Another field trip

So I get to go on a few field trips this year. A couple of them are sports trips of 3-4 days each for the big Brazil international school tourneys. Another potential trip this year is a repeat of the trip to Petropolis that I went on last year. Then there's the big one coming up in January that I've planned. Nine days in Greece. I'm really looking forward to that one.

But I just got back from my first trip of the year. A 4-day trip to the Mata Atlantica Rainforest on the northern coast of Brazil with our 8th graders. For most of these kids, this trip would constitute "roughing it", although it really was a comfortable trip for the most part. Here's a recap:

Day 1:
We arrived at a the Quilombo Campinho near Ubatuba, a local beach resort area. Quilombos are runaway slave communities that are, in many ways, frozen in time. They tend to be very, very poor communities that existed for years without even being recognized or identified by the government here. Finally in the late 1980's the lands on which Quilombos existed were legally turned over to those communities. Of course, that hasn't gotten them electricity, roads or government assistance of any sort. But it does get them visits from 8th graders in the private schools in Sao Paulo! What a consolation.
At the Quilombo, we ate a traditional Brazilian feijoada lunch. Then we had a chance to learn from the locals: basket weaving, drumming and dancing were the main activities in which we got to take part. Then, it was off to the pousada for a good night's rest.

Day 2:
My group, which was about 1/2 of our 8th graders, headed to a local creche (daycare center). It was a full day of community service; we planted a new vegetable garden to help them to be more self-sustainable, we contributed to a massive cleaning effort to make the daycare more vibrant and attractive for the kids, we helped to make toys out of donated and recycled materials, and we generally had a chance to make life a little better for the young children in the local community. It was a rewarding opportunity for me, but more importantly for our students who don't often have opportunities to give something back to the less privileged in Brazilian society.
When we got back to the pousada, I played some barefoot basketball with a bunch of my kids (NOT recommended) while the rest of them played mud futbol. Nice.

Day 3:
We on a trek up to Saco do Mamangua, a fishing community near Parati that you have to boat into since there are no roads (or any other sign of civilzation) as you approach. In fact, the roads leading to our boat launch were so rough and unmaintained that our charter bus couldn't (or wouldn't) take us. We had to take a rickety old bus down the road to deliverance. Along the way, we passed a man raking his "lawn" with no pants (or anything else) on, which was a bit of a shocker to the right side of the bus.

Anyway, we got a science lesson about the mangroves, canoed around the bay, ate lunch, got a hands-on lesson on net fishing and generally had a chance to find out how this fishing community exists without electricity or any other convenience most of us can imagine. Pretty powerful stuff.

Day 4:
The last day started with a hike through the rainforest. We stopped to swim in the river near waterfalls and learned (in Portuguese, meaning I was educationally challenged) about the ecosystem. Good stuff.
Then it was off on our 4.5 hour drive home that took nearly 8 hours thanks to Sao Paulo rush hour.

Did I mention the food (or water?) poisoning? Six of the eight teachers ended up with some nasty stomach problems starting late on day 2. I was one of the six. Not cool. But the drug stores do sell some pretty hefty meds for that. We stocked up on our way to Saco do Mamangua on the morning of the third day, and started popping pills. We labeled them "big blocker", "slow blocker", "vomit meds", and the like. Big blocker is a miracle pill, although I'm still trying to get back to normal now, 4 days later.

So that's the story. As Abby's pointed out before, traveling with the school is such a nice, peaceful event. The contracted educational tour agency we hire does everything..... EVERY. THING. We teachers just follow along like kids, which is great for rapport with them. It's a chance to interact with them on a different level, and I found it to be very rewarding.

Next stop: Greece.

Paul Comes Home Tomorrow

We've had a good week, just the three of us. We had dinner with friends last night and a quiet night at home Tuesday and tonight. It is certainly easier having them on my own than it was just a year ago! Both kids are desperate for Paul to come home though. Noah's taken to sleeping-no joke-like this all week.



In other exciting news...Noah has his first loose tooth! He's been *thinking* there's been a wiggle for quite some time, but tonight I felt it actually move a bit. Noah predicted it will be out by October 10th. I better load up on some apples, carrots, and other crunchy foods-Noah's a pretty determined little guy. I wonder if the tooth fairy pays American families living in Brazil in dollars or reais?

Sunday Football

It looks a little different...but Paul loves it just the same.

