Well, another year has come and gone. There were days
and weeks full of routine, as life is prone to be when raising
small children, as well as adventures and other notable things.
We had a young person living with us all year, and he survived
the challenge of doing virtual high school in a language that is
new to him, all while never having met his teachers or
classmates in real life. He did a restaurant training program
during the summer and then promptly used those skills to work
at a Mexican restaurant, and then switched to McDonalds, that
is walking distance to our home. Luke continued to work from
home for Neighborhood Partnerships from the shed.
In addition to hanging out with our dear friends’ son daily for a
few hours, I found myself busy as a foster parent mentor and
also informally mentoring several folks who were in their first
placement, often through Marco Polo. I also reached out to
connect with other folks who have fostered unaccompanied
minors before. I coordinated a drop through Azure Standard,
and helped to sort the monthly orders for neighbors at our
home. I was able to do some volunteer work through Holla
Mentors, by delivering groceries to folks, and as a family, we
packed lunches for folks who live outside.
We remained connected with our friends and community
through weekly Zoom calls after bedtime, and garage hangouts.
We also both got more involved in the small groups through our
church community, Access. Luke enjoyed many Timbers soccer
games with some friends as they split a season ticket. We
shared weekly meals with the Kings, as well as ate more regularly
at the Yellow House, grateful to at least have a small circle of
folks we were connecting with regularly face to face during this
phase of the pandemic.
We continued to get outside a lot, whether through monthly work
days at the neighborhood orchard, or park playdates with friends
or camping or spending weekends out at Zephyr Farm. We are
so lucky to have family closeby and the kids enjoyed many
playdates and sleepovers with grandparents and cousins.
We were also immensely grateful for the break and breath of
fresh air. Many sweet babies were born- Emerson, Noah,
Zella, Levi and Anastasia, as well as several of our friends were
adopted after waiting for so long- Audrey, Eli, and Lovia.
I wore the same wool dress for 100 days in a row and took a
picture every day of the challenge. I painted the kids’
bedroom with colorful polka dots, a project I had been
wanting to do for a while. We finally managed to grow dahlia
flowers for months in the summer and were delighted with
the variety of tubers we had. We were excited to find out that
Dahlia would be attending a closeby Spanish Immersion
program at Lent Elementary and in the same class as a dear
friend. Access moved into a new building, so much time was
spent on work projects to prepare the space for folks to gather
when it was safe to do so. Micah played with remote control
cars everywhere he went, and was obsessed with monster
trucks. Five years too late, we upgraded to a king sized bed,
which is so helpful because Micah still believes that our bed is
his and joins us every night, taking up twice the space a
person his size should.
January:
-Snowshoeing with Anne/Andrew at Frog Lake
-Beach house with Bonham/Eads
-Started potty training for Micah!
February:
-Edgefield night by myself
March:
-Rainy family photos at the Sandy River
April:
-First dose of vaccine!
-Eloheh work day
May:
-Yurt trip with Sandors to Nehalem Bay
-Second Dose
-TImothy Lake bandit camping
June:
-Jesse/Catherine visit
-Solstice party at Buxton’s
-“In the Heights!” date with Luke
-Heatwave- camping by Sandy River, Lost Lake float day,
swimming at Creston Pool and Oxbow
July:
-Eads (and 4000+ trees) move to Zephyr Farm in
Gales Creek
-Tried to float the Lewis River with Bumbaloughs
but the water was too shallow
-Karen and Christian co-ed baby shower
-Friends Camping at Cape Lookout
-Cathedral Park Jazz Festival
-Pick Blueberries
-Family River Float where John got separated
-Aunt Margaret/Holly/Andrew came to visit
-Karen’s baby shower
-Camp at Oxbow with Rogers Family
-Bought my new bike!
-Dahlia did her first ballet class at CBA
-Hagg Lake with Vogels and then hung out at farm
August:
-Erin/kids visit
-Celebrated my birthday with a pool party with friends,
river day, hike with Erin in the gorge
-Swim lessons at Creston Pool
-Swim at Sellwood Pool with K and C, Erin/kids,
make sushi, listen to live music in Happy Valley
-Concert at Happy Valley Library
-Trillium Lake Day with Erin/K and C
-Camping in Bellingham, paddling the Bay at sunset
-Luke/Dahlia backpacking Salmon River with Ensz
September:
-Dahlia started kinder at Lent!
-Labor Day camping at Zephyr/Treehouse work
-Started watching Alder
-Noah born!
-Backpacking with friends to Indian Heaven
-Dahlia turned 6- unicorn cake
October:
-GIrls weekend at Edgefield
-Friends Camp
-Micah turned 3- the year of the monster truck
-Halloween- Dahlia unicorn, Micah parrot bird
November:
-Apple Cider from Reverend Nat’s instead of apple
pressing party
-Bend with Karen/Christian
-Dahlia vaccinated
-Thanksgiving meal in Vancouver
-Sleepover at the farm/turkey enchiladas
December:
-Puerto Rico with Luke, while kids stayed with family
-Tattoo
-Busy winter break/snow
-Christmas with Eads/Bonhams
