Sequestered in Seattle, Day 257

Monday morning was our conference with Lydia's teacher. We almost forgot about Eric's class, which started at the same time. I was looking at my email for the Teams link and realized. He has class again tomorrow, but not Wednesday.

Lydia got a good report from Mr. Fraser. Her reading and writing both show significant improvement since September. He says she communicates with him a lot and clearly likes school. He suggested she should read more aloud, such as to her brothers, and hopes she will share more readily in her book club, because she always has good insights.

I spent the rest of the morning sitting with Eric during his classes and getting some dough ready. Some was for pizza tonight, and some was for the steamed buns I have long promised Eric.

After lunch, Rachel had her final class, but the rest of us left the house. Nicole ran an errand to get the vacuum repaired, while the rest of us walked to see the snowy owl. It was sitting atop a roof not far from where we left it on Saturday. There were many people about, some evidently experts, who again spoke as if this was the same bird they'd seen before. I didn't get to ask them how they know. This time we had the binoculars out, and Lydia took a picture through them.

Nicole tried to meet up with us on our way home, but it didn't really work. She finally found me a block from the house, and we caught up with the kids. It was about time for Rachel to be done, so we brought her outside, and continued the walk. We stopped at Ken's to get pizza toppings, and then the girls went with Nicole so Rachel could see the owl, while I brought the boys home.

We watched another episode of our show in the afternoon, and then I made pizza. One was Zwiebelkuchen, with caramelized onions covered in a sauce of creme fraiche and egg, topped with raisins. It was excellent. The others were just pizza.

We watched a bit more Carmen San Diego as a family, then had a successful reading time. Maybe tomorrow a vacation plan will actually materialize. Or maybe we'll just wing it and wander around looking at owls.