May 2020

I feel like by the time we got to May we were all getting a little stir crazy.  Luckily for us, the weather was nice and we had visitors. Kort and Dan drove here from Denver to spend Mother's day with us and to spend time swimming. And they brought Max, which thrilled Emmie. Everything was still shut down, but businesses were starting to reopen  with restrictions. Masks weren't required by the government, but many businesses were requiring them if you wanted to enter. At this point in time it still felt weird to wear a mask in public. I would guess that only about half of people were wearing them. The mask mandate for the county didn't come until later in the summer. 

The kids started doing a bit more with friends as well. Emmie, Elsie, and Susie got together a few times. It was so fun to watch them hangout with each other again. On the day of the picture below I had taken the kids to Nordstrom Rack for an incredible shoe sale. Apparently I'll risk getting covid for a killer deal on Birkenstocks and Chacos! My plan was to get in the store early, get our shoes, and get out before there were too many people. My plan was foiled however. When we were about done shopping we noticed the line. It wrapped around nearly the whole store! At this point we had worked too hard for our shoes, so we decided to stick it out. we waited forever. Emmie was stressed because Susie and Elsie were supposed to be coming to our house for a playdate and we were most definitely going to be late. After calling their mothers to move the playdate back an hour we finally made it to the car...and the car didn't start! My battery had died! John left work early and met us to jump the battery. We then drove to an autoparts store where they confirmed that the battery was dead, but wouldn't help us replace it.  We ended up at the dealership to get a new battery installed. But Emmie still got her playdate! It was just a few hours late. But they still managed to make this phenomenal cake, and we didn't get covid, and we got a killer deal on tons of shoes, so in the end I guess it all worked out.

The most memorable day in May was memorial day. We started the day with a hike up to stack rock. It is and 8 mile hike up near Bogus Basin. John was on call and Ainsley didn't want to come, so it ended up being a hike with Owen, Emmie, myself, and half of the Demars family. John offered to smoke us some meat for a BBQ that evening. So after a long day of hiking, we all came home and showered and cooked and then gathered again that night for a BBQ and Yard games. 

I still don't like to think about what could have happened that night.  Owen and a few of the kids decided to jump off the roof onto the trampoline. When Owen asked me I said no. But he went to John and told him that I said it was Okay if he thought it was okay. So John went along. My kids had done it earlier that week but there were fewer kids and more supervision. All was going fine until the first casualty. Emmie jumped and hit her head to her knee when she landed. She came inside to me and I was helping her when I heard someone scream "OWEN!"

We have pieced together that Owen told his friend to give him a double bounce when he jumped off and Owen's plan was to jump and then do a flip. He had successfully done it several times, but the double bounce was too much and he lost control. He flew backward and as far as we can tell he hit the back of his head on the bar of the trampoline and landed on all fours in my flower bed. It truly was a miracle he survived. He fell in between the house and the trampoline. He narrowly missed the house, and the cement that could have done permanent damage. 

John came in frantically telling me to get a towel for all the blood. I had no idea what was going on because I had been focusing on Emmie and hadn't seen anything. Brandt was helping get Owen to the car. Owen was in shock and struggled walking. John drove to the hospital while I sat in the back and held a towel to Owen's head catching all the blood.

When we got to the hospital they wouldn't let John and I both in because of Covid. So John left Owen and I there. I had nothing, no keys, no car, no phone, and Owen didn't even have shoes. The emergency room staff tried to keep us calm and the mood light and they all shared their battle wounds from jumping off things they shouldn't have jumped off of. Owen got 12 staples in his head. And his knee was fractured. We were finally discharged and John came to get us several hours later. We got home at about 11:00 that night. That was when the realization of how horrible things could have been hit and I lost control of my emotions. All of the what-if's clouded my mind and I couldn't hold back the tears. Owen was home and safe and would be okay, but I couldn't help but feel guilty for allowing any of it to happen in the first place. 

