Good Things

What a week last week was! I haven't had such a good week in a LONG time and I'm still on a high.

As previously mentioned, I was home last Monday because E had an eye infection and could not go to gan (daycare). My friend and co-worker phone me up at home that day saying she had "news". I asked if it was good or bad and she said, "WOULD I CALL YOU UP AT HOME IF IT WAS BAD????" Haha. OK. She forwarded me an email that the CEO had sent out to all employees saying that at the end of May the company is paying for employees and spouses to go to Amsterdam for a long weekend - Thursday through Sunday!!!! No kids allowed. DH and I have not been away without the kids since we got married 8 1/2 years ago. We were scrambling to think of who we could ask to watch them for four days as neither grandmother is physically capable of it. It looked like we were going to have to give up on going but I asked my DD14 if she would be willing to stay home from school to look after them and I asked my Mom if she would stay over those 4 days just so there will be an adult in the house. Between the two of them they should manage. We will pay DD14 something for her efforts. So it looks like we're going. Hurrah!

Then my Mom forwarded to me the FB profile pages of two cousins (sisters) from my Dad's side of the family that I haven't seen or had contact with since I was......three? Four? I wrote to both and the older sister and I have been going back and forth re-getting to know each other, sharing pics, memories, catching up, etc. Fun!

I won't bore you with all the twists and turns but as a result of finding this cousin and thanks to FB, I also literally "found" a half-sister of mine (Dad's daughter by his first wife) that I have been looking for off and on for 10 years or so! It's a long story and I won't say too much at this time as we are still getting to know each other but I'm in love with what and who I found and am astonished at how well she "fits" into the family. I guess there's a lot to say for genes!

I am really wondering about the timing of all of this which comes on the heels of my decluttering rampage last Monday. Is the universe trying to tell me something? Maybe if we get rid of all the excess baggage and materialism it makes room for the universe to give you what you REALLY want/need?

Last night after I got home from work, I took the kids to the park until it got dark. At one point Y asked if she could take her shoes off and I said no. I was getting cold so I started rounding them up to take them home and Y asked if she could stay a little longer by herself (which I have only recently started letting her do). I agreed and went home with Effie. The park is one apartment building away from our building - almost literally downstairs. She comes home when she gets cold or hungry. Yet when she did turn up at home, she had taken her shoes off and was holding them! I was disappointed that she disobeyed me and sent her to her room. I told her she could come out when she apologized to me for not listening. Eventually she came out and apologized and I gave her a hug. I said, "Do you remember what happened to Little Red Riding Hood?" She said, "The wolf ate her." I said, "That's right. Because she didn't listen to her Ima (mother), did she?" She got the point. I thought that was a rather clever analogy myself.......well done me!

My Mom has as a decorative piece a huge conch shell that her father brought her from one of his many travels round the world. When we go to my Mom's, my kids like to get it down and listen to the "ocean". Last time we were there, DH got in on the fun by listening to his "shell phone", as he put it:

My boychik has had an affinity for balls since he was very little and is incredibly good for his age at throwing it and kicking it. He really amazes me! This is him bashing a beach ball around in the entry way to our building about 6 weeks ago. He wasn't even 2 yet.

Last night I crashed even before the kids. Now that is scary! I am not a high energy person - especially when it's cold in the house and dark outside early - but that is ridiculous. We are set to change the clocks back to daylight savings time at the end of March. I CAN'T WAIT! I hope once it's staying light later and warms up some that I will have more energy.

Downsizing, Simplifying and De-Cluttering

The bug has bitten me HARD to de-clutter. I mentioned in a post a couple of days ago about the Zen Habits blog that I was finding inspiring and that in the spirit of simplifying and de-cluttering my life I'd deleted all but my closest friends and family from FB.

E woke up with an eye infection on Sunday morning so he could not go to gan (daycare) but stayed home with DH. Yesterday it was my turn to take the day off to stay home with him and give DH a break. The weather was grey and cold and rainy - good housecleaning weather. I woke up with a lot of energy - just being home gives me energy.

