Playing at Frances Slocum, Spreading Mulch, and Pictures of Our House and Property

Samantha: 107 Months, Week 3
Aedan: 74 Months, Week 2
Owen: 31 Months, Week 3

Sunday, May 3rd was going to be a gloriously beautiful, summer-like day. It reached a high of 77, and we wanted to take advantage of the weather and get outside. Since church is online, we can technically watch it whenever we want to, so instead of spending the morning at home and inside, we decided to head to Frances Slocum State Park to hike around for a little while, let the kids ride bikes and scooters around the parking lot, play baseball with Owen, and even let Aedan try out his new roller skates that he got for his birthday. We had such a fun time being out in the sunshine, and there were not many people there, so it was a great way to spend our morning together.

Ben was throwing a little plastic baseball for Owen to hit with his plastic bat. Don't you just love his little baseball hat as well? He looks so adorable, and he was having a blast playing with Daddy. Ben even got some action shots as he threw the ball to him.

While Owen and Daddy were playing baseball, Samantha and Aedan rode their bikes all around the parking lot. Since we went to Kirby Park to ride bikes on Saturday morning and Aedan did so well, he was very eager to ride again. He put his knee, elbow, and wrist pads on so that way he would be protected. However, as he rode around and realized that it was safe and he didn't need to be afraid, he actually decided to take off the pads. I was so proud of him, and I'm glad that the pads helped give him the confidence he needed to get back on his bike again. Samantha loves to ride her bike, and I think she was glad to have Aedan joining back in with her.

Aedan was just as excited as we were for him riding his bike again. Here are some videos of him riding. In the first video you can hear him calling out to me, "Mommy, look at me, Mommy!" We made a really big deal out of how proud we were of him being brave and not letting his fear keep him from doing something that he really enjoys.

After we got our fill of playing outside, we went back home for lunch and getting Owen down for a nap. Then, Ben and I got to work on spreading more mulch for the rest of the afternoon. He would do the hard work of shoveling mulch into the wheelbarrow, then pushing it up the hill and dumping it to where we needed it in our landscaping. Then, I used a rake and a small shovel, but mostly my gloved hands to spread the mulch around and make it look even and nice. It was a lot of hard work, but it was a beautiful, sunny day outside, so it was a great time to work outside. We got all the front areas of landscaping mulched, so across the front of our house, and then most of the large area going down our driveway, which was much more difficult due to the steep incline of the ground in that area. However, here is our finished work for the day, and I was really pleased with how it looked. Putting fresh mulch down really made all the colors of the plants pop and gave it a much more finished look to it.

The big kids played outside most of the afternoon, and Owen joined in when he woke up from his nap. In fact, we talked to our neighbor across the street for a little while, and she invited Samantha and Aedan to come over and see their chickens. They were really excited about that, and they spent most of the rest of the afternoon chasing their chickens around the yard. I was able to talk to her for awhile as the kids played in their yard. Owen came over once he woke up and had fun going on the swing set and running around their yard. It felt so good to actually interact with people and see the kids running around and having fun. It was kind of strange at first, and you could tell that Samantha and Aedan weren't sure if it was okay to be that close or to stay and play. In fact, the neighbor girl grabbed Aedan by the hand for him to come and play with her, and he looked at me with a scared look in his eye as if to say, "Is this okay, Mommy? She's holding my hand." I said that it was fine, and it was crazy how excited they were just to be able to play with other kids since they haven't been around anyone but our family since March 13th. It was very refreshing, and a welcome relief to reach out to our neighbors.

Since Ben and I were working outside all afternoon, (in fact, I even got a sunburn from working outside wearing a tank top), we didn't feel like making dinner so Ben just went to pick up Wendy's instead. Then, that night after getting the kids in bed, we decided to use our fire pit again, for just Ben and me. The kids are more interested in eating s'mores than they really are with sitting around the fire for very long. We got a shipment of wood delivered to our house on Saturday evening, so now we have plenty of wood to use for fires. We also ordered a package of fire starters to help us out so it's not so frustrating to get the fire started. It was a beautiful day of being outside pretty much all day. It was fun and productive and warm, a perfect way to spend a Sunday.

As we got in bed that night, I noticed this paper folded up and waiting on the shelf at the head of our bed. Ben opened up and started reading it, and we both almost died laughing. Samantha really loves animals. For awhile she was on a kick about wanting a rabbit, and now after spending the afternoon with the neighbor's chickens, and having them offer a few of them to our kids, she was really wanting to build a chicken coop in our back yard and have our own chickens. Her letter is pretty convincing and persuasive, don't you think?

Monday was back to our typical routine of school in the morning. At one point during the morning, Owen brought this Star Wars book out into the kitchen, or as he calls it, "Star Horse." He loves looking at the pictures in these books almost as much as Aedan does, and it made me smile how he was talking about what was happening in the book and saying, "pew, pew, pew...uhh, uhh, uhh..." He is very animated and he has learned a lot about Star Wars during this time of of big brother being home from school. He makes me laugh every day.

