Nashville on New Year's Eve - 2021

 Dec 31st.  The last day of 2021.  We felt adventurous.  So we explored Nashville.

We parked and started exploring by crossing a huge bridge.  I love this picture of Nels and the kids.  

Cloudy, but warmish day.

The kids are getting creative for pictures and I love it.

Isak photo bombed our selfie.  haha.

We enjoyed our walk and just seeing the outskirts of Nashville and the greenway along the river.

Then we went to Goo Goo Cluster...

We ended up not buying anything there.  We wanted to check out another place.  

I'm not sure if it was the best idea to come on New Year's Eve...and the street we were walking on was mostly bars.  😬Loud music too.  The kids kept covering their ears.  

But we found a Candy Kitchen and eventually found some treats for everyone to enjoy.

We found a quiet fountain area to eat our treats.

Isak took our picture...

Sofie really wanted her picture...

See the "Candy Kitchen" store in the background?

We left around 4 pm.  It was fun to see some of Nashville.  A lot of plaid, cowboy boots and hats.  😄

We ate pizza for dinner and had our traditional white donuts...

We watched Encanto as a family.  So good.  I had a headache so I went to bed early...10 or so.  Nels got the rest of the kids put to bed by 11.  It was a fun New Year's Eve. 

I thought I would do a recap/highlights of our last year.

January:

Lots of snow - built large snow cave in backyard

Sledding and walks in the snow

Coded a budget app

February:

More sledding

Outings with boys (Portillo's) and girls (Hey, Sugar)

Valentine's Day

Learned how to make homemade bread that was delicious!

March:

Pots of gold candy treat for St. Patrick's day

Lots of reading, piano, library, treats, more bread

Sofie lost her first tooth!

Indexed 250 names

Nels interviewed with Mahle

April: 

Donated 10 inches of my hair

Tulip hunting with the kids, Tank park

Easter-stuffed animals for the kids

Sidewalk chalk

Bikes and parks

Painted ceiling and decorated girls room

Golf date

May:

Tummy Tuck on May  6th.

Sofie and Noah turned 5!

G&G Nyborg visited and helped us out.

Isak and Kira finished 2nd grade

Sofie and Noah finished preschool

Enjoyed Buttermilk with Isak and Kira before my surgery

June:

Missouri Vacation! Amusement park, water park, go karts.

Pool time and swim lessons

Parks and walks

Isak built a Robot

We made unpoppable bubbles

July:

4 splash pads in 1 day!

Aurora Zoo

Library camp for Isak and Kira

More swim lessons

Primary Park day - rainbow themed

My Birthday - age 39!

Nels interviewed with Mahle again

August:

Nels quit IP and started with Mahle

Door County! Washington Island, Mini golf, beach, ice cream, cherry brats

Six Flags

First day of school: Isak and Kira in 3rd Grade, Sofie and Noah in kindergarten 

Red Oak Nature Park

Last of pool time

Prepped house to sell

September:

House on Market and sold in 5 days

Kari and Sadie visit - Chicago and 4 parks!

House Hunting - G&G Nyborg take care of the kids

Decluttered a lot!

October: 

4 play dates for the kids in 3 days.

Nels birthday - age 45

Under Contract for a new home in Tennessee

Moved to TN arrived Oct 28

2 ward Halloween parties 

Squeezed in lots of parks

Concert with friends

November:

Isak and Kira turn 9!

Start new school - Overall Creek

Explore Nashville and Radnor State Park

Found 3 parks and the library

Thanksgiving

Coded a Matching Game for sight words

December:

Jenny had her baby Lydia!

Cut down Christmas tree

Trip to Larysa's in Georgia

Lots of Christmas Celebrating

I blogged, I journaled, I photographed, I planned, I executed.  I tried to make moments.  I tried to connect and be present.  It was a hard year - but I see the joy in it.  I see things I needed to learn.  I have hope for a happy, delightful 2022!

December Moments 2021

December started out with me getting a phone call from the school nurse asking me to pick up my kids.  Kira was coughing a lot, Isak was starting to, and Sofie was sort of sick...so might as well take them all home for a couple of days.  😂 They were all tested for COVID and all came back negative.  Just a cold...So I took them home and we relaxed and took our time being sick for a bit.

Haha...Noah is quite the character.  I was doing a reading lesson with him and he took his glasses off and said, "I can't see mom."  

We had a three week delay for our windows on our new house...I drove by it and was happy to see a couple of windows came.  👏

Here's Isak just snuggling his elephant Sam and studying the periodic table for fun.  

Here's one of Sofie's trash creations...a sled for her teddy bear.

And another one...

Hot chocolate with a chocolate spoon for another fun holiday treat.  

Sofie and Noah took in lots of cans for their food drive.

Leaving the apartment to go to the bus...

A cute Sofie grin.

More cans for their kindergarten food drive.

I backed up the car and scraped the bumper on the post for the under cover parking...😞  Poor Goldie.

I'm so proud of Kira.  She made a goal to read 21 books in 2021.  She kept track of them and finished reading 21 books...she even read a couple extra but didn't write them down.  

Great job Kira!!

Sofie with Lamby...

Waiting for the school bus...

I stopped by Nels's work and brought him Chick-fil-a to help him through the day.  His desk is adjustable so he can sit or stand.  Cool!

This was so sweet.  Noah spent a long time coloring this elephant for Isak and even drew Isak next to him.  Isak wrote a kind note to Noah.  Good brothers.  

STEAM night at the kids school.  They each showed us their project they worked on.  Sofie and Noah built barns to withstand strong winds and flooding for Otis the cow.

Pretty cool to be doing that in kindergarten!

Isak and Kira did a report about an enclosure for the Nashville Zoo's snow leopard.  

Kira's team actually got to present virtually to the Nashville Zoo!

Isak's was very creative and thorough too.  I was super proud of both of them.

Fort building...

And some relax time in their forts. 

Sometimes after church we will stop by the house to show the kids the progress.  I thought they looked cute walking into the house to check it out.  The walls are up and windows are in.

Straw building in the background and figuring out the coding bunny toy.

One night, I started making dinner and realized I didn't have enough eggs!  So I loaded up the kids and we headed to the grocery store.  They had this fun cart which made the trip fun for the littles.  Ended up buying eggs, milk, bananas and of course some ice cream!

Reading lessons.  We are slowly progressing.  But they are getting better and better.  I love this "Teach your child to read in 100 lessons" book.  I think it does a great job.

Brushing teeth before bedtime...

Kierstin gave us a huge ice cream sundae bowl.  So we made a family banana split sundae with all of the flavors...

Ta Da!

Um, it was a little difficult to share....

I slurped up the leftovers.  😂

Isak finished his Lockbox...

He also made a lot of bead pets.

He was very busy during Christmas break.

I have another post coming for what we did on New Years Eve...

But that wraps up December.  

We were sick and healthy.  We had stressful times and relaxing times.  We ate lots of treats.  We made some fun family holiday memories. I'll wrap up 2021 in the next post.