School Update

Today wrapped up the second week of school for the kids, and we couldn't be happier with this start to the new year.

Last year, there were moments of doubt during the hard transition. There were tears, there was frustration, there was a lot of hard work.
While at the kindergarten level Derek went along with little trouble, Alex felt the changes deeply and I wondered if the end result would be worth the price.

This morning at drop-off I watched another little girl clinging to her mom in tears. I'd followed them up the stairs from the metro to the school and overheard them speaking English. I have a feeling they were experiencing their first year with a new culture and language.

It reminded me of the early weeks when Alex didn't want to let go when I hugged her goodbye at the steps to the school. Too old to cling and cry, her eyes were watery as she turned to face another day of confusion and isolation. When I turned away mine would be as well.
It's so hard to watch your child struggle, no matter if you believe it to be in their best interest. Our 6-month mantra-- We're proud of you, We love you, It will get better.

And so it is with deep thankfulness that I pick up a sparkly-eyed 8-year-old at the end of each school day, excited to tell me about everything.

We are so proud of her. We love her. And it got better!

She thinks third grade is the bee's knees because not only do they get to play the recorder in music class, but they also swim every week, and she just signed up for an extra art course twice a week. She also has an hour a week of French-- just what the poor child needs, one more language ;)

It makes this mama's heart happy to see her baby happy.

Derek, meanwhile, is probably slightly less happy than last year, because it turns out that you have to do more reading and writing in first grade. Bummer.
We also just signed him up for swimming, which he'll begin in October.

One of the things we like about their school is that extracurricular activities, like Alex's art course and swimming for Derek, are offered during the school day. That's a big bonus when the day is so long already that we couldn't possibly fit it in afterward.

Other things I appreciate:
The have all the "extras" as part of their regular schedule-- music, art, gym, computers
They get lots of recreo, or free playtime
They have a big, healthy hot lunch
The teachers make them eat it ;)
It really is the teachers that make them eat it-- they do everything with the kids, including lunch duty and even riding the bus route.

There are certainly things that are different, and a little strange to us, but overall we are pleased with the school and thrilled that Alex and Derek are speaking a second language. What an opportunity!

A list.

1) Derek had a birthday almost a month ago. He turned six. We love him.
The end.

2) You see, when I get behind on blogging I start to feel as if I can never catch up. So I just caught up.

3) The Flodge.

The other day we went to a water park, and it reminded Derek of when we went to the Great Wolf Lodge, an indoor water-park hotel chain that needs to consider raising the temperature of their water, at least in the Williamsburg, Virgina location.

Derek saw the wave pool, and commented-- "It's just like the Great Woo Flodge!"

The what, Derek?

"The Flodge! You know."

Kids are funny.

4) Today was the first day of school.

How did it go, you ask?

Well, the best part was the quiet.
The worst part was the waking up.

Oh, you meant for the children?

It went great! At least, it did for Alex. She likes her teachers and they did her favorite subject-- not math.
That's right, the absence of doing math is her favorite subject.

Her father is extremely disappointed, as his mathlete status is something he treasures.

We don't know how things went for Derek because he can never remember. He's pretty sure his teacher told him her name, but he just can't remember what it was.
He's pretty sure some of the kids from last year are in his class again, but he can't be certain.
He definitely went to the bathroom today, but doesn't recall if he pooped.

Sorry, it's true. And yes, we ask. Because if he said "yes, I pooped" then he would need a bath to decontaminate. I just don't trust him.

Or the boys bathroom.

Day 1: Success. (Unless Derek suddenly remembers something to deem it a failure, but I wouldn't hold my breath.)

5) I have a dentist appointment tomorrow.

6) Josh bought some NFL program that lets him watch every football game of the season on the iPad.
Now I don't have a husband, or an iPad.

I'm choosing to allow this, because my he missed the last two football seasons in Afghanistan and California, where we decided the cost-benefit ratio wasn't justified for the amount of time we were staying there.
Also because I love him.

7)  Life in Madrid is good. Thanks for checking in.

Mo summer

Things at which I am terrible:

blogging
being awake before 9am
being awake before 9:30am
getting out of bed at any time of day
cooking
cleaning
making phone calls in Spanish
making phone calls in English
not procrastinating


Things at which I am not terrible:

choosing a husband who puts up with the list above


Now that we have that established, I will make no excuses for my half-month lapse in blogging. It's just...summer.
Everyone's posting their first-day-of-school pictures on Facebook but we still have another week to sleep in, do nothing, and stay up late. I shall enjoy every last morning in which it is technically afternoon by the time I finish my second cup of coffee.

