This week has been one of an overwhelming number of hours related to work as well as my unpaid work of doing what I can to support our local businesses. I may be more settled in to the realization that this is “real life,” but I’m also just tired. Okay, exhausted. So this week’s update will be short. The extended nature of this crisis is just straight up draining, and I know I’m not alone in that feeling.
Friday’s Frugal Five
1. We decided to “splurge” and pay for Disney+ (on top of Netflix and Amazon). For $7.99 a month, it’s already paid for itself in the first month with Frozen II and… another movie I’m completely spacing on. Plus we’ve been watching some National Geographic documentaries on there.
And by “we,” I mean that the kiddo watches the movie or show, my husband does half the time, and I do maybe a quarter of the time. Regardless, I’m definitely glad we’ve paid for Disney+. While we’re home a lot more for however long, having more interesting movie and show options seems worth it.
2. Another neighbor had her birthday this past week, so we celebrated in the cul de sac again with a happy hour mini party. It’s not quite the same, but it’s a heck of a lot better than nothing. I am so in love with my neighborhood.
3. We had a pizza “party” with our old neighbors who are currently stuck in Italy, along with another family who still lives here. We each made our own pizza, and we ate lunch here while they ate dinner given the time difference.
One thing I very much hope will continue after all of this is the increased connection with those who don’t live near us. At this point, Italy is just as close as Seattle, and I don’t plan to let that get away from us once we can move about normally.
4. I was able to tick another month off of my clothes buying ban. Considering I’m not going anywhere and doing no shopping other than essentials and take out, this was entirely too easy. But hey, I’ll take it. And I might get to four years after all if this keeps up.
5. So, I’d kept this out of the Frugal Five last week, but it felt wrong to keep it from all of you just because I was worried about the possible backlash. Starting last week, my neighbor has been watching my kiddo for part of every day while I get more focused work done.
She pulled her kiddos from school the same time as I pulled mine from preschool – five weeks ago – and for the first three weeks, we fully quarantined from each other. After those initial three weeks of isolation, we’ve been treating our two homes as one, and we have not come within six feet of anyone outside of that.
We’ve been eating most dinner together, and she has been my lifeline through all of this. Life is weird, and hard, and surreal, but with her and the rest of that family, we’re able to tread water and get through this together.
If you’re going to comment just to tell me I’m wrong, I don’t want to hear it. But I also want to be transparent and share what my life looks like right now. And this childcare option makes a whole lot more sense than a busy daycare right now.
Exercise Update
Like last week, I made sure to get out for a walk every day. Friday I also went for a twenty minute run, which felt totally awesome. I’m still taking it easy, but I seem to be able to run a couple days a week now without aggravating my heel too much.
Tuesday I had an hour “dance party” in my room by myself, which was entirely more fun than it sounds. Wednesday was a live vinyasa yoga class through Zoom. It’s been a long time since I’ve taken a tough yoga class, and I am sore.
How are you all holding up?
What a blessing to extend your “family” when you have to be isolated from your usual family. Wise to do an initial social distancing, but then I total agree with making your two families into one. The mental health of all of you is critically important and you are lucky to be living next door to such great people.
Mental health has been a big part of it, and just sharing the burden of intense extended isolation. And so the kiddo has friends to play with!!
Yes, it’s a draining time, definitely. Most of us in the U.S. are a few weeks behind you, so I imagine the sense of isolation will grow for us as well. Glad you can get a little reprieve from the kiddo. I’ve wondered about this idea, with two families doing a strict isolation for 2 weeks and then relaxing with each other. I could see this being an attractive option if we decided to have our parents come and stay with us, for example. I guess we will see.
Hang in there, friend! Keep taking advantage of these tech supports that bring the world closer. We just had our first Zoom calls with both my parents and my brother’s family this week, and wow, I wish we hadn’t waited for a pandemic to do so. So good to connect with loved ones this way.
