition is biscuits and gravy for breakfast. Well, this year Zane's school begins at seven thirty so there is no way I'm going to get up and make that in the morning. So biscuits and gravy for dinner it is.

It should be noted that Thatcher is solidly trying to start fights with his brothers so that he won't miss them as much when they are gone. This is taking a page out of my old long distance relationship playbook. So T spent the day hitting, punching, and kicking his brothers. I don't think he remembers days without them here. Five months to a three year old is a long freaking time. 

So here we go! My heart breaks that this is the world we live in. I am terrified. I am excited. I so devastated. But mostly I'm exhausted. The past five months have been excruciating. I so desperately want school to be good. I want my kids to be able to see their friends, to go to art class, and have music. I want them to be taught by professionals. I want them to have some tiny since of normal, even though none of it is normal. I want it all to go well. I want it to work and I want it to be safe. I have no delusions that there is a huge chance that that isn't going to be the case. But I so desperately want it to work. I'm ready for some sort of good news. I'm ready for something to go right, even if going right looks like my kids only going to school for two days. I'm desperate for a win, no matter how small. I pray this isn't the worst decision I've ever made. I pray that this doesn't all end in flames with us all home for the rest of the year. I just don't know if I can face it. Wish us luck and send us all the prayers.

Pandemic Summer 2020

It's been awhile since I documented this particular time in our life. I feel like, even though I'm actively trying to block it out right now, there might come a time when I'd like to look back and remember what life was like during the 2020 pandemic. Maybe that's not going to be true, but just in case that turns out to be true I'm trying to record a snapshot of our life now.

Life here is weird and hard. That pretty much sums it up. When summer started our learning routine pretty much went out the door, but we did keep morning exercise time as part of our morning routine. There is less fighting about it now and it's just what we do, probably ninety percent of the days, when I'm home from work. The "summer" which feels a whole lot like the spring, has come and gone and we've had no grand adventures beyond trips to the lake and our trip to see the giant dinosaurs in July. The boys finally finished out baseball after threatening to not finish the season if their teams didn't enforce actual social distancing guidelines, in turn getting both teams to agree to social distancing.  Baseball has been the one thing that has felts even somewhat normal over the past few months. 

This was Jurassic Quest which is usually housed in the a big arena but due to COVID became a drive through exhibit. This capped off Dinosaur week where we did all things dinosaur at home. It was loads of fun.

Here are the boys masked up ready for practice. 

I didn't get to go to most of the games this season, but did get to see Rowan's last game.

Our days are spent at home so in the morning after workout time I try to force them to spend some time outside before it gets to hot. For some reason this has become a point on contention because they are confident that seventy five degrees with a cool breeze at nine o'clock in the morning is just too hot for there sweet little bodies to handle. Spoiler alert: it is not. Thatcher usually is up for going outside anytime of day, generally in a full super hero costume, no matter how hot it is. He spends his day riding his little tractor around the yard until the battery dies, then he drives up on the porch and knows how to plug it back in and then asks me repeatedly, "is my tractor fully charged," until I give in and let him drive it some more. He will also play catch with any and everyone who asks or wants to. He has practiced quite a bit this summer and has a pretty good little arm on him now.

We have also recently started back going on bike rides occasionally in the morning, braving the Mississippi Kites that are circling and do attack. This does mean that Thatcher will occasionally have to ride past a yard with barking dogs which ends with Thatcher having a full blown screaming panic attach. Needless to say Thatcher has become terrified of barking dogs this summer, especially the mean dog on the other side of the fence, that ate his finger, but somehow still lives over there. That dog is very territorial of the fence and anytime we get anywhere near the fence he barks and Thatcher runs away screaming, because of course he does.  The kid has PTSD but continues to power through all of this. Friday he went to his one month post op appointment and his finger has healed up as nicely and on can hope I think. It looks different but there is a little fingernail and you probably won't be able to tell if you didn't know something had happened once it's fully healed.

Letting his little finger air out before wound care time. He's graduated to maybe just a band-aid but usually his new little finger is just out in the open.

After morning outside time we have started running a few errands here and there. Last week we went to Target for the first time to buy Zane a backpack. I knew they'd be cheaper there than Amazon, but I did end up buying loads of random crap that we did not need so probably ended up spending more money when it was all said and done. Thatcher had forgotten how to sit in a shopping cart, which was comical since we did that literally everyday in the before times. Going out in the world is less stressful in Oklahoma City city limits since there is a mask mandate there, meaning masks are required in all public places. From what I've seen everyone is adhering to that policy. In related news the number of positive cases is finally trending down in OKC, it's almost like there is a cause and effect there somewhere. Over the last few weeks when we are in public it's jarring to seeing someone without a mask because the majority of people are doing the right thing. There was one big noticeable exception at a local farmer's market/coop where no one was masked or distancing and needless to say I won't be returning there.

