Day #8 Corona Virus Quarantine  March 24, 2020

Today our guest writer is our beautiful, kind hearted and smart 9-year-old daughter Ellen.

Today is our 2^nd day of homeschooling.  So far I like it because we have no homework and I don’t like it because we don’t get to see our friends.  Today we watched a virtual zoo and we learned about black rhinos.  The coolest thing I learned about them is that the rhino’s favorite food is strawberry jam and that it could paint.  We each got a turn with Fletcher again.  He’s not the best listener but he will get better. I am starting my specialty state project tomorrow.  I have to pick a state to study and then present it to my family.  I am not sure which one to pick yet.

My favorite part of the day is playing volleyball in the barn.  Today I worked on my serve.  I added a little jump to it to try to jump serve to help me get it over.  I felt like I was stronger at it today.  We did yoga this morning and it was so hard.  I thought yoga was just stretching, but apparently not.  Fiona said at one point “I feel like my muscles are going to pop out of my skin”.  It felt good to be done!

We spent a lot of time with Gi Gi outside.  She can be wild, but she’s a sweet little puppy and I’m glad we have her.  Overall, I think our quarantine is going pretty well.  I just wish it would get hotter.  I like hot weather better.  Today I am thankful for my family, our house, food, water, clothes to wear, and my pets.

Love, Ellen

Fletcher’s addition since her refused to write the entry…My favorite part of my day was having breakfast and riding my bike.

Highlights of mommy’s day:

Right after breakfast…Fletcher: “mommy are we going to cancel school today?”

Day #2 of homeschooling went pretty well…I suppose.  We had a few meltdowns and all the kids realized that Fletcher is a challenging student…but at least they will learn patience.  Right?  I hope…

First of all if you haven’t checked out the Cincinnati Zoo online, do it immediately.  They have 20-minute animal zookeeper chats where they teach you about animals.  Today the kids listened to a session about black rhinos.  The kids loved it and were most impressed that these animals can apparently paint!  The zoo left the session with an art project, which the kids enjoyed.  We made it a contest, Finley was our winner!

We attended mass this afternoon for a friend who needed some extra prayers today. It felt good to be at mass and teach our kids that sometimes other people’s problems are so much than our own.

Can’t love all the time outside enough.  The dog helps with this because if she’s outside I know she’s not peeing in my house.  Why do puppies have so much pee in their bladder?  Anyone?  It’s out of control.  Send help.

She looks cute here but she can do some peeing.

Also a huge fan of the letter writing activity each day.  They write the sweetest notes. My favorite are the ones they write to each other!  I got a nice one today as well…  shout out to Aunt Jenny who had the idea to begin with!

These letters are just the sweetest.

Cooper’s letter to his brother…it’s incomplete here but the finished product was quite sweet.

The barn has become my sanctuary and I will make it my personal mission to beat Cooper in pickle ball, because, yes, he beat me again.  Don’t have a lot to compare it to but holy moly…he’s amazing.

The girls ask to play volleyball everyday and I love that.  I never force them or ask them first, they always ask me.  I would never want to push my love of the game on them, but the fact that they love it makes me so happy.  They are becoming quite the little passers.  The best part is how hard they are working and the joy it brings them.

Each one of the kids wrote some goals to accomplish while in quarantine. The goal sheets were amazing.  I decided that it would be better to write a few goals each day so we are going to start that tomorrow.  However, Finley did write on his original goal sheet that he wanted to make 100 shots a day.  Today he made over 300.  He was pretty excited that he crushed his original goal.  If anything good comes out of this crazy time it is hopefully that kids learn the only thing we can do is control what we can control and hard work and a positive attitude are at the top of that list.

Didn’t get one of him shooting but he also did some dribbling drills.

I don’t want to paint the picture that each day at the Dorsey’s is a perfect day where we all skip about the house hugging each other and crushing personal goals (although I did suggest we add hug time to the day…didn’t get the reaction I was hoping for).  We have all kinds of imperfections in ourselves and in our day.  For instance, today Ellen lost her mind because she was trying something new and couldn’t figure it out easily. She ran off, yelled at me and lost her treat after dinner as a result.  I tried not to laugh to be honest, because I totally get it and I’m right there with her.  New stuff is hard and frustrating. I am learning that with this whole on line learning I am embarking on with my own students.  I am trying not to lost my collective crap while navigating a whole new style of learning.  All I can do is laugh at Ellen and laugh at myself when I feel overwhelmed and know that we will both figure it out in the end.  Good news is that she wrote me an apology  note…another way that letter writing thing is working out!

We shall see what happens as things are going to start getting a bit busier!

Praying for you all!  Stay well!

#celebr8awesome

#dorseyshenanigans