Pandemic Chronicles: Week Two

Week Two of this new stay-at-home normal was March 22nd - March 28th.

Sunday morning was my first "church at home" morning with the boys. The week before they had been with my parents and I had been the only non-worship or tech team member sitting in church, haha. But then it was highly pushed that you could not meet in groups of more than 10, and we needed to limit who was there. So me and the boys began our Sunday mornings at home, while Mr.Pate headed to church.

Oh wait... I should add that we had some strong storms the night before and lost power for a few hours. That resulted in our modem frying. So I woke Sunday morning to no internet. Thank the Lord for good mobile service and hot spots! 

Kim graciously offered to teach the PreK/K class on Zoom on Sunday mornings, so we kicked that off on the 22nd. Those kids were the cutest. And Kim is so gifted with them.

 

 

 

Then we settled in to watch church together. Griffin hung with me but I had not prepared enough for Grady and he got bored quickly and went off to play.

Griffin finished Harry Potter and the Sorcerers Stone (we had been reading it together) and took his first at-home AR test, and passed!! He was so freaking excited. I was really proud. I sat next to him and would have missed a few.

We met with our connect group via Zoom for the first time that day also.

That week I worked half days in the office so there were not as many of us there, and then we were all sent to work from home starting Thursday. We home-schooled the kids some more, I figured out how to work from home, and we had more Zoom church classes. Also, Mr.Pate built a pitching mound and they turned the back hallway of church into a training facility. Ha!

Thursday, Bristow did a wave parade and it was soooo sweet! We even made a large banner that marked out six feet where the kids could stand to hold it. Ha!We also went back to Bristow to help give out Cotton BBQ.

Friday and Saturday were gorgeous that week, so we played and worked outside as much as possible. Griffin spent lots of time in his hammock listening to the second Harry Potter also. We watched Home Safaris, and Mo Williams teach us to draw, and took advantage of all the free awesome resources people were providing right now.

Saturday we went on a Bear Hunt in a local neighborhood and had a ball. Almost every house participated and it was really fun to search for them. We let the kids hangout the sunroof and windows and it was a beautiful day. Then we ran into the Floras doing a bike ride on our way home! 

Pandemic Chronicles: Week One

The first full week of this new normal was March 15th-21st. During that week, I still went into work like "normal", and Mr.Pate held down the homeschool fort. He also had two additional kids that Monday, and one additional kid the rest of the week :-)

The kids did well working at home and playing at night. We played a few games of indoor soccer and basketball, parents vs. kids.

We did Wednesday night church via Zoom (the first of many Church Zoom meetings, haha), and played some crazy scavenger hunts with lots of laughing.

Thursday and Friday, church grilled food for Bristow families and we helped deliver meals to many.

Friday night the kiddos had a movie night with the Brennans, and we got Yuki for a little "date night". Because this "take out only" world was new to most restaurants, it took almost the whole time for us just to get the sushi, haha. The kids had a blast though, and that would be our last date night for who knows how long?

Saturday, we had our first Zoom church staff meeting to figure out all this new online ministry world. Then we played basketball with the boys and neighborhood kids outside. This would end up being the last time we did this also, but at this point we didn't even consider social distancing from them outside. It was a super fun day, and might be the longest I have played basketball. Haha.

The Beginning of our “new normal”

So yes, the coronavirus had been getting media attention in growing amounts since January. Towards the end of January, the US got its first confirmed case in country. But life here still felt like this was not something that could take over lives.

We were finishing basketball, WKU students were returning for the Spring semester, and church was bursting with people. We were planning and praying towards kicking off two services on Easter Sunday. We had our 2nd annual Valentines dinner (so fun).

Fast forward to March 13th, and our children were sent home from school for 2 weeks to help with social distancing. The Preston Center was closed as of Friday the 13th also. WKU extended their spring break for an extra week while everyone got prepared to continue classes online for the remainder of the semester. Safe to say, life between January 21st and March 13th had rapidly changed. Toilet paper was chosen as the most needed commodity (??), and stores were quickly selling out of almost everything. Basically, many were spiraling into varying degrees of panic. On Sunday, March 15th, no Redeemer folks came to our building for worship. We moved to "Church Online" and began learning how to minister completely over the internet.

And thus it began... 

Pate Pandemic Chronicles

Well, as is the rest of the world, we find ourselves in a Pandemic. Over the past two months, the Coronavirus was a random headline or joke, happening halfway across the world. I really think most never imagined in two short months the entire world would be dealing with this. But here we are.

So what better time to start blogging again?! 

I may blog some about my thoughts or feelings on the matter. But mostly I want to capture these days with my people. For better or worse, we are spending way more undivided time together than I can ever recall. And I want to make the absolute most of this time the Lord has given us. 

So here are our Pate Chronicles of life during the Pandemic....