Katie Eborall, a mom of two, has come up with a way to not have to say no every time her kids ask to do something outside the home during the coronavirus pandemic.
Eborall, of Leeds, England, created a family bucket list jar with her husband Kevin and their kids Max, 4, and Evia, 2.
When the toddlers ask to do an activity like go to the zoo or go to a friend's house, instead of saying no, Eborall tells Max and Evia to write the activity down on a slip of paper. The paper then goes in the bucket list jar that will be opened when stay-at-home orders in their town are lifted.
The goal, according to Eborall, is to complete all of the activities they have wanted to do during this time they are staying inside to help slow the spread of the new novel coronavirus.
MORE: Nurses share powerful moment of prayer from hospital roof"Because my kids are so young, they don’t really understand what’s going on at the moment," Eborall told "Good Morning America." "All they know is that we’re having to say no to a lot of things that we wouldn’t normally be an issue, so it's quite confusing for them."
"What the jar has helped with is rather than having to say no to them and they get upset and have a tantrum, we say, ‘Yes, that’d be lovely to do one day. We can’t do it today but why don’t you write it down on a post-it note and put it in the jar,'" she said. "Instead of missing all of the things that we can’t do, let’s try not to be too sad about them and let’s try to look forward to the time when we can do them again."
MORE: 'If they lose me to COVID’: Doctor’s tweet to her children resonates with parentsEborall posted about her family's new practice on Facebook, where it quickly went viral. She has also started a blog to help her keep track of the family's activities and preserve the memory of this unique time in history for her young kids.
"I don’t want to forget those things that pop into my head during this period," she said. "The danger is we get back to normal life at the end of this and then you just kind of go back to what life was like before. It’d be nice to think we could actually take something positive away from this."
Eborall said her family's jar was at first full of "things you take for granted" in life, like going to the park and going to see their grandparents, but has expanded into much more.
"It's grown into some of the big things we’d hoped to do in the next few months that we’re not going to be able to do anymore and some things that we always say we’re going to do but never get around to," she said. "It’s a way of not just appreciating all of the simple things in life at the end of this, but kind of committing to doing the things we always say we’re going to do and to making the most of life."
