Week 10 of Quarantine ~ A Gentle Change

We have entered Phase II here in Western North Carolina. With that change, many more people are out and about. Not surprisingly, the number of cases and deaths are rising quickly in our state. I am concerned about going back out into the world, but also see that we are stuck with this virus for a long time. So we are going to need to learn how to live with it as safely as possible. That means taking all of the precautions possible (masks, social distancing, gloves in some cases and picking events carefully) while dipping our toes back out into the world. Anne was asked to come back to her consignment job and she accepted. It is a tiny shop with lots of precautions being enforced. We are taking a calculated risk and hoping that she is safe there. They added a day to her schedule so she is now working 16 hours a week. She is overjoyed to be back at work and in the world. I am cautiously optimistic.

With our move to be a bit more in the world, we needed more masks. Rebekah and I have struggled to make masks that we like. Neither one of us are particularly handy with a sewing machine. I traded our family's signature Banana Sour Cream Cake for three homemade masks from a friend. They are fantastic and way better than what we were creating. I may need to trade her for more.

Anne also had the opportunity to take three online classes this week with the University of North Carolina School of Dance. It was a prep program for those who have been accepted into the summer dance intensive that will be online this summer. Anne auditioned and was accepted into the program. She will be taking two weeks in June. This week was to make sure everyone's technology worked and that they had an idea of what they would be doing and if they were properly placed in the correct level. She did great and really enjoyed being back in ballet. She did feel a bit rusty. It is going to be a shock to do ballet classes 7 hours a day 5 days week. We also realized that without electricity in the dance shed, it was going to be too hot for seven hours of dancing. Keeping her technology charged was going to be near to impossible. So, we are clearing out the guest bedroom and turning it into a dance room for the two weeks. I feel very blessed to have such a large house to move things around and make it work during this time. That is a change for me. I usually feel burdened by the size of our house and property.

She also did her Rockette's class online and in the living room when it was raining really hard this week. The dance shed was super dark. They did a dance from the musical, Chicago.

Vocational Rehab called us and they are ready to start doing career testing with Dean. We are hopeful that will be set up and underway in the next few weeks. Voc Rehab is so slow. It takes forever to get anything done, but I am very grateful for the program. Hopefully, Dean will have a job by the end of the summer. He really doesn't want to go out into the world at all until the virus is gone, but that really isn't realistic.

Dean is counting down the days to being done with school. He only has 10 days to go. What will happen after that is still up in the air. I do feel it is important that he has a schedule and responsibilities each day. We are working on plans. We still don't know if one of the camps that he was hired to work at pre-Covid 19 is still going on. The other camp has been cancelled.

The highlights of this week in school was our Yum Yum box. It was from the Philippines, and we had lots of fun eating the snacks and learning more about the country. I think it was  the best box in a long time.

We also wrapped up our English class with a light and fun family read aloud. It was The Quilt by Gary Paulsen. My kids love Gary Paulsen books and I thought ending with it would be nice. It is a story about women living through home life during World War II while dealing with death, loss, joy and all of the hard work of running farms while their loved ones are away at war.

The movie, Suffragette, was amazing. It touched my kids to their core. Dean, who has been raised to love and care for everyone, could simply not comprehend why anyone would want to deny women the right to vote. We have covered this topic before, but this movie brought them so much more. It left an impact that has carried through the entire week. The discussions have been rich and meaningful.

I hope you all are well!

Blessings, Dawn