Opal, My Special Little Lady at 27 Months

This little lady broke her arm falling off of our living room couch this past month.  I knew immediately that something was wrong, as she normally has a very high pain tolerance and recovers from bumps and bruises very fast.  She was shaking in pain, and inconsolable, and fortunately Will was only five minutes from home when it happened.  Unfortunately, it was the event that I had been warning my kids against during COVID, where Will and I have been repeatedly telling them to stop whatever risky behavior they are currently doing so as to avoid a trip to the ER.  I didn't see a fall off of the couch on the danger list.  

We opted to drive to the nearest ER, as we didn't know what was exactly hurting on her arm, and couldn't see buckling her into the five-point harness of her carseat.  So Will held her in the backseat while I drove the few blocks to the hospital.  Who knew that our location so close to the hospital would prove to be so convenient time and time again between injuries and Will's kidney stones over the years.  When we got to the ER, we were told that only one parent could go in with Opal, and so we had to make a decision on the spot - I knew that Will could handle Opal's pain better than I could, but I also knew that my mama heart needed to be with her.  I chose to stay, and Will went back home to the older girls who, since we were on quarantine, were going to be situated with a friend's husband sitting in his car in our driveway in the event that our kids needed anything. Unfortunately, the ER doctor was convinced that Opal had a dislocated elbow, and even after x-rays revealed that her elbow was NOT dislocated, he attempted to pop it back in while squeezing the part of Opal's are that had a double fracture.  This was so traumatic for Opal, that as soon as he let go of her arm, she stopped screaming and fell into a deep sleep on me.  My heart was breaking, and I was so upset with the doctor.  When he came back a few minutes later I told him that he would not be touching her arm again without sedation.  He responded that he spoke with the on-call Orthopedic and was advised to x-ray her entire arm this time, not just her elbow.  I was shocked when I realized that they hadn't taken an x-ray of her entire arm to begin with - her arm is not that big and I just ASSUMED that the x-rays included her entire arm.  The next time the x-ray machine came in, I made sure to look at the x-rays myself and with no medical training what so ever I could see the double fracture in her arm, just below her elbow.  The doctor came back in and humbly apologized to me, for which I am grateful, but I am still trying to forgive myself for not being a better advocate for Opal.  At the end of the day, I just didn't know and I know that all doctors are under so much stress from COVID.  It is what it is, but unfortunately, the rest of our month was spent with a little girl who began to have some major anxieties.

Our nurse told us that it was her first day on the job, and was unable to answer most of our questions. She did do a fine job of wrapping Opal's arm in a soft, temporary cast as we waited for the swelling on Opal's arm to go down and for us to get an appointment with an orthopedic to put a hard cast on her arm in a few days.  Getting a hold of an orthopedic to cast her arm was another nightmare, as during COVID no doctor was taking on new patients.  I'm sorry, but my two year old does not have a chart at an orthopedic!  She is two!  After getting our pediatrician involved, we were able to get an appointment a few days later with an orthopedic who took good care of Opal from there on out.  In the above pictures are Opal relaxing in a chair outside with her soft cast, some curls on the back of Opal's head - it seems like her hair is taking forever to show up! - and finally, the amount of cups and drinks at her spot at the table, because it is impossible to tell the baby of the family "no" under normal circumstances but it is impossible times infinity to tell the baby of the family "no" when she has a little baby cast on her arm!

The physician's assistant that mostly worked with us at the orthopedic was named Luke.  I took this as a very good sign, and the young man even had a head of curly hair, which is how I've always imagined our Luke to look like.  Opal was in good hands with Luke, and I am certain that her brother Luke in heaven arranged the entire thing.  Opal was given the choice of cast colors, and very confidently and insistently said "Pink."  When Luke picked up the pink wrap, she shook her head and pointed to a slightly different shade of pink.  It made me happy to see that she was a girl who knew her own mind.  The other crazy thing is that it is the same color my cast was for a broken wrist when I was in third grade.  Each time we went back for a check up, I told her that they may decide to put a different cast on, and each time Opal was prepared with a different color that she was going to pick.  One time it was orange, and the next time it was blue.  She ended up keeping the same cast on for the entire month however, and our neighbor gave her cast stickers and a cast tattoo which Opal enjoyed putting on and then picking off.  

