I know for me, COVID-19 has given my emotional health a check. It is hard to be secluded. SO many things have been hard. With all of the hard things, Scott and I have noticed so many blessings. We decided one night to sit down and list all the blessings we have seen, and because this is my journal, I thought it would be worthwhile to record them!
Blessings from COVID-19
1. Visiting the Cutts family right before everything shut down.
My sister and her family drove to Utah (from Minnesota) for their Spring Break. As they drove home, everything shut down behind them. I pulled the kids out of school for a couple of days, and Scott took off work for a couple days so we could go up north and spend time with them. We went to Hale Center Theatre in Orem to see "Seussical" with all the kids, and we went out to lunch afterward. We went to one of the last performances--before the theatre was closed down! We went to BYU Creamery to get ice cream afterward. We were able to have one hurrah with them before travel and everything else became complicated!
2. Family together time.
If anything, our family has spent a lot more time together! Sometimes that together time was hard and stressful (especially as a parent...sometimes you just need a deep breath and a break!). But our kids really love each other, and we really love them! Our big kids were so used to being at school--and our little kids were used to go them going. For the first time in a while, they were together all day long--and they loved being together!
3. Scott was able to work from home.
When schools closed down in March, obviously Scott couldn't go back to work, so he was given permission to work from home. In fact, he worked from home all summer long! Scott is so good and diligent, and he always made sure he got his 8 hour work day in, but he was willing to do it with a baby on his lap...or while helping a child with math homework. He listened for sleeping babies in the afternoon (and worked inside in silence) while I went outside with all the big kids. He gave me support and freedom in a stressful time--I'm so grateful for that!
4. All big summer plans were cancelled--extra money in our bank accounts.
It didn't take us long to realize that our summer plans were going to be cancelled. We cancelled a trip to Bear Lake, our anniversary trip to St. George, and our family vacation to Disneyland. Thankfully, we cancelled in the very beginning of the "crazy", so we were able to get back refunds for these trips pretty quickly. Plus, with no summer plans, and extra money in our accounts, we were able to do more to pay down debt!
5. Stimulus bill
There was an economic stimulus bill passed to help aid all Americans going through economic uncertainties with jobs and life. Thankfully, we are extremely blessed and have a certain job and paycheck. With the stimulus bill, we have quite a few dependents, so we were given a substantial amount of money from the government. It was a godsend! We have been fighting with credit card debt for over 2 years, and with this bill, we were able to pay off our credit card in one fail swoop--it felt amazing!
6. Being prompted to stock our cupboards right before grocery shelves were wiped clean.
As I said before, Scott and I have been trying to get out of debt for years. We have slowly been making progress, but in this process, we have learned to live off of the bare minimum. We have a food storage supply...but we live off of food storage...because in our lives, this was our time of famine. My parents had gifted us some of their 30 year old, on-the-brink-of-expiring food storage, and we have been using it before it goes bad.
With that being said, we didn't have extra on the shelf. It had been a long time since we have had extra! The week they were deciding if they should shut down schools, I couldn't get the thought out of my head that I needed to stock my shelves. Because I couldn't shake the feeling, I brought it up to Scott, and we decided I needed to go to Walmart and stock up. I grabbed anything I thought we might need. I piled my cart full! Two days later, I had a list of random things, that I felt like I was supposed to go back and grab. Random thoughts that came in my head and I couldn't shake. I went and did one more trip.
Not even a week later, and the world went crazy. Toilet paper became a hot commodity (people were hoarding it and actually selling rolls out of trailers down here...crazy!). The grocery shelves were empty. EMPTY. I have never seen anything like it--even in all my hurricane-North Carolina years! Everything was gone...even the random foods that never go off the shelf. People were panicked. Even now, over 6 months later the shelves are still not fully restocked.
My kids didn't know anything was different. That was a blessing to me. They didn't have to go without. I may have mixed gallons of milk with powdered milk, but they had enough. Years of living off food storage was finally starting to pay off!
7. Temples were closed worldwide, but we were still able to renew our temple recommends.
We have lived really lucky lives, and we haven't had to live in a place where a temple is not readily available. For years we have read about members of the church worldwide who were never able to enter the temple, but they always had a temple recommend. When our recommends expired in June, and temples were still closed down, we were able to meet with our bishop and Stake President, and our recommends never missed a beat. We are so grateful that even though temples were closed, we have always been able to hold a temple recommend.
8. Revelation to start "home church" not even a year before churches had to close down.
Church transitioned from 3 hours to 2 hours, and our meetings became more home centered less that a year before all of this. We knew what it was like to learn the scriptures with our kids at home--because we had been doing it for a while. We are so grateful for a prophet that put this change into action with enough time to be prepared for church at home.
