The Beach Family Blog: Week 8: Quarantine Blog

As you can probably imagine, life in week 8 has been a lot like in weeks 1-7... Not too much has changed, although our big news for the week is that North Carolina began it's Phase 1 of reopening, so we'll be watching that closely to see when we're comfortable getting out into the world again. I really hope it's sooner than later... the grown ups are definitely getting a bit restless around here!

____________________________________________________________

This week was teacher appreciation week, so after Ben made a card for his teacher, we took our weekly walk in the hood to go deliver it. He's become quite the little walking buddy these days!

____________________________________________________________

New records were set as the global death toll topped a quarter of a million people... and a few news updates for the beginning of the week...

____________________________________________________________

We're continuing to see some meat shortages, as it seems that meat packing plants are being hit pretty hard with COVID-19 cases... Good thing we stocked up on all our meat last week!

____________________________________________________________

Our Governor announced that "Phase one" of our reopening plan was set to begin on Friday at 5pm. The only real difference we can see in this phase is that more businesses will be allowed to open, and shopping can be at about 50% capacity, while social distancing still is in place and mask wearing is strongly encouraged (and in some stores, mandatory).

____________________________________________________________

Even though not much is changing yet, this is a good summary of what we can and can't do... We will be continuing to stay home through this phase, and keeping our social distancing when outside with friends.

____________________________________________________________

One of our favorite things to watch on Youtube has been this family's videos through the years... Their newest one takes on the questions of what is it going to be like when we go out again... It's pretty funny! Check it out!

____________________________________________________________

The memes are still coming in, and giving us some light-hearted moments in otherwise stressful situations!

____________________________________________________________

Ben started up with his special accelerated math stars group again, and they are meeting once a week to challenge each other! I used to teach this group in his class and I miss meeting with the kids, so it was fun to see everyone again!

____________________________________________________________

I slowed down a bit on my 1500 piece puzzle the last two weeks, but I finally got it done!

____________________________________________________________

I decided to try my hand again at sourdough bread, and this time I made homemade English muffins... They were WAY smaller than they were supposed to be, but they made perfect "mini" BLT's and egg sandwiches for lunch! As always, bread baking is quite a process...

____________________________________________________________

Our US death toll also hit a new record this week, topping 75,000... We're really hoping we'll begin to see this numbers go down soon, but it's going to be interesting to see how that happens as we begin reopening things...

____________________________________________________________

There is quite an economic toll that has happened, with news of many companies going bankrupt, and possibly not opening up even after we get back on our feet.

____________________________________________________________

And just in case we weren't worried enough about the Coronavirus, we apparently now have "murder hornets" to look out for! This world is getting a bit too crazy for me these days...

____________________________________________________________

But of course, with the new threat out there of the murder hornets, it's bringing on a whole new set of memes! :)

____________________________________________________________

And of course to add just ONE more thing... the cicadas which only come out every 17 years are making an appearance for us too! Yeah!

____________________________________________________________

And we're not just worried about getting rid of Coronavirus, but are also concerned now what a SECOND wave will look like... It might be time to just go hibernate...

____________________________________________________________

So to destress, I knocked this 750 piece puzzle out in one afternoon, to make it our 6th completed puzzle in the past 8 weeks!

____________________________________________________________

Saturday was a much needed family day... We all got in the car (for the first time since March 11!), picked up some Chick-Fil-A and drove to a wide open field near us to have a picnic. It was a bit cool, but but perfect windy kite flying weather, and we had a blast! (Good thing I remembered we bought the kids kites for Christmas two years ago, and I still remembered where they were!) Then we took a drive to the furthest ice cream shop we could find (they have great ice cream, and it helped pass the time!) It was a great start to my Mother's Day weekend!

____________________________________________________________