The J6 Journey: Year 5, April 17th-19th, 2020: Changes in the Weather

Ouch. Changes in hormones, weather patterns, same shoulder pain, seasonal allergies and a 36 hr migraine because of all of those, ouch. But I managed to put away most of the other groceries with Abishai, put through a load of laundry and put it away with Justin and Keturah's help, feed my family leftovers with a few extras that Jared put in, go over homework (slowly and surely), straighten out the last of this year's school books, and prepare the books for next year, including summer reading. Yup, got it. Oh, cut dog nails, call the Math U See people to switch out the teacher book for the student book, and run the dishwasher, all the while, most women would be in bed. Yup, but that's life. The migraine part is the worst because I can't get any comfort. It seems to be decreasing, but it's taken three doses of meds, lots of essential oils, and lidocaine roll-on. Kids had Bible class, Benaiah had math class and dealt with his computer and talked to Ava. Abishai pretended to be swimming by putting on a snorkel and googles (it has been raining all day). Justin played with Luke and Chad and friends on Fortnite and with his other homeschool friends. Abishai watched Captain America: Civil War. Keturah is watching Disney Plus of some kind. And now they are all watching Star Wars: Clone Wars.

Now, I'm hoping I feel a ton better tomorrow because, we have 4 days in a row of 60 degrees and no rain, so, the men will work on the bench, and I will get the other kids to do a bit of the clean up. Then hopefully on Monday we'll pull everything out of the garage, sweep, put the bench in, and then get all the tools on it. And the rest of the junky cardboard boxes of Jared's stuff can go away. That's what I hope. I may or may not get the chance to finish labeling bookshelves. I need to read for school and Bible study, too. Oh, and we could get the washing machine looked at, too. We'll see how it all works out. I don't want to spend too much time on here, but do some reading tonight and catch up fully on videos. I'm almost there. Oh, we got our stimulus check, yeah! Benaiah was too old to qualify as a dependent, so that's why it was different than we expected it to be. I wonder if he'll get his own as an individual. He is watching his bank account to see if he'll get something. We'll see! I know some are giving a bunch to charity. We'll put some of this in retirement and maybe spend it on other things like a mother's ring? More curriculum? Who knows. But I do think we need to put it into something because it might affect the kids' medicaid. Anyway, things to think about.

And, Lisa Strunk still wants to go ahead with the graduation open house for the boys since her family will be in town. I think she's assuming everything will be back open by then. I'm not so sure, and even then, I'm not sure it's wise. I hate to do that to them and us, but Benaiah is staying home until then, so I don't know if that will break his quarantine or not or whatever. There's talk about opening things back up in a few days to weeks and I don't think that's a good idea either. We aren't going out until about then either. We'll have to play it by here. I was hoping it would be postponed because I haven't worked on Benaiah's photos yet. I think now that I have curriculum sorted, and we'll be slowing down on school soon, I'll have time to ramp up the preparations. Sigh. We'll see.

And now it's more like 36 with no signs of stopping.

I did all the things today, slowly, but I kept moving. Sitting around makes me more depressed and moody.

Little man had me take off the helicopter skid so he could put wheels on. I had to google what the landing ear was for a helicopter and typed in "helicopter legs." Uh, don't do that. Actually, there's some models of helicopters with adaptive type landing gear but it makes the helicopter look like a spider or something. So weird!

We only walked around Aldi and Meijer yesterday and I got all my steps in. That's why grocery shopping is tiring for chronically ill people.

My very eager helper putting away the vegetables and fruits. And then he helped bring the rest of the groceries in as I wiped them off.

Man, my camera messed up again! But yes, that's like 18 avocados, two bags of mandarin oranges, a bag of pears, a bag of apples, and a bag of grapefruit. Not sure that will last a month but we'll see!

6 green peppers, 3 bags of min peppers, a bag of onions, one bag of regular carrots, two bags of baby carrots, two english cucumbers, 3 things of tomatoes, garlic, two bundles of celery, 1 bag of spinach, 1 head of lettuce, and 1 bag of romaine lettuce.

That looks a little better stocked with real milk, almond milk, grapes and 3 dozen eggs, plus leftovers.

This part had 3 totally empty shelves. I was so proud of us for using almost everything! Now it's filled to the brim again, well, almost.

These will last maybe 4 days once they are ripened.

Abishai came up with a game with the empty boxes from the fruit snacks and granola bars he dumped in his special snack drawers. He lined them up like bowling pins and chucked the other empty boxes at them. He played with them for 30 minutes or so.

Then he made them target practice on the piano.

