From November to April our girls had a lot of musical contests in which they participated. The twins were playing flutes with their group of girls and took second place in the international festival .
Here they are goofing around on the piano in their classroom while waiting for the results.
With their group and their teacher, Bayan Beketovna.
On stage receiving the award.
Veronika and Polina formed a duet which they called Americano and performed at a Russian Talent Festival where they also took second place in the string instruments category with a Sting's song "Shape of My Heart".
Showing off their certificate
Later they played and sang the same song at the National Contest for young guitarists and won "Judges' Choice" award.
Polina and Sophia took a carving class for the last two years, and this spring their work ended up at some contest as well.
Polina's spoon in the shape of a parrot.
Sophie's spoon with a tree branch and a ladybug.
At the beginning of March our figure skating coach texted me that all of our girls are urgently needed for the Opening Ceremony of the International Youth Hockey Tournament. So, our girls and a few others from their synchronized figure skating team went. Some girls were leading teams out on the ice, and others were carrying flags of the countries of the participating teams (there were teams from Belorussia, Slovakia, China, Kazakhstan, and two teams from Russia). The girls only had two practices (just like about everything in Kazakhstan, it was a last minute deal) but did very well.
Waiting for the practice to start.
Getting instructions from the tournament organizers in the biggest hockey areana in the country.
Before the Opening Ceremony. The girls in purple t-shirts were the ones leading the hockey teams on the ice (Sophie is second from the left, Lina is fith, and Lexa is last), and the ones in national costumes were carrying the flags.
Flag bearers. Nika is in the national Slovak costume.
The teams were coming out of this big snow lepard (a mascot for the national hockey team). You can see Lexa there in a purple shirt who was the first one out with her team from Russia who ended up taking the first place in the tournament.
There is Sophie with her team from Slovakia (in blue) and Nika carrying their flag.
Life has been super
busy here and I just realized that we haven't posted in over two
months. A lot has happened since then, so we'll try to catch up as
much as we can.
Our family is
doomed! Just like their parents, all of our kids volunteer and get
involved in everything, big or small! February was full of activities at the kids'
school, including “Miss Ocharovashka” (Miss Enchantment) contest
for the Elementary School grades, the same one they did last year.
This year our youngest three decided to participate in a true Kazakh
manner (meaning with only three days notice!). They had to do a
little presentation about themselves in a poem style, make a dress
out of whatever they find around the house, and show a talent. For a
mother of three cute little contestants it was a no easy task.
Fortunately we saved Nika's dress from last year's contest, so I only
had to make one more dress for the other twin, and Lina's contest
was on a different day, so she shared the dress.
The only reason our
twins wanted to participate is because they really wanted to sing a
famous Russian song that they learned earlier in the month and were
enthusiastically singing just about every night on their way home
from school. And the only reason Lina wanted to participate is
because she really wanted to play her guitar. These were the
classroom competitions, and whoever won would go on to the school
competition. I was really hoping that we would somehow avoid it
remembering all the hassle with it last year when Nika won her classroom contest. Well,
this year Lina won. I guess it just runs in the family. All the girls
had the blast though, and we were really proud of them.
Lexa and Sophie, ready to start!
Twins with their best friend, Dariya.
They are just so cute!
Lina is waiting for the contest to start.
Their teacher really went above and beyond in organizing this contest.
Lina is playing Lizginka (a Georgian folk dance) on her guitar.