The next several days and weeks were long. Owen couldn't get up and down stairs so he slept on an air mattress in the family room for days. His friend Logan (that had been on the trampoline when it all happened) was traumatized by the whole situation, but was such a good friend to Owen. He came to visit constantly to keep Owen company. He helped keep Owen sane. After a week we were able to get the staples out of his head. His doctor had monitored his concussion and he seemed to be recovering from that as well. We had to visit and orthopedic surgeon for his knee. An MRI revealed that his knee was fractured but he hadn't torn any ligaments, which was a relief. Surprisingly he was off of crutches within less than a week and was just left with a brace and physical therapy. His knee recovery took the longest. If I'm remembering correctly he was still doing physical therapy in July. 

And now as I write this in January, Owen is fully recovered. He and Logan ran 6 miles tonight. Although it was a traumatizing time (probably mostly for me) it was also a miracle and I will always be grateful that the situation wasn't any worse. 

Here is Owen with the 8th graders in the neighborhood and their graduation party. Owen was still on his crutches. He had to skip the after party at Wahooz, but he had a good attitude about it and at least he got to have a little celebration with his friends. 

 

April 2020

By mid April we were fully shut down and getting into our quarantine groove. Business were closed. you couldn't go out to eat or shopping if you wanted to. It was almost eerie how little traffic was on the main roads. We would go walk around the track at River Valley and Eagle Road was nearly empty. The busiest intersection in all of Idaho had less traffic on it than it had in probably 40 years. The parks were even closed. So you could go to the park, but not play on the playground equipment. 

The kids were doing online school. But not really online. We picked up a weekly packet that the kids worked on throughout the week. And then we never turned it in. And then we picked up a new packet the next week. It didn't take them long to figure out that they were never going to be held accountable for anything the rest of the school year. John worked from home at a make shift office we set up in our bedroom. I "worked from home" for a few hours a day on a district device. But really there wasn't much I could do. Luckily the district paid everyone the wage they would have made if they had been working so I still got a pay check. 

At first I tried to keep everyone on a schedule, but as I realized we were going to be home all day every day for a long time, I found that it wasn't worth waking up early because that just made the days longer. We had good days and bad days. There were actually a lot of things about quarantine that I loved. We had never had so much time at home with our kids with nothing else to do. No friends, no sports, no school, no nothing! I can't imagine that we'll ever have that much time home as a family again. We organized most of the house. (Sadly if you were to look at my house today you would never know that it had been deeply cleaned and organized less than a year ago.) We spent time exercising. We did family 5k at Kleiner Park on Saturdays, which the kids hated. I made a workout circuit with different exercises at different stations throughout the house, which the kids were slightly more tolerant of. We had a popsicle house building competition with my family. Each family ordered 1000 popsicle sticks on amazon and we all had a week to make a house. Ainsley made most of ours, and of course knocked it out of the park. We did a lot of baking, a lot of watching movies, and a lot of reading the news. We took the kids on an outing to Bruneau Sand Dunes. We had a Dinger family talent show with all of the Dinger cousins over zoom.  And we even had an earthquake!  One that we felt! I was upstairs in my bedroom and thought the kids were shaking the house. John and Emmie noticed the lights shaking. I think John was the first one to realize what was going on. He is clearly the calm head that you want around in an emergency. I just stood still while trying to recall my earthquake training. Which never came to me. 

Luckily the weather during April was gorgeous. My parents heated their pool and we swam earlier than we have in years. We spent more time in the yard during April and May than we have the entire time we've lived in this house. John made me some grow boxes and we got around to some landscaping projects that we hadn't been able to find the time to do for years. We moved loads and loads of pavers, planted trees, built a retaining wall, put down 5 yards of bark, and put down a boarder of pavers between our rocks and grass. It looked so nice when it was all done! The kids and John also made some awesome cornhole boards. I think they turned out amazing. They were a great project and as a bonus they got a lot of good use this spring and summer. 

We went out on a limb and purchased tickets to Mexico. We were sure life would be back to normal by November when we were scheduled to travel. Boy were we wrong! We currently have a large credit with American Airlines. Hopefully the trip to Cabo with my parents will happen November 2021. 

We celebrated Easter. We actually got up and got dressed. Which we hadn't done in weeks. We were becoming accustomed to home church by now and I was starting to prefer it to regular church. John would bless the sacrament and Owen would pass it. We would read our scriptures and do our come follow me lesson. Some weeks were definitely better than others, but I could say the same for regular church. 

