Kiddie Vodka Shots

After a trip to the Botanical Gardens, what better than water out of shot glasses.  Largely because they were the only glasses available in the room. Bottoms up!

Crimea - Simferopol, Land of.. Not Much

Crimea is the peninsula in Ukraine that sticks out into the Black Sea.  Long known for its restorative health properties, due to the fresh sea air and fresh water, it is home to a number of sanitoriums (no, not for crazy people - like 19th century spas.) Due to a happy coincidence, I was in Simferopol for a Friday and Saturday conference for defense attorneys (on land law, and all in Ukrainian, so you can imagine how much I got out of it!)  But it was the perfect excuse to invite Aaron and the girls down Saturday night, to celebrate the May Day holidays, since Monday and Tuesday were days off.  Their flight down, already scheduled to get in at the ungodly hour of 11 PM, was delayed for ridiculous reasons, and they didnt' arrive until 1 AM.  Poor kids!  Thankfully, Simferopol airport is pretty small, to say the least, (the baggage claim is outside - it's a wall that you can walk around, that has a donut shaped baggage carousel - pretty funny!) and it was a domestic flight.  As a result, I was able to sweet-talk myself past the guards and out on to the tarmac to get in the plane and help Aaorn off-load sleeping kids.  Try that in America!

Anyway, On Sunday morning we had a lovely (?) breakfast at my hotel - which was definitely not a spa.  And then we walked across the street to the Botanical Gardens.  They had been busily planting of the May Day holidays and it was beautiful.  They do take their flowers seriously here, I tell you. 

And here is my dear husband, practicing his Ukrainian woman super-cheesy pose.  

Don't look behind you - there's a killer pigeon, which kept following us around, even though we had no food!

Super-stroller - built to withstand the squirming of not one, but two children! Unfortunately, the kid on the bottom was not so designed...

Our first Bicycle

A direct outgrowth of the ANZAC lunch was the gifting to us of a child's bicycle that our friends are no longer using. Miss S was over the moon.  She's seen bicycles, and ridden on the back, but never had her own.  We tried to ride it in the park down the street, but the road was so bumpy that the training wheels kept getting stuck.  So she rides it in the apartment.  My favorite thing is when she wakes up in the morning, she hops on her bicycle to ride from her bedroom to the living room.  And lest you think we let the little kids have all the fun, here's photographic proof of "Mr. Hot Wheels" doing some tricks. 
And once I upload our current photos, there may or may not be a photo of GranDora riding the bicycle as well...

ANZAC Day!

This year ANZAC Day, April 25th, fell on the Easter Monday, and so we invited friends over for a big brunch.  Unfortunately, we were so busy having fun, we didn't get many photos.  But see if you can "spot the kiwi" in this photo... Actually, see if you can spot the confused Kiwi-American, who isn't quite clear what holiday she is celebrating. And her older sister, who is wearing a dress in the colors of the Ukrainian flag.  We are all truly citizens of the world, with love for members of all nations... but a little more love for Kiwis and Yanks!  So Happy Memorial/ANZAC Day everyone, keep our soldiers and veterans in your thoughts.

Easter Sunday - Enjoying the weather!

Easter Sunday the weather was so beautiful that we wanted to go out and enjoy the sunshine and the freedom to run around.  We chose to head back to "Glory Park" which is between the Lavra (Monastery complex) and the Statue of the Mother of the Motherland (see below.)  It's a lot of stairs but at this point both of the girls can walk, so it's not as bad as the first time we did it in the end of 2008.   

Mother of the Motherland.  At any given point, I was only in charge of one of the two girls.  Here we stop for a photo, and the little one makes a break for it. She really is active at this point, but more motion than sense, as I like to say.

Someday my children will thank me for the opportunity to have a cool childhood.  They will also marvel at the fact that our idea of fun was climbing over left-over Soviet military hardware and picnicing at the site of WWII memorials and graves.  Here it's time for fun with anti-aircraft guns! Yeah!

Easter Sunday - Looking for treats!

The baskets started out empty, but for some soft, floppy bunnies, and some leftover New Year's candy (shhh, don't tell the girls!)

It doesn't take much to impress them - here Miss S is showing off her ChupaChup lollipop.  The idea that there was candy hidden all over the house was exhilarating to her.

The older got the concept, and you can see an egg hidden behind her on the chair.  She left some for her sister - some of the more obvious ones, but as you can see, Miss G found what she always finds - mischief!  She loves to push the power button on the laptop and see if anyone is Skype-ing her, since obviously that's the only reason people Skype, right?

