Quarantine

 Last time I blogged here was Gerry's birthday, way back in January.  Shortly after that, the world went to hell in a handbasket and I've just not been in the right frame of mind (or had a moment truly to myself) to write here.  4 months later, we seem to have more of a handle on things and here I am.  

Shortly after Gerry turned 7 (beginning of January), I started paying attention to rumblings I was hearing in the news about a new virus called Covid-19 or Coronavirus.  It had started in China and there was talk of it making its way to the US, but no one here seemed too concerned.  A lot of people said it was like the flu and no big deal.  A lot of people said the chances of it making its way here were slim and, even if it did, there wouldn't be that much hardship.  

Late February/early March, I started hearing even more about coronavirus.  Countries were being decimated by the virus, closing their borders, quarantining their people, and putting heavy restrictions in place.  Facebook was flooded with posts by people in other countries who were a few weeks ahead of us in terms of virus timeline.  These people urged the rest of us to take this seriously, to social distance, to play it very safe so that our country wasn't hit as hard as theirs were.  

Early in March, I heard about how areas near us were being hit hard by the virus.  People were walking around asymptomatic, going about their normal routine and unwittingly passing the virus on to everyone they came into contact with, who passed it along to everyone they came into contact with and so on.  There is no vaccine and very little was known about prevention and how it would affect certain people.  I got an email from the kids' school just checking to see if we had internet and computer access at home "in the event that distance learning may occur".  

Friday, March 13th....we were officially in the midst of a global pandemic.  Press conferences were being held all over the place, thousands were dying by the day, and entire regions were being shut down by the government.  That afternoon, our governor announced via press conference that all schools in our region would close for the next two weeks to sanitize and help combat the effects of Covid-19.  My kids were thrilled to have a random few weeks off in the middle of the year.  Little did they know, March 13th would be the last day they left their classrooms this school year.

Following the governor's orders, I shut down my daycare for 2 weeks, too, with plans to reopen on Monday, March 30th.  Because of Spring Break, the kids were home until the second week of April.  I went from having 8 kids in my daycare to having 1.  As of this posting, I've officially lost 3 kids as a direct result of the pandemic, and all but one have stayed home since March 13th.  

Our county was placed under a Stay Home order.  Businesses and churches and daycares closed and only those deemed essential were allowed to remain open.  People were required to wear face masks when leaving their homes, and households were quarantined.  Employees were required to work from home whenever possible.  Playgrounds were roped off, previously planned activities were cancelled.  Our country was, for all intents and purposes, shut down.

Then came the announcement that schools would be closed for the rest of the school year.  Just like that, millions of parents and caregivers became homeschool teachers as our kids began distance learning.  It's been...an adjustment.  Not necessarily a bad one for us, but that's a post for another time.  

My kids have had to adjust to being homeschooled and not seeing their friends or teachers.  We haven't been to a playground or the movies or to the mall since March.  Birthday parties have been cancelled and we've been having birthday "drive-bys" instead to minimize contact.  Doctors visits have become "telehealth visits" where, instead of going to the doctor's office patients stay home and video call with their physicians.  Toilet paper and hand sanitizer were a hot commodity and sold out in most places for months.  Customers were limited to a certain amount they could purchase at a time so that there would be some for everyone.  For a little while, sidewalk chalk was hard to come by after viral posts popped up from parents who used chalk and painter's tape to keep their kids entertained outside for more than a few minutes.  

It's been such a strange time, but we're slowly getting back to (what is now) normal.  Our county is set to open in the yellow phase of quarantine by June 5th.  This means fewer restrictions in place.  We're not fully open yet and it will be a few more weeks before we're in the green phase of reopening, but we're getting there.  Eventually, I'll write a post about how the quarantine affected us personally, but for now, this is what I've got.  It's been an odd few months, but we're slowly working our way back.