It has taken a while for my brain to realize I am no longer on vacation. The kids started school, and Mike started work, the day after we got home. We were right back into life. We were at the doctors' office three times this week. Rachel, Caitlin, and Michael all three had ear infections. Mike's were the worst. Both ears, in front and behind his eardrum. OUCH! They think there was some bacteria in the pool, and getting on the plane right after, cinched it. Don't worry, they still thought it was worth it:-) We were also there for more shots. I don't think I knew there were so many different kinds of vaccinations.
Caitlin and Rachel are both getting ready for the school talent show. They are both doing dances with different groups of friends. They have been practicing hard. Jay is getting ready for the lower-elementary school production. Nicole started drum lessons. Eli is plain bored. Who wouldn't be after all of the entertaining that went on in Thailand? Who can compete with trapeze, swimming, and ice-cream three times a day? He is getting pretty creative in entertaining himself around the house, though. When not sneaking into everything to scavenge treats, gum, etc. from any room in the house, he was found making a giant sling-shot with one of those elastic bouncy-ball things you hook to your wrist. He stretched it tight between the stairs and the door, and flung pens across the room. He was also found repairing the broken elephant that I brought from Thailand with his chewing gum. While on time-out for sneaking into the Valentine treats I had hid for the kids, he said (right after a big lecture on not getting into things anymore), " Mom, I'm just going to turn around and face the wall." He proceeded to sneak into the pack of gum he had been hiding. Little Sweetie...
Mike took me to dinner for Valentine's Day, and bought me beautiful roses. I'm not sure if I will get in trouble for sharing this, but he also agreed to 3 ballroom dancing classes. A couple we know from work asked if we would go to some private lessons with them, and I guess Mike felt really bad for his friend, and said OK. I don't care about the reasons...I think it's about the best Valentine ever. Mike hates to dance. So, we spent 30 minutes learning three salsa moves...Over and over and over again. I left thinking it was the shortest class I'd been to (and that we didn't learn much. The men left thinking it was 15 minutes more than they could take (and I don't think Mike remembers the moves)! I thought Mike did quite well. When asked how it went...He said he survived. I guess it was too much to ask that it was fun.
Today, we had two people from the manager's office at our complex come to the door right before church. They speak NO ENGLISH. They spoke so fast, it was hard for me to make it out! But they told us that the fireworks we did on New Year's Eve broke the window of our Chinese neighboor down the street(now, we didn't do many, can't figure out how it made it through the tree and into their window, not to mention that there were fireworks coming from everywhere) and that we needed to go apologize. So Mike and I went over, and apologized, which really meant tell them we would pay for the window, and everyone left happy (I think). It was a bit weird. This all happened at the same time people were arriving 40 minutes (?) early for church. Now, I figure I need to be ready a good 30 minutes before church starts, just to be safe. So you can see how I needed a good 10 more minutes to have the house ready! I guess they are all going to have to love us for who we are:-)
Sunday afternoon is always nice, to rest and recuperate for the coming week. We watched our weekly family Macgyver episode ( a special tradition since Mike bought the season at the DVD store), learned important survival skills from him, and had plenty of Light-saber fights with our plastic Star Wars toys (of course, very restful, Sunday-like fights). Now it's time to read the boys a story, and put them to bed. That is when we can take a deep breath, and start another week...
