October 2020 we were still in full on online school. Our school district divided up the grades and had half the class is going to school Monday Tuesday and the other half going Wednesday and Thursday. Ian decided to stay home, but Maddy and Rylan went back temporarily, but then decided that it was easier at home. He said that it was just really weird, classes were small 5-10 people each. He said that for lunch they had a bunch of desks in the cafeteria all separated and he did hand motions to his friends from across the big room.
Ian usually had his own to-do list of things he had to do everyday and he was done by 12:00. Sometimes he has Google Meets with his class and sometimes they don't.
Madelyn’s teachers have 15-minute google meets during their assigned class time, mostly to answer questions and to check in for attendance, but Maddy said that for some of them the teacher has the camera at an angle a couple feet away from the computer recording and it’s hard to hear what they are even saying. There are good days and bad days. I don't want to blame the district or teachers beacuse it would have been extrememly hard to teach how they were forced to do.
Some days the kids had trouble and I would feel like my day was dedicated to Maddy and Ian’s school work! Ian sometimes would have tech issues and needed my help. I would have to text the teacher and and wait until they got it resolved. Maddy once asked for my help and our conversation went like this:
M: I don’t know the answers to these questions
L: reads assignment and said, “you have to read this first to get the answers”
M: I don’t want to read this whole thing!
L: that’s the assignment
M: can you help me
L read the material, I’m not doing it for you! If you still need help after you read it completely then I will help
M: you always help Ian more than me
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| Ian did his school in the livingroom |
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| Bo was always by his side. Maddy wouldn't let me take her picture. |
In October we wanted to celebrate Halloween, a perfectly socially distanced holiday right? Ever since we got Bo Maddy wanted to do this couples costume with him, Lilo and Stitch. I made his costume out of a blue sweatshirt I bought at Goodwill. I cut removable vinyl for Maddy's Lilo costume. Ian wanted to be an Axolotl. S0me poeple got it but most people had to ask what he was, and you better believe he had some facts to to share about his favorite animal.
Trick or treating started at 5 in our community. Scott took the kids and the neighbor kids and I handed out candy with my slide. Rylan asked if he could have 2-3 friends over to play a scary video game. We always give Rylan a hard time about trick or treating every year so we were happy for him to do something else. I bought a ton of candy for them and snack food. I made mummy dogs and they came at 5:00 to start playing. It was going to take a couple hours to get through the game together. Our neighborhood is so fun during halloween, people put up lights and play music and parents drive into our neighborhood to send their kids to go trick or treating. I think I went through about 600 pieces of candy total, and I was trying to give out 2 each. The upright freezer we bought last week had styrofoam pieces on the corners, the kids and I taped them together to make a slide that was about 8 feet long. I cut holes in the side and put string through and tied it to the porch railing. I sat on my porch and picked up candy with tongs and slid it down the chute. I think the kids thought that was pretty fun. I ran out of candy at about 7:45 pm, and the trick or treating was supposed to end at 8:00.
The kids painted pumpkins:
Rylan had a somewhat limited band season. They still learned a song but were not able to preform it often because of the compittions being cancelled.
One one of their last perfomances at a football game, they paid tribute to the seniors moving on and they figuratively passed the torch on to the juniors. They usually light candles, the seniors have lit candles and they light the juniors candles and give them some words of wisdom. They couldn’t be close enough to light candles due to Covid so they knighted the juniors with dull swords. Rylan thought that was pretty awesome.
Bo had a growth on his ear removed and had to wear a cone. Bo was super confused and frustrated with the humongous cone they put on him! He kept bumping into things and he obviously couldn't see below him. Scott had to carry him up the stairs because either he felt sick from the medicine or he couldn’t see the stairs well enough. We all took turns coddling him and rubbing his back trying to comfort him. He has 6 stitches on his head right on the crevice where his left ear meets his head.
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