Feliz Día de la Primavera

Here in Tacna, Wednesday the 23rd was celebrated as the first day of Spring (since we are on the other side of the equator). I never really felt like I could see a big difference in the states between the last day of summer and the first day of fall, especially in phoenix, or the last day of winter and the first day of spring. However, here in Tacna the sun has started coming out earlier since Wednesday, and that has made it significantly warmer, so I am happy!

To celebrate, the students in preschool and the first three grades of primary put on a little show about spring. I found out about it on Wednesday morning from the psychologist who I work with, and walked over to the amphitheater to check it out. I sat down in the back by myself, but was quickly approached by a parent who asked me to be a judge for the contest of which grade had the best show. So I agreed and got a seat in front, with the vice principal and another teacher.

The kids were adorable and made their costumes out of reused or recycled material, which were very cute and creative, mostly a credit to the parents I imagine.

A few pictures for your enjoyment:
These kids are from the three-year-old room in preschool--as you can see there is some corn, a bee, a flower, and some girls in dresses. While I am not sure what part of spring they represent, I do know that the multicolored dress in the middle of the picture is made of candy wrappers stuck on to pieces of cardboard--I saw it up close. Very elaborate and probably lots of cavities for the kids in that family!
Above are two birds who are creatively dressed in newspaper--their outfits match, even if they are not sure where they are supposed to be looking.
Above are two butterflies, the one on the right has her skirt and wings made out of old huggies diaper wrappers--you may be able to see the words if you look closely.
Here we also have many creatively dressed trees. The pictures above are all from the preschool kids, whose performances consisted mostly of getting dressed up and staying in place and looking cute, then saying something along the lines of 'happy spring!'and leaving.

With the older kids, there were some activities along with the costumes and posing.
In first grade, there were several bugs that danced around a cactus.
There was also a bunny rabbit (costume made out of plastic bags bunched together) who hopped around on stage.
There was a gardener who watered the flowers so they would grow.
And in third grade they all danced around a little and wished us happy spring!

It was an entertaining morning and the kids were great. The winners of the contests were the five year old class of preschool and the third graders of the early primary kids.

Happy spring!