Coding Games

Matthew and his teammates won the nationwide Coder Games contest!  (He told us they did Coder Games at the Coder School online event that he did, but we didn't even realize it was a competition until the Coder School owner emailed us to let us know his trophy had arrived!)  We are very proud of him!

End of Fifth

 The boys had their last day of fifth grade on June 12 -- the school year ended a little earlier than originally scheduled because of the coronavirus. They were glad to be done, but it was kind of anti-climactic!

On the 15th, we went over to school to pick up all the things from their lockers, and then they had the gym set up for picking up art projects, turning in library books, and so on. (The school had set up different days and times for pickup based on last names.) Masks were required, of course, but the building was pretty empty.  It felt a bit strange and sad to me, but the boys didn't seem too bothered.

James's teacher left a nice end of the year envelope with a letter to them, and Matthew's teacher (and assistant teacher) actually came by the house to say goodbye!  It was a quick visit but really nice!

Happy Father's Day

 Hope you all had a happy Father's Day!  Mike had been wanting to go to Olcott Beach, so we took a little trip up there for Father's Day.  It was nice and sunny.  There were a few people out and about, but it wasn't too crowded.  We walked by the lake for a little big, and then stopped in to a couple of the shops -- they only let in a few customers at a time and required masks (and had spray hand sanitizer available), so it seemed okay. We ended up with some delicious carmel flavored popcorn! Then, back home for homemade pizza for dinner. 

Quarantine Projects

Well, one silver lining of being "on pause" or quarantined is that Mike got the garage cleaned out and largely organized to his satisfaction. :)  However, he is also happy that he can now go into stores again. (Previously when he had suggested it, I demanded to know what was so important that he was willing to kill us all, etc.)

He has taken advantage of his newfound freedom by going to the bike store and the liquor store. :)  James had outgrown his old bike, and so now he has a new one -- although apparently there is a nationwide bike shortage (in part because more people got interested in riding bikes and in part because the supply chains got disrupted). So, we were lucky that they had a used bike at the store that was the right size.

Governor Cuomo has been doing daily news conferences since early in the pandemic, and Friday was his last one. Each day he would give the number of deaths and hospitalizations in the state, and I remember being relieved when the deaths dropped from the 700s (per day!) to the 600s, and now it is down in the 20s -- which is obviously still sad, but so much better than it was.  I will kind of miss the briefings -- he was direct, reassuring, focused on the facts and science, and reminding everyone to work together and be New York Tough (which he specified also meant smart and loving).  It was such good leadership, especially compared to the disasterous and divisive approach from the White House.

Social Distance Dinner

 Western New York has moved into the second (and now third) phases of reopening. There are still COVID cases in our area, but the numbers have been going down. So, last weekend we did a socially distanced dinner with our friends Jake and Kelly -- we picked up take-out from Andersons and ate out on their deck, seated an appropriate distance apart. :)  Their dogs, of course, ignored the distancing in favor of getting pets and the occasional dropped french fry. :)  It was fun to have a somewhat more normal get-together!

Sunset on the Harbor

We went down to the Outer Harbor last night to see the sunset (and some bonus rainbows) -- since all our usual plans were cancelled, Mike was eager to get out of the house!  :)  There were a lot of people there, but it's a huge space, so it was very easy to keep more than a safe distance from other people. James was a little disappointed that we wouldn't let him play on the playground, but they enjoyed running around on the rocks instead and rolling down the hill a few times before we left.