Jenyfer Matthews

You may have noticed I have a schedule for posting – I have a schedule for most of my daily activities. With as many things / activities as I have to keep up with, if I didn’t have a schedule to follow not only would I fall hopelessly behind, but I’d also never know what day it was.

Today was armed forces day in Egypt and so schools and most offices were closed. Generally speaking, I am not a fan of mid-week school holidays. While I did enjoy being able to sleep in this morning, I know I’ll be paying for it for the next couple of days. I was already two days ahead of myself by mid-afternoon, assuming that today was Friday. You can imagine what it does to the children’s sense of time. They will not be pleased to go back to school tomorrow morning.

Oh well, a small price to pay for a truly pleasant and relaxing day spent sitting in the shade at our neighborhood club, chatting with friends while our children swam and played.

Yesterday was the last day of school and both children arrived home weeping. I was a good student and liked my teachers well enough, but crying because school was finished for the year was never my reaction to the last day of school!

The kids seem happier today – and have kept themselves busy. The pop-up soccer goals that Santa brought haven’t seen much action in their intended capacity but they are being used today – as tents. The kids have put them side by side, covered them with a fleece blanket and dragged their pillows inside along with their flashlights. Their intention is to sleep in “the tent” tonight. We’ll see how long that lasts.

Their room is currently a disaster, but hey, it’s better than watching TV all day and I have only heard the words “I’m bored” once today so far…

Only 12 days of peace-I mean school-left.

Putting the constant cries of I’m bored and the general sibling sniping that occurs when the children are in each other’s company all day, there are several things about summer vacation I’m looking forward to: getting out of Egypt and the heat and seeing family, no homework, no packing school lunches (x2). There are too many things to itemize really, but one very small thing that I really love about summer is not having to wake up to an alarm.

What’s your favorite thing about summer?

The kids have yet another holiday today – this time for Taba Liberation Day. That makes three days this month already and it’s only half done! Sometimes I don’t know how parents who both work manage. Oh wait – yes I do. They have nannies.

I don’t have a nanny and am working at the library today so my son will be having a boys day with his father, who also has the day off (daughter isn’t home from her trip yet) The school my children attend doesn’t share the schedule of the school where I’m working which can sometimes be a pain in the butt. Though the children there have the day off as well – this is a library maintenance catch-up day.

Fun stuff.

My daughter will arrive back later today. It’s been very quiet around here without her.

Wouldn’t you know it – I come back from a writer’s conference fired up and ready to get to work and the kids have a week off school for the Eid holiday. Not going to get anything done this week. Oh well…there’s always next week…

Eid Mubarak everyone.

First things first – thank you to everyone who stopped by this weekend and left a comment for Shelley. Congratulations to Cathy who won a PDF copy of Shelley’s book Playing to Win. Drop me an email and I’ll get that out to you.

I just looked at the calendar this morning and seriously, where has April gone?? I’ve hardly got my mind around what month it actually is and it’s almost over! I think the problem is that the kids have been out of school more than in school. I counted – they’ve only had 14 days of school this month! The first week was western Easter holidays / spring break and now we’re coming up on eastern orthodox Easter holidays and an Egyptian holiday called Sham al Nessim, which marks the beginning of spring. The children will be off school until May 4th.

Since my husband is also on spring break, we’ve scheduled a family trip to Luxor and the Valley of the Kings over the upcoming weekend, which for us will begin with an overnight train ride Wednesday night. The kids will miss one day of school this week, Thursday. Normally, I’m not the sort who schedules activities that require them to miss school, but I unwittingly did myself a good turn here. They are having book week at school this week, culminating in a costume day on Thursday where they have to dress up like a character from a book. They will miss costume day, which as upsetting as it is for them, is quite a relief to me. Outside of Halloween, I really hate coming up with costumes for school. I’m a prolific quilter but costume design? Not so much.

As you might expect, I haven’t made a huge amount of progress on my WIP. There’s always tomorrow (or May) right?