Big Decisions

When we started this international teaching journey two years ago we had visions of taking a little break from the monotony of our life and returning shortly there after. In some ways it seemed like such a short period of time, but in other ways I remember thinking Oh my goodness! I will have a four year old and a six year old when I come home! For some reason the jump from a 2 and 4 year old to a four and six year old seemed huge-much larger than just two years. And suddenly we're almost there. Now, we're approaching the time when we'll have to decide whether to pack up and head home, stay in Brazil, or explore another teaching opportunity. It's a hard choice. Our school forces us to make this decision very early-usually between late October and early November. Definitely before we've had a chance to secure another job. The year flew by-just now, after selling our house and settling in here-are we starting to see the bigger benefits of being overseas. We still have lots of South American traveling we'd like to squeeze in. I love, love, love going to school with the kids (and Paul too!). However, we miss family and the pure ease of being in the United States. Truthfully, I miss Target too. I've always been horribly indecisive which does not bode well for large, looming decisions like the ones in front of us. Paul's super logical and I'm more of a "gut instinct" type girl. I feel like so many other decisions ride on this one...I hope we feel the same when the time comes to commit.

Saturdays

This is the second Saturday in a row that Paul's had to spend the entire day coaching. I think that's hard on both of us. He has a long day on top of an already long week and I have my hands full with the kiddos. The good news is when the weather is good (like it was last week) we can spend the day like this:

The bad news? That was last Saturday. Today is gray and cool and we're trapped in a small apartment waiting for Paul to return this afternoon.

Adventure Recap

We enjoyed a three day weekend in honor of Brazil's independence this week. We weren't sure we were going to travel-traffic is horrible when the whole city is off- and the weather isn't certain enough to risk a beach trip just yet, but Leca and Peter invited us to Campinas for the weekend and that seemed to be the perfect short and sweet trip we needed. So Saturday, after a relaxing breakfast during which Sophie requested broccoli with her french toast rather than any type of fruit I had prepared, we headed out to Campinas. Leca is from Campinas and her entire family (think many, many cousins, aunts, uncles, etc...) pretty much still lives there. Paul traveled there in December, but I was in out of town, so this was my first trip. Campinas is about 90 minutes from Sao Paulo and we arrived mid afternoon Saturday. From the moment we arrived I knew I liked Campinas better than Sao Paulo-it is smaller, cleaner, greener, and people seem to drive normally-not like the maniacs around here! The streets are a bit wider and many are paved with cobblestones, adding to the charm of the city. Saturday night we arranged for a woman to watch Noah and Sophie at the hotel while Peter, Leca, Paul and I headed out to a nice dinner and then to a chopperia (bar) to watch Brazil play Argentina in a big, much anticipated soccer match. The weather was pleasant and it was really relaxing to hang out! Leca's cousin, Caca, joined us later in the night. It is really fun to have everyone together and I find it fascinating to figure out how we all move from English to Portuguese back English without too much thought. Well, Leca and Peter do that. I listen intently to the Portuguese (and understand a fair amount) but nearly always speak in English. Paul's pretty good at going between the two and he gets the award for the best effort of the evening.Hippie fair Sunday morning

Sunday we headed out to the Leca's family sitou (farm) for a chuhasca. Leca's family lives in this little Swiss colony outside of Campanis. It was really beautiful even though the weather was pretty damp and gray. The day was fun, but tiring. Trying to keep up and be personnable in a second language takes a lot of work-I have a renewed respect for what my students do each day! The kids were amazing. The way they interact with new people is so refreshing-they switch from English to Portuguese and back again without a problem. By the afternoon they were playing Brazilian children's games with all the other little cousins running around. Sophie especially feels at ease in these situations, but even Noah was comfortable and making friends. Late in the afternoon we went for a walk-oh, how I wish I had the camera! At one point the kids were walking ahead to look at some roosters (LOTS of roosters) on another piece of property. Suddenly, out of nowhere, these black dogs come charging towards us barking loudly. Leca quickly closed the gate to keep them inside the property and away from us. Just as we were catching our breath we turned to see many cows coming down the road and a bull! There was no gate separating us this time. I started to get really nervous at this point-but over the hill came the man in charge of the animals. I don't know what he would have done had the bull charged-but seeing him made me feel better and they passed by without any further excitement.
Monday Leca's mom invited us over for lunch. We had a fun time and Noah and Sophie had fun playing with Julia. We left midafternoon and made it back without hitting too much traffic.
It was lots of fun-I'm sure we'll head back another time.

Good buddies

For now we have our sights set on our four day weekend in November-we're traveling to Buenos Aires-and our trip back to the U.S. in December-we've built in a short side trip to Bogota, Columbia. Lots of travel to look forward to!

