Birthday celebration in the COVID circle

Papa turned 69 this year! Nana had some great birthday-themed costumes for everyone.

As we celebrated, Nana got a call that Papa had some drive-by birthday well-wishers!

 

Daily Schedule

 Our current situation, with everyone at home all day, requires some structure to the day. Within that structure is flexible times (creative time, quiet time, outdoor time), but we have found that having a general structure to our day has been important as we transition to learning from home. It keeps everyone sane and on task.

Virtual school begins

After a week of spring break, the kids have "returned" to school. While the original plan was to do a few weeks of school at home and then return, it turns out the the COVID pandemic is a lot more long-lasting than hoped, so the kids ended up doing the entire 4th quarter of school from home. We set up different work areas for each of the kids. Jacob and Claire, on their own computers, were able to work from their desks. 

The 3 youngest kids take turns on the computer. There isn't a whole lot of instruction for them through the computer, about an hour or two per week, so they are able to share without an issue. There isn't a lot of new instruction happening, but it is good for the kids to have some school work to do.

Kate and Liam's music teacher had all the kids one day dress up for their school play. The kids had a fun time singing along, and then at the end, he let everyone unmute themselves to say hi to each other - it was complete chaotic joy for the kids!

All of that said, all of our kids are excited to go back to school in person.

COVID 26.2 - A "socially distanced" marathon

While we were in Gatlinburg, I got notification that the Kentucky Derby Marathon was cancelled due to COVID. I have been training for months for this, which was going to be his first, so I was pretty bummed.

This week's run was supposed to be a 21 mile run, but I thought there was a chance I may go ahead with the full marathon, and a few miles in, I was feeling great, so I decided to run the whole thing. Every few miles, still feeling good, I confirmed that idea. Finally, around 21 miles in, I texted Dani and said, "21 down, 5.2 to go." She immediately had the kids quickly make signs and tried to locate me on Find my Friends.

The found me just as I turned back on Pfeiffer for his last half mile. Liam accompanied me up and down Hunter's Knoll to the finish.

Ending time: 3 hours 45 minutes, exactly the goal I had set for myself! 

Gatlinburg 2020 - the beginning of a long spring break

With the COVID virus beginning to spread throughout the world, we had to make some adjustments to our spring break plans. Fortunately, we were able to go on spring break. While we originally planned on doing activities like a Pirates dinner theater, mini golf, a mountain coaster, and other typical Gatlinburg activities, those didn't seem like a great idea.

So, instead, we hiked - a lot. Our cabin backed up to the Great Smoky National Park and a trail, so we did some trail runs. Jacob, joined Jared and Dani on a run down to the visitor's center and back up the hill - the up hill was quite an effort! On one run Jared took, when he rounded a corner, there was a bobcat on the trail about 75 feet in front of him!

 

One day, we drove a long ways into the park into Cade's Cove to hike to Abram's Falls. It was a beautiful drive near mountain creeks. The hike was a beautiful 5+ mile hike through woods and near a stream down to Abram's Falls. The kids were good hikers.

 

The waterfall at the end was worth the hike! 

The house was perfect for our family. The cabin was quite new - it opened to guests only a few months earlier. We had a lot of fun just being in the cabin. Downstairs, there was a video game in a barrel console that got lots of use, especially by the boys.

We sat on the wrap-around porch to eat sometimes, to sit and read, and to just enjoy the woods.

 

There was a hot tub downstairs that we enjoyed a few times.

We also watched some movies as a family. The kids discovered "Secondhand Lions," which they thought was especially funny as they compared one of the characters to Grandpa John. We also watched the Narnia trilogy. Liam was really into it and couldn't sit still.

The downstairs became our puzzle table - we made a couple puzzles as a family, led, of course, by Claire!

The driveway getting to the cabin was super steep. One day, we decided to run hills, going down to the bottom and running back up. Everyone joined in the challenge. It was seriously a big, steep hill!!!

The one activity we decided to do was a horseback ride. We went after some rain, so it was pretty muddy, but it was a fun ride. A lot of the ride was through areas of the forest that had been burned recently in some of the large wildfires in 2016.

One day, we drove up to the Appalachian Trail (since Jared has been listening to the book "North" about the Appalachian Trail). Unfortunately, the view wasn't very good because the clouds were very low that day.

After the drive, we took another 5-mile hike up to Alum Cave. The trail had some fun features, including a little area like a tunnel through some rock. There was a great vista of the valley below where we stopped on the way down for our lunch. The cave itself was not so much of a cave as a large rock under-cropping, but it was neat to see.

On the way down, Liam came up with the idea of a video game he wants to create called "Forks and Knives, Battle Royale." He spent the last 2 hours of the hike constantly talking about the different characters, the cheese grater, the can opener, etc, and the different levels and bosses. After getting back to the cabin, he started drawing out his characters as well.

One day, we went to a park in Gatlinburg to play disc golf and to play at the park. The course was nice, and the park was a great place to get away from the crowds.

We even got to see some bears! We drove up to Ober Gatlinburg to see the view, and on the way down, Dani noticed a mama bear and her 2 cubs walking right next to some condos on a hillside.

Gatlinburg was still bustling, but as the COVID outbreak worsened, more activities began to shut down. While on our spring break, Great American officially closed their offices and transitioned to everyone working from home. Jared needed to be on some calls to arrange this. Additionally, Sycamore schools closed down and will begin learn from home as well. It was a little bit unsettling not knowing what the environment would be when we returned. We were grateful, in any event, to have chosen a destination that allowed us to be outside and with our own family.