Owen is 9!

We celebrated Owen's birthday yesterday. His 9th birthday. I don't know how the time has gone by so fast, and honestly neither does he. Initially we had made plans to spend spring break,vwhich is the week before his birthday, in Southern Utah. The first reservations were for Kanab, the Grand canyon, and Sedona. Once word of a possible pandemic started spreading we changed the plans to Kanab and Escalante, two lesser traveled towns with hundreds of miles of land and trails. But as the epidemic from abroad turned into a pandemic hitting Utah locally, we had to cancel our spring break plans altogether. We also had to cancel any in-person birthday party for Owen. We got creative and tried to make it as memorable as possible for him though 

I ordered a package of 100 balloons; light green, dark green, and white to fill the climbing room and surprise him. I also made a surprise video chat with 'Scales and tails' to have a reptile presentation just for him. We made a Minecraft birthday cake and got ice cream (which we ate for breakfast since our freezer is dying slowly and wouldn't keep it frozen). We had video chats with Jeannie and family, and Deborah's family. We talked to Grandma Crowther on the phone and ordered Chinese take out (all restaurants are closed for dining in but many still offer take out or delivery). Then at 7 pm we went outside and lit sparklers along with 3 neighbors families and sang happy birthday for Owen. It was an unconventional but hopefully memorable birthday for him. 

At this rate it is looking definite that we'll have to do a virtual birthday party for Claire in a month as well. But for now we continue to take things a day at a time.