Easter and April - Shelter in Place

We actually do have a Shelter in Place order, but it hasn't been the entire time this post covers, but about half.

Let's start with quotes because everyone needs a little toddler in their life! All are said by Gideon unless otherwise noted.

At the end of "reading" a scripture one night into an old prop microphone (he repeats after us, a few words at a time), Gideon ended with "Thank you."

"Yay! Scriptures is done. Now I can watch the Frozen!"

"Yay! Church is over."

    Sensing a theme here??


Rob: "Natalie can you get him one of these." [Capri sun on pizza night]
She passes hers to him and goes to get another one for herself.
Gideon: "Natalie, Can you say I'm sorry Gideon."
Natalie: "Why?"
Gideon: "For taking my juice."
(He thought that because she gave up her drink so he could have one immediately and not have to wait, that she had been in possession of his juice from the beginning and relinquished it as Dad's command.)

One night I recorded: My impressively odd toddler just hijacked and finished family evening prayer, and before I could tell him I was proud of him for learning to pray, he waddled off quacking.

(Jacob made this meme in response)

He asks often when eating his dino chicken nuggets, "Is this the head or the tail?"

"Sacrament is over! Yay! I want my nighttime clothes!"

Seth: "Did you know you can go 3 months without social interaction before permanent damage?" [He does have social interaction; just not in person. The kids are read for "normal again!"]

Gideon keeps putting his hands on my torso and asks, "Is that your baby?" "Do you have a baby in your tummy?" [No; I do not.]

Gideon was playing with a tea set and serving his sisters. He was trying to serve tea, and they were insisting that it was lemonade that he was serving. He should have been ok with this since lemonade is a new favorite with him, but he was not and came running in to see us to tell us his gripes over their non-cooperation. He refers to his siblings as "the kids".

After a long explanation of what "the kids" said that was contrary to what Gideon was trying to say to them, he ended his report with "That made me so much sad and mad."

We explained to him that since we don't drink tea, we usually pretend lemonade or hot chocolate or water when we play tea set. He said ok, seemed to understand, and rushed back to the den to resume play. Gideon: "Ok, it's tea." [Just pretend it's honey tea or herbal tea, girls.]

Referring to himself in a nerf sword fight Gideon kept saying, "The magnificent!"

He was actually not magnificent; Seth disarmed him about every 30 seconds, but he was having so much fun! 

"Take a picture of me."

My kids horsing around like they were medieval swordsmen or something!

"I live at the beach and I'm Grammy and I like to dig sand and I like to look for starfish."

My goal: Get some sand for under the playset.

"I scare the birds."
(referring to birds outside window at the bird feeder that we all enjoy watching)
"The baby bird forgot his cars. The baby bird wants to read books."
(referring to himself as my baby bird one night before bed)
"I'm going to bug Kaitlyn and she can read these books."
(At least he asked first if he could go to her room, about 8:15am Saturday morning. I know she was awake; not sure about Carolyn?)

Other odd happenings:Birthday "parties" (Parades) - we have a picture of this below

Virtual Sleepovers - the girls did this one night in their room with phones and games with friends on their phones. Surprisingly successful.

Alee intellectual goal: learn to make and decorate cakes this year. (First cake, with help)
March cake

This is Gideon's prayer position for the night.

Gideon isn't old enough to help with the sacrament of the Lord's supper, but he wanted to sit right up in front as close as he could. Seth administers the sacrament each week under Rob's direction.

Kaitlyn usually plays the piano for our church service (especially the prelude), but Alee and Seth each played one of our hymns this past Sunday. (I played a song too.)

I'm ready for sacrament.

(Gideon's church clothes requirement since he hates church clothes: shirt with no pictures and pants/shorts not made of knit. No pajamas for church.)

"It's Saturn!" (We have no idea where he learned that Saturn looks like a ball with a ring around it.)

Sunday picture:

My brother cracks us up making selfies out of our pictures.

"It's time for scriptures!" (He's being Rob here. It was not actually time for scriptures; he just likes being in charge.)

One of our drive through birthday "parade-parties":

Gideon asks almost every night if we're going to have ice cream after supper. (We definitely do every Sunday. Occasionally we do on another night.)

His shirt got messy. He doesn't like messy shirts. The shirt must go. (The sticky on the shirt must have gotten wiped over his hair, giving him this awesome ice cream hair style that "stuck" up!)

I love the Google-made videos.

Here are some links to these:

Sunday in April
Easter Weekend
Dying Eggs
 Morning Walk
*You click the link, then it will open like an album in my google photos. You click the still picture for the video clip to begin. Most are about 30 seconds.
Longer video: Egg dying and Egg Hunt

We had an Edwards Family Testimony meeting a few weeks ago over Zoom.

Gideon thinks he can use the TV like a touch screen, so sometimes we cast something like a drawing app up on the TV and follow his movements to play along. It's really fun.

We rearranged; we have an office. The girls share 2 upstairs rooms in pairs. Seth has a room. Gideon has a pass through area. It's not perfect and we need to continue to tweak the arrangement a little until it's just right. The office is also a music room/study space, or at least that's the goal.

