Getting the hang of things....

There are quite a few things Ive had to get used to living her in Vilnius. The first is of course teaching... Ive never taught before in my life, except for maybe a primary class a couple times. It has taken the whole week for me to become somewhat comfortable with teaching. My older, most advanced, class is so dang hard to teach. It makes me realize that our language is so confusing and there are a ton of things we do for no good reason. This week I had a girl ask me what "even" meant. Not as in an "even number" or an "even amount" but like how, why, and when do we use "even" in a sentence? I had NO clue how to explain it! I had to look it up and give her a few examples, but Ive never had to think about the word even until now! My younger class is crazy, straight up crazy. At the beginning of the week our head teacher was telling us that it will be so hard to leave the kids at the end of the semester... well earlier this week I said "No way! Those kids are insane, I'm gonna party when I don't have to teach them!"  Well Friday's class was the first day that I started feeling super confident and the class went smoother than usual. Dont worry, they were still crazy boys, but I felt like something was different. Now I think Ill definitely miss them, but I still have 4 more months with them.  It is definitely fun to hear all the kids yell "Teacher, Teacherrr!!" Cutie kids. Still have a long way to go, but I'm getting the hang of teaching slowly, but surely!

During my advanced class, the girls taught me some phrases in the many languages they know. On the board is Lithuanian, Polish, German, French, and Russian. These kids are so incredibly smart, it blows my mind. 

Favorite little boy - Daniel

He's kind of quiet but such a sweetie and during break he comes and snuggles on my lap :')

Im also getting the hang of living in the snow. Its really not terrible, but this week we were blessed with a couple days of a little SUN!! I have missed the sun so dang much! And for everyone back home thinking that I'm freezing my booty off... Im not! Im good... with the right clothes its really not bad. It just takes forever to bundle up!

We lovveee blue skies and sun !

It was actually so warm this day that we didn't even need hats or scarves!

(34 degrees!)

Another thing Ive had to get used to is not smiling! How terrible?! People don't smile here and apparently you aren't supposed to smile so thats pretty depressing but I guess its the culture. Women are also not allowed to sit on the ground without a blanket or something under because they believe that our ovaries will freeze and we wont be able to have children... hmmm ok?  I also learned today that it is common to have parents bundle up their babies and leave them in a stroller outside in the cold for naps. How is that a thing?! We were walking down the streets of Old Town today and there was a stroller right outside this cafe so we jokingly checked in it and there was a baby in it!!!! What?! I don't understand people here, but its fine. Oh also in the grocery store don't just hang out in the middle of the aisle because an old lithuanian man is not afraid to ram into you with his cart - yes this happens to me all the time! On a happy note - we explored more of Old Town today and it was beautiful and delicious! We ate at Boom burger and Holy donut! We also found some random pink cathedrals and souvenir shops!

Getting the hang of life out here in Vilnius one day at a time! Ill practically be a local in no time! This week was full of teaching, Maxima trips and vacation planning - eek so excited! Miss you guys, much love from Lithuania!