School has started again, this year with Dominik. He proudly walked to school with his bag and a school cone almost larger than himself. He quickly figured out where what is, how it works with lunch and that he can play outside during breaks. He likes doing his homework right after the school and it is better to leave him alone until he is finished and then quickly check it with him.
At the last moment and out of the summer season, we went on another trip, to the cairn of Štefánik. The weather was wonderful. We only missed the train that regularly goes up to the cairn from Brezová pod Bradlom during the season but we promised our children to come here sometimes again. The children were captivated by the size of the cairn and the beautiful view from above. Finally, after a few steps down the forest, we came to the Bradlo cottage, where we sat down for a coffee / Kofola with a cake.
Beautiful weather, not too hot. We were thinking about some short trip before lunch. Everyone agreed to go to the ruins of Korlátko. We somehow packed our backpacks longer than the trip itself. To get there, we set off on the way to Rozbehy, from which we turned onto a forest path and in a while we were already climbing ruins. Quite a few parts were repaired and new organic toilets appeared.
At the end of the holidays, we finally managed to travel to our family. Almost traditionally and with great joy, the children helped with cooking of tomato sauce and harvesting the potatoes. They rode on a tractor with harrow and all the time played outside. It was no longer very warm, we skipped swimming this year, but the children discovered in the store a sticker magazine about interesting places in Slovakia, which they were very interested in.
After a long time, we went on a trip to a nearby park. The kids were thrilled to finally make the trip avoiding sitting at home due to Corona. The weather forecast was terrible with rain, but that didn’t spoil our mood. Equipped with raincoats, at the end we had wonderful weather. It rained for a moment and then at the end heavily as we were running to our car, but everyone was satisfied and pleasantly tired.
The end of July was busy and more demanding, because in the school, they tried to catch up with all the tests to get enough grades, but we still managed to spend a lot of time on the bikes with the children. We discovered playgrounds in neighboring villages and tasted ice cream everywhere. Dominik was symbolically thrown out from kindergarten. Olivia spent an evening full of reading at school. In Biergarten, a small farewell event was organised for Olivia’s teacher, who teached them the first two years and then the holidays could begin.
Dominik is a bit older again. He still likes to cuddle, but especially when he needs something or wants to complain that someone has hurt him. He started playing guitar. He is mostly lazy to practice what his teacher tells him, but he always has the guitar in his hands and plays. At the end he can play everything as needed in class and he catches chords as if he was born with it.
Dominik is looking forward to school. The most to the school gym, playground and twice as long holidays as in kindergarten. And he also likes breaks and school trips. And after my exploratory look, he added that he would also like to learn a lot. He always has many questions and is interested in many topics from the ocean and its inhabitants, lithospheric plates to the formation of mountains and trenches.
This winter was somehow short, although of course it is not over yet and maybe after a short spring break it will snow again. But at least it snowed and the children were in the garden at every opportunity, building a house with a tunnel, which was nice and big in the end. Too bad that it melted so quickly. We did home learning much better than during the last lock down in April.
Olivia wanted warm and sunny weather for her birthday because she wanted to celebrate in the garden. This year, her wish miraculously came true. Spring came somehow earlier and we suddenly had 17 degrees for a week. We uncovered the trampoline, picked up scooters and inline skates, and we went to watch the birds. The birthday cake was a chocolate one in the shape of a heart and with butterflies exactly as Olivia wished.