Crazy Times

These are some crazy times, yes?  The kids are doing their best to figure it all out.  Their parents are doing their best to figure it all out.  These days have the same feeling to them as the time after the 3/11/11 earthquake/tsunami/nuclear meltdown--uneasy and unsettled.  Still, we'll get through it.

Ryleigh (and her Mom) are pretty darn sad that the April meet and the State Championship has been cancelled for gymnastics.  The gym is doing their best to send out ways for the girls to stay gym-ready and we're lucky enough to have a kip bar so Ry can work on some stuff on her own.  Dance teachers are uploading videos of the choreography for the recital in June so we can stay on top of that, too.

The kids get to video conference or message their teachers every day. There are online lessons to complete in math, reading, social studies, science, and yes even music and PE.  Mama is throwing in some virtual museums and National Parks and an online doodling class with kids' book author Mo Willems every day.  We have recess and play games outside.  We also have recess and play video games on the AppleTV.  The kids found a game that all three of us can play together, and we're all hooked!

Jip is doing his part to help keep things under control at the shipyard.  We will be eager to find out how this whole thing is going to affect his transfer to a DC-based job this summer, as the person relieving Jip is coming from Japan and moves are virtually on pause right now service-wide.  Right now, it is just one day at a time filled with change after change to policy and procedure.

Here are a few photos of what life looks like at the present.

Recess with a game of Murbles (it's like bocci) 

Happy St. Patrick's Day from RJ

Happy St. Patrick's Day from Ryleigh

Learning how to draw the beloved Pigeon from the author Mo Willems

Doodle Prompt: Draw something with lots of legs

Doodle prompt: Start with a letter and make a drawing

Ryleigh made a story that involved Elephant and Piggie meeting Pigeon.

The kids asked that their drawings be sent to Mo.  I'll let you know if they show up in his videos over the next couple of weeks.  In the meantime we're going to do our best to stay safe and sane.  Jip will be picking up take-out for us on his way home so we can keep supporting local businesses.  We'll get outside when we can.  And, we'll all work on adjusting to our new normal, though we're hoping that the old normal can return.

Stay safe out there, all.

Until next time, cheers!

Shamrock Invitational 2020

Ryleigh had another great meet.  She finished 2nd overall for her level/age division/session.  The vault is still her nemesis.  But, she gets to sign the board two more times for two more 9.5s and up: one for floor exercise, and one for beam.

Ryleigh helped me work the last session of the meet.  Despite being tired after competing the day after the time change, she enthusiastically clapped for and smiled at each competitor on the floor exercise.  She was tickled to be able to stay until the end of the evening so she could help accept the team award, and even more so when Coach Terri picked her as one of the girls to accept and hold the team banner when Ocean Tumblers received 1st Place for Level 3.

Enjoy the video I put together.  She looked so serious all the time--but, I promise she had a great time.

Yep. It's been a month since the last post.

I'm not sure how the blog got away from me, but it did.  Apologies.  So, this will be a random post to catch you on up on what has been happening (and not) for the Mosman Family.

RJ hosted Greer for a night, so Ryleigh and Amy had a girly night.  We enjoyed our charcoal (Amy) and chocolate (Ry) masks.  I put Ryleigh's on way too thick and it never dried.  But, it was still fun.

On February 20, we had snow.  It was our first snow of the year.  When it was heading our way, everyone was sure that it was going to dump more than 5 inches.  All of the schools cancelled after school activities and most cancelled school for the next day.  It looked promising when it was coming down.  The kids put on their snow gear and asked me to get the sleds out.  After they had been out for a bit, I looked out and asked Ryleigh what she was doing.  She replied, "I'm building a snow hill, mom."  Okay, kiddo.

As you can see, the snow stopped as quickly as it started.  The kids got super wet from the super wet snow.  We warmed up.  Jip made it home on time.  And, school was only delayed by 2 hours.  VB was the only school district not to cancel classes.  

 A few days later, it was beautiful enough for a little baseball, sans jackets, in the front yard.

Ryleigh's class recently wrapped up their social studies unit on three Native American tribes.  They got to feel some animal pelts and use virtual reality headsets to put themselves into a Pueblo village.

RJ once again did a Gifted and Talented workshop at William and Mary.  This time, it was over 2 weekends, with the sessions being 5.5 hours on each Saturday.  And instead of a Lego robotics class, RJ took an aeronautics class.  They did some fun stuff, like trying to build the best payload container to prevent your egg from breaking.  They also launched some small rockets to test their parachute designs.  RJ's team's rocket ended up in the trees.  It was so high up there, it's going to take some crafty birds or an enterprising tree trimmer to remove it.

RJ had a couple of field trips in addition to our normal gymnastics, hip hop, ballet, Ninja Zone, and Code Ninja activities.  We're plugging along and doing our best to get through this long period of five-day school weeks until spring break starts April 13.

I'll try to do better about posting more often, but no promises.  So, until the next time, cheers!