J also did several numbers with the group that I didn't capture. All of the students did a great job! This was at a pavilion down at Aspen Grove Park.
When it comes to family photos, it's never easy for us to get one. We're rarely all dressed up. We rarely have a photographer with us. The kids always make faces. This is the best we could do. Thanks to our ten year old neighbor for the photo!
Oof. I have not been great about monthly posts, have I? I shall have to see if I can climb aboard that wagon again soon.
We got in quite a few hikes in due to the decently mild weather over the winter.
We got a nice snowfall in February, and tromped around the entire neighborhood looking for good sledding spots. Given that we got sleet followed by 1-2 inches of snow, it was, as they say where I grew up, "slickernsnot."
We took a weekend trip to Chattanooga and stopped by the Tennessee Aquarium. I appreciated that they were quite strict about masks, and I only saw one unmasked person. We went on a weekday, too; that's probably the emptiest that I've seen the place!
Poppy also came to visit in March and brought along his new puppy, Whiskey. Of course, the girls were quite smitten by him.
Meanwhile, we're working on trying to get a house built! Surveying and permitting is taking forever, but hopefully we can get things started this summer and finish by fall.
These pieces just keep getting more complicated! I especially enjoyed the Bach Double, played with her teacher. We recorded it on Instagram Live, hence the landscape orientation.
Looking at all of our photos, it's clear that despite the pandemic, we managed to eke out a summer! We got in several trips, lots of swimming, and quite a bit of gardening. Things looked a little different this year, but it was still a good summer.
As mentioned in previous posts, we put a small pool on the back porch and it was well-used. R2, in particular, enjoyed jumping and splashing in a shaded, mosquito-free environment!
We made a trip to Beech Mountain, North Carolina in June and spent a while driving and hiking the Blue Ridge Mountains. We canoed Price Lake and enjoyed it so much we came back the next day.
We got to see Poppy several times, and he (as usual) humored the girls with their wishes.
We took a neighbor with us on a trip to Pickett State Park (one of our favorite nearby state parks!) for the weekend. The girls got to hike the Twin Arches Trail Loop in Big South Fork, which is a beautiful trail. It does involve a lot of stairs, but the girls didn't complain much. We also canoed the lake in the park (the girls used a paddle-board) and swam until well after dark. I'm glad we went early in the summer because trying to book a trip to state park cabins in the fall got exceedingly difficult!
In October, we took a trip to Gulf Shores. This was, by far, the riskiest thing we did all summer and had we known how bad mask compliance was in Alabama we probably would have skipped the trip. Regardless, I'm glad we were able to go and we all definitely enjoyed seeing the beach for a while.
As usual, we hit up the local gator reserve and the girls got to see some monster alligators. They even had a two year old gator that we were able to hold.
We also went on a dolphin boat tour. We didn't see many dolphins up close, but it was neat to learn more about dolphins in Wolf Bay and, honestly, it was just fun to be on a boat. 😆 Captain Jack let all of the girls steer for a bit and they really enjoyed that.
Over the summer I installed a fire pit in the backyard, and as the weather got cooler we enjoyed it more frequently. The girls (J, in particular) have gotten pretty good at starting fires; I consider that a good thing, with reservations. They have also learned when it's safe to build fires and when it's not (e.g., not on dry and windy days).
It stayed pretty warm all the way through late October here. Even Halloween was so warm that R1 ran around barefoot! Below you can see our Red Riding Hood, Harry Potter character, and vampire.
J played with her group but also did a solo piece. Loved seeing her finally get to play publicly!
I will get to a "summer recap" post later, but for now I'm just sharing C's Book 3 recital. She worked really hard on this!
What a month! If someone had told me on May 1 that COVID-19 would no longer dominate the headlines by June 1, I probably would not have believed them.
Despite all my skepticism, I sincerely hope that the mostly peaceful protests will enact real, tangible change. In early April I read "Devil in the Grove: Thurgood Marshall, the Groveland Boys, and the Dawn of a New America." When I heard about Ahmaud Arbery I couldn't help but think that nothing has really changed since the 1940s. Racism is a part of our nation's DNA, from the moment we decided that "all men are equal" meant "all white men are equal." In her book "These Truths," Jill Lepore does a great job of showing the thread from that moment, when some men who knew better decided that artificial peace was a good compromise, to the Civil War, to where we are now. These protests highlight two things: race is still an issue and our police have become way too militarized. Radley Balko has been warning us about the latter for years, hopefully we start to listen.
