Our Week - The One with Quarantine, Week 16 & Summer, Week 6 (4th of July)

Well, quarantine has been going surprisingly well these past few months, but last week we all hit a wall.  Nothing earth-shattering or bad happened, but our little fam all seemed to get in some sort of funk at the same time.  (Well, not Brian… he doesn’t ever seem to experience funks.  Must be nice!)  I think all of these weeks of staying home and not seeing many friends or family finally started to take its toll, and there wasn’t much we could do but wait for it to pass. 

I always get in a funk right around 4th of July anyway, so my funk was right on schedule.  Early July is the point at which the novelty of summer starts to wear off for me, probably because the weather starts reaching excruciating temperatures on the daily, so that’s the point at which I decide I’m done with summer and I’m ready for fall.  Throw in the pandemic and the fact that we can’t go anywhere, and it’s a recipe for disaster… all we can do is stay inside our own house because it’s just too hot to be outside during the day!  In addition to my usual funk + the pandemic, Jacob and Olivia, who get along like 99% of the time (yes, we know that’s really rare and we are really grateful for that), fought like cats and dogs all last week, and that definitely didn’t help matters.

However, we’re starting out this week on a much better foot, and I’m hoping that means that the funk has passed (although, my longing for fall has not – ha!).

Monday, June 29 (Day 108 of Quarantine)

Monday started out pretty good.  I had an appointment with the eye doctor, finally!  I was due back in February but failed to make my appointment until March, and as you all know, that’s when things fell apart and everything closed, so my appointment was canceled.  In addition to the pandemic, I was in the midst of switching to a new eye doctor for the first time in probably 15 years, so procuring new contacts without an appointment was a bit of a struggle.  My new eye doctor is very popular, and therefore, hard to get in with, so by the time they reopened in early May, the earliest he could see me was the end of June.  Shew. 

I’m happy to report that he was worth the wait!  The facility is so nice, the staff is fantastic, and the doctor is the most thorough I’ve ever had.  He’s also hilarious, and we also discovered that we know a lot of the same people because we both graduated high school in 2000 (although from different schools).  Which brings me to… this visit made me feel exceptionally old because I think this is the first time ever that I have seen a doctor who was not older than I.  How is it possible that someone my age can be a full-blown doctor?!  Last time I checked I was still 25.  ;o)

I had to have my pupils dilated for the first time in years, so I struggled driving home, but I did stop by Chick-Fil-A to grab lunch for B and the kids.  Olivia received some mail from her BFF, Becca, and that completely made her whole afternoon.

I spent the rest of the afternoon working while the kids played and watched TV.  After dinner, B and I took the kids to the culdesac at the end of our street to practice bike-riding.  Jacob was not remotely interested, and it put him in the worst mood, but Olivia was excited to practice.  B was able to let her go for a split second a couple of times, but girlfriend just has zero balance and falls every single time.  Somebody please send help!!  After a very frustrating 30 minutes (in the sweltering heat, I might add – haha) we decided to ditch bike-riding practice, and instead, let the kids take turns riding the scooter while we took Maui for a short walk.  They love that thing!

Tuesday, June 30 (Day 109 of Quarantine)

Tuesday morning, Olivia had her Zoom reading lesson with her teacher, and then after that, the kids and I washed Brian’s and my SUVs.  We usually just run them through the car wash, but I figured it’d be something different for the kids to do and a way to spend some time outside while keeping cool.  It started to rain just as we were starting Brian’s SUV, but we went ahead and got it done.  Both vehicles look so much better, but we didn’t quite do as good of a job as the car wash does. 

After we washed the cars, we checked on our baby birds, and we were excited to finally be able to see their little beaks, although they weren’t holding their heads up yet.

It rained all Tuesday afternoon, so the kids built a giant fort upstairs in the play room (read: made a MASSIVE mess – haha) but it kept them occupied all afternoon.  I sat down to do some work around 3 that afternoon, and 20 minutes in, the thunderstorm knocked out the power.  The power came back on almost immediately, but our internet was down for about an hour, so I couldn’t get anything done.  Sigh. 

