I begin this post with joyous news: the bird that’s been tormenting our house is gone!! About a month ago we noticed a Robin outside our front windows that was, according to the internet, either 1. trying to nest inside of our house or 2. fighting off his own reflection and completely trashing our window sills and glass during its efforts. We’ve been starring through bird-poo markings on all bottom thirds of of all our window panes and have had bird poo on the window sills for months. But alas! The bird is no more and the power washer is coming out this weekend!
More good news: the Michigan stay at home order has been lifted after Governor Whitmer announced this week a new, more flexible set of rules. Activities that are now allowed include swimming in local pools, swinging on the nearest playground, renting books from libraries… and soon grabbing a beer and a snack at your local restaurant. But things that’ll have to wait include getting your hair cut, nails done and sweating it out at your gym of choice. I miss The Dailey Method so bad!!
The last couple weeks have looked a bit different for us while working from home because our fantastic daycare provider Barb had knee surgery and is closed for three weeks during her recovery. This has meant managing (or tying to anyway) the balance between parenting and being a productive worker all at the same time - spoiler alert, it’s super hard which is why we enlisted our family to help us this week. Big thanks to Jeff’s sister Stephanie and parents for splitting the week with the kids so we could avoid the frustrations of last week altogether. It takes a village indeed!
And just before Memorial Day weekend Governor Whitmer started allowing groups of 10 or less adults for social gatherings which meant the entire family was able to spend the holiday together at the lake like we normally do. And gosh did that feel good! It truly felt like summer as usual: we grilled, played in the sun, took boat rides, played yard games and hung out all as a family for the first time since 2019 (Christmas).
Another sense of normalcy has been our weekly golf leagues. For the last three 4 weeks Jeff and I have fallen back into our usual routine of Wednesday night womens league and Thursday night mens league. Another consistent, my golf game being terrible. My only hope is that if I start now in my 30s that by the time I retire I’ll have a respectable score.
The kids recently completed swim lessons and just in time too because with the order lifted it means pool parties and long weekends at the lake. Two weeks of daily lessons has Natalie swimming across the deep end and Thomas now actually enjoys being in the water. Best money we’ve spent all year.
One of our New Year resolutions was to start investing more in our local community and a positive result of the pandemic is that we couldn’t have avoided forming that new habit even if we had tried. With everything closed over the last three months we’ve reduced the majority of our footprint to mostly the confines of our own property and the surrounding Ottawa Hills neighborhood. We’ve connected with neighbors for drinks on the porch and in our driveways. We’ve gone for walks and gathered around backyard bonfires. We’ve discovered that sitting on our porch during the 5p to 9p timeframe means impromptu happy hours, conversations and ultimately… building that connection to our community we were aiming for. And man does it feel good. We love it here.
But it is, with great sadness, that we mention the the violent protests in downtown Grand Rapids last weekend triggered by the brutal arrest and death of George Floyd. It is not often that we discuss heavy issues during our updates but as we sat outside with neighbors around the backyard bonfire last Saturday night and listened to the helicopters fly overhead towards downtown it was a subtle reminder that racism affects us all. But as someone who sees the problem I, very honestly, don’t know what to do next.
The other day Jeff and I were discussing racism and the movement to become vocally antiracist. It felt like a similar discussion that we’ve had in the past about being Christian and the calling to actively share Gods word with those around us. I’ve never been secretive about being a Christian just as I’ve never been secretive about believing all men were created equally. And while I’ve always felt like I’ve strived to lead by example in both being a Christian and as someone who is not racist, I’ve most certainly not been actively vocal about these beliefs. And perhaps this is where I should begin.
We have taught our children many things and we understand that now more than ever it is important to also promote diversity and inclusion in their foundational values. We will continue to lead by example but also strive to find the opportunities to have those hard discussions together. Our world and therefore our children’s world is very white. And again, while I’m not sure what to immediately do about that, I do think we can talk more about it.
We have found ourselves nearly half way through the year and heading into months of summer fun. Our minds, hearts and finally our doors are open and ready to receive whatever is around the corner.
