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Our wonderful friend Elizabeth owns horses and rides them everyday.  She offered to teach Melissa and Bella how to ride and to let them come to the stable every week to ride.  Melissa has been asking to ride horses for a few years so this is an amazing gift for her and she couldn't be happier.  Today was the first day so Marcia and I went.  We did not tell Melissa that this was happening so she had no idea.  She is very excited.  Both the girls are completely unafraid and we can tell they are going to be hooked.

Bella had her second ever dance competition last weekend in Owing, MD.  She is, of course, as I've said before an amazing dancer and did a really fantastic job.  She improved considerably over her first competition about a month ago.  She did the same three dances as that one so I think all the girls were a little more relaxed this time.  They placed in each dance and got first place in one of them!

She lost her tap shoe half way through the third dance (you can see it in the photos) but she didn't lose a beat.  We were very proud of her in general but especially because she stayed composed when that happened.

My lens broke on the second day so the pictures of the second dance are a little blurry but I included because of the crazy acrobatics that Bella did in that one.

Melissa and her team had a soccer tournament in Richmond over the weekend.  They played well (for the most part) but ended with a 0-1-2 record.  One of the losses was from a team that probably shouldn't have been in their bracket.  The tie was a heart breaker because they were winning 3-1 and then ended up tying.

Melissa played really well (of course) both at goalie and in a few different positions on the field and we are very proud of her and her growth over the last year since she started playing with this new team.  She really enjoys the friendship of all her teammates and loves her coaches!  We all had fun hanging out with the team and their parents too between games and at the hotel around the pool.