Josh's course has begun, so our time of taking leave and exploring Spain is over for now. That's okay, because we made sure to leave lots of the nearby towns undiscovered. We'll try for weekend outings, provided Josh's workload allows for it.

Some things we've been up to since returning from our trip to Andalucia...

For Alex's birthday, way back in May, we went to the Parque de Atracciones (the amusement park). This is in keeping with my never-throw-a-birthday-party preference. She got to choose what we would do, and to make it more special we had agreed that she could do one of the "extra" activities there-- the trampoline jumper-thing-a-ma-jig.
But it was rainy that day and the trapoline jumper-thing-a-ma-jig was not open. So we promised, next time for sure.
But then Josh fell off a cliff and "next time" got pushed back. It was awhile before the four of us made it back to the park, but it finally happened.

Jumping fun ensued.

We also went back to the zoo.
The bears here are the best. In accordance with the Spanish laid-back attitude, there is no "Don't feed the animals" rule. The bears sit and beg for peanuts all day.

Also, the distance between that ledge and where we stand does not seem far enough if, perchance, the bear decided he wanted something more filling.

We have also done a lot a lot of "school" this summer. We really needed to take advantage of the time off to review the concepts that were thrown at them so quickly when they started a new school mid-year in a new language. 

Derek practicing reading in Spanish in the park. Don't ask me what the kid in the picture is doing.
I mean, I could tell you, but it's not as interesting as what you might contrive on your own.

What else?
Oh yes, we went to a water park one day. I have no pictures because I was in the water. And a bathing suit, of which we do not take photos.

We made two trips here:

About 40 minutes drive and we can be totally out of the city, surrounded by mountains and this river that is so clear you can see the fish on the bottom.
We had a picnic and enjoyed the coolness of the river as a break from the August heat.

Also, Alex does not own a black bathing suit, it was photoshopped in because that day we didn't bring suits and she was swimming in her underoos.
The little Spanish girls don't wear bathing suit tops generally, just the bottoms, so she blended in. 

So there's a bit of a review of the last couple of weeks. Parks, playgrounds, libraries, church, popsicles, summer. 

Also no shortage of:

Stop copying me!
Your feet are touching mine!
It was him!
It was her!
Mooooooooom!
I'm hungry!
I'm thirsty!
I'm hot!
I'm not hot!
I'm loud!

Wait. That last one might never have actually been said. But if it had, it would have been true.

I've enjoyed this summer. And I'm not ready for them to be gone for such long days again. But I can't deny that I'm looking forward to hearing myself think.

Granada

Hurry! I have to finish the trip recap because other things are happening, like the 6th anniversary of when my tiny infant baby boy exited my womb, and if I don't blog while the memory is fresh I shall forget entirely.

His birthday, not his exit.
That I remember vividly. Especially the part after he was born when there were about ten people waltzing here and there around the room and no one had thought to pull the sheet back down over my knees. I couldn't do it myself because the beautiful, wonderful epidural had rendered me motionless.

Just airing things out, I guess. 

But that doesn't really have a lot to do with our trip, now does it?

So.
We left off with us leaving Ronda and heading toward Granada.

We were going for "flexible"on this trip, so we waited until we were sure we were ready to move on from the beach before booking our hotel in Granada. We randomly picked a place and got lucky.
This was our view from our corner room, which ended up being a suite with separate bedrooms.

That little detail made my husband a happy man. I shall not expound on that.
 

The hotel had a rooftop terrace and pool with great views.

After we dropped off our bags, we headed out to see the city and find some tapas.

Success.

Sangria and a load off. It had been a long day of driving and sightseeing on the way over.

 The key to taking children with you while tapas-hopping is bringing electronic babysitters.

Kids in a bar= Normal in Spain

Then we took it up a notch from kids in a bar to kids at the bar.

I think Derek just had a strong shot.

After a night's rest, we headed to see the Alhambra, which is the most-toured attraction in Spain.

Click the link for the wiki history lesson or take my word that the Alhambra is an old Muslim palace/fortress with incredible gardens and preserved buildings.

We took the sting out of "grown-up" touring by choosing the hop-on-hop-off bus as our means of transport. The kids have been drooling to get on the top of one of those buses ever since we arrived in Madrid.