The first couple of nights were ROUGH.  She kept smacking herself in the face with her cast, waking her up frightened and battered and she was in pain.  It was like having a newborn baby again.  Things gradually got better, but she is still not sleeping that well.  I never thought I would say that I was happy that we finally found a TV show that Opal would sit for, but when it's been days with sleep deprivation and your thirty pound toddler refuses to be set down, it came as such a relief when we accidentally found out that she loves a YouTube channel with cute and funny pet videos.  Here she is in the above photo, happier than we have seen her all month, watching videos on our TV of cats and dogs doing silly and adorable things.

Opal's Godparents sent her up some lovely get well gifts from Florida that really made Opal feel special, and lots of other friends made beautiful get well cards for Opal.  She started feeling proud and offering to show whoever we were Facetiming her cast.  I think she realized that it was a great attention getter.  In the above photos, Opal is playing with her presents from her Godparents. In the below, left-hand picture, Opal is planting flower seeds in a pot that she painted herself, another gift from her Godparents.

Most of Opal's fears this past month were centered on falling - she had a traumatic time riding in the car and kept screaming "I'm falling!  I'm falling!" any time we went over a hill or hit a bump.  No amount of distraction or treat bribery would detract her from her fears and the only good thing about quarantine was we only had to put her in the car to take her to her orthopedic appointments.  She also was afraid to sit in her highchair, for fear of falling and for some reason was scared of loud noises as well.  This was very inconvenient timing, seeing as the road in front of our house was being torn up during this entire ordeal with loud and heavy machinery every single day.

It was a rough month, but our little lady found moments of fun and happiness.  Here she is below, posing for the camera.  We had three shirts that fit over her cast, and we managed to put them on rotation, and all three outfits are featured in the photos below.

 Lucy found a tree by our house in the local cemetery that was dropping an amazing amount of flower petals and did a photo shoot with Opal playing in the fallen petals.  It was fun and healing for Will and I to watch Opal playing in the moment, with no anxiety or fears.  I also took heart in the fact that as I carried Opal into the medical building for one of her checkups, she was quietly singing to herself a song from one of the Muppets movies..."I've got everything that I need, right in front of me!"  She can't be that traumatized if she is signing as I carry her into the doctor's office, right?

I have been known to call my daughters "little Lady," and when they are being ridiculous, I refer to them as my "special Lady".  When Opal was throwing an anxiety induced fit this past month, she stopped, looked at me, and said in a sad voice, "no special Lady, mama, no special Lady."  Oh, Opal, my sweet and always special little Lady, my heart hurts when my little Ladies are hurting!  Here's to a month of healing in both body, mind and spirit!

Singing In the Rain in May

There was a lot of excitement at our house this past month.  Not only did we celebrate Violet's birthday, Mother's Day and my birthday, but Opal started out by breaking her arm on the very first day of the month.  I will write more about her broken arm in the blog post just on Opal, but let's just say that it was a traumatic event which influenced our entire month with little sleep and a lot of emotions.  Here are the girls below, a day after Opal broke her arm and before it was put in a hard cast.  Lucy wanted to do a photoshoot with her sisters in the field of white violet's in the cemetery by our house.

Below are some of Lucy's photos.  She is doing a great job learning how to use the camera.

Lucy's favorite thing to do with the camera is to take it on our daily walks.  I like how she is capturing our life with her own perspective.  When I add her photos to the photos I take, it gives a fuller snapshot of our family.

Some of the wildlife by the pond on the trails by our house, also captured by Lucy...clockwise from top left below: a turtle on a log in the pond, a blue jay, a frog in the pond, and a dragonfly by the pond.

 Will set up a badminton net in our backyard this past month which come to find out, Will and I had the most fun with out of everyone at our house!  I really enjoyed the "duals" as we called them, and really, our goal was just to keep the birdie volleyed in the air as long as possible as our daughters jeered or cheered on the sidelines.  The top right photo below is our solution to get Violet and her bike home after she had a bike injury on one of our walks. We were feeling pretty proud at the way we figured out how to hook the bike onto the handle of the stroller while Violet stood on the rear wheel axel.  I'm sorry to report that moments after this "look, we are making it at this parenting gig" photo, the entire stroller flipped backwards.  Both Opal and Violet were okay, but Opal, who was dealing with anxieties already from her broken arm was inconsolable.  Normally, we would have been able to carry her the rest of the way home while the other parent pushed the stroller, but because of Violet's bike injury, one parent was needed to push the stroller and the other was needed to get Violet's surprisingly heavy steel-framed bike home.  At one point I had the idea of having each girl level down on a bike - Emma ride Violet's, Lucy ride Emma's, and I ride Lucy's bike home.  That only got us so far before Lucy and Emma claimed they couldn't ride another minute on the too small of bike's.  It is such an awkward thing to walk home a bike that doesn't sit taller than your knee with two out of our four kids wailing.  We made it though, and put all four girls promptly to bed.

