This last weekend our activity revolved around Alex's musical performance of Once Upon a Time, A Rock Fable. She and the entire cast did an awesome job! She was a member of the Nursery Town Characters chorus and did fantastic. I posted a pic to Facebook-trying to figure out how to get the pictures off FB and onto my hard drive so I can put here, but in the meantime, since most of you are FB friends with me, check her out there! It will be nice to have our Friday afternoons back as rehearsal went from 12:30 to 4:30 and that meant it was a 5 trips to school day between drop offs and swim club night.
Ahhh, swim club! Alex swam her very first individual medley on Friday night as well. She was exhausted! Age 11 and under only have to do 100m total and the 12 and overs do 200m. She is very glad she did it, but also glad she is over it too. She told me this morning that next school term she's thinking about upping her training to 2x per week as she isn't exhausted and sore after every session now. Good girl! If we can get Annika swimming a bit better, she'd like to try it out as well.
We survived our first Thanksgiving in a long time without family. To be honest, we really didn't do anything. It's too hot to cook a traditional American meal, and it feels too heavy to eat anyway. We gave thanks for family and friends, and that we most likely won't be here too many years. While the climate is amazing most of the year, this time of year is heading into miserable, and since the AC still isn't fixed (parts are now on backorder) I'm thinking we'll be hanging out at the local mall and library where it is much cooler!
The kids have this week and next week, then we take a 6 week summer break! Alex thinks it's funny that we will have 2 summer breaks this year, 6 weeks or so each. So, in the end, we still get an American length break, just split up over the year! She'll be in year 7, Annika in year 2, and Ian in Prep. These are roughly equivalent to 6-7th grade, grade 1-2, and Kindergarten. I'm pleased with how the kids are doing in school and not worried about them being behind when we go back to the US. I figure if I ever do feel they are getting behind, especially Alex, between Lyle and myself we can fill in the gaps. I know of some great independent learning sites and curriculums! Ian is getting so excited to go to big school-only 2 months left!
Christmas-wow! It is really hard to wrap our heads around Christmas right now. It is the wrong weather for it, so it doesn't seem real yet. We're going to the school Christmas Carol festival tonight at school. It sounds like a lot of fun-bringing camp chairs, jackets, flashlights, and enjoy singing and listening to Aussie carols! There will be a BBQ with sausage sizzle-think skinny sausage wrapped in a piece of white bread with ketchup or BBQ sauce, YUM, cold drinks, paddle pops (popsicles), and other treats. On a family gift note-please don't send stuff as it is crazy expensive to send through the mail. We'll be back next Juneish and we can celebrate then! I already know what I'm getting for everyone-very Aussie Centric gifts that will be totally appropriate for everyone that time of year! Seeing as we'll have fairly long shopping lists we'll be bringing pretty empty suitcases for our stuff, (except for the late Christmas stuff!) ready to fill and return! I'm bailing on Christmas cards this year as well-I'll get some pictures developed and sent to my folks to pass out, but seeing as postage going back to the US is even worse than sending stuff here, perhaps we'll do summer cards from Costco to mail out for Christmas in July!
Miss and love you all-I miss the snow right now-believe it or not!
Ahhh, swim club! Alex swam her very first individual medley on Friday night as well. She was exhausted! Age 11 and under only have to do 100m total and the 12 and overs do 200m. She is very glad she did it, but also glad she is over it too. She told me this morning that next school term she's thinking about upping her training to 2x per week as she isn't exhausted and sore after every session now. Good girl! If we can get Annika swimming a bit better, she'd like to try it out as well.
We survived our first Thanksgiving in a long time without family. To be honest, we really didn't do anything. It's too hot to cook a traditional American meal, and it feels too heavy to eat anyway. We gave thanks for family and friends, and that we most likely won't be here too many years. While the climate is amazing most of the year, this time of year is heading into miserable, and since the AC still isn't fixed (parts are now on backorder) I'm thinking we'll be hanging out at the local mall and library where it is much cooler!
The kids have this week and next week, then we take a 6 week summer break! Alex thinks it's funny that we will have 2 summer breaks this year, 6 weeks or so each. So, in the end, we still get an American length break, just split up over the year! She'll be in year 7, Annika in year 2, and Ian in Prep. These are roughly equivalent to 6-7th grade, grade 1-2, and Kindergarten. I'm pleased with how the kids are doing in school and not worried about them being behind when we go back to the US. I figure if I ever do feel they are getting behind, especially Alex, between Lyle and myself we can fill in the gaps. I know of some great independent learning sites and curriculums! Ian is getting so excited to go to big school-only 2 months left!
Christmas-wow! It is really hard to wrap our heads around Christmas right now. It is the wrong weather for it, so it doesn't seem real yet. We're going to the school Christmas Carol festival tonight at school. It sounds like a lot of fun-bringing camp chairs, jackets, flashlights, and enjoy singing and listening to Aussie carols! There will be a BBQ with sausage sizzle-think skinny sausage wrapped in a piece of white bread with ketchup or BBQ sauce, YUM, cold drinks, paddle pops (popsicles), and other treats. On a family gift note-please don't send stuff as it is crazy expensive to send through the mail. We'll be back next Juneish and we can celebrate then! I already know what I'm getting for everyone-very Aussie Centric gifts that will be totally appropriate for everyone that time of year! Seeing as we'll have fairly long shopping lists we'll be bringing pretty empty suitcases for our stuff, (except for the late Christmas stuff!) ready to fill and return! I'm bailing on Christmas cards this year as well-I'll get some pictures developed and sent to my folks to pass out, but seeing as postage going back to the US is even worse than sending stuff here, perhaps we'll do summer cards from Costco to mail out for Christmas in July!
Miss and love you all-I miss the snow right now-believe it or not!
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