May 30 - Quarantine Day 74

We started our day with a lost tooth! Callie poked out her top middle tooth while catching her morning show. She was so thrilled! Look at that smile! Look at that hole! 

We working on preparations for a little camping adventure we are planning to take to Wisconsin tomorrow after church tomorrow. We are excited to see Josh and Tori, and enjoy a few days away. 

One of the exciting moments in the day was watching the Space Rocket launch! This is the first launch from US soil in a number of years. We tried to watch it a few days ago, but the weather did not cooperate for the launch. Today was attempt #2 and it was a success! A private company, Space X, along with NASA astronauts made history with this launch. It was fun to tune in and learn! 

Callie’s picture was in the newspaper today along with the rest of her graduating class. What special memories of kindergarten graduation! 

May 29 - Quarantine Day 73

We braided Callie’s hair before bed last night and she woke with the best bed head ever! She loves her wavy hair! Pop and Cade went to do some morning mowing. The grass is growing strong out at the cemetery, and Cade got a new regular, Mr. Walker, that takes some extra work with the jungle of trees. 

Callie, Joel, and Mom we went to Zearing park for a walk around the path. Joel rode his bike down to Zearing while Callie and I drove. Callie then scootered around as Joel biked, and Mom walked with a few friends.. We didn’t catch any frogs or toads today. On the way home, we stopped to find a book at Miss Bridget’s Little Free Library. Cuddly Kittens looks like a fun one. In the afternoon, we made some bird feeders out of orange juice cartons. They turned out fun, but we may need some fresh seed. The seed from the shed we had is a few years old. Hopefully we can get some birds to visit!

Mom started ready The Mystery in the Cupboard after our art project, another book in the Indian in the Cupboard series. Hopefully it will be good! 

May 28 - Quarantine Day 72

Joel headed to the golf course today with Pop to start the day. Callie practiced hitting some balls in the backyard. We have stopped our Bingo cards but are still trying to work on our skills. It is a bit harder for Mom to think of everything throughout the day, and then to remind and motivate the kids to do them. But we continue to try. 

We enjoyed seeing the baby birds fresh out of their eggs. They don’t look very pretty but it sure was fun seeing new life. The momma robin does not like when we peek in on her birds. She squawks and flys at us. 

Joel got a piece of mail in the mailbox today! He was so excited! He sent a number of mail pieces to friends over our quarantine days and has not received anything in return. Getting this card from Ms Vickie was so wonderful. His smile was so big when he opened it! He felt so loved! 

May 27 - Quarantine Day 71

It was Callie’s turn to head to the golf course with Pop! We pulled out her new hat to keep her shaded on the course and slathered her up with some sunscreen. She got a bit of a burn yesterday in the slip n slide! While Callie and Pop were golfing, Cade worked on making some banana cookies! He loves Grandma Bev’s banana cookies and could eat them by the dozen! He wanted to try to make some for himself! We made a double batch and froze some too. I think round one was mighty successful. He even sent a few home with Pop to share with Grandma. Joel enjoyed listening to an audio book this afternoon and playing with his toys. He loves building. His magnets have been a favorite lately. In the evening, Cade and Daddy went to church to play some basketball with some guys - Matt, Mitch, Justin, and Evan. They had a great time together. 

May 26 - Quarantine Day 70

It was time for a new slip n slide! Next year I think we will have to upgrade to some thick plastic so Cade can enjoy it more. This one wasn’t strong enough for Cade’s slide and released from the ground. Instead of getting to enjoy the water, he decided to work on his tan. Sadly the city pool won’t be open this summer. Our water bill will probably see an increase so we can cool off and enjoy some water fun. 

May 25 - Quarantine Day 69

We had an early morning wake up! Callie woke with the sun and was just so excited to get the day started. Mom forgot to have a plan when people woke up so they would not wake others up. So we all awoke and enjoyed some time laying in bed. We had a yummy breakfast of pancakes, sausage, and eggs. We just love the new grill, as it has a griddle with it too. It is so nice! Rain was forecasted to start in the later morning but we wanted to enjoy as much of the outdoors as we could till the drops started falling. Thankfully there wasn’t much to clean up so that didn’t take long. During our morning breakfast time, Dad kept hearing a pheasant “talking”, so we went on a hunt to find it after breakfast. The boys tried to get it to fly up by walking in the tall grass by the ditch but it never did. We know it moved but we are not sure where it went. Callie, Joel, and mom then ventured to the kids fort area in the woods. There were so many beautiful wildflowers to see along the way, so we stopped and enjoyed many of them. The kids’ treed-fort area was still there from last Fall’s camping adventure. The kids named the fort Log-o-Logs because it had a log you had to step over to get into the fort (and because it was a Fortnite term). The kids showed me the different rooms and area in the area. Their imaginations are something wonderful! And we noticed a number of deer enjoyed walking through their home too! 

Did I forget to mention the toads? Toads, toads everywhere! The kids had fun catching them and holding them! 

We pulled out when a few rain drops started to fall. Mom drove home and we went right through a rain storm so it was perfect timing to leave. 

Though the RV feels a bit smaller this year with our children who have grown, we are still filled with thankfulness of having the RV to bring our family great adventures! 

May 24 - Quarantine Day 68 - Part 2

Later in the afternoon, we headed north out of town to the Corner Patch. This is a little piece of timber between a bunch of country crops fields that our friends allowed us to camp on for the night. We were excited to get out and enjoy the outdoors! We invited out the Bullington’s to join us for dinner. We took our new Blackstone grill and grilled burgers, and the kids did some hot dogs in the fire pit. The kids were so excited to play together. It has been sooooo long! They loved playing in the camper, and Cade was so caring with Hudson. The guys played a tag game with the little kids after dinner which made them thirsty and tired, and full of happiness. And of course, we had to have some delicious s’mores together!! Though our party exceeded 10 because of all of our kiddos, this time together was great!

The governor has had to back pedal on many of his statements these last few weeks as people have continued to fight him on his executive stay-at-home order. People want our state to “open”! There have been protests and lots of people contacting state officials to have the governor’s power taken away. His executive orders have become like he is an emperor. So in just five days, there will be some adjustments to the “order”. We are all looking forward to hearing the new “guidelines”. 

May 24 - Quarantine Day 68 - Part 1

Callie enjoyed sitting with Grandma at church today. During singing the windows were down and the sun roof was open, but it was warm enough to have to close the windows at times to get a little air conditioning too. This week at church, Miss Chariss made Children’s bulletins full of activities for the kids to color and draw and play. It was a huge hit and exciting for the kids. Joel and I worked on the word search puzzle together and often when Curtis would say a word in His sermon, it was the word Joel and I were hunting for in the passage of the word search. Joel would smile and laugh. It is not easy for any of us to be in this circumstance, but I am thankful for all of those that are continuing to serve in our church body to make this time useful for the Lord’s growth in our hearts. Because it was so nice out, many got out of their cars to make socially distant hellos and conversation. We didn’t leave church until almost 12:30pm. People are missing each other!

We ate lunch at Pop and Grandma’s after church. The best part of lunch was the dessert!! Joel and Grandma had a special plan up their sleeve and it turned out fabulous .... a banana split dessert! The dessert included had half of an ice cream sandwich, crushed pineapple, half a banana, strawberries and whipped cream. Sooooo yummy!!