Family health news and a pandemic Christmas

In a "best kind of bad news" situation, I learned earlier this month that I have breast cancer. But the "best" part of the equation is that is what they call Stage 0, non-invasive Ductal Carcinoma In Situ. It was discovered in a routine mammogram, and followed up on with a biopsy and a breast MRI. I also had genetic testing done and learned that I don't have any genetic predisposition for breast cancer that they can tell. 

While this certainly isn't the best news ever, it is going to be okay. I am scheduled to have what they're now calling Breast Conservation Surgery, or what more people call a lumpectomy, on January 7. A few weeks after that I will have radiation treatments...duration not yet determined. I should be fine after that, I hope. It is a strange situation, and scary, but we will get through it and then I hope it'll just be a Thing That Happened and that'll be it.

Meanwhile we celebrated Christmas in this weird pandemic year. The Mitchells all went to the river (with the exception of Stevie's family, who wanted to have Christmas in their new home), and the Sharps/Borcherdings did their own thing. In more difficult health news, my Dad was scheduled for a heart procedure and needed to quarantine in preparation for that, so we didn't see the Wenzells either. [Note to add: the exploratory procedure revealed that he will need to have bypass surgery in the coming weeks to correct blockages. I hope that does the trick.] Jim came up from Florida, but because we were also trying to minimize our interactions with people outside our home, we didn't see him much. He came over Christmas morning for breakfast, and we had windows open and fans on, and he wore his mask when he wasn't eating. How strange to live this way. We also met up with him at his condo in Reston and did a nice walk on the bike trail. 

Other than that, it was just the four of us (well, six of us including Shelby and Eddie), as it's been since March. We watched Elf on Christmas Eve, and I really enjoyed the fact that we weren't running around all over as we usually do. Christmas morning was mostly us, as I said, and then we had a nice Christmas dinner with just the four of us. 

It has been hard for everyone to be so isolated this year. I truly hope the coronavirus vaccine will be readily available enough in the next year that we can get back to our usual celebrations next year. Fingers crossed. 

18!

Our baby boy turned 18! This is the last time I'll add a picture to his birthday collage (sigh). I'm so glad I started doing this so many years ago – when you see someone every day, it's hard to see how they've changed. Having a single image for each year really shows how he's changed and grown (especially his hair). I wish I could revisit every one of the days these pictures were taken, and talk with him at each of those ages. 

Once again, Reed decided on a movie outing with friends to celebrate. A bit different this year, though...first, he didn't need Tod to drive (and chaperone). He drove one friend and the rest met up there - most of them have been driving a lot longer than Reed. Second, there aren't really any new movies out, but the theater had a pretty good deal. You could rent the entire theater and choose a movie from their selection, and bring up to 20 people. Most of the options were Christmas movies, but "Tenet" was a choice, and since Reed is the only one who's seen it (at the drive in, with Dad, when it came out), he decided to go for it. He had a great group of pals join the party, and since they were the only ones in the theater, they could act as goofy as they wanted to. It sounds like they had a good time.

On his birthday morning, Jennifer brought him donuts as a surprise. We are meanies and made him do school, even though he did ask to skip it (I don't think he was serious, though). He chose Five Guys for his birthday dinner (shocker!) and then we followed it with a blizzard cake from Dairy Queen and his presents. All in all, a pretty great day, I think!

We voted, we won

Huge exhale. Finally.

Four years ago, I hadn't been involved in politics at all, and in truth hadn't paid it much attention throughout my life, I'm sad to say. I voted, but that was about it.

Over this last four years since I attended my first Loudoun County Democratic Committee meeting at the Leesburg fire house in December 2016, I've become so much more aware of how my fellow Americans suffer due to institutional racism, economic equality and inequities in the criminal justice system. I know I have more to learn, but it has been my honor and my privilege to work to help elect Democrats who I believe will work to remedy these issues. 

