The Sickles for the Porch Project - A Porch Portrait

Lesley (40), Audrey (8)

Before this pandemic started our daughter Audrey attended 2nd grade at Davey Elementary, had weekly dance classes and piano lessons. I worked for Main Street Kent as the Marketing Coordinator, spending days in the office, attending many meetings and spending time at our downtown businesses. We were in the midst of planning numerous upcoming spring events, promoting our women in business and working on our annual Art & Wine Festival. Chris works at the Deluxe Corporation in Streetsboro as a full time press operator in their  Direct to Consumer department.

Since this pandemic hit, I have been working from home, corresponding with my co-worker Heather daily, brainstorming strategies to keep promoting our downtown businesses. We unfortunately had to postpone all of our upcoming events for future dates keeping the safety of our community at the forefront. It saddens me to see some of our businesses being forced to close. This has hit me hard emotionally given my passion and dedication to my job as well as numerous business owners being friends and family. I am hopeful and trying to stay positive. We have an amazing and strong community that will get through this together.

During the day, alongside working from home, I am working to keep our daughter happy and healthy. We spend time doing school work, making lots of crafts, going on walks and bikes rides. She misses her friends dearly so we have embraced FaceTime for them to chat in the evenings. It's refreshing to hear their laughter. They also deliver letters and drawings to each other. Her dance and piano lessons have become virtual and I am thankful for Franklin School of Dance and Woodsy's for keeping our kids creativity and physical activity alive during this.

Chris's employer is considered essential so he is still working full time. There is potential for layoffs but he is taking things one day at a time and is grateful to still have an income through this. He, too, is concerned for our parents, family and friends, our downtown and the well being of our daughter. He is a music lover so our house is filled with a variety of songs every evening. We sing, dance and try to stay upbeat, but we sure as hell can't wait for this to end.