Jack's Quarantine Birthday(s)

 Jack's 7th birthday fell during the Covid-19 Quarantine.  The Stay-At-Home-Order was still in effect, so the idea of celebrating on time with family and friends was not an option.  Instead, we celebrated on his real birthday (May 17th) with our immediate household -- the same people that we have been spending every waking moment with for the last several months -- and I did my best to still make it special for the Birthday Boy. 

All along, I had planned on a NERF theme.  Jack LOVES NERF guns, darts, targets, etc.  And I thought that it would make a great party idea to celebrate with a bunch of other 7 year old boys.  While we didn't end up celebrating with his friends this year, I still used the blue and orange colors and pulled a few things together.

Traditional cinnamon rolls for breakfast:

All of the gifts from us were wrapped with standard NERF colors -- blue, orange and white.  And the target was something that I made simply using a bunch of concentric circles and orange tape.

I couldn't possibly love this picture more if I tried.  And, I love how Sam took the liberty of writing "from your favorite sister" on any of the gifts from her.

Spiderman joined us and can never pass up an opportunity to help someone else open their gifts ...

Jimmy was pretty excited about the mask that he picked out to give Jack (it is used during NERF gun wars).

Sophia was still in her pajamas -- that's what happens during quarantine -- but showed up with smiles for the Birthday Boy.

Samantha surprised Jack with something special -- a ticket so that she would play any game of his choice with him.  Definitely a thoughtful idea!

Steve's gift to Jack was a great one!  It was a tackle box with anything and everything in it that a fisherman might want.  Truthfully, Steve won the filled box during a raffle last Fall and we saved it for Jack's birthday.  It was perfect timing because Jack has now started to really LOVE fishing.

One happy boy!

And, of course, I made him a cake -- an oreo cake, per his request.

********************

Grandpa came over one day to go fishing and to give Jack his birthday present.

Once again, Little Brother was on the scene to assist with the package-opening.

It was a 2-pack of salt guns for shooting bugs!

********************

Finally ... at the end of June ... we were able to celebrate Jack's birthday with family!

With the warmer weather, we opted to set up the taco party in the garage!  

Jello in cups, designed to look like NERF darts.  Wow, the kids loved those!

New googles for diving this summer!

And white sunglasses, which seem to be one of his dad's signature items -- along with camo.

And, there is another favorite thing -- a camo tank top!  Yup, this boy is ready for the Summer months now.

Lighting his OWN candles.  

Happy birthday, (again) Jack!

Springtime Randoms

It's been a while since I did a "randoms" post and I have several pictures floating around that need to be shared.

********************

Jimmy asked our neighbor, Mr. Harley," if he could make him a wooden gun.  I'm not exactly sure where the idea came from, but every single time that he saw him or heard his named mentioned, he asked about it.  One night, the doorbell rang, and there was Mr. Harley with the gun of Jimmy's dreams.  The look on his face was priceless.

********************

This Spring started what I hope becomes a lifetime hobby for Jack -- fishing.  He grabs his pole whenever he has a chance and heads across the street to fish off a dock.  He is patient at it and is successful more often than not.

********************

My mom found a few special recipes that belonged to my grandma and sent them along for Sophia to have for her recipe book.  The very first one that we tried out together was a recipe written, quite haphazardly, on the back of a random piece of paper.  

It was lemon bars and they were a pretty big (and rich-tasting) hit in our house.

********************

Right before the pandemic hit, Jack went on a field trip and came home with a container of dirt and two buried bean seeds.  We set it near the kitchen window and watered it every day.  Eventually, it spouted and Jack was able to harvest a few beans from it!

One of the beans was purple and one was green -- both were from different plants and a great surprise!  (Note that the pandemic meant that Jack was in dire need of a haircut!).

********************

While the bigger kids are working on school work, Jimmy likes to be included with his own "work."  We are learning to use scissors to cut both straight lines and curved lines.

********************

Springtime means that my plants are in bloom!

********************

Mother's Day with my brood.  It looked a lot different than years' past -- no Mother's Day lunch out at a restaurant, but I was happy that they all agreed to take a picture with me to acknowledge the day ...

********************

I keep looking at this picture of Sophia working on her essay for school (on my laptop) and can't believe how much older she looks ... in just a few years, she will be typing away, faster than ever, and ready to enter high school.  Gulp.

