Covid Quarantine Thanksgiving, IEP Meeting, Car Repairs, Moab Quick Trip, Arches Day 1

What a crazy two weeks it has been!! Two weeks ago was Thanksgiving.  My sister in law, Michonne,  and my brother, Bryan, were kind enough to invite Matthew to have Thanksgiving dinner with them since we were still under quarantine--aka Covid Jail-- at our house and he couldn’t come here for Thanksgiving.  I was so grateful they had him for dinner because he would have otherwise been at home by himself with one staff and that is not the greatest way to spend your first Thanksgiving living away from home.  The way things worked with Covid, is I only had to count 10 days from my first symptom and as long as I was getting better and fever free I didn’t need to isolate anymore.  Josh and Sarah were out of isolation Friday morning, but the rest of the family had to wait the full 14 days of quarantine to make sure they didn’t get sick.  Since I broke out of Covid jail two days before Thanksgiving I decided to take Matthew out to dinner the night before just so he could get out of his house with family.  I picked him up and let him decide where we would go.  He decided on Red Robin.  Before we left his house I placed the to go order.  By the time we got over there, I went inside and picked up our order while Matthew waited outside in the car.  I brought it out to the car and we had a fun dinner date while we chatted and ate our dinners.  Matthew had just gotten out of his 14 day quarantine two days previously so he was able to go back to school the next day which was a Wednesday and was so excited about it.  I was glad for him because Matthew does not do well without a routine and schedule which didn’t happen to well while he was stuck at his house on quarantine.

The next day was Thanksgiving.  We had a small Thanksgiving with just our family--Aaron, me, Josh, Daniel, Sarah and Noah since we were still under Covid quarantine--aka Covid Jail.  

 It made me a bit sad since this will most likely be Josh’s last Thanksgiving for a few years since he will probably be on his mission next year.  What can you do, though?!  Michonne sent me this picture of their Thanksgiving with Matthew.  After dinner Matthew even got to walk Charlie around.  I am sure he LOVED it!  I am so grateful he was able to spend Thanksgiving with family!

Josh and Daniel had a lot of people tell them that Noah looks like them.  We did a side by side picture, but I don’t think Noah looks like either of them except fo the messy hair and the blue eyes.  What do you think?

Matthew’s phone broke last week and it was not a happy time for him.  Luckily, he had great staff around him that let him use their personal phones so he could make a call.  We ordered him a new phone as soon as we found out it was broken, but it took almost a week to get to us. Thankfully, Aaron was able to set it up from the car outside Matthew’s house since Aaron was still in quarantine--Covid Jail.  Matthew was so excited to get the new phone.  He usually calls me almost every day so for him to go almost a week without being able to use his own phone was a bit rough for him.  I was glad Aaron was able to get the new phone working.

Matthew had his annual IEP meeting last week.  We had to do it over Zoom due to Covid, but it turned out to be fine.  Matthew has a new teacher this year and she has been great to work with.  Aaron was on his last day of Covid quarantine so he was home with me and able to attend the IEP meeting.  Matthew got to lead the IEP meeting for the first time.  You could tell his teacher had practiced with him going through the agenda and how to bring up topics.  He did such a great job!!  We were really impressed!  His teacher, the principal, Aaron and me, and his Vocational Rehab counselor were all in on the meeting.  Here’s our Zoom screen:

We discussed his goals and plans for the next year and beyond.  Matthew is really progressing and doing so well.  His principal even commented, “Matthew you have grown so much this year!!”  Matthew, being Mister Literal, took the comment in its entirety and then said, “I know!  I can’t even button up my pants anymore I have grown so much!”  Everyone got a chuckle out of that even Matthew after the principal explained what he really meant using terms that Matthew could fully understand without any double meanings.  And it is true, I had to buy Matthew two pair of new pants last week since his old pants don’t quite fit as well as they used to--haha!