Peek a boo! I caught you on camera! He said he's wearing socks so his toenails don't hurt anyone because they are too long and could scratch someone. Lol.

The last of the books for the year, at least until the library opens and find out I have more than I need waiting for me.

Sorted and ready for next year. Again, silly camera and my quick movements don't match up. I need to get a crate for Abishai's stuff, but that's his pile in the middle! I'll be officially homeschooling three kids again!

And I was able to combine a couple of boxes and give him his own pencil box. We won't be buying many supplies again this year. We are pretty well stocked at this point. So happy, excited, but sad and anxiety producing all at the same time. This is my last chance to do it well. What if I mess up again and he hates school, too? What if I don't stretch his brain enough and he's just average? What if it's a struggle? All the questions and all the feels. But yes, we are somewhat ready about 3 months or so early.

Saturday, Covid-19, Day 30 (Wow! Day 30 since Jared started working from home!)

Ah, that's better. That first day of a monthly cycle with it's headache and cramps is a killer. But today, I was more my normal self. I still have a headache, but it's more like a rebound headache. I took some tylenol this morning and have powered through the rest of the day with a little headache. It did warm up today, so the men put together the work bench and it's in place! (See pictures below). I rearranged a couple of things after I had a few ideas of where they could go. I still want to do a full pull everything out and sweep and vacuum, but we can do that on Sunday, Monday, or Tuesday and the middles can help. I probably worked too hard but that's ok. We but things in the trunk of my car to be given away and put recyclables in the van. That freed up some space. Then I gathered up some misc outdoor chemicals and things into the wheelbarrow so they could easily be moved to clean. I brought in my mother's rocking chair and the ball pit, while putting the rolling crate for balls out to the garage where I originally intended for it to be. I tried to condense a bit of my packaging materials, which, again, is mostly being saved for the boxes still at Gary's house and will be recycled if need be. Benaiah's old mattress needs to go in the shed, but we pulled it outside for a bit and then back in the garage for now. The goal is to get the drum set out in the garage. But in order to do that, I need to come up with a way to keep it clean besides just the sheet. Plus I want the shelves to be more available with maybe one thing in front of them, not several layers of boxes. I.e. I want more floor space so we are going to take down the table with got from the Cooks and used once. We will keep it, but it was only being used as a horizontal surface, as we typically do, to hold things. It takes up a lot of real estate on the floor. So, it's coming together.

I also weeded in the flower bed (there was just a few weeds) and pulled the nasty vine that is choking the bush near our bedroom window. It's already been a long battle with that vine, and we'll need to keep working on it. But it is getting there. Abishai worked on his on projects, Justin went to Grandpa's house to work, and Keturah wandered around as usual asking for tablet and sugar. I went over the last bits of Justin's homework this evening before supper. And then everyone had screen time after supper, per our rule of no screen if it's nice outside. The kids did run around outside and on the trampoline, too, after supper until 7pm. Even Jared got on the trampoline for the first time in 6 months! Yeah! Oh, and I did the reading I needed to do as well, first thing this morning because if I had procrastinated, it wouldn't have gotten done. We had turkey breast cooked in the crockpot, mashed potatoes (from a box) and fresh veggies for supper. It's awesome having fresh food in the house again, although the real milk is already gone. We'll let Benaiah get milk (we'll pay for it) if he goes to the store, but other than that, fake milk it is.

Now we are all exhausted and there's not much to say. I've heard rumors that the governor is making plans to reopen some businesses as early as May 1st, which is two weeks from now. And so people on all sides of the opinion train have been out in full force today. And so I'm glad I was not on social media that much today. I'm tired of the arguing. People are going to do what they are going to do. We will isolate until the end of May, when we might still have Benaiah's open house our co hosts won't change it unless the venue is still closed. That means, I need to book it on getting photos ready. Beyond that, I think Jared and I will still not go out as often as we did before, which wasn't often at all. We might stay home from church if they continue live streaming or wear masks and definitely wipe down carts and groceries more often. I know it's hurt the economy. But sometimes, that's what it takes for people to really think about what is necessary, their lifestyles, their careers, their families, etc. I'd have them isolate for longer just for those reasons! But they won't. You know, these are laws that are in place. Maybe mandates, but you can't be fined or thrown in jail for not doing them. A cop might stop by to break up the party, but it's not a law approved by legislators so how is it violating your rights? It's not. We choose to follow the recommendations. And because you don't, we'll isolate for even longer. We don't know if/when Gary will feel comfortable traveling again. But I do know that all his May events were canceled or set up to do online. Anyway, I guess the wisdom of a few might just save the lives of many this time around. We isolate for your sake, not just for our own. It's not the end of the world. It's saving lives by postponing a rush at the hospitals for ventilators and beds. The virus won't go away, but it's slowing the spread so that everyone can be taken care of. Big business can just wait to have their profits back. CEO's can give up their big salaries. This isn't about them. People can retool and get a different job. Anyway, I could go on and on. We've made our decision and the six of us are home and going a little stir crazy.