 

We've had a few little nothing adventures like eating lunch at Sonic, but at the picnic tables. We went and got ice cream this week and ate it outside. We went to the new big park downtown with Able one morning followed by the spice shop. There was no one at the park, since it was eight thirty in the morning. It had rained the night before so it was cool with an almost chilly breeze. That almost felt like a normal morning adventure. We have also started putting a lot of books on hold at the library which is doing contactless curbside pick up now. Last summer we went to the library once a week to walk around and pick out books. We now pull into the parking lot, call inside, and someone brings the books out and puts them in my trunk. It's a really weird world folks.

Rowan has finally made it an entire twelve months without breaking his arm. We're so proud.

Aside from those few adventures are days are spent at home trying to not drive each other completely crazy. This is no small feet. Zane and Rowan both completely adore each other and completely hate each other all at the same time. With this being said I spend most of my time breaking up arguments and trying to keep the peace. The three of them spend hours playing hide and seek everyday. They really would like Grandma to play with them if it all possible. This is an activity that they seem to be able to do without killing each other most of the time so I support it. A few weeks ago Thatcher discovered the joy of playing pirates. Pirates has been an absolute staple at our house for years and watching another little pirate join the crew was just the cutest thing ever.

Here is our little pandemic pirate, wearing his mask because safety first.

Thatcher also recently learned the art of the play kitchen, serving pretend meals, cooking pretend things, taking orders, and delivering them. I'm not sure how he's gotten this far without really knowing how to do this. It's probably because the play kitchen is in the office which is a full dumpster fire at any given time. He also has always mainly served food from his living room food truck, but he has really enjoyed this new found game.

There continues to be a lot of baking going on at our house. Zane did another Nailed It challenge with his neighborhood friend. This time the challenge was a turtle cake. Zane's inspiration was of course Willie the one eyed turtle that we rescued a few months ago and removed a fish hook from his mouth. So yes our turtle cake had a fish hook in it's face. 

The boys also did a watermelon carving Nailed it Challenge. This is either a monster or a shark, either way it looked awesome and they had tons of fun doing it. 

There are lots of cuddles, each boy needing their own mom snuggles at different times during the day. This is T and I watching backyard backing practice/home run derby.

Backyard baseball practice is my favorite. Rowan is working on hitting. His goal is to be able to hit it over the fence in the backyard like Zane, which might be an unattainable goal, but it has definitely motivated him. Zane continues working on his pitching and he's seen great improvement over the past few weeks, after a lot of hard work and patience on Zach's part.

Zane's most recent project has been this little lean to shed on the side of our house. This area previously was the dumping ground for all the random large pieces of trash, branches, or compost that had nowhere else to go. It was much cheaper than buying a new big shed and I think it turned out pretty good. We now can store all the yard and garden equipment, toys, and baseball stuff in there freeing up a lot of space on our porch and in our garage.

There were a few days at the end of July, first week of August, where the highs were only in the mid eighties which lead to some lovely mornings and cool evenings on the porch. I cannot wait for fall under the pergola. 

The boys have taken really well to wearing their masks. Rowan has been wearing his around the house in an attempt to get use to wearing them at school. Thatcher has probably had to wear his the most with his multiple doctor and hospital visits.

Sadly we haven't been able to swim this past month with Thatcher's finger healing, but we did wrap it up a few times and run through the sprinkler. Hopefully we can get back in the pool/lake soon.

This past week there was another piece of breaking news. Zane finally relinquished his tattered, torn apart blanket which has been with him since day one. It went to every doctor's appoint when he was little, it was with him in the hospital for both surgeries and all the ER visits in between. It's wiped countless tears from his blue eyes and was his constant source of comfort. It now is safely housed in my cedar chest, after a teary good bye from Zane and I both. He does still have Mooly who is going strong. 

Day one

Ten years later

Meanwhile this is me at work. I have been able to work, although sometimes doing not your typical RN things. For instance I spent two days sitting outside COVID patient's rooms, dressed like this, watching people put on and take off their PPE. I was making sure everyone was doing that correctly and staying safe, but mainly I was reading my book on my phone. I also was a safety attendant for various types of patient's all of which involves doing exactly nothing all day, but I did get paid. There are a lot of pediatric positive cases both on the medical floor and in the ICUs. There are also a lot of COVID positive mothers who are going into labor early, which means more NICU babies. If you are able to give blood now would be a great time to do that. The supply is dangerously low and they will test you for COVID antibodies so you could potentially give plasma to a COVID patient who is fighting for their life. 

 

So we've made it through the summer, somehow. Next week starts all the back to school things which all seem very strange and scary. Zane has meet the teacher tomorrow and Rowan's is Tuesday. Wednesday they both go to school then will be home doing virtual learning Thursday and Friday. Most weeks they will be at school Monday and Tuesday then home doing virtual Wednesday-Friday, well at least until something changes. I don't know if this was the right decision, but doing fully virtual also didn't feel like the right decision, so who knows. We're going to see how it goes. We have no idea what the virtual aspect of this will look like. I've never logged in to the software, I don't know what the at home schedule will look like, I have no idea how to prepare them for what is going to come next that is extremely hard to accept. We're taking it one day at a time and not looking too far into the future. This historically hasn't been my strong suit, but through pandemic life I am getting better at it. I'm living in each moment and just seeing what life brings next. Wish me luck.