Last Monday Josh had a pretty bad day.  He was out of Covid Jail so he was able to go to school Monday morning.  I usually don’t hear from Josh until he gets home after track/cross country practice which is after school.  So he usually doesn’t get home until about 4-4:30 unless he works then he won’t get home until after 8 pm some nights.  Last week Aaron and I were getting in the car to drive over to Matthew’s house to drop off his new phone when an unfamiliar car pulled up behind us in the driveway.  Josh hopped out with a handful of stuff and walked over to us.  When he got to us he said that he had had the worst day.  To start off he had a rough day in classes, then he ended up leaving his cell phone in his math class.  He didn’t realize he had left his phone in his math class until after track practice.  When he went to go pick it up the classroom was locked so he couldn’t get it.  However, he needed his phone to call us because when he went to go get in his car to come home, it wouldn’t start. DOH!!  He had no way to call us because he had no phone at the time.  Luckily, some parents who had come to pick up their kids took pity on him and tried to jump start his car.  Unfortunately, again it still wouldn’t start.  A really nice parent drove Josh home and luckily Josh caught us before we had left to tell us what had happened.  That just made it a bad day for all of us--DOH!!  Car troubles are the WORST!  Anyway, I went and took care of Matthew’s phone.  Aaron was still in Covid quarantine so I had to do the leg work which is fine.  After dropping off Matthew’s phone we went over to the high school and took a look at Josh’s car.  We figured it was most likely a bad battery.  We had no tools with us so I had to run over to pick some up at the store while Aaron waited in the car.  We went back and removed the battery and I picked up a new one.  Aaron then replaced it and I was able to drive the car home.  However, on the way home it was making a weird noise.  So when Aaron drove the other car home I wanted him to listen to Josh’s car.  When we went to start Josh’s car it wouldn’t start.  DOH!!  Aaron was thinking it was a bad alternator.  The next morning after Matthew’s IEP meeting we got the fun opportunity to tow Josh’s car to the mechanic’s shop.  Luckily, Aaron was out of Covid jail that morning so he was good to be in public by then.  He drove the van and I got to ‘drive’ behind in the towed car.  It was a tow party--not a very fun type of party, though!

The mechanic worked on it over the weekend.  It wasn’t a bad alternator it was a bad battery cable line.  While he was working on the car he also fixed the brakes and changed the oil.  However, the car wasn’t ready for Josh to drive to school Monday morning.  Josh ended up riding the bus and HATED it!! At least he was able to get his phone back after leaving it in his Math class.  Anyway, I didn’t feel too bad for him because riding the bus once every two years isn’t going to kill him.  However, he was more than excited to get it back Monday afternoon.  Just in time for the high school to go into a soft closure because the Covid count reached over the 15 case threshold.  The high school did try and do a student testing trial.  It is where if they got 80% of the students testing negative for COVID they wouldn’t need to shut down.  Unfortunately, they only reached 68% participation and found an additional 27 cases to add to the already 19 in the school.  That means they had to go into a soft closure for the next two weeks, but that means the students won’t go back to school until January since that two weeks will put them into the holiday break.  Josh is not too happy about that, but what can you do?!  His poor senior year is turning out to be pretty rough with all the soft closures, cancelled activities, etc.  It has just been a rough year!  

Over last weekend we put up our Christmas decorations.  Usually Aaron tries to pick a fight with me so he can leave and then by the time he comes back home everything is already magically done.  I caught on to that tactic and was as sweet as pie so there was no fighting to be had so Aaron helped this year--haha!  Just kidding I don’t think he actively tries to do this, but it is what usually happens.  Josh and Sarah took over decorating the living room Christmas tree.  Josh is super tall so I was more than happy to let him reach the top part of the tree.  I said while he had the ladder out (he needed it to put the angel at the top of the tree) he needed to get the microfiber mop and dust off the spider webs from the wall.  However, he went above and beyond.  He even dusted the top of the dividing wall.  It was pretty bad.  Josh is super allergic to dust so afterward he was a huge snotty, red itchy eyed, sneezy mess.  However, I had a nice clean dividing wall top and no more cobwebs on my walls.  I was impressed he saw something extra that needed to be done and did it without being asked.

