The Dogs, the beaver and the zoo!

We love animals! We love to see them at the zoo, in the yard, and even in the first grade!  This week, we covered all our bases.  Mom took the little sisters to the Dinosaur Trail at the Nashville Zoo with our friends.  Jess had a great time with Laura and Molly, but less fun with the pretend (but still very scary!) dinosaurs.  There's a dinosaur behind them there in that picture, which you can't see.  Jess wouldn't be in the picture until Mom agreed to get in it too.

I didn't get to go to the zoo, but I did get to dress up for our first grade production of "It's Raining Cats and Dogs".  As you can see, I was a dog. What you also need to know is that I have a gold medal around my neck.  In my school, extra super good behavior gets you special recognition and a gold medal.  And I'm a gold medalist!  This was a very big day for me!

For some reason, Blogger won't let us move around our pictures very easily anymore, so the play pictures are not in the exact order that I would like them to be.  But, you see the first graders over there: Cats to the left, Dogs to the right. Each class sang and danced a number, although I refrained from any dancing.  If you know me, you know that singing and dancing for an audience is just not my thing.  Instead, me and a few other kids got to stay on the stage and sing into microphones.  We were a little further away from the audience this way, and it was much less stressful!

Marina had her team soccer picture on Saturday.  Here's Mom's amateur shot.  Marina was amazing in the game following pictures:  FOUR goals! A new record for her! She has learned how to be aggressive and GO AFTER that ball! She helps her teammates make their goals too. What a difference a few months ( of basketball with 6 year old boys!) makes. 

We also took some time to enjoy the amazing Tennessee weather this week.  Sunny skies and warm temperatures have been a regular part of our routine.  We lit the fire pit at night and took some nature walks during the day.

We also checked out the creek behind our house.  Here you see some evidence of a beaver.  Isn't that amazing?? We have our own beaver who we've named Justin.  Justin Beaver comes to see us a few times a day and always goes to the same exact spot in our backyard.  He is very, very shy, and runs for the creek as soon as the back door opens.  It is unlikely we'll ever get a picture of him- but trust us: He's a cutie!

Daisy Scouts and Katie's First Birthday

This weekend, we celebrated a century of Girl Scouts with a little party for the Girl Scouts of Williamson County, Tennessee.  It was supposed to be only Girl Scouts, but our troop leader told us it was alright to sneak in our Marina.  She was happy to be one of the big girls!

Marina got into the festivities fast, as you can see.  I do not dance in front of strangers as a rule, but Marina has no such issues.  

We also got to eat a lot of junk, play with horses and bring home some balloon animals.  BIG day!

Unfortunately, Jessa is not big enough to pass for Girl Scout age.  Poor, poor Jessa.

Jessa was happier on Sunday afternoon, when we celebrated baby Katie's first birthday with our friends!










Sweet Baby Katie!

Almost St. Patrick's Day!

 It turns out everyone in our new hometown loves everything about St. Patrick's Day-- which is great! Because we love St. Patrick's Day too! Today we had a party with some friends.  Jess should be wearing green, but she is ridiculously attached to this flower shirt.  And she is very, very stubborn.

The rest of us enjoyed the party too.  Here's Marina and I lounging, eating snacks and playing in the sunshine. It was 81 degrees today!  Then we went for a nice little run to burn off some calories.

Of course, us busy bees have alot more going on than just cake and treats.  To keep in the holiday spirit, we spent some time earlier this week at the library checking out a great group of irish dancing girls.  Mina and I did take one class in irish dance earlier this year, but haven't had time to make it back.  Maybe some day though..

Being the cultured kids that we are, we also took in a play last weekend at the Nashville Children's Theater.  It was Beauty and the Beast!  Dad stayed home with Jessa while Mommy and the big girls went to the show.  Mina really liked the "meet and greet" with the actors when it was done.











While we got all cultured, Jessa just romped around with her best friend Laura.  They rode the "roller coaster" and did cart-wheels.  Jessa came home battered and bruised, having taken a tumble off the coaster and not quite mastered cart-wheelin'.  As always though, she smiled all the way through it.

And last, but certainly not least, Mina continued working her way towards and athletic scholarship (at least, that's what Mommy and Daddy hope!).  She prepped for her first game at practice this week.  What a difference a year makes!!  Mina has the hang of things now and finally understands it's not a bad thing to steal the ball from the other kids.  I can't wait to see her first game this coming weekend.

 

This year, I am a Daisy Scout. Normally, this means getting crafty and having lots of girl time, but occasionally, it also means doing skits with lots of other girl scouts.  Here I am at the Festival of the States with my troop talking about Alaska, which was our state.  I really don't like being on a stage of any kind, but I suffered through it for my troop.  Luckily, I mostly just had to bundle up, stand there and sing the Alaska Flag Song.

It turned out to be a really great day, after all, and I had lots of fun with all the other girl scouts!
Afterwards, I spent some time outside with the sisters enjoying the warming weather.

Jess enjoys outside time with Laura and Molly, who are now both three.  Jessa is right behind them though!

Laura turned three today, so her Mom and Dad threw her another mini party at Chuck E Cheese. We were so happy to join them there!

 
We also took some time this weekend to explore our area a little.  Here we are in Nolensville at the Feed Mill.

 

And here we are at the park, which is on the greenway trail, about a mile and half from our house.  We road our bikes there and back with no whining and no falling and no training wheels!  We have come a long way, I think.  Jessa has some catching up to do of course, but until she does, she's happy in the bike trailer. Really, she's just happy period.   

 

You might have heard we were on track to get some severe weather in Middle Tennessee this weekend, but luckily, that didn't happen. The tornado sirens went off once, but there were no touch downs in our area. We are mindful of how terrible the storms were elsewhere, and so we send our thoughts and prayers to those families in other parts of the state and the country. We know we were very lucky, and we don't like tornadoes. We hope we're always lucky, but just in case, we put some water bottles and a flashlight in the crawl space for next time.