So I was talking to my sister this morning, and she encouraged me to start blogging again!
We've been in this COVID lock down situation since March. It's currently September. Hawaii is cray cray, and at this very moment we are under a very strict draconian stay at home order. No going to the beach, no visiting parks of any kind, no hiking on trails, no non-essential businesses, no dine-in restaurants, and no visiting with anyone other than the family or people that live under your roof. Like I said, it's a little cray cray. Of course we aren't following it to a T because that would be impossible, but we are feeling the isolation and boredom.
It does take a little bit of a commitment to chronicle life with three young kids, but I think it will be worth it.
I'm thinking I'll try to update once a week and talk about what we did the previous week. I remember doing this when my oldest two were little, and it's fun to look back on all our adventures and what we did to keep ourselves busy. These days there might not be as many adventures to document, but I'm sure we still fill our days with something.
I think I'll start with last month and document what we did in August (back when we were allowed to do stuff).
First off... school was supposed to start in person on August 4, 2020. So we decided that since we weren't able to go on our summer trip that we'd at least do an inter-island trip at the end of July. When that got canceled because Mike wasn't allowed to leave the island due to work, we opted for a staycation at Marriot before school started. We invited some friends along and thankfully they were able to come! We frolicked in the pools that were open, hit the lagoon, splashed in the whirlpool tub, ate lots of food, played lots of games, and watched lots of hotel cartoons.
After our staycation, school didn't actually start! It got pushed back to August 17, 2020 and was full distance learning. We were able to enjoy a few more weeks of summer. We hit the parks, did neighborhood walks, hit the beaches and even enjoyed a surfing date.
Then, on August 8, 2020 because of the increased COVID cases, they mandated a second stay at home order that crushed us. We had to get creative at home. Immediately, Emma hurt her head playing near the island in our kitchen. We weren't technically supposed to see friends, but we didn't exactly follow that directive. We had friends over to swim every now and then.
We went to all the stores that were open: Sam's Club, Costco, Target and Walmart!
Our neighbors even had their trees trimmed during the shutdown which was exciting...
I did a hair trim on Emma, we had a sleep over at Auntie Kim and Uncle Jordan's house, and a mommy daughter spa day with Color Street Nails.
I even got inspired somehow to make this little over-the-oven shelf...
School finally started (the week of the 17th), but Lily's day to meet her teacher was on the 20th. She went for a half day and learned the different platforms and how to login, etc. We did a week and a day of distance learning and then decided that we didn't care for the schedule. It would have been a great set up (if I didn't have two little ones at home), but because I did we found it rather tough. We switched to Abeka Academy after the first week and did it jointly with her friend, Lyla. The first day of school was still pretty exciting though :)
We did lots and lots of crafts this month. My girls love crafts of all types! Painting, string art, coloring, stickers, bracelets, beads, etc.
Our good friends bought a house in our neighborhood, and we've been loving taking afternoon and evening walks to each others' houses. Mike also helped Alex with a lot of the renovation. They completely redid their kitchen (including taking a wall out) and their front bathroom.
Of course we had church days as well which have been our saving grace. Not literally, because that's Christ's role not the church. Anyway, I digress. Church did not get shutdown this time around which I'm very thankful for. Overall, we got through it. It was tough in the midst of it, but now in hindsight, it's easy to see Christ's sustaining hand on our family. Here are a few others of our garden, school set up, PE, and a painting project Mike had the girls do. I'm glad August is behind us and look forward to the FALL...