Tuesday evening, I was pretty frazzled after struggling to get my blog post up for the next day, so when the kids decided to be whiny and uncooperative during clean-up time I was done.  Thankfully, B took over and I went out for an hour long walk around the neighborhood all by myself.  That helped me clear my head, so I was in a much better frame of mind when I got back home.

We all watched part of America’s Got Talent, and then the kids went to bed. 

Wednesday, July 1 (Day 110 of Quarantine)

Wednesday morning, I walked into Jacob’s room to see the kids working on the activities my Mama Cass had mailed to them.  She’s been clipping the kids’ activities in our local paper and mailing them to us and the kids have loved it!  There are mazes and word searches and things for them to color…

After that, everything went downhill.  Everyone was cranky and the kids were argumentative, and I just had zero drive to do anything.  Mid-morning, I decided enough was enough, so I dragged the kids outside to get some fresh air since that usually helps!  I ended up blowing bubbles while they chased and popped them (Jacob with a baseball bat but, whatever works!  Haha) and by the time we were done everyone was in a better frame of mind. 

A storm rolled in as we were coming inside, and the rest of the day was spent reading on the couch, doing summer homework with the kids, and working.  I didn’t have a lot of energy and I also felt kind of nauseated, so it was a very unproductive day.  I did Facetime with one of my old coworkers, though, and he and I got all caught up on life and the recent goings on in the world. 

After dinner, we decided to go for a walk around the neighborhood since the rain had cooled things off.  I had discovered the previous day that the new build we’ve been stalking was finally framed, so we wanted to go explore it since it’s the only house in our whole neighborhood to have a basement.  It turns out, it’s our exact floor plan, but with a few tweaks – including a third car garage and a full basement.  BRB, moving down the street!  Haha. 

We watched the rest of AGT after we got home, and then the kiddos went to bed and B and I watched some more of All American and Sneaky Pete.  All American is so good, y’all!

Thursday, July 2 (Day 111 of Quarantine)

Thursday morning, I woke up with a bladder infection, and that actually made me feel better because that explained my lack of energy and nausea from the day prior.  I get them once every year or two, and I was long overdue, so it was time.  Thankfully, we have Telemedicine services with our health insurance, so I was able to schedule a phone appointment with a doctor right there from home, and they sent a prescription straight to my pharmacy.  Easy peasy. 

While I was waiting for my prescription to be ready, I tried to do a yoga workout, but I only got through about 45 minutes of the hour long workout because I felt exhausted and nauseous.  Apparently, my body was working overtime to try to fight the infection and it wore me out!  Luckily, my prescription was ready quickly, so I grabbed the kids and headed to get it right when it was available. 

I thought it would be good to get them out of the house, even just for a car ride, and they agreed to come if they could get cake pops from Starbucks.  Haha.  I ended up surprising them and telling them we could get Chick-Fil-A milkshakes instead if they wanted… they were ecstatic. 

We surprised B with a shake when we got home, and then I spent the rest of the afternoon working.  After dinner, I was feeling a little better, so we all went outside to play wiffle ball in the back yard.  It started to rain a little so our playing was cut short, so we headed back in to watch the very end of AGT and an episode of Be Our Chef.  Then, after the kids went to bed, it was more All American.  I'm obsessed.

Friday, July 3 (Day 112 of Quarantine)

By Friday, that nasty antibiotic had me feeling sick as a dog (anybody else get suuuuper sick when they take antibiotics?!) so I was on the struggle bus the second I got up.  Thankfully, B was off of work that day for The Fourth, so we were able to sleep in and then he went out and picked up donuts for breakfast.  We had initially discussed doing something special (outdoorsy where we could social distance, of course) since he had the day off, but since I was feeling pretty terrible from the infection and the meds I didn’t want to venture out too far.  We opted for the park near my mother-in-law’s house because the walking trail is in the woods, so it’s shady and cooler.  We walked for about a mile and a half and then headed back home, stopping by Zaxby’s to grab some lunch to-go on the way.  