We had a fun day and it was good to get out in the sun!

Finally! I'm finally almost caught up on my YouTube channels! I've probably deleted about half of them (and unscubscribed to some channels), but there's multiple families I follow that put out almost daily content and it's hard to keep up! It's not that important to keep up normally, but I was anxious to see how the Covid-19 was changing their routines. Anyways, I can't remember how I got so far behind, but yippie!

Hm, no action in this scene. But Abishai was insistent in helping Daddy fill the bucket by dumping it all in at once. H also pulled the empty bucket out of it's corner spot in the pantry all by himself and then pushed it back in there when it was full after we got the other stuff out of the way.

Cuties. He loves to wear that pool floatie around the house, too. And Keturah brings out her kiwi or hamburger round towel as a blanket when she's cold.

Peep Jousting challenge by Kidustrial Park. Two peeps with toothpicks.

Mircorwave for 20 seconds....oops! Too long and too far apart! Let's try that again!

Two peeps, two toothpicks, 15 seconds....

And Abishai's peep is the winner (the peep that melts the fastest will drop it's toothpick onto the other one.)

After a minute or two. Yes, they still ate the peeps.

Finally! A stretch of warm days so we can get this done! Of course, Jared didn't start until after a greasy breakfast he ate at 10 and then Benaiah showed up at 1. But, it got done.

I always forget before photos, so here's a progress photo. Doesn't look much different from this side.

The ball pit is gone (from bottom right) but all that stuff is Jared's tools, paint, etc.

Tools on the bottom, misc. big stuff on the right and upper right. Middle stuff may or may not move. But I want to get all the tools up, then take everything else OUT then sweep, then put back. Remember, I never actually saw the garage empty because I wasn't here when the first load of boxes were unloaded. I didn't get any empty "before" shots after we purchased it. We saw it once when people still lived in it and we bought it. So, I'm excited to get this hodge podge mess cleaned up.

Mattress will go into the shed. Misc. repackaging boxes will be used or tossed, and picnic table from Cooks will be taken apart and stored. I moved all the giveaway stuff to the trunk of the car and recycle stuff to the van. Now there's just a few big easy fairly easy to move items, vs. the multiple trips you have to take with little things.

Mommy, I need to plan, where can I get paper? I told him he could get the paper that was above the printer that was misprints. Instead, he found the bucket of newspaper and junk mail that is ready for recycling beside my desk. And he got my pen. He asked me to help him figure out how to build a dog house for Socks. So cute! He kept the paper and pen in his workbag. Oh, and he found his other garden/work glove in the dress up box. He was so excited about that! My little hard worker.

Not sure what to label all of these here, but I figured today of all days was a good day to get trigger happy and document the whole process. It's a pretty simple table with plan Jared made up in his head. Not fancy, but usable and solid like our playground in Beech Grove was all his idea. It wasn't a kit.

Drawing up plans is hard work and Abishai needed a snack break. I'm loving having our nice sidewalk and the mulch all nice and neat out front, plus our little sitting area. Definitely feels like a proper, nicely taken care of home.

Watcha doin?

Oh, hiding from Mommy I see. I found you!

Hard at work, from sunrise to sunset. I think he and Socks got a proper workout in today.

This one? Working hard or hardly working? Well, he claims working hard, and for the most part that is true.It's just not nice when he tries to compare how hard he works to how hard I work. But we did file his first official FAFSA yesterday to Ozark! Yeah! And he decided to stick with Ozark because it's a small city, CIY is there, and there's more opportunities in general.

Always climbing. Always. It will be fun trying to teach him, that's for sure. That's why we are practicing now with a couple of pages of work and then letting him quietly stay in the room when I do read alouds.

Where'd you go? And what's that smell? You bubbled!

Can I see your face? Nope, just a hand.

He was talking to Keturah who was hanging out her bedroom window, so I caught him peeking!

Now, this is how it's done. I sit, they work. Actually, I had just worked for 2 hrs. And I forced myself to stop so my shoulder isn't sore tomorrow.

Ah, this is the life.