In the above lefthand photo, Lucy is holding another four leaf clover she found in our front yard, the photo to the right of it has all four girls riding the disc swing, and to the right of that is Lucy with her sweater tied between her handle bars to hold a snack cup on a bike ride.  Necessity is the mother of invention, I always say!  The below photos are the girls holding flowers or frogs.  I love that Lucy can be so fashionable in a perfectly coordinated dress with matching accessories while holding a frog.  I hope she never loses her fashionista or frog loving sides.  We were excited to watch a family of baby ducks grow this past month, and I am laughing when I remember the looks other people gave us on the nature trail as all five girls in my family sighed a collective "Awwwwwwwww!" each time we saw the baby ducks.  The center photo below is of a tombstone Lucy made for a frog that died at the paws of Charlie.  Bad boy Charlie get yelled at and didn't seem to care one way or the other.  The worst part is, he doesn't even really eat the frog, besides it's legs, and it seems like in the case of frogs, he is just killing for sport.  

Charlie is a lover, not a hater when it comes to people, but he is a killing machine when it comes to wildlife.  I am so very torn about this, as I want all wildlife to be protected in my yard.  One of our neighbors came over the other day and asked if "that bird killer" was ours.  When we said that yes, in fact, he was, our neighbor toned down the name-calling but told us that every morning he and his wife watch Charlie pick off birds at their bird feeders.  A few days after Opal broke her arm, Charlie showed up in our yard with half of his face swollen.  Our state was still in the throes of complete quarantine lockdown, and so to get Charlie into the emergency vet, Will ended up sitting in the parking lot of the vet's office for FOUR hours, until a tech came out to his car and told him that they were sorry, but there wasn't time to see Charlie that day.  Ugh!!!  Not only was Will completely late for work, and had sat in that parking lot (no one was allowed to sit in the waiting room due to COVID) but he was unable to get any WiFi and so was half a day behind on work from it as well.  The next available appointment for Charlie was the following day, and so my sister-in-law who is a vet in Florida advised me to get a thermometer and take Charlie temperature rectally so at least I would know he would be okay until the appointment the following day.  This presented an entirely new set of issues, as now Will was at work and I needed to get a thermometer for Charlie as I wasn't about to use a people thermometer in that way!  Up until this point we had been doing grocery delivery, but seeing as time was an issue and grocery delivery took days to arrive, I had to go to the store and buy a thermometer, while leaving my kids at home with a friend on standby for them (no sitters due to COVID!).  The first store was sold out (thank you again, COVID) and the second store was as well, besides a fertility thermometer, which the pharmacist assured me would do the job no problem.  Thankfully, Charlie did not have a fever, and so I was at least able to rest my mind until his appointment the following day where it was determined that something bit him in the face, and after cleaning up the wound, getting a rabies shot and a shot of antibiotic, he was sent home, really no worse for the wear.

For the next few days at least, the local wildlife breathed a collective sigh of relief as we locked Charlie up in the garage until the swelling and redness had gone and he seemed better.  He turns seven this summer, and I swear he has already used up all nine of his lives.  I love him so very much though, and am relieved that this injury was a mild one.

We had lots of outdoor adventures this past month, but there was a lot of rain too, which gave us lots of time indoors.  Here are the girls below with the hardest puzzle we have worked on to date.

This puzzle took several weeks to finish, which is why it came as no surprise that there was one piece missing.  Frustrating, but definitely not shocking.  The kids played lots of Legos this past month, enjoyed painting and drawing, and had fun making "Drawing Shops" and selling their artwork to Will and I for nickels and dimes.

I was inspired to make some felt play pies for Opal's play kitchen, and some mini oven mitts.

