First day at school!

Now, you may know that Naomi was five last August and generally, in NZ, children start school on their fifth birthday. Unfortunately, poor Naomi is missing out on that experience for the moment and will have to start her formal education when we get back home, when she will be five years and eight months old, but she will probably be way ahead by that point, owing to her mother's ultra strict and rigorous home schooling regime;)

But, who would have thought that she would in actual fact, have her first day of school in Canada? Caroline asked Jacob and Eleni's teachers if they would mind if they brought their NZ friends to school on Monday and the teachers said it would be fine! Crazy eh? We didn't have to sign a form or anything, you would think that they would need some kind of insurance for that kind of thing - thank heavens they didn't break any limbs!

Benny was so happy and skipped off with Jacob to his class, his first project was to be Jacob's assistant in his science experiment demonstration in front of the class, easy peasy.

Naomi, of course, was not so easy. After being very confident at home, she suddenly didn't want to go when she saw the actually class and teacher, I thought it was a bit too good to be true, and didn't blame her really, I suppose it was a lot to take in. But, the teacher was amazing, and persuaded Naomi to take the plunge and we left, and she was at school! The teacher took Caroline's number and made a deal with Naomi that if she changed her mind and wanted to go home, she would give us a call.

Caroline wanted Alex and I to enjoy a couple of hours together so dropped us into town so we could have a lovely romantic lunch at the Empress Hotel.





The Empress Hotel is famous for it's afternoon teas, cucumber sandwiches with no crusts, Devonshire scones and the like, but I could tell that Alex didn't really fancy that (I think it could have been the way he said 'I don't really fancy that' which gave me the hint) so we went for a curry instead, in the hotel too, which was good, and had a glass of wine with my lunch, which made me relax and forgive him a little for denying me the opportunity to drink raspberry tea from dainty cups with my pinky finger pointing.

They even sell Empress Hotel china in the gift shop, it is beautiful, ahhhh...




Caroline picked us up after lunch complete with Naomi and Eleni giggling in the backseat. Naomi had apparently remembered the teachers promise and, at lunchtime, asked her to call Caroline to pick her up - little monkey - and of course Caroline couldn't leave Eleni, so she came home too. I didn't get to take a photo of Naomi at school for her short loved first day/three hours of school, but here she is later, with her rainbow creation. I was so proud:)




Benny and Jacob, of course, had a ball.








And here is Benny's artwork, 'When I am 100 years old', and a portrait of him in 93 years time.

'When I am 100 years old I will do experiments. I will live in a Lego house. I will wear jeans and a t-shirt and eat pizza every day. In the evening I will watch tv. My snake will keep me company. For my 100th birthday I will drive a tank.'




That evening, our last evening in Canada, we also had a little birthday celebration for Benny (he will be 8 years old on the 28th Feb and we will be on a plane for most of the day). We had a treasure hunt, a pass the parcel, balloons and even a birthday cake with his name on! Thanks Caroline;)




Love
Est xxx