Last week all of us were able to be completely out of Covid jail.  I had been wanting to take a trip down to Moab for a few years.  We finally booked the trip for a few weeks ago, but that is when everyone got Covid.  Luckily the Air BNB host let us change the dates for a few weeks later so we could go when we were all better and safe to travel.  We booked it for the day after Aaron, Noah, and Daniel got off quarantine.  I wasn’t sure how well this trip would go over since we had already spent the last three weeks all cooped up in the house together and now we were going to go spend 3 days cooped up in a very small condo together, however, it would be a change of scenery.  We were all going crazy staring at the house walls not able to leave so it would be great to have something different to look at!  I saw this meme and thought it was so appropriate--haha!

We left after the kids got home from school and Aaron got home from his first day back at work in person (not teleworking) Wednesday evening and made the 4+ hour drive down to Moab. The kids had just started back to school that Tuesday so they still weren’t quite back in to the school routine yet--getting up early, doing homework, etc.  They were all going to miss one day of school, but we thought it was worth it.  Anyway, we wanted to make sure we social distanced as much as we could.   We packed up all our food so we wouldn’t need to go to the grocery store while we were there.  We got to the Air BNB about at 10 pm.  Enough time to get ready for bed.  However, Daniel found a corkscrew wine bottle opener and thought it was pretty fun to play with.

The next morning we got up at 5:45 am to get a good head start at Arches National Park.  Again I have been wanting to take this trip for a few years so I wanted to make the most of our visit.  That meant trying to get to the first hike right before sunrise.  This was going to be a lot of hiking kind of trip.  Matthew absolutely HATES hiking so he didn’t come along with us.  That morning Sarah let me do her hair, which is a rare occurrence lately.  I had to take a picture just to remember such a momentous event--haha!

We had a hard time getting our act together so we got into Arches National Park a bit later than I wanted to, but it was  right as the sun was starting to rise.  It was beautiful to see. 

The very first hike was the one that was a MUST DO for me.  It was Delicate Arch.  It is the iconic arch that is on all the Utah license plates.  I wanted Aaron and the kids to see it in real life.  I have hiked this before, but it was 34 years ago.  However, we were second guessing ourselves when we parked and saw that the outside temperature was 11 degrees.  Brrrrrrrr!

Good thing all of us were wearing quite a few layers of clothes including thermals.  We started on the trail.

 Seeing as no one else is as crazy to visit when things are so freezing outside means that we almost had the whole place to ourselves.  It was amazing!!

There was a small peek a boo arch that Josh, Daniel and I hiked up to see.  Through the arch you could actually see Delicate Arch.  It was pretty cool!

We were close and didn’t mind the drop off beside the trail as we made it the rest of the way to Delicate Arch.

It didn’t disappoint!!

Josh, Daniel and I got there first and there was NO ONE there!!  That NEVER happens!!  It was pretty cool!  I took a picture of Josh and Daniel while we waited for others to join us.

Someone did come along a few minutes later that was willing to take our family’s picture under the arch.  It made me a bit nervous to walk under the arch because there was a HUGE drop off right behind us.  However, as long as I didn’t look behind me, I was able to slowly inch my way out so we could get the cool picture.

Since we got there about an hour after sunrise we were able to see our shadows on the opposite cliff wall. I’m the shadow running away from the sheer drop off on the other side of the arch.  Standing by that made me too nervous.  The older I get the more fear of heights I have.

We enjoyed the view for a few minutes:

Then we made the trek back to the car.  On the way we got to see some petroglyphs which were pretty cool:

We drove over to our next hike.  We had a quick brunch and set off to hike.