The Women's March was my first protest of many over the last four years, and it was really life-altering to be part of an incredible moment like that. Then there was the March for Racial Justice in September 2017, the second Women's March in January 2018, the March for Our Lives in March 2018, the Families Belong Together march in June 2018, the Kavanaugh protest in September 2018, the third Women's March in January 2019, a pipeline protest in Leesburg in May 2019, the Lights for Liberty protest in July 2019, the We the People March in September 2019, the fourth Women's March in January 2020, a Black Lives Matter protest in Leesburg in May 2020, the Loudoun NAACP Rally for Racial Justice and March to the Polls in June 2020 in our neighborhood that I helped organize, all the way to the Loudoun NAACP March to the Polls just a few weeks ago. There were other events as well. It always felt good to be among people who believed similarly to me, who were willing to show up and speak up. 

I have gotten to know a whole new world of people within my community, who I've been so happy to work alongside, to protest alongside, to celebrate alongside. I'm grateful to all of them, for all they've done. These folks helped me step outside my comfort zone, reminded me that we all have different strengths and that knowing them is key. I certainly never thought I'd be a person standing outside the polling place for 12+ hours each election day, approaching strangers about Democratic candidates. It's still not my favorite thing, but I've learned not to take it personally so that makes it easier to do. I've tried my best to encourage others to join our cause, to give them opportunities that suit them, and then to always express my thankfulness for their involvement.

History has been made, and the U.S. has FINALLY elected a woman VP, and she is Black and South Asian, the child of immigrants. What a moment, I am in tears. 

Jason Isbell's "Hope the High Road" has been a balm since it came out in early 2017. It's one of Jason's reflections on his own white male privilege and desire to be a part of the solution. 

I used to think that this was my town
What a stupid thing to think
I hear you're fighting off a breakdown
I myself am on the brink
I used to want to be a real man
I don't know what that even means
Now I just want you in my arms again
And we can search each other's dreams

I know you're tired
And you ain't sleeping well
Uninspired
And likely mad as hell
But wherever you are
I hope the high road leads you home again

I've heard enough of the white man's blues
I've sang enough about myself
So if you're looking for some bad news
You can find it somewhere else
Last year was a son of a bitch
For nearly everyone we know
But I ain't fighting with you down in the ditch
I'll meet you up here on the road

I know you're tired
And you ain't sleeping well
Uninspired
And likely mad as hell
But wherever you are
I hope the high road leads you home again
To a world you want to live in

We'll ride the ship down
Dumping buckets overboard
There can't be more of them than us
There can't be more

I know you're tired
And you ain't sleeping well
Uninspired
And likely mad as hell
But wherever you are
I hope the high road leads you home again
To a world you want to live in
To a world you want to live in

Over the last few weeks "There can't be more of them than us" has been my mantra. I'm so glad that turns out to be true.

The work is not done, not even close. We will take a bit of time to celebrate and recover from four horrendously awful years of our values being attacked and America's standing in the world being diminished. And then...we will continue to work just as hard, with joy always in our hearts.

Keeping us all on track

I don't think I've written about our wall calendar by the kitchen table. It's how we keep everybody informed – and BOY, do they prefer to be informed – about the weekly goings-on. Right now it's looking a little run-down and in need of a cleaning, and I think some of our color-coded white board markers are running low, but we're keeping it real here:

I bought this dry erase calendar, that's essentially a big decal sticker, four years ago. Each Sunday, Tod goes through our google calendars (which we're also really good about keeping updated) and he writes out all of our plans for the week. (And then we give him a hard time when things are hard to read, or in the wrong color, or whatever else we decide to pick on him for.) The decal actually runs from Sunday to Saturday, but as you can see I put labels on it so the week runs from Monday-Sunday that way we can look ahead at the whole week. The kids absolutely rely on it to know what to expect from the week, which as I said before, they really rely on – neither one particularly likes surprises, they like knowing what's coming up. Of course most things these days are virtual, like this week's Dems meeting and the Theater Parent meeting, as well as Reed's tutoring prep meeting. And sometimes we have to write things we intend to do (like try to straighten out Amy's clothes/closet situation) on the calendar so we don't forget them. 

I think this has helped to teach the kids that writing things down (wherever it works for you – on the wall or on your phone) is the best way to keep yourself organized. 

[And now I need to make a note to take some time to clean that calendar...it is a mess!]

On the road again...

