Weekly Review April 17 '20

Well, here we are at the end of the 5th week of "social distancing" / sort of quarantining. I think we're getting a little lazy...I've noticed that we are getting up a little later in the mornings and that Seth isn't getting started on his school work as early as he was before. Part of that is because of spring break, though--we kind of got off our normal schedule for those few days and now we are trying to get back on it.

We are mostly still sticking with our usual daily routine, though--exercise, chores, and school work in the mornings. I sit next to Seth while he's doing his school work and work on projects, check email, read scriptures, etc. In the afternoon, Seth gets a couple of hours of screen time (and I get some peace & quiet!) Before I know it, it's time to make dinner and then we sometimes go on a walk after dinner.

Frank is still working a lot. He was going to take today off because he worked every other day this week for a good part of the day, and also worked 3 hours on Sunday because of an emergency that came up with one of the restaurants in Virginia. But this morning a problem came up with another restaurant (also in Virginia) so he is down there now taking care of that. I am trying to be okay with him having to work so much, but the petty side of me is really annoyed / upset about it. It's hard to be dealing with anxiety over income and feeling like there's nothing we can do about it, and then seeing him work so hard and realizing that's not going to help the situation at all. Besides that, he's also not accumulating paid time off during this time, so he's actually going to have fewer days off than before. However, I keep reminding myself that anything he does to help keep things operating is going to contribute to him hopefully still having a job long term. I hope! Besides that, I think it is better for his mental and emotional health to keep busy, even if he isn't getting paid for it. So I am trying to be content. But it's an uphill battle because I'm a very imperfect person.

We had a nice Easter. We dressed in our Sunday clothes and had our family worship service in the morning and I'm grateful that we did that before the emergency with Frank's work came up. He invited Seth & I to come with him to the restaurant in Virginia, and Seth didn't want to go, but I definitely did. It was super nice to get out of the house, have long uninterrupted conversations with Frank on the way down and back, to see some beautiful countryside, and to see for myself that there is still a big world out there, beyond the 1 or 2 square miles I've been seeing lately. I even got out of the state of Maryland!! We went to Leesburg, which is a really cute little city in the middle of rolling hills covered with ranches and beautiful homes. I tried to get some pictures, but it's hard to get good pictures from a moving vehicle! While Frank was working, I sat in the car and read scriptures and also read the current book chat book, The Enchanted April. (I'm really enjoying the book, by the way. It's sweet, and often laugh out loud funny.) After we got back from Virginia we made and ate our Easter dinner. That evening, I listened to the Tabernacle Choir Messiah concert.

We had a few virtual activities this week. On Tuesday, one of my ministering sisters did a visit with me using Zoom. It was nice to talk to her and I appreciate the effort she's making to stay connected with me. On Wednesday evening I had a virtual RS activity, where we discussed books we are currently reading, childhood favorites, and resources for finding good books to read. I really enjoyed that.  Seth had his weekly Deacon's activity on Thursday evening--they played Mad Libs. They also had a quorum meeting on Sunday, but Seth forgot to tell me about it so it wasn't on the calendar, and then he forgot about it completely, so he missed it. He was pretty upset about that, but they are having another meeting this Sunday.

We've had some nice days, weather-wise, although it's colder right now, with temperatures dropping below freezing the last couple of nights. I'm noticing that the weather is not concerning me too much right now--since I don't have to go anywhere, I don't care a lot if it's colder than normal for a few days (or even weeks). I do crave sunshine, though, so I don't like a lot of cloudy days in a row. Our lawn is continuing to grow and I mowed it again a few days ago (in two shifts, so I could get both the front and back yards mowed).

On Saturday I completed and filed the personal property tax return for the business. It was pretty easy and only took about an hour to do it.

I made a couple of masks earlier this week, so now I have a mask for each of us, plus one extra. In Frederick County, as of yesterday, we are required to wear a mask if we go anywhere like stores, so it's a good thing I got those done. I really should make the rest of the masks I have cut out, since I'm sure someone somewhere could use them. I'm curious how other states compare to Maryland with the number of Covid-19 cases. I really feel like I don't know what's going on anywhere except Maryland. There's a website I can check that is updated daily with information about confirmed cases and deaths and so forth, so I usually check that. Today (just for the historical record) we are up to 11,572 cases in Maryland, which is 788 more than 24 hours ago. Deaths are at 425, up 33 from yesterday. Frederick County has 525 cases (6th highest in the state) and Frederick has 409 of those cases, with 113 of them in our zip code. I know that Maryland has about the same amount of cases as Virginia and DC combined, but that's about all I know (except that there are other places, like New York, that are much worse than Maryland). I keep hearing all these conflicting reports about whether or not shutting things down was really necessary, which makes me crazy. I hope it really is doing some good--what a waste if it's all for nothing. I do feel like the worldwide fast was a good thing, though, and believe that it has and will continue to help.

I decided last week that if I am ever going to have a chance to get caught up on all the Marvel movies before I die, that now is my chance! So we started back at the beginning and watched Iron Man last Friday or Saturday. This week we have watched the Incredible Hulk and Iron Man 2. I think Thor is up next. I've actually seen the Iron Man movies already, but it's been a long time. I had not seen the Incredible Hulk. They're not my favorite kind of movie, but I'm enjoying them and it's nice to do something with Seth & Frank that they both enjoy.

I got to talk to Amy for a while this week which was really nice and I talked with most of my boys too. Both Scott and Tanner needed to replace their cell phones, and I had to help them with that since they're still on our cell phone plan (although they paid for their phones themselves.)

I tried to include a few pictures in this post, but for some reason blogger is not letting me add pictures. I only had a few of Easter dinner, a few of the trip to Leesburg, and a couple of Seth playing Minecraft with his brothers. Maybe I will be able to add them to next week's post.

Other than that, I can't think of anything else to tell you except that my heart has been a lot better this week and in general I'm less stressed although I feel like I'm mostly just trying to ignore how I feel. But to end on a positive note, I think we are actually going to be able to collect some unemployment. Not entirely sure yet, but it's looking that way. Oh, and we got our relief check from the government too so that will be helpful. We certainly have everything we need right now and I'm grateful for that.