Skip To Main Content

desktop-menu

mobile-menu

header-container

logo-container

logo-image

right-container

right-top-container

search-container

search-popup

cta-nav

horizontal-nav

Breadcrumb

" A Town is Made of People And Memories And Dreams"

“Do you have brick for sheep?”

–Any Settlers of Catan player 

 

We are a month into 2025, so it is a bit late for me to wish you a Happy New Year, but I do so nonetheless. Our winter holiday was spent with family and friends at home. This included our two older kids home from college, as well as family visiting us from the U.S.--it was fun to have young-kid energy in the house. We did some ice skating in Borisova Gradina, walked around Sofia, spent a day in Plovdiv, and enjoyed the snowy days. We also watched the full extended version series of The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings films (young-kids excluded). Yep, 20.25 hours of Hobbits, Elves, Dwarves, and Men (and Women–go Éowyn!) fighting to save Middle Earth. 

I enjoyed the entire holiday, and my favorite evenings were when we made dinner together and played a board game or two. Cooking with your kids, young and old, is a fantastic way to help them learn to follow directions, develop math skills and understanding, and sometimes to grow their ability to deal with disappointment. It is also a tremendous way for parents to practice patience. Plus, as kids get older and ready to head off on their own, they will know how to prepare a home cooked meal. We began teaching our kids to cook when they were in Preschool. Each kid got to choose a meal for one day a week, and then they got to (had to) help prepare it as well. The other kids got to the dishes. The dinners have progressed a long way from when our kids were little tikes. We’ve gone from sloppy joes to single pan baked chicken with cardamom rice. 

Before, while, and/or after cooking, we played board games. As a kid, I was not a fan of board games. There were a couple that I liked when I was really little, but when it came time to play Risk, Monopoly, or the like, I did not have the patience to play for hours before I lost (I always lost). Now there are plenty of board games to choose from for people of any age. We played a variety of games this winter, but we returned time and again to Settlers of Catan and Splendor. Of course, I still lost, but it was fun to have the time together. Even the bickering was somehow fun with everyone back home for a time (though the food bills were brutal).

On a related note…my community of  family and friends is one of the communities I am fortunate to be a part of. I’ve written about community before, but I have a couple additions to share today. 

I want to thank the students of Ms. Lizette’s class (2A) and Ms. Ula’s class (2B) for inviting me in to be interviewed about community last week. I usually feel well prepared to be interviewed by a room-full of kids, most of whom don’t have a mouthful of teeth, but our 2nd-graders had tough questions. They asked questions about what makes a community, what are the parts of a community, and maybe the most difficult of all–what is community. Since those interviews, I’ve been (once again) thinking a lot about community.

This leads me to Big Fish. Tonight is the final showing of the High School performance of the musical Big Fish. I knew nothing of the book, the film, or the musical before I attended the first performance on Wednesday of this week. There is a lot going on in Big Fish. I don’t want to spoil anything for anyone who is going this evening, so I will only say that the story explores everything from big fish to community. But more than the story itself, what has stood out to me this week is the incredibly powerful community that has developed among the cast and crew of AAS’s Big Fish. They came together as a group of students and staff at the start of the school year to begin working on bringing Big Fish to life on the Rila stage. Tonight they complete that journey as a tight knit community. A community within a community.

There are many communities within the AAS community. From second grade classes, to CEESA teams and theatre troupes. It is really cool.

As we move into the second month 2025, I hope you have time to soak up your communities, whether it be through cooking, board games, or creating (or taking in) a musical.

“...a town is made of people and memories and dreams.”

–Eddie Bloom from Big Fish