The rest of the afternoon was spent laying in the back yard reading while Olivia played in the pool.  Brian pulled out his golf clubs to teach Jacob the basics since he’s been begging to go play golf.  We all showered later that afternoon and B and the kids played video games while I got some work done, and then B picked up Five Guys for dinner.

Friday night, we started a new show on Netflix that we’re all loving – Floor is Lava!  It’s exactly what it sounds like… a game show where people have to make it through an obstacle course and not fall in the “lava.”  We ended up watching three episodes that night and Jacob and Olivia are both obsessed!  It’s such a fun show to watch as a family.

Saturday, July 4 (Day 113 of Quarantine)

Saturday was July 4^th and we had no plans other than to shoot fireworks that evening.  Saturday was the worst day for me, unfortunately, and I had the antibiotics to thank.  I woke up long enough to eat breakfast, and then I had good intentions to read on the couch, but I ended up sleeping instead.  B and the kids played board games while I slept, and I woke up just in time to play a game of Yahtzee with them. 

Honestly, this year, I really wasn't feeling super jazzed to celebrate our nation's birthday anyway.  We're more divided than ever, our leadership is lacking, and too many Americans haven't taken the pandemic seriously, making us the world leader for Covid cases and deaths.  We're kind of the laughingstock of the world right now, and I just felt like that didn't necessarily need to be celebrated.  I'm confident things will change for the better, though, and I'm praying that change comes soon... it will be nice to be able to say that the "United" in United States actually means something again.

We had lunch and then spent the afternoon hanging out in the back yard, reading and playing in the blow-up pool.  Late in the afternoon, I went in and showered, and by the time I was ready, I was exhausted again, so I lay back down on the couch to read and… fell asleep again.  Two naps in one day… who even am I?!  Stupid antibiotics. 

Fortunately, that nap was just what I needed, and I rallied by the time my father-in-law and his friend arrived at our house with pizza.  We spent the whole evening on the back porch eating, drinking, playing Cornhole, and shooting fireworks.  Tons of people in our neighborhood shoot commercial grade fireworks every year so we end up getting a huge two-hour long show right in our own back yard.  This Fourth of July may have been the biggest and the craziest for fireworks in our neighborhood ever!  Obviously, the city didn’t put on their fireworks show, and neither did anyone else in surrounding areas, so everyone just decided to do their own.  It was insane, y’all.  Insane.

We spent most of the night watching from our back yard and then we moved to the front yard to watch our neighbors do theirs in the culdesac.  Our neighbors down the street almost blew up their house at one point, but fortunately, all was well. 

I normally dread 4^th of July night because people tend to do fireworks until at least 2 AM, but we were pleasantly surprised to hear the last of them in our neighborhood right around 11:15… right as the kids were getting in the bed!  Olivia didn’t even have to sleep with us that night!

This Fourth was definitely different than the ones in recent years since we normally throw a big party, but we still had fun, so that’s all that mattered.  Next year, I'm praying that our nation will be healthier as a whole, and then we gon’ throw DOWN to make up for this year.  I miss my people.

Sunday, July 5 (Day 114 of Quarantine)

Sunday we were all exhausted and B and I ended up sleeping in until 9:15!  We got up, had a quick breakfast, and then I did a nice, long dance workout before it was time to get ready for lunch at my mother-in-law’s.

We celebrated my brother-in-law’s birthday at lunch, and then spent most of the afternoon in the house since it was so hot.  We did step out into the garden for a bit to see how the fruits and veggies were coming along, but our time out there was brief.  Summa summatime temps are here and they are no fun!

We made a quick stop by Publix for some milk on the way home (the kids and I stayed in the car), and then the rest of the day was spent playing video games, getting some work done, and eating leftover pizza for dinner since my Momma and Daddy didn’t have us over for Sunday dinner.  They had to help my littlest brother move into his new apartment all weekend and they didn’t want to risk exposing us since they weren’t able to quarantine.

And that was our week!