March started out busy with softball, dance, violin, school, fun with friends and ended with the world shutting down. It was a very emotional month and looking back six months later (I really need to get better about writing these on time), there is probably a lot of stuff I would do differently had I know what was in store for us.
Emmett had some fun dress up days at preschool. They had Wacky Wednesday and dress as your favorite animal and he loved getting to dress up!
We made a last minute decision to drive to Cal Poly for the day to watch the end of Emily's waterpolo tournament. We had so much fun with the Miltons and of course had to go to Pismo to play on the beach for a little while. Looking back, I'm so glad we were able to go as it turned out to be her last game as everything shut down soon after.
We had a crazy rainstorm that flooded our street. The kids had a blast playing in the river! Clara also had fun making cat houses complete with "blankets" (aka paper from packages) and "toys" (aka pipe cleaners and poms).
Clara managed to get one week of softball in March. Hers was one of the only teams that actually got pictures. It rained so they literally had to stop after a couple teams and never got to reschedule due to COVID. I was out of town at a conference so Tia made sure her hair got done (and did a way better job than I could have)! She had two more games (one of which ended in her literally laying down at first base and refusing to do anything else because she was mad she didn't get a hit and had to use the tee), and then the season got canceled (luckily right before I had to work the snack bar). Clara got to play catcher during her last game and thought that was pretty fun. Even though she only got to play four games, Clarita really enjoyed softball and was actually good at it (minus the tantrum). She said she's going to play again!
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| The best softball helper |
I went to a conference in Monterey March 10, 2020 thinking all the rapidly mounting concern about COVID-19 was just hype and everything would be fine. I was at a two day training through Department of State Hospitals first and then the conference started that Wednesday. The power went out, it rained, and then Thursday morning I got back from running and got a message that the conference was canceled because there was now an order banning group gatherings of more than 500 people. It was all very surreal and we packed up and headed home. Little did I know that would be the last day I ate in a restaurant for five months! The next day, appropriately Friday the 13th, we gathered with some friends for dinner and games. We were all joking about what plans would be ruined (at this point, I still believed we would go to Hawaii in two weeks) and checking the news as rumors of schools closing spread. We all got the calls/messages about our kids' schools being closed for three weeks (resuming after spring break) and joked about plans for the teachers in the groups to start a home school. We joked about needing to get to the store early the next morning to see if we could get toilet paper and let our kids run wild. Little did we know that would be the last time we were all together in a big group.
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| Attacking Jon was the fun game of the night! |
We continued that weekend with some normal activities like going for runs, bikes, donuts with friends, and hanging out with neighbors. We were still blissfully ignorant. At this point, school was still on for Emmett so it seemed like things would be ok.
The following Tuesday (St. Patrick's Day), I was about to leave for work when I got a call telling me that I had been exposed to someone who tested positive for COVID at the conference I went to the week before. I still didn't think it was a big deal until I was told to call my doctor to get instructions as everyone else had. I ended up having to call the health department who took down all my information and instructed me to quarantine for two weeks. We also got the call that day that preschool was now also on hold for the time being. We sent Aba home, freaked out a bunch of people thinking we had exposed them, got thrown into teaching our kids while trying to work from home, only to get a call a few hours later that it was all a big mistake and the person had actually tested negative. It was a welcome relief as Clara's birthday was in two days and she was devastated that it would be ruined because we wouldn't be able to see anyone. Tio saved the day by bringing her an early birthday present (opened at appropriate social distance of course as we still thought we had to quarantine at that point).
Since I had already given my information to the health department and been told to quarantine, we figured it was probably best I follow that just in case. It was a crazy two weeks of working from home with my kids, but we did get to at least see Tios again and have a St. Patrick's Day/early birthday twin dinner.
Clara's birthday was still as normal as could be for the first half. I felt terrible because I had convinced her that our trip to Hawaii was actually her birthday trip and therefore she didn't get a party (it was really for a meeting Dada had). Of course that got canceled so my perfect plan turned out to make her birthday extra terrible. We were still planning a family party but I had absolutely nothing for her actual birthday. I had tried to buy some presents on Amazon but everything was super backed up and none of them came in time. I literally searched the house and found some random things to wrap up. We blew up a bunch of balloons and decorated the house after she went to bed. Clarita was definitely surprised when she woke up. I even went to Uptown Sprouts and got her a cinnamon roll for breakfast! It was still pre shelter in place at that point so Bailey and Elise came over and Aba helped them all with school while I worked. We even went to Bella Bakery to get more treats when we picked up her school packet. Unfortunately, on the way home from her violin lesson, the governor gave the shelter in place order and we realized that we would not even be able to do the family birthday celebration we had planned for the weekend. To say she was disappointed was an understatement. That being said, Dada still picked up dinner from BLD at her request and she got to watch a movie. All in all, it was a good day, but not at all how we expected her birthday celebration to happen. It was also the last day we considered that things would work out an be normal.
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| The hand sanitizer was her favorite...I should have sold it on the black market at that point! |
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