Field Trip!!

Back on December 6th Lilli’s class got to go on a field trip to the main Downtown Library to hear the Governor’s wife read a holiday story to kids as part of her “Read 20” program.   The main library is literally just around the block for them, so it’s an easy walking field trip and since it’s a short walk for me, I signed up to be a parent chaperone.

The two oldest classes from Lilli’s school went, the mom of one of her schoolmates is the head of the children’s library program downtown, so this is their second field trip over to the library.  A couple of other kindergarten classes from some local private schools also came.  It was open to the public as well, but only one or two other kids came (I doubt anyone even knew about it.)

We had some time to kill before the program started, so several of Lilli’s friends wanted their pictures made.  Lilli and one of her best buds Amelia:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lilli and several of her buddies – Katherine, Laoise, Holden and Amelia.  They really just wanted their pictures made so they could look at themselves and mess with my phone.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Someone (I’m guessing the photographer/press crew she brought with her) wanted all the kids to scoot really close to her.  That’s just a recipe for disaster, and several times she had to tell them to put their listening ears on.  She talked to them about reading and asked what kind of books they liked.  Lilli raised her hand to answer and Mrs Haslam called on her and she said “Princess Books” – no big shocker!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

She read them a Christmas book and they all got to take home a copy of it donated by a Friends of the Library association, and the kids were all SUPER excited about that.  After the story time, they got to decorate some sugar cookies with all the icing and sprinkles they wanted.  At let’s just say they WANTED.  One of the kiddos at Lilli’s table took the icing tube and just emptied it into his mouth.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Icing was all over their little faces….this was right before lunch so I heard they didn’t eat a ton of lunch and naps were a bit hard to come by that day too!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mrs Haslam was sort of wandering around talking to the parents so she stopped to talk to me and I asked if she minded having a picture made with Lilli.  I was pretty certain I’d get the deer in the headlights, hands in the mouth photog, but I figured I might as well go with that to add to her “Celebrity” photo collection.  I like to call it her “I don’t think my parents voted for your husband” look.  (Honestly, I don’t remember who we voted for or who ran against him.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Even more exciting than meeting the “First Lady” was when I realized I was standing right next to Kimberly Williams Paisley – aka the Bride in the Father of the Bride movies, and wife of country singer Brad Paisley.  She as just there as a parent chaperone for one of her boys from one of the private schools, and literally we were shoulder to shoulder as I was trying to figure out where I knew her from.  (Um, TV.) I said Hi to her and she said Hi back, but I definitely didn’t want to weird her out on a field trip with her son for a picture with Lilli.  And she was so close I definitely couldn’t get a good undercover picture, so the best I got was below (she’s in the pink jacket).  She’s definitely cute and seemed just as normal as you would probably think they are.  The private school her son goes to isn’t even one I would consider exclusive or high priced, so it was kind of crazy to see her there among some pretty regular people.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The next day, Friday the 7th, was also a fun day with Lilli.  The division I work in had our annual Christmas breakfast downtown and then we all get the rest of the day off.  I made it out in time to get to go to most of Lilli’s weekly music class.  She loves their Music class and says she wants to be Ms Kim when she grows up.  I’ve always wanted to see their class, but never had a chance.  She was so excited I was there and I could tell how much she loved that class.  She got all into the songs and props they get to have, and it was a lot of fun to see.  Some of the kids in her class have to be told to get up and wiggle or sing, but Lilli was completely engaged.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

They did lots of cute Christmas songs with bells and stuffed snowmen, but by far the class favorite was a song about getting out of school for snow where they all get to peg each other with tissue paper wadded up like snowballs.  I wasn’t prepared for that one, and all her friends thought it was fantastic to peg me.  They’re going to be “performing” for all the downtown workers later this week on the steps of their school one day at lunch.  They’ve been practicing several Christmas songs so it’s going to be cute to see how they do.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After Music class was over, I checked Lilli out and I gave her a few options of what we could do with our afternoon together and she chose going to the “big movies”.  We had a lunch date at Panera and then headed over for the noon showing of Wreck It Ralph.  She was enamored with the Hobbit poster (mostly because of the working door).  Definitely not taking her to see that, but hopefully Brent and I can sneak in a date night before Abbi arrives to see it!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wreck It Ralph was really cute and she enjoyed it a lot.  There was only one other mother and daughter about Lilli’s age in the theater and that was really nice too!  Afterwards we came home and rested a bit before heading out for the annual Nashville Christmas parade!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now it’s time for me to work on addressing about 100 Christmas cards! Oh fun!