We did Tunnel Arch:

Pine Tree Arch:

More hiking:

Landscape Arch which was pretty impressive. It’s longer than a football field.  You can’t get right up under it anymore because a big chunk broke off of it 15 years ago and they don’t want to risk anyone getting hurt.  But even looking at it from afar it still is impressive:

There’s always time for a photo op:

By this time Aaron’s ankle that he had had surgery on earlier this year started really hurting.  He sat the next few arches out just to give it a break.  Josh, Daniel and I hiked and scrambled up using hands and legs to climb up the smooth stone of some of the fins so we could see two more arches that were close by.

If you look at the middle fin Josh is the small, black ant looking thing on top of it.  Aaron took this picture while he was waiting for us to come back.

Here’s what Aaron, Noah and Sarah looked like from the top of the fin:

Here’s the picture of Josh from the other side of the fin.

On top of the fin you could see the Navajo Arch and the Partition Arch.  It was so bright that I just had to take the picture and hope you could see the arches behind me which you can for the most part:

Josh got a better picture of those two arches:

More hiking:

Towards the end of the day Aaron and I weren’t as fast at hiking as the kids were.  Here they were all waiting for us on the trailhead rocks as we finally made it back to the parking lot:

As we were driving Josh and I stopped to hike to Skyline Arch.  Everyone else sat this one out because they were getting tired.

After a rest break we set out to do some more hiking.  Noah liked climbing up all the big rocks:

We hiked to Sand Dune Arch.  To get there you had to pass through a small slot canyon in deep sand--thus the name Sand Dune Arch--haha!

Sand Dune Arch.  We made it.  However, it was in the shade and slot canyon caused the winds to blow through it.  It was SO COLD inside here.  We didn’t stay at this arch very long because it was SO COLD!!

Walking back out you can see how narrow the trail got:

We then hiked over to Broken Arch.  On the way Daniel and Noah were walking together.  Daniel had his arm around Noah. I took a picture to remember that they don’t always fight and that there are times that they really do love each other--haha!

We made it to Broken Arch. 

Again we were the only ones there.  It was pretty awesome!!

There was a narrow crack that ran alongside the arch.  Noah and Daniel climbed around inside for a bit.  They are in there trust me!

We then stopped by the Fiery Furnace.  It was beautiful!

The Petrified Dunes:

We then hit the Windows section of the park.  You could see the North and the South Window Arches:

We hiked to the North Window Arch:

Then we hiked to the South Window:

Next was the Turret Arch:

It was pretty cool to see:

We saved the Double Arch for last.  This ended up having more people at it, but it still wasn’t that busy.

At this point I had hit my limit.  I let the kids hike up right under the arches, but I stayed at the base of the arch.  This 5 second video shows how big the arches are from where the kids are to my point of view.  They were HUGE arches!!

On the way out of the park as the sun was starting to set we stopped by Balanced Rock to see it.  By the end of the day it reached a balmy 36 degrees.

We jammed packed that day with hiking.  At the end of the day we had gone almost 13 miles 

(roughly 28,885 steps) in hiking.  You want to know something that is completely unfair?!  Josh and I were both wearing sport watches which documented steps taken, heart rates, calorie burn, etc.  Josh ended up burning almost 4000 calories to my 1400 calories even though we hiked pretty close to the same amount.  How unfair is that?!  Oh well, it was a fun day and I was so glad we finally made this trip happen!!  Since we had done a big portion of Arches National Park we were going to hit Canyonlands National Park the next day.  We had a quick dinner when we got back to our condo.  Also the condo we stayed at had an outdoor hot tub.  We definitely wanted to try that out.  We had the whole thing to ourselves and it felt so good to sit in after such a long day of hiking.  We had to walk to the hot tub in our swimming suits while it was 20 degrees outside, but once we got to the hot tub it felt good to get in.  Josh and Daniel had a contest to see if they could get their wet hair to freeze.  It didn’t freeze until they got out and walked back upstairs to our condo.