Family Update

It's been so long since I've posted a family update.....I can't possibly catch up

. 

We're getting more settled in but still have piles upon piles of boxes and stuff in the garage.  

It's hard to get motivated to go out there and work when it's so cold and we have all the necessities for day-to day life in the house. 

Oh, and apparently the Plunger Fairy has come and taken both of our plungers and left us nothing in return.....we've had the joy of a stopped up toilet and cannot find either plunger anywhere.  Joy. 

We're missing old friends and life in Virginia.....while at the same time enjoying new activities and meeting new people here....and spending as much time as we can with family.   

 Here are a few highlights from the past month or so.

We've joined a 4-H group that has several different projects for kids to be involved with....the girls are participating in a miniature horse project and Corban is doing robotics.  

The Mini-horse project is so awesome - the leaders of the club have a farm with about 10 mini-horses (and several full-sized) and once a month, the participants get to go out to the farm and learn all about taking care of the horses.The rest of the month (and meetings) are spent learning about horsemanship, hippology terms, etc.  My girls are the youngest in the group but are absolutely loving it.  

Marissa adores Gypsy - she's so gentle and compliant, easy to lead and great with kids.

Annika practicing picking a hoof.

Annika taking her turn leading Gypsy around a course of cones.  Eventually they'll be able to compete with the horses in contests, and even learn how to drive a little cart!

These two beauties live in a pasture back behind our house....we walked there a couple of weeks ago and discovered them....the girls are in love.

Every day that the weather is nice, the girls are begging to go back to see the horses. 

Even Ellia gets in on that fun.  She's too young for the 4-H group now.

In school, we had the joy of dissecting owl pellets.  Oh, you don't know what an owl pellet is?  That's okay, I didn't either.  So when owls eat rodents, they can't digest the bones and hair.  Their stomachs form the indigestible materials into chunks, which the owls vomit out.   Owl pellets.  Lumps of rodent hair and bones. 

Theoretically, you could find an entire mouse skeleton in a single pellet....we were not so lucky. (???)

We sure found a lot of tiny bones, though.  Very interesting.  

Moving on to something much prettier, Marissa and Annika are taking ballet classes from my lovely younger sister Anna.  We have to drive 45 minutes one way to get there, but it is totally worth it.  She's amazing teacher and the girls absolutely love it.  And her. 

Well, it's only a snippet and I could post much more......but life is calling.