Yeah, I SO miss our family right now. The kiddo wants his grandmas and great grandma so badly.
that’s a good looking pizza. yeast is hard to come by around here. we only have 3 packets left. i might just have to get another sourdough starter going in case of yeast emergency. also, to hell with the backlash.
Luckily we stocked up on a couple of jars of yeast back in February. I haven’t tried to buy any more sense though…
that’s wonderful that you can have an expanded home. Mental health is so key – for you, space for work, and for your kiddo, friends.
Thank you – I agree ❤️ And we are still being very, very careful outside of our bubble.
You are so lucky to have great neighbors! I know my kid misses having a playmate. Unfortunately, we haven’t been here long enough to develop those ties. It sounds like a reasonable compromise of staying safe and staying sane. And yes, a lot safer then sending him to daycare. I could easily send our kid to daycare since I’m a healthcare worker but since hubby is working from home, we have chosen to keep her home. We have to tag team care to get anything done though.
It’s safer for the kiddos that have to be at daycare to have fewer there as well. And yeah, we are very lucky. Has your kiddo been up for video chats with friends?
Isolating together with another family who has also gone through appropriate quarantine is within expert recommendations, so you’re not wrong, and it also sounds like a great solution for your whole family (and theirs)!
Thanks, friend ❤️
I’ve been trying to figure out the best path forward as all this gets extended! I live alone and work from home, and know 2 people who also do that who I’d like to form a germ pod with – not live or work together, but actually see in person INSIDE. (So transgressive-feeling.)
I also know three other households who are also quarantining (I’m in Portland, so we started a bit after you but it’s been almost 3 weeks of shelter in place) – I’ve gone on walks with some of them and we’ve gotten within a few feet of each other (sidewalk side-by-side, but not touching) and even then I’m a bit plagued later wondering if it was okay/the right thing to do.
I understand the concern about being judged by others, and I want to be safe and healthy, and I want this quarantine to be effective, and I do not want to never see the people I have close relationships with. I’m already sick to death of screen socializing. Ugh. I sure wish we had more testing and more information. But I’m so grateful that so far we haven’t had the explosion in cases we’ve been trying to prevent.
Yeah, it’s so so hard to know what is the right decision now.
That pizza really looks good!
Oh it was!! Clearly time to make more… hmm.
Like you, I hope to maintain more contact with friends and family once this chaos ends. The only difference is that I’m still going to work, so my life isn’t as limited as most others. Still, there are things I like about this current state.
What do you do that has you going into work still?
I fully support with your arrangement with your neighbor and I know you have a lot of regard for science and health. And I’m glad the arrangement is giving you some space to accomplish what you want and need to accomplish. Honestly, I want to take my neighbor across the street’s kids for her, but her partner is the general manager of a hotel that is still open so…. it wouldn’t be prudent. And, my partner is a nurse and working so either way, we need to keep to ourselves. I so wish the situation were a bit different as my early retirement status would allow me to help more. I think the situation is tough for only children especially since your neighborhood is like mine and the kids seem to play together spontaneously on a regular basis. Mine is doing well but she misses social interaction and zoom and facetime just aren’t the same.
Last weekend a neighbor put together a social distanced running race (our loop is conveniently 1/2 mile around) – 1/2 mile for the younger kids and 1 mile race for the olders. The families each had their own time slots (30 minutes) and we got to cheer on everybody over the course of the day out of our driveways (it took quite awhile). Considering doing it again in month to see if ppl improve their times. I’ve seen a few more kids running the block this week so I think the “race” idea was brilliant.
Okay a social distanced running race is THE coolest idea I’ve heard yet.
Hey, you’re doing wonderful. And that’s freaking amazing you have a quarantine friend to help watch your son, that would be a huge mental health benefit that you should take advantage of. Anyone who whines about that is a big jerk.
Amazingly, with that caveat I wrote, I haven’t had to delete any jerk comments.