The route here passes our apartment every 20 minutes (read: we live on a street other people tour. Yeah, we're that important.)

I jest. But we do have a cool street.

So we took the bus up the mountain to the Alhambra. Later that day we would read that a tour bus in Italy crashed into a deep ravine and I would be grateful for safety and also that I read that after our trip up the windy roads.

I can't do justice to the gardens there, so I wont even try.

The kids liked to run and hide along the paths.

 

 

View from the fortress tower

 

Taking the bus around town.

 

Followed by more sangria and tapas.

 

Spaniards consider sangria a tourist drink. We're okay with that.

Dinner hour in Spain starts somewhere between 9 and 10 typically, and since our American stomachs are hungry earlier, we prefer to have tapas (small plates of appetizers that come with your drinks or sometimes big ones to share as in the picture above.)

Here in Madrid we know of a couple restaurants where we can eat dinner as early as 8:30, so occasionally we do that. Most of the time, if we're going to eat out we'll do the big mid-day meal and stay home for dinner.  But tapas are fun now and then as well.

The next day we got up and headed back home. It was about a 4 hour drive home, and once we walked in the door it was about 40 minutes until Josh had all the suitcases unpacked and back in the closets. He's the yin to my yang. The butter to my toast. The only one of us with motivation for such trivial nonsense like unpacking.

And it was about 4 days later that I was finally caught up with all the laundry. I will say that clothes hang dry a lot faster in August than they do in February.

That's my glass-half-full comment for not having a dryer.

Rota y Ronda

Look at me, actually continuing my trip recap.

After checking out the Roman ruins in Mérida, we pressed on to Rota Naval Air Station.
It's near Cádiz, underlined on the map.

Josh had to go there to have his annual flight physical done, and thankfully he passed. We weren't entirely sure if he would, given the way he likes to break his falls with his face.

And hand. And knee. And wrist. And shoulder.

Once his appointments were out of the way, we were free to relax.
There is a beach right on the base, which was lovely and very convenient. And the water was like taking a bath! I never knew the Atlantic got so warm.

Alex and Derek, like most kids, love the beach. And I love watching them love the beach.
They are never still for a moment-- constantly running to and from the water, building sandcastles, looking for shells, writing in the sand, more swimming, mud pies...
They leave sandy, brown, exhausted, starving, and happy.
There is just something right about kids playing on the beach. Maybe it's the freedom to be as dirty as they want. I don't know, but I like it.

We stayed 5 days in Rota, enjoying the beach and a taste of America.

Things I shall remark on:

1) When we went into the commissary (the base grocery store) the kids were blown away. "I remember these! Mom! Fruit Snacks! Pop Tarts! Capri Suns!"
And so on and so forth.
The biggest hit by far was string cheese.
I'm sure some of these things are available here if I looked hard enough, but the small market where we usually stock up does leave a few things to be desired. 

2) We saw two movies. In English. And 3-D.

Despicable Me 2 and Monster's University.
I liked the latter better, if you care to know.

3) We went bowling.

4) We ate sand at Taco Bell.

5) We were reunited with humidity. I'd forgotten what it does to my hair.
Hence, not a lot of pictures with me in them.

Madrid gets very hot, but thankfully it's a dry heat. And compared with what everyone has warned us about for summer heat, so far we've gotten off pretty easy. (Knocking on wood.)

Once we had our fill of little America, we got back on the road to head to our next destination, a stop in the beautiful city of Ronda.

 Ronda is a city built on and around gorgeous mountains and cliffs. It almost looks fake in this picture.

You'll have to take my word for how high the overlooks are, and the incredible ways they were able to build bridges across deep canyons. For I am not a good enough photographer to do it justice.

This shot only shows part of this bridge-- it just keeps going down farther.

We had another yummy Spanish lunch.

And then we got back on the road to where we were spending the next two nights-- Granada.

The Princess from Brave

We just arrived back from our trip to Andalucia (the southern part of Spain) and we had a great time. It was super relaxing and no one got hurt!

It's a great time in our lives for family vacations. I shall list why:

1- No extra equipment needed (diaper bags, portable cribs, strollers, etc.)

2- The kids are still easily enthralled--
   The beach? Awesome! A swimming pool? Great! Bowling? Is this paradise? Movies? Best trip ever! Popsicles? My parents rock!