My house has been overrun with clutter for toooooo long and I'm sick of looking at it, sick of it draining my creative energy, sick of it taking up space in my life and home. I started a major clear out in T's room which is the catch all for everything that we don't have a proper home for. I won't bore you with the blow by blow account of what I unearthed. Suffice it to say I was pretty brutal and ended up with about 4 jumbo size garbage bags full of STUFF to throw out, 1 large garbage bag of nice clothes that Y has either outgrown or outright refuses to wear - GORGEOUS stuff - that we will be passing on the daughter of a friend of mine, about 6 large garbage bags of fabric scraps that during the 2 years that I was not working I had fantasies of using for various sewing projects but now that I'm working.....not so realistic. I have a few people who are interested in taking the fabric off my hands so the fabric is going to good homes. I also went through my clothes that are hanging in T's closet and bagged up for donation anything that I never wear or that isn't flattering or that doesn't fit anymore or that I just don't LOVE. The amount of space I freed up in that closet and in her room was astonishing and felt awesome! It's still a small, crowded room but at least there is a place for everything and everything in it's place now.

I started doing the same in Y's room which I'd say is 3/4 of the way done. Hope to finish that by the weekend.

I've always said: If you haven't worn it, used it, listened to it, played with it, looked at it in a year - GET RID OF IT! Chances are you won't even miss it.

It feels SO good to let it all go - it's very freeing. I realize that I need to practice my contentment skills and be FAR more selective about what I let in my house or I run the risk of being snowed under again at some point. I still have a long way to go before my house is "under control" but I feel good about the start I've made.

And I'm hoping my pack rat DH will get inspired and follow suit.

A Lot Going On

Last week, Y's school had a party, the theme of which was Traffic Safety. They had a model building competition which I only found out about 2 days before therefore I didn't really have time to help Y make anything (I'm reaaaaally bad at that kind of thing anyway). She was disappointed but I told her next competition they have we will make something. There were a LOT of models, quite a few VERY ingenious ones. It was fun walking around looking at all of them and voting on the one we liked the best.

After that there was a GORGEOUS dairy buffet dinner in Y's classroom. Take a look at how beautifully the table was laid out:

And here's Y gobbling up her chocolate pudding:

And here's Y's best friend and deskmate from school, Neta (on the right):

After the dinner, there was an arts and crafts project having to do with traffic safety. Here is Y working on hers:

It was a really nice evening.

Y has an electronics class. Yes, in FIRST GRADE! I think it's fantastic and I'm jealous. I wish I'd had an electronics class when I was her age. Until now, everything they've been learning has been work pages and text book stuff at first grade level. For example, learning to identify the various parts of a light bulb, etc. Then last week she brought home her first electronics project - a night light. I think it's brilliant! Take a look, front view:

The light shines through the star and moon cut outs. And now the back view:



Adorable! I told Y that I hope now that she understands why it's important to learn this stuff - i.e. so she can understand how things work and make things.

Ever heard of muddy rain? Well, we get a LOT of that over here. It occurs when there's a sandstorm and rain storm at the same time and the result is all of the cars are covered in a thick layer of huge brown mud splotches after the raindrops evaporate. It looks like this:

Big EWWW.

On another note, my friend, A, from NJ is here visiting with her family. Me and E met her at the mall on Friday and she handed over some stuff I'd asked her to bring. I now have quite a nice little stash of Baco Bits. O happy day!





A and her dauther from Ethiopia, Nessa, and my E

 My boychik LOVES to take a bath. Saturday night he was getting ferfruntzled about something so I asked him if he wanted a bath. He was instantly all smiles and he.....vanished....so fast. After a second I said, "Where's E?" We all went looking for him to find him standing fully dress in the empty bathtub but spraying the lower half of his body with the shower head.

He thought it was funny. Me? Mmmm. Not so much. Well....maybe a little :-).





Funnies

As do all kids, mine have said some pretty funny things over the years. Here are just a few:

Before I remarried, T and I were living in an apartment on our own. We had 3 cats at the time. One night these cats found somehow a roll of toilet paper and played with it all night so that in the morning, T and I got up and came out to the living room to what looked like a snowstorm. Little bits of white fluff EVERYWHERE. We were standing side by side surveying the mess and T quietly said, "I didn't do it!"

