School's Out For Summer! School's Out for Ever!! Woche 19

Getting on the bus the last day of school

Well, maybe not forever, but we're certainly very excited around here!  It seems this week has been a crazy one.  They have so many fun activities for the kids on the last week, that Danyon and I spent most of our week either at the school, or getting to or from.  The good news is, that I found a new favorite way to get to the school with public transport.  This route only takes 45 minutes, instead of the 55, and I get to take buses the whole way (which are more stroller friendly than some of the older trolleys).  We drive up the street and head into the hills and vineyards.  We travel to the top of the hills, get a great view and then travel through forest almost all the rest of the way to the school.  It's beautiful! 
One day, there were only 2 of us on the bus.  That's much less crowded than the other way.

Tuesday was Deagan's class' picnic and awards day.  Of course, it was pouring rain.  That didn't stop the fun.  We just ate our lunches in the cafeteria and we had the awards ceremony in the classroom.  Deagan got the Mr. Sunshine award (the teacher loves his smile, although she admits that it is often a mischievous one).

Wednesday was Dyllan's class' ice cream social.  All the kids loved it!  They got to eat ice cream and play on the playground for a couple of hours.  The entire last week of school, there is no work.  There is a lot of extra play time and lots of fun.  Danyon was the hit of the party at this event, however.  He had about 5 girls surrounding him at all times.  They all thought that he was so cute.  You should have heard the shrieks and swoons coming from them after they found out that he could clap.  Watch out!  This one's going to be a ladies' man.  If all he has to do is clap and smile and he gets that much attention, dating life will be a piece of cake for him!  I might suggest sticking to girls a little closer to his age, however.  After that, it was my chance to show the kids the new way home.  We hurried to the new bus stop, just to watch the bus pulling away.  The next one didn't come for another 30 minutes.  I told the kids it was worth the wait, but they overruled me.  So, back to the old way.  We did get a newer, stroller friendly trolley though.  That made it nicer.

Dane with his teacher, Mr. McFarland

Thursday was field day and Dane's Moving Up Ceremony.  Fifth grade is still considered to be in elementary school here and so, Dane moved up after fourth grade, moved down when we moved here, and now is finally moving back up to middle school.  After having made a transition similar to this one in Indiana already, he appeared to be unaffected by the whole thing.  They had a nice BBQ for all the families (and they had Cheetos).  The graduation was nice and relatively short.  Afterwards, it was the first time that Dane opted to stay with his friends, hang out and ride the bus home, rather than coming home early with his parents.  Boo hoo, cried Dan.

We got report cards on Wednesday.  The report cards here are not based on the letter grades (A-F), but on a number scale (4-1).  I was very proud of all the kids for doing so well.  They had all 3s and 4s, which I thought was great considering that we turned their lives completely upside down and they were still able to focus on learning and adjusting to their new home all at the same time, and all in the middle of a cold and depressing winter.



Friday was a half day of school and the kids had planned a little water party with two of the kids from the bus stop.  One is the same age as Dane, and the other is in between Dyllan and Deagan.  They had water balloons and guns, they swam, they jumped on the trampoline (which we were finally able to set back up again, after 4 years) and they ate, and ate, and ate.  I think that everyone had a great time.

When making our summer plans, I conferred with the kids and asked them what kinds of things they would like to do this summer.  I was expecting to hear, "Let's go to this museum and let's go here, and here and here", since public transport is free for kids in the summer.  But, the first response was, "Please, don't make us go sightseeing everyday!"  With that thought in mind, I settled on just going sightseeing one day a week.  The kids were more worried that they might not be able to enjoy the pool and trampoline this summer than missing one more museum or old building.

So, Saturday, I didn't make any plans.  We just went grocery shopping and we took it easy.  We invited another couple over and we hung out at the pool.  It was Dan and my first time getting all the way in the water.  It was still cold, but bearable if the sun is shining and the wind isn't blowing.  We jumped on the trampoline and played Wii.  We had fun and it was the kids' perfect vision of what the summer months should be like.

Danyon went off regular milk bottles just recently

Dyllan had the quote of the week this week.  We were watching a year-end slide show video of Dyllan's class.  They had a United Nations day and kids had baskets full of items from countries all over the world.  "She's from Russia", or "He's from Germany", we would say as we tried to name each of the countries based on the flags attached to the baskets.  One basket had a red flag with a white cross on it.  Dyllan very quickly announced, "He's from the hospital!"  We obviously have to work on  geography around here, considering that "hospital" flag is from one of our closest neighboring countries, Switzerland.

After a month of being on a diet and doing Insanity again, I have to report our results so far.  Dan is looking great and has lost 15lbs in the 4 weeks.  I have not done as well.  I have only lost 5 and I had to fight for all 5 of them.  It seems that the best time to experiment with new desserts is when you are on a diet.  I tried a new lemon tart that was really good.  It has a shortbread crust and tastes like a lemon bar, but better!  It also got us thinking back to when we were in Samoa and we had banana cream pie with a shortbread crust.  Dan wants me to try to make that one next week.  (Easy for him to say, as he has lost big lbs this month).

Dan went to Russia this week.  He really enjoyed being back in a country where he was comfortable speaking the language.  He loved being back in Russia again, too.  He found time to go to the Banya (Russian bath).  He really enjoyed his coworkers there.  Things have changed a lot since he was there on his mission.  He was able to find all kinds of things to buy and all kinds of things to eat.  On his mission, he was lucky just to find food, let alone have choices!  The city he was in was small (500,000 people.  Population becomes relative pretty quickly when you're living in a city of 1.7 million people), and he really liked it.

Father's day is not widely celebrated here.  Actually, Austrians celebrated it last week.  We were a week late for them, but right on time for home.  Dan told me he wanted to be pampered for Father's Day.  I told him that Pampers were much too expensive here to be just wasting them on him.  He would have to settle for Pretty Baby (the local generic brand).  He didn't find that very humorous, but he did enjoy his new cow tea pot, his wasserkocher (a quick water boiling machine-cup of herbal tea in less than 60 seconds), and his new shirt.  He even found time to read in the sun this afternoon (he'll be enjoying his sunburn tomorrow).  Of course, the kids all gave him breakfast in bed and they made him cards full of love.  We didn't grill, but we had a great dinner.  It made me break out into song, "Welcome to the Cafe Mexicali, such a lovely place, such a lovely face . . . "  The menu sounded pretty basic, but it really took us about 4 different stops at different stores to pick up all the ingredients to make Sweet pork quesoles, cilantro lime dip (except that they don't have cilantro here, it's Koriander leaves for a substitute), homemade salsa, and chips.  After finishing, I must say, it was well worth all the trips.  We're off to eat one of Dan's favorite desserts:  Frozen strawberry delight.

By the way, "Plenty of room at the Cafe Mexicali . . ."--when are you all coming to visit???