Week 3 - Central Asia and Eastern Europe

 

This week we learned about Russia, Kazakhstan, and Armenia.

 

 

We learned about Russia on Monday and Tuesday.  We played checkers with the kids as we learned that in Russia, chess is part of their schooling (chess is a little too complicated for a 3 and 4 year old... actually, so was checkers, but that is ok).  We also learned that they have more time zones than any other country, and we had breakfast for supper (to note that in some areas of Russia they are eating breakfast while others are eating supper).

 

Wednesday and Thursday was Kazakhstan.  We learned that they produce some of the tastiest apples in the world, both in orchards and wild.  We talked about the many fruits God gave us and made a fruit salad (with apples, of course).  We also learned about how they eat differently than we do.  Boiled horse meat is apparently common there.  We definitely don't eat horses here.  We also learned that they don't have lines to take their turns like we do at stores here.  You have to be able to work your way to the front to get a turn at something.  I definitely would not do well there!  I hate 'barging' to the front!  As an activity, we all crowded around one person as they 'tried' to get from one room to another... but we did take turns being the person who was crowded!  We learned that this was probably similar to how it was for Jesus with all the crowds of people that wanted to be near to him.

 Armenia was the country we learned about on Friday and Saturday.  True to each week, this time I made food from this country.  We did Armenian Pizza, called Lahmajoon.  You can get the recipe I used here.  We were supposed to play egg jousting (a game played at Easter by the children in Armenia) but I had no eggs to boil.  You use hardboiled eggs and tap the ends together.  Whoever doesn't have their eggshell break wins.  we also played a game of Mother May I, learning about how in their culture, the mother is considered the manager of the home, responsible for teaching the children their culture and customs.  The kids had fun being 'mother'.

Oh, and just for fun, here are pics of each of the kids eating their Lahmajoon.

 

Baby A didn't eat with us, but she did munch munch munch on her fist all evening!  I think she's teething.  :)

 

Well, that was week 3 in a nutshell.  Stay tuned for week 4!

 

Oh... as a side note, I've been getting a little lax on keeping up with the weekly things.  I have had a few days where I didn't do the items until late evening, or even the next day.  Week 4 was worst for this as my husband was on the field as well, and that meant not doing things together as a family, and then I don't seem to remember to do them as well.  We did manage to do them all (some a bit late), but I need to take note a little earlier on and actually do them in the mornings if possible.   The kids are quick to remind me about the coloring of their stamps and flags!