Hey, why don't you roll down the hill? What hill? This hill! I'm glad he had long sleeves and long pants on because I think grass and hay bother his skin. We think our front lawn is chemically burned and thus gets super brown in the fall and crispy. We haven't figured out how to help it yet, although I think Jared has tried to put some fertilizer on it. I think we might need the soil tested or something. For now, it just means less mowing. And neither us, nor Gary mowed today because it had been so cold this week that the grass didn't grow much.

Putting the legs on.

Bottom shelf. It's much wider than I thought and I was a little nervous at first, but wait until you see it in place.

Just the right height for little guy and a ton of 5 gallon work buckets.

Almost there.

There's this new things called "whipped coffee." I think you can do this with regularly brewed coffee but my friend said to do it with instant. I used 2 tbsp of instant coffee, 2 tbsp of water, and a bit of sugar. Whip on medium for 5 minutes and it comes out like this. I had to bring out my hand mixer because my stand up one doesn't have a beater. I can purchase one separately, but haven't yet. I should because making real whip cream and icing would be awesome!

It's best for cold coffee, so you add ice cubes and milk of choice (preferably a cup).

Then you mix it. Oh my word, it was so bitter! I forgot how much I don't like instant coffee! I had to had a ton (2 tbsp I think) of sugar and some vanilla just so I could drink it and not waste the almond milk. Blech! Nope, not trying that again. Anyone want some instant coffee?

Fitting on some chair leg pads to even it out I think. One leg is a tad shorter than the other or something.

Carefully watching the process. Abishai saw me taking photos, so he ran to get his camera! Monkey see, monkey do. That's why it's so important to model good behavior1

Thank goodness Jared is finally back to his baseline with his sciatica and do this while Benaiah is off from work and school! It only took 4 months to get better!

And it's in place! I think it's a bit high, but I don't think Jared plans to do much "work" on it except maybe things like the painting he did for Gary's Christmas gift. It's basically a shelf, not a work bench. And I'm hoping between it and the cabinets above it, we can keep his tools in check. I think we might have to take out those salt bags, but we'll see. We didn't do it tonight because the top needs to be screwed into place and Jared was hungry and tired by this point. It takes us a few days to do projects like this because of our physical and time limitations.

Trying to get out of the corner.

Free standing. I don't think he's screwing it into the wall because of the boards that are being stored there. Now, I have no idea where the boards will go when I put a fridge in between the door and the bench, but we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.

Benaiah literally tossed this piece of wood up to adjust it in his hands. He says they do things like that in the workshop at church all the time. Eek!

Oh that red stain Jared keeps buying and then saying he needs to use it up! Actually, it's like the red clay of PEI. I never realized that until just now as I typed this. Interesting.

He's such a goofy kid.

Mommy, I've watched 3 of these! Yes, on Disney Plus he has. He's really gotten into watching the movies on the tablet when it's his turn. He might not sit through a whole movie, but eventually he finishes them I think.

A storm trooper with his ducky climbing. What's wrong with that?

A little more difficult, especially on the way down, but he made it work!

More jumping.

He missed big brother Justin who was working at Grandpa's house. Wrestle time! Whoops! He farted on Justin's chest! Justin actually INITIATED asking Grandpa if he needed help today. Justin has a Lego set he wants so he needs to start earning money for it.

I missed you big brother!

Where are you going with that? He wanted to sit in it. He put it together himself.

Mommy. I want this Lego set and can you put this on the list wish. Thanks.

Shaggy dog. I'll have to cut his bangs at some point. Justin is able to sweep his out of his way. And the cowlick is super strong with this one.

Crazy static hair tonight.

Wowzers!

He's already going stir crazy. My poor extrovert. Making us laugh with all his crazy sounds.

Family jump time.

Showing off their moves. Keturah did a front flip in a nightgown!

Daddy got to jump for the first time in 6 months!

7 pm and this kid is still a bundle of energy. And he was barefoot like the other kids.

Socks got tired quickly. Poor thing. Abishai kept calling him and all he wanted to do was hang out by someone's side.

See! I moved a lot today! I did NOT go for a walk, but need to tomorrow or the next day. Yeah!