********************

Jimmy's preschool teachers stopped by one day with a surprise for him: A Spiderman balloon, some M&Ms and a diploma.  He was pretty bummed to see his school year come to an abrupt halt in March, but this certainly put a smile on his face!

********************

Samantha started her first job!  Our neighbors hired her a couple days/week to babysit their little guy.  Nick was born 3 months early (at the end of January) so he seems like a newborn.  I insisted that Samantha watch him for the first couple of times at our house, but now she is watching him at his own house across the street.  She usually brings him to our house for lunch and then I, too, get to snuggle with him!

********************

It's time for our garden!  I opted to do a smaller one this year, and cover the dirt with untreated wood chips to help with the weeds, and the boys were anxious to help!

Yup, a shovel and some dirt ... and my boys are all smiles.

Teamwork!

Fresh haircuts and fresh dirt!

Easter 2020

This year's Easter looked a lot different than any of the ones before.  We had hoped that the Stay at Home Order issued by the governor in the middle of this coronavirus pandemic would be lifted in time for families to celebrate at church and with their loved ones.  Instead, it continued and that meant that the traditional Easter Egg Hunts, church services and Sunday dinners were all canceled.

The kids were disappointed about this, but we made the best of it.  We colored eggs and planned our own small Easter dinner (I had to go to 'Plan B' upon discovering, at the last minute, that my online personal shopper that I used to secure groceries during a time when it was not feasible to go to a grocery store bought expired chicken breasts for me).  The Easter Bunny was immune to the virus (thank goodness!) so there was a special Easter Egg Hunt outside and candy and filled Easter baskets  ... and memories to last forever.

'Twas the night before Easter and the baskets were filled -- before the Bunny whisked them away to be hidden:

The Easter Bunny wrote a special note with instructions on where their baskets had gone.

Samantha read the note out loud explaining that each of the kids were assigned an egg color and they were to start with the eggs on the plate (next to the partially-chewed carrot and celery).  Inside that egg was a clue that would lead them to the next egg ... and so on until they finally found their Easter Basket with the very last clue.

Sophia's assigned egg color was pink, of course!

Jack took time to carefully read each of his clues and decipher where he was to look next.

Steve helped Jimmy by reading his clues and eventually, Jimmy found his basket hidden under our bed:

And size of that chocolate bunny?!  I laughed about it for a long time.  You see, during a pandemic when most stores are closed, the Easter Bunny did a lot of ordering online.  And The Easter Bunny grossly underestimated the size of that chocolate bunny compared to the others!

Sophia found her basket hidden in her closet and is still questioning how/when the Bunny made it into her room while she was sleeping.

The cutest (more realistically-sized) chocolate bunny:

Jack found his under the sink in the boys' bathroom downstairs.

Samantha struggled with her clues the most.  The Bunny did make hers a little more challenging, but she was really not on top of her game that morning!  It took her the longest of any of the kids to find her basket, which was hidden in my craft closet in the basement.

After the appropriate amount of 'oooohing and aaahhhhing' over everything in their baskets (the Easter Bunny prides himself on picking out the perfect little things for everyone!), the kids dressed warmly with boots to head outside into the early morning Spring weather.

The Easter Bunny has never done an Easter Egg Hunt OUTSIDE for the kids, but decided to do one this year because the kids were so bummed about not being able to head down to the park the day before, like we have always done in the past.

The eggs were scattered in both the back yard and the front yard -- 20 for each kid -- and each of them were assigned a particular color.  This avoids most arguing and more importantly, they know when they are done looking.

Whew, there were some tricky ones out there and the kids made a couple of loops around the house to make sure that they found all of theirs!

Sam's were some of the hardest ones to find before her assigned color was green and it matched a lot of the green grass and plants that were starting to grow.

Blue eggs for my blue-eyed boy!

Jimmy is a certified egg-hunting expert now.  He understood the rules entirely and managed to find all 20 of his blue eggs all on his own.

Counting their eggs on the sidewalk:

These girls really are the best of friends when they want to be:

Looking at this picture reminds he that Jack was in dire need of a haircut.  During the pandemic, the hair salons have been shut down and Steve is waiting for a new set of clippers to arrive that he ordered for cutting the boys' hair.  (Shipping has slowed down significantly if the orders are for what are considered to be nonessential items).

Almost done ... and ready to open them up and collect all of the candy inside!