Recent weeks! Earthquakes and such

Just a quick run down of recent weeks--a lot happened even though it felt like this last month went by pretty slowly!

Our Spanish is coming along SLOWLY, it feels. Max seems to be doing pretty well in school. He was excited to pick a poem about dogs to memorize for his class poetry month presentation. He worked hard at it and we made 10 cut out puppies on sticks for him to use as a prop. He was pretty proud that he had one of the longest poems in the class :) I'm continuing to do some language exchanges and work on my own with you tube videos and computer quizzes. But the listening and following along with stories is challenging, even if I understand most of the words! Everything is processed at a slower pace. Isaac is pretty good at squirting around working on his Spanish at school--he does A LOT of math work at school, which he does on his own since the 5th grade math is too easy for him, so he works in his own workbooks. Not sure how to better help him get up to speed and have interest in working on his Spanish. The monthly books his class reads are just so challenging for him and neither boy likes looking words up in the dictionary, so now I have Max read and underline words and I look those up for him. Max's books for his class are much more manageable than Isaacs! I do give Isaac quizzes on the computer and am working through my workbook with him, but he definitely is not interested!!!

April included many days off of school and many holidays! This was a relief to everyone involved in the "Driving of Car to school in the mornings"! Good Friday and 1/2 the day before, Easter Sunday meant everything was closed. The next week on Wednesday was Census Day, which meant everything was closed and we were suppose to stay in our house until the census takers came by to count the family. We were confused on whether we all needed to be present or just one. Chris was knee deep in work these past few weeks so he was just working all day. Boys and I went to the park a few times during the day and our census person came by at about 5pm. It was kind of a long day! Then we had rain on Thursday so no yoga. And on Friday many schools were closed (not ours!) because of river flooding and water issues.

Chris left on Friday to Baltimore and his meeting. The boys and I went to the Science March on Saturday, which was interesting to see just how many people came out, but was also not really so much fun for the boys. We didn't know anyone, talked to two families, but the crowd was so big that it was hard to stay connected with anyone. And the march was really not that loud! No chants! Just some whistles, really didn't get one in the protest mood. We were about to leave the group while sitting at Plaza de Armas and my phone died on me. I was nervous about finding our way home, so I thought we should stick with the group until the end of the march, where I knew how to get home. We stopped for a bathroom break and ice cream close to the end, then made the walk back to the bus stop. Ended up being quite a long walk and we were quite tired by the time we got home. My phone battery is going, so that must have been what happened as it happened again the next Saturday.

We didn't do too much on Sunday except take a walk to Plaze Ñuñoa and a small wine festival there. Isaac really got involved in making hexaflexagons, something he saw on a video on Khan Academy. He was totally involved in doing that all day. I was anxious about having to do all the morning driving the next week so really was not relaxed or in a good mood on Sunday! I also signed up to help out in an English classroom at a local school and was starting that on Monday, also kind of anxious about that. Was glad when Monday was over! Turns out the school had a special program for Diá de Libro and my 2nd grade class was mostly involved in a special assembly. It was cute to see all the hats they made and listen to the story. It was VERY loud in that school, lots of children in each classroom.

Both Isaac and I came down with a sore throat and headache virus that made us feel a bit under the weather last week. Neither of us felt HORRIBLE, and Isaac continued to go to school each day, and it never progressed to a cold. I didn't go into my volunteer job Wednesday and didn't do yoga because of it on Thursday---hard to do downward dog with a headache.

Also, we got to experience our first earthquake shakes last week! Saturday night I felt it, boys were both asleep. Then on Monday there was a much stronger one but we were out playing football at the park. Friday we felt it twice, the boys were at school and had to evacuate the school building--though they tell me they only heard windows shaking and the floor didn't move! The epicenter was off the coast of Valparaiso in the ocean. I think the highest was a 7?? A bit of a strange sensation, felt a lot like the simulation at the Natural History Museum in London!

We made it through the week, but I really didn't do too much other than get the kids to school and home. I did a lot of searching for apartments for our move (!) and that was a bit stressful as it seems there are not furnished apartments near here or anywhere close to the school to make it a more tolerable drive. Also so much distraction from the awful politics in the US. Very hard to not feel powerless and depressed about the state of things.

We were very happy once Friday rolled around! I did meet with two friends on Friday for coffee and had some good Spanish practice. It was a nice sunny day! We were happy for the evening of movie night and cookies. Slept in on Saturday, everyone else was busy so the boys and I took a leisurely trip into the city again to stroll up Cerro Sta Lucia hill and the castle. It was a nice time! My phone pooped out on me again, but this time I had my paper map with me and i knew exactly how to get home. We stopped and played at the park at Parque Bustamante with a good climbing structure and played with a kid named Diego, who was 8 years old. Isaac wanted to play tag on the climbing structure because he's super fast and coordinated moving through all those ropes. Max and I are not so much! Max slipped on one rope and got a good rope burn! Sunday we were all going to bike the cyclovia (roads shut down on Sunday for us to bike), but Isaac slipped on the rug in the bedroom and knocked his ribs into the bed and got a good scraping! He didn't feel well enough to bike, so Max and I went out for a short bike. Got our tires pumped up as they were low and that helped! I also did grocery shopping since we had nothing in the house! Ate down to the crumbs during the week :) Ran to the feria after our bike and had invited a woman over who is here from Boston College on a Fulbright. She got here before i got back and the boys did a nice job entertaining her. We had a nice lunch of empanadas and salad, then went for a walk to the park and played some football. It was a nice afternoon!

Monday was a nice surprise because it was a holiday! And Chris got home Monday morning, when I thought he was getting home Monday night. We met some friends at the park in the afternoon. Nice relaxing day.

Now it's May!