Trail 5K

On a cool, wet Saturday in early May, Natalie and I participated in our first ever Trail 5K race! It was put on by my friend Maya's horse rescue, Hope's Legacy, on the farm where they keep all of their rescues. Since Natalie and I have been walking so much, and we do occasionally add in some running, we thought we would tackle it! Plus, the money all went to a very good cause.

All 4 of us actually signed up, but when the morning of the race was wet and muddy the boys backed out of going. So Natalie and I put on our layers, packed another set of socks and shoes (as we knew our feet would get wet), and headed out to Afton for the event!

It was drizzling on and off as we arrived, and we definitely had to be careful of some muddy parts on the trail. But we had a great time looping around the farm, and made decent time. Was it my fastest? No. But there were a lot of hills, it was quite slippery, and I couldn't run the whole thing. Natalie actually beat my final time by about 10 seconds, as she put on speed at the end in order to beat me. Ha!

 

We were both very proud of ourselves for doing something new like this!

After the race, they posted photos on FB and I found one decent one of each of us.

Look, she's out in front of me here, too!

Afterwards, we changed out of our wet shoes into the rain boots we brought, and went around to meet some of the horses, check out the vendors who attended, etc. Natalie loved getting to pet the donkeys, horses, and even mini horses. In fact, she fed a treat to a mini horse who Maya said had not let anyone get that close before! My girl loves animals, just like her mom.

Foxfield 2019

In catching up on events from last spring, how could I have nearly forgotten about Foxfield?!

This year, we had absolutely lovely weather. We were due after so many terrible years, weather-wise, out of the past 6 or so! Either ridiculously cool and rainy, or WAY too hot. This year was juust right.

I managed to corral almost all of the kids together for a photo before leaving for the event (Rosie was being stubborn and didn't want to come out). Aren't they all so cute in their hats? And also ever so slightly old fashioned and creepy?

I seriously loved Henry's old man cardigan and hat this year. Since it's so hard to get him to dress up EVER, this made me so happy.

 

So then, Foxfield! Horses! Food! Drinks! Much fun in the sun!

We Old Ladies, getting our annual photo. Sadly Beta couldn't make it this year, but she was with us in spirit!

And then Old Ladies with our brood! There's a lot more of them than their used to be, and they are a heck of a lot bigger. Zabby is taller than me!

And the obligatory family photo, of course! Unfortunately this was the best one, and it does have the bus behind us, but in all the others someone had their eyes closed or was making a dumb face, so, bus photo it is!

This year, as happens every few years, Foxfield was on Evan's birthday! So he got an extra special Foxfield cake.

 

As always, a lovely day with our friends made even easier for us by living here in C'ville now, and getting to go home after! Next year will be WAY more fun when we can host all of our friends at our house (they rented a house, as see in the top photos). We can't wait!

My photos of UVA

In my previous post, I showcased favorite photos that the kids took while we walked around UVA on a spring afternoon. Now, I get to share my favorites that I took, and I think the timing is great since the students are moving back in this weekend! I've enjoyed the quiet of the summer, and miss being able to walk unimpeded through Grounds, but it's also nice to see it come back to life.

I've taken to shooting in both RAW and JPEG so that I have the RAW files if I ever have time to edit/process them, but I'm also focusing on camera settings so that I don't HAVE to process them afterwards; I'm happy with how they look straight out of camera. This was a batch that I did not have the energy to edit, and didn't really feel the need to!

She's such a pretty subject. And capturing her eyes without needing to edit is hard! Thankfully I think I'm getting the hang of it.

 

The kiddos were so cute. I loved capturing them capturing their favorite images.

Henry out there did understandably give me some pause...he was a bit precarious! But Evan was nearby, just out of camera view, ready to intervene. Plus, he was so excited to shoot from that perspective, it was hard to say no.

And I love this one of N and I taking photos of each other!

I really love getting to share photography with the kids. Natalie is reaching the point where she wants to learn more about composing an image, what she can do with the camera, etc. Henry still just wants to take photos without any interference from me, which is fine! But I'm hoping I can teach him a few things down the road too.

