Gerbers - Corona Virus Pt. 2

We made it through our first full week at home.

It's been tough.

The girls get sick of school really fast. Sydney is really motivated by games but London just drags and claws her way through the work.

Our saving grace has been two sessions with Elli on Monday and Thursday, being outside and going to get free lunches from the school and stopping by park.

My emotions are all over the place. I feel fine most of the day and then something will happen and I silently cry.

I am focusing on work, and getting some school done everyday. I worry my kids are falling behind - specially London but I guess all kids are behind at this point

It snowed 8 inches on Thursday/Friday. Luckly the girls played outside and Tyson build a slide for them.

Sydney had "activity days" via zoom
Sydney and London and Abby did a zoom Lego challenge
We tried to do a dance party with Jael and Julio's kids (big bust)
Girls built dollhouses our of cardboards

Last night there was talk of a forced shutdown for entire states ... which freaked me out. So we went out and bought extra things

Sticker by numbers
dot to dot
paper
shampoo
pads and tampons
popcorn

All the toilet paper and baby wipes were out so we could not get those.

Going to stores is super stress-inducing. I just go into panic mode. Tyson has been asking "how are you doing" but I mostly just suppress my feelings. I can't feel too much - if not I will break down.

The stock market is crashing but we did put $2500 into each girl account hoping we are buying at a good time. That will probably be it for the year ....

I stopped sending extra payments to the mortgage.

We have not paid taxes yet but I hope we can pay it soon.

I told my kids, that you will be telling your own children, 

"Listen, I grew up during the pandemic of 2020. I couldn't go to school. I couldn't play with friends. All the restaurants were closed, all the businesses were closed. People had to cancel birthday parties, weddings, trips, anniversaries. We rationed our milk and our toilet paper and our bananas. Our dad had to get up at 5:30 AM to go to Walmart and stand in line so he could get the things we needed. We stood in long lines at the grocery store for eggs. My mom homeschooled us and we ate from our emergency food storage and exercised outside and kept at a six-foot distance from anyone. Playgrounds were closed, gyms were closed, library's were closed. 

It is a hard, surreal, bewildering time, but surely, such a unique time in history.

dinner before we started isolating. This was early March

doing yoga as a family

The girls creation

The Gerber - Corona Virus Thoughts Pt.1

I wanted to make sure I wrote down our thoughts and dealing with the Corona Virus of 2020.

I have to say this totally took us by surprise. We really thought 2002 was going to be such a year for us. But life quickly changes. 

I first remember hearing about the virus in China in January. I felt bad for everyone but it felt so far away. 

Well things quickly changed in early March - when we got the first case in the US. 

Then the week of March 6th - EVERYTHING changed. We had our first cases in Colorado. At this point Washington, San Francisco and New York were getting hit really hard. 

By March 9th, within 2 days Colorado was in a state of emergency, schools were closed, people freaking out and buying all the toilet paper. 

We were informed that our schools were closed on 3/12 that our schools were closing and now we are doing remote learning. 

So yeah, we were freaking out. Mostly because the idea of working AND homeschooling sounds horrible. General Conference canceled, church canceled, all activities canceled. Restaurants closed. 

Literally, in 15 days - the whole country shut down. 

We did our first ever "church at home" on Sunday. We all changed, we prepared a talk, we did the sacrament. It was such a weird experience. I wish I could say the spirit was super strong - but honestly, it really was not, but I was proud of us for staying strong and doing church. 

We are in day 3 of "home schooling" and it's been so weird. Sydney has done great but London has really struggled. 

We are getting the hang of doing everything in the Chrome Books. There are days that I am super depressed and some days I feel like I can do this. our saving grace has been going out for bike rides, walks. Sadly the next two days it's suppose to be SUPER cold and I am so sad. So tomorrow we will have to bundle up and really get warm before going outside. 

To also top it off - we just found out that Utah had a earthquake and my entire family felt it. I also so sad to hear that our house needs to have the foundation fix and it will cost about 7K. 

Adulting feels SOOOO heavy right now. Everything feels like we are frozen. 

And yet I am hopeful and I feel like the Lord is helping us. Part of me is in disbelief that this is even happening. It feels like we are part of a movie - but this is REAL life. The real point that all normalcy is gone. How I wish I could go to the store and NOT worry about being enough food. Luckely, we have enough food and enough toilet paper to last us for a few weeks ... I am trying to NOT worry about the future, but to stay present and stay positive. 

This is history in the making. It's just been crazy. 

Home Church Program

End of February Happenings

The final weeks of February were awesome!  We had a really smooth time coming back from vacation - which is always a worry for me. We had some fun highlights. 

1. The girls did their 3rd STEM fair at school. London got 2nd place (only 2 people entered in her grade) and Sydney's grade had 5 entries. So Sydney got the Participant Award. Either way we really enjoy when this is over - ha! But it's really fun to see the girls excited for their projects. 

2. We celebrated my birthday - 37 years old! I kept telling Tyson that this year I felt really understood.  Iuliana got me an AWESOME toilet paper holder. Debbie got me a seated laptop stand and Tyson suprised me with an Instant Pot DUO crisper and a funs scanvanger hunt. All of these were really simple but present that REALLY got me. It was so nice!

3. The girls attended Emilia's birthday party at the Ninja Nation Gym - so so cool! Even Tyson tried to "Get that Wall" but it was not successful :) 

4. We are *this* close to being under 100K in our mortgage. So I printed out a cool poster from someone in a Dave Ramsey Group. I had her put 106 little houses. It's big! We will keep it in our closet - and the funny thing - it totally has Tyson and I fired up!