Day 2 of the kids’ e-learning is off to a slightly rocky start today — I couldn’t figure out how to get the Zoom address onto Anand’s school iPad. Sigh. Kevin did it yesterday, but I told him he could sleep in today. I ended up loaning Anand my iPad for the morning, and sending a note to Kevin to show me how to do it for tomorrow. So a slightly slow start, and we missed the first assignment of the day, a little survey during morning meeting; hopefully we can make it up later today. This will get easier, right?
I also made bacon because I thought the wafting smell might help get my 8th grader out of bed on time. Then I managed to set the toaster oven temperature too high and burned it. Sigh. Edible, if you broke off the black bits, but not great. The second batch came out perfect, though.
In my defense, I honestly think it was the bacon’s fault — I did the first batch at 400F, which is standard, but I think this is pretty lean bacon (from our local butcher, Carnivore), and that was just too hot for it. I did the second batch at 300F, which is quite a bit lower than anyone recommends, but it was perfect in 15 minutes. Odd. I suppose the lesson here is to keep half an eye on the bacon, but it’s tricky when you’re also arguing with Zoom about whether to let you into a meeting.
On the plus side, Kavi was downstairs by 8, as requested, got herself cereal and ate it, and then helped me take 20 minutes to straighten up the first floor. If we’re going to be working together in this space, I basically can’t cope if it’s cluttered — just one too many inputs in my ADD brain. It was literally making me want to cry, and/or snap at the kids, so clearing up was definitely the right option. Kavi then went up stairs to brush her hair and finish getting ready.
I think she’s excited to have her schoolday up in the playroom by herself. We haven’t really finished setting up her workspace yet — we have an organizational board we need to mount on the wall, and there are some desk supplies that are back-ordered. It may be a month before I have cute photos for you. 
But it’s functional now, if something of a hodgepodge.
We also contacted our twice-monthly housekeeper and asked her not to come today. During pandemic, we started up again in July (we paid her from March, but didn’t have her come), but we’ve been leaving the house while she’s here to minimize exposure (in both directions), taking the kids to the woods. That’s not possible with e-learning, but luckily, she has a Saturday afternoon slot, so we were able to switch to that. That’ll work as long as the weather holds, at least.
Now, Anand is doing jumping jacks in the front room for PE with Mr. Williams, Kevin has come downstairs, grabbed some non-burnt bacon, and showed me how to do the morning Zoom link on Anand’s school device, Kavi is ensconced upstairs, the Roomba is merrily wandering around in its pretty flowered dress, and I’m ready to go check in on the Slack and respond to whatever my students posted overnight.
I’m a day behind on my newsletter edits (sorry, Emmanuel and Stephanie), but I think my readers will forgive me sending it out a day late. We’re all going to need to extend each other a lot of forgiveness and grace this fall, I think.
We can do this.
