As we’re into our seventh week in this COVID-19 shelter-in-place/stay-at-home/quarantine, life has really become a mixed bag of circumstances, consequences, and emotion.
Above all, it’s important to count our blessings: we are still healthy, gainfully employed, and luckily not in dire financial straights, and are lucky to have relatively few struggles compared to many others who have much to worry about. We’re also lucky that we haven’t seen the scary scenarios that were being predicted nearly two months ago.
That said, one word sums up our predicament: uncertainty. It seems that there’s more we don’t know than we know, and the lack of knowledge has forced people to make tough choices between bad options, with no potential good option in sight.
Our own daily lives are encompassed by doing the best we can with what we have, but it becomes difficult to ignore the consequences of the situation. In our own lives we’ve found the rhythm of a daily routine staying mostly at home. Aided by the nice spring weather, our daughters have grown accustomed to lots of independent play outside while we work, but also with more screen time than we’d care to have under normal circumstances. We’re getting by and keeping our sanity in tact.
We do greatly miss school, however. The remote learning that everyone does their best at is a poor substitute for the educational clamoring of a young first grader. While Clara still gets excited about learning, transitioning from play into school is still a struggle, and we can’t help but concede that our own best efforts as working parents fall far short of the quality of education at school. As with all young kids, we’re seeing educational stagnation, but accept this as a necessary short-term step to keep our societal health at bay. This is the way the rest of the school year will play out, all four weeks left of it. Going through pictures from past Mays reminded me that our “last day of school” picture is going to be an interesting one this year.
Colorado itself is transitioning from a “stay at home” order to a “safer at home” phase. The reality is that “safer at home” is basically “please still stay at home”. There are businesses that are starting to open up, trying to balance their own need to ensure the survival of their livelihoods, finding ways to be able to serve customers mitigating as much risk as they can in a sea of uncertainty. For the most part, however, people remain reluctant to venture out. Every time I get groceries or run errands (typically once per week) there’s a prevailing sense that you’re taking your life into your own hands, with the stores filled with a general sense of unease. For the most part, people are trying to follow the government’s directives of maintaining a 6-foot social distancing barrier, as well as wearing a mask. I’m very deliberate in not touching my face, sanitizing my hands right after I get in the car, scrubbing my hands the minute I get home.
It’s not clear whether this is the no normal (for now), or in a weird transitional state towards the new normal – back to the uncertainty. It seems that our town, state, the country is collectively holding their breath to see what’s coming next, but getting a little light-headed along the way.
I don’t mean to paint a grim picture of despair. On the contrary, we are taking the extra time at home as opportunities to work on different projects (like re-doing our garden area), play with our kids, and enjoy our time together as a family.
However, aside from being strategic in our meal planning (to avoid excessive trips out), we’ve had to learn with not having a plan that extends beyond a day – in large part because our options are limited, but also because we’re not quite sure what’s coming next. Right now there’s little we can do besides count our blessings and try to be optimistic about the future, but ready to begrudgingly accept setbacks.
We’re venturing into our third week of social distancing/quarantining in our homes. Luckily we still have our health and no one has seriously hurt each other.
This is really strange in many ways. We’ve moved away a little bit from the more organized schedule, replaced by our own natural rhythm of each day. We’ve learned to accept that the kids will be little tornados throughout the day, requiring a resetting of the house each evening – but after accepting that fact, it’s been easier to accept the chaos. It’s also helped that the weather has been nice and the girls have been able to spend more time outside. We play in the back yard quite a bit, as well as ride bikes around our cul-de-sac. We’ve been lucky that the weather has been mostly nice and that we’re able to be outside, although when we get a cold day, those days feel especially long.
Bethany is now has started working from home this week, but with Clara technically on spring break, we’ve relaxed some of the structured learning. She’s scheduled to resume school online next week, and we’ll be facilitating that. Bethany and I are working to trade off the time we focus on work with being present to the family, and it’s seemed to work well so far. I have to confess that the screentime restrictions have gone out the window, but you do what you can go get by.
We’ve done a good job of obeying the official “stay home” order, only venturing out for a dog walk or bike ride, as well as a weekly trip to the store to stock back up. We’ve been lucky enough to find all the items we’re looking for at the store, and the panic-buying has seemed to have calmed down a bit (although there was no toilet paper when I went to Sams Club today).
I’m not quite sure what to make at just how much our kids are picking up of the situation. We’ve avoided using terms like “COVID-19” and “Coronavirus” when the kids are around, and instead of leaned heavily on the term “germs”, pressing the importance of washing hands and maintaining distance. We’ve been lucky that the kids haven’t balked at their favorite places being closed, and have mostly been able to entertain themselves with things around the house. They’ve had some interactions with daycare and dance classes online, and that has surprisingly brought some level of normalcy as well.
Overall weeks 2 & 3 have been filled with the reluctant acceptance of the situation, gratitude for what we have, and nervousness about what may come. Here’s to staying inside and flattening the curve.
