
The end of the school year rolls in, and we head back to our favorite holiday destination. Just like with Hannah before them, we want to make sure that the twins get used early to greenery replacing cement.

Hannah is bummed. Her grades are bad, she’s going to have to repeat a year. She’s a straight-A student… in the only two subjects that she has an interest in, History and Geography. In these two, her young passion burns bright and fierce. Unfortunately, they’re not enough to bring her average up.

My little one tells me she feels too stupid to understand Math, or French, or Biology, but I’m not about to let that happen.
Hannah darling, you’re a beautiful person with an incredible brain, and an amazing drive. I’m not about to be the teeniest bit less proud of you for not following exactly in school’s grand plan for you.

Cleo is entirely done with this conversation — she’s not even a kindergartener yet, an average is very much a foreign concept for her — and she opens the way into the lodge, after Hugo and Cyril.

As an attempt to cheer Hannah up, I start reading her one of her favorite stories.

It involves Mayan mummies and hidden treasures, and though she knows every word by heart, Hannah is enthralled.

Cleo is not, though. If anything she’s captivated by her MySims game.

Hugo is outside playing with the twins, so Hannah and I eat our fruit salad together — well, with Nounou.
She’s still preoccupied, so I suggest she takes a walk to clear her head.

Reluctantly she agrees, and at first the effects are not obvious.

But slowly, the Granite Falls peacefulness and the mountain air win over her worry, and I can tell she’s merry again.
And this is when Hannah starts what would become a life-long passion for her.
She goes exploring.