Kristy Shaw plans to do something on Mother’s Day she rarely can do: stay home with her family.
The Highland mother of two daughters, Maegan, 17, and Cameron, 14, said for years her Sundays in the springtime have been devoted to taking the girls to club soccer matches and tournaments. Occasionally, the family gets to go to brunch, but usually Mother’s Day means a backyard barbecue after soccer with her mother joining as well.
She said she will miss seeing other family members on Mother’s Day. The most difficult part of sheltering at home due to Gov. Eric Holcomb’s executive order to stem the spread of the novel coronavirus, COVID-19, is the things the family is missing.
“God, my hormones kick in right now, watching everything they are missing,” Shaw said. “I look at my daughter’s prom dress. It’s so beautiful. She was really upset.”
The family’s spring break vacation was canceled. Shaw celebrated her “quarantine birthday,” which she describes as her best birthday ever despite being stuck at home. Her husband, Ted, spent weeks making a video of birthday messages from family and friends.
Sheltering at home has had some benefits.
“I think it’s making everybody closer in our house, especially the two girls, as sisters,” Shaw said. “There’s a lot more family dinners, too. Usually we are so busy with our activities.”
Her Mother’s Day wish is for things to get back to normal.
“I think that, that’s a good wish, for everybody to go back to normal,” Shaw said.
Mallory Avalos
New mom Mallory Avalos, of Crown Point, is missing out on normal. When she first became pregnant last year, she could not have expected how her last month of pregnancy and first weeks of her new daughter’s life would be.
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“I kind of imagined my mom being there with us (in the delivery room). I’m a big momma’s girl. I was really kind of upset about that,” Avalos said.
Having her husband, Ryan, by her side felt natural, she said, but she missed her mom and misses the opportunity to share 5-week-old Payton with family and friends.
“I imagined I’d get to go and see all my family and share her with them. Having not been able to that is really kind of upsetting,” she said. Her mom, so far, has been the only one other than Mallory and Ryan to see the baby in person.
Avalos said she is using technology to share Payton with her loved ones. She has been using the Family Album app to privately share photos with her chosen circle of family and friends.
“I post like every single picture,” she laughed.
“The just me and her time is something I’m really enjoying. I will be able to cherish that.”
Niquelle Winfrey
Niquelle Winfrey, of Gary, a labor and employment attorney for a Chicago-based technology firm, has been working at home since Mayor Lori Lightfoot ordered its non-essential workers to telecommute.
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The mother of two toddlers – Nina, 4, and Jonah, 2, — said it has been a challenge juggling video conferencing with the kids and husband Joel, who also has been working from home. Her stepson, Tyler Winfrey, 21, initially returned when Indiana University closed the campus and went to virtual learning, but returned to his apartment in Bloomington to finish the classes and return to work.
“This obviously is different now working form home exclusively,” Winfrey said. Nina’s preschool has been canceled, but a family friend who routinely watches Jonah in her home has still be doing so. Occasionally, when the couple have a busy work day ahead of them both, Nina joins her brother.
“We haven’t really had a lot of contact with my in-laws, who literally live around the corner,” Winfrey said. “We’ve seen them a couple times, even thing still keeping distance and not hugging or being close to each other. That’s been hard.”
Her children, she said, really miss their grandparents.
On the bright side of things, Winfrey said, sheltering in place has meant spending more time with her husband and kids. Working from home has trimmed about three hours from her daily commute and dropping her children at the babysitter and daycare.
“I am definitely spending more time with my family, way more than I normally do,” Winfrey said. “We’ve been in the yard a lot more than we normally are, spending way more time than we normally do.”
Winfrey said she is excited about Mother’s Day and spending time with her family.
“I’m excited to have time to reflect on my own mother, grandmother and my really great mother-in-law. I’m just thankful for that. At the same time, it is just weird. I definitely will be more appreciative in the future when we can have holidays together again,” Winfrey said.
Evelyn Stokes
Evelyn Stokes, of Crown Point, is going to miss going out for breakfast with her family this Mother’s Day.
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“I always look forward to that every year. I feel bad. I guess there’s nothing I can do about it,” Stokes said.
Old habits are hard to break and after 81 years and dozens of Mother’s Days, spending this one at home is going to be different.
“It’s very hard,” she said. If the weather is nice, her son and daughter, and maybe a couple of her five grandchildren, will stop by and social distance in the back yard on the home’s large deck.
“We are a very close family. I usually see them a lot. It’s going to be hard. I’m going to miss not seeing them,” Stoke said. She expects she will also be spending her 82nd birthday May 21 without her family close by.
“It’s just hard not being with your family,” she said.
While Stokes said she never could have imagined the current situation and how it would impact daily life, she counts herself lucky. She said she can’t imagine how young mothers are coping. Stokes said she also is fortunate to have her husband David with her.
“I think I got it better than anybody,” she said.
Carrie Napolon is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.