The below photo collage I am titling "real life".  In clockwise order from top left: yard signs waiting to be mailed to happy customers, the contents of our art closet spewed into the office so that we could organize and clean it up (it was amazing to see just how much that closet held, but kind of made sense why every time we opened the closet door we took a quick step backwards so that whatever was falling didn't hit us), Emma vacuuming with heels and headphones on, Lucy displaying the art she made in yoga class this past year, and finally, a text between Will and I that I had to screen shot so as never to forget what real life COVID was like.  We needed to sign paper work at the bank, and we both needed to sign the papers.  However, kids were not allowed in the bank, and we had to make an appointment for us to even go there.  So, we took a family walk, so that we could take turns going into the bank to sign the papers while the opposite parent stood outside with the kids.  Remember, during COVID quarantine, there are no babysitters.  Seemed like a plan, except it took FOREVER in the bank, AND it started RAINING.  At one point while I was sitting in the bank, waiting to sign the papers, I overheard a bank teller tell the manager in an alarmed voice that there was a pack of wet looking kids peering in the windows.  I piped up and claimed them as mine and that my husband was with them, before the situation got out of hand.  I did notice the banker I was working with picked up the pace after that.

To add to the drama of this past month, the road we live on was completely torn up and repaved.  Because we live on the last corner on the street, all of the heavy equipment parked on the side of our house and beeeeep beeeeeep beeeeeep-ed it's way down the rest of the road backwards starting at 6:50 am every. single. morning.  Unless it was raining.  Oh, blessed rain!  Opal, as I mentioned above was having some major anxieties after her arm injury, and had a super hard time with the loud noises, crashing sounds of concrete hitting metal dumpsters, and the incessant beeping.  I had a hard time with four cranky kids who despite being woken up one to two hours earlier than normal each morning, refused to go to bed earlier.  Ugh.  The phrase that I kept repeating to the point where my kids were quoting me was: "I am over it!  I am so over it!"  At one point, as I was trying to get the kids to a chiropractor appointment on time, and was sweating like a pig with thirty pound Opal on my hip and a diaper bag and water bottles and someone's jacket and silly me - a mug of hot tea - I realized that the phrase I was saying under my breath was being repeated by Opal in the same chant rhythm that I was saying it in.  Fortunately, she did not say the same words I was saying, but she was darn near close.  In the photos below in clockwise order from top left: Violet and Emma watching concrete being dumped into the dump truck, Emma and Violet camped out early one morning to watch the road work from Opal's bedroom window (of course Opal's bedroom was at the front of the action), the drop from our driveway to the now dirt road, and finally, Opal with noise canceling headphones on, held by Will who was the only person who made her feel somewhat safe.  Funny side note is that the girls named all of the construction workers, and watched them all the live long day to the point where I was concerned that they were too young for the giggles and whispers about the young men they had named.

 We ate many baked goods this past month, and I think it was how we coped.  Once the concrete of the road was pulled up, the dust from the dirt below made it impossible to sit outside and covered everything like snow.  Double Ugh.  BUT, fortunately our asparagus and rhubarb just needed to be washed off and we enjoyed plenty of dishes with both of these early garden crops.  I also made homemade waffle cones, burnt a batch of homemade apple fritters (see photo below of fritter dough in my hair and burnt fritters), and discovered an amazing recipe for a rhubarb and almond oatmeal breakfast bake.

 We planted the seedlings we have been growing from seed into the garden this past month, and enjoyed collecting more eggs from our chickens now that the days are getting longer.  The more light there is in the day, the more eggs they lay.  I had to screenshot a conversation Will had over text with my brother who is on the fence about getting chickens.  I thought Will summed up having chickens just about right.

Maybe it was for the best that the roughest month of our year so far happened with some lovely holidays in it.  We enjoyed Violet's 6th birthday at the beginning of this month...

...each year after watching all of her sisters have their birthdays first, Violet is just SO happy when it is finally her day.  She got spoiled, and got all her favorite things - Frozen Legos, Calico Critters, Barbies, books, a toy bird in a cage that talks, and more.

While we were out on our daily walk, friends stopped by and taped some birthday messages to our window, and Violet was excited to have Will hang up her bird cage, and to set up her new fan and reading light on her bed.

She wanted a Sanders bumpy cake, which we were able to get in a curbside delivery from the grocery store which was a win, as we weren't sure how we were going to obtain it.

Violet is my most loyal child, and my only completely mama's girl.  She loves snuggles, and art, and reading stories with me, as well as telling me adorable and hilarious tales about what Opal said or did.  She also is extremely observant with people's mannerisms and can mimic anyone.  She is such a good big sister to Opal, while also being the only one in the house who isn't afraid to tell Opal no.  She loves playing Barbies, Calico Critters and Legos with Lucy and Emma, and is at that point in childhood where her older sisters sometimes leave her feeling left out.  I keep telling her that soon, very soon, Opal will be her best playmate, and that Violet will never feel lonely again.