So this happened on September 18...Reed finished his behind the wheel sessions that day and got his temporary license. We will go finalize things in November, but meanwhile he's good to go. We sent him to pick up dinner in this picture. It's hard to send my baby out there on the road by himself!! He's still got some learning to do, but it will only come with more practice. One day last week I had to go to the office (GASP!) and he texted me to say he wanted to just go for a drive. What?! Well, okay then. And this past Saturday he got up and showered, and took Shelby over to Manassas Battlefield to go for a bit of a hike. Adding the X factor of a goofy dog in the car with no one to corral her was even more stressful to me. But I took a deep breath and said of course you can. And he was fine! This whole thing is very hard!

And then...

One day after she was eligible (only because we couldn't get an appointment for the actual day), Amy got her learner's permit. Tod has let her drive the Cube before, but I wasn't prepared to let her drive home. Instead I drove her to a school near our house and let her get some practice time in. She drove back to the house, though. Maybe this whole thing is getting a little easier?? No, not really. She is clearly much more eager to learn to drive than Reed was for so long. So I fully expect that she'll be getting her license the day she turns 16. I hope she'll learn where things are by then...she always has her nose in her phone when we're driving, so she's not paid a lot of attention to how to get places. Thank goodness for navigational apps!

Time is flying by!

Off we go!

It was Reed's last first day at LCPS. Only two more to go for Amy. 

Didn't we just send them off to kindergarten?!

We did our traditional "breakfast for dinner" the night before school started, and this year we even remembered to include both their grade AND their names (we forgot for the last THREE years!). [Note: we also finally got good at it – Tod realized I had extra squirt bottles leftover from tie dying projects, and those worked perfectly!]

Of course this isn't exactly a normal school year. The kids will be doing school from home at least through the first semester, which runs into January. Who knows if they'll be back in school after that....fingers crossed.

Since both kids already have their own computer desk area, fortunately we didn't need to do much to prepare for virtual learning. Reed has his basement lair, and Amy is ensconced in the formal living room. I continue to work in my upstairs office (that is really a bedroom).

Reed even spent part of the first day doing class from the back deck – why not, the weather was great!

They didn't run into any technical problems yet, so that's a plus! Amy is uneasy with participating in the interactive parts of class, but hopefully she'll take some deep breaths and just give it a whirl. The schedule is a little bit weird, they have Mondays to basically work on their own (and get help if it's needed), and then on Tuesday/Wednesday they have their A day classes, and on Thursday/Friday they have their B day classes. Each day has built in time for doing classwork with the teacher available, so that's a plus. Hopefully they won't have to do much schoolwork outside of these hours, given that it's all "home"work at this point.

This is certainly not the year anyone was thinking would happen, but here we are. We will make the best of it, hopefully our resilience will do us good.

OH, and I almost forgot that THIS happened! Senior photos!!!!

At this time every year

Every year since my Mom died, the back to school time of year has been so melancholy for me. The late start this year puts it closer to the change of seasons too, which adds to the feeling. Partly it's thinking about all our kids have missed out on by not having her in our lives these past 10 years. How she would have loved to see our kids in high school, becoming their own people! They would have been so good for each other. 

This isn't a new feeling, but when the days stop being so miserably hot and humid, and we have gorgeous early fall days like we're having this Labor Day weekend, the passage of time is just so clear. Soon the leaves will start falling, then the trees will be bare and the air will be cold. We'll be into a new year....the one where our baby boy graduates high school and maybe goes off to college. Sure, it's the way things are supposed to go, but that doesn't make it any easier. 

From listening to other parents, they all felt this way at this time. But then the world conspires to make both the kid and the parents really eager for the separation, as if by design. I remember Aly driving Jennifer so crazy that she couldn't wait for college drop-off, where the previous year it'd been unimaginably hard to even think about. So I know it will all be okay, and we'll all grow and change with the seasons.

For now I will just enjoy every day.

Why didn't I think of this earlier?!

