In a couple of days time, on 4th June it is our 3 month isolation milestone having started our own lockdown sooner than most. Despite the easing of restrictions, things remain the same for us.
We remain at home. We've not set foot in a shop since the start of March and have relied on deliveries.
We've avoided going outdoors other than our own garden and occasionally getting fresh air in the evenings when the roads are quieter and it's possible to avoid most people.
It has been a time of paradoxes and contradictions for us in many many ways...
Our house has been the cleanest it has been for a long time, yet is also at its messiest. We've found time to deal with things like limescale on the taps and we continually disinfect door handles. Our no shoes in the house policy is stricter than ever. Yet at the same time the sink is constantly full of washing up, the laundry basket seems to fill more quickly than usual, and there is just so much clutter and things to keep handy for keeping the kids entertained... paint pots, glue, bubbles all kept out rather than packed away. Piles of schoolwork. Lots of boxes and packaging for Miss T's junk modelling projects. Clean AND Messy at the same time.
The days fly by mercifully quickly. I feel busier than ever. And yet we haven't got anything to do in terms of places to go, and schedules and deadlines.
We are finding that we have time for a bedtime story far more often than previously, yet bedtime has shifted later than ever.
The house is full of people with us all at home, and yet there are times that I feel so lonely.
Some days I feel full of hope and joy and gratitude appreciating the opportunity to spend this precious time with my family. Other times, the fear creeps in and I dwell on the awfulness and enormity of what is happening.
This month we've continued our late evening outings when we can - although my back pain has been worse so I've been struggling with pain levels at times. We are fortunate to be just minutes from a countryside lane where we can see fields and foxes and pheasants and sheep. We've even spotted deer recently and bats as the darkness falls. It does get hugely busy there during the daytime, hence waiting until late evening or night before we ever head out.
We've enjoyed baking. Miss T made some yummy cookies and she also made a delicious carrot cake with daddy this month. My sourdough is largely back on hold as we've been managing to get weekly deliveries again so have been able to get enough bread to last each week without having to bake our own at the moment.
Garden play and garden fun. These ribbons are still proving popular!
She even created her own garden festival...
We got some "make your own chocolate London" kits and had fun moulding the chocolate to make Big Ben and a London cab and bus.
As it was a hot day, D's decided to melt rather rapidly...
The hot sunny days have been perfect for water play in the garden...
And for me that's meant being able to enjoy the hot tub. It has to be the best ever impulse buy having picked it up on sale at the supermarket last summer and made such good use of it last summer and this year. I step into the hot tub and it feels like I'm on holiday. For a short while I can forget what is going on in the world and just pretend everything is ok.
I've realised how much it helps ease my backpain too. It was when I didn't use the hot tub for a few days that the back pain worsened.
We are appreciating all the little things like finding wild strawberries growing in the garden. We were also mesmerised by watching a spider catch a ladybird it it's web so fast that we didn't even have time to take a photo. Memories like that will remain in my mind from this strange period of time.
After years of thinking about it, we think we are going to tidy up and revamp the garden a bit over the coming months. Starting small scale with freshening up Miss T's wooden bench with a lick of paint.
I even witnessed something close to a miracle - the three kids working together as a team without any squabbling to hang the washing out. I couldn't believe my eyes! All three of them together can often end in tears. So this was definitely a proud mummy moment for me.
Another proud moment was J beating his own world record score on Crossy Road (again!) and since this photo was taken, he's beaten it yet again with a new high score of 3713. Totally mind blowing! Such dedication to his hobby.
I'd given myself a lockdown hair trim a while ago and this time it was Miss T's turn. I have never dared cut her hair before and we usually only trust our amazing hairdresser Tony to cut her hair but it was a case of needs must as they say. Thankfully she was pleased with the outcome although I have a feeling both of us will need a very good hair cut at the hairdressers once it is totally safe to go there again. The boys won't let me cut their hair at the moment. Ironically, I often cut their hair and they rarely go to the barbers or hairdressers. But for some reason, at the moment when it most needs cutting, they are insisting on growing their hair longer.
I love Miss T's attitude of dressing in her fave dresses regardless of being at home...
And a regular chat with granny on zoom has become part of our new normal.
Our raspberries have just begun to ripen so we are looking for the ripest to pick each day...
And Miss T continues to love making and crafting... She has had so many hours of fun with her "gingerbread" doll made from cardboard and creating outfits for her to wear.
So that's our round-up for another month. At the start of March, I had hoped that by the time we reached June that there would be a significant improvement in the situation. Whilst we've been through lockdown and subsequent easing of lockdown during this time, for us the reality remains that we deemed the risks too high as of 4th March to continue "life as normal" - at that point there was yet to be a single death in the UK. So there's still a long way to go as far as we're concerned.
We remain hugely thankful to all those whose kindness and selflessness has meant that we have been able to keep our family safe at home. With 2 of the children higher risk, I am hugely grateful each time we manage to get a grocery delivery and each time the post arrives. We are so thankful to so many keyworkers. We've even managed to have several of Miss T's hospital appointments via video call and phone call so we are grateful to the doctors and hospital teams that enabled that to happen.
