A Ton of Fun in 2021: Week 8 Recap

Nope. Not happening. What you ask? Keeping up with this blog. Here it is time to write the Week 9 Recap and I'm just now getting to writing Week 8. Well let me tell you why in bullet point form why I got so behind on these. 

• Snow
• Snow storm
• Blizzard
• Kids had no school
• I had no school
• Ice
• Snow
• Level 3 Snow Emergency 
  
  
  

Ok, I think you get the point. We had snow and then some more this week.  Started off with President's Day on Monday- so NO SCHOOL for my kiddos. Oh, wait for it, you'll see a pattern. I ended up working from home on Monday so I didn't need anyone to stay home with them. 

Started predicting snow on Monday to hit throughout the night and into Tuesday. So much so, I emailed all my classes on Tuesday and moved them remote. Well when I woke up Tuesday morning to my kiddos had NO SCHOOL. I also had an email from the provost encouraging us to cancel classes at ONU as well. Don't have to ask me twice! I have some good pictures and videos of this epic snow.  It was at least 6 feet in some places where it was plowed over on the side and at least 3 feet as you can see from drifting in the front yard. 

 

So Wednesday the snow got plowed off the road enough to send those kiddos back to school. But I still have NO SCHOOL on Wednesdays because I don't teach, so I work from home. I have done this since I started, as the began as dissertation days, but now have morphed to get everything done on Wednesday-day. Olivia decided it was a good day to make cut-out cookies when she got home because guess what?! They're calling for more snow. What could be more appropriate than polar bears! 

Thursday brought more snow as promised, so NO SCHOOL again for my kiddos. But because we are out of calamity days at Elida, my kiddos needed to do work remotely. Flashbacks to COVID spring started to emerge. Olivia might have even mentioned the need to bring up the chalkboard. No thank you. Yet, today was our mental health day at ONU...so NO SCHOOL for mommy! So guess what, now I had a day off to teach my own kiddos.  Nice how that worked out hey?! So I decided since the snow was beautiful today to do something I have wanted to do for years. Get my wedding dress out of the box, let it be way too big on Olivia, dress her up like a princess and take pictures. Here were some of my favorites.  

Now, while we are all dressed up, I tell Isaac I want to get him in on the action. So in their winter coats, scarfs and hats, we attempted to take some outdoor snow pictures. Now I don't want to waste your time reading for hours of how we had to do this twice because Isaac couldn't keep his eyes open. No seriously.  I'm going to post a tiny fraction of this child and his eye debacle. I tried everything and after the second time of trying to capture just one picture, I finally threw in the towel and said we're done. 

Another fun thing we did on Thursday is pick up the Dorsey kiddos and drag them along with us to the reservoir to sled.  Well because I forgot that Jeremy had our sleds in the back of his truck, it's a good thing that their friends were willing to come along and share their sleds. We only stayed for about an hour, but it was so cold that I think that was enough time to not feel their fingers and toes, thus time to head home. 

Friday---alleluia everyone went to school. Yep, I went to ONU and kids went back too.  Refreshing.  

Saturday brought about our last home swim meet before championships.  Isaac did pretty well but didn't understand how he could get last in the fast heat and still place in the top three.  Because they combine age categories, he was doing great and winning his age category, but losing to teammates older than him.  I love this picture of him talking to Jerm about his swims.  It melts my heart that my kiddos love sports as much as Jerm and I did. It's fun to watch them care so deeply about the team and their events. 

 

PS- I can drive myself MAD with the picture placement in this blog. It sucks.  No the program truly sucks and doesn't allow them to be nice. I really need to find a new blogging platform! 

A Ton of Fun in 2021: Week 7 Recap

 LOVE is in the air...

This is Valentine's Day Week! I have lots of loves who I got to see on the perfect week of love. We hit the ground running with my favorite dessert love. The best part is you can make it in the Instapot. Yes, I bought the 7 in. spring pan JUST for this dessert. It's delicious. I'm pretty sure I ate the entire thing myself with little help. No one else around here really likes to eat it. Too bad for them. Here is the recipe if you want to try it out for yourself! 

Siblings. I LOVE these two monkeys. They love each other two, but I find them arguing a lot. I came into the bedroom to find Isaac saying "mom!" not to get her off, just to prove that she was trying to fight with him before he retaliated and had her crying.  When he gets fed up with her and fights back, it eventually leads to her coming to me crying saying Isaac hurt her.

My next LOVE...one of my college roommates, bff's, and cruising buddy- Stephy.  As a polar bear alum, she was able to share her love with her students and now some of those students are getting ready to chose a college. Because she had one of those students who has a mom who was also a polar bear, Steph got to come back to her old stomping grounds. It was fantastic to reminisce and show her around the new business school (since Huber is where we took classes). 

And then these two loves. The only niece and nephew I have on my side. Adorable right?! So when you come to my house and want ice cream for a snack or for breakfast, who am I to say no?! They arrived earlier than when my own kiddos got off the bus, so we headed down to the basement/toy room to entertain. Hunter is totally into organizing (if I didn't know better, I'd think he was mine right?) so when he asked if we could clean up and organize I jumped on it. Now he thought we could finish before Isaac and Olivia got home, but I knew better. The pic of the art cart is just a small example of how much he helped. We organized the pens by color and the crayons too. Everything had it's place. It was beautiful. I asked him several times if he needed a break and wanted to go play for a while.  He said no....seriously, did God send me an angel or what?! He stuck it out for around 4.5 hours. What? We threw out 3 bags of trash and had a pile to go to Goodwill, but OMG where has he been all summer!  This was a pandemic project that never got finished. It took Hunter coming to make it happen. Thanks buddy!