9. Being authorized to do the sacrament at home and creating a "holier" space for the sacrament to be taken.
Church was cancelled for about six months--it just started back up again (a modified version of it, anyway). We were authorized by our bishopric for Scott to administer the sacrament at home. We learned how special the sacrament bread was (as we couldn't buy it on the shelves, and we made our own bread from our supply of wheat) and the importance of having enough for Sunday. We also were able to teach our kids about cleaning the "church area" in our home and keeping it a holy space Saturday evening into Sunday.
10. Policy changes in church to allow couples to get marred civilly and not have to wait a year to be sealed in the temple.
Before coronavirus was even spoken of, policy changes within the church were made. In previous years, if a couple got married civilly first, they would have to wait a year before they could be sealed in the temple for eternity. With the new policy change, a couple could be married civilly one day, and the next they could be sealed in the temple. With temples closed down, we have had to watch many of Scott's former students have to be married civilly. As temples are opening back up, they don't have to wait a year, they are able to go right in and receive further covenants and be sealed to each other for eternity. Such a blessing!
11. Being able to participate in "Project Protect" and help aid in making masks.
At the beginning of the pandemic, the Relief Society of the church approached local healthcare and asked what they could do to help. They partnered up and agreed to make 5 million masks to donate to healthcare providers (because masks and materials were hard for medical companies to locate and stock up on at the beginning of the pandemic). I felt so lucky that I was able to help make masks! They gave me all the materials...I just had to assemble them!
12. Being able to donate some of our supplies to help the Navajo Reservation.
There was a really bad outbreak of COVID among the Navajo Reservation. They were struggling to find supplies, and so the church (and some missionaries) organized a couple of giant trucks and trailers to bring supplies down to them. There was a drop off at the Stake Center in Monroe. We were able to take some of the sanitary supplies we had collected to share with them! It was incredible to see the response! They had one giant trailer filled, and they were trying to locate another trailer to bring down the rest of the supplies! Even in hard times, people are so generous and good!
13. Missionary work/work at the seminary has morphed and become more available
At the beginning of the pandemic, many missionaries were called home--especially those who were serving foreign missions. Many, eventually, were able to go back out with different assignments. Going into homes was discouraged for a time, but with everything, missionary work did not slow down! Many things transferred online and virtually.
Seminary work didn't slow either! Thankfully, when school transferred online, Scott was able to utilize programs he learned in his Master's program, and school transferred pretty seamless to online! The kids were able to still participate in seminary, even when everything else was going crazy.
14. Jerrell Dowell brought us a box of grocery items when shelves were empty.
We have a good friend from our ward. She is my kids' second mom on Sundays! Scott had to be gone about half of the time to Ward Conferences and then speaking assignments. I navigated church pregnant, with 5 little kids. Jerrell and her husband would sit next to us, and they would help entertain my kids and watch them if I ever had to run out. When the beginning of this pandemic happened, she was one of the first people on my doorstep with all the things stores were sold out of--a couple gallons of milk, Clorox wipes, laundry detergent, cleaning supplies, cereal, and a freshly baked loaf of wheat bread. Her goodness brought tears to my eyes!
15. The Merayos brings us eggs, cereal, milk, extra produce.
We have wonderful neighbors a couple doors down that have been so good to us! Beth has been dear to me for many years. We first met when she was Quinn's respiratory therapist when he had RSV at 3 weeks old. We ended up moving 2 doors down from her in our new house! She took care of our Lucy when she was hospitalized, she has helped deliver most of our babies, and now she is retired, she is still taking care of us! She is still bringing us eggs from her chickens (which was a huge tender mercy when eggs were gone from the shelves)! She has brought us so many things--milk, cereal, snacks, extra dessert. She has been a godsend in my life!
16. Friants brought us eggs.
Our other neighbors down the block from us have chickens as well. They brought us eggs a couple times too!
17. Grandma Bagley delivered grocery items, cleaning items, projects for the kids and a gift card for groceries.
We were so well taken care of! Grandma Bagley came a dropped several boxes off on our front porch with so many goodies and so many things we needed! The kids were so excited to see her through the window. She even hand sewed a stuffed Olaf and a stuff Forky (from Toy Story) for the kids to share. Not seeing grandparents regularly and be able to hug them was one of the hardest parts of COVID!
18. Grandma Christensen brought groceries and food storage items to us.
Grandma Christensen came and brought us groceries too. There were a few gaps in food items that I didn't get or wasn't able to find or weren't on shelves for a long time, and because my mom has been prepared for a long time, she had enough to share with us! She helped us make our food supply seem seamless!
19. Preparing for and being able to watch General Conference (even when there was no audience)
President Nelson asked us to prepare for General Conference in April 2020 by focusing on some portion of The Restoration. April 2020 marked the 200th year since Joseph Smith saw Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. Our family chose to memorize the scripture that relates The First Vision. We memorized a new phrase every week. It was so fun being able to prepare for that together!
