- Feeling depressed or anxious
- Being tired
- Missing the people you used to hang out with
- Seeing the people you used to hang out with
- Clinging to your family
- Not being able to spend time with your family
- Sending your kids to school
- Not sending your kids to school
- Having a cheap face mask
- Having the most expensive face mask that exists
- Not having a job
- Wishing you didn’t have a job
- Loving your job
- Hating work-from-home
- Loving remote work
- Fearing the uncertainty of the future
- Being sad about the world around us
- Being angry about the world around us
- Being closed off from the world around us
- Eating at home
- Eating out
- Picking up food to eat somewhere else
- Going for walks/runs/jogs
- Cocooning at home
- Not being able to concentrate on reading
- Reading more books than ever because you have nothing else to do
- Being unproductive
- Being so productive people around you complain
- Sleeping late
- Not sleeping well
- Doing whatever it is that you need to do to survive or even thrive
Category Archives: Family
Things For Kids To Do While You Are In Quarantine (and they won’t even realize they are all educational!)
- Invent a new board game
- Use chalk art to turn your entire driveway (or front porch, or back deck, or garage floor) into a mural
- Write letters to people you know
- Make hand made cards to mail to strangers in nursing homes
- Bake cookies
- Plan a menu based on ingredients at home
- Learn to cook
- Watch animal videos (Cincinnati Zoo, Shedd Aquarium)
- Make up fun songs
- Read Shel Silverstein online and then write silly poems like he does
- Create a dance routine to a favorite KidzBop song
- Write a rap about the period table of elements, (or the Greek alphabet, or mutiplication tables)
- Film your rap on TikTok or SnapChat or Facebook live
- Plant a container garden
- Do a multi-week experiment about what kind of music helps your container garden grow faster, (find a “scientific method” chart online to help with recording their hypothesis and testing it)
- Detail the inside of the car
- Video chat grandma
- Teach grandma how to use her video chat first
- Read big books together (Harry Potter, Narnia, Animal Farm, Moby Dick, Alice in Wonderland)
- Do YouTube videos for family meditation
- Do online exercise videos from LesMills or your local YMCA
- Measure all the things
- Design charts to show the measurements
- Create a stop-action film with Legos or play dough or stuffed animals (or, if you really enjoy Bob’s Burgers, with a pound of raw hamburger)
- Write a movie script, design sets with items on hand, film it, post it online
- Let them find Pinterest activities they can do with common household items
- Build the Best. Fort. Ever.
- Draw their own comic books
- Make salt dough and play with it
- Memorize something (Scripture verses, your favorite monologue from a movie, the preamble to the Constitution, all 50 states in alphabetical order)
- Hide Easter eggs around the house
- Do old fashioned calisthenics
- Organize toys (NOT YOU… let them do it and then be okay with how they do it)
- Create a time capsule to open in 10 years
- Bury it in the back yard
- Hide a “treasure” and then make a treasure map for others to find it
- Use paper plates or construction paper to make giant Scrabble letters and play word games
- Help change the oil in the car
- Learn how to change a flat tire
- Do easy science projects like eggs in various liquids, or testing air pollution, or the effect of germs on bread (all on Pinterest plus a million more)
#SawyerLouise
- Sassy
- Spunky
- Scowly
- Sweetness
- Curious
- Cuddly
- Clever
- Courageous
- Committed
Things I Am Thankful For
- My family
- My friends who are like family
- Adorable grandbabies
- My new condo
- Sunsets
- Ocean waves
- Vacations
- Ice cream
- Sparkly swimming pools
- Whitening toothpaste
- Fall colors
- Holidays
- Clean diagnoses
- Safe transportation
- Clean water
- Opportunities
- Mentors
- The smell of new books
- The smell of old books
- Bonfires
- The susurrus of wind through trees
- The Boundary Waters
- Beaches
- Laundry in my home
- YouTube tutorials
October
- My dad’s birthday
- Cold nights
- Bon fires
- Brilliant foilage
- Hoodies
- Tall boots
- Crunchy leaves
- Costumes
- Kids laughing
Leaving On a Jet Plane… and a Cruise Ship… and tenders…
- Chicago
- Fort Lauderdale
- Blake Shelton concert
- Carnival Cruise Lines
- Nassau, Bahamas
- Nassau Native Quest
- Half Moon Cay, Bahamas
- Turks & Caicos
- Dominican Republic
- La Casa En Playa
- Florida
- Illinois
Things I Would Rather Be Doing (Assuming the Weather Was Nice Enough for Weather Dependent Activities)
- Reading a good book
- Visiting family
- Watching Survivor
- Sitting around a campfire
- Making s’mores
- Eating s’mores
- Walking in the sunshine along the river
- Wilderness camping
- Writing & editing a novel
- Binge-watching home shows like Flip or Flop, Love It or List It, Desert Flippers
- Getting a pedicure
- Getting a massage
- Decorating a Christmas tree
- Planning parties
- Eating stuffed crust pizza
Word That Describe My Mother (Because it’s her 70th birthday today!)
Things My Friends Have In Common
- Kindness
- Sense of humor
- Willingness to laugh at themselves and at me
- Food sharing
- A little bit of craziness
- Acceptance of everyone, no matter who they are
- Enjoyment of games of one type or another
- Down-to-earth realness
- Loyalty