It’s been another exciting week over here in quarantine. We started planting our vegetable garden, Alex got a lawn tractor, we went to the BEACH {!!!!!} and we had a wonderful weekend celebrating Mother’s Day.
Early last week we entered into “phase one” of our state’s re-opening. Mostly it opened up some outdoor recreation opportunities with social distancing. Included in this was the re-opening of Lake Wenatchee State Park, a hop, skip and a jump away from our house.
Our family has years of memories of visiting Lake Wenatchee State Park – well before Ben and Hannah were a part of our lives. It is one of my favorite places and I think the kids feel the same.
On Thursday afternoon I packed the kids in the car and we went to the beach at Lake Wenatchee State Park. The weather was perfect for a beach trip.
The kids and I had a really wonderful time. It felt almost normal, amidst the pandemic. Ben is very aware of what’s going on; however, he’s still working on impulse control so he had quite a few reminders to stay away from other people.
Our outing made me hopeful for more weekday and family outings to local state parks and hiking trails this spring and summer. It also made me realize {again} how much I take things for granted. I never expected our favorite state park to be unavailable for us to visit. I assumed it would always be there for us to enjoy.
Late in the week we received the special delivery of our new lawn tractor {also known as a riding lawn mower}! The grassy yard on our property is around a half an acre so it’ll be handy to have a riding lawn mower to speed up the job a bit. I’m not sure who was more excited for the tractor – Ben or Alex!
This week we got stocked up on food again, thanks to a grocery order and Seattle trip for Alex. We’ve been eating all of the veggies this week and what a treat that’s been. I made some really fun salads and found out Ben LOVES farro!
Late in the week we had a Zoom call with the incoming Pre-K and Kindergarten classes, as well as teachers and some administration, at the school Ben will be attending next year. It’s a new school for him and it was really exciting to get to virtually meet the other families.
Our weekend was extra special since it was Mother’s Day.
We’re starting to get our weekends dialed in and realized that one of our first agenda items for weekends is getting Alex some one-on-one time with Ben. It doesn’t seem to matter what they do together but they’ve got to kick of the weekend with some father/son time.
I sure love that because I get some much needed one-on-one time with my Hannah girl.
Ben and I get a lot of solo time while Hannah naps and I sure do get a lot of Hannah time, but it’s different when I’m also paying attention to or keeping an eye on Ben at the same time.
Alex took over cooking on Mother’s Day. I hadn’t realized how much I needed a break but it was such a treat to have someone else prepare all of the food and clean up all of the dishes all day long. I had cooked 189 consecutive meals {aside from snacks} while out here in quarantine.
We started the day out with homemade cinnamon rolls {our Christmas morning tradition}, had eggs Benedict for brunch and Alex’s burgers for dinner. I’ve always known Alex is quite a capable chef, but he really nailed it. Everything was delicious!
I got spoiled with cuddles and kisses and homemade flowers, I enjoyed a solo run followed by a shower {!} and planted a bunch of seeds and some of my vegetable starts in my garden.
We have a mini raised garden bed up on the deck that’s now home to some basil and lettuce starts, in addition to our two pots with other herbs. I carefully planted my green beans, snap peas, some carrots, radishes, green onions and some Nasturtium.
The weather was absolutely perfect. Really I couldn’t imagine better weather this weekend. The kids had a blast playing with the water table and running through the sprinkler. We’re living outside these days.
We finished off Mother’s Day with a little campfire and S’mores. The kids were so excited about the fire and S’mores they just could not sit still in their little camp chairs.
The days are sure blending together, though some stand out quite a bit. This last week and weekend was a standout one.