Claire stayed with our kids again this week, except we had even more families at our house this week. On Sunday, Tuesday and Wednesday the Murff kids were there. Our friend Oscar was there on Tuesday, and then on Thursday we just went into work with our kids, fingerprinted in and came home to finish getting ready for our trip home. Poor Claire earned her money this week for sure.
What do you do on a boring Ramadan day? Why you pull a tooth, of course. This was on Sunday afternoon.
Just when you think they don't like each other, they share a coloring book. Jack is terribly tolerant of Millie, but Millie puts up with his sneakiness so I suppose they are equally annoying to each other. Ah, sibling love can't be beat.
The rest of the school week was spent saying goodbye to some teachers, learning of some late staff changes that were a total shock, and having more coffee. Some people left for home early. I'm not sure how this works. We have been told that if we miss the last day of school we won't get paid for the vacation. However, I'm not sure it actually happens because there sure are a lot of early departures.
Monday afternoon I took Jack back to the ENT doctor. He said Jack's throat was healing nicely and the ear pain would most likely still occur for at least another week. I am proud to report Jack has had no pain medication since Sunday morning. Thank goodness!
Once Jack and I returned from his doctor's appointment, Jack went to play at a friend's house while Stuart and I sat in the living room and listened to Millie talk to her babies for about an hour. I finally told her to take a breathe. When she did, she just resumed her yammering on to her little ones. This girl can talk!
Since Jack was at Kennedy's house, Kennedy's mom, Rayna, came down for a catch up. It was great. It was one of those surprising visits that made me feel special.
Millie and I made brownies for some of my devoted sweet eaters at school. Millie not only likes to bake, but she likes to wash dishes. Yahoo! Don't think I'm not grooming her. I often pull a chair to the sink and let her have at it. I look forward to the day when she takes that duty from me.
Monday evening Stuart went to play poker at Wade's house. I ordered curry for Cathy, Claire and myself, and Stuart had to be honest and tell me he initially would have preferred staying with us for curry. But since he won a little bit of money, he decided he had an okay time at the guy's poker night.
Tuesday after school, Fechin came to pick up Oscar and stayed for a chat. He must have stayed for well over an hour, and it was still only 3 pm when they left. Stuart headed for a round of golf before leaving for the summer. He hasn't played in forever. He did, however, beat Wade, which did set well.
Wednesday was full of goodbyes and farewells to those staff members going back to their home country, transferring, or heading to a new adventure in a different country.
Once we were home we continued to wash and remake beds, launder clothes and towels, tidy toys, and throw out some of the riff raff that has come home with the kids from school throughout the year, such as a paper mâché fire truck and a toilet paper roll owl. I am not the good parent who keeps all of this. I find these things cluttering and I hate clutter.
We decided to go to the Hilton for an Iftar dinner with the O'Riellys and Davisons (although Cathy was on her own). We figured we should celebrate the end of our first 2-year contract with the people we connected with when we first arrived. Although we are all staying for at least another year, Cathy will be a Head of Faculty next year, and Gemma and Fechin are going to a private school in Al Ain. The advantage of working at a private school is that they provide free schooling for your children. No expat child, unless they are Muslim, can go to a public school so private schools are the only choice for us. The fees can be a bit costly so some choose to go to private schools to work after their initial contract in the public sector.
The dinner was delicious. But the way the locals treat the Iftar dinner, breaking of the fast, is a little disturbing. Just before sunset and the call to prayer indicating such, they go to the buffet table and pile their plates high with food. Then once the Emam starts the call to prayer they break their fast with water and an odd number of dates (the fruit, not an outing with the opposite sex). Then they dig into the food and within about 20 minutes the restaurant clears out. Some western Muslims I know are somewhat disturbed by the ritual as well, and although they fast all day, they break their fast with the dates and water, but eat a sensible meal. It's different for sure.
The kids had a late bed time on Wednesday, were up early to go to school with Stuart and myself, and we're going to have a long day and flight, so we put them down for a nap just before 2 pm. We had gone to the rugby club for lunch and they clearly showed signs of being tired. We drove the long way home so Millie would fall asleep in the car, and although Jack was distraught about having to lay down in his bed, he did lay down. I told him I would come and get him after 25 minutes. Before the 25 minutes was up, he was downstairs twice. I finally told him I would come get him and he was not to come back downstairs. He complied. I went up to get him around half past 2. We watched television to pass the time, then, once Millie was awake, both kids got in the shower in order to be clean for our 27 hour journey from the time we left our house for the airport until the time we landed in Phoenix.
Once the kids were awake they both took a shower and got ready for our travel. Cathy and her friend Mandy drive us to the airport. We were there in plenty of time. We had been told to get there way before sunset because once the fast time came there would be a lot of counters closed at check-in. I'm not sure Delta has a ton of Muslims working for them, but it was better to be safe and go early than to be sorry and have to wait a long time.