… and just like that a decade went by. Growing up in the 80’s and 90’s, the passing of the decade seemed much more momentous, but it seems like the 2000’s and 2010’s just blew by.
The 2010’s have been a pretty transformative decade, marked by a lot of joy, but not without its share of sorrow.
2010
We were celebrating our first year of marriage, living in Fort Collins. Bethany was in the midst of finishing her Master’s Degree in School Counseling and had to do a year of unpaid internship, making it a financial challenge. However our little family grew by 1 – adopting our kitty, Logan.
Major Milestones:
Traveling to Las Vegas (multiple times), Boston, Minneapolis for Joel & Katie’s Wedding.
2011
Bethany started her counseling career at Northridge High School and celebrated my 30th birthday, receiving my first new drum set since I started playing the instrument back in 1996.
The Balderrama’s meeting up in Keystone, Colorado for a reunion
The birth of our nephew, Liam
2012
If 2011 was a “calm before the storm year”, 2012 represented the storm that set in. It represented many changes, as well as enduring tragedy. In 2012 we decided to sell out town home in Fort Collins and move to Windsor, during the process we learned that Bethany’s brother, Rocky, had unexpectedly passed away. We learned the horrible news just hours before we were about to set on our Baby-moon Cruise to Alaska, setting a long and heavy shadow over the trip. When we returned from the trip we were in between moving out of our old house and had not yet moved into our new home. The house we moved into was not in the state we had expected and we ended up having to deal with a lot of unexpected hardships.
Despite the darkness during the year, we ended it on a positive note, with Bethany coming pregnant with Clara.
Major Milestones:
Selling our townhome in Fort Collins
Buying our single-family home in Windsor
Welcoming our niece, Sonia, into the world
Taking our 2 week Baby-Moon to Seattle and on an Alaskan Cruise
Mourning the loss of Bethany’s brother, Rocky
2013
The year that changed it all, when God brought Clara into our lives. They weren’t kidding when they talked about how children change lives. We experienced all of it, but were very blessed to have a beautiful, healthy and happy little girl in our lives.
Work-wise, my company went through a split, which really increased my workload leading up to Clara’s birth. Clara’s birth also gave us incentive to invest in a DSLR camera, unlocking new talents. Aside from a quick trip to Kansas for a wedding, we did not travel anywhere for 2013.
Major Milestones:
The birth of Clara!
Experiencing a tornado in Windsor, causing damage to our house
The Broncos having a great season, making it to Super Bowl 48 (then losing to the Seahawks).
2014
As transformational as 2013 was, 2014 continued to be a year of “firsts” for us – Clara would have her first real food, first crawl, first steps and continuing to experience the first holidays.
We started to venture out, making Clara’s first plane trip to Daytona for an SoB (Summer of Balderrama’s) trip, seeing Disneyland. We also road-tripped to Kansas to visit family, Taos to commemorate Rocky’s birthday, as well as a new year’s trip to Durango.
Major Milestones:
Clara being a flower girl at Shannon and Andrew’s wedding
Clara growing from an infant to a spunky toddler
Summer of Balderrama’s trip to Florida
Road trips to Taos, Durango and Kansas.
2015
2015 was all about Mariana. We spent the entire year anticipating her arrival, which finally came on October 29. We then got all of the reminders of parenting a newborn, along with the challenges of a full-fledged toddler.
Clara continued to blossom and develop her own personality as a happy-go-lucky little girl. Looking back at this time, the 27-month span was perfect for the girls, as Clara was intrigued about having a little sister, but didn’t really develop the jealousy a new infant would bring.
Music-wise, I also joined Amy and the Peace Pipes and had an awesome year with them. We got selected to play at FoCoMX, released our first EP and played over a dozen shows throughout the year.
Major Milestones:
Traveling to Nashville for a long weekend trip
Road-tripping to Kansas to visit family
Introducing my mom to Durango
Welcoming Mariana into the world!
Broncos win the Super Bowl (it technically happened 2016, but it was the 2015 season)
2016
In 2016 we watched the girls grow into being sisters, being witnesses to many of Mariana’s firsts, as well as learning how to be our family of four. We also had a very busy summer filled with weddings (and Clara being a flower girl), as well as a trip to New York to go meet our new niece, Elisia.
Major Milestones:
Our friends Brett and Joanna getting married
My sister Amanda and David getting married
Cousins Laura and Herrick getting married
Our niece, Elisia, being born
Our trip to New York to go see the city and visit our new cousin
Clara starting dance class
2017
Now it’s Mariana’s turn to grow into the full-fledged toddler, while Clara grows into a little girl. Clara started preschool in the fall, while also going full-fledged into dance class and soccer. It was such a rewarding experience watching Clara being exposed to these activities, learning more each day.
Mariana also became pretty active as well and incurred our first major injury as a family, falling off the couch and fracturing her leg. It happened a few weeks before we were scheduled to go to Disneyland as well. Fortunately she was able to get her cast removed two days before we were set to head out, and got the full Disney experience.