And now for April in photos:

Planter Boxes

Raised flower bed.

                                           Trees planted, pavers not yet removed.

Dying Easter Eggs

All Dressed up for Easter. 
(Documentation of the beginning of John's beard)

Cornhole boards in progress,

Cute kids Easter pictures.

Popsicle house competition.

 

March 2020

In an attempt to recap the infamous 2020, I plan to go through my camera roll and put photos from that month here on the blog along with any important news I feel like I should add. So here we go...

March 2020 started like most other Marches. Band concerts, piano recitals, and plans being made for spring break. And then Covid hit. A week before spring break school was canceled, I remember wondering if the kids would go back to school after spring break. Clearly the crisis that was happening worldwide was not fully understood by me, or by most people. Every day it seemed we were hit with new surprises as more and more of the world came to a crashing halt. Tennis was cancelled, soccer was cancelled, church was cancelled. But when Disneyland closed, my mind was blown. We slowly started to realize that we might be in this for the long haul.  Not really knowing what "the long haul" meant. 

Ainsley and Emmie were supposed to be going to Disneyland with my parents. That got cancelled. John and I were going to take Owen to the coast to visit James and Shelly and spend time on the Oregon coast. That was cancelled. John had been interviewed for a documentary on Idaho history and we were supposed to go to a fancy schmancy showing at the Idaho history museum, that was cancelled. John had his birthday.  That wasn't cancelled! Although I had the genius idea to drive 2 hours away to a hot springs.  I figured that would be a great thing to do to get away from people and covid. I was wrong. The place was packed. I couldn't even relax and have fun. More and more people kept coming the longer we were there and I finally made everyone pack up and leave. Even the family we invited to go with us. John was not happy with me. But we did come home and eat his beloved huevos rancheros. So hopefully that redeemed his birthday a bit. 

I panicked again when we suddenly couldn't get toilet paper. Luckily we were always able to find some when we needed it. John and I went to Winco one evening to get some food, the store was packed, and the shelves were empty. I've never lived through anything where I had to worry about not being able to get food for my children. And while I knew we would technically be fine because we have a surplus of food at home, it was still a little unnerving. I couldn't even comprehend that life wouldn't be back to normal for a long, long, time. I'm still waiting....

And now, photos from March.

Owen's band Concert.  Look at how close they were sitting! And not wearing masks!

Ainsley and Emmie's piano recital. My parents had just returned from a trip to visit Syd in Florida and Kort in Denver and this was the first time we had seen them in weeks. My mom was SICK. Horrible cough, fever, etc. She had seen a Dr. in Denver who told her it was just a virus. She flew home. After some time home she finally went to her Dr. here ,who couldn't be certain, (covid tests were hard to come by then) but said he would not be surprised if she had indeed had covid. We'll never know for sure. No one around her ever got sick and we still joke that she was the first case in Idaho. Joke might not be the right word, as it most definitely is not funny. 

School was cancelled on a Sunday night and on Monday we drove up to Bogus. February had dumped a ton of snow in the mountains and there was still decent skiing.  On Tuesday they shut down the ski resort....because of Covid, not the lack of snow.

March was the beginning of the quarantine. We stayed home and didn't see friends and family to help flatten the curve. We started doing what the rest of America was doing. Spending time as a family finding ways to pass the time.

Next up...April.

January 2020 Recap

I found this list waiting for me. It appears to be a list of things I wanted to remember to write about when I sat down to update the blog.  However, here we are a year later and I can't seem to remember what some of them mean, and I can't bring myself to delete my list.  So I'll just leave this here. With my thoughts in parenthesis...if I have any thoughts. 

Family/youth goals 

(We sat down in January and made goals with the kids to go along with the new youth program. I had just been called to be a primary activity leader with my friend Heather and we were lucky enough to be over our daughters' group! I loved being able to have Emmie in my group for a year. If I recall, Owen set a running goal and a goal to get a 4.0, Ainlsey set a goal to try a variety of workout classes at the gym, read a book in french, read the Book of Mormon, I set a goal to print my blog, read the Book of Mormon, reach out to friends old and new and have in person conversations, and...sadly the rest I can't remember. I know that we all accomplished some of our goals...but not all. This year threw us a curveball!

