Category: week in review

Another week of life under covid-19. This week, the kids were each back at school for one day each. Of course, not the same day, but that will likely happen in due season.

Another week gathered largely around the dining table.

When we visit grandma to make sure she’s looked after, the kids sit on the couch and do their homework. Puff is starting to adjust to how much more work there is at High School compared to Primary School.

Huff had a chance this week to show Grandma her skills at a new word game.

Dad and Puff went for a walk early on Mother’s Day to bring back breakfast for Mum.

Puff had made a special computer program for Mum to look at.

Here we are on a school night having pies for dinner – living large at home.

Another week of school from home (and Dad’s birthday). Weekends are a lot like weekdays. Heading into May, the weather has changed quite a bit. Puff still doesn’t seem to feel the cold, and prefers to get around in a t-shirt and, under duress, long pants.

The kids continue to get along much of the time.

Huff was playing an AI drawing challenge game, and invited Dad to have a go too.

Lots of TV watching in the downtime, but still plenty of reading and other activities.

Dad and Puff walked 4kms to pick up the car from the mechanic. It seems like it’s the blocks of time like that where it’s possible to hear (and try and answer) the important questions.

We’ve also taken a couple of times to go into the backyard and throw a ball around for a while. It’s long overdue, but it has been good.

In this season where everyone is over-using screens, it’s been good to have some sense of purpose: for us, it’s trying to make decisions that will have this time remembered fondly, not as a time of huge stress and fighting.

Huff made her first ever batch of Anzac biscuits; this is before they went into the oven.

It was a bit harder earlier on Anzac morning, watching the dawn service on TV.

Puff has had a good school holiday, and learned some lessons about keeping track of how much homework is set when you’re a high schooler.

The headphones and laptop has been a bit of a fixture these holidays, but we found a little bit of time to throw a tennis ball in the backyard.

And now tomorrow we’re back to school-from-home again (we had two pupil free days back-to-back for the start of term).

Isolation holidays continue, with everyone spending much of their time at home. We made some progress in tidying up the lounge room, but it’s slow going with every day looking much like the day before.

We showed the kids some new (to them) movies this week, including North by Northwest, Abominable, and Huff had a funny reaction to the start of the rebooted Star Trek movie.

Mum helped Huff bake and decorate cake while Dad was working.

Huff was very proud of it.

Her favourite part was serving it up for the family.

We’re currently trying to work out what the return to school will look like. Puff has a lot of homework to get through in the holidays, and continues walking up to the shops for exercise on a regular basis.

Another week of lockdown, but this one with Easter and the start of school holidays included. Dad and Puff went together on one of Dad’s 10km morning walks, pausing for a coffee at this ancient relic.

We had a bit of a search for Easter Eggs on Easter Sunday, for which the kids were very grateful – this in addition to the Sunday morning Easter Egg trail: the kids were this year more interested in making sure that Dad and Mum had a trail than in their own trails.

Church, and a lot of movie watching, are now in the lounge room. We’re working on a school holiday project of doing some tidying, even as Dad sits in the corner working much of the time.

Huff had a go at baking, with some help from Mum. Even though the cookie dough was placed in spheres, a comfortable social distance apart, they increased in size in the oven: a valuable baking lesson.

Puff continues his tradition of going for a short-ish constitutional walk most days: he’s growing up and having some extra freedom as a result.

More holiday-at-home hijinks next week.

It’s been a week of (largely) staying home. Schoolwork at home, often with headphones on.

Dad spent time on the weekend tidying up the backyard so the kids could make better use of it. Huff celebrated by setting up pillows and blankets outside where she could do some reading and other school things.

The kitchen sink was a place for Huff to do a science experiment (buoyancy), and Huff was reacting enthusiastically enough that her brother came to watch the end of the experiment – how many coins, after all, can a paper boat support?

We ended up watching a TV show at the same table where everyone has been studying.

Everyone is studying. One holiday project is to tidy up.

We would at this point welcome ideas for what to do to make the most of this time together. Dad has been trying to switch tasks between work and school supervision, trying to engage with the kids, but also to get work done. It’s a balancing act, but one we look like having many weeks to experiment with!

Stay safe everyone. 

We’re spending more and more time at home as the NSW regulations become tighter. Here’s a scene from a happier time where the kids could still wait outside at a cafe for a while (they’re in the same household, so hopefully we can put up with this breach of social distancing).

We visited Grandma again – Dad was working on more uni readings in some of the downtime.

Puff had a split drink

Huff took a lot of distractions with her.

And the kids sat outside for a bit at the hospital – with the new regulations there are limits on how many visitors can come in. Nonetheless, it was good to be able to take them for a walk for a while. Exercise is in shorter supply at the moment.

Huff is feeling a bit isolated from her friends at the moment, so braved the overgrown grass in the backyard to have a video chat with some of them – she was very happy to have that chance.

The changes and challenges continue. The kids are largely very well behaved during the day, but it’s been a challenge having everyone in the same space all the time – a bit like a rainy caravan holiday.

With the announcements around schools remaining open, but parents advised to keep their kids at home, we are now doing school-at-home for the foreseeable future. This will be an adjustment for everyone (and a serious workout for the home internet), but in the meantime, here’s last week.

We visited grandma in hospital – the kids still fit side-by-side in this fold-out armchair bed.

Huff’s classroom had ten baby chickens that needed looking after for the weekend, so we stepped up. It was a welcome ray of sunshine. Puff loves birds, so was also enthused about it.

Both kids were excited about having the chicks.

And Huff was excited that school was finished.

Another milestone has crept up: six hundred weeks! It’s a strange time in human history with the spread of the Corona virus changing things we’ve taken for granted – we seem to be only days or weeks away from school closures (Huff can’t wait, Puff would like to be able to see out the term so he can finish all his school tests) and there’s an uneasiness about spending too long in public places, and concerns about how virus transmission will happen.

In this midst of this, Dad had a weekend-long uni class in economics, so there was limited time with the kids, and not many photos.

 

Here are the kids relaxing on the weekend.

On Saturday night, we played payday as a family. Puff won. It was our first game.

Dad did the school run today in the midst of a work-from-home day, and Huff was super excited to show off – the school chickens! It’s a bright spot in a school day that is otherwise missing many of the most fun aspects.

Dad is trying to make the most of the time before uni classes start up again this weekend, so there was some bonus time with the kids. We waited for some takeaway drinks and then played in a park.

Then, while Dad was out watching a movie with friends, there were a couple of board game battles: Aunty C vs Huff.

And Uncle J vs Puff.

 

Sunday Dad and the kids went to Cronulla to go for a walk. 

Huff’s favourite part was walking on rocks. She was asking to walk on all the rocks she could.

We made it 6.5km back and forth near the beach, and then stopped for some dinner and dessert.

Monday afternoon (between work and a night meeting) Dad and Huff went for a quick journey on a double decker bus (the one thing Huff didn’t manage on the weekend). We had the top deck to ourselves for a few stops, then walked back, during which time Huff sketched out her plans one day to make quadruple-decker buses with personal butlers and serves of hot chips. Also hover chairs and elevators, and loan iPads, and personal notification service, and cloaking for jackets and scarves.