The word “routine” describes our week fairly well. Because of that, I really don’t have that much to write. (I know…Ellen at a loss for words?) Really, I’ve been so exhausted that my brain isn’t even functioning at full power.
Two more teeth have come through for Layla! That brings her up to 6. I try not to compare my children in a competitive manner, but I do compare them to each other at certain ages and end up marveling at how different they are. Alethea had quite a few more teeth when she turned one, and was a size bigger in outfits. Layla is still my tiny babe. Layla is walking all around the house now. She’s getting pretty fast! Sometimes too fast. Alethea didn’t walk until two months after her first birthday.
We are very excited to celebrate Layla’s first birthday next weekend! I can’t believe it has been a whole year since she was born. With her birthday also comes the painful anniversary of the Covid-19 state wide emergency shut down. Did you know that a year later, our state is still in a declared state of emergency?
Before the pandemic, the only time a state of emergency was declared was during bad snowstorms, and travel restrictions were imposed.
The panicked state that the state of emergency has permanently left us in, is unreal. The sadness and chaos that we have lived through, is at times unbearable. And the division and rage that has been stirred up amongst us, is insane. We can’t stand our own friends and family anymore. You can’t even open Facebook without entering a war. God forbid you even try to have a real conversation about anything these days. You probably couldn’t even talk about puppies without being slammed for having an opinion.
It’s been a tough year. And routine is what has kept me going. Without a routine, I’d be tempted to fall into the pit of despair.
So this week, we did crafts, watched a lot of Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, read a lot of books, did devotions each morning, played a lot, and got out of the house on the one warm day we had. We went to Round Hill Park on Wednesday when it was in the mid 50’s. It was beautiful and all of the animals were having a great day! If you’re not familiar with round hill, it is an operating animal farm that is open to the public every day. They also have a splash park (which will hopefully reopen this summer) and a whole park with pavilions and playgrounds, just opposite the farm.
My mom and sister Ruby came with us and we had a wonderful time. Alethea was not afraid of the animals like she was the last time we visited, and had a blast talking to the alpacas and chickens. Because it was a beautiful day, there were quite a few families with kids there. Alethea talked to every single person. She’s quite the social butterfly.
We ended the week with a visit to my grandma. It’s always fun to hear her stories about her life in the past. We even found a very old, colorized photo from her and my grandfather’s wedding in 1951. My goodness…I never realized how much my brother looks like my grandfather did at his age. He passed away a long time ago, so none of us kids ever knew him. But the stories my grandma has told me makes me feel like I did know him.
We got an ice cream cake yesterday. No particular reason, but it’s a big birthday filled month and we felt like celebrating. Alethea loved eating a piece last night, but she shivered the whole time and said “This is COLD!!!” It was adorable.
Hopefully we’ll be getting some great weather in the coming weeks. I can’t wait to get outside more. Last night we facetime’d my sister and her husband, randomly, and had a lot of great laughs.
Enjoy photos from our week!
Love deeply. Live passionately.
Ellen