Here we are below on Mother's Day.  It rained, but we still got a nice hike in.  On the way home while it started to pour, we popped open our umbrellas and the girls and I danced and sang "we're singing in the rain" at the top of our voices because we were confident that no one else would be out due to rain, our road being closed due to the construction, and COVID.  It was so very fun until Lucy slipped on a wet curb and twisted her ankle and knee.  We should have known not to tempt fate in an already crazy month.  We got home and got Lucy doctored up and dry and snuggled in to watch one of my favorite movies, Anne of Green Gables, for the first time with the girls while Will made us snacks.  For dessert, Lucy and Will made me strawberry rhubarb cobbler.

We ended the month with my birthday, which was relaxed.  I took a long and luxurious bath, and afterward went shopping by myself in our downtown as the stores were now open with appointment.  We took a walk as a family later, and the kids and Will made me strawberry shortcake for dessert.

What a month May was, and although we did our best to sing in the rain, we couldn't help but feel a bit upset with the wet curb that kept tripping us up!  Here's to Opal's arm being healed, Charlie all better, COVID getting better and the road work finally complete in June!

Opal at 26 Months

Opal continues to be the main attraction in our family - whether it's us tiptoeing around because she is sleeping, us tiptoeing around because she isn't sleeping and is making demands, or us telling each other the latest adorable Opalism.  She is delightful, demanding and always loved.  She has spent the first two months of her second year of life under quarantine, and she is young enough to have probably forgotten what life was like before COVID.  Make no mistake though, if Will an I are leaving for the grocery story or other essential item, she asks us excitedly, "Opal come too?"  And on the rare occasion she has gotten to come as it was an appointment for her, she reminds us as we are getting ready to go - "Opal coming'?!  Opal coming?!"

Besides missing going out into public, Opal has enjoyed us all being home with her, and her not being dragged to all different appointments that aren't for her.  I've noticed a big difference in her ability to play on her own and I wonder if it is because she finally has the space and time to do that, now that the other five members in her family aren't having to go here and there and everywhere.  She is showing us how to savor time at home, and to enjoy the moment.  Here she is below, after I found her on top of the dining room table.  She told me, "smell the flowers, mama!  Smell the flowers!"

Her growing ability of climbing up onto things previously out of her reach is actually some serious foreshadowing here for the following month.  But this month, we found it cute and annoying, and we continued to take her off of high surfaces.  See the bottom, right hand picture below, of Opal on top of the girls Lego table.  Other photos include Opal trying to hide in the fridge, Opal reading aloud a book to herself, Opal sitting in a bin of Legos, and Opal in her favorite "Princess Dress".

Although Opal is starting to play better on her own, she still prefers to have a parent or sister play with her.  I am so grateful that there are five of us to take turns, as that means there is almost always someone available to play, and she is so very happy when someone plays with her.  The photos below in clockwise order from top left: Emma and Opal wearing matching outfits, all the way down to their socks, Lucy and Opal on our newly installed disc swing, and Lucy painting Opal's fingernails.

 All three older sisters take care of Opal, and are protective of her.  They love dressing her and for the most part, playing with her and keeping her safe.  Sometimes they are more strict with Opal than Will or I would be, if for the simple fact that some battles Will and I have learned are just not worth fighting.  Or the other simple fact that she is our fourth child, and we are tired.  Either way, her sisters are not tired and have a strong and active sense of justice.  One morning as I was finishing getting the last items ready for breakfast while the kids started eating at the table, Lucy told Opal that she couldn't have syrup on her waffle that already had jelly on it.  I came into the dining room with more waffles and Opal asked me if she could have syrup on her already sugared-up waffle.  Making the quick assessment that this was a battle not worth fighting and not knowing that Lucy had already told her no, I proceeded to pour syrup on top of the jelly.  Opal looked sideways at Lucy and said, "Don't look in my eyes Lucy, don't look in my eyes!"

In the below photos with Will and I, we are both feeding Opal.  She doesn't like getting food on her clothes or her hands, and insists that someone feed her when the menu is messy.  Again, because she has five family members, someone is usually available to do this.  I think this is an example of how the youngest can become spoiled.   I guess there has to be some perks for her, since she essentially is growing up with four moms instead of the usual one.

This past month while Opal was feeding herself some of Violet's birthday cake and goofing around, she dropped her spoon covered in chocolate and ice cream onto my slipper.  I told her to eat nice and that she just got my slipper all dirty.  To which point Opal started singing, "Happy Birthday to Mama's Slipper, Happy Birthday to Mama's Slipper!"

