The Spring of Sheltering (let there not be a summer edition)

We had no idea how much time we would be spending in this littlish apartment. Between both of us working from home, home schooling Brock, Alice running around like mad, and trying to make a ton of decisions about the house, it's been enough to make a nightcap into a daycap. But we are healthy, employed and the house is still being built, so we can't (shouldn't) complain about a darn thing. Here is a little slice of daily life inside.

There are a lot of science and projects going on. Here is our dive into structural engineering and snacks. 

 Triangles are great.

Catapult. It works AWESOME.

We are constantly whispering because most of our projects happen during Alice's nap (thank goodness she still takes one).

Brock makes some science.

With no playgrounds open, we turn to broken sidewalks and rubble. I love Chicago!

This is my "work station". It got posted in our employee weekly news. Brock built me a meditative zen temple. 

 One of the projects from Brock's specials, Art, class had him pick a work from the Natural History Museum's online collection and use it as inspiration for his own work. This is his chosen piece and accompanying walrus sculpture. 

 Boccie is our greatest escape. I have been creaming the boys for weeks, but they vanquished me on Sunday.

 Thank you GPOmaha's for the set, it is getting a lot of millage. 

 They may have closed the playgrounds, but we still have grass. A rare Midwestern ostrich sighting. 

 Brock got a tie-dyeing kit for Easter and we went to town one day.

Brock has gym twice a week and we all try to participate if I'm not too busy with chats. Here is yoga day.

Gym another day. I included this not so great video of gyming so you could see our regular interior chaos state during this magical time.

and here is some gyming.

and some dancing for specials dance class. 

 Of course Brock has been doing a ton of school stuff. I print it up and have him do it by hand to work on his penmanship. And quite frankly, the text box typing option I have to hover monitor. The fun part is getting his friends into the shots for turning it in.

Speaking of school, it has been ok. Here is a daily schedule from Brock's teacher. They normally do 

Brock's favorite online learning app which is "Spelling City" during 11-11:30, but they had a treat of watching Matilda for next week. His reading group is the Harry Potter team and they meet on Fridays. The small group online learning with Ms. Manon seems to be the most effective, and I wish we had this more than once a week. They meet everyday, but the kids are very distracted during the lesson and Brock just doesn't engage the same way online that he did in class. We often have to add some additional reading writing and math as he can cruz through a lot of the assignments, which of course requires a little more effort from us. They have this fun interface they use call Flipgrid that Brock likes, here is a clip from a daily question that Ms. Manon asks them. Yesterday it was right up Brock's alley which was what house would the sorting hat put you in at Hogwarts. Brock and I did some research (we had talked about it before without looking anything up) and decided that Brock would be in Ravenclaw. Here he is explaining it. 

To be sure, modesty is a Hufflepuff trait :). Also, we think daddy might be in Slytherin. 

I take the morning shift and Matt locks himself in the bedroom to face the days of the wildest markets in history while I take on reading and writing. Then we have lunch somewhat together and Matt takes the afternoon specials and math portion with Brock. Alice does her best to get a piece of the attention pie whenever she can. 

 We have also made friends with this stump and visit it often. 

I have decided for the joy of the children of the city we will put something fun to step on on our sidewalk block. 

We've been taking a lot of walks and gathering sticks and rocks to make crafts with. Even foraging for food (more on that next)!

This is one of the many pet rocks we've made. They now live in the plants.

Besides that, I've sewn two dresses, and Matt and I have been looking at a LOT of light fixtures. That is a bright side, it has given us more time to shop for house stuff. I'm not sure what we would have done if I would have been opening a show next week and Matt was still going to softball and basketball. Other pluses, Matt has discovered and made this amazing duck recipe that requires juniper berries. This is also great because it requires us to go outside and harvest juniper berries from the neighbors. Other pluses are sleeping in every other day till 7:15, and my girlfriends and I have set up a Tuesday cocktail night that was always difficult to make with kids before we went online. Matt plays poker a couple of days a week with various groups of friends. Dinner happens at 6 when we would like to eat but normally can't because I am commuting home. So, there is some lemonade, and there's no point going into all the lemons. I tell Brock that he should keep a journal, as it will be a "primary resource" when students are writing about COVID19 in history of pandemics class. Non one of our century has experienced anything like this, it has been so strange. The days go so fast because our brains are organizing the many moving pieces of the moment. But the weeks are long. So long. How has it only been six weeks since this began? I need a hair cut. I have a wart on my foot. Matt is afraid the Board of Trade will never open again. But onward we forge into the tepid exhilaration of quarantine. 

This is Brock's amazing spin fun he made. A little hardcore, but pretty much sums it up.