Back to School

A new school year began about a moth ago. This year Pace is Year 6 (6th grade) which here is the start of middle school. So there are a lot of changes, he stays at school longer, now eats lunch at school, and has a different teacher for each class. He loves it. What he really loves is they have extra clubs after school and he gets to be in two of them. He decided on robotics and band (think small rock band not large instramental band). He has been sharing his piano tallents there. He also started school a day before his younger brothers, so he got a first day picture by himself.

Grant is in Year 4 this year and still loves his classmates and teachers. He already won an award for being a great participator, and I love that he is finding his confidence in school. Louis is in 2nd grade and is still is goofy friendly self. His teacher put together a kind words wall and she said Louis is sending messages where he tells his friends they are his favorite foods, like "You're chicken nuggets". Haha, what a jokester. Kai is officially in Kindergarten (senior kindergarten here). He is playing great with all his classmates. He loves the english portion of school (which is most of it for his age), but is still pretty uninterested in portuguese. He loves coming home an sharing animal facts he learned at school.

Jane actually started a week and a half before everyone else at her preschool. She is going to Joao Machado which is nextdoor to our apartment. She goes 17-11:20 every weekday, and then we spend a half an hour playing babies or kitties before we go and pick up Kai for school. She is only 3, but she needed this for the social interactions. We've found it hard to find friends here that can play in the mornings and she misses her best friend Ezra from Japan. And while she was nervous at first, she has loved making friends at school.

Also, we went to celebrate Louis's friend's birthday together. They had really fun inflatables and a really talented face/arm painter. We all had fun at the party. I was feeling pretty proud of myself for holding a good conversation with everyone in protuguese even with all the background noise (yes, I am bragging 😜).

And speaking of birthday's we've had a couple this month in our family as well. Louis turned 8. He is very passionate about things. He loves to cook, build legos, and play minecraft. We celebrated with his friends at school and as a family here at home. He choose to watch a pokemon movie his birthday night.

Grant turned 10. We celebrated with his friends at schoo (although I didn't get any pictures) and as a family at home. Grant LOVES rocks. He got a rock polisher for his birthday and now we have the sound of it as a bockround soundtrack to our lives. He loves to build things out of any kind of blocks. He's picking up a new hobby or model making from his dad and really wishes we had more materials for diaramas to put them in. He chose a red velvet cake and also wanted to watch a pokemon movie on his birthday.

On the last weekend in February we went to a Chinese festival. We got to hear a beautiful string group play both brazilian and Chinese music. It was lovely. And they had a fun photo stop. And as a bonus the expo center had a t-rex we could check out as well

So, our first couple weeks of school have flown by with lots of fun. And after a lot of adjustments we are starting to get used to the school schedule, but we sure miss sleeping in a bit later.