After a few slow months this spring June seemed to scream by, I can’t believe it’s already over! We had a lot to celebrate and new fun things to do this month!

Currently Leaning Into – Our core beliefs and making sure we are making a better future for everyone.

Currently Spending All Our Time – Hiking! The weather turned warm this month in the mountains so we have been spending a lot of time out hiking. Cannon can hike three plus miles and Emmy loves the pack so it is a good activity for everyone. We love being in the mountains and get out as often as we can.

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Currently Celebrating – Cannon turning 4!

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And Father’s Day. It was nice to spend some time getting out on the water (what Cory wanted to do) and spent some time with my parents.

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And 14 years of marriage!

Currently Loving – Playgrounds! Our local playgrounds opened up with some social distancing guidelines and we have been at one almost everyday. Cannon and Emmy missed them so much.

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Also loving that our pool has opened up to limited capacity

It makes me a little nervous going out more with our COVID numbers rising here in the US but the pool has very few people allowed and our county is still not doing too poorly.

Currently working on– Getting all set up to camp, we love it and want to go more often. It’s been a learning curve figuring out how to make it work with two littles but they love it so much!

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We have also been trying to get out more on our kayak and SUP

The kids are currently enjoying short rides in the kayak, I haven’t been brave enough to take them on the SUP yet.

Currently Buying – a new car! We don’t like to update our cars often so a new to us car is big news.

Currently Spending All Our Time – Outside =)

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What’s current with you?

What are you looking forward to this summer?

And juuuuuuuust like that it’s the end of May. Our world has been turned upside down with Covid and social injustice I can’t wrap my head around all of it.

Currently Learning – How to do and be MORE. I would consider myself NOT a racist and my core belief is that everyone is equal. But it has become very clear that is not enough and because of my privilege it is my obligation to be actively anti-racist. My reading list on racism and white privilege is long and my desire to show my children how to do things better is deep. We can and MUST do better. Black lives matter, we see you, you matter, we will do better.

Currently Dealing With – Humphry’s health. We spent a lot of time and lots of money figuring out what was wrong with our little guys’ health. After seeing a specialist we were told it was likely cancer and it would not be treatable. After a terrible 48 hours of not knowing we found out the there was NO sign of cancer and that he had necrotizing pancreatitis. Most likely Humphry will heal himself with some meds to keep him comfortable. We will know for sure in a week or so, fingers crossed.

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Currently Loving – Playing in the water in our back yard. Any day it’s warm enough we are out playing in the pool or water table.

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Currently working on– Home DIY! We are still working on our kitchen. Our original plan was to move out of our house and have the floors fixed and cabinets painted. With quarantine and Covid-19 that was derailed so we are trying to figure out a new plan. We are also planning on putting in a paver patio in our backyard. Currently we have a stone walk that is uneven, the kids fall on it and the weed block has broken down so it really needs some love.

Emmy is super cute but please notice ALL of the weeks already (yikes). Time to do something about it!

Currently Eating – Still eating outside as much as possible. It’s great because when the kids are super messy we can just hose it off!

Currently Conquering – Cannon’s first 5k. Cannon’s school hosted a 5k for their students (PE) so we participated. Cannon ran/walked most of the way and I was so proud of him. Grandma found an old 5k medal and gave it to him to celebrate his accomplishment!

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Currently Visiting – We have kept fairly isolated especially from my parents, while that has been hard we have had a BBQ on their deck while they stayed inside. We did let the kids play with their uncle Erik, he has been very careful and responsible so we decided he was a safe bet. Also Emmy melts into him when she sees him and they both love him so much!

Currently Watching – A family of Great Horned Owls that live in our neighborhood.

Currently Buying – Welcome to summer gift baskets for the kids, lots of bubbles, swimsuits and fun to kick off the summer and celebrate the end of “school”

Currently Spending All Our Time – Outside looking for bugs, frogs, birds, turtles, snakes and anything else we can find.

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What’s current with you?

What is your favorite month? Mine are (in order) October, December and May.

We got to celebrate our special little girl yesterday. I think she had a great time but she is really missing her family and friends. It’s hard sometimes that we can’t really make her understand that people can’t come see her and give her hugs.

We had cake, presents, and a hike complete with jumping in puddles.

Grandma and Grandpa came to visit and deliver gifts from across the fence. We sure can’t wait to hug them again!

Emerald’s second birthday is tomorrow and it will look a little different than her birthday last year. I am a little sad that we won’t all be together and getting to do something to really celebrate Emmy but given situation going on in the world I am just glad that the four of us a healthy and can spend the day together. I never got around to sharing Emmy’s first birthday so I thought now would be a good time.

Emmy’s birthday last year fell the same week as Easter so we had lots of celebrating to do. We decided on a Peter Rabbit theme to go along with Easter and had a egg hunt for the kids who came to her party. We did also visit the Easter Bunny.