Another time I went and bought one of those two-wheeled carts that people use for shopping in the shuk (outdoor market). When I brought that home, T said, "You're not a savta (grandmother)!" I guess she relates those with being old.

Before E was born, DH and I were discussing boys' names in front of the girls. I favor Biblical names. He favors names that "work" in both Hebrew and English. He said, "Why can't we call him Tom or Lee....?" And T carried on with that theme with, "....or Johnny or Sparky?" Don't ask me where she got those!

After E was born, Y, who was 4 1/2 at the time, was watching me change a breast fed poopy diaper of his and at seeing how runny it was she exclaimed, "His kaki (poop) melted!"

Once we went to visit my Mom when Y was about 4 and my Mom had made hazelnut cookies for dessert. Y saw the nuts in the cookies and said to me, "Ima, be careful of the bones."

E isn't talking yet really but here is just a sample of "E's language", as we call it:
"Cock" - could be Crocs, socks or clock but he usually points to it so we can work out which one it is
"Oop" - soup
"Pooz" - an orange in Hebrew is "tapuz"
"Dee-oh" - cereal
"Bibbit" - biscuit
"moomoos" - hummus

Living Slow

I recently discovered a blog called Zen Habits: http://zenhabits.net/ that I really like and find inspiring. It's written by Leo Babauta and his theme throughout is, simply put, "Simplify". In every area. This is something I long to do but am having difficulty making it happen. I have a picture in my head of how I want my life to look and my house to look (think Country Living magazine) and the reality is a far cry from this which produces huge amounts of frustration for me. My life as it is now seems to be one long, mad, blurry rush from dawn to dark. Where is the time to stop and smell the roses and to really live "consciously" and "in the moment" before I collapse from exhaustion at 8:30 pm? And it's not even like we get a real weekend here that is net relaxation/recreation.

I don't know what the answer is but I think the starting point is Living Slow. Saying "no" more often to the committments/perceived obligations that prohibit us from living consciously, prayerfully, contemplatively, centeredly and contentedly.

I remember that when I was still married to my ex, we lived for a year and a half on a yishuv (settelement) in the Shomron along with 120 other families. It was a custom on this yishuv that all the women took it in turns on a rotating basis to make cakes for the soldiers who guarded the settlement on Shabbat. Eventually, the committee of women who organized this came knocking on my door to coordinate this with me as it was my week to make the cakes. I was in a bad marriage, I was young, I had a small baby and I do not enjoy cooking and the thought of doing this was so totally overwhelming that had I gone ahead and done it I would have felt totally off center, out of whack, frazzled and fragmented - not whole. I told the women I was very sorry but, no. Just "no" without any explanations or excuses and they were probably appalled and/or offended but I couldn't really worry about that. It was hard but it felt good at the same time and I knew I'd made the right choice in the moment.

Some time ago now, a book came to me (I believe certain books come to us when we most need them) called In Praise of Slowness by Carl Honore. (You can read a synposis and reviews here: http://www.powells.com/cgi-bin/biblio?isbn=006054578x and view a 20 minute talk by the author about the book here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UhXiHJ8vfuk.) This book has become my bible and I have read it many times. It's inspiring and motivating and well-written and the statistics he presents are, at times, shocking. In the book the author also talks about the worldwide Slow Movement which I'd never heard of but their website can be found here: http://www.slowmovement.com/. Apparently, there are enough people around the world who feel the need to slow down and live connectedly to their land and cities, to their food, to their families and neighbors, to their educations and to their money to create a movement. Who knew? Unfortunately, this movement has yet to hit Israel, as far as I can tell, but when it does, I'll be the first to join.

One step I just took to help me slow down and center myself is that I started doing yoga with a friend last night. My Mom had lots of yoga videos that DH copied onto DVD for me ages ago and it's been on my "To Do" list for an eternity but it's no fun alone so I talked to a friend about it and she agreed to do it with me once a week. It felt SO GOOD to slow down, shut every thought and worry out for an hour and just BREATHE deeply and relaxedly. It's so basic but none of us do it.

