March 2021

 Crazy it's been a year.  One year since we started isolating due to covid 19. So many awful times but I'm taking note of the good times.   Our local school has 2 kids with covid so children will not be returning to in class learning until further notice. 

I'm thankful that Gary and I decided to keep the kids home from school this year.  It has been a huge amount of work for me. More than I can handle some days but so many great memories and new things we have tried. 

My kids have learned to be independent.  They have to be accountable to finish their own work in time. This often means school work on weekends.   They have learned to entertain themselves.  They ask me what crafts I have stored away for them to do as a project. These are great learning opportunities.  We have knitted, sewed, skated, built, painted, felted, walk dog, made picnics, play dice or cards. Mostly cribbage but we like rummy and countdown crazy eight. 

 Here is a picture of the beautiful quilt Emily made.  Her own design and fabric choices and sewing.  I am very proud of her. 

Ashley recently got into fimo. She made tiny clay foods and animals and glued them onto earrings pieces.

This is a lamp Gary made with the girls on Saturday night.  I ordered the lamp wires and pieces online at Lowes for a rainy day. Gary used an upside-down clay flower pot for the base that Ashley painted. 

Now that's its spring, the girls ride there bikes.  Last week they wanted to see how far they got towards Bath. 

Last May I downloaded audible.  We listen to a lot of audio books.  They are a great break from the girls being on the computer all the time.  I get to sew and they paint or sew or draw and we listen.  We just finished the fablehaven series.  It was 5 books. Now we are listening to dragonwatch. Yesterday I made the girls write a short book report on the fablehaven series and I submitted it as work for their virtual school. 

We Bake a lot. We try new things. For holidays we make cards for some members of our church especially ones who live alone.  That is what we are doing tonight because Easter is this weekend.  The girls often get mail back from the people too. Which is exciting. 

We are constantly arguing about chores and the house is a continuous mess.  We all work together and get on each others nerves.  The barn chores are a big part of the day but it is actually really good to work with animals and have a reason to get outside. 

Now we are starting our seeds for spring planting.  It will be a great garden this year. We still have homemade canned salsa and frozen pumpkin and apples and zucchini to cook with.

I hope the girls return to school in September.  I can't do another intense year like this but I'm glad we had this year. We all learned a lot. If I wanted to to summarize my biggest lesson, it is : Do fun life things with your kids and count it as school lessons.