Birthday Party

                                                                                     Last weekend we went to a birthday party for the girls friend, Kiera.  We are good friends with Kiera's parents and the girls have been friends since we first moved to Prague.  The kids don't see each other as often any more since they go to different schools but we try to get them together as often as we can since they have such a good time together.  Sofia was a little nervous going to the party becuase she was worried that all the kids would speak Czech since Kiera speaks Czech and goes to Czech school.  Once we
arrived though all of Sofia's fear evaporated and she jumped right in playing with everyone.  It is always interesting to be at these events to watch the kids and adults switch back and forth between languages.  There never seems to be a problem with languages and even when the same langauge isn't spoken you can still converse in a limited way.  The kids had a lot of fun coloring, dancing, joining in the conga line, trying to bite a donut from a string and some of the adults joined in for a little limbo game as well.  It was a fun party.  We all left the party tired from all the fun.

Ali playing

Ali really enjoys playing with her dolls and is very good at pretend play.  I am often amazed at how she can create a pretend world.  She dressed one her dolls up the other day and decided she was going to dance and sing a song.  It was very cute and kind of funny since Ali just kept singing the same words over and over.



Miss Susie...

When I was little my friends and I would slap hands to "Miss Susie had a steam boat the steam boat had a bell...".  We always had a lot of fun doing this and I wondered if kids still played this same game.  Well, they haven't learned miss Susie yet which is fin with me since I don't want her figuring out the meaning of that one yet but I was very excited when her friend Bella came over to play the other day and the two of them showed me one they had learned!  Apparently there is another way to do it but they have made up this version themselves to be silly.



Deer

In front our our house is an old apple orchard that I have written about before.  Well, there are deer that live in this orchard and the surrounding fields as well as the orchard across the field.  I have seen the deer quite a bit this year.  Sometimes I see them through the backdoor looking at the field across the way, sometimes on our road, and most often I see them at the end of our road.  Watson is usally oblivious to the deer when they are around.  He just doesn't seem to hear them which I find amazing.  The other day he did see them but the deer ran down a steep hill and Watson couldn't figure out how to get down the hill to give chase.  Today was a different story.  He spotted the deer before I did and took off after them.  They ran up hill and back into the orchard with Watson in hot pursuit.  I don't actually mind that he chases the deer what I worry about is that he didn't have a collar on and I was afraid he would get to the main road and get hit by a car.  I quickly made my way up the hill into another open space but Watson was no where to be found.  I stood there just calling his name so that he could eventually follow the sound of my vioce and come back to me.  It didn't take him long to find me and I was relieved he came back so quickly.  Since he never headed out into the road and came back on his own unharmed I'm glad he had a little excitement in his day.  He came back out of breath and seemingly happy.  It is fun to see the deer all the time!

It's Cold Again

Our short lived burst of warmth has come to an end.  We had light snow this week but it has already melted.  It made the drive to school yesterday less than ideal.  I had training from 6am-7am yesterday and it took me an hour to make a drive that normally takes about 8 minutes.  Once I finally reached home I picked up Jason and the kids and took the kids to school.  This is about 4.5 miles from our home and it took us about an hour to get to school.  So to recap....I drove two hours and didn't actually go anywhere!  The roads were incredibly icey and of course no sanding or salting of the roads had happened so there were accidents everywhere.  I was happy that the roads were much better this morning and it was an easy drive to school.  We have nothing planned for this weekend which will be nice.  The weeks go by so fast.  With the kids in school  and having after school activites the day flies by.  They also have homework every night so from 3:15 until 7pm it seemed like we are constantly going.  Once I pick the kids up from school and bring them to their next activity, we still have to come home and the kids have to do there homework and have dinner.  I also try to make sure they have time to play.  Fortunately they get to play most nights while I make dinner.  I know they feel like they miss out of they don't have their free play time so last night I made Sofia put down her book and go play.  She really wanted to finish her book but I knew if I let her read until bedtime she would regret it when I said, "ok time for bed.".  It was the right decision since she went upstairs and played in the playroom with Ali becuase they had such a great half hour of play before bed.  I am not worried any more about creating a love of books with Sofia.  That girl is definitely hooked!

It is warm!

The last few days have been so warm!  Nothing crazy but 8-10C (46-50F) but it feels so warm after the very cold and snowy month of December.  I even had to break out my sunglasses today which I haven't had to wear in a long time!  Today Jason went for a run which he hasn't done in a while and then we all went outside and did some clean up...raking the yard, fixing the pool cover, sweeping the patio.  It felt like we were starting spring clean up.  I'm still surprised that the sun is still shining.  I'm hopeful that this weather will last into next week so that I can enjoy a few runs in springlike weather.

Catch Up

I haven't posted since the New Year but not much has been happening either.  The girls and I had a lot of lazy days around the house.  I'm happy to say though that even with three weeks off school the girls did not seem to get on each others nerves and played very well together.  I did send the girls outside every day to play in the snow.  They would complain about having to go outside but once they were dressed and out they had a great time and would stay out there for two to three hours digging tunnels, sledding, rolling down the hill etc.  We had no major injuries which was a bonus.  The girls did fall over the back of the bench swing in the back yard but luckily it was just a couple bruises and a little bit of a fright.  I think they have learned there lesson about using the swing properly.

The snow has begun to melt and it is nice to see grass starting to poke through the snow.  It feels like spring is coming since the snow is melting and it has warmed up a bit but I'm sure we have more snow in our future.  The girls went back to school this week and were very excited to go back and see their friends and teachers. I'm excited to be able to get things done around the house.  Cleaning while the kids are at home is useless since I pick up one room and then another and by the time I'm finished with the second room the first room is a mess again.  Cleaning is never fun but at least when the kids aren't home there is a sense of accomplishment when the house is all clean.

So onward we move into 2011.  The kids will have school, construction club, gymnastics and Czech lessons to keep them busy.  I have the kids, the house, and my new fitness course to keep me busy and Jason will be busy with work.  While life will be busy we will still have lots of fun so I will keep you posted.

Happy New Year!

We had a fun relaxed New Year's Eve again this year but this year we didn't spend it at home!  We went to our friend's house to celebrate the New Year.  We took the kids with us so that they could play with their friends too.  We brought the kids pajamas and had them change into them after we had eaten a few snacks since we assumed they would fall asleep at some point.  We were wrong.  The kids stayed up until midnight!!  They were very excited to be up so late but behaved very well.  We lit off some of our own fireworks which took about 2 minutes and then we let the kids play with sparklers.  They had a great time making circles with the sparklers and it was fun to watch them.  At midnight the real fireworks started in true Czech style.  We could see fireworks in all directions from firework displays put on by local villages to  fireworks put on my local people from their yards.  We watch fireworks for about 40 minutes and then decided it was time to get the kids home to bed.  As we drove home we watched fireworks from the car but they were mostly over by then so it was mainly a good way to keep the kids awake searching for the five minute car ride. UnfortunatelyI left my camera at home so I don't have any pictures but it was a fun night!