Oh, Opal!  Life is an adventure with you, and we love you so much!

Finding Four Leaf Clovers in April

April is usually a very busy month at our house, with two birthdays and usually Easter worked in to the month as well.  This year, our stressors were different.  April was still busy, but instead of trying to fit the prep and celebration of three different holidays into our usually full schedule, our schedule was wide open but the prep and planning was a bit stressful.  Stores were out of lot of items on our list, and the shipping for online orders were delayed.  We wanted our kids to still have a nice holiday, and I never realized before how much of that was dependent on the ingredients we buy from the grocery store and the thoughtful gifts we intentionally buy in the stores and online.  Flexibility and setting expectations for our kids went a long way, and I am happy to say that all three holidays this past month went well, despite the above mentioned stressors.  I hope I will never take for granted again the ability to buy what I want and need, when I want and need it.

The first holiday we celebrated this past month was Easter.  Thankfully, our chickens supplied the eggs for our annual Easter egg dying, and we had food coloring already in our cupboards.  

The week before Easter I went grocery shopping for the first time in a month.  Lots of substitutions were made for the items on my list including flour, chocolate chips, and cinnamon rolls.  We still ate delicious food though, and I'd say the kids were still spoiled too.  The interesting thing was we made do with less, but still spent more, thanks to the higher prices on everything.

COVID didn't stop our annual Easter egg hunt, and the kids were excited that this year they didn't have to wait until after church to hunt for their eggs!

It was a little odd to not see family on Easter while being healthy, as that is the only reason we have ever missed celebrating with family in the past.  I have to say that it was a very quiet and relaxing day that went at a pace slow enough to savor.  I'm not sure how to take this bonus into the future, as we missed our family, however it definitely was nice to have a holiday that allowed time to savor it, especially at the point in our lives right now with young kids.

Two days after Easter was Emma's ninth birthday.  

Emma is usually our hardest kid to shop for, and add in COVID onto that, and it was almost impossible to find gifts that we thought she would really love.  We did though, and it was so great to see her surprise when she opened her presents.  Highlights included a giant Lego set she thought was out of our budget, Craftsman tools, books, a book light, Calico Critters, and straps that help you climb trees - think rock climbing wall on a tree trunk.

We ended up having to go to the Chiropractor on her birthday, due to Emma spraining her ankle the day before.  This was our first venture out as a family since Quarantine, and so Emma was excited to be leaving the house, even if it was for a hurting ankle.  We also enjoyed a birthday parade of friends, complete with homemade cards, signs, and even a birthday song blaring from our friend's phone, complete with Emma's name in it.

Emma wanted to have a mint chocolate chip ice cream cake roll for her birthday, and although I never made one before, it turned out delicious, if lacking in beauty and style.  

It is hard to believe that Emma is nine now, and it has been a privilege and a pleasure to watch her grow into her personality and God-given talents.  Emma looks so much like me when I was her age it is almost uncanny.  But although she resembles me on the outside, she is all her on the inside, and I love her spunky, sparkly, humorous, sweet and smart personality.  It is amazing to see her knack of figuring out how things work and how they are made, and how she can fix or build anything she sets her mind to.  She has a flair for writing poetry, especially limericks, and she loves to invent things.

After Emma's ninth birthday was Lucy's eleventh birthday.  Lucy, the girl who came bounding into our lives after Will and I experienced such great sadness.  Lucy is intuitive and always available to lend a hand and anticipate what family members need.  I am at the point now that if I am not here, I know that Lucy will take care of it - just as good, if not better, than I would have.  What a blessing her thoughtfulness, caring, and intelligence is to us, not to mention the delight we have when we see her creativity.  She has a knack for creating beauty wherever she goes, and I rely on her artistic eye whenever I am creating things.

Some of the highlights of Lucy's gifts include a Lego set, the Frozen 2 soundtrack, film refills for her Polaroid camera, a portable stereo, a book light, a Family tree book of famous people in history as she loves history, and, glory of all glories, a new to her Nikon camera!  She was beyond excited to receive this "real" camera, and we are so grateful to our Uncle Fred for making it a reality for us.  He is excited to share his love of photography with Lucy, and she cannot wait until quarantine is over to share the hobby with him.