I am addicted to Facebook. I admit it. But more than once it has gotten me into hot water with one family member or another and finally this week I made another Slow Choice by sitting and deleting all of my "I-don't-really-care-how-many-times-a-day-you-sneeze" FB friends. You know what I mean? Anyone who I do not consider to be a close friend and who I accepted as a contact at some point because.....well, because I could....rather than that I really want a FB relationship with them. It felt good to do some virtual FB "housecleaning" and maybe this will cut down on how much time I spend on FB as there won't be so many statuses to read or people to chat with.

Now to figure out how to find the time and energy at the same time for some real housecleaning........sigh.

A Kinder Way to Live

Y + E hugging this morning in the kitchen - AWWWW

DH and I are at odds on our views regarding E still having a pacifier at the age of two. DH grudgingly "permits" E to have it to sleep with but insists that E discard it as soon as he opens his eyes and gets out of bed which most of the time he does. E seems to understand - most of the time - that once he gets out of bed it's more of a hinderance to communication than anything else and that he no longer needs it and he's just fine going through the day without it. He NEVER leaves the house with it.

But there are some times - like yesterday - where E wakes up on the wrong side of the bed, in a foul mood, and giving him the pacifier calms him down and makes the pre-school, pre-gan rush more peaceful and pleasant so I don't mind letting him have the pacifier for a few minutes longer than usual. Yesterday, DH went balistic, yanked the pacifier out of E's mouth which made E hysterical. I found DH's behaviour over the issue to be very unkind and I told him that I think there is a gentler, kinder way to live. I don't think DH understands how strong the sucking instinct is in babies and very young children. I think he is bothered by E having it because he sees it as "not manly" or something. E also has a habit of biting his fingernails which makes me think that maybe THIS particular child does need a pacifier still. With Y, we took the pacifier away when she was about one year old and she never looked back. But each kid is so individual and I don't think you can make a hard and fast rule that "At age one we take the pacifier away. Period." Might work. Might not.

Today as well, E hung on to the pacifier even after he was out of bed. DH started getting wound up again so I just calmly took E into his room and told him to throw the pacifier and his blankie into his bed which he was very happy to do. He threw them both with gusto and we were both able to cheer and I was able to tell him what a big boy he was and how he didn't need them any more because he was going to gan and the whole episode ended without a tear and on a much more positive note.

I do not intend for E to be a six year old still walking around with a pacifier. I find that weird and somehow freakish too. I think that his third birthday is a reasonable target to aim for in having him weaned from it. I really don't think it's a big deal.

Now I just need to get some Valium for DH.........LOL.

I REEEEAAAALY Wanted a Pajama Day

Two days ago Y was hit on the head by a large rock that was either thrown or flicked by a boy in her school. She got a nasty bang on the head. No blood or anything but it still hurts her. She said the boy wasn't aiming for her and it wasn't intentional but as soon as she told me, I phoned the teacher who told me the principal had already been informed and was taking it seriously. The next day the teacher told me that the boy had been sent home immediately and was not allowed to come to school yesterday either. She said that they want to make sure that Y knows that it is safe to come to school and that they are there to back her up and protect her and that it has been handled. I was very happy with how the school dealt with it.

Yesterday morning Y woke up saying she didn't feel good. We didn't know if it was as a result of the rock incident so I let her stay home from school and took her to work with me but shortly after arriving at work she started with a high fever so I had DH come pick her up and take her home. The fever is now "low grade" and this morning she woke up saying her throat hurt so I stayed home to take her to the doctor who said she has a "throat infection". What IS that? Strep? Who knows? Whatever. So it's back to antibiotics for her.

E is also coughing his guts out and has a runny nose so he was home today too. No fever though - yet.

I didn't know what to do today about work. On the one hand I really really really need a pajama day at home and curling up on the couch with Y and watching movies all day and being able to get a nap in at some point sounded like heaven but the thought of being at work where what I do STAYS DONE and not having to look at my messy house sounded attractive as well. In the end, I came in to work late (11:30), got some bits and pieces done and now I have nothing to do. I'm bored, itching to get out of here and watching the clock until 4:30 goes "ding" and I can leave.

