And here's the performance. You can see me leading the kids out and then squatting down to help them remember the moves. I'm really happy with how it went.
Here's all the kids posing for their parents after their dance was done.
This Friday there is a Multicultural Performance at school. Last year, the performances were during the Multicultural Festival, but this year the Festival part (with booths) occurred in the fall.
My friend Mary volunteered to lead the first graders in an "American" dance. This really isn't a one person gig so I told her I'd help her. She picked the song "Surfin' USA" and I choreographed the dance. We practiced at lunchtime for several weeks and today we had our dress rehearsal. The kids are good at the dance moves but they still need direction. Initally, Mary and I thought we would need to dance along with the kids and during the rehearsal we did just that. It wasn't ideal since we are two grown women. But after watching some other dances, we realized they were receiving direction from a mom sitting down in front. We took our group to the side and tried that instead. It worked. The kids got the guidence they needed without the moms making fools of ourselves. Hopefully someone will take a little video on Friday.
Here's Serafina with her friends Gianna, Sunny and Millie.
On Thursday night, my aunt Sheila came to town for a visit. She's been a trooper about just hanging and doing our usual thing - like attending a soccer game and shopping at our interesting ethnic markets. Today we took a little road trip up to Berkeley to visit the not-yet-open Fern's Garden store. Sheila and Fern have been friends forever and Sheila used to work for Fern selling wind chimes at trade shows. I worked at Fern's Garden in my 20s. Fern's Garden has been in Long Beach for a long time and they are getting ready to open their second location in Berkeley. When we visited today, most of the store was set up and they were preparing to open on Wednesday. Fern let my kids make a wish on a "wishing shell" and place it into the sand in one of the displays.
Here's Fern explaining how to make the wish.
The kids took it very seriously.
We got some fancy ice cream just a couple doors down from Fern's Garden.
Then we headed to one of my favorite spots in Oakland.
Serafina turned in her home model project today. Her brother did the same project in first grade, but our house looked different back then. She was pretty clear on how she wanted to execute the project and was happy with the results.
It was a double field trip day today. I agreed to chaperone for the first graders first, so I didn't join Leo's third grade field trip to the planetarium. It sounds like he had a good time. Here's a picture of him with his friend Sharon as walked to school.
The 49ers football team have an educational outreach program that is a pretty sweet deal for schools. Not only did we have a cost-free field trip to the stadium, they also sent buses for the kids. There wasn't enough room for all the parents on the buses so we carpooled separately. I was totally okay with that. I'm not a big fan of the bus anyway.
Of course, I started our day with a stadium selfie.
All the first grade kids were on the field trip and we were split into the groups by color with a mix of all the classes. Here are the six I was in charge of... (left to right) Alyssa, Serafina, Reyansh, Niti, Ani and Maxim. They were mostly well behaved. Maxim is always a handful but he's little and cute and gets away with most of it.
It was a gorgeous day.
Unfortunately, we spent most of underneith the stadium.
We started out in this room where the players's families and friends wait for them during the game. It was large and beautiful. The tour guide talked a lot about team colors and the pictures on the walls and passed around a jersey for all of them to check out. It was a lot of sitting and listening for these little people, but they handled it well.
I thought this room divider was cool.
We didn't go out onto the field at all or even into the seats. We caught a glimpse of it as we walked by an opening. They were setting up for a Monster Jam on Saturday night. Serafina suggested that Leo might want to go to it, but I can't think of any adult that would want to accompany him. Tom has been there, done that.
Finally some outside time.
The kids got a chance to toss a football.
And jump some rope.
They also tried a long jump.
They all ate lunch inside together and then our group headed to the classroom for an art project. They were allowed to create whatever they wanted using color and texture. I'm not sure how this ties into football, but the kids enjoyed it.
After art, we headed to the 49ers museum. It seems like a cool place to explore even if you aren't a big football fan.
When you first walk in, you can see yourself on this big screen with different players, cheerleaders and even the mascot projected on it. The kids thought this was thrilling.
The kids had to do more sitting and listening though.
In all our years of going to Tahoe, we've never been in Tahoe for Easter Sunday. But this year, the schedule had us going up for Easter weekend with our housemates. Apparently, the Easter Bunny isn't interested in visiting the snow because Thursday morning, the kids woke up to filled Easter baskets and this note from E. Bunny.
Thursday night we headed up to the mountains. A storm blew in and we could tell it was affecting the travel time. There was chain control over the pass but this wasn't anything new. We've experienced plenty of weather and traffic trying to get to Tahoe, especially this season. But this time...this time was different. When we got to the base of the mountain, the highway was closed. Just completely shut down. We had to turn around and back-track 30 minutes to stay in a hotel room over night. In the morning, we ate the complimentary breakfast and got back on the road. We made good progress and then we ended up in a dead stop. Eventually, the cars started moving and we got to the house. We were able to head back out so Tom and the kids could get a couple hours of skiing in. I went for a long, beautiful walk to clear the bad travel energy out of my body.
The kids had a good ski day and ended it with a frozen treat. Here's Leo, Serafina, Nico and Carlo.
It was a long, tiring day. I was kind enough to carry the kids' skis to the car.
Here's a happy Leo out on the mountain.
And here's a video of Serafina ripping it up.
Here's the crew having some post-skiing refreshments on Saturday.
It was a little tough to cramp the traditional Easter activities into a busy ski weekend. The other mom Kim boiled some eggs on Saturday night so Sunday morning the kids could dye a couple eggs before heading out to ski.
We packed up the house this trip. Tom may make one last trip next weekend if he can't resist the snow, but the kids and I won't be going back up this season.
Last weekend was rained out. This weekend we are traveling. Poor Serafina hasn't had the opportunity to play a single soccer game this season. She did put on her uniform to go to soccer clinic last night, so I took a picture.
Serafina's class went on a field trip to the Guadalupe River on Monday. I didn't sign up to help with this one and I'm glad I didn't because I came home from Tahoe pretty sick. She did fine without me and enjoyed the trip. Here's a picture with her teacher Mrs. Moriarty.
And meeting an educational puppet.
On Friday, Leo had Theater class at school. He said he enjoyed it. Here he is doing an acting exercise with his friends Sharon and Solomon.
Leo also experimented with our neighbor Colleen's Rip-Stick today. She's letting Leo borrow it for a little while since he is getting the hang of it and thinks it's pretty fun.
We headed to Tahoe this past weekend for some spring skiing.
Serafina is keeping her hair long until after her dance recital in June so she can have a good bun for the performance. I see her reasoning but managing this hair is a bit of a nightmare for both of us. I braided it Friday night and on Saturday she kept the braids for skiing. They were tucked up before she headed out.
Our housemates were there and everyone enjoyed skiing together over the weekend.
Silly faces.
We went into Truckee on Saturday for dinner. Here's Serafina and Nico enjoying some sunshine before we head into the restaurant.
We had great weather and my kids really enjoyed skiing with their friends. Unfortunately, we missed Serafina's soccer game to go to the mountains. The last time we went to Tahoe we missed a game and the game in between was canceled because of wet fields. Now there is rain in the forecast for this coming Saturday, which means another canceled game. At this rate, she will only play three games this entire season since we will miss two more games later this month (for Tahoe and Denver trips). The coaches have been very understanding but it's a bummer that she doesn't get to play in the games like we had expected when we signed up for the spring season.
