We met up with our friends on Valentine’s Day for a playdate. It was a cool and rainy day so we chose a warm and active option instead. Our friend Lincoln introduced us to Gym Bugs and the girls fell in love (with Gym Bugs, not Lincoln – hee hee). They asked to go back immediately. It is a great place to work off our extra energy. Basically they have a room filled with interactive toys and gym equipment pieces for the kids to play with. The girls loved playing and then when we were done we got lunch at Chick-fil-a together. It was a great way to spend the day – with other little people we love.

I think the big kids were pretending to be chickens while they bounced. The little one was just loving bouncing and playing.

Emily found these fruit bins and fruit to sort. She played with them the whole time sorting them, resorting them, moving them, and finally cleaning them up. She did do other things, but always came back to them. Such a serious girl.

The less serious side of Emily. She seemed to love being in flight.

You have to love the serious face on Kenzie. What a silly girl! She had a blast.

They have this rollercoaster for the kids to ride. I would have thought it gimmicky in a catalog, but in person it is pretty cool and the kids love it. They were so good to share and put the car back for the next kids. Julia’s turn was next – can you see her excitement?

Julia’s turn!!!!! That is one happy kid.

What could anyone want more for Valentine’s day than a hug from Maeve.

Emily picked to swim for her birthday party. She also picked her party theme to be a Snow Princess party. To be a Snow Princess she got a special blue dress with pom-poms sewn on to make it ‘princess-y’.

We went to a local heated pool to have her party. We started off with some running around a gym, followed by decorating princess shoes with gems (Aiden got a frog to decorate), then lunch of pizza and cupcakes, and lastly all the swimming the little ones could handle. Emily had a lot of fun at her party. She is already planning her next one.

The birthday girl – she was having a good time despite the serious face.

A little pre-party game of tag. They do not understand the game and just had fun running away from Ms. Rachelle.

Craft time

Emily was serious about her shoe decorating. She had been planning for days which shoe she wanted to decorate.

Julia took her gluing seriously. She spread it all over her shoe like she was icing a cake.

The frog turned out pretty cute!

Our table of goodies

Emily enjoyed a lot of freedom in the pool because she was willing to kick herself around on the kickboard. She seemed to have the hang of the kickboard more this day than she has before.

Julia was pretty busy in the pool. Every time the camera came out she seemed to be turning her back to it. She had a great time just playing.

Aiden and his Mama – what a great photo. They both have great grins.

Elena floating on her own

Maeve’s eyes seem to always have such a sparkle

The little girls floating and having a great time together. It is nice to have friends.

Our annual fall trip to the pumpkin patch had to be moved once so that we could have a beautiful warm fall day. We enjoyed the sunshine, friends, maze, tractor ride, pumpkin picking, goat feeding, and a picnic. We love this playdate!

There were no photos of all of the kids looking at the camera so I picked one with no one looking at it. Why fight kid-nature.

Aiden enjoying the gravel.

Maeve and Lincoln being sweet together.

Elena having fun among the cornstalks.

Emily bringing in her pumpkin. I wonder if she gets that tongue thing from her Mama?

Emily collected flowers from everywhere we went at the pumpkin patch and made herself a flower bouquet. I think she was pretending that she was a bride and that was her wedding bouquet.

An excited Julia!

Julia kept picking flowers and smelling them and then offering it to Mama to smell too.

Julia was proud of her pumpkin.

Kenzie and Heather picking out a pumpkin together.

Maeve feeding the goat.

Natalie found a rock in the pumpkin patch. She was headed over to meet the goats.

Baby Rose hanging out in the sunshine.

A beautiful Fall morning took us to the Knoxville Botanical Gardens for a playdate. It was perfect. The kids had fun exploring and running around with each other. It is tough to get great photos of moving kids, but I got a few. We are looking forward to the next fun Fall playdate.

Hey, look we got all seven kids to look the same direction at the same time . . . kinda.

As a reward we asked them to make silly faces. It seemed to be a hit for the over-two crowd.

A great and hard-to-photograph genuine Emily smile.

Sweet Elena

Grins from the sun-kissed Julia.

An almost smile from McKenzie.

A pixie smile from the pixie Maeve.

We joined our friends for some fun blueberry and blackberry picking. It was a sunny fun way to spend the afternoon with picking and a picnic. We picked blueberries first. The kids were fun to watch together. Some picked and filled their buckets, some picked and ate, some picked rocks and filled buckets, some watched after the babies, some ran and played games in the field, and some ventured around the bushes like a maze. Poor Julia had a rought time with a busted lip, the second of the week.

Then we went up to the blackberry rows to pick. I love to see how the kids gravitate to play with each other and which Mama they end up with. Ms. Sara was the hit with my girls, then Ms. Ashley, and only last did they come to the row with their own Mama. The girls did a pretty good job of picking the darkest of the blackberries. Emily pointed out a red & black one and told me that it was not sweet. I think she learned this by experience.

We have a little goat story to go with our blackberry picking. We picked next to a pen of goats. When we were almost done we noticed that one of the goats had gotten out of the pen and was grazing on the blackberries. As we finished up and started to walk out he moved over two rows to share our row. Emily was very curious about him. When we weren’t watching our buckets closely enough he ventured over and ate out of Ms. Ariaun’s bucket. She fought him for it and won. It reminded me of the little black bear eatting out of Little Sal’s mother’s blueberry bucket in “Blueberries for Sal” by Robert McCloskey.

Our local aquarium has a preschooler program once a month. We try to go once a year to one with our friends. We just got back from one of these programs. This year the class we attended had only our kids in it. The girls didn’t seem to mind the specialized attention. The class was about coral and the animals found in it. They got to color a seahorse craft, hear a story about a clown fish, have a snack, and touch a live starfish. It was fun. After the class we spent time exploring the aquarium. We caught two dive shows and while it was fun to watch the feeding it was really hard to understand the commentary that went with it. I asked the three of the four girls what their favorite thing to do in the aquarium was. Elena said touching the starfish and Emily and Julia both loved the penguin tunnel.

Some other fun things from the day –

• I had told Julia the night before what we were going to do, but told her it was a secret and not to tell Emily. In the morning I asked her if she had told Emily, she put her finger to her lips and said “shhhhh”. She had kept the secret.
• The girls loved loving on McKenzie and Kenzie seemed to like the attention.
• The glass floor in the penguin area and tunnel took some getting used to for Julia. She didn’t want to walk on it at first. Then she had to master crawling on it. She loved standing above a swimming area and watching them swim by.
• Watching the little girls watch the Nemo fish tank. They tried to grab the very recognizable Nemo and Dory fish.
• Going shopping after the aquarium with a bunch of little girls.

Emily touching the starfish. A lot of times she chickens out of things like this when she actually has to do it, but this time she even asked to do it a second (brief) time.

Julia touching the starfish. She was so excited to get to do this like the other girls.

Ms. Jessica teaching the Sea Squirt class.

Little girls discovering the “Nemo” fish tank. I love Maeve’s face of delight.

Big girl friends hanging out in the fish tank.

Julia watching the penguins swimming with McKenzie and Ms. Heather.