End of School Fun

For the 16 years I taught elementary school I remember the end of school quite differently than I see it now as a parent!  June days were once filled with reports, packing up, endless meetings and countless parties.  Well, the parties still remain, at least! I am sad that school is ending but find it reassuring that Gio will return to the same classroom in September with many of the same teachers.  Though most of his current class will move up to Kindergarten, his favorites, Grace and Joshua, will remain in ECU (Early Childhood Unit) with the added bonus of Grace's father Mark joining the teaching team.  Here are quite a few photos from the last few weeks of activities at school and around Kyiv....

First, our beloved Enzo.  He does not like the increasingly warm weather.  That plus his fear of thunder makes summer his least favorite season for sure.  Do not worry, dear fellow....bitter cold will return soon enough.

Field trip to the Natural History Museum.  We arrived early so had to wait a bit.  

First a rather odd hut made of (fake) dinosaur bones, or so we think.  No signs in English, of course, and no tour guides, so everything we saw we just had to tell the children our best guess!

Bones.  There were a LOT of skeletons and stuffed animals in this massive place.  

A whale, we think.

The babuskas patroling the rooms were not too child-friendly.  In fact, we got scolded quite a bit for running, talking, laughing, touching, giggling, skipping, singing and other crimes of eager excitement.  Sigh.  

Probably Gio's favorite in the entire museum.  A giant "ca-RAB!"

One rainy, cold weekend we headed about 20 minutes outside of Kyiv to this very fun restaurant.  We sat outside under a thatched roof while the children raced about feeding animals (horses, pigs, goats, birds), visiting the playground and spending time in a children's house where women did face painting. 

Rabbits.  

Ordering grilled meats and lots of beer!

By the way, Enzo lay under the table throughout the meal.  He was quite happy to finish off a few pieces of the roasted meat!

Gio spent most of his time with his beloved friend Hannah.  They chased this poor cat around for at least an hour. 

And today was the ECU class party complete with a graduation ceremony for the children moving up to Kindergarten next year.  Gio's program is for 3-5 year olds, so the older children are ready to move on.  Gio will actually be repeating the EC3 year next year since he will still be 3 at the start of the year!

Sitting on the rug with Miss Suzie.  Gio somehow ended up in his bathing suit- not really sure how that happened! 

The mother who made the graduation hats was nice enough to make them even for the children not moving up.  Here is my non-graduate posing with Nikhil and Joshua (Joshua will remain in ECU next year, too, much to Gio's great delight!)

Miss Suzie will also continue to be Gio's teacher next year.  Great news!

And then the feast!

When there is pizza and a bowl full of raspberries nothing else matters.  Gio sat here peaceful and content throughout the chaos.  And so easy to clean him up after.  Perhaps the bathing suit was not such a bad idea after all!

Post feast Gio and a few boys hit the playground.

These are two of Gio's favorites: Joshua and Florian.

On the endless search for worms.

And then back inside for cupcake decorating.

The final act of the party: water guns!  Our amazing classroom parent Merilee  had the brilliant idea to bring a huge bag of them.  The entire class, many of the teachers and even a few of us silly moms joined in the fun.  Boys vs. girls!  Hard to say who won, but there were a lot of smiling happy children.  

Loading up (Merilee on right).  I have no pictures of the battle as I was too busy squirting!!

Today we said goodbye to Miss Kristine who is leaving school one week early to go to Moscow to finally get her two-year-old daughter whom she has adopted.  We are all so excited for the new family.  Miss Kristine will return to PSI in September but sadly not to ECU as she will be moving up with many of her current students to Kindergarten next year.  Mr. Mark, Grace's father, will take Miss Kirstine's place.  It is going to be another wonderful year, I think!

What is ahead for us in the next week or so?  No school tomorrow due to EuroCup (England vs. Sweden tomorrow night).  Paolo will be attending the game with a work colleague.  We will spend Saturday getting our Volvo serviced for its big drive and then hanging out at the Maher's house to watch Saturday's matches on their giant outdoor TV (they also have a kegerator!).  Sunday we will take Gio to a ropes course and then attend the going away party for Lina and Marius, the World Bank family who are returning to DC this summer.  Then begins our final week in Kyiv before we hit the road next weekend for our drive to Italy.  Look for a post soon on Eurocup.  I am actually going to attend Tuesday's match (Sweden vs. France) so at last I will get a glimpse inside this stadium that I have been watching being built over the last 20 months.  I must say I am curious to see what $700 million can build.....