Our flight was on time and we actually knew some folks on it. We first flew to Atlanta and then on to Phoenix. Jack and Millie slept a good part of the first flight, which made it go by a bit faster for all of us. I watched movies, in the midst of dozing, so probably didn't see more than a half of each of the films I watched. Sleeping on a plane is not something I do well.
Once we were in Atlanta we stood in a long line to go through customs, collected our bags to recheck, and then relaxed by having a Starbucks. I had to remind Jack and Millie that they couldn't just roam around away from us. It made me a bit sad to speak of 'stranger danger', which is not really a conversation we have in the UAE. It's not that people are better, they are just more fearful of consequences of doing something bad, so we are less frightened for our children when we are in public places. It's hard to explain, but there is a definite comfort we have that doesn't exist in our US home.
We finally boarded our flight for Phoenix. Jack was so excited. He didn't want to sleep at all, although I knew he could probably use some more sleep. The flight was pretty non-eventful. By the time we got to Phoenix we had been traveling for 28 hours. It's not an easy day by any means but it was good to be back home.
Grammar and Pop met us at the airport with gifts, naturally. We loaded up the car and headed to our house. We unloaded and then, because we arrived in the morning, we needed to occupy ourselves all day in order to lessen jetlag. So what do you do? You go shopping, of course.
We first went to Ross to see if we could find some clothes for Stuart. None of us brought very many clothes, knowing that we could buy some here or that my mom had already bought the kids things. Ross was a bit of a bust. We went to eat at Chipolte, which was the first place we wanted to eat once we arrived, and then on to Target to buy our essentials for the year that we can't buy or are too expensive in the UAE. We brought very little in our bags so that we could fill them to return. I had ordered some things, a lot of things, from Oriental Trading Company for the 4 kid celebrations we have in Al Ain (Halloween, Christmas, Valentine's Day, and Easter), as well as Millie and Jack's birthday party favors. I thought Stuart was going to have a heart attack when he saw it all. Oops!
After Target we were starting to fade so we dropped out stuff off at the house and headed to Grammie and Pop's to swim. We all lasted until about 5 pm, then Jack fell asleep on the sofa. The kids had bathed and we did our best to keep them up, knowing this would be quite a challenge. We headed home just before 6 and as soon as we pulled out of the driveway, Millie was asleep as well. I suspected it would be a challenging night.
I showered and went downstairs to watch some television, but shortly fell asleep. I think I woke up around 8 pm and went upstairs for the night. Both kids woke up a couple of times, but not at the same times so sleep was not that good for any of us, except for Stuart. That guy can sleep through a tornado and not be effected.
We were all up and around by 6:30 am. We went downstairs and started the coffee. The kids had some cereal and then Jack decided he wanted Chef Boyardee spaghetti and meatballs. Made sense to me.
Around 7:30 am Vicki, Ryan, Gavin and Maddox showed up with donuts. We had a good visit and he kids started playing as if they had never been apart. It was so nice to watch and to catch up with old friends.
After they left, I took some pictures of some things I wanted to sell. I posted them on the Facebook page dedicated for that and by Saturday afternoon I had several things claimed and would hopefully have them picked up by Sunday. It's way better than a garage sale for sure. We have so many toys we need to get rid of because the kids have outgrown them. I am sure once we are back permanently we will have the worlds largest garage sale.
Around 10:30 am Saturday morning we took the kids over to Grammie and Pop's. Stuart and I went to do some more shopping while the kids played and swam.
Jack and Millie styling in some of their new clothes.
Once we returned, we went to the Queen Creek Equestrian Center because we had heard there would be good trucks there and some sort of event to entertain us. The 'event' had something to do with very loud motorcycles, which wasn't of interest to any of us. So we decided to get the food to take back to Grammie and Pop's. The wheels were starting to fall of the bus for the kids anyway, so it was the best decision. On the way home Millie asked when we were 'going back to Liz's house' to which I promptly responded, 'Um, Millie, that house where Liz lives is our house'. It's all a bit confusing for the almost four year old.
Once we got home, Jack had fallen asleep in the car so we attempted to put him in the guest bed. However, he kind of woke up and ended up laying on the sofa until he went to sleep again. Neither kid are much and both were asleep by 6:30 pm. Since that is their normal bed time, I was hopeful for a full night's sleep from both of them.
We got home and put the kids in bed. We stayed up and watched a bit of television with Liz and then retired just before 10 pm. It's great to be home.
For my loyal readers, I am debating whether or not I will keep the blog up for the two weeks we are in Arizona. While I love to entertain you, most of the people who read this actually live in Arizona and will 'live' some of this blog first hand. However, another reason I write this is so Jack and Millie can read about our crazy lives when they are older. I haven't decided yet, so stay tuned.
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