3. Kindle Fire and Nintendo DS-- the quiet in the car lasts as long as the power supply.

4. There's a marked improvement in bladder control. Now if we have to pull over for a restroom, it's probably my fault.

So we began our journey by leaving Madrid before traffic hour, which meant I had to actually set an alarm and get out of bed. It was probably the worst day of my life.
Most days that I have to set and alarm and get out of bed become the new worst day of my life.

I believe this is an indication that my life is good.

We made it out of Madrid and to our first destination: Mérida, España
It's the northernmost underlined town on the map below, a little over three hours from Madrid.

It was a great half-way stop; Josh had researched the things we should see and we spent a couple of hours touring the town.
 Mérida was founded as a Roman city, and has preserved more Roman architecture than any other city in Spain. The center of the city is small enough that we were able to park on the street and then walk around to see the sites. Or sights, if you will. Both will work.

Theater

Temple of Diana

Roman Bridge

The kids' favorite part:

Then it was back on the road to the U.S. Naval Station in Rota, Spain (near Cádiz, which is underlined on the map).
It was time for a little bit of home!

To be continued. I hope. Because I'm really bad at continuing trip updates, as evidenced by the fact that no one has seen photos of our last two cruise ports from spring break.

Off we go...

Now that Josh is about 75% recovered from our last vacation, we're leaving tomorrow for another one.
;)

Well it's a kind-of vacation.
Josh has his annual flight physical at the naval base in southern Spain (the same place we went to pick up our car) and so we're all going to tag along.
We'll spend several days there at Rota and then move on to see two more towns in the south-eastern part of Spain that we've been wanting to visit, Ronda and Granada.

I have to admit I'm looking forward to a few days in "little America" at the U.S. base. We'll be able to stock up on items at the commissary and exchange store that we can't find here in Madrid, take the kids to the movies, and eat American pizza.

Southern Spain also has great beaches, so there's that too, of course. ;)

Derek is forever talking about how Daddy needs to be careful on the rocks near beaches, and I mean all the time, so the other day this conversation occurred:

Josh: Hey, buddy. When we're at the beach next week, is there something Daddy should watch out for?

Derek: SHARKS!

Ach, that boy. Just when you think you've got him figured out.

Since we know vacations can be dangerous, I thought I'd update with what we've been up to lately, in case I fall off a cliff and am incapacitated:

-- I have done all the driving since the beach incident, as Josh's knee is still recovering.
I am getting better, but it is still nerve-wracking.
Lanes? What lanes? Purely optional.
Roundabouts? Yep, everywhere.
Crazy taxi drivers and motorcyclists? Give me heart attacks.
And this is all weekend, non-traffic-hour driving.

The good news is that Josh should be able to do some of the driving on our trip south tomorrow (it's a 6-hour drive)

-- Speaking of Josh's knee, he's started physical therapy for that, and his hand/wrist as well.
Turns out that the Spanish version of physical therapy is to have a good-looking young blonde give you massages.
Everything's better in Spain. ;)

-- The kids have been doing quite a bit of "school" this summer. Three times a week, their Spanish tutor comes, and I think they're doing great.
Derek is quite the chatter-box, and wastes no time in pulling Carmen into his room and shutting the door.

Ladies' man.

They play a lot of games together. 

Carmen and Alex do a bit more focused learning, but also a lot of arts & crafts and things to make it fun.
They both look forward to her visits.

In addition, we're still plugging away at our summer study charts. It's been good to have time to cement all of new things they had to learn so quickly when we arrived. 

--We went to a barbeque at the house of one of the guys Josh works with last weekend. Though they are Americans, they are native Spanish speakers, and the other guests there were all Spaniards. It was a boost to my language confidence, as I was able to follow almost all of the conversation and add to it as well.
We're getting there, ever so slowly...

-- We still have a very small social circle-- the two American families that we knew for the past 6 months have both left Spain this last week. I think my hermiting skills have prepared me well for this awesome, yet rather isolating, assignment.
We have met one new family, so we're starting to rebuild. Only one more to go ;)

(Now is the time to challenge me on Scramble with Friends. For I have no real ones.)

-- Our schedule is slowly changing to the later style of the Spanish. The other night we were in a restaurant at 10:30pm, although we were finishing up and paying when most people were still walking in.
Alex and I went to the amusement park together from 8pm-11pm one night, to get our roller-coaster fix. We got home from the "lunch" barbeque at 9:30pm.
We'll be madrileños in no time.


Off to finish the packing! Here's hoping this vacation isn't quite as memorable as the last one :)