New Normal

I was leaving the house the other day and couldn't help but notice this.  We have a catch-all shelf with hooks inside the door from the garage.  Our keys are deposited here, mail gets dumped in the cubby and now our masks hang here.  Dave starts summer school next week so I've made him a few masks (Gopher fabric of course!) and M has a pediatric one from his last well baby appointment.  I have a handful of them in my vehicle for when I go out shopping and I have to wear one in and out of the hospital.  I still remember first masking in public mid March and how strange it felt and now I feel almost naked without one.

Florida, Arizona, Texas and California look absolutely terrible Covid-wise.  I can't stress this enough people:  Wear a damned mask and stay the hell home.  If you have been, keep it up.  If you haven't been, START already.  It will save lives.  The poor healthcare workers in those states are getting crushed.  I can't even imagine.  ICU work is hard enough, but it is even worse with isolation precautions.

We have thus far avoided a surge and our hospitalized numbers are going down for which I am very thankful. I am sick and tired of hearing people (several of them in my own extended family) saying this is no big deal, it is just the flu, etc.  These same people hate our governor and the shutdown and restrictions we had.  Many of our restrictions have been lifted and thankfully prudent people who can think critically continue to mask and avoid large groups.  The low numbers we are seeing are the result of those measures and these critics are either ignorant or dismissive of this fact and therefore say it is no big deal. 

It reminds me of patient after patient I've encountered who were newly prescribed blood pressure medication for hypertension and stopped taking it after 2 weeks and their blood pressure was out of control again.  Why did you stop taking your medication?  Because my blood pressure got better.  They just could not connect the fact that their blood pressure was better because they took their medicine.  I'm so afraid that will happen here in Minnesota.  People will go crazy and go out and gather because our numbers are better.  They got better because we took our medicine, i.e. we masked and abstained from those activities.  Cause and effect!

I am thankful this guy is not school age because they are trying to come up with a plan for the fall.  We've been paying our daycare lady to keep our spot but keeping him home to keep our exposure to a minimum.  I'm a little worried about next week when he has to go back. I worry about Dave being in that infectious slurry of kids and bringing germs home.

We've been going out to play in the sunshine and get our daily vitamin D.  Here is his bubble lawnmower from Aldi.

Here are the two men in my life dressed head to toe in Aldi fashions.  They had these darling Papa Bear and Bear Cub shirts for Father's Day and they look so cute together.  M has his Aldi Croc style shoes on too.  I don't praise Aldi enough.  They kept us well fed and equipped on a limited budget through a strike and now a pandemic.

Marek is now starting to enjoy blankets and I am so happy!  He is watching Sesame Street with a blankie made for him by one of Dave's coworkers. 

He loves the water!  This is our redneck version of a water table and he can't get enough.  He runs through the cold sprinkler and drags it around the yard.  I'm disappointed he can't go to Toddler Tuesday at the paddling pool this summer because he'd go crazy.  Next summer.

We've had plenty of indoor fun too.  I got this magnetic wipe off board/chalkboard to work on letters and numbers and colors.  I'm pretty OCD when it comes to the toys and like to put them away assembled with all their different pieces versus throwing everything loose into the toy box, etc.  26 letters and 10 numbers were going to need some sort of bag...

I found some leftover Eric Carle fabric when I was raiding my stash for surgical cap fabrics.  We love Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? around here so this was perfect.  I made a zippered bag lined with leftovers from his dinosaur pillowcase and it holds the magnets, chalk and dry erase markers. 

I just love little things The Boy does.  He tucked his crib toys between the railing and the wall.  He's had that Miffy since his first Christmas.

Lord knows we've been cooking and eating around here.  We got a new grill and Dave assembled it out in the awful humid heat--he was in heaven.  He used Lopi's old dog tie out to lower the old one in pieces down from the deck.  The cord slipped and he dropped the main piece down onto the yard.  It looked like the scene of a terrible accident by the looks of the mangled structure.  We couldn't resist the chance to take a funny picture.

We made our first batch of spicy Korean chicken wings with the induction hotplate out on the deck.

Whenever we get that pot and oil out, we start thinking about what else we can throw in there.  I tried a batch of doughnuts using a recipe I found online.  I don't even remember which one I used but I only made a half batch and we had more than plenty.  I cut one actual doughnut with my cutter and decided that was too much work.  To save time, I cut them into diamonds like a beignet.

I checked with the neighbors before I started frying and we unloaded three plates on three different households and still had more than we could eat.

Onion rings.  Need I say more?  This was such a tasty, easy and cheap recipe.  I never realized the markup on onion rings.  You could easily turn a bag of onions, a sack of flour and a 6-pack of beer into $500.  We did this on a different day but shared these with our neighbors too.

We made cheese curds using this recipe the same day we made onion rings.  I dredged them in the egg and crumbs twice for a thicker crust.  My neighbors paid me the biggest compliment when they told me, "Who needs the State Fair when you live next door to Katie."

We do eat vegetables around here too!  Here is our first bunch of broccoli coming in.  The Boy loves his broccoli and this is the first year we've grown it.  I just got 2 pots of well established eggplant yesterday at HyVee's garden sale and will get them in the ground.  I hadn't planned on growing them this year because you tend them and wait all summer and then pick them a week before the first frost.  I'll try again seeing as I got these for $1.59 each.

Our peonies have come and gone for the year.  My parents stopped through on their way up to Duluth for my niece's graduation.  We kept our distance from one another and it was wonderful to just SEE them even if we couldn't really hug each other.  We stayed home from the celebration because I'm always so afraid I have been unknowingly exposed at work and I don't want to share it with my family.  Mom was bringing a bunch of her deep pink peonies to Duluth and we sent along a bunch of our white blooms.

I went out to the front garden to pick some shrub roses and was pleasantly surprised to find some tiger lilies blooming.  I thought we'd killed them all off.  Look at that almost fluorescent orange against the bottle green glass of the vase.

The same goes for the fuchsia of the roses.  I love having these cheerful colors on the table.  My new obsession is Escape To the Chateau where they have extensive vegetable gardens and glorious flower cutting gardens.  We've cleared a new area of garden that is full of landscaping rocks.  We're growing a pumpkin vine in that area because the vine doesn't care what kind of ground it rests on.  I have a potted dill plant there too and I'm hoping it will seed itself into a full on bush for next year.  Maybe we could grow some flowers in that area too and I can cut them for the house like Angel Adoree.  I just know Angel and I would be best friends!

Keep safe and social distance.  WEAR A MASK.  

Keep your mind and hands occupied and this too shall pass.  Happy Fourth from home!