The week of May 10-16 was a big one for our area in terms of the pandemic. Ohio continued the reopening process.

I just rescheduled with our dentist and the cleanings that were canceled in April have now been pushed back to August. I assured them it was not urgent and that I understood. Many restaurants with patios are now open. Retail stores are open again and people are out shopping big time! In Kentucky, a federal court overturned the governor’s temporary ban on churches meeting in person. This was big news for the church I grew up in where the rest of my family still goes. With strict guidelines in place for everyone’s protection, they were able to meet in person on Mother’s Day for the first time since the quarantine.

Our church is still recording services.

We aired our tenth service yesterday. It’s not easy to do virtual services. Whether you are meeting in church again or online please remember your pastoral team in your prayers (as I’m sure you already do if you have a church you consider home). The church and leadership are not at lounging in their recliners soaking up all of the free time! As someone who volunteers as social media director at our church and is married to a worship pastor I can assure that your pastoral team is working around the clock right now to figure out how to do virtual church or reopen or a mix of both while also doing mental and spiritual health check-ups, outreach in the community, and all the usual stuff on top of that. The church is essential and they are on the frontlines. God is big enough to take care of it all though and I am blessed to be a vessel. I just wanted to be candid about how much work it is. I have had people bless me, check in on me, text me, and pray with me and I appreciate all of that! I am sure your pastor, tech team, worship team etc. would love to hear some encouragement and positive feedback from you too!

Now about the whole distance learning thing, this past week was okay.

SJ had to create a fictional animal for science. This is UniDog. She also had to do a report that included vocabulary and information they’ve been studying.

Things are winding down as we only have two weeks left, however my mind will NOT stop racing about what happens in the next school year. Elle is already enrolled in her first year of Pre-K. Z’s classes are all lined up including his recent acceptance into a special math cohort program and Language Arts for his first year of Junior High. I was really looking forward to this next school year and still do, but I am starting to become fearful. I know that fear is not from the Lord, but there have been recent discussions about what school will look like in August in the fight against this virus. I’ve seen drafts of plans and they don’t look they are going to work for our family. I won’t get into all the details right now, but let’s just say for now we plan for all four of kids to go to school in the fall. However, that is contingent on what school will look like for the kids and if it’s something that seems like a negative detrimental experience then I will homeschool them. Or there is a possibility that some will go to school and others won’t. We are going from one school to three this year (it’s not the first time I would have children spread out in three different schools). Anything could happen. I am trying not to think about too much, but I don’t want to be naive and assume everything will be back to normal (or close to it). With all that we have been through so far in 2020, I don’t know if anything would shock me at this point. Either way J and I have a lot to pray about and consider for our family. I am thankful to be in a country where we are free to do that and also be in a situation where, as a stay at home mom, this is something I can consider. That’s all the information I have for now though and it will probably be a couple of months before I even know more.