My least favorite chore is figuring out what to make for dinners. I don't mind making the grocery list, doing the grocery shopping, putting the food away, and I mostly don't even mind doing the cooking five days a week. But I absolutely HATE deciding what we'll eat. I get into ruts with the same 6-8 recipes, adding a new one or deleting one I'm tired of, over the weeks and months. It's also hard to make everyone happy, when Amy is a vegetarian and Reed doesn't like beans. 

Another parent mentioned to me that their three kids each had to cook dinner one night a week and I was blown away. Why hadn't I thought of this?! For a stretch of time, Reed often made dinner (mainly because that meant he wouldn't have to do dishes, if he cooked on his dishes day). But mostly it's me doing all the meals.

That stopped two weeks ago. So far, Reed did a bratwurst and cole slaw night and a pork stir fry night. Amy made fettuccine Alfredo and black bean burgers (you can guess how Reed felt about those). This coming week we're having fajitas in the air fryer (Reed) and vegetarian chili mac (Amy). They have to do everything involved with the meal – finding the recipe, seeing which ingredients we need to buy and which we have on hand, and then cook the meal. I have no idea why I never thought to do this earlier!

The kids are learning a lot about cooking, and I think it's awesome that they're both looking up and trying new recipes. I'm sure they're going to get pretty bored of it, but right now it's going great. Maybe they'll each develop a "specialty" recipe that can be their go-to. 

Life skills! I love to see it!

This whole thing might be getting to me

So it's now been more than five months of very limited in-person human interaction with anyone outside of our immediate family. I think it may be starting to show.

Yesterday while I was working at home, I hit the button on my (awesome, motorized) stand-up desk to raise it up to a standing position, and at the same time, I slightly leaned on the table...which caused it to start going back down again. I immediately responded with "Sorry!"

I apologized. To the desk. 

Get Cubed

Well you know how it goes with Big Steve – why buy one of something when you can buy two or three? A couple years ago when his friend Tim McGrath sold his real estate business, Steve bought the three Nissan Cubes the business had. He's sold two of them over time, but still had one more. Amy's had her eye on it for a while, she thinks it looks cool (she is wrong. LOL). Well Steve decided he wanted to finally get rid of the last Cube, and Tod thought it'd be a good buy and a good car for the kids. 

So we didn't really need the car because Reed still didn't seem interested in driving (it'd been a year and a half since he last practiced) and Amy can't get her learner's permit until September 25. And heck, with me working at home full time, we hardly need two cars, much less three! But Steve was anxious to sell it, so off we went. We picked it up on August 1.

I've been telling Tod for a while now that I thought if we just bought the kids a car, that might spark Reed to want to drive. Well, that has turned out to be true...or it's just a big coincidence, I suppose. And since Tod is busy with school, and I'm home all the time, for the last two weeks I have become the driving instructor.

This is NOT a role I wanted, at all. It is terrifying. But he's getting better all the time, and I feel a little less like throwing up as the days go by. Why do they let parents teach kids to drive, what do I know about teaching someone to drive, just because I can drive myself?! He and I are both doing our best. I think he's come a long way already, but still needs lots and lots of practice. Glad he's taking the plunge.

Ice cream experiments

I saw someone on Twitter recommend this book, and figured it was right up our alley for our ice cream machine. 

Amy has decided to experiment with various recipes, which is great for all of us! So far she's made cheesecake ice cream, caramel "crack" ice cream (SO good!), and peach frozen yogurt.

[P.S. This one was SO good, it MUST be made again!]

But the great thing about it is that she's rating each recipe on a scale of 1-10, making notes about the prep, and then saying whether she would, might or wouldn't make it again. 

This sounds a bit familiar. 

The Larson women apparently like to keep track of things. Tod's mom Eileen had a huge wall of VCR tapes of movies she'd recorded. And with that was a corresponding notebook where she kept track of the movies as she watched them - with ratings and everything. And I have a spreadsheet where I keep track of the concerts and theater shows I go to, along with where they were held and who I went with. 

So I guess I'm saying that Amy comes by it naturally. 

