Nice week for being outside

This week the weather has been nice, warm but not hot in the middle of the day, and cool but not super cold in the morning and evenings.  Matt took advantage of the nice temperature and took the kids to a hiking area after remote learning on Monday that they learned about when they hiked on New Year's Eve.  It is call Reservoir Canyon and they really enjoyed the hike. Just enough of a hike to get moving but not a long commitment.  There is a waterfall and a cave.  Matt took this cool photo of Olivier at the cave entrance that reminds us of the cave in the Miss Peregrine's books they have read/are reading.  

And this is from outside the cave looking at Olivier in the same spot.  Gives you an idea of how dark the cave is!

Today we decided to go back and check out the hike together as a family.  It was so nice out!

I went in the cave and took this photo of Mason just outside.  

And Anna looked really cool in this rock/tree chair.  Very important!

It has been a good week.  Still looks like everything is on track for the boys to return to modified in person instruction on March 8th and Anna on March 15th.  It will be a bit of a juggle, at least while we sort out how traffic will be at pickup and drop off, but a positive step.  More people are getting vaccinated, including some of our parents, which is a positive step in moving forward.  Tomorrow we may head to a park and play some bocce ball!  

Happy Birthday Matt!

Today we celebrated Matt's birthday!  He is the last in our family to celebrate a COVID birthday.  And to think last year on February 22nd we ate at a restaurant, inside!  So weird to think about things like that now.  

We love you Matt and wish you all the best!  And there is a very chocolatey cake in front of him made by Anna but covered by the sign, oops on my photo taking!

Closer to going back to school in person

 On Tuesday the school Board had a very long meeting (we did not attend or watch).  They were considering the reopening plans for the district and after a lot of consideration they voted to move forward with reopening in accordance with state guidelines.  There are a lot of mixed emotions since the teachers and staff at the schools have not been able to receive COVID vaccines yet and the schedule is far from ideal in order to accommodate physical distancing but it will be happening.  

We still don't know what their schedules will look like but we do have an idea on the timing.  It looks like the boys will start back on March 8th and, if things continue improving, Anna will on March 15th.  Of course there are still a lot of unknowns that we are waiting on but overall we are hopeful for a smooth transition.  We had been a bit closer to a firm date for the upper grades but one of the key factors in allowing them to return slipped a little so the measurement period has to be restarted.  Thankfully the cases have been much lower so it should happen.

The building for work has been making good progress and this week they delivered the steel supports.  This was the site Monday afternoon.

And this is Friday morning.  They were really cranking and it is exciting to see the building taking more shape.  

We enjoyed a quiet weekend as the kids get ready for a full week of class.  After two short weeks this week will seem long!

Lots of Love!

This week was a four day week for the kids which was nice, and next week is too!  Matt and the kids went to check out the local lake one afternoon and it was nice to get out of the house.  The schools have been asking parents to take "school photos" for the yearbook.  We took them but still wonder about how a yearbook will work in these very odd times.  

On Wednesday I attended the vaccine task force meeting and it continues to be an emotionally tough meeting with so much need and so little availability.  

On Thursday night we had Chinese food (or at least a version that the kids would eat, far from the real thing but we take what we can get) and decorated Friday morning for the Chinese new year!  Our house has a lot of red and ox decorations.  We did some research with the kids on traditions and is have been fun to learn about traditions from different cultures.  

On Friday we got a message from the district that the school board will be meeting Tuesday and the recommendation to them is that K-6 reopen on March 8th and 7-12 reopen on March 15th.  It would still be limited in person (half day) for those that elected to go back to in person instruction.  And the school board could decide to do something different.  With COVID cases in our county going down significantly (thank goodness!!) we aren't totally surprised by this news but it will result in another adjustment that we have to figure out to our schedules.  And until we see how drop off and pickup really works we won't really know how our schedules will work out which adds to the the uncertainty.  

In order to support the kids in the uncertainty, especially for Anna, we decided to go walk around the junior high to get a feel for the campus layout since she will likely be on campus in a month and has no idea what the campus layout is.  After we did that we got hot cocoa/tea.  The sun is nice but the wind makes it rather cool.  Still no more rain since the crazy rain storm.  

Today we are having a nice quiet Valentine's day.  We have much love to be thankful for!  

Quite start to February

 I don't have much of an update for this week.  We didn't get any additional rain which is a bummer but might also be a good thing given how much we did get in a short period of time, it allowed time to do some clean up in areas where they had mudslides.  It has been fairly normal temperatures.  The number of COVID cases in our County has been a a fairly consistent but not alarming amount.  Vaccines are progressing but the County was allocated under 1,000 doses for next week so it is very slow going.  School is showing no changes in the near future and work is working around that schedule.  

I guess it is a week of no news is good news!  We are preparing for the Chinese New Year on February 12th.  Ready to clean out the old and bring in the new!