Because of COVID, we weren't able to meet together for April or October General Conference, but we were able to watch from our homes! The prophet and apostles attended, masked and socially distanced.
20. Being careful and staying well.
We have been so blessed! We have been healthy for 8 months! With kids not in school, and staying away from the general public, we haven't been sick! It has been kind of wonderful. With a newborn in our house, I was so worried about getting her sick with the flu or RSV...we have missed everything! We have been really blessed to stay away from COVID, so far, too! There is peace in staying careful and staying well...for that, I am grateful!
21. In December 2019, we tried to play a family vacation, and we just didn't feel good about scheduling one.
Taking family vacations has been a priority for me. We usually schedule a big one every year. We went through a slew of vacation destinations, and we didn't feel good about any of them. We were actually gifted a trip to Disneyland from Kevin and Blair for Christmas...and those plans were taken away (because Disneyland STILL is closed)! We were really lucky to not have money tied up in a vacation that needed to be refunded.
22. P-EBT credit gives money to our family because we were receiving reduced lunch at school.
State governments were given an allottment of money from the Federal government to help aide people and the economy. One of the programs that was instituted in Utah was a P-EBT card with funds on it for children who were receiving free or reduced lunch from the school. Being those kids should have gotten free food from March-May, we received funds for the food they missed. We had 3 kids in school, so we got about $925 of Pandemic Food Stamps to help feed our family. It was a complete godsend.
23. Emergency school/park lunch--we were able to feed our kids lunch/breakfast for 6 months.
The federal government used FEMA funds to pay for emergency lunch and breakfast to be provided for all children ages 0-18 across the United States. Our lunch program sent our awesome lunch ladies out everyday with a bus full of food to pick up. We drove to the school everyday, and we sat in line to get lunch for our 5 kids for lunch and then breakfast the next day. It was such a blessing to not worry about feeding my kids. I'll be honest, it wasn't always the best food, but it fed our kids, and we were so grateful for that!
24. Jemma's learning improved with one-on-one time at home.
Jemma kind of struggled with the transition to Kindergarten, and she has had to work harder than my other kids to get caught up. Coming home for 2 months seemed to really help her focus and learn.
25. Getting revelation on what to do with our kids this fall.
I know I have written about this before, but deciding what to do with our kids this fall was a real struggle for me! I flopped back and forth between sending them and keeping them home. I literally waited 2 weeks before school started before I decided. I was woken up at 3 AM, and I knew what I was supposed to do. I am SO grateful I got the answer I did. While teaching my kids at home has been HARD some days, and I haven't regretted keeping them home and safe.
26. Our paychecks have become more of a blessing--paying off debt has become a possibility.
We have had so much financial help this last year, and after years of struggling, for once, it has felt nice to be on top of things and have power over our money. We have been able to start to tackle looming debts, and that has been such a blessing!
27. Bags of clothes from the Monroes.
Our good friends up the street, moved houses, and she cleaned out all of her kids' closets. She gave us many trash bags full of clothes for our kids. It has been nice to not have to worry about our kids' clothes this year because we have had those clothes to use.
28. Family vacations--CAMPING!
Like I said before, family vacations are super important to me! With everything closing down, hotels weren't necessarily considered "safe", and we didn't want to travel too far to share germs with others, we decided camping was our mode of travel this summer! My parents actually bought us a 13 man tent for Christmas. I had grown up camping with my family, and I always wanted to make it a thing with our kids...but our kids have always been little, and I knew that would make it harder! Well, this was the year...ready or not! It was a lot of work, but the kids had A BLAST! We took one cooler temperature camping trip and one really hot camping trip. It was nice to know that we COULD do it, and we hope to be able to do it other years, too!
29. State Farm car insurance offered money off our bill because we haven't been driving as much.
This one is pretty self explanatory! They have lowered our auto insurance rates twice now...because people aren't driving much. It has been nice to have the extra money in our pocket.
30. Having the money to support small businesses around our community.
One of the things that has been pushed through this time is to shop locally. Support local businesses. We have tried to use our extra money to help all the smaller businesses around town--restaurants, movie theatre, shopping, grocery stores, etc.
31. Having a garden to help put away food for fall/winter.
We saw first hand food scarcety...probably for the first time in my life (minus the bad NC ice storms or pre-hurricane stock ups). This experience has made us reconsider our food storage, and what more or less we need. We had a great garden this year that helped us stock our food storage for the next year.
32. Evenings less crazy--more time to establish family prayer and scripture study.
33. Health Insurance premiums have gone down for 2021.
We haven't used health insurance like usual, so our health insurance company has lowered premiums for the following year.
34. Being able to drive our van most of the summer before the AC compressor went out.
We didn't do any big traveling this summer--less miles, so we were grateful that our AC compressor went out in August. AC compressors cost over $1000 to fix, so we were grateful the fall weather soon set in, and we can drive for a little bit without AC.
