A 4 day week? I’ll take it!

Sunday morning Jack had to have his swim kit and gym clothes as he had swim squad during lunch time and had an Aquathon after school. This is where the kids swim 200 meters and then immediately run 1600 meters. Millie had swim squad and had her PE kit on as they are allowed to do so on the days they have any kind of sporting activity. In the middle of the day, the PE teacher asked me if Millie could go to the Aquathon and represent the age group above hers as there had been a child drop out of the competition. She had her swim kit and her PE kit, so why not? I had a meeting after school so wasn’t able to get there until the competition was over. Jack ended up getting 3rd place overall for his year group, out of 12 children, and Millie ended up winning for the age group she competed in, which are girls a year older than she is. She was so excited! 

After I collected them we got home and they unpacked their things.  They then took showers and ate their dinner. While at school, I had been informed that Cathy had been taken to the hospital as she was having difficulty breathing. The nurse at school thought it was her heart. She has had challenges with her lungs and heart, so it would be hard to know. I messaged her and she said they had taken an X-ray of her chest then had set her up an emergency appointment with the cardiologist. It was decided that she would come and stay the night at our house. Since she’s all on her own now, we definitely wanted to keep a closer eye on her since she was not well. 

I picked her up from the hospital just before 8 pm. We went back to her apartment to collect her things for her night’s stay. We got back to our house and had chili for dinner. We sat up until around 10 pm talking about all of the things we needed to do for our reports as well as all the paperwork we needed to do before the end of term. It is never ending. 

Monday morning we were all up and out of the house by 6:30 am. I finally finished my reports for the term, which was so satisfying. After school I had a meeting about the Winter Wonderland. This is the last week of term every year. We have a  lot of dos and don’ts for that week in order to remain culturally sensitive. It was decided my year group would make a video that looped all week long. I ended up missing basketball practice. We went home after my meeting and the kids got changed. We then headed to the club for training. Jack was to stay after for touch training. I didn’t want to stay so said I was taking Millie home and Jack could stay with Stuart. I am sure Jack was thrilled. This means Jack can stay and play with his friends. Stuart and Jack got home just before 9 and although Millie had a meltdown during her getting ready to go to bed routine, we did enjoy watching an episode of the holiday version of Nailed It. 

Tuesday I got to school and somehow misplaced my glasses. I tried to retrace my steps but didn’t find them. After school Jack had swim squad. While he did that Stuart and Millie and I went to the mall just up the road from school. Stuart decided he needed a kandora (which is the white dress-like garment the local men wear). The men in our school were all wearing one for our National Day celebration. As luck would have it, he found one. Of course neither Millie nor myself had anything to wear, but Jack had a classmate whose brother gave him a kandora, so the boys were set. 

We went back to school to collect Jack. Then the kids and I went home while Stuart went to the golf club to meet with the general manager regarding the resort sponsoring the rugby tours in June. The kids and I met him later at the club for Jack’s touch match against the other kids’ team. Jack’s team thumped the other kids’ team. It was amazing and Jack was thrilled. 

Wednesday seemed to never end. We were told there would be no school due to the death of a Sheikh last week. We were asked to not have our National Day celebration as it was too early to be celebration after his death. So it turned out we would have a 6 day holiday for National Day. That worked for us. After school we had prize giving, which is a little like Student of the Month. After the ceremony I picked Jack up from his football match and took him to his orthodontist appointment. Thank goodness this one was more reasonable. We decided to bite the bullet and schedule his appointment to put braces on him. He was so excited. We shall see how long that lasts. 

The exam. 

Gorgeous profile, jacked up teeth. 

We then headed to pick up Luna from someone who decided to take her from the club. Luna is the cat who we had fixed last spring. She has been a club cat, but the club house manager told us they were going to trap and relocated the cats, whatever that means. At any rate, the lady who took her couldn’t keep her so I picked her up. Turns out she’s too feral for us. Jack and I picked Millie up from training and went home. Because we wouldn’t be going to school the following day I said we could keep Luna for a few days and see how things worked out. 

Thursday morning the kids actually slept until nearly 7 am. We had told them that from now on no electronic was to be used before 7 am on the weekends. It’s amazing how well this worked for at least Thursday. Apparently they would have slept later but Millie woke Jack up because Luna and Pumpkin were fighting in the living room. I put Luna outside because she had pooped in the loft and on the sofa. Lovely! She would need to sort herself out or she would not be able to stay. 

We left the house around 9:30 am to take Jack to a friend’s house. Then Millie, Stuart and I went to the mall to see if we could find Christmas clothes for Millie. We found a dress and a fuzzy jacket, but not any cute little t-shirts for her to wear that evening for the Winter Festival at the club. She would just have to settle for the hand me down reindeer shirt she had. 

We then dropped Millie off at Bounce with her friend Kalina. Stuart and I had the afternoon to ourselves. We went to the supermarket to finish off our shopping for our pre Christmas dinner we were having on Sunday. When we got home there was no sight of Luna. I know this sounds cruel but if she were to run away we would not be sad, even Millie. 

I picked Millie up from Kalina’s then she and I went to pick up Cathy. We then headed straight to the club, threw some decorations on the tables and the place was ready for Santa. There was a school choir that performed before the jolly man came in on a horse. I saw the horse we were to use. It was by the tennis courts and it was going nuts. It was an Arabian, which clearly wasn’t prepared to carry in a guy in a red suit. I asked the trainer where the saddle was and when we should bring Santa to ride the horse. He said, ‘No man ride horse!’ Ugh! Seems someone didn’t get the memo that we needed a calm, rideable horse. The general manager of the resort sorted it out for us and in the end Santa got to ride a horse. 

This was the calm horse 

Although Jack knows the story of Santa now, he still plays along for his sister. 

It was a great night! We had about 125 children get to sit on Santa’s lap, and a couple of the children peed on Santa’s lap. Poor Santa! After Santa had left the club, we took the kids home. It was a good but exhausting evening. 

Friday morning Millie had a few rugby matches at the club. She ended up only playing in one of the three matches. She scored a try and was thrilled. She had an utter meltdown when we got ready to leave the club and it just got worse on the way home. Needless to say, time out was in her future. I’m hoping this is a phase she’s going through, but tagging her with the word ‘disrespectful’ would be an understatement. 

Friday afternoon we went to Lara and Brian’s for their annual Thanksgiving dinner. There weren’t a ton of people there, but it was good to get together to celebrate what we were thankful for. At the end of the evening Jack had Louie and Ian sleep over. I didn’t find this out until the following morning, but for some reason Jack flushed 40 dirhams of Louie’s money down the toilet. When I found this out Saturday morning I may have lost my cool. I put Jack in the car and took him to Louie’s house. Louie has gone home about an hour before and Rochelle reported to me that he was very upset. Rightfully so! What a knucklehead! Why would he flush money? I have no idea. We sorted it out and Jack gave the money back to Louie. Why do kids do stupid things? I think I would be super wealthy if I had the answer to this question. 

Clearly the waffle breakfast happened before I found out about the money flushing event. 

The rest of Saturday was spent just lazing around. Stuart spent most of the day putzing around, getting food prepared for our Christmas feast on Sunday. Cathy came over and we watched The Holiday. She ended up having a migraine and Stuart had to drive her home. She’s been dealing with a lot of stress recently so it’s not surprising she got a migraine. 

We were at the end of our weekend, yet we still had three days off for National Day holiday. Yahoo! 

Saturday morning I was wide awake at 6 am. Why is it that when I can sleep in, I don’t?