After school play

Sofia has been going to school full time now since the beginning of January. She is so happy staying the full day and greets me at the end of the day with a big hug and smile. It is so much more pleasant to pick her up from school. With the weather being a bit warmer this week we have been staying at school for an extra 30-45 minutes every day so that Sofia can play with her friend Anna. They have a blast running around the school yard together. It is so nice to see Sofia developing friendships. Ali tries to keep up but she often goes over to the nursery section of the playground and plays by herself. It is nice for them to have time to play and burn some energy and it is nice for me too since it gives me time to talk with the other moms. By the time we leave school and get home it is around 4:15ish and the girls are ready for pajamas. It has been great to exhaust the girls since when it is time for bedtime they both go right to sleep.

Scholastic book order

I was so excited today when I was reading the info board in Sofia's classroom. The teachers will soon be sending home the scholastic book order forms with the kids. If there had been people around they probably would have laughed at my joy since it was probably greater than most. I have such fond memories of the scholastic book order forms. I remember bringing them home from school and agonizing over it to figure out what books I wanted since I knew I couldn't get them all. I am looking forward to going over the book selection with Sofia. Now, just like when I was little, I will anxiously await the order form.

Corn Flakes

In the U.S. there is an entire aisle devoted to cereal. You can have sweetened, unsweetened, corn, wheat, rice, bran etc....whatever your heart desires. Here the cereal choices are VERY limited and the majority of them are sweetened cereal. The one cereal that you can get that isn't sweetened is corn flakes. (You can get rice krispies and grape nuts at the British shop if you want to spend a lot of money) I have tried the few brands of corn flakes that are available and they are all terrible! I feel that in the U.S. when you buy corn flakes they don't really have that much flavor but here they really taste like corn. The corn flavor is really overwhelming. In any event, I have had a couple of bags of corn flakes sitting here for quite some time that no one will eat. I have finally found a use for the corn flakes. I can make a dessert with the corn flakes. Two of the British moms in Sofia's class had told me to just melt chocolate in a pan and stir in the corn flakes then drop them on balls into muffin cups and let them cool so that the chocolate solidifies again. It is really quite tasty. It gives the chocolate a nice crunch to it. I'm happy that I have some way of using up the corn flakes now!

Oscar

I forgot to post about Oscar. Who is Oscar? Well, Oscar is the Sofia's nursery class pet. Every weekend Oscar gets to go home with one student. The best thing about Oscar for parents is that Oscar is a stuffed animal! Sofia had a great time taking care of Oscar. She had to brush his teeth every morning and night. She also tucked him into bed at night. She also got to take Oscar wherever we went. This was a little stressful for me since I didn't want to be the parent that lost Oscar! At the end of the weekend we wrote in Oscar's diary so that the next child to take Oscar home can read all about Oscar's travels. Here is a picture of the girls riding their bikes with Oscar.

Beautiful Sunday

Sunday was a fantastic day. We woke up to clear blue skies, which after a long winter of gray skies, was really a treat. We decided to head out and enjoy the outdoors. We got the kids dressed and decided to go to the zoo. We took the bus to the boat crossing and then walked to the zoo. It was such a beautiful day and warm that we had to keep shedding layers on the way to the zoo. By the time we were at the zoo we all had our coats off and our sleeves pushed up. The girls enjoyed seeing all the animals at the zoo. Ali and I had been to the zoo recently but Jason and Sofia hadn't been to the zoo since last fall so it was fun for us all to see it together. The zoo was quite crowded since everyone had the same idea as us but it didn't matter since it was just nice to walk around outside. We used one of the wagons at the zoo so the kids wouldn't get too tired walking around. They both enjoyed sitting in the wagon. The kids didn't want to leave in the afternoon but after a couple hours at the zoo we knew it was time to head home. We enjoyed our walk on the bike path back to the boat crossing and came home for a little rest before heading out to church. After church we enjoyed dinner at a pizza place near our church and then home to put the kids in bed. It was a very busy day but fun. It really makes me look forward to summer.

I see the light!!

There have been signs around us that spring is coming. Every day on the way home from school we stop at multiple flower beds and see how many tulips have started coming up. They have the beds covered in evergreen branches acting as a sort of mulch, I assume, so we can't see all of the tulips that are coming up but we can see the ones on the edges of the flower beds. The girls really enjoying finding them. Tulips are such a sign of spring to me as well that I love seeing them. What really shouted SPRING to me though was when I went for my run on Monday it was light enough out to run in the park. I don't run through the park in the winter since it is too dark. I stick to the sidewalks on the roads where there are street lights and cars going by during the winter. I know that odds are I would be fine running in the park in the dark but I just feel safer in the light. So, when I went for my run on Monday I started out on my winter route and then realized it was light out. I was so excited I quickly changed routes and headed to the park. I hadn't realized how much I had missed running in the park. Watson likes the park as well since he can be off leash for a much longer period than when I just run the roads. I am happy that spring is coming. Living in a city and not being able to ski makes for a long winter!

