The Waterstraut Waterspout: The Great Quarantine of 2018

So, it's been an interesting week and a half around here. Asa came down with Influenza B, and it was pretty awful. We closed off the bedroom and placed him on Quarantine (Calib made the sign), because I was not about to have all of us get those germs. In particular, because Peyton and I are once again headed to Ohio (tomorrow actually). It's probably a good thing I did too, because we are now on day 12 of Asa being in the bedroom. I think he's probably ok to come out today, but since I'm leaving tomorrow I am not taking any chances with those germs.

But before I get to the fun of quarantine, I do have other April happenings to report. We had Easter, and this year I was like 'do you guys want to color eggs?' and the boys were like 'yea, that's cool, we can do that.' So I said 'ok, so we have to hardboil eggs then' and they were all like 'yea, I think we're out then.' They know return on investment, people. I've taught them well. So instead we hid plastic eggs just like last year. The colored ones had money for their jars in them, then they each had a special one with a $20 bill in them, and then there was the one golden egg with $5 that would go to whoever found it first.

We did the money eggs last year too, because I feel like I've used all the good hiding places for baskets, and hiding the $20 eggs is way more fun (and way more challenging for the boys to find). So, their baskets fulls of food (yes, Peyton asked for pickles in his easter basket) and candy were ust sitting out on the counter.

Asa and I opted to hide the eggs in the morning, as opposed to the night before -because the boys tend to stay up later than us, and we're always up first. Case and point, here's us waking them up at 10:30 on Easter morning.

We had some fun new hiding spots for eggs this year- It's also only our second Easter in this house, so that provided some more hiding spots too.

When we finally got the boys up they went off hunting for their eggs.

So I hid a yellow egg in the tie behind the curtain on the French Doors. The boys walked past it a ton before someone finally found it.

Peyton's $20 egg was hidden in the dog food bin, but he found it pretty easily.

Calib's was inside the ottoman. He ripped the bottom open one night messing around on it, so I told him his punishment was a good spot to hide his egg.

Hayden's was the only one that didn't require digging to find it, but it still took him awhile. We put it at the bottom of the bookshelf in the living room behind the abacus.

They were happy with their basket items. We had some Takis, Zebra Cakes, and Mountain Dew.

The golden egg took awhile to find, and Calib is really the only one who didn't give up. It was in the bottom of homeschool central in the red basket with the flashcards.

We didn't have any sort of rhyme or reason when we were filling the eggs with change. It was just all random amounts, so the boys were excited to open them up and see how much money they had to add to their jars.

We had our usual Easter breakfast of bunny pancakes.

Also on Easter, Hayden asked if we could finally use the confetti nailpolish to color in the last country from every continent. I obliged. We've been doing flags about once a week just to keep everything fresh in their minds.

We spent Easter afternoon playing games- board games and Xbox. Thanks for the introduction of Drawful into this house Jake.

And shout out to Aunt Patti who sent us Easter candy in the mail. She made all of grandma's homemade candy and sent it out to us!

And for Easter dinner we had our traditional Low Country Boil.

Easter night we headed out to Top Golf to finally play some golf at night. Asa had free money to spend for his birthday, so we thought it would be fun to go at night. The boys really liked it, and it was fun to see it all lit up.

I also hear it's been cold up north. My mom sent me a text last night and told me to bring a hat. It's fricken April, you guys, get it together. We actually have had a few 'cold' days here too, but we also got up to 90 a couple of times, so a trip to the pool was in order.

And Adventure Island is open for the season, so we headed out there for a day.

Although, I'm not sure when leaving the house became such an ordeal, but I feel like it takes forever for everyone to be ready to go lately. So, while I waited for Calib to decide what pair of shoes to wear, I made note of it on the chalkboard.

We also made a trip to Dave and Busters. We had money still left on one card, and then got $20 free on another and went on half-price Wednesday. The boys wanted to get another giant ball (they had popped theirs) and Peyton wanted a third blanket (he says it's a tradition to get one now).

We got enough tickets to get two balls (so when they inevitably pop another one- we have an extra!) and the blanket for Peyton, mostly because Asa and I killed it on the game where you throw the balls to knock down the clowns.

We were blacked out at Disney for the two weeks surrounding Easter, but Asa and I decided to give Disney Springs and a waterpark a shot. We had a nice lunch at Disney Springs but it was SUPER crowded, so we decided not to do the waterpark. But, all was not lost. I'll drive an hour and 15 minutes for Poutine anyday. Plus, it gave me a tiny Disney fix (since I SO miss it--- we haven't been in awhile).