Ben and I had the goal of finishing the mulch by the end of the week, so once getting Owen down for his nap, he and I went back outside to do more work. We finished the area down the edge of the driveway, as well as the curved area along the parking spot down by the road. We got another dump truck load full of seven more scoops of mulch delivered on Monday afternoon, so we had even more work ahead of us, but we believed that we would have enough to finish the rest of the landscaping areas. I know that I'm including a lot of pictures and videos of our experience mulching, but it was a lot of work for Ben and me to accomplish, and we felt very proud of ourselves for working hard and we really liked the finished product. Also, I want to be able to look back at these pictures come spring next year so that way we can remember what we did. Plus, I just like having these pictures of our house and our property.

As you can tell, we hadn't put mulch on this area, but I wanted to take a picture of this brick area that I uncovered when I was pulling up weeds. This whole area on the hill up to the kids' play set was overgrown and full of weeds, so I decided to see what was underneath. I first discovered the section on the left and noticed that there were actually some plants growing. Then I noticed the bricks surrounding the edges as well as brick steps off on the right side. It will be interesting to see what these plants grow to look like. I figured I would just wait and see what happens this summer after uncovering it from all the overgrowth, and then maybe next year I will think of planting new flowers or plants to fill in this section.

I know I sound a little bit like a broken record, but the rest of the week really was more of the same. We did school work in the morning, with more weeding and putting mulch out in the afternoon. The weather was a little cooler and cloudier some days, but we took advantage of the clear weather we had to get as much done as we could. Some days I was just out by myself while Ben was inside doing work with the kids, or we tried to work in the afternoons while Owen was napping and Samantha and Aedan were playing together either inside or outside. I was getting a little tired of the work after awhile, but it was also kind of nice spending time working outside. It was often very peaceful and quiet, and I find that doing physical work like that helps to clear my mind so I'm not really thinking of anything in particular, and it gives my brain a nice break from thinking about everything that is going on in the world right now and thinking about the future.

Samantha is continuing to work on her city project packet, and on this day she had to come up with two businesses that would be in her fictional city. She decided one would be Wallace Park where people could enjoy time outdoors, as well as a store called A.N.F.S., which she said stood for Allegheny National Forest Store, which would sell camping supplies, clothes, toys, and more. It was interesting to see what she would come up with, and she was enjoying expressing her creativity through this project.

Wednesday morning Ben took over doing art with Samantha and Aedan because they had Mother's Day projects they were going to make for me, since Mother's Day was coming up that coming Sunday. Aedan made the first picture, and as you can tell he drew me in green because that's my favorite color, and he drew himself in orange because that's his favorite color. (He's very creative when coloring, drawing, or making up his own crafts, but he tends to do the bare minimum when it is something he is being forced to do.) Nevertheless, I thought his picture was really sweet.

Samantha did a very nice job coloring hers, and I love the things she wrote about me and how well she really knows me. I'm glad she enjoys it when I scratch her back and that her best memory of me is when we were riding horses together back in the fall when I took her out on a date. We will have to do that again sometime when things start getting more back to normal.

Samantha also made an egg drop for Innovation class that day. She wrapped it up and put it in a little plastic bag, with Darth Vader included, and then attached the plastic bag to a plastic grocery bag to act as a parachute. They were allowed to use plastic eggs as well filled with some kind of objects to weigh it down, so Samantha used beans. The parachute helped the bag lower down easily, and the egg did not break open when it hit the floor.

I'm not sure what it is that makes me feel more over things on certain days than others, but on Wednesday night I was in one of those moods where I just wanted everything to be back to normal and I wanted this whole thing to be over, but then I also felt a little nervous about getting back into normal life, whenever that happens, and the chance that we could catch the virus or that things could get shut back down again if infections increase again. However, since the stay-at-home orders were going to be lifted for Ohio and Indiana and soon in a good number of counties in Pennsylvania, we decided we were going to take a trip to Upland, leaving on Sunday and staying for about a week. We have basically been around our house, not really even going to Wilkes-Barre very often, for eight weeks, and I was really excited about the idea of getting away from home and everyday life for a little while. We won't be doing anything really different there, just staying at their house, playing outside, and going on walks and bike rides around campus. But at least Ben and I can have a break every once in awhile, and the kids can have more people to play with and give them attention. Plus, it's nice being at other people's houses because you don't have the constant burden of things you have to do around your own house like cook, clean, do projects, and things like that. Ben and I also decided we would like to sneak off to Indy to get come carry-out food at Chuy's or something like, just to be somewhere by ourselves and have a little date. I think this trip out of town will be a welcome break to all of us, and we were eagerly awaiting the arrival of Sunday so we could head out of town.

On Thursday the kids had a few assignments that were a little different than normal. Samantha was reading about different types of art, particularly using different materials. She was supposed to make some of her own art, so she used some of our dried beans and made the shape of a person.

Aedan was doing a game on the computer where he could build words with a short a sound, so I would give him a word off the list, and he would use the mouse to drag the correct letters into the spaces. He does an excellent job with tasks like this.

