May Birthday Boys

Eli & Owen are NINE

I've behind on updates, as usual.  I was thinking I would have a lot more time to post and share but the distance-learning at home with 4 kids in 3 different grades in a language that I'm NOT fluent in was tough, to say the least.   When momma is stressed, everybody is stressed!  It wasn't good for anyone and someone was in tears at some point nearly every day, no exaggerations.  Many of the times it was me.  However, WE SURVIVED and are now on summer break and life is SOOOO much more relaxed.

Owen and Eli turned 9 on May 16th.  The Corona birthday protocol seems to have been birthday drive-by's for the birthday child so I sent out texts to their buddies' parents and asked if they'd mind driving by at 10am on their birthday (which was a Saturday) to honk and wave as a surprise.  Well, their buddies did WAY more than that!  We had over 20 cars lined up and they all came by with music, banners, honks & waves, and gifts for the boys!  That part was totally unexpected and so generous.  The boys were on cloud 9.  They hadn't seen those kiddos in months and it was so special for them...Believe me, the love was felt :)

I was so worried they'd have a downer of a birthday being we were/are in the throws of covid and social-distancing but they both said it was one of their best birthdays ever.  Mom-win!

Decorated and ready for them to wake up

Birthday breakfast of the requested Monkey Bread

I didn't get too many pics of the parade but my neighbor got a video for us, fortunately!

Hale came up for the day for swimming and dinner.

Which was buttered bowtie pasta (Eli's pick) and homemade cheese enchiladas (Owen's pick).

They love Uncle Hale! 

Feliz Dia de los Madres

Me and My Little 

My mind is partially in Spanish a lot of the time with the kids being home from school- I try to speak as much in Spanish as I can (and it's NOT a lot) in the day-to-day as, if not for this quarantine, they would be in their school immersion program and being exposed to the language most of the day. The loss of that is one of the biggest losses in their education right now, IMO (in my opinion).  I can only supplement so much.  I do my best.

Anyways, I had a wonderful Mother's Day and am so grateful for my kiddos...They started with breakfast in bed and a the special "coronavirus coffee"   check it out here: corona-coffee that I had been curious about.  It was really good!  

coffee treat

Giant yummy breakfast! 

(who says you can't eat good vegetarian and gluten free??!)

We then headed on a hike not far from us in the Olivenhain area of Encinitas.  Beforehand, Owen said, "I don't really want to go on a hike but since it's Mother's Day and you want to, I guess I will".  Haha.  Yes, you will.  It's MY day! Lol.  He later said, "This is the best hike I've been on."   Success.  Some pictures:

Spring bloom 

(Man-Made) Waterfall 

Crossing a log bridge (he fell in minutes later)

My Tween 

Not sure how this happened

father-son 

Ella (she insisted on wearing her mask for most of the hike even though there was no one else around for the most part) 

My loves 

A Sad Goodbye to the BEST Dog in the World

Kyla 

2/27/07 - 5/2/20

Oh my sweet golden girl...I miss you more than I ever could have imagined.  I mean, I knew I would be sad and I knew pets don't live forever...but I just never imagined the emptiness I'd feel when you were left us.  You were more a part of our lives and my being than I even realized.  It has been less than 48 hours since we said goodbye so I know it's still "early" in the grieving process, but I just didn't know my heart would hurt like this.  

my co-pilot

We looked at pictures of you on a big slide show on the tv last night and there were over 700 photos and videos!  We didn't make it through all of them yet but it was so amazing to look back and see how you were there for EVERY. LITTLE. THING.  Every baby we brought home, you were right there in the action, greeting them and sniffing them and soon loving them...followed by putting up with them!  If we went on hikes, you came.  If we went to the beach and it was a dog-friendly spot, you came.  If we camped you came. If we went to a park, you came.  If I went on a run, you came (before you got older and couldn't run as much...and then not at all).  If we went on vacation and you could come, we brought you.  We never ever, not once, put you in a kennel or boarded you.  We never had to and I feel so lucky we didn't...as I would have worried about you the entire time.  You were used to being by our side and you were a true "velcro dog" (someone told us that term when you were a puppy and it is so fitting...you were always stuck right to us.  I wouldn't want it any other way).  

You were so incredibly smart.  You would walk and carry your own leash.  As a puppy we trained you to nudge some jingle bells tied to a string by the door with your nose when you needed to go outside to the bathroom.  You quickly realized you could ring the bell any time you even just wanted to go outside at all...even if you didn't have to go to the bathroom.  When the bell was jingled, the door would open.  You LOVED to have a job and when we got the mail you made sure we let you have a piece to carry in so you could earn that treat.  Oh, you loved your treats!  When my mom would visit it was your special job to bring in the newspaper that she would have delivered.  You loved to be important and to earn those treats.  