We also split the three little piggies at BB Wolf Company,

and the slider trio at the Polite Pig.

We finished it off with a strawberry crepe from Amorette's Pattiserie.

Ok, now this is some kind of miracle, because while we were at Disney Asa told me he felt like he had had a low-grade fever for the last few days, mind you AFTER he had shared all that food with me (somehow I did not get sick- a miracle!) This was Thursday, and by Friday night he really wasn't feeling all that well. Then Saturday we decided to put him on quarantine. He wasn't allowed out of the bedroom, in an effort to contain the germs.

I thought the air mattress would be better than the pull-out couch for me to sleep on, so the first night, I slept in the Family room with Ellie Belly, turns out the air mattress never warms up, and I woke up a million times freezing to death before I finally ended up on the (non-pull out) couch.

Sunday was wrestlemania, and Asa or weeks had been planning with Hayden to theme dinner around wrestlers. I was happy to let them have at it, and I was excited to finally have a food event like that where I didn't have to do anything. But, Asa was in quarantine, and Hayden really wanted to do it. So, he worked with me to make a whole spread of food and signs. He was excited about it.

The boys said I had to let Asa out to watch wrestlemania, but I decided they could have the door to the bedroom open and just watch it on two different TVs, but together. (Porkchop still has to be kept separate thus the board and the chairs.) We also set up a sanitation station just outside the Quarantine door. Nobody went in without spraying Lysol and using hand sanitizer.

From Sunday, it really went downhill. Asa was basically non-existant. He slept all day, and the only interaction he had with the outside world was me bringing him medicine, tea, and the occasional piece of toast or jello.

Meanwhile, I was flying solo keeping the house running. The boys have been really helpful though- with dishes and trash and watering the plants and the dogs and such. Twice a day we would put on a song and lysol wipe down the house for the duration of the song just to make sure we weren't spreading any sort of germs. I'm pretty sure my house is cleaner now than it has ever been before.

But it's been tough, I've been sleeping (not well) on the couch for 12 nights now. I've been using the boys bathroom (which they have so nicely been making sure to put the toilet seat back down for me-when I know they don't usually do that) and keeping it pretty clean. I also have been working on limited clothes, and items from my room and bathroom because I don't want to bring germs out of the infested room.

But I have been a pretty good trooper. I tackled all kinds of stuff that has been needed done around the house, all by myself. I even replaced the boys toilet seat with a new one, installed one of those slider things in the boys bathroom cabinets, cleaned out the microwave, fridge and freezer (and even unfroze the water line to get water out of the fridge again), hung a bunch of pictures I'd been meaning to get to in the office, and flipped the dryer door so it opens in the other direction. I cleaned the garage out. Plus, I've been doing the usual chores Asa does. I've been making all the meals, vacuuming every day, and doing the laundry, and I even mowed the lawn and washed all the dogs (and I medicate them without too much difficulty.) I ran all the errands, even ones I don't usually do. Oh, and I did take care of the taxes.

But, my most impressive showing (according to Calib at least) was when some wild animal left a decapitated squirrel by our trash can in the side yard. Calib discovered it when he was taking out the trash and he was like 'I just can't do it', so I went out there with a shovel and took care of it all by myself.

I noted the event in the Get Well card I made for Asa mid-week. (Hayden made one too).

But as the days drug on, I became increasingly frustrated. I think it's the lack of sleep and using my own bathroom and not having anything really fun to do. Not only that, I've washed my hands so many times, they're dry and cracking, and then using hand sanitizer just stings.

The boys felt bad for me. One night they pooled their money to buy us pizza for dinner.

And then last night Calib made dinner for everyone. And there was just one small kitchen fire, so you know, all in all, not too bad.

About four days into the ordeal Calib added 'Days since last healthy dad' to his Quarantine sign. We have twelve tallies on it now.

In all fairness, he could probably come out today. He's clearly much better. He's up and around, and while he took last week off from the interviewing circuit, he is back on it this week. He's left the room twice in 12 days: one for a Skype interview from the office, and once because Calib was yelling 'fire', and none of us have shown signs of anything remotely close to what Asa has, so I think we're all going to get out of this with nobody else getting sick.

But it has been a long 12 days.

And tomorrow, I'm headed to Ohio with Peyton, in what will probably prove to be a long week.

Though, I'm sure my mom will provide us with Chud Spuds in thanks for coming to help with grandma's house again. And, we get to see Aunt Patti too, so we're excited about that. But, you guys, you best be getting rid of that snow before I show up. I am not having that.

I leave you with my cute animal pictures from the last three weeks or so.