Once upon a time, I kept a monthly blog for six years. Then we moved…and the baby days faded…and the blog fell to the wayside. What can I say? Life got in the way. No regrets.
But then you know what got in the way of life? A GLOBAL PANDEMIC.
Yep, hello 2020. You are a strange little year, aren’t you? Here you go, taking all the toilet paper and canceling school. What a jerkface year you have been. Yet, our family is incredibly fortunate – as our jobs can be done from home and our kids are “easy” – but it’s still hard. I can be thankful and sad at the same time. It’s a roller coaster.
Part of MY therapy has been getting a new cat (more later) and sorting through the overwhelming amount of new – or newly found – resources on the internet. I thought it would also be good therapy to start writing again. I plan on jotting down some of our activities during this strange time – and giving my reviews of some of those overwhelming online resources. I’ll give links to the ones that worked, and I’ll give links to the ones that crashed and burned. I’ll also provide a handy scale:
SCORES TO UNDERSTAND PANDEMIC IDEAS DURING THIS INCREDIBLY MINDBLOWING EVENT (the S.T.U.P.I.D.T.I.M.E rating scale)
1: Don’t even click on the link. It will sound good, but just don’t.
2: It was okay. If you need to kill some time during a global crisis, do it.
3: The kids enjoyed it, but it was a pain in the…
4: The kids enjoyed it and Mom enjoyed it.
5: Totally click. This might have just saved my sanity.
The 2020 Covid 19 Time Capsule: Writing Activity
the S.T.U.P.I.D.T.I.M.E rating scale – 2
If I had fifth graders, this would have gotten a much higher score. But my sweet 4 & 7 year old boys did not have the enthusiasm for documenting this time in their lives. I might make it mandatory later, but it just seemed like forcing something that no one was in the mood for. I also took off the cover, as it was just too cute. I imagined finding a colored journal called “My Polio Diary” or “My Adventures through Smallpox” and it just made me feel weird. Here are some highlights from my boys’ reflections:
Rapping Fox in Socks
the S.T.U.P.I.D.T.I.M.E rating scale – 5
If you have ever fought your way through this book, please enjoy. Seriously. Stop what you’re doing. Rap to Dr. Seuss books with Dr. Dre instrumentals. Why haven’t you clicked on this link yet?!
Melting Crayons into Crayon Pucks
the S.T.U.P.I.D.T.I.M.E rating scale – 4
Do you know what’s more fun than crayons? Melting crayons into giant chunks of crayons! The hardest part was actually taking off the crayon wrappers. TIP: let them soak in water before peeling. Ben got into this much more than Freddy, and I was shocked at how long he engaged in tearing paper off of crayons. I liked the final product more than the kids – but really, they aren’t big into coloring anyway. I might do this again without them.
Sending Hugs in the Mail (No link, but a billion similar things on the internet)
the S.T.U.P.I.D.T.I.M.E rating scale – 1
I thought this was a really nice idea until we made them. It was fun to do, but wow – that’s some depressing crap right there. For Valentine’s Day – cute. For a pandemic when we don’t know when we will see grandparents again – hold my glue stick while I weep. Or, as my husband responded in text: “Dang. This is sweet and some dystopian future YA novel crafting here”. So we sent painted cards instead.
Our school district has been doing a great job of providing links and resources during this crazy distance learning experiment, but I’m extremely thankful that the lessons are “voluntary”. I am able to pick and choose and modify to my heart’s content. This option also lets me trick my son into learning….like how his writing assignment today changed from “Write about people in your community” to “Nintendo desperately needs to you design a new Mario power-up”. Speaking of, Mario has become my co-teacher in other ways….
Scrabble Math
the S.T.U.P.I.D.T.I.M.E rating scale – 5
Back when I taught fifth grade, I would throw this in as a random activity – it’s super easy to change the difficulty. However, I had totally forgot about the awesomeness of adding up the letters of words. Ha! Fred had a blast finding the letters, and Ben loved figure out which name would score the most points. A++, will do again.
Coloring Squared
the S.T.U.P.I.D.T.I.M.E rating scale – 5
I LOVE this way to combine art and math. It has different levels, so Freddy just had to identify numbers and Benny was able to practice subtraction facts. To be a mean mother, I cut off the title of the picture, so they didn’t know what they were creating. Freddy got bored fast, and I gave him a free pass to LEGO. Ben was curious, then annoyed, then determined. We took a lunch break and then I started working on my sweet, sweet Princess Peach design. Ben announced, “Why are you making us do this pixel art!???” And I was like, “Dude. I just wanted to finish mine. You don’t *have* to do anything……” Then he kept going and uncovered his Super Mario design over the next 30 minutes. Hahahahaha. FOOLED YOU, SON!
So that’s just a glimpse into some of the things we’ve been up to, and I hope to get this blog going again. WordPress has made some significant improvements over the last couple of years, so it was much easier to whip this up. Much love to you all. Now go wash your hands.