We continued to spend most of May in a limited lock-down, only seeing a handful of friends of neighbors in what we determined were acceptable risks. We certainly miss our friends that we have not been able to see, church, the downtown library, and so much more.
May is a month of birthdays for us, and we still celebrated, albeit in a very muted way. R1 celebrated her fifth birthday, and C her eighth. It's hard to believe they are getting so big!
We also adopted two young bunnies, Clover and Violet. We are hoping both of them are female and we can limit it to two for now. The plan is to use their manure for the garden, and the girls get to enjoy the new pets. Thanks for my dad for connecting us with these little balls of fuzz.
May is also the month of the strawberry wave. We rode it as well as we could, sharing with neighbors and friends and eating them until I think we're nearly sick of them. 😆 We froze many quarts and will enjoy them over the next year in strawberry smoothies.
The YMCA pools are a staple of our summers here, and they will probably remain closed all summer. Hence, we went ahead and picked up a small 8' pool and put it on the back porch. The jury is out on whether or not we'll upgrade to something a bit more substantial. I have a feeling that pool companies are going to be really busy this summer!
Musical performances have been curtailed, but that didn't stop C from doing an outdoor concert with her fellow students a few blocks away on Forrest Ave (here in East Nashville).
We also got in a few hiking trips. We visited Dunbar Cave State Park, which was pretty but not really worth the 45 minute drive. The cave was also closed due to COVID-19, which was understandable but disappointing. We also hiked at Long Hunter State Park, which we liked better. It's only the second time we've hiked there in the 10 years we've been in Nashville, and I'd like to go more often!
Last, but not least, R2 had her much-awaited heart surgery (CHD repair) a week ago. I'm happy to report she's doing quite well! She is a little trooper and tolerated all of the wires, tubes, prodding, and poking with a sweet spirit. I'm thankful for the excellent care she got at Vanderbilt. The hospital had just restarted elective surgeries so there were a lot of empty rooms. I felt she got more attention than she normally would have due to that, which was nice.
I'm grateful for the very temperate weather we had during May as it allowed us to spend a lot of time outside during the lock-down. Of course, we're all hoping that things will return to "normal" in the short term, but it's still challenging to entertain four young girls when so many of the things we do remain closed (Nashville Zoo, libraries, art museums). I hope we find creative ways to get out of the house in June that don't entail unnecessary risks and also don't involve a whole lot of sweating. 🙂
Stay healthy and sane out there! ♥
Well, that certainly escalated quickly, didn't it? I'm happy to say that so far we've stayed healthy. I've been working from home since March 11th and the R2 has been home from daycare since around then. We've been making the best of it. I'm very thankful for the spring time weather that allows us to spend a lot of time outside! We probably have the most well-groomed garden we've ever had.
We've spent a lot of time on bikes, exploring the neighborhood. Traffic is lower than normal, which is nice because it feels a lot safer.
Even though we home school, our normal week consist of visits to the library, the zoo, and art museums. This definitely does not feel "normal." At one point, C told me, "Can we go somewhere today? Anywhere. I don't care if we go to jail." Even R2 tries to tell us, in her own way. She will often take mine or A's hand and walk us out to the truck, and point at the door. Or she will put on a hat, a backpack, and shoes, and wave "Goodbye!"
It's not easy, but at least we are well and I still have a job. This is going to be a tough time for a lot of people, and I pray that God gives us the wisdom to know where best to share our resources (Luke 3:11).
Prior to The Big Pause, C did her Suzuki Book 1 & 2 recitals. She did great!
We also played for my grandmother at her assisted living facility. I'm glad we were able to visit her prior to all visitation being prohibited.
My grandmother does not really understand what is going on right now (she has advanced dementia). My aunt has been video chatting with her, but it's not easy to do. My grandfather visited once, but after she cried and didn't understand why he wouldn't come in, he hasn't been able to go back.
In early February, an Uber driver mistook his accelerator for the break and hit A in our 2002 Toyota Tacoma. A's dad bought her the truck new when she was in college, and we had taken really good care of it (it only had 140k miles) so we were very sad that it was totaled. I'm glad that it served its purpose: protecting A and the girls. No one, fortunately, was hurt.
We build a ton of memories with that truck, including the six week road trip we took when moving from New York to Nashville. Every time I see a similar model Tacoma, I get hit with a little bit of sads.
I'll leave you with this. The girls have really been into Think About Things by Daði Freyr. How's your quarantine going?
I was very happy to see my youngest brother get married today. Here are some photos from the wedding.
Being number three has its challenges. Here are some recent zingers from Rowdy R: