We've read on the news about the Coronavirus in China and then it spreading to other countries with Italy being completely locked down. Around the first week of March we read it being on the West side of WA and Spokane started to keep it in the daily news so it was on the forefront of everyone's minds. The next thing we know the Governor shut down schools statewide for 6 weeks, President Nelson announced church meetings would be canceled worlwide and worship services would be held within the home. A few days later the Governor shut down restaurants, bars, all entertainment favilities, all recreational facilities, all retail (with the exception of grocery stores and pharmacies), etc. Everything is closed. It all happened so fast, we've been glued to the news every day because things are changing HOURLY.
Grocery stores are completely out of essentials - produce, bread, milk, eggs, paper products, pasta, rice, beans, all meat, all cold and flu medicines, toilet paper, paper towels, etc. They've finally started to modify store hours open from 7am-10pm to allow for sanitation and restocking during the night. The hardest hit and most vulnerable are the elderly and most stores have started having the first two hours of business open to customers of 60 years and older. Doctor's offices and hospitals are without hand sanitizer, face masks, and other necessary supplies because patients are stealing them. Now our hospitals are ill equipped to deal with a mass epidemic. The hope is that with social distancing (self isolation) it will slow the growth and spread of this virus. Italy is already without necessary equipment, like ventilators, so the doctors have to pick and choose who lives and who dies. It's so sad.
Lots of people are scared and panicking. Lots of people are now without jobs. Most, if not all, people throughout the nation are home schooling their children which leaves households of two working parents in a pickle with childcare. These are unprecedented times, this has never happened in our modern history and people are scrambling.
But on the flip side, there's so much good to be found! The way neighbors and communities have rallied around each other in a distant-appropriate manner has been overwhelming. I've heard and seen so much good come out of this! Families are now spending 24/7 together (which does drive some crazy) but it has been amazing for me as a mom to try to embrace that. School closed before teachers were able to get us any resources or packets for homework, so I've had to be creative in our studies. I say studies, but lets face it. Our school time of actual academics is less than 30 minutes a day. But we do lots of reading and I make sure we go outside every day. EVERY DAY. I've found this to be essential to everyone's sanity, especially my own. We've definitely been getting more exercise than ever before!
There's speculation that our country will be on a complete lockdown and I have no idea what that is to look like. I'm a little excited to try to live off of our (meager) food storage just to see if we could actually do it. (I'm confident we could make it 1-2 months but not much beyond that). There's speculation that school will not resume at all and in fact will start quite late next year due to this virus. Time will tell.
I'm VERY excited for general conference in 2 weeks! I hope the kids will behave enough to let me listen to it. I think it will be nothing but hopeful, inspiring, and faith promoting. Afterall, we are Heavenly Father's children and he loves us. He would never leave us destitute and has promised that if we keep the commandments, we will prosper in the land.
This was our first Sunday at home. In the morning we did an act of service for Daddy - cut and wrote on hearts why we love daddy. Then we made his favorite treat. We did our actual sacrament meeting later in the evening with Kimball giving a talk on what it means to be a child of God.
Making leprechaun traps
Happy St. Patrick's Day!
We took a 2 hour hike up Beacon Hill. WE LOVED IT!!!