The Bickersons

Well we're still pretty much only at home. Tod is back to the office full time as of two weeks ago but I'm still at home full time. In the beginning I pretty much only went to the grocery store once a week (rather than the twice a week that I used to do pre-pandemic) and gone to restaurants to pick up food (as opposed to having it all delivered, as we did in the beginning of the shutdown). But now I've been going out a bit more, to Walmart and a couple of other stores here and there. And we've hosted a Father's Day get-together when Jim and Nicki were in town, attended our friend Laura Yager's outdoor wedding, and gone to Jennifer's to celebrate Aly's birthday. I'm not sure we made the right choices for those things, but we did our best to be safe.

Anyway, while the kids and I are all cooped up in this house 24/7 (minus the walks we all take) we really still manage to be separate. During workdays I'm upstairs in my office, and whenever Amy rolls out of bed, she's in the "formal living room" that is basically her office, and when Reed gets up he heads to the basement for pretty much the entire day. Reed talks with his friends through Discord, and Amy occasionally talks with her friends over zoom. Not a ton of socialization going on. The three of us interact a bit throughout the day, but don't really log any "together" time until the four of us sit down for dinner.

And then, my goodness. These kids just l.o.v.e. to bicker. They push each other's buttons like siblings do, and even though they are really enjoying it, it is SO miserable to listen to!!!! It seems to be a great deal of fun for them, so Tod and I both try to let it go a little bit, but we have to protect our own sanity. I'm not sure what we'd do if we managed to make it through dinner in an entirely civil manner. LOL

We're in the midst of trying to decide between two not-great options for school in the fall -- sending the kids 2 days a week or total distance learning. It's really tough to know the right call to make. Deadline for the decision is Monday so we'll see what happens.

Goodbye, 2019-2020 school year - we will NOT miss you

 

Well school is finally done. Nearly three full months of "distance learning" to round out an otherwise great year. Amy ended the year with 6 As and 1 B, and Reed had 8 As including three AP classes and two dual enrollment college classes. We were so happy with the kids' effort through the fourth quarter. In actuality, the work they were doing didn't really count for much – the deal was that basically the grade they had at the end of third quarter would be their final grade, though they could earn a "bump" (for instance from a B+ to an A-) if they were engaged and kept up with their work from home. 

The working from home was rolled out without a lot of planning so it's not surprising that it wasn't the greatest. And the school board is trying to make decisions about school for the fall right now – a no-win situation if there ever was one. Glad I'm not deciding these things. If there's distance learning next year, as I expect there's likely to be, I hope that every teacher is required to actually teach class even if it's over the computer. And I really hope things have improved enough that they will get some time in school, and it would be terrific if extracurriculars could happen in some fashion too. I guess we'll see.

We celebrated the end of school with pizza followed by cake and ice cream made by Amy. Now let's relax a while. Also, we have a rising SENIOR?! This does not compute.

Surprise flashback

I have over 19,000 songs in my iTunes library. But somehow this old gem pops up more often than I'd expect...

Reed went through a short phase of being really into listening to "The Radio Adventures of Dr. Floyd" podcast when he was maybe 10 years old. It makes me happy when these episodes pop up, thinking about little Reedy.

(And don't ask me why this handful of podcasts shows up as if they were songs, because I don't know.)

The coronavirus in our family

I haven't mentioned that the coronavirus did hit our extended family. Big Steve got sick and tested positive around April 21. Of course that meant that Wanda, Nikki, Jay and Lena were all at risk too and had to be quarantined, since they live together.

They were managing Steve's symptoms fairly well at home until April 26 when his oxygen level went down too low, which is something with this illness that can escalate and become quite serious very fast. So Steve ended up spending 24 hours in the coronavirus unit of Kaiser in Tysons, where he evidently didn't get great care and was quite eager to get sprung from. He came home on oxygen for a couple of weeks.

Meanwhile as Steve was sick, Wanda and Nikki also both weren't feeling great. Wanda ended up testing positive but didn't get as sick as Steve did and was able to recover fine at home.

The whole thing was pretty scary. Steve was diagnosed with a bladder tumor a few weeks before all this stuff started so he is even more at-risk. And having three generations in the house made it more stressful too. We are all so grateful that they are recovered without major incident.

"They're fine, Mom!"