Major Milestones:
Family trip to Disneyland, with Mema, Papa and nephew Liam
Clara starting pre-school in the fall, 3 hours each afternoon
Clara starting soccer in the fall
Clara continuing dance class
Mariana’s first cast
2018
One of the coolest things to happen in 2018 was Bethany being recognized as the High School Counselor of the year by the Colorado School Counselors Association, which was so well-deserved and we were very proud of her!
Clara started all-day Kindergarten in the fall of 2018 and we were blown away by just how much she was learning each day. She was transforming into a little reader and writer, excited to read to her sister.
Mariana joined Clara at Just for Kix Dance Classes and was a natural to the stage. We also worked through the adjustment period after Ms. Amanda closed her daycare to finish her school counseling internships.
Oh , and through the generosity of Bethany’s mom and step-dad, we were able to see Hamilton at the Denver Center for Performing Arts!
Major Milestones:
Clara finishing pre-school and starting kindergarten
Mariana starting dance class
Clara continuing dance and soccer
Going on a beach vacation in North Carolina
Seeing Hamilton!
Bethany winning School Counselor of the Year
Saying goodbye to Bethany’s grandmother
Being an active campaigner fo the new library in our town and ultimately losing that ballot initiative
Bethany completing her first sprint triathlon
2019
Clara finished kindergarten and is now in first grade, continuing to amaze us with her growth. We’ve been really lucky to have great teachers working with her at her school, and outs been neat to see her come home excited to tell us about her day.
Mariana is in an incredible daycare and making her own educational strides as well, already working on writing. After going from an in-home to a center, then back to in-home, we’ve found that in-home works much better for Mari.
Work is going well for both Bethany and I. I am blessed to have my school drop off schedule accommodated and have some flexibility to be able to help out from time to time. Bethany is rocking it at her school and headed to Washington DC in early 2020 to be recognized for her counseling award.
We took some awesome road trips over the summer, first to South Dakota with the Miles-Hastings, then to Yellowstone with the Balderrama’s, experiencing a lot of the beauty of our country.
Amy and the Peace Pipes had a great year, capping it off with an opportunity to play Old Town Square in Fort Collins.
Major Milestones:
Road trip to Yellowstone
Road trip to South Dakota
Road trip to Durango
Clara starting 1st grade
Both girls performing in dance (Clara doing hip-hop)
Clara playing soccer (with Bethany coaching both the spring and fall teams)
Bethany running her first half-marathon!
Thus closes my forth decade on this earth. It’s definitely been the most transformational of my life, going doubling our family, moving to a new home and planting some roots within our lives. I’m anxious to see where our family will be ten years from now.
It’s that time of year again when the weather starts to cool, the leaves start to turn, the air grows brisk, and pumpkin spice becomes a thing. It’s that time of year that we take our annual family trip to the pumpkin patch. This year we made the trip to Tigges Farm and absolutely loved it!
Tigges farm got on my radar in my search for roasted green chiles, I was fearful that I was already too late to get them for my chili making this winter, but I was delighted to find that not did they have a wide variety for you to choose some, but they would roast them on the spot, or sell you ones they’ve already frozen.
The best part about the farm is all of the old equipment they have throughout the farm. By each piece of equipment, they had signs that described how it was used, providing history and context. Whether you’re aggie or fascinated by historical tools, it was deeply fascinating.
On weekends throughout the fall they’ve had different events and activities to entertain families. The day we attended included a covered wagon ride, as well as a visit from Princesses.
We however left with two regrets. 1) They don’t take cards, and we didn’t bring enough cash to get all the chiles I wanted. 2) The girls weren’t dressed up and Clara was coming off of a fall that banged up her face. We’re hoping to make another trip this fall to rectify those two regrets. You should definitely take the 5-minute drive east of Windsor.
As we’re heading into Labor Day weekend, I’m just baffled by just how quickly the summer went by. Next thing I knew, six weeks passed without making a post. Family-wise, we took a trip to Durango and spent a lot of time playing outside. However, when I wasn’t working, every time I was in front of the computer, I was consumed by making lots of other things besides blog posts.
New Amy and the Peace Pipes single
My band was excited to release a new single, “Piano In My Head”, and I did some artwork for the cover, having little fun compositing the images in Photoshop.
The single is available on Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon, Google Play, and just about anywhere you can stream music.
Bethany’s Counseling Video
After winning Colorado School Counselor of the Year in 2018, Bethany needed to submit a video to the national association for their award. She came up with a really great idea of doing a parody of “We Will Rock You” and story-boarded the whole video. We got the footage last spring, but we had to get it edited and submitted. While it turned out a little differently than we originally envisioned, we were really happy with the result.
https://youtu.be/_MYQlUHWTQs
Design, design, design
I’ve gotten some opportunity to do some poster and promo designs for a lot of band events I’ve been involved with. As a band, we had some pretty big shows, including getting to play Old Town Square.
I guess after creating all those things, I can see why it feels like summer zoomed by. Here’s to a fun fall!
