Reason #1,048 why we love our creek...

This is how we spend our Saturday mornings at 330 Lynn Drive!  Our kiddos LOVE exploring in the creek, looking for water bugs & tadpoles, and getting into some good ol' dirt!

The Nashville Flood of 2010 and a sump pump

If you haven't heard, Nashville experienced one of the worst floods in our state's history last weekend.  I can't begin to articulate what it's been like to see friends all over our city who lost everything in the flood.  However, the beautiful story that has unfolded is our city's citizens coming out in droves to help loved ones, friends, and strangers as they seek to rebuild.  WE ARE NASHVILLE is the mantra that we now chant as our community has come together, embraced each other, and fearlessly pushes forward to heal, to help and to rebuild.  If you're interested in donating to flood victims, a friend had a great list on her blog of agencies working w/flood victims.

Before we moved into 330 Lynn Drive, I never HEARD of a sump pump; I had no earthly idea what it did.  The original owners that we purchased the house from had put in this REALLY, REALLY nice waterproofing system including a sump pump before we bought the house. Over the past years that we've lived here, it's worked beautifully when we had an occasional storm, and I was thankful.  However, my thankfulness SOARED this weekend as the STORM of ALL STORMS came through and as I watched our neighbors on both sides (and many others in our neighborhood for that matter) have flooded basements.  Our sump pump was working overtime, and it beautifully did it's job.  I wanted to HUG the sump pump last weekend and even told a friend I wanted to make it some cookies because of my gratitude to it!  And, our sweet little creek in the backyard, oh how it swelled, but it never crept over into our backyard.  How thankful we were for this!

So tonight, we sit in a nice, warm, dry house and so thankful for the foresight of Mr. and Mrs. Smith, the original owners. (Remember, I mentioned they built it like a tank!)  Our hearts, however, are heavy and burdened for those around Nashville who have lost so much.  Please consider giving monetarily to support Nashville Flood victims.

Rain, Rain GO AWAY

In case you missed it, Middle & West Tennessee got hit w/MAJOR rain and flooding this weekend. I must confess that I didn't believe the "hype" that we'd heard from the meteorologists all week long. They kept telling us that we were going to get LOTS of rain. I, honestly, didn't think anything about it this morning when the rain began. However, after running to the post office twice in one hour (it's a LONG story!), I noticed a VISIBLE change in the amount of water on the streets.

When I got home, I looked in our backyard. My husband and I had been watching our creek all morning. The water was clearly rising, and we actually laughed, "Wow, the water's getting higher and flowing quickly." This time, however, I was a big more alarmed as our creek turned first into a raging river followed by a pond; finally, it was a growing lake in our backyard. Thankfully, the water finally subsided, and it never got over the "hill" into our backyard. I didn't get a great picture (I was trying to protect my camera), but maybe you can see how large our lake got this morning.

This will be another story that we add to 330 Lynn Drive's history--the day that the creek turned into a lake. So, we're very thankful that our house didn't flood and are mindful of those experiencing the chaos that these rains have brought.

2 Little Ducks...

We had 2 guests @ our creek this week...a male & female duck! My father-in-law was here that day, and he said they were looking for a place to nest. I was HOPING against hope that they would nest in our creek. We would LOVE little ducklings around here (well, I guess they probably would hatch after we move. sigh.). Sadly, they were gone the next morning. :(

We had another pair of ducks a couple of years ago. They were so cute swimming in the creek! We tried to convince them to stay by bribing them with bread. The bribery didn't work for them; they were gone the next morning, too. :( There's lots of wildlife to enjoy in our backyard, which has been a pleasant surprise since we're in the middle of Nashville! Squirrels, chipmunks, deer, minnows and frogs in the creek.

Spring has arrived @ 330 Lynn Drive

I love SPRING...especially @ our house! I'm in LOVE with this tree in our front yard. It has BEAUTIFUL pink blossoms this time of year. Not sure what kind of tree it is. Maybe you can help me figure that out! Also, remember this post when I talked about the flower bed in the backyard? It surprised me our first Spring in the home. The flowers BURST forth out of the ground a couple of weeks ago. The purple hyacinths have finally exploded and are in full bloom. The buttercups WOULD have been in full bloom by now. Do you see the yellow color on the ground behind the hyacinth in this picture? My sweet 2 year old decided to "pick" flowers last week. He picked ALL of the blooms off of the buttercups; they were JUST about to open! Sad that I don't get to enjoy them this year. Did I mention this was the SAME day that my sweet 2 year old "dropped his fishing pole" in the creek? He walks up to me with jeans wet up to the knees. "I dropped my fishing pole and had to get it out," he explained. :) Oh what fun our "big kids" have in the creek!

The Creek

One of my OTHER favorite things about 330 Lynn Drive is that there is a CREEK at the back of our property. Just follow this little wooden bridge seen above, and you're there! When we moved here, our oldest son was 6 months old, and I knew immediately that the creek would provide us hours of fun! It DEFINITELY has now that our family has grown to three boys! They love to play in the creek, throw rocks in the creek, go "fishing" in the creek. We've even had ducks stop by for a short visit in our creek! We fed them bread hoping that they would stick around and become the "pets" of our creek, but sadly, they flew on. Who knew that in the HEART of Nashville, you could have a CREEK in your backyard?!?! It's nice to live in the city, but have some amenities of the "country" like this creek.