The Mrs. Yoy Blog: The Quarantine Coronacles

Today I put 37 to bed and welcomed 38 with wide open arms. I'd like to think I've grown wiser with age.  So I'm sharing a few nuggets I picked up over the past 365 days. 1) Go.  Go where you may ask?  Go anywhere.  Commit to do something.  Even if you are dead tired and would rather zone out on the couch and reread your three month old Glamour magazine.  Just go.  You'll most likely have fun and meet new people.  It won't kill you.  I promise. 2) You don't have to love red wine just because everyone else pretends to.  Don't get me wrong, I'll drink just about anything, but I don't have to pretend to love it. It's warm.  And it stains your teeth.  But it DOES slow down consumption considerably, so that's a plus. 3) Tell your friends you love them and miss them.  Chances are everyone is busy with life and days and then months slip by and you haven't had a chance to meet up for lunch to vent about all the things that ...

Vacations, in theory, are awesome. Mr. Yoy and I rounded everyone up for a quick weekend trip to NC.  To keep our trip budget friendly, we reserved a hotel room with two queen beds.  We were unsure of the exact configuration, but it would be all four of us in one room.  No adjoining rooms for us this time.  Boo! Our road trip started off slow.  We left a little later than planned which guaranteed that we'd get snarled in the sh*t storm that is Atlanta Friday pm traffic.  On Fridays it begins promptly at 11:30 am. We finally arrived in Durham close to 11 pm.  Big E had powered through and remained awake for all 350 miles.  Little E passed out mere minutes into the drive, but woke up around 6:30.  He slept just long enough to ensure that he would never go to bed that night. Once we had everyone and everything in the hotel room.  I frantically set up for bed.  On went the white nose machine, much to Mr. Yoy's displeasure. ...

We spent the day eating, playing, and watching a movie at Atlantic Station. They have a nice fake grass field the boys love to play on.  I sat on a bench and watched the boys giggling and rolling around and running together.  They were so happy. A woman, accompanied by two young men, asked me if I would take their picture.  They must have come from Easter services as they were all dressed beautifully. MOM, WHY DON'T YOU STAND BETWEEN US? They positioned themselves into a nice little family portrait.  Luckily for them, they asked the phone photography expert to snap their picture. THANKS FOR TAKING THE PICTURE, I KNOW YOU ARE BUSY WATCHING YOUR LITTLE GUYS. She smiled at me and commented how sweet the Yoys were.  Who can resist matchy-matchy, anyway? They were sweet, except that Big E kept pausing to eat boogers. They began to walk off and the mom turned around to me. I WISH WE COULD FREEZE THEM AT THAT AGE. Her sons were walking ahead of h...

Yesterday was a bittersweet day for the Yoys. Mr. Yoy turned in the Sienna aka The Big Red Bus and came home with a Toyota Avalon. My new car is beautiful, but there will definitely be an adjustment period. THINGS I WILL DEARLY MISS ABOUT THE SIENNA: 1) Having a toilet in the back seat.  I know this screams unsanitary, but there has been many times when the Yoys had to go.  And not just a quick squirt in the bushes, like for reals.  I'd just click open the sliding door and their throne awaited. 2) Road tripping.  Sure the gas mileage was bad enough to make an environmentalist cry, but we fit everything in that sucker.  Bikes. Beds. Enough snacks to feed the Atlanta prison system.  That thing had mad space.  On our future endeavors we will need to be more selective.  Maybe only one of our children gets to go.  And definitely not the dog.  Her breath almost always relegated her to the third row.  Where will she go now? 3) ...

This week we observed Passover with our family in D-Wood. I always have high expectations of Passover seder.  I have visions of my children sitting quietly, thoughtfully listening to their Grandpop tell the story of Passover while eagerly shoving matzo and gefilte fish and charoset into their mouths. With four kids aged five and under we all know the ugly truth.  It is loads of screaming and yarmulke tossing and zero listening. The only thing that brought the Yoys back to the table was when we began to talk about the prophet, Elijah . For my non-jewish readers, Elijah visits every seder and drinks a big ol' glass of wine before departing for the next seder.  He's sort of like Santa.  Except instead of milk and cookies he gets wasted on cheap, sugary wine. Part of the seder is opening the front door to let him in.  The kids were fascinated by this.  We were going to let some random into the house.  They watched anxiously at the window. IS TH...