Watson...

This morning Watson and I went for a nice long walk. I didn't feel like running but wanted Watson to have some outside time so we walked to Stromovka Park. Watson loves Stromovka and he runs all over the place. Today he got in a little fight with another dog. I find this annoying since if your dog is a dog that doesn't get along with other dogs then that dog should be on leash at all times. By letting your dog off leash you are essentially saying, "my dog is safe to play with." Well one dog that we came across today who was off leash was not nice and I quickly called Watson back to me. I gave him a quick check and saw that he was ok so I continued on my way. The other dogs owner didn't even seem to register that anything had happened and never looked at me so I couldn't even give her a dirty look. Oh well, i figured Watson wasn't hurt so I would just move on. Well, once we were home and I went out to do errands and then came home again I noticed Watson had something on his snout. That mean dog had actually bitten Watson!! I was very angry when I realized he had been bitten. I called our vet but they were closing and couldn't see him. I called a number I had for a non-stop vet and it was basically a vet on wheels. She told me it would cost 2,000Kc to have her come to our apartment. I asked her if there was any place I could bring him so that it would cost less. She was very helpful and Watson and I headed to the bus to go to a new vet. The bus trip was easy and the vet was very nice. Watson now has antibiotics and we have to disinfect his bite 4-5 times a day. I have to bring him back on Monday so they can recheck him.

The only upside of this whole story (besides knowing there is a non-stop vet we can go to if needed) was I learned a new bus route. When we first moved here and had to get our physicals done to get insurance we had to go to Motol hospital. The only way I knew to get there took us 45 minutes if we caught all the trams/buses on time. I realized today that I could have taken a bus to Motol and been there in 10 minutes! It is good to now there is an easy way to get to the hospital.

My brain hurts....

No, the kitchen didn't fall on me again. My brain hurts because I have a new Czech teacher. My previous teacher is in France for 4 months on a school scholarship and has set me up with one her friends to continue my lessons. I met with my new teacher tonight. She is a hard @ss!!!! This is good in that I will most likely learn more Czech at a faster rate but it also means I am going to have to put in a lot more effort to be ready for each weeks lesson. She made me speak almost the entire lesson in Czech tonight and my brain is hurting. I feel like even my eyes hurt from having to concentrate so hard. Wish me luck with my new drill Sargent...oops, I mean teacher!


Don't forget to donate HERE to the Avon Walk for Breast Cancer. - Thanks!

How to Eat Food

Not to sound like Martha Stewart but being here has made me aware of the different styles of using utensils while eating. I hope this doesn't get too boring but I need to set a bit of background. Most everyone is familiar with what I guess would be called the North American and Continental/European styles. The formal North American style would typically mean holding your fork in the hand you write with. When cutting you would switch hands and hold the knife in your writing hand, cut your food and then switch the fork back to the writing hand to bite. The Continental style is common in America but is the less formal; typically holding the fork, tines down, in the non-writing hand with the knife in your writing hand where the cutting and eating of food is done with utensils staying the same hand.

I have noticed two interesting derivations of the Continental style since coming to Prague. I find that many Americans, when using the Continental style will sometimes move the fork back to the writing hand to scoop up food while many Europeans I have eaten lunch with will keep the fork tines down and carefully push a portion of vegetable, potato, or whatever up onto the rounded section of the fork and get the full bite from there. This requires a bit of practice and patience to get the food properly balanced before moving to your mouth and it sometimes seems to me it would be easier to just switch hands, turn the fork over and scoop up a lot of food.

Well, there is also a Czech derivation of the Continental style which I suppose solves the challenge of balancing food on rounded top of a downward facing fork. I have noticed that most Czechs will keep the knife in the writing hand, the fork in the other but instead of keeping the fork tines down will actually just use the fork tines up but in the non-writing hand. Personally, I dont think I could just use my fork in this tines-up manner but in the "wrong" hand. There seems to be an advanced version of this whereby you keep the fork tines down to get a good cut on the food, and then with a bit of slight of hand you quickly turn the fork over, keeping it in your non-writing hand and use the fork as a scoop, with a bit of help from the knife. It seems not everyone is capable of this advanced style but I see it pretty frequently and find myself impressed with the dexterity required to pull that off.

