Hi everyone!
I was actually told by my own children that I need to sit down and blog. Because the norovirus (terrible stomach flu) visited our house in the past two weeks (more on that in a minute), I shared this post with the older three girls and we all had a big laugh looking back on those times. After reading they starting blog-hopping around all my old posts and reminiscing with stories about themselves when they were little. When they visited the blog home page and noticed it had been two months since I had posted, they recommended I get back to work. So... here I am!!!
Side note: it is pretty cool to me that they enjoy reading my old posts. Of course as a blogging Mama you worry about your kiddo's privacy and have to put filters on some of the things you might say. As they have gotten older I ask their permission more and more before sharing information or pictures. So far they have been fine with it. Phew!
So yeah... in the three weeks before April vacation, I ended up taking two sick days-- once for a stomach flu, and another for a really bad cold. I told M that we reminded me of that gif you always see about making it to the weekend, only we were trying to make it to April break.
M avoided the stomach virus when I had it, but he did get the bad cold. He decided not to take a sick day when he had the cold, but he pushed through that week, and... well, guess what hit him on Friday night just as we were leaving for Good Friday mass? You guessed it-- the stomach bug. He barely made it through the last hymn and bolted outside. He managed to wait until we were about a half mile from our house but I did finally have to pull over. After he was feeling better we made many jokes about fertilizing our neighbors' mulch bed. Mysteriously, when I took the girls out the next morning to go to our town-wide Easter egg hunt, the barf had been washed away (most likely by the previous night's rain). After that many Easter jokes were made such as being "washed whiter than snow" and "why do you look for the barf among the mulch?" Super glad we can laugh about these traumatic events afterwards. It's certainly no fun in the moment!
Here are some shots from the egg hunt!
If you've seen the movie Donnie Darko then you're completely creeped out by the image above, as I was.
I just took the two younger girls because the older girls are now too old for egg hunts, apparently (10 and under only!). N and L were fine with staying home, and we saw a lot of the little girls' friends from school so it worked out well. As per usual with these types of things it was a mad dash and all the eggs had been found within about 30 seconds. I was happy that our girls got a few-- enough that they weren't disappointed, anyhow.
The rest of the weekend was pretty low-key, since we decided it wouldn't be wise to have family over to our norovirus palace. In the end it was just us. I sang the Easter Vigil Saturday night:
Although I was without M it was still nice to be with my other singing friends, in person for Holy Week for the first time since 2019! It was a lovely night.
When I got home at about 10:15 N was still awake and informed me that M had passed out around 7 PM, and that the girls had dyed the Easter eggs and put themselves to bed. I wasn't surprised that M went to sleep early; poor guy had been up sick almost the entire night before.
I was pretty keyed up from all the fun singing so I had enough energy to prep our cinnamon rolls for the next morning:
Then I fixed myself a snack and watched a little TV!
The Easter Bunny visited and filled the baskets!
I went to sleep a little after midnight.
The next morning we enjoyed watching the girls open Easter baskets, eating cinnamon rolls, and completing the egg hunt that we had planned to do with our little cousin. It was still fun just us-- the big girls were the hiders, and the little girls were the hunters.
I managed to get together enough energy to make our brunch food that we had planned to have with family-- eggs, sausage, toast and fruit. We feasted and then we watched some TV and napped. Then I showered and it was off to church for one more mass to sing.
Bundled up to go sing, in sweater, wool skirt, and boots. It was not a warm Easter day!!
Easter Monday my car needed to be worked on, so M went with me to drop it off. We spent the rest of the day hiking and taking more naps. It took a few days for M to fully recover from the stomach virus, as I suspected would happen. Norovirus is no joke.
We discovered a quartz boulder near our house which I had seen on maps but we had never managed to locate. It was so cool!!!
Tuesday M had to work, so the girls and I spent the day at home catching up on chores, and I taught a few lessons on Zoom. The girls were busy getting a home ready for... drumroll please... our new bunny!!! We had an appointment Tuesday evening at the Bunny Rescue Shelter to select the newest member of our family.
Just to back up a little, the girls have been asking to get a bunny for years. Up until now it just hasn't been the right time with moves and housing situations and life busyness. But the girls are getting so big and responsible now we figured this was something they were ready to handle themselves. We actually offered the bunny as sort of a consolation prize-- earlier this year all three bigger girls got devices of their own (N and L now have phones and as a result C inherited their old iPad) and managing screen time has been a new parenting challenge. When we announced that further screen time rules would soon be implemented, we also announced that we would be getting a bunny to keep them busy and keep them off their screens. They were more than okay with that. 😉
On Tuesday evening when M got home from work we visited the shelter.
The girls got to meet and pet several bunnies. It was actually a very tough choice; there were so many lovable bunnies available to adpot! In the end a sweet and playful little boy called Jem was the winner.
We brought him home Tuesday night and he has been an absolute delight! I am not really an animal person but this little charmer has won even me over in a way I did not expect. He is just the right mixture of playful and gentle to make a great first pet for the girls.
So my car actually ended up staying in the shop from Monday until today (Thursday) because they had trouble getting the part they needed to fix it (you know, 2022 and supply chain issues are best friends). So we haven't been able to go anywhere this week. It has made for a less eventful vacation than we anticipated, I think, but our "babymoon" with Jem has been pretty sweet and special.
We have fallen into a nice rhythm of Jem playtime in the morning, outdoor time and exercise mid-day while Jem naps, and then more playtime in the afternoon, attending our usual dance and gymnastics in the evening when Dad comes home with the car.
Wednesday we attempted to walk to the cafe down the road from our house (about a 1.5 mile walk) only to discover that it was closed... womp womp. Luckily the pizza place nextdoor was open!
Today we took another walk at the wildlife sanctuary (did I mention we can basically pick up the trail into the sanctuary right across the street from our house?), bringing a picnic lunch.
Of course as usually happens I began the vacation week with a big to-do list. A good number of those items have gotten done, but there have also been multiple things that have happened to prevent me from being productive. The car being in the shop all week is one example. Another example is that our district's grading database has been down all week, and so the grading that I brought with me to do while the girls were in their dance classes tonight and last night has not happened.
One big item on my to-do list was rest. It seems I was gently guided to prioritize that item by being prevented from doing almost anything else. Rest and soaking up time with my girls, who are growing up all too quickly these days. We have had lots of laughs this week, lots of slow days, lots of time. And I'm definitely not mad about it. The other things on the list will get done eventually.
I hope that you all are finding rest and peace and joy, dear readers! Until we meet again!
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