Self-Isolation Day #35

We appreciate continued prayers for my husband's mother D. who was on a ventilator in ICU with confirmed COVID-19 for 16 days and is now starting what is a serious and challenging rehabilitation. 



Thomas (4-3/4) has started creating some really fun art lately: his drawings make me smile!

"Thomas shooting John, the bad soldier."

We ate a picnic lunch in the back yard and it is good to remember what a simple activity can bring such joy and lifting of spirits. Ingredients used today:

• Two bath towels (easier to launder than a picnic blanket)
• Grilled sandwiches (cheese, PBJ, PB-Nutella) and no other food
• Lemonade made from a mix
• Baby wipes to clean up

Result? Children who really felt loved and that they had had a big treat.





Motherhood a large family can make a person so harried! Breakfast today set me off because I ruined the first batch of eggs and I ruined the second batch of eggs and at that point I decided everyone was going to be served peanut butter toast and be done with it. This morning while juggling teaching math to four children, I felt like I couldn't get through speaking one sentence or one problem without being interrupted by one more "Maaaamaaaa!" I need about six of me, but, alas, there is only one. It is so easy to feel defeated that one cannot possibly provide an education! We finally finished and got most of our various music practices completed, so I made us a picnic lunch, which was fun. While I was trying to clean up the kitchen--which included even cleaning up the breakfast dishes--one child had a potty accident that necessitated an entirely new outfit, top to bottom. I left that child naked and waiting while I ran upstairs to get an outfit. I was already being called by another child with an urgent request regarding poison ivy, but I had to yell to them just to BE STILL, and then a fight broke out that needed my intervention. All those fires put out and before I could take one breath or finish the dishes, a child outdoors got injured while trying to a fancy trick on the swings. It was one of those injuries that had me checking for concussion or broken bones and mentally trying to consider how I would get this child to the Emergency Room in the middle of a pandemic with five other children to manage and my husband not home at the time. While I was settling said injured child to rest in bed and taking water and Advil back up to the bedroom, the four-year-old was screaming urgently for me to "HELP ME FINISH WRITING MY LETTER TO J-----!" I don't even have a conclusion of wise words except that I do triage all day and sometimes I feel momentary peace and many times I feel panic that I am unable to meet all the needs. God has to fill in the gaps I leave and having needs unmet builds character.

In the afternoon, we all visited my parents' gravestone--a social distancing-approved activity!

Praying Divine Mercy chaplet

Bonus Reading for Posterity:

• I'm linking this article for my children decades from now when we're trying to explain how the constant changing of information--sometimes daily or hourly--was so confusing and distressing for regular citizens trying to figure out what to believe. Coronavirus timeline shows politicians', media's changing rhetoric on risk of pandemic
• Every day now, there are more studies--albeit small and needing to be enlarged--showing that  the degree of herd immunity is probably much higher than we think. Dutch Study: Hundreds Of Thousands May Have Virus. Fatality Rate Could Be Astronomically Lower.
• Super interesting (to me) study out of Israel: "Professor Yitzhak Ben Israel of Tel Aviv University, who also serves on the research and development advisory board for Teva Pharmaceutical Industries, plotted the rates of new coronavirus infections of the U.S., U.K., Sweden, Italy, Israel, Switzerland, France, Germany, and Spain. The numbers told a shocking story: irrespective of whether the country quarantined like Israel, or went about business as usual like Sweden, coronavirus peaked and subsided in the exact same way. In the exact, same, way. His graphs show that all countries experienced seemingly identical coronavirus infection patterns, with the number of infected peaking in the sixth week and rapidly subsiding by the eighth week." Israeli Professor Shows Virus Follows Fixed Pattern
• It's interesting to watch state protests increasing. "Over the next week or two this balance between the power of the government and the will of the people will continue to shape the coronavirus response. But that balance is beginning to shift in favor of the population, this is America, and it is Americans, not our government that will ultimately decide when this cloud lifts. That is as it should be, and thankfully leaders like Trump and Cuomo understand this. The United States began in earnest with the words “We the people.” The coronavirus lockdown will end as a result of that very same authority." The Lockdown Is Loosening Whether Government Likes It Or Not
• Thoughtfully well-written . . . WE ARE NEEDLESSLY DEVASTATING OUR COUNTRY
• A reminder for all of us Catholics (including me reminding myself) to be charitable . . . Danger to Catholics during the Coronavirus Panic