What We Did Over School Vacation

During a regular school week they’d be studying subjects like English and math and history and science.

This week they took “classes” in baseball and bowling, manicures and movies, swimming and sleepovers.

That’s how a sampling of Woburn students and, in some cases, their parents, have spent time this week of February vacation.

Take Elyssa and Sarah Delano. Elyssa is a student at the ; Sarah, a student at the . They started the week with a friend sleeping over on Monday night. The girls all got their nails done Tuesday. Elyssa and Sarah went bowling with their dad, Michael, on Wednesday.

Elyssa likes to bowl, she said—unless her sister beats her. It was Sarah’s idea to go for the manicures, Elyssa noted.

The girls’ parents alternate work shifts to be with the girls, their dad said.

Elyssa and Sarah's high school-age brother spends vacation time playing basketball and hockey and at the Y gym, according to his father.

Philip Byers, a fifth-grader at the , kept up his usual schedule of hockey, hockey and hockey. He skates on Tuesdays and Fridays, trains on Wednesdays and plays games on Saturdays and Sundays, according to his mother, Stephanie.

This being vacation week, he also spent some time bowling with his father, Phil, playing monster golf and hanging with friends. The family planned to go skiing together, Stephanie said.

Stephanie enjoys when her son spends time with friends during school vacation, she said; she also likes the opportunity to do some “fun stuff” with him.

Alexa and Anthony Palmieri spent their school vacation weekdays at the . The best thing about vacation week, according to Anthony, a first-grader at the , was going into the Y pool. Alexa, a sixth-grader at the , said she liked helping the Y director with younger students.

Alexa and Anthony’s mother works part-time and also goes to school. So she doesn’t have the luxury of taking the week off, she said. Nevertheless, she and Alexa and Anthony went together Wednesday evening to the for some together time.

Robert Zahigian, 10, spent his mornings at a baseball clinic at in Woburn. His sister, Renee, 13, went to work with her mother, Judy Smith, Wednesday morning. A number of Renee’s friends spent time during vacation week at sports camps, Smith said.

Renee and Robert went to the Woburn Bowladrome Wednesday afternoon to do some “homework.” They bowl there in a Saturday league, their mother explained. Since they have plans for Saturday, the Winchester residents “pre-bowled,” she explained.

One older student—high school age—spent her vacation in a different way than any of the aforementioned youths. A number of Winchester High School students went on a school trip, explained mom Judy Smith, leaving a need for child care by parents who had to work while their children were on school vacation. So Smith’s oldest daughter, Rachel, who is 18, was pressed into service, she said, to provide child care for the week.

Just as some parents are sighing at the thought of the end of this school vacation, take a look at your calendar. There’s one more school vacation—in April, the 18th through the 22nd—before school ends in June.