Schools’ done!

In an attempt to catch up on events that have happened in the past several months...

Back in June, we realized that summer was creeping up on us when the artichokes started to come in. Besides the strawberries, they are one of the first summer things we can harvest!

Xiao Yu completed his time at pre-school, St. Andrew's.  His two teachers were wonderful and marvelous.  This year he made tons of progress on his letters and numbers, thanks to the teachers' dillegent work with him.  Xiao Yu will be attending kindergarten at our public school this fall.

Gabe graduated from his kindergarten class.  He really enjoyed going to class every week, because his little friends were in the same class.  There was a full on graduation ceremony and he tolerated wearing the cap (much to our surprise.)

There was a little reception afterwards with lots of treats.

Outside the church that holds his kindergarten, there are these stairs.  Gabe went down these handrails every time he was picked up from school.  So here is the last time he'll be sliding down these!

Eliana's class finished out their school year with a presentation for the parents.  All the parents were invited to see various projects that the students had created.  Eliana and a friend of hers were the MCs for the presentation and did a wonderful job explaining to the parents what was going on.  She is quite a good public speaker.

The kids also participated in Awanas again this year, and that drew to a close.  Each kid went on stage to receive their certificate.  This was Gabe's first year doing Awanas.  Because he usually refuses to talk to strangers, he has always before refused to participate.  But on a bring-a-friend night, Karina brought Gabe as her "friend".  The teacher was super nice to him and he ended up liking the experience and joined the group for the rest of the year.  One of the main purposes of Awana is for kids to learn more about the Bible, and to memorize Bible verses.  Gabriel is very good at memorizing, but he wasn't willing to recite the verses at club.  So, we videoed him each week reciting his verses, and emailed them in.  A bit of a compromise, but this was a major milestone for him, attending every week.

Here is Karina with her certificate.  Also she got a plaque for memorizing so many Bible verses.

Eliana got a trophy for memorizing Bible verses as well.

And that started our summer!

Haircut!

Karina has been growing out her hair for basically her whole life.  With the exception of trimming off a couple of inches now and then, she has never had it cut and it was down quite a bit past her waist.

As a result, it tangled easily and needed to be braided every morning.

She then decided she wanted it cut.  Also she wanted to donate her hair to an organization that made wigs for kids who needed to wear them because of medical reasons.  So a couple months ago, she got it chopped off!

It is now nice and short, and much easier to maintain!