We had a busy week.

I keep thinking about how I can’t relate to so many people in quarantine who are binge watching shows and napping and joining Tik Tok because, why not!? What else have we got to do!?

There are lots of people who are bored out of their minds, but I am not one of them. (Coincidentally, I say the phrase, “You are not allowed to be bored!” 12 times a day.) I still feel busy with all the things I have to do to keep my family fed and my household running. Plus, nowadays it’s a strategical nightmare to find a place to eat Cheetos where I won’t be discovered.

Even though I’m tempted to say this is as busy, or maybe even MORE busy than before, I’ve recently tried to take note of the things I’m not doing.

The hustle that used to put me in a bad mood is totally gone. The packing and loading and loading, the car seats and running back into the house because you forgot one thing — it’s all gone. And it’s nice. I kind of forgot how to get all of my kids ready and out of the house, and I’m ok with that.

We aren’t rushing home to get Anna down for her nap, or having to wake her up to get to the bus stop. (AH, the bus stop! The worst part of my day, I DO NOT MISS YOU!)

No more packing lunches and snacks. (Of course, I am feeding them lunch at home and doling out snacks all day. But still, I used to pack lunches at the end of the day and it’s SO NICE to spend that time sitting on the couch instead.) No more searching for water bottles or library books.

Mostly — no more laying in bed rattling off all the things I need to remember. Thomas has show and tell, David needs to wear his class t-shirt, Mary’s assignment is due. Oh, and I need to order that birthday gift in time for Saturday and wash soccer uniforms so they’ll be clean in time for games.

None of that.

Not that that stuff was bad, but is was busy. 

Like I said at the beginning — we had a busy week. A busy, sunny, fun, messy, at-home week.

If you haven’t heard from your 2-year-old in a while, it might be because she’s feeding the cat a mix of cat food and nutritional yeast in the playroom.

We had two trees taken down this week. My friend called it the most expensive entertainment. Very true. According to the tree people, our tree was uniquely challenging, which meant the workers worked VERY SLOWLY over two days. Want to know what’s NOT entertaining for kids? Slow work in the name of safety.

I bought a bunch of balloons for Thomas’s upcoming birthday. They were the star of the week’s rainy days.

The kids made a big balloon pit in our living room, and we left it set up all week.

When the sun came out, we switched to water balloons.

Before the actual water balloon fight, David had some sort of complicated water balloon organization. All I know is that the kids were running water balloons back and forth from the water table to a bucket. And they didn’t complain once! They just do whatever David says. How can I get that kind of compliance!?

LOOK HOW TIRED THOMAS IS! But he kept running!

 

Anna, too. She did the most laps. She had no idea what was happening, she was just happy to be included.

Finally! THE FIGHT!

(It lasted 30 seconds. Preparation took about 45 minutes.)

If you missed Mary’s first blog post, stop reading this right now and go read her account of us making lemonade.

We made lemonade! I made the typical “ordered 5lbs instead of 5 individual lemons” mistake. Life gave us lemons, you guys. We had no choice but to make lemonade.

I’m not sure I’ve ever made homemade lemonade. It was REALLY good. You can tell by this totally un-staged photos of my kids cheers-ing in the backyard!

The pool is open! Water is juuuuuuuuust above freezing.

Mary learned to ride her bike this week (which is HUGE NEWS that I don’t have pictures of) and this one got swept up in the hub-bub.

She is, obviously, ready to go.

And I saved the best news for last! WE GOT CHICKS! WE GOT CHICKS!

Introducing Chick Hicks, Wonder IV, Rexa, Buttercup, Stripes, and Lollipop.

We are ALL enamored. Every except Anna, who is horrified.