Our family.

Our family is not very large. I have a father, a brother and a sister. We all live together in a new flat in one of the industrial districts of Smolensk.

My father Igor Ivanovich is 45 years old. He is a tall and well-built man with short black hair and grey eyes. He works at a big plant as an engineer. He likes his work and spends most of his time there. By character my father is a quiet man, while my mother is energetic and talkative. Her name is Olga Petrovna. She is a teacher of music and plays the piano well. My mother always has a lot of work to do about the house and at her school. She is a busy woman and we all help her.

My sister's name is Alia. Like her mother Alia has blue eyes and lovely fair hair. She is a very good-looking girl. Alia is three years younger than me. She is a pupil of the 9th form. She does well at school and gets only good and excellent marks. Literature is her favourite subject and she wants to become a teacher, the same as me. My name is Tanya. Last year I left school and tried to enter the University. But I failed in my exams. For a year I worked at a school as a secretary and attended preparatory courses. Now I'm again an applicant for entry to the philological faculty of the University. I hope to be lucky this time.

Our family is very united. We like to spend time together. In the evenings we watch TV, read books and newspapers, listen to music or just talk about the events of the day. Our parents don't always agree with what we say but they listen to our opinion. All of us like to spend our week­ends out of town. We often go to the village where our grandparents live. They are old-age pensioners now but prefer to live in the country. My great grandmother is still alive. She lives in my grandmother's family and is always glad to see us. She is in poor health and asks us to come and see her more often. I also have many other relatives: uncles, aunts, cousins and many friends. We are happy when we are together.

Vocabulary

district — район

well-built — хорошо сложенный

to work as somebody — работать в качестве кого-либо

talkative — разговорчивый

good-looking — симпатичный

to be three years younger — быть на три года моложе

to be lucky — быть удачливым

opinion - мнение

pensioners - пенсионеры

to prefer - предпочитать

alive - живой

to be in poor (good) health - иметь плохое (хорошее) здоровье

My Family-2

Let me introduce myself. My name is Irene, Ira for short. My full name is Irina Petrovnalvanova. On the tenth of September I'll be seventeen. I think I'll invite my classmates to the birthday party and we'll have a good time.

My family is not very large: my father, my mother and myself. My mother's name is Marina Pavlovna. She is 40. My mother is good-natured and cheerful. She teaches French. She's devoted to her work. Once I attended one of her classes. The children read and spoke French, wrote a little, sang and played games a lot. She is very fond of her work and often tells me about it. She works hard and knows the French language well. My mother also keeps the house for us. Even though we all try to-help her, she has a lot of work to do about the house.

My father's name is Pyotr Andreevich. He is a strong handsome man of middle age. My father is an architect, he works hard at his office. At home he helps my mother, he also takes care of his elderly parents. I love my parents and grandparents very much; we are on friendly terms.

I'm an only child. I have no brothers and sisters. I'm leaving school this year. I did a lot of subjects at school. I also learned English. I am fond of English and I work hard to master it. I'm going to take my entrance examinations to the local University. My dream is to know several foreign languages.

We live in a town not far from Moscow. Some of our relatives live close by, including my grandparents, who are on pension now, aunt and uncle and their children, my cousins.

We try to spend Sundays together as a family day. Our relatives often join us for tea or sometimes for dinner. At the week-end we go to the cinema, sometimes we visit a museum or an exhibition. In summer we like to travel.