Last month’s siblings photos taken at the park feel like they were taken a very long time ago now! We’re now into our fourth week of staying home due to the coronavirus pandemic and afternoons at the park feel like a distant memory. One positive thing about it all though has been the extra family time we have been able to enjoy. Seeing Sophie and Thomas enjoying having more time together than they would have normally had.
In some ways, it makes me think of the days with Jessica and Sophie together before Jessica started school. I remember being acutely aware of how precious that time was and I’m feeling the same way about this time. Despite the anxiety and fear over the coronavirus, there is also that feeling that we won’t get time together like this again, and I’m trying to savour it while I can. When I’m sitting in my garden watching the children laughing and playing happily together, I can almost forget what is going on in the outside world. It’s lovely to be able to stop and enjoy the moment.
Watching Sophie and Thomas together is always bittersweet though, and particularly so at this time of year with the anniversary of Jessica’s death. I wonder what this time would have been like, having the three of them together at home. Jessica was at her happiest when she was with her family. She would have had so much fun out in the garden with her siblings. I can picture her sitting in the home-made tepee with them; pushing Thomas around the garden in the Little Tikes car or helping him to go up and down the slide. There would have been a little more laughter, a few more smiles and no doubt a few moments of bickering here and there too! Oh yes, I can imagine it. It just breaks my heart that I can never experience it.
Thomas (1 year 8 months)
- Can now feed himself with a spoon.
- Enjoyed being able to run around Grandma and Grandad’s garden and see them from a distance but was very confused as to why Mummy kept scooping him up and moving him away whenever he tried to go near Grandma and Grandad.
- Fell over in the hallway and got quite a nasty cut on his forehead. Thankfully it seems to be healing well.
- Can now say “peas” and “nank-oo” when asking for things and often says “aww, I love you Mummy,” when coming up to give me a cuddle.
- Loves playing with the wooden number turtles. He can put them together in the right order and loves to count them. He can now count to twelve, and is also starting to count to ten in French, although tends to miss out quatre, cinq and sept.
Sophie (6 years 5 months)
- Has coped well with the transition to home learning.
- Has been doing lots of crafts and drawings at home and has impressed me with her creativity and ideas that she comes up with for creating her own crafts.
- Is missing all her friends but has enjoyed writing them letters and delivering some toys that she wanted to share from a big Easter box she received.
- Has been enjoying being able to keep taking part in her ballet class and joining in Thomas’s classes thanks to Zoom and Facebook live streaming.
- Loved decorating her Easter bonnet and having an Easter egg hunt at home.
Jessica (forever 6 years 7 months)
- We shared Jessica’s story with Action Medical Research to help raise awareness into the importance of the research they have been funding to help other children with hypoplastic left heart syndrome.
- Sophie and I made salt dough hearts and delivered them to friends to help #givejoyforjessica on the second anniversary of her death.
- We last visited Jessica’s forever bed on Mother’s Day and have been unable to do so since as GreenAcres is now closed to visitors for the foreseeable future. It has been so hard not to be able to visit her and we were so grateful to the team there for putting flowers in Jessica’s vase on her angelversary in our place and sending us a photo.