Backstage at Cinderella

Natalie's first big performance with Charlottesville Ballet was in March 2019. She had auditioned for a role in January, and got one of the 40 spots that over 70 girls auditioned for! We were so proud of her, especially for being new to the school.

They performed Cinderella, which was choreographed by the head of the Southwest Ballet Company (including using his costumes and some of his male dancers for a few roles). The girls worked very hard for 3 months, as did the company members, and then gave two performances in Charlottesville and two the following weekend in Lynchburg. I volunteered backstage both weekends, which let me get a lot of fun backstage photos of the girls!

The Charlottesville performance was at the Paramount Theater on the Downtown Mall. We had about 24 girls plus a couple of parents wedged into this small dressing room for the show, but they did great!

They were excited by the mirrors lining the room in which they could get ready.

 

One of the coolest things at the Paramount is that through the backstage hallways, people who have taken part in performances have signed the walls. It's so cool to walk through and experience! Even cooler, is at only 11 years old, Natalie's name is now there!

 

In escorting them to/from the stage, I was able to grab a couple of photos with my phone from the sidelines.

 

You'll see Natalie appear in the video below with her fairy friend in blue.

Like I said, the following weekend we headed down to Lynchburg for two performances there. Natalie and I stayed in a lovely hotel on Friday night, after dress rehearsal, and had plenty of time on Saturday morning before we had to arrive at the theater to go for a nice walk! There's a beautiful walking path over the river, and it turns out there was a St Patrick's Day 5K that we inadvertently took part in.

I have a lot of photos from Lynchburg that I took from the sidelines but they didn't all come out that well; this is a collage of the 3 I took that I liked the most.

I did take a bunch of photos with my actual camera during dress rehearsal in Charlottesville; I have gotten those edited and will next post my favorite stage photos of my girl!

A spring day in Albemarle/Nelson

On a lovely spring weekend day, I wanted to have a family day in our new area: get out, enjoy the spring weather, and show the kids how lovely their new home is, after the gray of winter was finally gone! So, we hit up 3 places in Albemarle and Nelson Counties. First up: Chiles Peach Orchard, who was having a day of spring fun with wagon rides...

Baby chicks - these were actually turkey chicks!

And treats to enjoy, including cider from Bold Rock Cider, which spurred our journey out to Nelson County. Our ultimate goal was to hit the actual cidery, but we wanted to have some lunch first. So, we stopped on our way at Blue Mountain Brewery, which has a gorgeous outdoor eating area and is only about 3 miles from the house I grew up in! This place definitely did not exist when I lived there.

The kids enjoyed the food, and were even more excited by the games. Nothing like corn hole to burn off some post-lunch energy!

We then headed down Rte 151 to Bold Rock, where we all enjoyed some cider. In addition to the alcoholic cider they serve, they also have non alcoholic which the kids really enjoyed! We took our drinks out back towards the river.

And then, after getting back...we all crashed out after a long, but fun, day :)

WCDE 2019

Dance, dance, dance! We just finished up the kids' first recitals with C'ville Ballet Academy, so I've definitely got dance on the brain. So many amazing photos to share! But before that, a couple of other dance activities Natalie participated in over the past few months, starting with an oldie but a goodie: WCDE!

Even though Natalie couldn't compete, since her new studio doesn't attend this conference, and she isn't dancing with LSB anymore, we could still go so she could take part in the workshops and cheer on her friends. I have to say, I was really proud of her this year - picking up choreography quickly has not always been easy for her, and they only have an hour per workshop to learn each dance. This year, she was exponentially faster at picking them up, and she had a really great time in each class!

She particularly has started enjoying hip-hop (I think she might actually take it at her studio next fall), and I was proud of her for asking for clarification from the instructor, who came out on the floor to show her.

He was a favorite of all of our dancers!

There was also jazz (another favorite) - she's in the blue pants.

And ballet!

And finally, the routine that got this song stuck in my head for AGES (I seriously do not know how many times we heard this portion over and over again). But it was one of her favorite routines, and she still talks about it every time we hear the song on the radio!

We got to stay in the hotel with friends, and I was so glad for both of us to spend the weekend with everyone.