Tuesday, Day #59 Phase I of Reopening
We request continued prayers for my husband's mother D. She has been sick with COVID-19 for six weeks (now negative, but still sick) and is now out of ICU and recovering at a long-term, acute care facility. She is still on a ventilator with tracheotomy: today she spent much time all smiles sitting up in a chair! The rehabilitation team's next goal is to get her off the ventilator. Praise God!
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| Two-year-old helping with eggs |
Kids were much better attuned to the new summer school routine on Day 2 than yesterday: they
do try hard to keep up with changes I throw at them!
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| Seven-year-old practicing keyboarding at www.typesy.com |
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| Phonics |
The roofers are doing a superior job and are providing interest to our days. Today they placed their radio on the roof adjacent to our chimney, so all day we could sit in our den and listen to the pleasant traditional Mexican music amplified through the bricks, just as if a speaker was in the room!
We peeked into our attic where it looked like outer space due to the nail holes!
Children spent time watching the roofers with interest.
My loving 13-year-old took me out for his Mother's Day gift today, buying me an ice cream cone and giving me gift money for plants at the nursery. We have so much fun looking at plants, looking up information about them, and talking about where we would like to plant them!
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| At the plant nursery with my boy |
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| Photo credit: John Lauer |
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| Photo credit: John Lauer |
Back at home, the children are making a new tree fort . . .
My little boys helped me plant three Japanese holly ferns in the woodland garden.
This is what a healthy, full-grown Japanese holly fern looks like: I am so excited to see these in our woods!
I picked up three
Aquilegia vulgaris 'Double Pleat Blackberry' to plant in front of one of our oak trees. This is what they should look like when full-grown and blooming.
I bought Mondo grass to form an edge for my little mother's garden, which I'm renovated. This is what it will look like full grown and thick.
Bonus Reading for Posterity:
- "It has become clear that a hard lockdown does not protect old and frail people living in care homes—a population the lockdown was designed to protect.3 Neither does it decrease mortality from COVID-19, which is evident when comparing the UK's experience with that of other European countries." (The Lancet: The invisible pandemic.)
- Is it time for a new approach to coronavirus?
- Expert Testimony Before Senate Contradicts Media’s COVID-19 Narrative
- Meanwhile, Los Angeles County is maintaining its lockdown for THREE MORE MONTHS and all 23 of California's state colleges are not opening in the fall. Los Angeles County has experienced about 1,300 deaths out of 34,000 confirmed cases, which is a death rate of 0.04%. Of course, that doesn't count all the unconfirmed cases: right now, antibodies tests are showing that about 11% of the 10,000,000 population has already caught COVID, which would mean the real death rate is 0.001%. (L.A. County could keep stay-at-home orders in place well into summer, depending on conditions.)
What lovely plants and plans for your garden. My idea of gardening is planting trees which usually don't require much care after the first year or two. I have little interest in weeding - so any flowers I plant have little chance of surviving.
ReplyDeleteI have to say I admire your commitment to home-school - I have been trying to home-school my kids with the school closures, and it is insane. The teachers supply lessons, and there are some Zoom and Google meetings, but trying to organize 4 kids ages 6-11 is so hard. We have a small house so the jr high kid, trying to get his full day of work done, has to contend with the kindergartner - who can whip through his work in 2 short work periods, and the 4th grader whose teacher gives a light work load. Add my daughter with special needs into the mix - it is hard to concentrate for more than a 10 minutes at a time. (I also have college and HS kids at home, but they are managing their own work.) And with everyone on different sleep schedules, someone is always eating which makes the littles think it's perpetual snack time. If I had to do this again (Heaven forfend!), I would set up much more defined schedules. (When this started I thought I have to do it for just 3 weeks - I lived in a fantasy world.)
Enjoy your day!
Thank you! We have so many trees on our lot, that I don't let myself plant anymore! I try to plant perennials that are very tough and thrive on neglect, plus they must be shade-tolerant and deer-resistant. I enjoy gardening so much, but my duties keep me very busy so it wouldn't be right of me to set up a garden that required constant maintenance.
DeleteI'm so sorry to hear of your stresses with schooling. Honestly, I don't like to call this reactionary schooling online "homeschooling" because what the school systems are expecting of parents IS "insane," as you say. You're juggling so many meetings online, mostly for children too young to be doing any learning online anyway, and they probably conflict with each other. How are you supposed to keep track of all the assignments? It's a mess. A homeschool would be designed with intention, there absolutely would be a family sleep schedule, a defined schedule or routine, and you would have carefully chosen your curriculum that enabled YOU to teach it. You'd probably be teaching entire subjects in groups (e.g., all kids below high-school doing the same history with you and the same science with you) in order to streamline. Just think of it this way: No sane person would set up a homeschool like what you are having to manage right now. You're probably doing an absolutely heroic job under trying circumstances!