end of year - the blue room performed a theater piece

the very hungry caterpillar

Ming Ming played the caterpillar

looking for food

eating different kind of food

having her last salad

then turned into a chrysalis and then a beautiful butterfly (Julian - a boy - played the butterfly, cool!)

singing the last butterfly song.

thanks for Jessica who took a video and put it online. 

after the show, as most parents started to leave, the kids got ready for the rest of the school day.

 

this pic captures Arun's classroom quite nicely!

 

 

This green linen dress is the best thing that I have sewn so far. it is not bad isn't it?

The school year has thus ended officially for MM, she will start summer camp at Akiba next Wednesday.

Picnic with the East Asian Languages and Civilizations department

football game after pizza picnic

MM was the goal keeper.. (the two of them look so big!)

 

 

 

Ballet Spring concert

If you can't find her, here is the hint: the tallest, in purple daisy costume, the one waves her friend to come back to their circle.

Ballet rehearsal, Spring concert tomorrow

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

school holiday 2: out to the museum!

Ming Ming's school friend Claire joined the gang!

 

such greenery!

 

Field Museum never disappoints!

 

concentrated in front of a TV screen explaining the evolution of species. 

spent four hours in the museum, picnicked outside, and rushed back to hyde park for ballet class. 

and before dinner we managed to squeeze in almost an hour of violin practice for the three girls (well, according to Mike, it does not really count as a practice for Avi and Nourit. but I am pretty happy with it already.)

if you want to be a big girl you need to sleep on your own

Ming Ming singing a song she just made up, about how she should sleep on her own if she wants to be a big girl, and then, after all the theorization, crawled back to my bed in the other room at 2am.
Second part of the video consists of me pushing her to count to ten in Hebrew, Spanish, German (all from school) and her two other home languages.

summer is finally here!

Spring was two months later this year. We were hoping for an early spring like last year (i.e. March), but we had a cold and rainy spring instead. Now it is all of a sudden SUMMER!  

School was off for two days (Jewish holiday again). But that boosted rather than dampened Ming Ming's spirit. Here we are on our way to a park meeting her school friends.  

 

 

 

Anya and Charlotte are both moving this summer, one to NYC, the other to Philadelphia, but the girls insisted that they were moving to the same place and they would be neighbors.

Happy mother's day

 

daily things

science experiment with Daddy

 

 

MM made a laptop computer, with arrows controlling direction for bees

recent drawing

focused on an abacus 

pancake dinner with Avi and Nourit

I got last minutes tickets to one more concert at the Symphony Orchestra - Abiyoyo. An African folktale performed by Pete Seeger. his original performance is so good that Ming Ming, after viewing it on youtube, got really excited about the concert. The CSO version is quite different (replacing Ukulele with drum) but still enjoyable. a bit too short though.
Pete Seeger's video is here, enjoy! 

videos

Ming Ming disciplining her baby, named Sister after "The Berenstain Bears", threatening her not to take her to the hairdresser's if she does not walk on her own... Ming Ming the martial artist, after watching some sort of martial arts film during movie night.. I asked her to do her martial art slower, and it became a dance piece.

The Japanese Cherry Blossom festival

We went to the Osaka garden in the neighborhood to celebrate the Japanese cherry blossom festival... too windy and too cold... but Jessica brought a lot of home-made Japanese food.. yuuuummppp!

 

the kids had a good time running around despite the cold weather... the adults gathered around food, shivering.