Queensland, Australia, is in pretty much of a lockdown like the rest of the world. Kids are being encouraged to stay home from school, all playgrounds and public recreation facilities are closed, and I truly fear families are going to go troppo sooner rather than later.
School holidays are now, and National and State campgrounds are also closed until further notice. Even the beaches up here are mostly shut down.
Me, my daughter and grandkids are fine so far. Bit pissed off that our apartment complex closed the pool, but doing some road trips into rainforest areas that have rivers, creeks and cascades and very few other visitors…easy as to maintain social distancing.
Hardest thing is getting the kids off Minecraft and getting their noses into books and a bit of schoolwork.
My daughter is doing alright. Her school district has been on Chromebooks or iPads for 3 or 4 years now and all her normal work and assignments are done that way. The only difference is she’s home and has more time to do the work and I guess my co-parenting roommate is subbing as her teacher. She almost became a teacher (took Masters level classes for the cert, did sub teaching, teacher’s aide, etc) and is well-suited for it, any way. They went for a walk today so I guess they are getting outside. I’m pretty much all work right now, so not around the kids much but it’s like that regardless these days. I was the primary financial and caregiver for most of their lives, this mostly means their mom is more involved which is good/fine.
The lil’wrekker is home from University. She’s completed her course work. Waiting on finals. Her program was going to Japan this summer. That is cancelled. She’s a bit stir crazy. Her long time boyfriend is here as well.
I have a plan for them to garden all spring. She’s gonna get busy.
My grand-wreks are just fine. They think this is soooooo cool. The two that are in Elementary school are doing lessons online.
It’s the Moms that are crazy with kids underfoot and no possible reprieve.
I have two teenage boys that seem to be doing okay, the older one more so than the younger. My 16 year old (oldest) is loving this. He’s kind of a loner homebody anyway, who always has a million projects going on, so he’s stayed busy with schoolwork, art, and some thing he’s building out of PVC pipes. He said he misses playing soccer, but otherwise quarantining is great! I think he’s enjoying being on his own schedule and not having to be at the mercy of school, practice, work, etc.
The youngest (14) is more of a social person, so he’s having a harder time being away from his friends. Since he’s in middle school and not high school, his work load has been a lot less. I think that will start to pick up soon, but he’s had to make up his own homeschooling for a bit. He also doesn’t have as many solitary activities that he enjoys. He dances pretty seriously (ballet, modern, jazz) and luckily his studio has been doing dance classes and conditioning classes every day via Zoom, so that has been fantastic. He’s also been setting up Zoom get-togethers with his friends.
For both, there has been a LOT of Playstation and tv watching, but I don’t really care. I require they go outside and exercise for at least a half hour a day, and they’ve been good about walking the dog or taking bike rides.
Eldest is grown and in an essential job requiring substantial travel (30 cities, 10 countries in the last month). I’m of course concerned about exposure. The good news is he’s young and in no risk groups so probably OK. He’s young enough to feel somewhat invincible and is coping well.
Youngest is in college, at home doing online classes. She’s not nearly busy enough and searching for something to occupy her time. Since my wife is home with the same dilemma, they’ve discovered a new hobby – me. So now I have double the number of women peering over my shoulder and commenting on every activity, book, TV show, meal choice, and *of course *every goddamned beer. So I’m coping JUST FINE. :mad:
I’m thinking of moving permanently to my boat. It’s a 10th the size of this house, but might feel less crowded.
I have a 10 year old son, an only child. He is miserable. He’s normally a big extrovert who loves to hang around with his friends. Almost every day I have to try to console him while he cries about missing school and his friends.
We do set up virtual play dates over Zoom and such, and he’s happy while they’re happening. But overall he’s very unhappy and I wish I could help him.
We already homeschool (no, we’re not weirdos), so their science/math/history/writing/etc is business as usual. However, they don’t have their usual social activities or art/Tae Kwon Do/dance classes, which is a bit disappointing for them. They’re doing piano virtually.
My son is a homebody introvert, so he’s actually loving the time at home with no obligations to leave the house. My daughter is a busy-bee extrovert, so she’s struggling with the isolation. My wife and I are also both introverts, so we’ve been setting up lots of Facetimes for our daughter with her grandparents and friends so she doesn’t drive us all up the damn wall. (I know that sounds kinda mean, but holy cow this girl needs constant human stimulation.)
