What's Been Going On: Thursday, 10 February - Sunday, 13 February, 2022

 Monday, Monday! How are you, friends?

I had a really productive weekend and am feeling, in general, a little more optimistic about things. I managed to get all the things done that I needed to, in order for the upcoming week to run smoothly- AND I even got a nap in there!

I struggle a bit when major life changes come around; it takes a little time for me to adapt, and that’s how it’s been with being thrown into homeschooling. My daughter is doing really, really well with academics; she’s able to focus well and pay attention and stay on task (and I make sure to notice when she’s getting antsy and take a five or ten minute break so she can get the wigglies out). She’s feeling pretty betrayed that the schools were forced by the lawsuit to drop COVID protections; she’s hurt and confused as to why the adults in charge aren’t willing to keep the kids safe, and I completely understand, because I feel the same way. I think this is why she’s been such an eager participant in our homeschool activities. She doesn’t want to go back, which is sad.

But we’re doing okay, and things have been going well around here! Here’s what I did during the second half of last week.


Thursday, 10 February, 2022

I got dressed, had breakfast and coffee, then scooped the litterbox, and then we were off to the doctor! It was an appointment with my physiatrist, whom I see about my back. Just a follow-up after my last set of injections, which really helped. She did prescribe me a new medication for the neuropathy I get in my feet (I think I also have Raynaud’s in my feet, which doesn’t help; my feet are a mess…). While we waited, my daughter and I read a book about chemistry. (The doctor agreed with me that it was nuts for the schools to remove COVID mitigations right now.)

At home, I threw a cup of black beans into the Instant Pot, and then we started on math. We took a break for lunch, did more math (in order to catch up with where my daughter’s class is right now), and then we did our 30 minutes of Read Harder (for me, reading American Literary Almanac, edited by Karen L. Rood)/silent reading (for my daughter; she’s reading a Geronimo Stilton novel). And then I dozed, because I was really, really tired. School was shorter today because of my doctor’s appointment, which I had scheduled pre-homeschooling. I have a few other appointments coming up like that; we’ll just take school with us, like we did. :)

I filled and ran the dishwasher, then prepared a batch of beans and rice, and visited my favorite homemaking blogs. I tidied and swept the living room before dinner, then did my Duolingo afterwards. I biked for thirty minutes, showered, threw a batch of white beans in the Instant Pot for the next day’s dinner, wrote my Friday post, put my daughter to bed, and read. My husband and I watched one episode of Deadly Women.

 

Friday, 11 February, 2022

After breakfast and coffee, I edited and posted my Friday post and got dressed. I emptied the dishwasher, then it was time to sit down and start on math with my daughter. She. Did. AWESOME.

Her school uses the Eureka curriculum and I love it so much. It makes math so much more intuitive than the way I learned it at her age; she’s already able to add two sets of three-digit numbers in her head, and she doesn’t sit and cry over math like I did. (That’s not to say that math always goes smoothly, but she very much knows what she’s doing and understands the processes in a way that I never did in school.) I actually enjoy doing these lessons with her. We took a short break afterwards so I could load and run the dishwasher.

We worked on grammar next, a lesson on possessive pronouns, and then we read more about plants, and finished our book about garbage (which gave us some really good ideas for projects. Stay tuned!). After lunch, I made a batch of Cauliflower Potato Soup with the white beans I’d cooked the night before. I unloaded and reloaded the dishwasher, cleaned up the kitchen, and took out the compost and recycling (my daughter was still eating her lunch during all of this). I tidied and swept the living room and swept the kitchen, then we headed upstairs to tidy up my daughter’s room, and I put away a load of laundry.

We settled down for our 30 minutes of Read Harder/silent reading. I threw a load of laundry in the wash, folded a set of clean sheets from the laundry room, and then we snuggled up for art class. My daughter LOVES art, and I’d given her the choice of activities earlier in the week. She had really enjoyed a fiber art project earlier in the year, so she chose to start learning how to cross-stitch with one of the kits she got as a holiday gift this year. She’s only seven, so it’s going to be a while before she’s ready to do this independently, but I’m happy to help her learn. Lots of good memories to be made together here. Here’s what she accomplished today:

 

We did two chapters of Making Thirteen Colonies (The Story of US) by Joy Hakim, and then we were off for a very cold, windy, sloppy two mile walk (shorter because the path around the pond would’ve been a wet melty mess!). At home, I switched the laundry and folded one load.

