SD Week 3 - Home Stretch Until Spring Break

Developments with homeschool: all kids started having regular Zoom classes.  Jack's teacher struggled the most to figure out how to work the fancy technology but she's getting the hang of it.  The kids don't always want to participate, but they enjoy seeing their friends, and Luke had fun with the themes his teacher had for each day (show and tell; share art you've made; crazy hair day; school spirit day).  This week we did a better job of sticking to our schedule, and I also started insisting that the kids spend at least 15 minutes outside during each of their breaks from schoolwork.

Other happenings included the big kids having their second piano lessons via video chat, which has been working surprisingly well.  Ben took Cat to volunteer at the Bishop's Storehouse, which has been extremely busy with so many people losing jobs.  Cat was a great worker and they both appreciated the opportunity to help for a few hours.  It was interesting to realize that the Bishop's Storehouses are literally the only facilities in the Church that are in operation right now.

"When the Blue Giants Attack" by Luke

One night when I was making fried rice and knew I had extra green onions, I asked the girls to try
a recipe I'd found in The Friend for a Chinese flatbread called cōngyóubǐng.  It was really good!

April Fool's!  Can you tell which Oreo has been tampered with?
A new prank: replacing Oreo frosting with toothpaste.  I strategically placed 3 trick-Oreos
back in the package and managed to trick Jack without even trying. (He told me later, "I had a mint Oreo this
morning.  It was weird.") but Luke ate a little and just spat it out, and Cat was too suspicious to even try it.

Cat and Luke made our traditional fake sushi.

Fun and yummy!

Eliza got really into April Fool's.  This is just one of the fun hair decorations she gave Luke
using green food coloring (which luckily washed out pretty easily).  She also had fun putting
green food coloring on faucets and Cat's toothbrush.  The kids tried a few other pranks too.
They're starting to get into it, which makes me worry about next year just a bit.

Jack was excited to get his schoolwork finished in time to join us on our April Fool's surprise outing.

The outing? To walk the .75-miles to Swig and go through the drive-thru as pedestrians.  We got in line
but were told pretty quickly that they wouldn't take our order if we weren't in a car. We waited
in line long enough for Cat to say in the most teenagerish way possible, "I hate my life," which made
it all worth it. Luckily, we were able to get drinks from a different restaurant in the shopping center
so the kids didn't completely hate me.

For dinner I made shepherd's pie cupcakes and chocolate cupcakes and everyone
closed their eyes and chose which one they would have first.

I love evening game time these days!  This one was all the better for Cat
playing "A Million Dreams," and other great tunes on the piano.

Luke invented a game called "Pie," which is just like chess
except there are basically no rules.  He's really good at it.

Our neighborhood elementary school, which our kids do not attend, had a drive-by
parade to wave to the kids. The kids watched and waved, except for Jack,
who preferred to stand cross-armed and stare down the nice teachers.
I found the part where all the cars honked for several seconds particularly entertaining,
since Ben was on a work call upstairs in the office, which faces the street.

I forced the kids to go jogging with me one afternoon.
I didn't do a good job of it, though, because most of the kids just walked.
At least I still have some influence on Jack.