Trip to Sao Paulo

So, I'm doing something I never do and covering past events. A few weeks ago I traveled to Sao Paulo with Margarita and Julio for their regional Destination Imagination competition. Ballerina Girl and I traveled on the bus with the kids. It took 8 hours each way. Thank goodness for Dramamine- while BG used her time wisely and read three books during the combined 16 hours, I took a really, really long nap.

The cool thing about the trip was that I got to go and be supportive of my kids, but I wasn't in charge of them. Their team managers were. I didn't have to do anything-just say hi, give hugs when I saw them, and cheer a little here and there; I didn't have to wake them up, make sure they were in bed, make sure they were ready in the morning, make sure they were on the bus. It was someone else's responsibility.

It was absolutely delightful.

During our down time, which was quite frequent, BG and I were socially introverted, preferring to find a couch to curl up on and read our books (or Kindles, or iPhones) instead of chitchatting with the other temporarily irresponsible parents.

We did take a little time to be social and met with our fellow blogger Fabiola who lives in Sao Paulo. We had a delightful breakfast together in the hotel. She is just as cool in person as she is on her blog:

I realize that none of us are actually looking at the camera. Had I used the "good" one of me, BG never would have forgiven me. (that's the kind of sacrificing friend I am. :) )

My kids did great-they both won their challenges for their age divisions.

Here's Julio and his group performing their skit about a teacher who had a change of heart towards his students.

Julio even got to show off his Beethoven's 5th symphony (I swear I hear that song in my dreams). (and nightmares).

Margarita's group only had her and two other boys; there team name was the "DIlanders". It was supposed to be the "DIslanders", but the boy who made the sign spelled it wrong. Oh well, they still won.

Their group had to make a structure out of only newspaper and glue and then during their skit (about the earthquake in Haiti) they had to see how much weight it could hold. Below is Margarita adding the weights which was actually really exciting:

Here's the Rio group in front of a famous bridge in Sao Paulo (sorry, can't remember the name).

And, finally, here's Julio jumping on a trampoline at the big final DI party the night before we left:

It was a really fun trip!