Then, since they were reading the story "The Little Engine That Could," Mrs. Weaver encouraged the children to make a train out of different food items at home. We got out some graham crackers, mini-marshmallows, and Smarties, and Aedan made this very long train engine. Very creative!

On Thursdays Samantha finishes up her spiral review for the week and sends it in to Mrs. Richards. She is always happy that it's Thursday because they usually have less work on Fridays, and it means the weekend is finally coming!

Samantha had a math test to do on Thursday for her work, and I sat by her as she worked in case she needed any help or clarification. This was the only problem she was stuck on, and that's because the arrow wasn't pointing very clearly. Samantha did a great job learning this new material on angles and measurement. It amazed me that she is understanding and following along so well, given that she is in a 4th grade math class and can keep up just fine. I am super proud of all the hard work she has put in not only just this year, but also during this time of doing all her work at home.

In fact, the third quarter recently ended, and the kids were largely given the grade that they had once school ended in mid-March, in addition to a one to three point extra credit assignment that they were given the option of doing. We were excited to see Samantha's report card posted online and Aedan's report card when we received it in the mail. They both have done a tremendous job adjusting to this new school in a totally new city and state where they didn't know anyone. Aedan was rated + for all areas this quarter, meaning he is meeting expectations in everything. He is really catching on quickly and is doing so well at reading. At Samantha's old school they did a standards based report card and really didn't receive traditional grades on anything, so getting used to receiving letter grades was different for her, but I think it was good for her to see more tangible evidence of her progress and success. She has had an A average every quarter, it is almost at a 100% in everything this quarter. She has been challenged in both the workload and responsibility at this new school, and she has definitely risen to the challenge. We are very proud of the hard work both of them have been doing.

Friday was a day to wrap up some of Samantha's work for Gifted, planning the Transportation, Shopping, and Dining that would be available in her city, as well as create an example of a billboard for one of her stores.

Aedan just finished up a week of comparing measurements of height and length, so he had to pick a couple of animals from a video he watched, so he picked a giraffe and turtle. We looked up the average height and length so he could add them to his picture.

With our plans to go out of town on Sunday and the cold, snowy weather that was expected to come on Saturday, I wanted to take advantage of my time to get the rest of our landscaping mulched on Friday. Ben took over doing school with the kids that morning so that I could work outside in the morning before it rained that afternoon. He would get several wheelbarrows full of mulch and dump them for me and then go back inside with the kids, and I would get to work evening it out and filling in gaps until I needed him to come back up and get me more. I forget exactly what areas I did when, but I know on Friday we finished the area around the bushes and cherry tree, the area next to the brick steps near the play set, the area along the steps by the garage, as well as between all the flower bulbs that I planted in the area right by the driveway. It took me most of the morning, but I was done by lunchtime, and it felt so good to say that we were all done with the mulch. Here are final pictures of all the areas we mulched. I think it looks really nice, and even though it was a lot of hard work over the last week, I'm glad we decided to put this black mulch down. It made me feel so accomplished to complete this large of a task, and something that I knew nothing about how to do before we began to tackle it.

We still have some mulch leftover, so part of me is thinking about putting some out in the area near the road where there are some bushes and plants and some bare areas of dirt. However, I'm not quite sure we would have enough to do that whole area, and I haven't even begun to make sure that is weeded, so that will have to be a project I think about tackling once we get back from Upland.

Here are a couple pictures I took of Owen that afternoon before I put him down for his nap. His hair is getting so long, but it's the perfect length for his right hand to twirl around in the back. Isn't that little smile so precious, though? He likes to see himself in my phone when I take a picture.

Since it was raining that afternoon, Samantha and Aedan took the chance to play with Legos together in the basement. They were enjoying playing with Aedan's new Star Wars Legos, in combination with all the other Lego people they have created. They came upstairs to show me this base plate full of Lego people with Obi-Wan Kenobi laying in the middle because he died and they were having a funeral for him. Do you see how many of them have light sabers? These kids are so funny with their obsession with Star Wars.

Saturday, May 9th was actually a pretty cold day. In fact, it actually snowed on and off all day. However, we spent the day doing laundry and getting packed up for our trip to Upland. We wanted to have as much done and packed as we could on Saturday so that way we could just get up and leave as soon as we got dressed and ate breakfast.

Aedan had been waiting patiently all week to build his Spider-Man plane with me, so he was really excited when I suggested that he and I build it together on Saturday afternoon. He really is very good at building Legos and following the directions, but every once in awhile he puts a piece on the wrong direction or not connected correctly and that throws the rest of the build off, so he needs a little guidance, but not much. My job was mostly just to get the next pieces ready for him, and to check as he went to make sure he wasn't making any small mistakes. He was so excited to build this plane, as this was a Lego set he had been wanting for a long time.

Here is Aedan demonstrating the doors that open and close on the plane, as well as the hatch that opens underneath so Spider-Man can swing out, or in this case, so guys can just fall out. Aedan has so many cool Legos now that he almost doesn't know what to play with! 

(Blog about May 3-9, 2020)