Reed may have inherited a bit of my stubbornness. We gave him a new pair of slippers at Christmas, and they're still sitting in his closet. Because I pointed out to him that he may be due for an upgrade, he has dug in and refuses to throw these out. He wears them from the time he gets up to the time he goes to bed, they've got a lot of hours on them. But he thinks I'd "win" if he swaps them out, so I guess until they literally wear through to the floor, he'll keep on with this pair. Whatever makes him happy!

Reporting in from Talamore Drive

We're still here, same as we have been. But I wanted to say that I'm really grateful that both Reed and Amy have been doing their schoolwork with no complaints (well, maybe a little complaining) and without a lot of prodding. Though we sometimes veer off course, our philosophy has always been "you're the one in school, it's your responsibility," and the same goes now when school is being done from home. They're handing it well and I am so glad we don't have to fight about it.

We're also all still getting along well, which is great! I realized the last time I spent this much time with our kids was when they were born and I had 3 months off with them. Wild.

Good thing we're introverts

The last time I posted, we expected school would be closed through spring break. But then Virginia's Governor announced that school buildings would be closed for the duration of the school year. Here in Virginia, we're not supposed to go anywhere other than work, grocery stores and restaurants (carryout only). Some restaurants closed altogether, and all non-essential businesses are closed - nail salons, hair salons, movie theaters, gyms, craft stores. The Governor's current order runs through June 10.

WOW.

It's a little surreal. While we're homebodies by nature, it's not really the same to be told you can't go somewhere, rather than choosing not to go somewhere. But really, we have all we need to be happy right here, and can order anything we need (mostly....toilet paper has become tough to find, strangely). I only get in the car for grocery runs or food pickup. Nowhere else to go. I've had the same half tank of gas in the car for a month now.

School districts were left to figure out for themselves how to make the rest of the school year work. Loudoun did a week of distance learning to review old material and kind of get their bearings. Then a week of supposed new learning, and then spring break (what?). So the kids had last week off (living the dream). Back to work this week, though I have to think they won't be learning everything they were scheduled to. AP testing for Reed's classes has been shortened and will all be done online. Grades for classes themselves for fourth quarter will be pass/fail. No clue how that changes their GPAs.

Here's what doing school at home looks like for us.

I've been working at home since March 17. I'm very fortunate since I'm very well set up for this, after 8+ years of telework – dedicated work space, two monitors, good chair, standing desk.

AWS started a Gold Team/Blue Team setup where one team works from home while the other goes into the SCIF. So he does a week at home and then a week at the office. When he's home, he's set up in what would be the dining room of our house (but has never been a dining room, as long as we've lived here). Not perfect, but it gets the job done.

All of us are doing pretty well with this, as far as I can tell. For me, I find if I read too much about the actual coronavirus illness itself and how horrid even the "mild" cases can be, I find myself feeling a lot of anxiety. So I am trying to just read enough to be a little bit ready for what we might expect if it hits us, but not too informed. The first few weeks, I really could not motivate myself to do anything once work was done, beyond my usual chores. I read, watched TV, but didn't do anything productive with my Dems work. I'm trying to work my way back into it. I am VERY glad the weather has been decent and we can all get outside and walk. We've all always been walkers (the dog gets a workout) and now there are SO many people out there! It's wild.

The kids seem fine. I've been checking with them to see if they feel any anxiety or worry, and so far they really don't seem to. Hopefully it stays that way, and we all stay well. Reed went for lunch and to play basketball with friends a couple days into things (I think it was way back on March 14), and that's the last he's seen of friends. Amy hasn't seen friends since school stopped. Reed has always been very connected with his pals using Discord to chat while they play video games, so I think his socialization needs are being met that way. Amy just started chatting with her friend Molly over the video game Animal Crossing, so I think that's good for her as well. Neither kid is one who'll text a friend to suggest a bike ride or anything like that, which I guess is fine in this case since then we'd have to worry about them keeping far enough apart, etc.

The kids are NOT too thrilled to have been drafted as our new cleaning crew. We are paying our cleaning service, but asked them to not show up, so they can minimize their own risk. It was way past time for these kids to learn these life skills anyway.