We tried to have him share a room with Seth, but their schedules aren't aligned, he kicks and aggravates Seth all night, and he fell off the bed (beyond my barricade) and woke up crying the second night.

Gideon got stickers - yay!


After the first week or so, I tried to create some space for school things; they were all over the downstairs. Four of the kids could put stuff here. (I then ordered something to help organize further.)

April's looking a little open; too bad we can't do visits right now!

The closet in the downstairs (bedroom) office is for the toy shelves. (I have since packed up a bunch of toys into opaque boxes so that we have fewer to clean and Gideon can more thoroughly enjoy those that are out.)

Gideon loves pajamas! (Red is his favorite color right now.)

The girls made a castle from the box Rob's new office chair.

(We've been using a kitchen chair since our last computer chair broke years ago, but using that ALL day EVERY day was not comfortable for Rob, so he used some of his bonus to get a computer chair for home since he works from home now.)

Gideon enjoys the marble run toy (that's been put away for a while). He's not old enough to understand it, but he messes with it until someone has time to build it for him again.

He dumped his fruit snacks on the floor, and then ate them like a dog. ??

Movie night! (Gideon did not stay like this but for 5 minutes; it was cute though.)

Haircut day. (I actually don't like doing haircuts, but Natalie has interest, so if this quarantine thing lasts, I'm going to teach her for next time!)

Gideon loves Rob's measuring tapes. (A child safe one would be a good idea for his birthday. He slept with this one for nap one day. Boys sleep with the strangest things!)

General Conference Sunday - Our white handkerchiefs are ready for the Hosanna Shout.

 

Kaitlyn is lying on a bubble wrap sheet (she stole Natalie's place when Natalie got up). They are playing cards in Carolyn and Kaitlyn's room. (This was one day "after school" and before spring break.)

Gideon painting. (He loves water colors and play dough.)

Gideon didn't feel like doing scriptures this night, so he tried to go up to the TV and tap "back" as we casted the Come Follow Me study book to the screen.

Walks with toddlers (actually walking) are about twice as long. He's watching the ants.

And we have to stop and smell the flowers.

We have had some really warm days and some cool days since spring began. The pool has come out a few times, but it's a lot of work to set up and clean up.

I've made a few masks to wear out shopping. I'm unsatisfied with the ones I've made so far, so I plan to try again.

Alee discovered ironing this month, and loved to iron. (She started requesting things to iron.)

Easter Baskets - Kaitlyn's is missing the glove we got her because she's a lefty and hers was out of stock.

We ordered a new fridge last month, and it was finally delivered April 11th.
 

We love it! And our old fridge is now in the garage, so we can buy more of things at a time and have room for them. (It was rusting on the front and leaking, and continues to rust and leak out there, but it's working.)

DeeDee (my grandma) missed her sunrise service for Easter, this being her first Easter as a widow. So our family gathered via Zoom and my aunt and DeeDee held a sunrise service. It was so nice to "see" everyone - including one cousin who was up at 3:45 am in his time zone for our sunrise service. She read one of my grandfather's Easter sermons. I love my family.


Seth had requested "fancy waffles", so for Easter morning, we had fancy waffles.

(Before Easter) - Rob used a day off and a Saturday to get the playset stained/sealed so that his hard work from 2 years ago would weather well. It looks so beautiful.

Happy Easter!

We set the table fancy, so Gideon got a plastic goblet (used to be Alee's before she could handle a heavy glass goblet). He now thinks this is his official lemonade cup. He had a meltdown the next day when we didn't understand what he wanted. We are still learning to calm and use our words.

He gets to choose his own ice cream dish (little fluted dish, waffle bowl shaped dish, etc). He chose a candy dish. haha That wasn't an option, but it wasn't important enough to say no.

He wanted every last drop of his ice cream!

Google made this collage. Look how he's grown!

Monday after Easter we did our secular Easter fun - dying eggs and egg hunt.

Gideon sings so much! Right now he's singing a lot of Frozen 2 songs.

Spring Break - enjoy your screen time!

Still took some family walks, but not every day this week.

Yes, he actually pulled her!

"Alee [pronounced Owie], we need to talk. Sit down."

Gideon is learning to play games. This was one of the girls' favorites. He's learning about taking turns and following rules.

He climbed up there all by himself. He couldn't get down.

I am not doing very well with diet or exercise, but I'm trying...Gideon is not helpful. (This was one of his more cooperative moments during this day's workout.)

As you've seen my kids love to dress up (Alee wearing an old Dorothy costume for the day just for fun). Gideon would prefer no clothes. Some days it feels like it takes him half the day to get dressed. Others he stays in pajamas all day. Either is preferable to nothing. (This was right after a bathroom visit and half hour before dinner, so I let it go.)

Gideon: "Can you row me across?"

Rob: "No, I'm going out to the garage."

Gideon: "I want to go out to the garage! I'm so 'cited!"