As Will and I were wrapping her presents the night before, it occurred to us that besides the Legos, the rest of her presents were beginning to be very grown up, and we shared a moment of emotion at how fast our girls are growing up.  Here Lucy is below picking the rhubarb from our garden for her birthday dessert - strawberry rhubarb cobbler.  Lucy tended and cared for the rhubarb for weeks prior to her birthday, to ensure that the plants were ready in time for her birthday.  Her extra watering and love paid off, as the rhubarb was perfect.

Eleven years of being parents on earth has been the ride of a lifetime, and God Bless Lucy for being the child for us to learn how to parent on!  She has graciously accepted many an apology as Will and I figure out this gig.

It wasn't all parties this past month.  We continued to tackle a To Do list, and as I write this blog post, I'm happy to report that our To Do list has never been so checked off.  Thanks, COVID Stay at Home orders!  The photos below show us starting the seeds in our garden, as well as Will building necklace holders for the girls' closet.  The bottom, left hand photos below are of our first patch of violets for the season, and Will trading out our espalier apple trees on the west side of our garage for raspberries transplanted from our garden.  We moved the apple trees to the east side of our garage, and hopefully they do better there with more sunlight.  

Some days in April were warm, and spring-like while others were as cold as winter.  We took full advantage of all warm days.  Below the girls are painting in the backyard - they waited all winter to do this!

Lots of bubble blowing, chalk art, flower picking, and even the discovery of an empty robin's egg happened this past month.  Who knew chalk would be on backorder until June.  As I type this, it should be arriving any day, which is great timing as our normally abundant supply of sidewalk chalk is down to nibs and nubs.

We took walks every single day and really enjoyed watching the subtle changes of spring unfold before our eyes.  We saw a string of baby ducks swimming down the river, threw rocks into the water, and even learned that our favorite hiking trail on our street has a coyote den.  I'm glad that the city is allowing the coyotes to stay, and that they are instead educating the neighborhood on keeping pets and small children safe.  A coyote in the environment is a sign of a healthy and strong ecosystem!

 Of course, it does make me worry about Charlie.  In the below photos from top left: Opal trying to give Charlie a hug through the window, Charlie snuggling me outside, Charlie playing with Violet's flip flop through the kid's soccer net, Charlie snuggling Will, and finally, Charlie drinking water out of one of the kid's buckets.  When I found him like that, I thought his head was stuck, but I was disappointed to find out it wasn't.  Drinking water out of a bucket isn't nearly as exciting as getting your head stuck.  #quarntinelife

Violet's flip flops have fake diamonds on them, and the way they catch the light intrigues Charlie.  It annoys Violet to no end, as Charlie bats at her feet whenever she wears them.

Our bees arrived this past month, earlier than they ever have in the seven years we have been keeping bees.  I hope to never have them come this early again if I can help it, as they were super hungry and as a result, were harassing us.  Honey bees are not aggressive by nature, but because there wasn't enough plants in bloom yet, they were desperately trying to find nutrients.  Lucy had her calico bonnet on, and literally had a bee stuck in her bonnet.  We laughed about it afterwards, but it was a freak out show before the bee fortunately flew away with neither girl nor bee being harmed in the process.  We put the kids to work on stocking product for the business, and we experienced a great surge in online business for our signs and other products that we sell.  We aren't sure if it was a combination of Etsy's latest business tools being rolled out to support it's members, stimulus checks, or the fact that it is spring and people around the world are stuck at home with their yards getting more attention than usual.  Either way, it was almost a full time job for Will and I to keep up with the shipping demands!  I am grateful for this added income, as all of my shows and classes have had to be canceled for the season due to COVID.

We did lots of homemaking this past month.  In the photos from top left in clockwise order below: a stack of the girls leggings with holes in the knees that I cut and hemmed into shorts, a delicious Instant Pot roast with homemade gravy and mashed potatoes - comfort food at it's finest, Violet helping me bake a low-flour dessert - oatmeal bars, another Instant Pot comfort food meal - this time of roast chicken and homemade stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy and corn, and finally, more low-flour baking of a breakfast casserole we call pear pie, and actual apple pie with a crumb topping.

Cooking, sewing, baking, reading, puzzles, Legos... this is how we passed the time this past month on quarantine.  If we could have put the stressors of COVID out of our minds, it would have been such a cozy month.  The fear of procuring food, medical care, worrying about our loved ones, dealing with the learning curve that is classes on Zoom, and wondering how this will all impact our finances were heavy, and at one point I just had to stop watching the news.