Emmy was NOT a fan.

We set up her treat table and got her a bunny smash cake.

The egg hunt was a success and it was warm enough to enjoy cake outside.

This year will be different, we have family and friends coming by to sing happy birthday from appropriate social distance and leaving gifts in the back yard. But we will do our best to make Emmy feel as special and loved as she is! I can’t believe my baby is turning two!!!

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Anyone else celebrating birthdays during this time?

Since so many of us are stuck at home now I thought I would share some of my favorites that make staying home just a little bit nicer.

My coffee consumption has gone up quiet a bit lately but I still rarely get to drink a cup before it gets cold. I am LOVING my new Yeti Rambler Mug. It keeps my coffee warm and holds a lot of it! I really like that I can take in the yard with my and not have to worry about it breaking.

Our Bounce House from Little Tikes is getting some early season use as I am trying anything I can to keep these kids busy and happy. We got this for Cannon’s first birthday party.

It has held up really well!

I am using the plan from Krissy Moehl’s book Running Your First Ultra. I am trying to be more “coachable” this round, more on that later.

We have been using more Sidewalk Chalk than ever! Messages on our sidewalk and playing in the backyard. We got THIS washable set from Target.

I just ordered this sweatshirt for both Cannon and Emerald. I don’t have them match often but I loved this so much. The bright colors are so fun and someday we will be going back to Disneyland. Gap is having a big sale right now so go grab one fast!

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What have you been loving if you are staying at home?

Any good hand cream suggestions?

I can’t believe April is half over already, somehow time is crawling and speeding by at the same time. I do have to keep track of what day it is so I know when I am teaching and also when important dates are. But after Emmy’s birthday on Sunday I will probably forget what the date is.

Currently Getting Ready For – Emmy’s second birthday. It’s definitely not going to be what I envisioned for her but we will do our best to celebrate this special little girl.

Currently Loving – Running in the light! The mornings are so much lighter and now that Cory doesn’t have to commute I can run a little later in the morning.

Currently Attempting– To do “Homeschool” with these kiddos. Even though I am a teacher, I teach adults so this is a completely different ball game.

Currently Eating – Outdoors as much as possible. This was short lived as we are getting 8 inches of snow by tomorrow night.

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Currently Wearing – this Ginger Runner “buff” as a face covering, it much more comfortable than you might think.

Currently Visiting – We can’t hand out with my parents but their dog was really missing “his kids” so he came over for a play date and it was very sweet.

Currently Choosing – A grey to paint our kitchen cabinets, it’s been much harder than anticipated. Who wants to be my interior designer?!?

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What’s current with you?

How are you holding up in these times?

Anyone else feel like so much is out of control and unknown? I don’t know when it will be safe enough to get “back to normal” or if there ever will be a normal as we used to know it. We had a couple trips planned for this year and for sure we won’t be going to Oregon in July. It is possible that the economy will be re-opened by then but it seems that without a vaccine it would be irresponsible to travel when it’s not necessary. The 50 mile race I signed up for has not been canceled and who knows if it will be but we will most likely not be there for the start. =(

I am really bummed that we won’t be traveling to Oregon in July. This is how big the kiddos were when we were there last time.

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When it became clear that this virus wasn’t going away anytime soon it was hard to think about really making big running plans. Who knows when it will be safe and responsible to race again!?!

I love having a goal on the schedule and not know what the future held for me running wise left me feeling flat and no very excited. I really felt like I needed something to help lift my spirits and something to look forward to.

I finally decided that what I needed was something that was within my control, that I could do regardless of what Covid-19. I decided to run a 50 miler in September, my birthday is in September so that seemed like a good time to shoot for. I am not planning on specific event because I don’t want to depend on something running or not. There are a few local races that I might sign up for if it’s safe by then. But that depends if I can get in as well.

If not I will just do a family supported run somewhere fun. Possibly Leadville but if that isn’t safe then just around out home. Or if things have really improved we will look at a fall trip to Oregon and there are some great trails and races there too, I am keeping my options open.

Whatever works but I WILL run 50 miles somewhere in September, that I feel like I can somewhat control, even if it’s ten mile loops around my house 😉

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What are your future running plans?

I hesitate to use the word quarantine in this post because we are not truly quarantined, we are still allowed to leave our house. I just doesn’t feel like social distancing accurately describes what we are doing either.

We do leave our house most days for walks around the neighborhood or short trips in the car but most of the time we are staying safe at home.

