My “New Normal”

It seemed like it turned up all at once, the mass cancellation of everything in close settings. Major sporting events, schools, concerts, churches and so on. What is happening? Is what I was constantly asking, obsessed with the news and figuring out what’s going to happen next.

I want to thank all the people on the front line for their continuous hard work. We have been self quarantined for 8 weeks now. It seems like it was so long ago that everything came to a halt. For the last 2 months the only public places I have been are the grocery store, post office, Target, Chick-Fil-A and Dunkin Donuts drive-thru windows. The crazy thing is now that things are starting to re-open I feel like I’ve adapted to this “new normal” — home life. Not saying I have it mastered, but it’s what life is, at least for my family, until the end of the month. Here are my feelings on it so far.

Exercise: I have been doing a whole lot of at-home workouts. My gym does Zoom workouts plus a lot of outside time on bikes with the fam. We’ve also been playing a lot of Just Dance which is great cardio. That has been the best stress reliever thus far.

Homeschool: It is now over, thank God! Check out my post on how digital learning went. But I can say that it has really made me think of school and learning in a different way.

Cooking at home: I liked cooking before and preferred for my family to eat at home. But now honey, take me to the restaurant and bring me all the good stuff on the menu. I am sick of figuring out what we are eating, washing pots and pans, loading and unloading the dishwasher. Ugh, the chores that come with cooking make cooking not fun. I’ve got it down now to where I make one big grocery run once every 1 1/2 to 2 weeks. We get enough snacks and stuff to make different meals, but at this point it’s getting a little boring and learning to make new recipes. Cinco de Mayo we hooked it up tho (as seen in cover photo). My guilty pleasure with the grocery store is not being able to take my kids has made it so much more enjoyable.

Housework: Dammit, it’s so hard to keep the house clean when everyone is at home. So during this quarantine I have finally finished reading Marie Kondo’s Life-changing Magic of Tidying. That book has inspired me to get rid of the clutter and reorganize my bedroom and our family/play-room upstairs area. Those were major projects. Now that they are done I’m obsessed with keeping them clean. My bedroom is definitely do-able, the family playroom is a constant effort. Meaning I’m spending most of my day cleaning up after everyone else. My children are not great at cleaning up after themselves so it goes on and on. At this point I just clean on one day a week and pick up on the other days.

Socializing: I will admit, I have enjoyed not being stressed about what I’m wearing to such and such, and not wearing make-up and a lot of times not combing my hair. We have gone to my parent’s house about once a week, mainly because that’s the only place outside of our neighborhood the kids can go. I really miss hanging and laughing with my extended family and friends, we have done a few Zoom meetings, FaceTimes, and texts, which have been good ways to stay in touch and helps me connect with them but we all know Zoom meetings are not the same.

Shopping: I was never a big online shopper before the pandemic because I like to see stuff for myself, feel the material, try it on or try it out. Now I feel like if it’s not at the grocery store or Target I’m just going to get it online. Between my husband and I we are getting a delivery at least once a week, one week it was a delivery truck here 4 days straight. I truly appreciate everyone in the warehouse facilities getting our packages shipped out to us.

Entertainment: I really miss being able to go to a show or a sporting event. I do enjoy some of the Instagram versus, because I feel like the artists are more real and open. I’m catching up on a lot of TV shows and learning about new ones. We got Disney+ now so I also get the nostalgia from old animated classics.

I guess there wont’ be a back to “normal”. We will continue to listen to the experts and do our best to be responsible citizens. For my family this will be a slow process back into the world.