We have insulated the kids from most of the COVID unknowns, and I hope that they remember this unique time in history as one of family togetherness and comfort.  Here they are below in clockwise order from top left: I came downstairs one day from putting Opal down for a nap to see the three oldest girls enjoying a self-made indoor picnic, Lucy and Emma entertaining Opal while I helped Violet with school, Emma, Violet and Opal dancing to music in dress up clothes, the girls playing with playdoh, and finally, Violet dressed up as Elsa, cracking me up by pretending that a doily a friend of ours crocheted was ice crystals.

At this point we aren't sure how our annual June dance recital is going to play out because of COVID, but I still made the decorations for Lucy and Emma's dance class.  It was a fun project, and my hope now is that we get to use them sooner rather than later.

Lucy discovered a bin of old clothes that I had saved that were too torn or faded to donate, but had too many memories for me to throw out.  She proceeded to make clothes for hers and her sisters' American Girl dolls.  I really enjoyed watching the creativity unfold, as well as knowing that these worn out clothes were getting a new lease on life.

 Will did a quasi-Zoom meeting with the girls for Take Your Kids to work day this past month.  I'm not sure how Big Bird logged in - probably something that Will needs to adjust on his privacy settings.

 Will has been experimenting with his facial hair styles, since he doesn't have any face to face interactions with parents these days at his job.  His coworkers have gotten a kick out of his facial hair though, and when Zoom is all you have, sometimes that's all you need.  The photo of Lucy above is a quarantine bonus - we usually get our movies and shows to watch from our library.  Since the library has been closed since March, we are out of new and interesting things to watch.  Lucy dropped something behind the couch the other day, and when she moved the couch to retrieve her dropped item, she discovered a forgotten I Love Lucy DVD season from the library.  It was like Christmas morning!

Will has been a great technical support for the girls while they do their Zoom classes.  The girls even did a piano recital on Zoom!

 It has been such a relief for me to no longer feel 100% responsible for Opal's behavior while her family members are on Zoom.

Zoom brought my entire family together for the first time in ages this past month, and we had a lovely family chat.  It was so fun to see everyone's faces together at once, and joking and laughing together almost like we do around the dinner table.  With siblings out of state and out of the country, it was comforting to connect like this during these uncertain times.

We have enjoyed some social-distanced visits with friends with fences and gates in between.  Our kids have done fairly well with these changes, but we do have moments of anger and frustration as to why things can't go back to how they used to be.  Here the girls are below, FaceTiming with friends.

Most of our walks have been in the neighborhoods and trails by our house.  We decided one day this past month though to walk downtown.  It was eerie to see the deserted shops and streets, but also heartwarming to see the notes of love and resilience on the shop doors and windows.  I took photos to document this, as someday it will be hard to remember everything that COVID impacted.  My favorite was a local coffee shop that had photos of famous people sitting at the empty tables.

 I made face masks for us, which was another COVID stressor, as there is no elastic to be found anywhere - online or for store pickup.  So, I thought I would be creative and improvise with old bra straps.  Well, as Lucy pointed out when we put on the masks and our ears were bent and turning purple: "Mom, bra straps are meant to hold up things much heavier than ears."  True story, Lucy, true story.  But, the second improvisation worked like a charm - I found leftover loops from the girls' pot holder loom, and those are not only stretchy, but soft too.  Win, win!  Necessity is the mother of invention!  And, waste not, want not!  I did end up finding a mask-making kit complete with elastic later on in the month, and I ordered one just to be sure anyone I knew who needed a mask got one too.

 Lucy found a patch of four-leaf clovers in our front yard this past month, and I am in awe of how many are there!  We need all the four-leaf clovers we can find to get through this year.

The girls were all able to find their birthday flowers this past month.  These are the flowers that bloomed on the day each of them were born.  Violet with violets, Emma with daffodils, Lucy with tulips and Opal with crocus.

 

I would say that at the close of April, quarantine felt like the new normal for us.  We had pulled off three major holidays in our family during this time, and the worry and learning curve of procuring food and working with Zoom seemed to have leveled off to more manageable levels.  I am ever so grateful for our health, the health of our friends and family and the health of some of our friends who survived COVID.  I am grateful that Will and I have still been able to earn an income during this time.  I am also grateful to spend quarantine with my favorite people in the world, and to have a cozy home with plenty of supplies for cooking, crafts, reading and playing.  We are learning to make the most of this time, and it is my sincere hope that when COVID is all over, that we will take some new insights and improved ways of living into our lives for a better than ever life and world.