I did my second hour of volunteer work for the week, blended the soup, and folded another load of laundry. After dinner, I did my Duolingo, put away a load of laundry. and switched the wet load into the dryer. I showered, put dinner away, and put the dishes in the dishwasher. I worked on my knitting, and virtually attended my synagogue’s Shabbat services.

My husband and I watched one episode of Deadly Women before bed.

 

Saturday, 12 February, 2022

Uh, so, the night before, I’d forgotten to take my new medication, and my feet bothered me all night long. TERRIBLE sleep. HMPH.

I had breakfast and coffee, and then, despite being exhausted and having massive bags under my eyes, it was time to dive into the day’s projects so that the upcoming week could go smoothly. I took my dried mushrooms out of the dehydrator, then chopped and put the remaining mushrooms in. I put away a load of laundry, then folded and put away two more loads. I showered my daughter, and then we did another math lesson.

This one didn’t go quite as smoothly as the day before, but I think that’s because she was hungry and getting easily frustrated, so we took a break in the middle for lunch. We finished up afterwards, when she had a full tummy and a better attitude, and then I lay down for a nap.

When I got up, I felt sluggish and gross, so I did a 20 minute yoga video (no walking outside, since I think the high was something stupid like 15 degrees F), and then I caught up on some things on the computer. Dinner was leftover soup. I did my Duolingo and biked for thirty minutes, then showered and put my daughter to bed (we finished reading Anne Frank: Behind the Diary by Ruud van der Rol and Rian Verhoeven. I didn’t read the last few pages to her, though I read them myself. She knows Anne didn’t survive, but she’s too young to know any of the more grisly details at this point. I read those pages myself when she went to bed so that I could complete the book). I read my book- still slowly reading Invisible Child: Poverty, Survival and Hope in an American City by Andrea Elliott- and my husband and I watched an episode of Deadly Women. I remembered to take my new medication and slept well this night!

 

Sunday, February 13, 2022

After breakfast and coffee, I did a few things on the computer, and then it was time to get to work! I emptied and reloaded the dishwasher, then collected yesterday’s dehydrated mushrooms into the bag- I have about 2/3 of a gallon bag full of dried mushrooms now, ready to add to soups and be rehydrated for other dishes. 

I then hauled the sewing machine upstairs in preparation to sew my torn bedsheet.

 

Yeah. It was a bad one.

I could NOT get the sewing machine to cooperate with me. I don’t know if it was something I was doing wrong (this is probably the most likely answer) or if there’s something wrong with the machine, but nothing I tried made my stitches turn out right. Not straight stitches, not zigzag stitches, the tension was messed up on everything. I’m going to have to play with this a little bit with some scrap fabric and figure out what the deal is. I ended up stitching the entire rip by hand, down and back again. It’s not perfect, but it should hold, and really, that’s all I care about!

 

By the time I finished sewing, it was lunch time. Afterwards, I got to work finishing the second knit square for my friend’s memorial blankets. I watched some YouTube videos while I knit. It’s been ages since I knit anything where I had to pay close attention and count while I knit, but this was a good project to get back into that. I think they turned out well. (If you haven’t seen my last post, my friend, who passed away last month, LOVED spiders. These squares are going into two blankets, knit and crocheted by our friend group, for her two kids, who are almost the exact same ages as my kids.)

 

With my knitting finished, I headed to the kitchen and prepared a breakfast casserole for dinner, with onion, garlic, peppers, and zucchini thrown in, then sat down to work on this post. After dinner, I did my Duolingo, then biked for thirty minutes and showered. I put the no-longer-ripped sheet back on the bed, then I put dinner away and filled and ran the dishwasher. I put my daughter to bed- we started reading Tales from Shakespeare by Charles and Mary Lamb- and I read my book. My husband and I watched an episode of Deadly Women before bed (and I kept waking up through the night. Hmph).

 

That’s it! Really, not a bad weekend. I had been worried, since I had so much to do, but I got everything on my list done and still had a bit of time to do other things. Being that productive feels good.

We’ve got an exciting week coming up, with something special coming up on Wednesday, so I’m looking forward to that! Happy Valentine’s day, friends!