I don't think I've really processed the fact that we're still going to be at home for two more months. Who would have ever thought something like this would happen in America? (Don't worry, I won't get started on the politics of this whole situation.)

The activities I'm missing right now are going to movies and concerts. That's pretty much it. And I'm glad that the last show I went to - in Austin, the Hal Ketchum tribute show – was incredible, because that's going to have to hold me over for quite a very long time, I think.

My hope is that this terrible illness doesn't get any closer to anyone that we care about. Amy's first grade teacher Ms. Rokus died of the virus on March 26, which was the saddest news. She was one of a kind.

For a while more, we'll just be here, cozy at home.

Happy #15 Amy!

We're home with not too much to do, you'd think I would have gotten this posted in a timely way!! Better late than never, I guess.

Amy's birthday came two weeks into the stay-at-home order, so we had an at-home celebration just with the four of us. She hasn't been interested in doing any kind of friend birthday parties for a while now (which I don't really get, but it's her call!) so in that sense she didn't miss out. However her birthday was supposed to fall on the alternate run of Footloose, which I think she was kind of looking forward to.

Amy had time on her hands so she decided she wanted to make her own birthday cake. She wanted both a white cake and a strawberry cake, so she made both for a 4-layer cake, all homemade from scratch, with Hershey's chocolate frosting. So good!

We ordered in dinner and opened presents and that was about it. Not as much fun as a 15 year old should have, but with the circumstances we're under, it has to do. I guess at the very least this will all make for a good story one day, of when she spent her fifteenth birthday on lockdown and out of school for months.

Wish we'd been able to celebrate with family....at the rate things are going, we might not be able to do that until the summer!

Coronavirus shuts it all down

Well the kids are now on day 5 of missing school due to the coronavirus outbreak and who knows when they'll go back to school again - it won't be any earlier than April 13, which would mean they'd have had 22 days off due to the virus, then 5 days of spring break. They're already getting a little bored, really. They're supposed to try to implement some kind of distance learning, but I am not sure that's really going to work.

For Reed, it means missing out on school time (not missing school time, just not having it!) and missing out on the two college tours we'd booked (JMU and UVA) during spring break - the colleges will be closed. He doesn't care about missing school at all. He had one outing with friends (to Zaxby's, Dairy Queen, and then to play basketball) and maybe that wasn't the smartest thing to allow, but it's good to get out and he washed his hands at least once, hopefully more.

For Amy, it means actually missing school. Well, a couple of classes, anyway (earth science, with her friend Morgan and a good teacher, and of course theater class. And boy has this thing thrown a monkey wrench in the school play. They've been working on Footloose since December, I think, and it was scheduled for March 26-29. Their teacher Ms. Novi has told them the play WILL go on at some point, but I really doubt it. Too many competing interests, if school ever even gets back into session this spring. For this reason, it's kind of a good thing that she has a less-involved role this time around - she's on the marketing team, rather than being an assistant stage manager (that's ASM for those who know what's what) like she was in the fall. For the fall play, she was at school basically 5-6 days a week for months. On the marketing team, it's about 2 days a week, though it probably would have ramped up a little bit as it got closer. Being less invested, I think it doesn't hurt quite as much that it's gone sideways. The other big bummer is that the theater trip to NYC which was to be the week before spring break is canceled. Boo.

For me, as of yesterday I'm allowed to completely work from home, unless something comes up. For Tod, the majority of his work at AWS is done in a SCIF, so he can't do that from home. He's hoping maybe it'll work out that he can work from home one day a week, we'll see. It's a super weird, surreal time.

We've never lived through anything like this before and honestly it's scary already to think of how things might go. So we will do all we can to stay healthy, maintain our sanity and not drive each other bananas, and hope it's sooner rather than later that we can go back to "normal," whatever that is. Right now we just keep deleting things from our calendars. And as much as all four of us are introverted home-bodies, when you have no choice but to stay home, it's not the same as when you're choosing to stay home. Having a snow day is awesome because you know it will be done in a few days...this, we have no clue how long it'll last.

Everybody wash your hands.