First volleyball game 

(I think this was referring to the fact that I joined a women's vollyeball league with some friends. We had a blast! We also lost every game.)

Birthday shopping/birthday plans 

(I think this was in reference to Ainsley's birthday. We spent the weenend before we went to Salt Lake shopping for her birthday. I always like shopping with Ainsley. She found a lot of really cute clothes and shoes for her birthday, and I got the pleasure of spending the day with her. My only complaint about shopping with Ainsley is that she might be even more indecisive than me!)

Test retakes...ains 

(I have NO idea what this is about, or why I would have written it down. But while we're on the topic of Ainsley and tests, she did take the ACT this year. For the first time. Without studying. and she got a 33! She's amazing.)

Owen skiing 

(I'm assuming this had something to do with Owen and ski team last year. He has become quite the skier. Last year toward the end of the season he could get himself down any double black diamond and clocked his speed down one run (Paradise at Bogus Basin)at over 50 MPH! Thank goodness he wears a helmet!)

Church at 10:30 

(Clearly I was excited about 10:30 church.  Too bad we only got to enjoy it for 3 months!)

Garage broke...money worries/blessings 

(I don't even remember the garage door breaking. Which makes me realize that often times things that might seem stressful or inconvenient at the time in hindsight are really not worth the worry. I wonder if I felt blessed that we had the means to take care of it and so it wasn't stressful.  We may never know.)

Johns tooth fixed 

(John broke a tooth on a frozen chocolate chip cookie. He may never eat a frozen cookie again. Which is sad for him because there is nothing better than an under-baked frozen chocolate chip cookie. And the benefit of him getting into the dentist to repair his broken tooth is that he set a future appointment to take care of some other dental work that he needed done.  That man avoids the dentist like the plague.)

Owen ordained a teacher and set apart as 1st counselor 

(We got to be with Owen when he was ordained a teacher. And ironically he was just called as president of the teachers quorum last Sunday.)

Owen Pep band 

(Owen was able to be a part of the High School pep band for a basketball game. The Lewis and Clark and Lowell Scott bands were welcomed by Centennial in an attempt to get kids excited about the band program. I think Owen had fun, although it didn't convince him that he wanted to do band in high school.)

Owen has it under control...somehow pulled off an A in his honors math class 

(Owen's grades cause me a lot of stress. He tends to start the semester off strong. Then his grade always falls to just below and A. Then he spends the rest of the semester trying to pull his grade back up to an A. Somehow he keeps managing to do it! But it stresses me out! Why not just stay at an A the entire semester if you're capable? These are questions I may never know the answer to.)

Emmie soccer and hockey with friends 

(Emmie is lucky enough to be apart of a soccer team that does fun team building activities year round. Last year they got together to play indoor hockey. During the summer they have lots of swim parties. And this winter they joined an indoor soccer league and some of the girls that ski spent a night skiing at Bogus together.)

Photo Recap: January/February 2020

Emmie on the mountain waiting for Owen to race

                                                                   Views from on top.

Primary Activity Group

Owen got braces.

 

Owen, John and I up at Bogus...again. Clearly that is the only time I think to get out my camera.

Ski day with friends. It was so sunny and warm that we all went home with sunburn beards.

Ainsley Young Women Recognition night. It was awesome. There was confetti, a Who's Who game (run by yours truly) and a funny and fun spotlight for each of the YW receiving their awards. It was put on by several of the mom's who's YW earned their medallions before the youth program change. 

January 20, 2020

Ainsley's 16th birthday! I'll have to let the pictures summarize the trip we took to Salt Lake for Ainsley's 16th birthday. Last year.  I remember we had a blast. We spent the weekend with John's parents and cousins. and We spent the day in Provo having fun as a family. I originally planned the trip thinking we could take her to a show or something because nothing was playing in Boise. But apparently January is a tough month for plays and live performances because there was nothing in Utah either...but I think she still had a great trip. And she was thrilled with the poster placed on our garage by her friend Hallie that greeted her when we returned home