Summer Vacation Week 8

August 9-15

It seems that the days go by so slow but the weeks themselves are very fast. It’s an odd situation to be in.

Sunday Becky and Beth went on what has become a weekly walk in the woods for them with Cloey.

Ally’s Monday lunch; 3 kinda of nut butter spreads (peanut, Nutella and almond) with watermelon and ritz crackers.

Tuesday morning snuggles with Daisy.

Tuesday afternoon snuggles with Mommy. Daniela came over for lunch with Ally. It was another hot day; 95 degrees but they enjoyed their weekly lunch date.

Ally and I celebrated our own version of Shark Week. We watched the Deep Blue Sea movie trilogy. All in one night. It was crazy!!!


We were pretty tired at the end. But it was fun.

On Wednesday we got the remaining furnishings for Ally’s Remote Learning Center. 

The rug and bookcase came. And Becky got the curtain up. This was Ally’s vision of a room divider.

She wanted her desk area to have some privacy.

The futon cover needs to be made. I just draped the new fabric over it for these pictures.

Becky and Beth will tackle that next week.

Cloey even likes the chair. Mostly she was looking for food on the plate on the desk.

More morning cuddles with Daisy.

On Thursday Becky and Beth went to the beach for the afternoon. On the way home they stopped at a Rita’s Water Ice. 

And they got lobsters! I made them eat them on the back porch so the house wouldn’t smell like seafood.

Beth came upstairs to check out the remote learning center makeover and she helped Becky take the old bookcase downstairs and out to the curb. 

Meanwhile on Thursday Ally and I started a puzzle and binge watched all 14 episodes of this Netflix show. It’s about middles school gymnasts! Perfect for Ally. I only made it through a few episodes but Ally watched it all. 

Cloey is always trying to get food. Friday it was our lunch dishes. 

Ally had some mid-afternoon ice cream. 

But was mostly thrilled that another pair of Air Jordans arrived. Actually this was a pair I ordered last month and Nike said they were out of stock. Which is why I bought Ally a different pair. But these arrived out of the blue. And Nike hasn’t charged me for them! I am planning on calling on Monday to figure it out.

Can you tell she loves them?

Friday night was pizza and volleyball in the park with school friends. 10 kids came out to play. Sophocles mom and I set up the net! 

When we got home Ally and Cloey played chase. It was hilarious. Note the pig’s tail is down.





Exhausted Ally lay down on the floor in defeat. But her pets are never far away.

Saturday Ally headed to the Cape for the day with her teammates. It was not a great weather day. But they swam in the pool and had fun.

Gymnasts doing group yoga poses.

But the day isn’t done until after some Minecraft with Mama.

While Ally was away, Becky and I ran some errands and binge watched the rest of Yellowstone and ordered pizza from the place Ally doesn’t like. Pretty good day for all of us.

Summer Vacation Week 7

August 2-8

The weeks seem so slow but then I write this blog and see that Summer is 7 weeks over and I can’t believe how fast time is going by. 

We did get some official school news this week. Ally will remote learning for at least the first few months of school. The district will evaluate things and maybe have students come back to school part time later in the school year.

Becky’s district has not yet made any final decisions. It looks like she will be remote as well, but they may require teachers to work in the building. That is TBD.

So here is the week in pictures.

Sunday morning Becky and Beth took Cloey for a “hike” we call it that because it’s mostly a walk in the woods. But they had fun.

While they were hiking this was happening. Daisy sitting on Ally’s face while she sleeps.

Becky finished a puzzle:

The teen was strong in this girl this week. 



But always a smile for a photo with Daisy.

Monday night Becky had a Zoom drinks with her co-teachers, so Ally and I watched a movie. Another Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson entertaining action flick, Skyscraper. 



Tuesday Becky and I started clearing things out to make room for Ally’s new remote learning center. The rug was due here on Wednesday and the desk this week too. Which meant we had to clear things out and get rid of the old desk and rug and a dresser we had up on the 3rd floor.

I made chocolate chip cookies Tuesday because I read it was National Chocolate Chip Cookie Day. 

She’s always so happy with her pets. I went to a friend’s house for drinks on Tuesday. When I got home Ally was pretty sad and down in the dumps. It took a while to help her feel better and so it was a late might for us. 

But Wednesday morning we met up with Daniela and her mom and sisters at a local Sculpture garden, the DeCordova. We had never been and it was really neat. Hot and the park regulations required masks but we had fun.

Daniela caught a toad.

Handstands still.

Friends

Selfie. The bronze cast in the heart sculpture was so interesting. There were shoes, weapons, trash very textural.

Ally’s chair arrived. 

Wednesday night Ally went over to Daniela’s and the two of them had dinner on the roof deck of Daniela’s apartment building. 

Ally’s art this week.

Thursday we had thought to take it easy during the day but then Olive’s mom texted to say they were going to the beach and so was Maya’s family, did we want to meet them there? To our surprise Ally was all in. So we quickly packed up and headed to the beach.

Olive, Ally and Maya

They buried Olive. Sofia, Maya’s little sister was there too.

Becky enjoyed the shade of our new umbrella.

Ally has decided to go to an informal running club some of the boy’s in her class had started. Well it’s actually some boy-parents, but Ally wanted to go. And she got Olive and Maya to go too. So after the beach it was off to a local park for the running practice. 

They played soccer after running. Ally said it was a good time, but the boys wouldn’t pass to the girls. And she wants to go again next week.

Thursday night snuggles with Cloey.




Friday Becky made an eggplant Parmesan casserole and took it over to Beth’s house. They enjoyed that and a fun game night together. Ally and I stayed home, Ally binge watched Outer Banks. 


Saturday morning the desk came!!! Ally loves it.

Becky and I went to the fabric store to look for some fabric to make a slipcover for the futon. Ally really dislikes the current cover. It came like that from the consignment shop we bought it from, we don’t love it. And after finding some really nice bargain fabric for a cover we went to Home Depot for supplies for the curtain. 

Ally likes her new space so much that we found her like this Saturday afternoon.

Saturday night Becky installed hooks in the ceiling and  altered some curtains I bought to create a privacy curtain for Ally’s new remote learning area. 

A rug came...but it was the wrong rug. A new one is scheduled to arrive this week. And we got a new smaller bookcase to swap out the black one for a white one. 

Curtain looks great! And Ally and Becky played Minecraft on Saturday night. The colored lights are from a new gadget called a star projector. 

And one last beach picture of Ally: