Lockdown 2.0, Days 62 and 63

 I was exhausted last night after my fortnightly homeschool Zoom meeting and went to bed to read rather than writing my blog - felt a lot better today.

There was a beautiful red sunrise yesterday morning - very different from the clear morning on Monday. The temperature stayed quite warm overnight as well - it was lovely sitting outside on the couch to do my writing.. It was also very windy again, then calmed down later in the day. Really has been some crazy weather lately. The girls did some yoga, I spent time working on my photos. Amelie skyped with a friend. I finally finished the number puzzle I'd been working on! We had 7 people on our Zoom meeting, all the usual people and a couple of others, it was lovely to see everyone. I had planned to go to Healesville to get my milk and do the weekly shopping, but got a text saying that the milk wouldn't be available as the dairy had no power (delivery would be Wednesday instead). It was nice to not have to rush off and instead I was able to go for a walk with the kids (Liam rode his bike). Caitlin cooked nachos for dinner, I did some work on my course then read my book.

I was up early again this morning, got my writing done, had breakfast and got going on the dishes pretty early. I managed to get everything washed - it's been a while since I had everything clean! I did yoga with the girls - such a beautiful sunny morning and very pleasant to be outside doing yoga. Amelie stayed outside lying in the sun, then lying on the trampoline, for quite a while. I enjoyed pottering around outside for a while, then spent a couple of hours tidying up inside. Mid-afternoon I headed down to Healesville- half way there I realised I didn't have my mask so back home to grab that. I did my Aldi shop (it was much busier than it usually is later on a Tuesday afternoon - not sure if it's normally busy at 3pm or if it was because it was Wednesday and the new specials are out) then a quick stop into Coles. I got my milk, and on the way home I explored a road a friend had told me about - it's within our 5km radius and it looks like a great place to ride bikes or go for a walk. Will take the kids back there sometime soon.

At home I went for a walk and talked to a friend on the phone while she walked as well. It was a great chat, will try to do that more often. The afternoon was gorgeous and Luna and I walked to the huge gum tree on Houghtons Lane. Just after I got home I heard a helicopter, fairly close - I quickly looked at the weather forecast and saw that frost is forecast tomorrow, so wondered if the helicopter was coming to us - it soon appeared over the trees near the shed and it obviously was coming in to land. Amelie and Luna and I watched it fly down towards the dam and circle around to land - I love helicopters and am always excited in spring when we have one here to minimise the impact of frost. It might be a noisy night if they have to use it.

The combination of yoga this morning and a long walk this afternoon though has meant my legs are pretty sore tonight - will rest up and try to get to bed early. I did a bit of work on my course and we had leftovers for dinner. I got a bit of piano playing in before Caitlin put the Block on. Liam is playing games online with a couple of friends.

The numbers were very low yesterday (low 40s) but back up in the 70s today. One higher day is not a problem in itself, as long as they go lower most of the time. We've been watching La Tour de France and been amazed that it's going ahead even though France is getting so many cases. Last night they announced that the race director has tested positive, as well as 4 team staff members. It will be interesting (and a bit scary) to see if anyone else is infected, and how that impacts on the Tour.

Lockdown 2.0, Day 61

 Today felt like a very productive day - there seemed to be lots of hours in the day to do things, rather than it suddenly being evening and not knowing where the day had gone. I was in a pretty good mood for most of it - a bit flat this evening, feeling sad about how long it will be until I can see friends again. I know that will happen on and off for the rest of the lockdown, I'm just going with it when it happens and letting myself feel what I feel. Having some yummy food or working with my photos or playing a game helps a bit, I feel content and happier and know that I'll be fine.