The sunshine has been hanging around about an hour too long for Mrs. Yoy. My militant bedtime of 7pm (sometimes 6:30 on extra militant days) had become a sweet, fuzzy memory.  Bedtime was stretching into the eight o'clock hour and sometimes beyond.  This was severely limiting my time to blog, check my e-mail incessantly, watch crappy television and engage my inner laziness that I suppress during the hours of wake-up to bedtime. WHY DO I HAVE TO GO TO BED?  IT IS STILL DAYLIGHT? Every night I am asked this question.  At first I tried to explain time zones and daylight savings to the kids and I actually almost put them (and myself) to sleep.  But after a month of trying to answer this question, I came up with a new strategy. I bought blackout curtains.  Navy.  Their once bright and cheery little boy rooms have been miraculously transformed into damp dorm room caves.  I guess you can say I'm just prepping them for life in the AEPi house. My...

As usual, the Yoys have nothing mentionable planned for spring break.  We were going to fly down to my parents and hang for the week, but they decided to move and I wasn't going to get roped into that disaster. So while many of our friends are doing awesome spring break stuff, the Yoys and I are doing errands.  Lots of them. First up today was my Weight Watchers meeting.  Big E participated the most out of all the members there. WHERE HAVE YOU SEEN THE MOST IMPROVEMENT OVER THE PAST MONTH? Big E raised his hand.  I shot him death glances as I told him under no circumstance was he to talk during the meeting.  But a room full of new people was too overpowering.  He was born to perform. I'M MUCH BETTER AT LEARNING BOOKS NOW! Of course he is.  The room erupted into laughter and our meeting leader gave him a star sticker.  Please, don't feed the animals, lady.  He was so proud of himself. WHAT DO YOU CONSUME THAT IS TRULY WORTH THE P...

On Friday, I flew up to NYC to see my family.  As I waited on Delta to find enough flight attendants to man our flight, I struck up a conversation with a young lady decked out in Gator gear sitting next to me. She was indeed a Gator, a Broadcast Journalism senior.  In about five minutes I had her whole story.  She was engaged to be married to a guy that works for a company out in Silicon Valley.  She didn't have a job yet as she wasn't sure where they were going to live.  Pretty basic conversation. She was pleasant and excited and I couldn't help think back to when I was 23 and moving to Atlanta.  I had my future at my feet.  I remember the excitement of finally being on my own.  I had a good job and I had made it. We exchanged stories about our time on campus.  Mine all began with, A THOUSAND YEARS AGO WHEN I WAS IN SCHOOL WE HAD A COMPUTER LAB AND DIAL UP AND TELEPHONES IN OUR DORM ROOMS... I asked about her wedding, dates, location...

Whew. Tonight was an awful end to a good day. I attempted to attend a PTA meeting tonight at Big E's school.  They had organized a soccer game in the gym with snow cones and popcorn for the kids while the parents met in the cafeteria.  Sounds pretty fun, huh? I guess my logic is flawed.  Big E freaked out.  I calmly explained that if he didn't want to play in the gym with his schoolmates, we'd have to go home.  And that was fine with him. So I dragged the Yoys back out to the car.  (This should sound familiar because Big E does this all the time and it rots my soul.  I hate this game he plays.)  By the time the boys were up in their car seats, Big E had changed his mind.  He did want to go into the gym and play.  And I really wanted to attend the meeting. Back into the school we went.  Little E went running into the gym.  He was excited to play.  And then eat popcorn.  Big E started crying again.  He didn...

We are less than a week into shorts weather.  It has been glorious.  All sunshine and flowers and birds chirping and bloody knees? I forgot how much my kids fall.  They have one speed: overeager contestant on Supermarket Sweep.  They run everywhere. Little E banged up his knee Tuesday.  Big E was sure to talk up how much it was going to sting when Little E sat down in the bath.  Little E stood throughout his entire bath, he was so worked up about it. Today was Big E's turn.  He ate dirt right by the playground hopscotch game.  It took him a few seconds to move.  I almost drew some chalk around his outline. When he finally stood up, he had bloodied both knees and two spots on his chest.  The temperatures this afternoon hit 80 degrees, and therefore my kids took this opportunity to show off their strapping bodies by discarding their shirts. Tears and hysteria followed. MY EYES KEEP LOOKING AT MY BLOODY KNEES AND I CAN'T GET THE...