International Women's Day

International Women’s Day, which is celebrated on the 8^th of March is a big holiday in this part of the world. If you want to know its origins, you can read about it here: http://www.internationalwomensday.com/about.asp#.VQj9JE0frIU. 

The way it is celebrated here I can only compare to Mother’s Day and Valentine’s Day put together. In other words it is a huge deal! On this day men give flowers to the women in their life including loved ones, family members, coworkers, and sometimes perfect strangers. It is not uncommon for a girl to receive flowers from strangers (men!) while walking on the street. And if you are a man who forgot to at least acknowledge in some way this very important day in every woman’s life here, I do not envy you the next day! Girls can also give flowers to each other, and it is totally normal. It is also a Federal holiday, and everyone gets a day off work. Except the flower shops! This is the biggest day of the year for all of the flower shops around here. And the flower of choice is … tulip!  Tulips are specially delivered here from Holland, and there are a lot of different varieties of them.

With 5 ladies in our family we had quite the festivities! Our girls had lots of attention from the boys in their classes. Each class also put a nice program for the moms completed with poems, dances, skits, games for moms (and the kids made some handmade gifts for their moms), and the boys put a special program for the girls in their classes. The girls and boys could also come to school in their pretty dresses and suits. After the programs each class had a "tea party" which in reality was more like a feast!

Polina in her class right before the festivities began.

The program has started!

Polina's class, each kid was saying a little poem for their moms

An Uzbek dance by one of the girls.

This was a game for moms. Each mom had to recognize herself in the pictures. I am the one in the second row on the right (in the purple skirt)!

The boys singing funny little riddles for each of the girls in their class

Sophie and Lexa waiting for their party to start.

Ready, set, go!

Sophie is performing a skit with her classmate, Azat.

A game for moms: moms had to recognize their own kids while blindfolded and while only being able to touch the children's hands. Impressively every mom found her own child!

Sophie's and Lexa's 1st grade class

Little ladies!

The "tea party" after the program.

Each of our girls also got a little present: flowers, cute journals, and Nika got a mug with her picture printed on it along with some greeting cards (I didn't get to see Nika's class party because it was exactly at the same time as the twins' program). The school also celebrated this day by putting together a competition show for the girls called “Miss Enchantment” but it deserves a separate post. 

Some of kids' presents.

And that’s not all! The girls on Spencer’s basketball team gave each of our daughters a tulip and a nice bouquet of them to me. With some gorgeous roses from Spencer to top it off we were totally spoiled! 

I do not remember having so many flowers all at ones!

We only have one vase, so we had to get creative with so many flowers in the house