You were THE BEST greeter ever.  The best guard dog ever, too.  Maybe not so much in the past year as your hearing seemed to seriously decline and you wouldn't hear the doorbell anymore.  Before that though, you would have thought a vicious Rottweiler was on the other side of our door if you rang our doorbell.  You would bark like crazy!  If people didn't know you they would be a bit hesitant to let you run up to them...I assured them that you were friendly. You always were.  Always greeting people who came.  As soon as you finished alerting us with barking, if the person came in you were quick to grab them a shoe or a sock or whatever you could find to bring to them as a welcome present.  Who doesn't love a good shoe, right?  That's what you must have thought.  Because of you, our shoes were always scattered about the house (can we really blame this on you?  I guess we will now see...).  If we were missing one half of a pair of shoes the first place we'd look is by the cabinet where your treats were stored.  At any given time there was 1-4 shoes without matches laying at the base of that cabinet.  "If I bring a shoe will I get a treat?".  It must have worked enough times that you thought so :). 

As a younger dog you loved to chase sticks. The bigger the stick the better.  We would go on hikes , find a stick, let you smell it and then chuck it FAR off into the bush and you would run and bound in and always would come back with that EXACT stick.  It was uncanny.  I don't know how you did it.  You would search until you found it...and I remember one or two times you where you were unable to find it and you did not want to leave that spot.  You would have continued searching until you found it ...but the hike had to go on.    

Oh, and the beach and swimming.  That was your HAPPY place unlike any other.  As soon as you would get out of the car at the beach you would BOLT for the ocean and no amount of calling or yelling your name would get you to stop.  This was the ONLY time that you didn't listen to us AT ALL.  You had no control when it came to the ocean.  You HAD to be in that water and you had to be there NOW.  You would swim and fetch your water toys for hours on end if we let you.  Then you'd take a break in the sand and dig crazy holes to lay in.  We had so many happy times at the dog beach in Ocean Beach together.  Swimming in the waterway that leads to the ocean together.  Of any place in the world that I would call as yours, it would be the beach & ocean.  

You seemed to sense human emotion and have a sense of sympathy empathy like many humans can't even grasp.  When I was pregnant with Chloe and had gotten some jarring news about her chances of survival (do to possible kidney issues in utero) I was devastated and scared.  You sensed it and you never left my side.  You laid with my while I cried and nuzzled me while I laid in fetal position not knowing what the future would mean for me or my first baby.  Chloe is fine...and in the end it is you that I lost to kidney problems.  

Your loyalty was unmatched.  Especially to me.  You wouldn't go downstairs in the morning until I went down.  I was your human mama.  Always will be.  You were my first dog & fur-baby.  Always will be.  If you happened to get locked out of the front gate you would just lay by it and wait for us to see you were there.  Never would you run away.  Always by our side...or lounging in some sunny spot.  Like your spot by the one-car garage door.  Or your grassy spot in the back.  Soaking up the rays on your golden coat.  You were a ray of sunshine yourself.  You had the best smile ever.  Especially in the mornings. You were loved by so many even outside our family.  People miss you.  Not just us.  I know we miss you the most though.  

That smile. That face. Such love.

Oh, we had the BEST times with you.  You lived an amazing life...but 13 years just wasn't enough for me.  I guess it was for you.  I know you were ready.  You had slowed down in the past year.  You didn't require or ask for walks as much.  You slept a lot.  You also now insisted on getting up on the couch with us (something we used to never allow but in the past months decided we wanted you up there with us...we knew you were more comfortable up there than on the hard floor).  I hope you weren't in too much pain in your final days.  I know you never let us know when you were in pain.  You hid it well.  So I can only hope you weren't suffering too terribly.  My hurt hearts to think that you could have been.   I have to find peace and comfort in the fact that you went peacefully.  That we all had the chance to say goodbye and pet and love on you in your final minutes.  Girl, I love you SO much and had no idea the hurt would be this big.  You were in my life for 13 fabulous years and I know that no other dog will ever replace what we were so lucky to have with you. Love to you my sweet pupsie-dog.  My "Kwals", my "Ky-Ky", "Kwalsie-Bear".  We will love you forever and never forget you.  

Cards & flowers from friends & neighbors

At the vet

True Love. Ella's First Love.

Part of the family. No doubt.

My favorite running partner of all time

Week 5 Quarantine

4/14-
Well, here we are on day #2 of the school week of which we were originally told would be when the kids would be returning to school.  Obviously that didn't happen.  When we found out on Friday THE 13TH (of course! ha) that the kids would be out of school and not returning until April 13th it was SO hard to wrap our heads around.  The reality of it was just something that was hard to imagine.  I chalked it up to being a bit like summer break when I'm home with the kids....though, even with that we have camps and busy schedules and are always out and about.  So, here we are heading into Week 5 of pretty much being-at-home full time.