Lazy Sunday, Covid-19 Day 31

We got up, I took a shower, went to church, resumed our bickering, had lunch, went for naps, I went for a long walk, had screentime, watched the youth group "After Show" where the staff ate baby food and Zoomed in the Monahan family to do a trick shot, and watched more TV. Yup. oh, and Benaiah spent 3 hrs on Ava's lawn, texting us back to ask if he could hug her. We said no. We also talked about his open house. He doesn't care. He thinks it's fine to do it as planned if the facility is open. I'm hemming and hawing. Jared doesn't really want it this soon, but he won't join in the conversation to push the issue. So, I have to make the decision. I'm pretty sure what I want to say, but I want to make sure it's non emotional so I'll wait a couple more days. I also need to consider my needs and what I will regret or not regret doing through this. Because Benaiah doesn't care as much, then it's up to me. It's my party now, I'll make the decisions and makes it happen. I think I need to pray more info out of him as well. He just wants to move on. I want to put a stake in the sand and say, "WE, the parents, the church community, the counselors, the friends, have accomplished this." He thinks he did it himself. He does realize we played a part, but he thinks he's the one who got himself through high school. Well, sort of, but only because we were behind you encouraging you, taking you, paying for some of it, teaching a class, etc. So, I want to celebrate everyone's contribution. And I'm not ready or comfortable to do that in May. Maybe August before friends go back to college, maybe September when it's cooler. Who is going to stop by? The adults that have helped raise you. Maybe some friends, but really, he has cut off a lot of people or haven't cultivated that many relationships. So, I suspect that number will be smaller than I first thought. You see, his dad did the same thing. Jared was so done with school in general that he didn't go to his senior prom, he doesn't remember having an open house, he just didn't care. I, however, had a private graduation, delivered a speech, had my favorite worship music played, had cake and punch, and I remember some of the details. And I finished well, with my highest grades then and when I graduated college. Don't peter out at the end of the race. Finish strong! Let's go!

And that's what we plan to do in our homeschool. 15 days left until 180. And we have 5 weeks of our history book, so I think we'll continue on and finish this time. The historical figures are decent, but I'm ok if we don't do much with them. Then we can dive in next year with the mid 1700's and American history (after colonization). We have to continue on in Math and Science anyway. Let's finish strong this year while we can! But tomorrow and Tuesday, we'll be outside, maybe plant some seeds in a planter, maybe help Daddy set up his workbench, maybe take everything out of the garage to rearrange it. We'll see! No groceries or counseling this week, so I'm a little freer. The new book from e2 is delivered here on Thursday and Jared says he will ship out about 2/3 of them, so that will be his project I bet on Friday or Monday.

Anything else? Not many pictures from today. Abishai threw a fit when he couldn't have tablet time during the sermon. He pouted through most of lunch. But, we finally got him to break down and laugh. He doesn't stay mad for long. It goes against his very nature.Yup, not much else.

Worship Around the World Video #2

Another week, another online Smitty concert. Worship Around the World. I only watched part of this (on the replay) last night. Same songs he usually does. Nice setting though. He's at his Deer Valley Farm studio.

The rest of the gang. Everyone records separately and an engineer pieces it all together. I wish Jim Daneker had more lighting in his studio. I've seen his pics of his studio before. I think he has a dozen or so keyboards in there. Insane!

Stu G

Jim Danaker

Drummer for the last 10 or so years.

I can't remember who he is.

Back up singer for the last 2-3 yrs.

Back up singer for a couple of years.

I like the way that you can have different people on the screen in different ways. Some video engineers are making a killing right now with all of these videos that are being put together in short order.

I've seen the studio a few times in bits and pieces of the behind the scenes for songs or video clips.

Aw, can you imagine having the same pastor for all these years! Well, some of you do. I think Gary was my pastor for 20 years.

Down the hill from us is a little creek that separates our part of the neighborhood from another part. We don't have a neighborhood name other than this is "New Bethel" thus the "New Bethel Ordinary" (Pizza), however it's in the town of Wanamaker, so it's call confusing. I don't know who exactly owns this land though. I walk down here and then turn around because I don't want to be out on the main road. I know some folks have come over from our northern neighborhood because I've seen people that I've never seen before.

I miss seeing the landscape as it changes during the seasons.

Yup, I had no idea what Indiana was like until I lived here, but this makes sense. Basketball movie "Hoosiers" and lots of famous players and the NCAA Hall of Fame. Lots of corn grown here. Indycar of course, althought that race is postponed until August. Tenderloins is a pork tenderloin that massive, like it hangs outside of a hamburer bun on all sides that is coated and then fried. And sugar cream pie is exactly what it sounds like. Very rich and sweet. I've had it once I think.

Flashback to 5 years ago. Makes me wish I had taken that picture this morning of Abishai on Jared's lap during singing time. Hey look, Jared is actually wearing his rings! He doesn't like how his rings fit or rub off on his fingers so he doesn't wear them anymore. Someday I'll make a stink about it. "Oo, buttons!" Yes, we started him off early, just like we did with the other kids.