Reed the movie buff

Reed has become a bit of a cinephile in the last year. This Oscars season, he wanted to see all of the movies nominated for Best Picture before awards night, and he did. When a movie he might want to see comes out, he watches their reviews on Rotten Tomatoes very closely, and won't see anything that's not rated highly (is "fresh" the right term?). When Amy and I were in NYC last month, Tod and Reed even went to the fancy theater to see a showing of all the short movies nominated for Oscars, like 6 of them. And they both loved it! For some reason, he even ordered BluRay copies of 3 of the best picture nominees, so he'd have them. It's kind of turned into his "thing" and it's pretty cool!

Still can't get him to organize a movie outing with friends, but at least he usually does seem to go along if someone else suggests it!

Home alone

Last weekend, we had our first "alone" getaway in almost 8 years – the last time we did it was for Tod's 40th birthday in 2012. But this time....we left the kids home on their own.

CRAZY. We flew out early on Saturday morning to Austin, where we had a fabulous time seeing shows, eating, and seeing the sights. Meanwhile back at home, Amy managed to get rides to/from the drama tech build, and they even set up their own grubhub account so they could get Red Robin delivered. They were 100% unfazed by the whole thing. Of course they do hardly notice we're here on the weekends, until it gets to be dinner time. They even got themselves off to school on Monday morning. We flew in on Monday afternoon and everything was just as we left it. 

I know they're 17 and almost 15, but it is still a momentous thing to leave them alone for more than two days!!

A note from Dad

It's been awhile since I made an appearance on NTM so it's time for an update from Dad.

In 2016, I learned that my GI Bill educations benefits were going to expire in 2018, so I started school at Capella University to earn a Phd in Information Technology. My Phd journey has overlapped with much of the kid's formative years. I started school in the Fall of 2016 and hope to finish in 2020. For Reed, that would be 7th through 11th Grades. For Amy, that would be 5th through 9th grades. Most of my evenings and many weekends from 2016-2020 have found me sitting in a corner with my laptop. I spent three weekends away for residency courses in Alexandra, VA, Dallas, TX, and Orlando, FL. Those trips would seem like business trips to the kids, while my time at home engrossed in my laptop I expect will have influenced the kids in some way. I hope they remember this time as demonstration of their Father working hard at school to further his education and make himself a more whole person. I fear that young minds would interpret my time as lots of lazy screen time wasted on an internet machine. I do think about the amount of time school has also taken me away from Lara and how my personal goal effects our marriage, but I feel we've communicated well so our relationship has never been a concern. I thank Lara and love her for the space and support, but the point of this NTM is our children's growth.

My Mother moved away from Dad and I for two years while she went to Billings to complete her Bachelor's Degree in Education. I was in 8th and 9th grades at the time and didn't think much of it. Dad and I ate lots of TV dinners and steak. Plus, Kathleen, Jed, and Carley lived with us for one of the years and I was deep into school sports so there was a lot going on. As a kid, I sort of didn't notice that Mom was gone. But, as an adult I recognized how hard that must have been for her to be away from family to complete a personal goal. Looking back, I think her example showed me that it's never to late in life to chase a dream (sounds corny, eh).

I've tried my best to maintain normalcy. Breakfast with the kids gives me a nice start to the day and dinner with the whole family is very important to all of us. I'm bless to have had jobs that allowed me the flexibility to make this work and a wife who shares the same values. Dedicating time to "go to school" and time to be with family keeps me organized. I have awoken early and stayed up late to do school work. I have taken vacation days and worked through the weekend in an effort to not let school consume my life, even as it consumes most of my waking thoughts.

I have learned a lot in these 4 years and am very happy to have spend the money, time, and effort to be successful. But, I do hope, one day, Reed and Amy can look back and see Dad as a positive example of a crazy, disciplined, and hard worker for completing this degree in the middle of raising and family.

A great birthday

The kids were super nice to me on my birthday...which is not to say they're not nice the rest of the time.

They made this peanut butter chocolate cake for me, as I requested. I will admit it isn't the most perfect-looking cake (ganache is tough to do, sometimes!) but they worked on it together while I was at work (they had a teacher work day). Reed assembled the ingredients, and Amy put it together. It makes me very happy to think of them doing this together, for me.

And yes, it WAS delicious!