We do not have school right now -- we're on "Spring Break."

This past weekend, we technically began our spring break.  Honestly - school was exhausting and really really frustrating towards the end of the week.  (Mercer had SO MANY assignments.... and the work that he was given was ridiculously hard... it was - according to another mom I was talking to - work that she did in high school!)  I actually ended up emailing the principal at his school asking about grace in assignments considering that some people are either working in the home or out of the home / the students may not have guidance.  Also... some people have multiple children to juggle or perhaps to share one computer.  The fact that he had 24 ELA assignments + 2 quizzes, 9 math assignments, 8 science assignments, 2 band assignments (+ practice each day), plus something for Spanish and something for social studies (honestly, those last two - I don't have a grasp of what he had for those two... hoping it was not a lot!)  Because of this, I'm behind in my work AND he's behind / he didn't finish.   (I've talked to several others parents and their kids didn't finish either.   Late Friday - the school system sent an email saying "it's ok..." taking some of the pressure off.  (Still, though, I want the teachers to dial back the assignments.  Some students (including mine) get overwhelmed easily and get deterred from doing the work / it's really hard to talk (him) into getting back in gear.

Isabella has a lot of work as well.  Not as much, however, she requires a persistent eye on her work.  To be honest - sometimes she goes off on a tangent and spends a bit of time on those tangents... and I'm OK with that.  For instance, she was working on geometry (shapes).  Squares... rectangles... triangles.  One of the 1st grade teachers made a video on how to use an online Geoboard.  So, she made her shapes, then she continued to play making patterns for at least an hour.  YES!  go for it.  (honestly - on Saturday - the Geoboard site was still pulled up on the computer and I had a little fun with it too!  :) 

(This shape hearkens back to my college thesis project -- a mathematical, but "fluid" shape that I used for the structural system of my airport.  The roof undulated. I still LOVE this shape, clearly.)  I found a shape online last year in an advertisement -- a bridge built in 2011.  I include here so, 3-dimensionally the visual is included.  My structure was enclosed... and on a larger scale... and didn't have neon lights, but still.... soo soo cool to see in "real life." Of course now, I need to go visit this bridge and walk through it!  :) 

Here's a shot from my thesis project board circa 1995. 

"movement"
"structure"
"perception"
"fluidity"

Here are the numbers as of Friday (4/3).  The number of tested / positive cases topped 1 million.   I looked at the site on the 3rd, but I didn't post.

I feel like we didn't do ANYTHING on Saturday.  And that's OK.  (Well, we did some yard work).  I also didn't check the numbers -- I still haven't 'til now.  Unfortunately, there are 300,000+ more confirmed cases since Friday and 20,000 more deaths.  This is also the first time that New York City has moved to the top 5 on the leaderboard for number of deaths... New York is ahead of Hubei province in China - the pandemic epicenter.  Just looked up some numbers. They have 60 million population.  New York has 8.   They have over 60,000 cases with close to 3200 deaths.  New York has over 70,000 cases with close to 3500 deaths.  China has ~1.3 billion people.  The US has just over 300 million (.3 billion).  Interesting to see how our number of cases is much much higher now.

My grandmother's funeral was on Sunday afternoon.  Here at home, we went to a park in a neighboring county (because our county closed the parks??!!)   I wanted some fresh air and nature Sunday afternoon at the same time.  I said a little prayer at 3.  

We picnicked, then went for a walk.  This is a park we were unfamiliar with -- however -- when we drove up to it, we realized that we had been there before:  Mercer had a  baseball tournament last October there.  We walked through the ball fields, down a big hill and found this lake.  (There were two ladies throwing bread into the pond attracting koi and turtles.  You can sort of see the giant 2' long koi in the photo.  Not to worry - we were at least 10' away from the ladies!) 

On the other side of the pond, we found a gravel trail, so we followed it.  It took us to a little stream and eventually back to the parking lot.

It was low-key.  People were very respectful of social distancing.  It was nice to see some nature.  (Check out this heron that Mercer shot a photo of with his phone!!)