Ballet

Sofia has started taking ballet lessons at school. Since she takes them during school time I hadn't been to see her dance but another mother who had stopped by the ballet lesson told me Sofia seemed to love the class. I was happy that Sofia was enjoying it. I figured she was since she would come home and show me how to do ballet. The ballet is actually offered by an outside firm that comes to the school for the lesson I had to figure out how to pay for the lessons. Noone seemed to know how I would go about paying for the lessons but Sofia's teacher told me to just come early to Sofia's ballet lesson and talk to the ballet teacher. I went to the lesson the last Friday to speak with the teacher but she also didn't know how I would pay. She told me that she would check and would bring me a form at the next class. So I am making progress on trying to pay for the class. It was fun to watch Sofia "dance". Here is a short video so you can enjoy it as well. It isn't the best video since it was hard to get Sofia between all the moving kids but it will give you something to see.

United States here we come...

Jason and I have decided it is time to come back to the U.S. for a visit. We have already bought our tickets and lined up our dog-sitter. We are excited to come back and see everyone. Jason has been back to the US for business twice since we moved here but I haven't been back at all so it will be interesting to see how I feel. It will be nice to see everyone and I will have to get my fix of Walmart and Target and Hannafords. I know, Walmart?? Target??. Yes, Walmart and Target! I have been away long enough that these two stores sound exciting to me! Jason keeps getting worried every time I say, "oh we will have to get that when we go back to the US", since he thinks I am going to be buying way too much stuff. I just say that I'm being realistic since there are things we just can't get here. I also plan on doing some major clothes shopping since I can't find anything here in the land of the skinny giant. I am going to have to make sure I bring my running clothes too since I am going to be eating my fill of all the things we can't get here. I'm not sure how we are going to fit everything in during a two week trip but we will find away.

Czech for toddlers

I have enrolled Ali in a Czech for toddlers class. It is a playgroup that Ali and I will go to once a week. We have been to one class already and Ali seems to really love it. The teacher is Czech and she speaks English very well. The entire class, however, is done in Czech. I realize that after a year of Czech lessons I have about a 2 year olds understanding of Czech! Ali likes the teacher and responds well to her. We sing songs in Czech which Ali really seems to enjoy. Since going to the class last week we have been singing one of the Czech songs before bed every night and both Sofia and Ali seem to love it. Sofia is trying really hard to learn all the words.

Not much going on...

I haven't posted in a while so I thought I would just update everyone to let you know there isn't much going on here. Sofia has been up coughing every night for the past week and a half. This means that we are all exhausted since Sofia is coughing at night isn't sleeping well which wakes Ali up and Jason and I are up a lot taking care of her. We still sent Sofia to school last week though since she seemed ok during the day. This week is school vacation week so Sofia will be home with us all week. I decided yesterday that I was going to take her in to see the doctor since her cough had been around for so long. I called the doctor today and was able to bring the girls in this morning. It turns out that Sofia has bronchitis. I'm glad we brought her in to be checked. We will bring her back in next week to have her checked again by the doctor. It is one of the interesting differences between pediatricians here and pediatricians in the United States. In the U.S. when we go to the pediatrician they prescribe medicine if necessary and then send you on your way. There is no check up to make sure you are better. They assume if you aren't better that you will call. Here, in Prague, when you see the doctor and you are sick they prescribe medicine and then they want to see you in a week for what they call "control". I'm not sure why it is called control but it is basically to make sure you are all better. On one hand I find this nice that we will be assured that our children are in fact healthy. On the other hand, I find it annoying because I don't want to make the trip back to the doctor if my kids are fine. I guess in the end I will just be happy that my kids are being well looked after by their doctor.
When we go back for the "control" visit out doctor will give me information for taking Sofia to an audiologist. I feel like she doesn't hear as well as she should. It could be she is just a toddler who gets absorbed in her playing and doesn't hear me or she could just be blatantly ignoring me but I want to make sure it is that before I yell at her! :) I'm hoping her lack of hearing is just wax in her ears that once cleaned out will make her hearing all better. We shall see.

Oh the things kids say...

"What is that?"

That question sounds innocent enough right? Well, let me put it in context. As Ali and I got up to get off the bus we were standing next to a woman with very large hair. I was holding Ali so she was in clear site of this woman. Ali proceeds to point and say, "What is that?" I am hoping the woman doesn't speak English at this point and I just quietly say, "A lady." I was hoping that would be enough but kids just say the darnedest things. Ali proceeds to say, "It's scary." while tucking her head into my neck to hide from the woman! I agree it wasn't the most attractive hair style I have ever seen but it wasn't meant to be scary. I quickly got off the bus and continued on my way really hoping the woman didn't speak English.

Avon Walk for Breast Cancer

My friend, Melissa, is going to do the Avon Walk for Breast Cancer in Boston this May. She needs support in order to participate in the walk. As some of you know, Melissa and I have been friends since 3rd grade. While we were in 6th grade Melissa's mother passed away. In her mother's memory please follow my lead and support Melissa with a donation towards fighting breast cancer. Click HERE to go to her donation page on the Avon walk for Breast Cancer site. Once there just click on the "click here to support me" button.

Thanks for your help.