A Night at the Ballet

For my birthday this year my in laws bought me tickets to the BALLET! I love going to the ballet so this was a wonderful surprise. And it was Romeo and Juliet, a great classic story, so exciting! My friend (thank you PAULA!) offered to keep all three girl overnight so we could enjoy the evening. That's right an overnight DATE NIGHT!!!

We enjoyed dinner at one of my favorite restaurants downtown, Amo-te, walked around and then headed to the Coliseu to secure our seats.

Someday we are gonna go all out and get one of the boxes, maybe for the Nutcracker one year!

We had open seating tickets so we rushed in as soon as they opened the doors to get the best seats we could.

Mark is debating if we have found the best seats yet... Yep, this was our view!

It was such a fun night! Dinner, ballet and sleeping in the next morning... all while the girls had a BLAST at their sleepover! Thanks In-Laws and Paula for making it possible for us to have a wonderful BALLET/DATE NIGHT!!!

Back to School

School and all the routines are back in full swing for us. Here are some pictures we took of the girls on their first days back to school...

Bria on her way to the first day of 3rd grade. She was so excited to go back to school and to be with her sweet friends again. She has a new teacher this year, and after just a couple of weeks she already loves her.

Tirzy Joy, on her way to the first day of Cinco Anos (5 year old class.) She is so excited to be in the "big kid class" of infantário and she will start learning to read this year! She is with the same teacher, Ana, that she has been with the last two years and she just loves Ana to pieces!

Here is Sahara on her way to the first day of 5th grade! What!? How is it possible that she is in 5th grade? But she is and she is SO excited about it. She started a NEW school this year as the other school only goes through 4th grade. We looked at SO many school and we are very happy with the one we ended up choosing. It isn't far from the little girls school, everyone has been so nice and helpful and she is there with 4 kids from the other school.

The actual campus of this school is much bigger than the other school so it has taken some adjusting to learn our way around. Sahara now has a directora of her class and has different teachers for most subjects. She is loving the new school and we are so thankful to have found another sweet school to entrust our Sahara with!

Here she is showing off her new uniform. She is still so happy to have a uniform, she wears the shirt ALL day long and would wear it on the weekends if I let her:) I am so thankful that she is enjoying the new adventures of 5th grade!

Barcelos and Bom Jesus

The final chapter of our trip is Barcelos and Bom Jesus. After Porto we headed just a little North to the city of Barcelos. It is a cute little town that has an old legend. It is the legend of the Rooster and because of this legend the Rooster is one of the symbols of Portugal. Roosters are everyone! If you have a Nando's near you the story is even written on the bags! So we visited the monument that the guy who was saved by the rooster made, peeked in on a beautiful wedding and had a great lunch. Oh and we bought ourselves a little painted rooster to take home with us.

After lunch we headed out to Braga another city just a half and hour up the road. Up above the city of Braga is this HUGE church called Bom Jesus (Good Jesus). It has a climb through a pretty wooded area and then stairs, so many stairs! Wow! There are little chapels along the way that depict the 12 stations of the cross. It was a little scary to me and sad because the resurrection wasn't a part of the walk. I wanted to see the Hope after remembering the suffering that Jesus went through for us! There was other symbolism along the walk as well, we did it backwards, started at the top and walked down. There is a nice little tram that took us back up! Oh and there was a wedding going on in the church, beautiful! The girls loved seeing the bride!

Once we were done there we headed back to Coimbra and to relax and enjoy some more time with our friends. It was a great vacation! Beautiful new places and sites and lots of catch up time with great friends!!!

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Porto

Part 3... After spending the day in beautiful Aveiro we head a little further North to the city of Porto to visit our friends who have recently moved there. It was fun to see where they live and to catch up with them a little.

They showed us around their beautiful new city. It is wine country and built up mostly around the river Douro, so it is a beautiful riverfront city with wine boats, beautiful bridges and an old charm to it. We enjoyed walking around and seeing the city by day and then had dinner on the riverfront and then went for a little stroll.

Porto is very different than Lisboa, it has it's own unique charm. We enjoyed getting to see it and to spend time with our friends! It is definitely a city we will visit again!

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Finally Part 4: Barcelos and Bom Jesus (the end of the journey) coming soon!!!

Part 2- Aveiro

After visiting our friends in Coimbra we headed just up the road to a little city called, Aveiro. It is famous for it canals. Someone told me about it our first year here and it has been high on my list of places to see in Portugal. I wasn't disappointed, it is such a beautiful city! The canals add a special little charm and there is just a calm about walking through the streets next to the canals. We took a boat ride on the canals and it was a BLAST! We all enjoyed it! After a great lunch of fresh caught fish we went to a little sweet shop, on a tip from teachers at the girl's school, and tried ovos moles.

YUM!

It is hard to explain so if you want to try them you will just have to come visit!

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It was a great, relaxing and fun day!

Coming next: Part 3 Porto