Papaya Boy

Picky Eater Girl

Worn Out

Weekend Fun

This weekend was gorgeous! It is still considered winter down here-but the sky was a cloudless blue and the weather warm. Saturday was busy-Paul and Noah headed off to teeball and Sophie and I enjoyed a mani/pedi together. That girl was made for pampering! She ordered up fuchsia nail polish with a glitter top coat. She politely asked the boy working the coffee corner for ice water on a tray-delivered to her while her nails dried! Sophie was so much fun, but I'm afraid this can't become a routine mother daughter activity...sometimes feels a bit ahem, entitled to things and doesn't appreciate them so much. I want to reserve this as a special treat!
Following the morning chores we headed out to a birthday party. I know I've mentioned how these parties go before, but once again I was blown away. The birthday girl is a friend of Sophie's and her mom is our co-worker, so I felt we needed to attend. The place did not disappoint! The kids enjoyed an indoor roller coaster, huge ball pit, amusement park rides, and a trampoline/jumpy aparatus. Each activity also has a monitor to help the kids-so the first part was fairly relaxing (the waiter bringing beer around didn't hurt either). The second part involved an hour long puppet show that was super loud and annoying. By this point, we were ready to go home, but of course, we hadn't sung "Happy Birthday" yet! The new three year old came out (escorted by her four year old brother) in a full Cinderella outfit and make up. Sophie was totally blown away by this and I am doing everything possible to deprogram her before her fourth birthday in January. I had planned something slightly smaller!
We ended Saturday with a dinner out with our friends Peter and Leca. It was so nice to go out, just the four of us, for the first time! We thoroughly enjoyed our selves and the kids were happy to spend the evening with Katty.Sunday...hmmm, we pretty much lounged by the pool and caught up on school work. A much needed, relaxing weekend!

Sophie's Classroom

Since I posted about my love of the Montessori program a few days ago, I thought it would be fun to post a few pictures of Sophie's new classroom. Both she and Noah are in a mixed age classroom. All 3-6 year olds are in one class, though the 3 and 4 year olds leave at noon (Sophie) and the five and six year olds stay until 3 o'clock (Noah). I love that Sophie has a chance to play with different aged kids and I love that Noah has a kindergarten class of 7-8 kids in the afternoon. Both kids attend P.E., music, and library throughout the week and Noah also attends art class. The Montessori program was a huge reason why we chose to come to Graded, and we haven't been disappointed! Both kids are just "down the ramp" from my classroom and I love to stop by while they are at the playground or eating lunch (Noah) to say hello. It is such a relief to feel so confident and happy about our school decisions. I love how it has shaped the kids!

Outdoor space for dish washing, painting, scrubbing, etc...

The dish area and drying rack...useful skills here!

The scrubbing rock

Montessori Love

One of the reasons I love, love the Montessori program that Noah and Sophie are a part of is that "practical life" is one of the centers the children spend time working on every day. All of that pays off at home:

Tee Ball

Noah started his first tee ball season on Saturday. The American Society sponsors Saturday morning sports teams at our school and another local private school. Noah was happy to take on an activity that included instruction in English-he's been getting frustrated with swimming lessons because sometimes he doesn't quite understand what the coaches are asking him to do. In reality, both swimming and soccer amount to a sports lesson and a Portuguese lesson, and after a full day of kindergarten, perhaps that's asking a bit too much! Noah loved it and next weekend Paul will join him as his coach!

Who's Complaining?

For all of my pathetic whining, the last two weekends have been spent like this:




When Paul and I are having conversations about how to structure our weekends better so we don't sit at the pool and Club all day long I guess I should stop complaining. Seriously.

Living Room Makeover

I hate complaining about our apartment-we live in a great community. The outdoor amenities are nothing short of breathtaking (especially in a city like Sao Paulo), but the apartments, and the buildings that house them, leave much to be desired. The rumor is that the architect was a bit of a communist and he wanted all the buildings to be "equal". All 8 of our buildings are plain cement towers and none of the buildings have balconies. The communist architect put all of his efforts into the grounds surrounding the buildings so that people would come down and "commune" (or sunbathe and drink caipirinhas for hours on end) with each other. He certainly accomplished that objective! But the apartments...some are better than others. In reality we got very lucky-our apartment has been renovated in the last 15 years. Although the decor is not my taste, per se, it is fairly neutral and we've managed to make it work. The biggest problem-the white! When we arrived last August it was so very white. The floors. The walls. The ceiling. Everything!
Remember?