4/18-
Week 5 completed.  By far the TOUGHEST week of the 5 weeks of quarantine thus far.  Up until this past week I haven't completely minded the stay-at-home part of this entire thing.  We have been caught up in a non-stop tornado of "busy-ness" for so long now that it took forcing us to stop the madness to actually stop the madness.  Finally, a weekend without 4-8 kids' sports games, running around from here to there, birthday parties, playdates, dinners out, never really relaxing or having down-time.  It has been nice. It has been NEEDED.
This week, however..."distance learning" commenced for our school district.  I was originally looking forward to this.  I had enjoyed "home-schooling" the kids the first couple weeks but thought it would be beneficial to have actual assignments from their teachers to hold the kids accountable.  What I didn't predict was how incredibly difficult having 4 kids each having so much to complete at home would be.  I felt like a pinball in a pinball machine all week trying to rush from one child to the next, all who seemed to need help and assistance with almost every assignment.  Chloë is pretty independent, thankfully, but the other 3 seemed to need me with almost everything. To top it off, ALL assignments and papers are to be completed in Spanish as all 4 are in a Spanish immersion program.  I know some Spanish but I'm far from fluent.  This definitely adds a challenge to the situation.  I stress that they are losing so much by not being at school in their full-Spanish curriculum.


To make a long story short, there were a lot of tears this past week, a lot of stress, anxiety, a lot of wondering how we are going to make it through 10 more weeks of this...and this was all from me.  I don't want to harp on it. I would like to move past this previous week and just move forward.  I realize the first week was a learning curve for all involved.  I can only HOPE and pray that next week can run a little smoother.


Photos from the past 5 weeks:

We did a puzzle

Visiting my brother from 10-15 feet away 

Grocery Store Trip

(last time we went was 17 days ago-now doing delivery)

Drive way happy hour

Eli letting his hair grow

(though Myke actually cut it last night)

Ella on a Zoom call with her first-grade class 

One Week Down...

Hard to believe it has been a week since Friday the 13th.  The day things got real...and it was announced that the schools were closing.  I mean, we had known it COULD happen, but I don't think anyone could really wrap their heads around the reality of it.  That is what we have all been doing day -by-day, hour-by-hour....trying to wrap our heads around something that is completely foreign and new to the modern world.  So far no success in wrapping here...

That said, we keeping completely occupied and busy with 4 kids at home.  We feel lucky they are still young enough where they don't completely HATE being stuck at home with us and each other.  At least not yet...ask Chloe again next week.  In fact, this is a DREAM for Ella.  She loves nothing more than to be at home all day long.  She is the biggest homebody I've ever met.  She's happier than ever right now in her innocent little 7 year old world.  We are working hard to keep the kids away from too much worry or stress about the situation.  

We started right out with keeping up on a school schedule to the best of our ability.  Myke even brought out the flag for the morning Pledge of Allegiance...and has a school bell sound play on the Home Pod right at 8:30a.m.  It's pretty funny.  By mid-week he had even printed out "tardy" slips for kids who weren't here when the bell rings.  LOL.

We've had a lot of rain lately...which seems to add to the doom & gloom mood of the current pandemic-ridden society we are living in.  The silver lining is that rain in San Diego often means snow in our nearby mountains so Wednesday was a field trip to Mount Laguna!  We left at 8:30am which would usually mean terrible rush hour traffic...but we zipped right down the highway and then headed west.  It was just over an hour's drive and didn't disappoint.  Snow play at it's finest ...though my boys both were more than content to stay in the car (what's wrong with these kids?!) and draw pictures and laugh together.  The girls were the one's out playing in the snow.  Go figure.  

Before the plow came through..a bit slippery!

So, yup, we are just keeping busy with Myke working (luckily, can work from home) and me putting my M.A. in Education (K-12) to work finally. I was just starting to get my paperwork back in order to do occasional subbing in the district and here I am now "working full time" but for no pay!  Oh well, so far I love my new "class" and haven't needed to expel anyone.  We will see what next week holds! 

Hope everyone reading this is doing okay, staying home, staying safe & healthy, and finding ways to keep in positive spirits as we navigate this new (hopefully-very-temporary) lifestyle together.  

xoxo

Sarah 

(No time to proof read or edit...Ella has been waiting over 30 minutes for me to play Candyland so I need to run! Excuse any typos/poor grammar)

A few more from this week: 

Pancake batter for St. Patty's (food dye central!!)

rainbow stacks

brotherly cuddles

(always touching eachother/bothering/wrestling/hugging)

Oh! I almost forgot to mention that my brother is here in San Diego!

Long story...but he's currently self-quarentining in my in-law's condo

in Pacific Beach (they are on the east coast) after traveling to the U.S. from Brazil.  He arrived Monday.  We stopped by to say hello from a distance.  

Welcome to the sh*t-show that is the U.S. right now, Uncle Hale!