The robins and some ducklings too!

First, a little update on our robin friends. The rescued baby robins were never found after they were placed in the nest. But a couple of days later we discovered this up in our playhouse portion of the swing set:

Yup, its another Robins nest. Not in the best place mind you, but the word must have spread that we are friends to the birds and now they are taking refuge in our yard! The kids are very excited to be able to watch the robins hatch and grow. Ryan and I are just worried about being able to keep the cat and Brylee away from them. The nest is right by the top of the slide. The cat can get up to it, and Brylee has already picked up one of the eggs. They are delicious at Easter time you know! So over the course of the next month, we will have to keep a close eye out for our new friends. (Apparently, you cant move the nest, even a little bit, or the mother wont recognize it...so our research tells. So that option it out, in case thats what you are thinking!)

In other birdie news...
our little Katelin who is shy beyond belief around most of society, was actually in a play at school! I love that our school has these PBL (project based learning) groups, in addition to a great arts program. Madi has learned violin, been in orchestra and choir, marketing, newspaper publishing, and movie making to name a few. Katelin had her first chance this year as a second grader to be in a PBL group, and she chose the Theatre Guild. It was surprising to us when she put that as one of her choices, but I explained what it was, and that she would have to be in front of people...and talk at them, but she still wanted to do it. None of us had any idea it would actually lead to a big production at the end of the year! She even had the opportunity to drop it for another group mid-way, but she wanted to stick with it. She ended up spending A LOT of time rehearsing at school, and all her hard work paid off. She performed in a play of The Ugly Duckling called "Honk Jr." in front of a big crowd on two separate nights, and did an awesome job!
She played one of the ducklings, named Downy. She had about 5 lines and sang a couple of songs (as a group). It was a really cute play, and Ryan and I were very impressed at how well all the elementary students performed. She even got her own personalized T-shirt to wear!

Here are all the ducklings before the show, waiting behind the nest. She had to sit back there for about 20 minutes.

We weren't allowed to take pictures during the performance, so here she is after in her "costume". It was pretty low budget, but what do you expect for a first time performance from an elementary school. She actually had one of the better costumes. You couldnt really tell what the other kids were supposed to be at all.

The 3 normal ducklings.

I tried really hard to upload the video's of her performance, but the Blogger wouldnt work for me. I did get them to work on Face Book, so you can check them out on my profile page. (sorry if your not on FB) There are 4 scenes she was in. It is worth it to watch them I think...not only because Katelin is in them, but it is a really cute play. You probably wont recognize her in this setting...you know, all vocal and everything, so Ill just let you know she is usually the orange one in the middle. She had a great time, and even loved it so much, shes talking about doing it again next year, and wanting to play the lead!

Who knew all she needed to be heard, was a stage and some lights!?