The we painted around Christmas time and the apartment began to take on some personality:

Finally, at the end of last year, we managed to collect quite a few things from people that were leaving. Most of July was spent unpacking, arranging, and rearranging everything to make it feel like home...we're almost there!
Here are a few recent pictures of the living room/dining room. We're still looking for a large piece of art for the far wall, but things are coming along. The rest of the apartment is looking much better too, but this room has had the biggest change by far!



If Noah and Sophie don't stop waking each other up "to play" at 5:30 a.m. my next project is going to be to transform our playroom into an additional bedroom. They're making me crazy (and each other grumpy!).

The Last Few Weeks

Normally the beginning of the school year is busy for everyone. Add to that a two teacher household, a five year old beginning kindergartner, and a three year old heading to preschool and it gets a little crazy. Add to THAT the swine flu fears (thus a few days home already with a slight cough), a new, heavy teaching load and coaching position for Paul, professional leadership commitments for me, a broken toe, abandoned race training (grumpy mama), and negotiating a house closing from Brazil and you have pure chaos! That's pretty much what's been going on here. It hasn't been pretty. This morning I believed we were starting to emerge from all of this, but was then reminded Paul was working late tonight and half of tomorrow and Noah had his first tee ball game tomorrow morning. And it is cold. Really cold. And Noah just came back from a playdate early because his ear was hurting him so badly and he couldn't stop crying. Should I go on?
It has been a ROUGH couple of weeks.
There are so many wonderful, amazing things happening, but I've been a bit blind to them lately. I just need the fog to clear.
Fun fact? We've booked our trip to Buenos Aires in late November!
Hopefully I'll be back with great pictures and fun updates soon!

Swine Flu Fears and First Week Insanity

We're drowning in swine flu fears and first week insanity....be back soon!

Sunday Afternoon in Embu

A few weekends ago we headed to Embu, a small artisan town about 20 minutes from here. Weekends there are fun-there are quite a few craftsman that set up shop along the streets, small restaurants, and a relaxing, laid back feel. We were hunting for a few pieces of art for our living room. We didn't end up buying anything (yet), but had a fun time!

A Small (Large) Bump in the Road

Since late May when I ran a 12k I've had my sights set on The Rio International Half Marathon. The a little less than twice the 12k and I was feeling very ready for it. My training back in the States was spotty-but once I returned to Brazil I was very diligent, and I was just about a month out from the race. My training was right on track. Until Sunday when I made the crazy decision to turn on a light in our living room. And bump into a wall. Now my foot looks like this:

I know-it doesn't look so bad, right? That's because the white tape is covering my purple and black toe that is swollen to the size of my thumb. Our nurse at school feels confident I broke the toe, but Paul, in his ample broken bone experience, feels I may have just sprained it. Three days later, it still hurts like crazy and I still limp around like Tiny Tim. I have no idea when I will be able to run again-the nurse told me to stay off of it for 4-6 weeks-almost laughable since the school year started on Monday and I have two little darlings that need me up at home. We'll see. I'm awfully bummed that a goal I've had for many years, and was so close to reaching, disappeared in a split second of clumsiness. I guess there's always next fall (spring).

Last Days of Vacation (for some of us)

I made it back from Seattle! Can you tell?


Today is officially the our last day of winter vacation and tomorrow we are back to school. The last few weeks have been miserable here-cold, rainy, muddy, and gray. Usually I have no complaints about living in an apartment, but after three weeks of that weather I was beginning to go crazy and the apartment walls seemed to be closing in. I was starting to feel ready to go back to work, but, of course, today the weather turned and it was gorgeous. It gave us a perfect day to enjoy a chuhasca (Brazilian BBQ) with friends in Embu, but it definitely made me long for a few more days of lounging at the Clubbe and playing at the park. Hopefully, these sunny days will start to be a little more frequent, although the rumor is by Tuesday we could be in the 40s! Either way today was a perfect way to end our "winter" vacation (which is strange since we battled 100 degree temps in Austin and Seattle and perfect summer weather in Virginia).

I bought the new kids new backpacks in Seattle. It seemed like a fun way to kick off the new school year-Sophie is starting the K-3 program and Noah is a big, full day kindergartner. Unfortunately, due to the swine flu concerns our school decided to postpone the first day of school for students until Monday, August 10th. Most schools here are closed until August 17th, so we'll see if Graded follows suit or actually opens on the 10th. Noah is really, really excited to head back, so for his sake I hope it is sooner rather than later!

Not so fast, guys!