I was up early again this morning - not sure if it's because it's getting light earlier or if I've just switched sleep patterns a bit. It was another clear morning, not quite as cold as yesterday. I went for a walk as the sun rose and took some amazing pictures of the sun on the vineyard, the new buds on the vines, and the reflections in the perfectly still dam. I spent some time on the computer, had breakfast then got a heap of dishes washed before anyone else woke up. Amelie and I did some number puzzles (we're both stuck on really difficult puzzles, it's good to have a fresh set of eyes look at them), I uploaded some photos, and tidied up around the house. I spent a bit of time outside and the weather was gorgeous - sunny and calm, and I was plenty warm enough in a t-shirt. Caitlin and Liam went for a bike ride, Caitlin and Amelie did some yoga in the sun, Amelie talked to a friend on the phone. I did some more puzzles, chatted to Tony (he couldn't go to work as Caitlin still didn't have her test results), and did some work on my course. I rang the test results hotline and got Caitlin's results (negative) - they had her phone number wrong which is why she didn't receive a text. Caitlin and I went for a walk mid-afternoon. On the way to the creek we spotted a juvenile tiger snake - it was perfectly still, staring at us (I thought it was dead at first), then it reared back and slithered away. It was gorgeous, quite long and pencil thin. It's the first snake I've seen on the property since we moved here, I was quite excited. It did make us more cautious about where we walked - I've been wading through long grass for a month or so now, and have been thinking that it was getting close to time to stop doing that. I guess that time is now here. We walked across the creek and talked to the cows in the paddock near our back fence. Mum rang to chat about the new plan for easing restrictions. When we got home I rang a friend who'd called while we were walking, and lay on the couch in the carport to chat. It was sunny there and out of the wind which had been steadily increasing through the afternoon. After the phone call I did more course work, and played games on my phone for a while. Back inside (it wasn't quite as warm inside, I wanted to stay out for longer) I did some more tidying up and sorting out of boxes and our filing cabinet. We finally remembered to watch the live stream of the Philip Island Penguin Parade - it was very very cool! After dinner (leftover lasagne) I did some more work with my photos, Caitlin and Liam played Among Us with a bunch of friends online, and Amelie watched YouTube. The wind is ferocious now - such a major change from the still, calm morning.

Oh and only 41 new cases reported today - that's very good news.

Lockdown 2.0, Day 50

 Another eventful lockdown day (or maybe little things now seem adventurous, as a contract to the sameness of most of our usual days). We had a massive wind storm - some rain, but mainly strong, damaging winds, and the power went out. We manage with power outages on a semi-regular basis, but this was just as it was getting dark, most of our phones had little charge which is unusual for us, my car wasn't here so we couldn't use my 2nd battery to charge up things we needed, we'd been just about to cook dinner, I tried to look up the website to see how extensive the outage was but none of our devices would load the site, and it just felt unusually difficult to manage. One positive though is that the water tanks are full after all the rain we've had so we still had water gravity feeding through the taps and we'd be able to flush the toilet. We got camping lights out of the trailer (which was tricky in itself because it was wet and windy while I was rummaging around trying to find them) and our camping stove - a friend had given us one that they'd got 2nd hand, to replace our old stove that was dying, and I hadn't tried it out yet. I couldn't find a hose with it so we disconnected the hose from our old stove and used it, but when we turned the new one on there was gas leaking. It seemed to be missing an O-ring and we tried to replace it with some we had here but they weren't the right size. We thought about going down to Coles to get a new O-ring, then realised it might be easier just to buy dinner, then realised that there was also no power in Healesville. Tony, Liam and Caitlin went for a drive to find food and had to go a bit further than expected - I was a little worried as they didn't get home until after 8, but they found food and got there and back with no trouble. While they were gone the power came back on, I was so grateful for all that that allowed us to do. I was even more grateful when I discovered that Healesville was still out an hour later, and Lilydale still had no power a couple of hours later than that. Very unusual that Tarrawarra gets power back before other places, we're normally last on the list. There were trees down all over the place, and the Black Spur was closed due to trees and a car trapped where the person needed to be rescued by air ambulance - we saw and heard the helicopter go over each way. It reminded me that the little inconveniences we'd had over the past couple of days really weren't that big a deal.

Prior to the storm the day had been fairly quiet, and fun. I pottered around in the morning, the girls watched SIMS videos and The Saddle Club on YouTube, I ordered some things we needed from Office Works, Caitlin and I researched the easiest place to buy cheap yarn so she can keep making her little creatures, Amelie and I did some number puzzles, I had a Zoom appointment with my counsellor, I reset Amelie's Animal Crossing New Leaf game so that she could start from the beginning (she'd bought a pre-owned copy so the save file had someone else's data in it), Caitlin decorated her cupboard with stickers, Liam played Getting Over It, I talked to a friend a couple of times. Caitlin and I went for a walk in the late afternoon - it was already pretty windy and the clouds were very black to the south. We'd had sunshine throughout the day but it was looking more and more ominous as we walked, it was pretty spectacular. We checked out the creek, it's running much lower again now, and walked along the front of the property where we noticed the fields of the Abbey are still covered in water, so we went across the road to get a closer look. It looked pretty cool. At that point, there were dark clouds everywhere and it was starting to rain, but Mt Dandenong was bathed in golden sunlight - that looked even more cool!

Numbers are staying in the low to mid 100s, deaths are continuing to happen every day, although some days now they are in single digits.