The girls did a lot of things together. Secretly I think Olivia loved having a little girl around, although she'd never admit it. They had a spa day in the jet tub and made a fort in Olivia's bedroom. Another thing we did is break into the April box from last year's "year of experiences" board (thanks pandemic for ruining that!) and pulled out the glow golf tickets.  We have a cool place right inside the mall so decided to let the kiddos go have some Lima fun. Since the cousins live in a big city where everything is at their fingertips, wanted to be sure they didn't get bored. Well, since it only lasted about 20 minutes tops...not sure it was loads of fun, but definitely entertaining for a bit. 

Then Sunday was Valentines Day. Started off the day with church and then headed to lunch with maw and paw at Banditos. Jeremy and I are still exchanging the same card since 2005 Valentine's Day.  It's honestly the best idea ever and so much fun to read back through the last 16 years-worth of notes to each other. Jerm and I got Isaac a snoopy mug for his hot chocolate and a little car and Olivia got a water bottle for all her activities and a stuffed puppy because she's been begging for real one and that's 100% not happening.  LOL.  Stuffed one will have to do for now.  

We ended the day with skate party at Edgewood.  Our church sponsors family skate night.  Olivia couldn't go because she had dance and Jerm had school work to finish up, so I volunteered to take Issac.  I love roller skating. I'm just afraid I might break something now.  But I went and had so much fun. 

A Ton of Fun in 2021: Week 6 Recap

 Let it SNOW!

Oh my goodness. February came in dumping snow and ice and more snow. This week my kids stayed home more than the went to school. Monday- went to college 🤓snow day! Tuesday- virtually went to school online while the Elida teachers got vaccinations. Wednesday went to school!  Thursday- Olivia went to school all day, Isaac had me pick him up at 1:30 with a belly ache.  Friday- snow day! What is a momma to do when you are trying to teach in person at the university but have a two-hour delay (then cancelled) on all these days?! Well, Monday they had to come with me. I don't teach and had already lined up maw (thankfully she lives close!) to watch them on Tuesday when I teach all day. They bring stuff to do- Isaac watched 5 hours worth of cartoons.  Olivia plays teacher and helped me grade a few papers that had one particular answer so she could while I was answering emails, using the scanner and sitting on Zoom calls from my office. I treated them to their favorite lunch on the way in exchange for good behavior! 

Tuesday they went to Maws and did homework online. Speaking of which, here's a picture I've never been able to take before and couldn't be prouder-thus refrigerator-worthy! Both kiddos made the honor roll.  For Olivia this is regular...but for Isaac it's monumental. He's obsessed with checking his grades online nightly now.  He was over the moon that he got all A's and one B and so were his parents.  These will remain on the fridge until the next report card-which Isaac reminds us daily is March 9. LOL

Wednesday is my work-from-home day.  I typically also do my grocery shopping on Wednesday and those who know me best, know I love me a list and shopping at Ruler or Aldi.  This week found me at Aldi.  Here's my cart bagged up. Four heaping bags will get us at least a good two weeks worth of planned out meals.  And the best part?  This cart-load of groceries was around $100. Yep. Aldi always cost a bit more than Ruler, but I also buy at lot more produce because I like Aldi's better than Ruler. There are always about three things (cheese pizza rolls for kids lunches, spaghetti o's, and Breyer's Lactose Free ice cream or Toft's ice cream) that are very specific I have to go get at Meijer afterward. Other than that, I can save a ton of money by sticking to the planned out meal list and shopping at my favorites. 

Thursday shortly before my noon class I got a call from Elida schools to say Isaac wasn't feeling well and asking me to pick him up.  Nurse Lauren was awesome enough to hang out with him for 1.5 hours because I had a test in my noon class and it still takes me about 35 minutes to drive from ONU back to Elida. I think it was something little man ate because he looked white as a ghost and said he had a tummy ache, but no temperature. He came home and I made him lay on the couch and watch HGTV 🤣 Sorry buddy, you don't get to come home and watch cartoons or you'd want to come home everyday! 

Friday it poured down snow in the early morning hours and school was cancelled. Because I don't teach on Fridays, I just sat up shop at the end of our kitchen table and told the kids to do their homework online and have me check it before submitting. Highlight of the day was Isaac asking if H-E-L-L was a bad word from the other room.  Me confused said yeah, why do you ask? He said it was on his homework 😳Yikes! I put it on FB initially (check out the screenshot) and within 45 minutes the poor teacher was calling me apologizing. I took down the FB post (no intensions to get her in trouble!), but it did give us a good chuckle for the day. 

Saturday= Swim Meets. Again the kids did a great job. Here are screenshots of their times. Isaac swam similar times as before. Olivia continued to take time off of her events. As the season is starting to peek, the first weekend in March will be the championships at BG.  Both kids have qualified and are excited to head north for the big event

These last pictures are just some fun ones. Jeremy continues to work on his PhD, so here's a picture of where we find him working on his classes.  Olivia was being a kid and decided to take the Jenga pieces and make dominoes throughout the dining room. All-in-all a pretty busy indoor week! ❄️