Quarantine Day... I don't know anymore

So this morning I woke up at 6, made coffee, got myself breakfast (I'm in the lucky phase of life when my kids are able to get their own breakfasts, with the exception of J), showered, did all the dishes, cleaned all the surfaces in the kitchen, made a loaf of bread in the breadmaker, put all the ingredients for split pea soup in the crockpot, did two loads of laundry, fixed a peg on my daughter's violin and re-strung it... and then realized it was lunch time "already" and how was this precious weekend day going by so fast without me having "done anything"??

I'm still at a loss, even at this late stage of life and motherhood, as to why my inner monologue so often tells me that I'm not accomplishing enough.

For me, the day-to-day tasks of simply running a family of six seem to take up the entire day about 80 percent of the time.  It is only just this week, after over two months of staying home with reduced activities for everyone, that I felt "bored"-- which for me means I have an hour or two to fill without any pressing chores or tasks or even "for-fun" activities that hadn't already been done.

So I know that feeling of constantly being behind just comes from the sheer number of things that need to be done on most days.  Even when I have a really productive day there is plenty that gets left unfinished, and the list is ever-growing.  But you would think I would have gotten used to that feeling by now.  You would think that my inner voice would have learned to give me a little grace.  I have been thinking about that a lot lately, not just with regard to housework but to other things in life as well.  Always on a journey of self-realization, that's me!  I'm a slow learner, I guess.

So, in the spirit of giving myself grace, here I am to visit the blog... setting aside the housecleaning for a moment and bringing my laptop outside with a cup of tea to enjoy the sunshine.

I am SO thankful for temperatures that allow me to NOT wear a winter coat!  Yay!!!

Getting to Friday is, I feel, almost more of a big deal during quarantine than it used to be.  Last Friday we celebrated with a really easy dinner for Mama to make (that was still delicious!) and watching old movies made by me, my brothers and sister, and my cousins back in the late '90s and early 2000's.  Pretty entertaining stuff!

Ooooohhh, Mother's Day weekend was very tasty!

We ordered takeout from a Mexican place nearby, to give me a night off from cooking, and the empanadas and homemade guac tasted soooo good.

Abbott's Frozen Custard... a throwback to visits there growing up in upstate New York!  I'm pretty excited they have opened up a location near us here in MA, and even more excited that they are offering delivery to your door during this pandemic!

When I came back from my long run Sunday morning I was greeted to the sight of this:

Mimosas in the making!

It was an absolutely lovely breakfast.  Can't think of anything better than a long run with a friend followed by breakfast waiting for me, and homemade cards!

Speaking of delicious food, N has been cooking her way through the Harry Potter cookbook and has made us some delicious treats this week!  Pumpkin pasties FTW:

She also made us Hagrid's Sugar Biscuits the other day, which I didn't photograph because they were promptly devoured.

My littlest brother graduated from George Washington University with his master's degree, and our whole family attended the virtual ceremony together!  It was great... very proud of him!

J went into a store with me yesterday and we followed the mandatory face mask order by covering her mouth and nose with a bandana.  I thought she was pretty much the cutest little bandit I ever saw!

(Obviously I try to avoid taking the kids shopping with me but we happened to be all together that day and it was just a quick in-and-out errand.)

The big excitement here this week was a tree removal crew coming to take down a large pine tree between our neighbor's yard and ours.

A big crane + a climbing guy in a harness = hours of entertainment

The girls were very critical of the tree removal guys for smoking, drinking Pepsi, and wearing Trump hats.

I guess you need a lot of sugar and caffeine to get through the day removing trees?

J put herself to sleep for a nap two days in a row this week... just kind of wandered into her room, laid down and passed out.  I was pretty glad for it, because although she would resist me greatly if I ever tried to make her nap, it does improve her mood to get those couple of extra hours here and there.  Sadly she slept through her ballet class this week, but I think it was for the best.  We all enjoy finding her asleep like this, I think... sort of the last little vestige of baby in our house.  *sniff*

Above is a dolphin and turtle animal hospital, inspired by our visit to Marineland as well as the girls' latest obsession with the Dolphin Tale books.  They made the dolphins and turtles out of modeling clay!

The three pictured above would play and play and play together for as long as this quarantine would last, and then still ask for more hours for playing.  They mostly get along really well, with the exception of a few frustrations when J is too destructive or obstinate.  It has been interesting to watch the dynamic changing over the years-- it used to be N and L that would get frustrated with C, but now C has grown into being an equal player, and our big almost-12-year-old N is more frequently wanting to do grown-up things.  I think I have felt for her the most during this quarantine because she's just not in the intense play phase of the younger girls anymore, and so I think she feels a bit isolated.  It has been wonderful for me to "hang out" with N a little more, because she's often interested in just taking walks together or chatting or reading our books out on the deck in the sunshine.  It has been great to talk through this phase of life with her; she admits to feeling a funny mixture of kid and teen within herself.  Being a Mama just gets better and better with these new phases!

I think that's all for today.  I'll be sharing a new meal plan pretty soon, and I'll recap the workouts then too.  Stay tuned!