A World without walls
everyday life while homeschooling overseas
We've started a new round of EnglishConnect classes! This time, we got two EnglishConnect 2 classes! It's so much fun! We really love our students and enjoy watching them learn. Last time we taught, we held classes in the evenings two nights a week. Now we've switched to all day on Saturday, and while it's a seriously long day, it's so much better than night time! Although, it's STILL hard not to switch to Spanish when I'm explaining! :)
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This is a pretty bad picture, sorry... But we had a cool opportunity to go to a concert with some friends! It was all Bolivian music played on typical Bolivian instruments. What fun! We enjoyed a fun night out with friends and some very cool music! :) The theater was super old, very quaint and beautifully decorated. I loved it! The Amazon Rain Forest in Brazil and Bolivia has been burning now for almost a month. SO SAD! So Claire's Theater teacher decided to put on a benefit concert. All the kids sang songs about helping the animals and forests and love and things of that nature. We all had an entrance fee, and could also buy raffle tickets, and all the proceeds went to helping the families and animals that were affected by the fires. It was a fun little concert, even if it was a little cold outside. I always love watching my Claire perform! :)
Yes, it's my birthday. It's a little sad, because Devin's in Hungary (well, he's on his way home right now, but still...), but it was made happy by my super special Bolivian family who made me an incredible dinner and even a magical gluten free cake! :) I love these people! They really made my day special, and tomorrow will be special, too, because Devin will be home! Just means my birthday lasts longer. :) In other news, I chopped the tip of my thumb off. Oh, it was painful. It wasn't bad enough to warrant a hospital visit...but I'll have a cute little scar. The Young Women had a 'spa night' for the moms, and they painted our nails. Since one of my nails was covered with a bandaid, I got a flower painted onto my bandaid! So cute! Love my daughter's pretty art work! :) I think this is one of my most favorite days here in La Paz. I'm sad this was our last one! El Dia del Peaton just means that no one can drive cars (except for a few with special permits). Everyone walks or rides bikes everywhere. There are parties and dancing in the streets. We enjoyed walking down the middle of the street to get to church, knowing no one was going to run us over! And after church, I stopped to read a book in the middle of the road! Ha! I sure miss walking paths and safe sidewalks. Maybe someday...
Hooray! It's Devin's birthday again! We had a whole lot of fun this year. The kids and I planned a small party on Devin's birthday...making a cake and a nice dinner. However, the week before his birthday, I made plans with a bunch of friends to have a huge surprise party!!! It was SO much fun to plan it all week long with my friends and with Claire! We got all the decorations and planned all the food. Then, in the early afternoon, I made the little boys take Devin to a nearby park to play so Claire and I could prepare. The best part was that the boys thought we were just making special food--they didn't know about the surprise party, either! :D Claire and I rushed around and made everything as fast as possible. Our friends trickled in and helped out with decorating and food prep. When Dev and the boys got back from the park we were ALMOST ready, so I made them all stay in the Lego room until I said that they could come up! :D It was SO fun to see the look on all their faces when they came up to the big crowd in our living room! :) We spent the evening singing songs with guitar accompaniment, eating LOTS of food, chatting, and just enjoying each other's company. The best was when Luchy got 'drunk' from Coke Zero. She's so hilarious! We had so much fun--I'm really grateful for our Bolivian family! :) When we add-on, collect, and hoarde, we stop looking outside of ourselves. We become afraid to leave...afraid to lose our stuff...afraid to look around and try new things. It's good to start over--to rebuild--to start from scratch again. This is how I keep my foundation strong: take away the building and all the stuff every once in awhile so I can actually check my foundation and fix it up and restore it if it needs help.
While living the foreign service life is HARD, it's also very rewarding and rich--full of experiences that are unforgettable and life-changing. While there are times that I hate it--hate bidding (GAH!!!), hate moving and packing and unpacking, hate being so far from family all the time--it's these difficulties that have made me stronger and made me who I am. I am a better person because of it. I know who I am. My foundation is constantly checked and rechecked. Hard things are good. Santa Cruz. This was the first time I've been there. Devin had to go down for the big 4th of July event, so I flew down with him! We had a really fun hotel that had great views of the city. We ate some really yummy food (like Salmon!!!). One of the really cool things we got to do was volunteer for Habitat for Humanity. Honestly, after doing that, I wonder how these houses stay standing! Seriously. None of us knew what we were doing, and I truly think that all the professionals come through after and fix everything we did wrong. For example, I really don't think that the bricks I mortared together are going to stay together for very long... :/ But it was fun. It was really hard work, digging those pits and passing around bricks, but it was fun to something manual for a bit. I'm really grateful it's not my usual job! Teaching EnglishConnect is a huge sacrifice of time, but we love it so much! We love our students and we love enjoying time with them! We planned a big 'graduation party' with our EnglishConnect 2 class and enjoyed eating a TON of food! We BBQ-ed hot dogs, made tons of tacos, roasted marshmallows and made S'Mores! We had ice cream after, of course! We even found some sparklers and played around with those in celebration. Such a fun class! We will miss them! |
Who Am I?
As a Stay At Home Mom of 4 wonderful children, I have the amazing opportunity not only to home school them, but to do so in many different places! I am married to the most amazingly wonderful (and handsome) man in the whole world! Together, we seek out, every day, that Joy in the Journey that makes life exciting! Archives
November 2020
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Emily's books
by Dan Brown
I like that the plot twists and turns a lot...and it makes you think. However, I don't appreciate Dan Brown's endings in his books. I find the endings incongruent with the rest of his stories--why make it a romance for the last chapter...
by Shannon Hale
I loved this book. I'm a sucker for fairy tales/fantasy. This was so well written! I can't wait to read all the rest of her books!
by Shannon Hale
I'm reading this one again. I liked it the first time I read it. I'm still liking it for the second time around. I like all of Shannon Hales' books.
**Still lots of fun the second time around! I do like this book for a comfortable...
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