Andrea Mara | Office Mum posted: "My kids have been asked to keep journals as part of their work from home packs. I keep telling them they should - that they are living through history, and they keep telling me they have nothing to write, because they do the same thing every day. Fair poi"
My kids have been asked to keep journals as part of their work from home packs. I keep telling them they should - that they are living through history, and they keep telling me they have nothing to write, because they do the same thing every day. Fair point.
But it made me think. And it prompted me to jot down the things we did one day last week, on an unusually productive day - YouTube yoga, baking, a bit of tennis (them, not me), a short run (me, not them - none of them would come with me) along with the usual school-work and work-work.
I decided to fill in the previous day's activities too, but there was a problem. I couldn't remember what we'd done. Every day had blurred into one. And in one way, it doesn't matter, but I know it'll bug me if some time in the future I look back and can't remember what we did and how we spent our minutes and hours and days during this strange locked down time.
I pieced it together bit by bit in my work diary, and decided to note what we were watching and reading and playing and baking too (our current reads and TV recommendations are here). I've kept doing it each day since, and it's giving me a little grounding. A bit like in kidnap films, when the hostage makes scratches on the wall to count off the days and stay sane. (Admittedly, doing YouTube yoga and baking is not quite the same as being a hostage, but you know what I mean.)
Something similar - this blurred forgetfulness - happened when I had Zoom Drinks with my best pals on Friday night (classifying that sentence in the "things that made no sense before March 2020" category) . We were trying to remember which announcements and restrictions had come in when, and we were struggling. Because of course it's all a blur.
So for me, to give me a grounding (and for you, if you need it too) I'm writing it down. (A blog is, after all, a weblog - first and foremost, an online journal.) So here goes:
March 7th
Three and a half weeks ago (or a lifetime ago, a sit seems) on Saturday March 7th, I was out for dinner with friends. We knew about Corona, we knew there was a shortage of hand sanitizer, and we joked about how hard it is to stop touching your face. We didn't talk about school closures, because that notion was nowhere on our radar. (And yet, five days later, the schools closed.)
March 8th
On Sunday March 8th, my daughter played a hockey match that put her through to another match. This next match was to be played on Mother's Day, and while we celebrated the win, we lamented the loss of Mother's Day plans. Little did we know. And we stood shoulder to shoulder on the sidelines, completely unaware of terms like "social distancing".
March 10th
Tuesday March 10th, radio news reported speculation about school closures, and WhatsApp groups up and down the country lit up. It's just a rumour, we were told.
March 12th
On Thursday March 12th, at 11.30am, the Taoiseach made his announcement - the schools were closing. I burst into tears, wondering why I was crying. Talking to people since, I realise I was far from the only one.
March 13th
On Friday March 13th, we tried to settle into this strange new fast-paced slowed-down contradictory world of no school. The first questions were about playdates and playgrounds and playing on the green. Then we moved on to worrying about homeschooling and working from home. It took a week or so to realise that a) schools had sent varying levels of work and b) parents had varying needs for school-work. A bit like everything else, no two families' needs are the same. And we are all winging it, including the schools.
For anyone still struggling with homeschool, this is a great piece of practical advice from a school teacher in a Facebook group I'm in.
By the middle of the next week, this was how I was feeling about homeschool, and life in our house is still pretty much as described at the end of this:
"The thing is, for every parent who is hoovering up information about activities and resources and ideas for things to do, there are others who are anxious about the pressure to *do* stuff with kids. The sense that if your child isn't learning Origami and speaking Dutch, you're wasting this time off.
But of course, like everything else, no two situations are the same. Some parents (like me) have kids who are old enough to do activities unsupervised, and we really want to know about the live illustration class on Instagram and the writing prompts on the Museum of Literature website (kids not always as enthusiastic as parents, obviously).
Whereas when my kids were smaller, the only way I could work from home was with a TV babysitter - Paw Patrol and Peppa Pig all the way.
So whether your kids are watching hours of TV, teaching themselves to type, playing Minecraft, jumping on a trampoline, re-reading old books, playing Nintendo Switch, sketching from pics on an iPad, or playing Subway Surfers on that same iPad as soon as you walk out of the room, it's all good. Mine did all of the above today. There are no rules, whatever keeps them from fighting and keeps us sane 💪"
Pre-lockdown photo!
And for posterity - from week 1 - this:
"For parents worried that every other child is flying through the curriculum, doing extra worksheets, learning a language or perfecting a craft - one of mine is pretending to hide in a drawer."
March 17th
On Tuesday March 17th, I cried again during Leo's 9 o'clock news speech and felt glad there were no new restrictions.
March 25th
Just eight days later, I'd done a complete about-turn was glad there were new restrictions announced. That's the other weird thing about all this - the constant evolution of thought about what's okay and what's safe.
March 27th
On Friday March 27th, in the middle of Zoom Drinks with my friends, the lockdown announcement came. Less than three weeks after my night out during which we joked about hand sanitizer and touching our faces.
The next day was strange. This was my (Facebook) diary entry, copied here so I'll remember how it felt:
"In a time of weird and surreal days, today seemed particularly weird and surreal. And a bit eerie too. And flat and edgy and confusing. And maybe a lot eerie. But there were gorgeous things as well, the things that bring the happy tears. Like the pharmacist who hand-delivered the medication because she lives nearby. And the people offering to buy groceries for other people's parents, because they can get to them more easily. And the friend who managed to arrange a new phone for her faraway dad, donated by a complete stranger. And the Aer Lingus staff who helped my sister and her family with their shades-of-apocalypse move back to Ireland yesterday. And Joe Wicks donating all his PEwithJoe YouTube revenue to the NHS 😭
And in between the bouts of happy tears, we muddle on with this new normal, ticking the exercise box and figuring out Zoom and reading and baking and watching and eating. I'm thinking we might just try to read and bake and watch and eat our way through this."
March 31st
Today, we're seeing out a March like we've never had before. I hope by the end of next month, things will be brighter. I know in my house, the kids will have had a lot more screen time, we'll have eaten our weight in cakes, and we'll be dreaming of treats like takeaway coffees and a walk on the beach. There will no doubt be stress and worry and tears. But I hope we'll have had some good times too, in this fast-paced slowed-down contradictory new world.
In the meantime, here are some of the things we've done or plan to do- this is my go-to list when the kids come to tell me they're bored. (Though the top thing to send them scurrying is, "Great, I need help with the laundry".)
Note: the number of the below activities done in my house today at time of writing (3.45pm) is precisely zero. Do-nothing days and no-motivation days are common too.
Read, re-read, borrow ebooks on Borrowbox
Listen to an audio book - free on Audible Stories (no waiting, signing up or reserving required) or Borrowbox (sign up online)
Make a comic - Dav Pilkey is doing video tutorials, one for Dog Man fans
Write a story (here's a prompt I gave my kids: "She realised then that while she could hear everyone, nobody could hear her")
Start leaning a language (Duolingo app or this website for German)
Start writing a book
Learn to do the splits (top aim of one of my kids)
Research someone e.g. the Rebel Girls book (one of my kids has inexplicably decided to research Boris Johnson, I think she's trying to catch him out)
Make a stop motion video with LEGO (this is great fun and kids age 7/ 8 can do it without help)
This is dummy text. It is not meant to be read. Accordingly, it is difficult to figure out when to end it. But then, this is dummy text. It is not meant to be read. Period.
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