A few days ago we visited Prairie Farm in Champaign. It's a working farm not far from our house. They have all kinds of farm animals there and at certain times during the day you can go pet them. The best part is that it's totally free!
The girls loved it, especially the ponies. There was a baby calf that was taller than Norah, and he walked right up to her, licked her face with his huge tongue, then started chewing on her hair. I wish I would've taken a picture of her facial expression! The goats were kind of picking on her too and kept biting the string on the back of her dress. I guess she was just the right size.
In other news, Anna has been assigned a school for Kindergarten. The schools in Champaign use a system called "schools of choice," where each family picks their top three choices of schools in the whole city and then there is a lottery to assign where each student attends. Most of the time you get one of your top three choices. The reason they do it this way is to ensure that each school has roughly the same demographics as far as race and economic status. Well, we missed the lottery for Kindergarten placement (it was way back in March before we even knew we'd be moving here), so we were just assigned a school where there was an open spot. We were assigned Kenwood Elementary. We went there today to fill out some more paperwork, and we were able to meet one of her teachers AND get a tour. Anna is in a class with two teachers, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. The classroom was huge, much bigger than I was expecting. We also got to meet the principal and the music teacher. Everyone was so friendly and I think it was good for us all to see what the school is like.
The school is about a five minute drive from our house, so it's very convenient. It seems like a good fit for us, especially after meeting the teacher. BUT, Kenwood is one of two schools in the district that operates on a "balanced calendar," which means the first day of school is July 27! That's only three weeks away! I'm pretty sure Anna will be ready, and I think it will be good for her to jump right in. I'm not so sure about the rest of us, though!
We've felt so strongly through the whole process of this move that God knows what he is doing and he has provided exactly what we need. And he has done so many great things for us! We've got a perfect little house in a great neighborhood, a very welcoming church family, a fun city to explore, and a job for Joel that seems like a great fit. We are trusting that this school placement has been orchestrated by God and that it fits into his plan for our family as well. So we're excited!
And we are also very excited because tomorrow (Friday) we are going on a day trip to Upland, Indiana to visit the Moser Family! We haven't seen them since last June when they were passing through Denver on a cross-country road trip. We're really looking forward to catching up with them. And Joel is excited to show the girls the neighborhood where he grew up. So hopefully we can take some cute pictures and post those soon.
Happy 4th of July weekend to everyone!
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