58 and counting

The deer are out in force with the snow melting and more vegetation showing by the side of the road. We're at 58 and counting and we haven't gotten to Two Harbors yet. 

Blasting last year's record of 50 out of the water...

Ski school with Derek

Katy seems very attentive.

Coach Derek says Katy is learning to do hockey stops (parallel stops) and link her traverses by bringing her skis together. Also keeping her weight on the bottom ski.

Fei fei fei

...getting harder as Katy nears 7!

But she and dada both still love it!

Kung Tai's Medal

Uncle Bernard is so great at keeping in touch.  He FaceTimed me today and we started talking about old photos and memorabilia.  I remember that Kung Kung had a medal from the Civil Service and Uncle Bernard said he has it now.  He sent me pictures.  I love seeing Kung Kung's beautiful handwriting again, albeit a little messier and less correct spelling than in his heyday.  I remember Kung Kung used to write lots of lovely letters to us on that thin blue aerogram paper and he had the most beautiful writing and quaint British expressions, like "don't dilly dally" and "I say men"!

Top o' the mornin'

Irish soda bread from St John's!

Yummy said Katy!

This year it seems like St Patrick's Day is making it big! The kids are super excited and ready to pinch anyone not wearing green on Monday! (Gently only of course!)

Katy will have a play date with Elsa, whose birthday follows "Leprechaun Day" as she delightfully calls it. 

Even though there is not a drop of Irish blood in our family, we do have a special fondness because of Mama's Australian Irish Catholic "heritage" (one College nickname was "Bernardine O'Lai".

Katy proudly tells anyone Irish about her Connemara marble rosary Auntie Rachel brought for her from Ireland, and she sported Irish onesies from Auntie Rachel as a baby too.

First ride on the big yellow school bus!

Katy was very excited and apprehensive to be riding the school bus home with Tyler for a playdate.  She said she only wanted to do it if Tyler held her hand all the way!  Tyler did make Katy feel more comfortable by explaining how the whole bus thing would work step by step.  And Mikayla also promised to hold her hand getting on the bus too.

Mama was too excited about Katy's first trip on a genuine American yellow school bus, so I had to stop by to take pictures!  Katy said that made her feel a lot more comfortable about the trip!

When we got to the Clair house later that afternoon for the adult pizza party, there was so much excitement and noise from the kids.  They were setting up a little play store for the parents to buy stuff.  The kids made their own money and then drew pictures of jewellery and lava lamps for the parents to buy.  Fun.

Neighbourhood girls

At the bookclub, I met Erica, who has the only other little girl of Katy's age in the neighbourhood.  We were thrilled to have Erica pop by with Annie for an impromptu cuppa and playdate!

We really hope they stay in the neighbourhood long term.  Annie is even in the process of transferring to Excelsior to join the Navigator program.  It would be wonderful to have another little girl to play with nearby.  It seems from talking to the bookclub ladies that the neighbourhood really is starting to turn over from the College age kids families who have been here for 10-15 years now to the families with elementary school aged children.  Yaaaaaaaay!

Private salon

Katy has been getting really upset this year whenever either of us or both of us go out.  She even gets upset when Naan goes out for the day sometimes...so she wasn't happy about my first neighbourhood book club meeting.

But she got excited about doing my hair for the evening...

I had to wait until I left the house before I could discreetly remove my hair accessories!

Librarian Appreciation Week

Afton Alps with Zoe

Our first trip to Afton Alps.  We like Lutsen better but Afton Alps is one hour away while Lutsen is four!  It's nice to discover Afton Alps as an easy one day ski trip.  And we can meet our friends the Meletious there - they live in Stillwater so we are too far apart for regular get togethers.  It's a shame as Katy and Zoe get along really well and are both only child girls.

Sophia's Birthday Party

Mini-hops

First Trophy

Katy performed (Ecossaise) in her first Suzuki Association of Minnesota Graduation Recital!  She was so excited to be receiving her first ever trophy!

The concert was in Wooddale Church, which was a pretty impressive facility!

It's so nice now to feel part of the Suzuki family in Minnesota and recognise faces at events.  Katy's master class teacher from MacPhail summer camp, Mrs Kotrba, was the MC at her recital.

It seemed to me to be a particularly long recital.  There were around 25 performers.  The kids did such an amazing job of being an attentive and respectful audience.  It's a really great experience for them to take part in these large, formal, "proper" concerts with other kids, parents and teachers they do not know.  They already have such poise.

Even more thrilling - the Book One trophy is pink!  And sparkly!

We love seeing Katy perform piano.  Very proud parents.

King of the Hill

I'll always remember the sight of our darling little girl trotting into school with her new big blue backpack jiggling up and down on her back.

The kids were thrilled to finally be allowed to play on the big hill of snow at school...while we parents shivered and pleaded with them to wrap it up!

Crafty

Katy and Paisley spent a lovely, calm afternoon quietly making loom bracelets and Chinese watercolour paintings.  Paisley's older sister, Piper, downloaded instructions for the fishtail weave from YouTube, and taught it to Paisley, who taught it to Katy!

Proud to be Catholic

For the first time ever, Katy seemed to be a little concerned about the kids at school making fun of her because of the ashes on her forehead.  So we had a little pep talk about being proud to be Catholic and Mama and Dada offered to take her into school to explain the ashes to her class.

Luckily, Mikayla was at Mass too and she was not fazed at all about the prospect of going to school with ashes, so that gave Katy the confidence to go to school without Mama and Dada.  Plus, we stayed after Mass for a great talk from Fr Carlson about the whole significance of the ashes and of Lent.  Katy and Mikayla listened with great attention.

Oh dear!

You can tell we're still newbies in Minnesota because our household goes bananas and we take a thousand pictures when a few deer wander into our backyard!

We are getting pretty good at it though now!

Fat Tuesday Brekkie

Stripey's still Number One

Happy birthday Sam

How to embarrass a nephew on his 18th birthday.