Early on in the quarantine we had a scare that we might have caught Covid-19

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Cannon and I both seemed to have symptoms that could have been Covid-19 (headache, cough, fever, runny nose, etc) but could easily be a common cold as well. We called the nurse line and they encouraged us to come in. We were hesitant to go in and risk more exposure but decided to risk it to get tested. Cannon was terrified of the staff in PPE and was pretty traumatized. We also didn’t get a test because they didn’t have any and you had to be so bad you needed hospitalization to get a test. The entire thing was pointless and scary. The doctor said there was no way to know for sure if we had it but it was probably a common cold.

Most days I get up early to run so I can focus on the kids the rest of the day. We then have a lazier than usual breakfast before Cory heads to work (home office). Usually I will spend a little time cleaning up while the kids have free play time. Early in the day they seem to be able to entertain themselves best and I can get a few things done. But that doesn’t last long.

Something that has increased a lot lately is coffee consumption. With both Cory and I home drinking coffee all day it’s killing the pot fast.

When free time is over we “walk to school”. I used to walk Cannon to school before in the stroller so this feels right and gets some energy out. We go out for a walk, come home and get to work.

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We try to get some “schooling” in but with a preschooler and toddler we usually just focus on learning through play, like finding bugs in the backyard, counting and reading books.

Cannon did get to have a Zoom call with his teacher and classmates.

The best days are when we get to be outside and play in the yard.

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We celebrated my Mom’s birthday with social distancing. We baked her a cake (Cannon decorated it). And sang her happy birthday from their porch.

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They are so sad not to see their grandparents but were happy to eat cake.

There has also been a fair amount of screen time…..helps ME keep my sanity. Thank goodness for Disney+ (shout out to my big brother that got us our subscription for Christmas).

Overall I am SO grateful my husband can work from home, that I can be home with our kiddos and still keep my job. I am so happy that our family remains healthy and we will get through this together, even while we are apart.

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How is quarantine going for you?

We enjoyed Easter weekend as much as we could this year. We missed our family, friends and events that we usually attend but we made the most of what we could.

Knowing it was going to snow on Easter Sunday we started celebrating on Saturday.

We had bunny shaped cinnamon rolls for breakfast, then enjoyed the sunshine.

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Our community had a drive through visit with the Easter Bunny, the kids enjoyed the visit even if they couldn’t leave the car.

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In the afternoon we had an egg hunt un our back yard.

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It was beautiful and warm out so we played and enjoyed some candy.

On Easter morning the we did have a smaller egg hunt inside the house and let the kids enjoy their Easter baskets.

We got dressed up even though we had no place to go.

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This picture best sums up my life right now….

Emmy walking off, not listening, and Cannon bouncing off in the other direction.

The kids got to color sheets made just for them from Grandma.

We had our traditional Easter dinner of ham, Shirley’s Potatoes (secret family recipe) and green beans. We finished it all off with carrot cake. We had so much food that we dropped some off at my parents house and visited them through the window for a little while until our hands and faces were freezing.

Overall it was a strange and little sad to not be celebrating with our favorite people. We spent a lot of time on face time, calling and texting photos with family and friends.

We are looking forward to better days when we can all be together but still enjoyed our time as the five (Humphry counts) of us.

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How was your Easter?

Well….the world has been turned upside down since I last posted and we are currently on day 18 of “social distancing”. My mom shared with me that some (older) kids are keeping journals of this time so when they are older they can reflect on what it was like. At one and three my kiddos can’t write journals but she encouraged me to keep so notes/pictures of this time. It seems like a good time to dust off the cobwebs and keep a little online journal for us to look back on what it was like for us during the Covid-19 Pandemic.

Currently Loving – All of our family time. It’s a silver lining to all that is happening in the world.

We got out last weekend on a quiet trail for some socially distant hiking.

Currently Eating –  Well maybe not eating but consuming SO MUCH COFFEE. And probably too many quarantine snacks.

Currently Researching – How long we will REALLY need to be socially distant. I think it will be much longer than we are all hoping.

Currently Training For – ????? I was very excited to race the Mt. Hood 50 in July but the way things are heading the race might be cancelled. Also since we would have to travel for the race it isn’t looking likely that we will go. For now I am thinking of focusing on a local race probably in the early fall but not really sure. I am running but I feel like everything is currently a moving target.  

Currently Shopping For – This was early March before everything shut down but we decided to remodel our kitchen, went shopping for new counters. We started the demo and are mid project now so that has been interesting.

Currently Obsessed With- My treadmill. This thing is has many many miles on it and is amazing. So very grateful for it during these times. But also excited the that weather is getting better and it’s getting lighter so I can run outside =)

Currently Working On – Working. I am grateful in these times to still have a job. My teaching job has always been online so nothing much has changed. The program I teach for is geared toward nurses looking to advance their degrees (RN to BSN or similar). I appreciate my students now more than ever.

Currently Spending Time –  In our yard. Thank god for nice days when we can play outside!

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What’s current with you?

How are you holding up in these times?