The Easter bunny was creative, and even hid an egg in our toy teapot.  Mom was only concerned that we find all of the real eggs, and they not disappear to be discovered either during packout or, even worse, after we arrived in New Zealand!  But I needn't have worried - as you can see, the haul was excellent.  And she even got over her initial concern when she picked up an empty egg "Mom!  It doesn't have any lollies!  What's wrong!"  Perhaps the Easter Bunny is trying to teach you that the hunt is just as important as the result?

 

Egg-stravaganza!

Even though we're overseas, we still like to do somewhat traditional things.  Traditional American things, as we also take on activities reflective of where we are.  And this year, we got to dye Easter eggs. We waited until G "The Destructor" was down for a nap, since her current craze is to "decorate" the house, just as we get ready to leave, with crayon and paint, and I thought that egg dye would be too much for me to handle. 

And so below, I include to keep the punters happy...enjoy my proof that my kids do all get along, and the teenager is actively engaged in our lives.  (Good form, son!)

The Laleka April Fairy Tale Spectacular! (Video)

The performance are always extravagant.  We were chosen once again to be a frog, but of course I didn't really have a good costume (still.)  Thankfully the school was able to provide a great frog hat (where were they hiding it last time???)  There were three froggies, and all of their names started with "S."  My favorite part is near the end when they pretend to eat the flies.  Classic!

The Laleka April Fairy Tale Spectacular! (Pictures)

And once again, we are back at beautiful Laleka during a workday to view a perfomance by the "Younger Class."  My daughter, foe the second time in a row, played the role of "Frog."  This time, though, you'll notice that they managed to give her an awesome hat.  Excuse me - where was that last time??So in this "spectacle" they acted out the fairy tale "Happy Hut" or "Veselinka Khatinka."  All of the groups of animals come up and act out their song, and then knock on the door of the hut (which she's sitting next to in the bottom photo) and go inside - figuratively, since these are all 3 years old, and cramming them together, while fun to watch, wouldn't end well.  Finally, at the end a bear joins in, and something happened, but since I don't speak Ukrainian, it's still a bit of a cliff-hanger for me.  I guess I could watch all of the video if I cared to.

Bunnies, Mice, Frogs.

And then at the end the awesome nursery teacher who does the planning for these events came out dressed as something - a raincloud?  Regardless, she had a big bunch of blue balloons shaped like a raincloud, and each kid got to do a circuit with her.  They loved it.

And the obligatory gift was provided at the end - thankfully not edible.  It's a great workbook... in Ukrainian.  I can figure it out, though, as the concepts of matching and grouping transcend linguistic ability.

Best frog EVER!

Easter finery at the Marine House

Happy, Happy Easter!This was the first year that we really felt like at least one of the girls was interested and involved in the process. But that didn't stop the youngest from having fun!  We went to the Marine House for their outdoor Easter egg hunt.  It's a great location since, as you can see, there's a tall, secure fence ringing the entire building.  You can relax and enjoy, and know that your kids won't wander off into traffic.  (Although I have since learned that small, devious and enterprising kids can actually slip through the bars, but I didn't know about this at Easter.  The photos on the couch are the only examples I have of the girls in their lovely Easter frocks, since April and May here in Kyiv are still quite chilly.

 

And below we have the aftermath of the hunt, once all of the eggs were gathered.  Like many of the littler kids here, who have largely grown up in an urban environment, the concept of "grass" is still exotic and foreign.  Lots of our playgroup buddies were interested in (or wholly suspicious of) the concept that you could sit in the grass and play, and that it wasn't dirty and full of cigarette butts and dog poop.

On that note, however, in one of the funnier moments, when the under-2s did their hunt, Miss G picked up not one single egg, but did hurry over to the garden, grab a cigarette butt and put it in her basket.  Her only contribution. In the event she needed to hunt and gather for a living, I think she wouldn't last long, although she'd probably figure out a way to organize the others to gather for her and then reap the rewards, as she did with her big sister's loot.

EGGS!

Poster child for Phila Horticultural Society!

OK, so older sister isn't in a flower dress, but I thought it was a nice picture, and worthy of inclusion.  In the other photos, the little Miss G is modeling a great dress covered in what I consider "'80s puffy paint" with lady bugs, flowers and bees.  When she put it on, all I could think was that GranDora and PHS would appove.  So enjoy the photos of my uncooperative model in her cute, cute (free) dress!