My son works in a Florida prison. He’s been doing twelve hour shifts, and last I heard they were on full lockdown. They thought they had COVID19 in the prison, but tests showed it to be influenza.
My daughter is a nurse and her fiancé is a doctor. They work in a hospital across the road from a nursing home where things have gone to hell. The administration responded too slowly to the crises, maintaining visiting far too long. Employees, pissed off at administration, quit, and now they have dozens of cases and a shortage of workers.
My daughter had a job offer to work in NYC for one week. Room and board provided, payment of $10,000.00 at the end of the week. She isn’t going to do it. Any nurses here get similar offers?
My 10 year old seems to think he is busier now than when school was in session.
He plays way too many video games and watches way too much TV but he does everything I ask of him (about 9 hours of scheduled stuff a day) so…
My girls are 11 and 14, I think they are coping reasonably well. They officially restart school tomorrow, albeit from home. My younger one misses school more, the older one misses her friends more.
We’re making sure that when they get under the other persons skin they recognize the root cause of the irritation and they know it’s ok to be sad, scared, and upset at times.
It’s actually really nice to have my young son (21 months) around, as he’s completely unburdened by a gloomy cloud of economic collapse and viral particles, so there’s not that wheezing elephant in the room that I find with many adult conversations at the moment.
Our kids are 5 and 3 and it sucks. We live in an apartment just over the river from Manhattan so everyone is cooped up inside all day. I have to do my son’s schooling on top of my full time job. And they constantly need to be entertained every 5 minutes.
My 13-yr-old loves to watch movies and play videogames. He is just as happy to conference and Skype with his friends as he is to meet with them in person. They play videogames together remotely. He has just discovered vintage films, and so has been watching a few films from the 30s & 40s every week with me. With dad he is watching the old Doctor Whos, and some of the Star Trek series he’s never seen before.
As a family we watched all the Family Guy Star Wars parodies, because we decided he was old enough for them.
He plays tabletop boardgames with us and the neighbors some evenings, and really enjoys them. It’s a joy to see how much of an adult he is when the five of us are socializing.
He is very responsible with his e-learning, and often finishes all of it by Wednesday or Thursday.
He walks the dog with me every day, so he is going outside and walking about 3.5 miles every day. That’s pretty much all the exercise he is getting, but the fact is, he didn’t get that much more before. He’s not a pick-up ballplayer, and he rides his bike to get places, but not for fun.
He’s not getting harassed about the amount of time he spends in front of a screen, and he’s loving that.
Our sons are both in college. The oldest was taking two of his three classes online already. He was supposed to start a job this month, but that’s on hold now. He does a weekly podcast with 3 friends. Our younger son got the notification during spring break that classes were moving online for the rest of the year. He’s missing his girl friend and the rest of his friends, but they all communicate pretty much every day. There are times that all four of us are in classes or meetings at the same time.
My kids were raised properly and are doing the right thing for themselves, their spouses and their children. I have little worry that they will successfully ride this out, but of course anything can happen. As for coping, they’re doing as well as anyone else in this situation. They have small children at home, which is nerve wracking, but their homes are large enough that they can get some distance when needed.
My wife and I are coping just fine. Two of her nieces are in jobs that are essential and who are exposed to other people on a daily basis (one is an airline pilot, the other a critical care nurse), so she worries about them. We aren’t exactly social butterflies in normal times, so it’s not like our routine changes all that much.
My son will be turning three this month. His daycare is still open and I’m still driving him there. There are hardly any kids there right now, so he’s getting lots of individual attention. This is a time when toddlers’ vocabulary expands anyway, but his word count has exploded and pronunciation greatly improved.
My worry right now is that he’s uncomfortable with masks. He usually calls them “mean.” I don’t take him on grocery runs now, so he’s not been seeing all the masks yet, but he will. We also just ordered matching cloth masks for the family to wear, but will he keep it on? He’s got sunglasses he doesn’t leave on for long.
I’m just glad he’s not old enough to realize how serious this is.
My son is almost 4 and my daughter is 18 months. My son is doing ok. He tends to be a homebody anyway. Happy to read and color and do puzzles and play in the yard. He is sad that his friends can’t come to his birthday party next weekend, and that we can’t go to the beach, but he’s doing fine.
I’m not sure my daughter is aware of it at all. Her routine has changed slightly but not dramatically (nanny no longer coming to care for her some days, now it’s just me and my wife).