I really really really want to get to bed early tonight. Yeah. Yeah. I say that every night and it rarely happens. But tomorrow night I'm going to Mom's and Thursday night we're invited to DH's m'chatanim (sp? - transl: his daughter's inlaws) in Jerusalem for dinner so that will be another late night.

The last two nights we have had a terrible time getting E to go to sleep. He comes home from gan and naps for no more than an hour every day and we still can't get him to sleep before 9 pm. Note to self: Must not let him sleep at all in the afternoons!

We downloaded the movie The King's Speech and we watched it last night. Wow! Highly recommended.

I read on the news yesterday that doctors can now prescribe Ritalin to anyone who wants it: http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4025013,00.html. As my DD14 has very recently started taking it, this article caught my attention. I think that sounds very very dangerous.

It's the Little Things......

After having lived here for 16+ years I do still wake up and have "wow" days. Where the "rightness" of being here is blinding. But those days are getting fewer and farther between as time goes by. I have found that the longer I am here, the smaller the irritants are.

In the beginning, it's not knowing the language. It's the not knowing your way around. It's not understanding the banking system or the school system or having to start over making friends.

I feel like I'm as good as I'm ever going to be at all that stuff.

I'll tell you what my latest irritant is. It's the grocery carts here where ALL FOUR WHEELS SWIVEL!

I mean, REALLY. Whose idea was THAT? (I wouldn't like to tell you what I'd do to him if I came across him.) What kind of sense does this make? I'll tell you. It permits your average Israeli shopper to be as horrendous a shopping cart driver as they are a car driver. It permits them to see something off over on the OTHER side of the aisle that he wants and to go chasing off after it while dragging his shopping cart half way with him so that it's now positioned perpendicularly ACROSS the aisle thereby blocking the flow of traffic in both directions. But hey. He got his orange juice/garinim (roasted sunflower seeds)/black coffee/cookies/celery/hummus/what-have-you and that's the Main Thing.  I'm telling you, those carts have a mind of their own and should come with a complimentary chiropractor. Every time I try to manoever a full cart to the car I throw my back out. Geesh! But as I was saying, I am now 16+ years wiser and have come to the conclusion that I cannot GO grocery shopping alone. I have to take someone with me - one to push, one to pull - so I don't do myself bodily harm trying to drive one of these things.

But hey. Maybe I SHOULD throw my back out, sue the company that makes the shopping carts and make my millions that way?

See you. Going shopping.......

Feeling Younger

Thursday was (another) crazy day. Remember the head CT appointment that we had last week that we arrived at only to find out the CT machine was out of order? So I rescheduled for this Thursday. We had to be at the hospital in Rishon at 7:10 am! So Wednesday night I picked T up from school so we could get an early start. She and I got up at 5:30 and were out of the house by 6:30 Thursday morning. We got to the hospital 10 minutes late, waited 45 minutes and she had the procedure done. In the waiting room there was a huge placard explaining the procedure and what to expect. She read about the intravenous iodine injection that she would have to do and nearly walked out! She does NOT handle discomfort or pain well AT ALL. I started laughing. I told her it was no worse than a blood test and I said, "If you think THIS hurts, what are you going to do when you have a baby? You can't walk out THEN." She gave a weak half-smile at that.

Anyway, I held her hand through the injection and the CT only took about 4 minutes. Then I drove her back to school.

Thursday night I had to be BACK at the school at 5 pm b/c she had her mid-year report card presentation that the parents were invited to. She got her report card and to tell you the truth, I was expecting worse. Plenty of room for improvement. But still.....

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I stopped coloring my hair when I got pregnant with E about 3 years ago and I am quite grey now - approx. 50%. My grey hair didn't really bother me but T was mortified by it and was always bothering me about going back to coloring it. On Thursday night on the way home from her school we stopped off to do the food shopping for Shabbat and she headed down the hair care aisle and started in on me again about it. I wasn't too keen on the idea but then she looked me right in the eye and said, "You'll feel younger." My o so wise daughter. She has a point there. She's becoming aware of the psychology of these things. The hair color was on sale (2nd box 50% off) so I bought two and did the transformation on Friday morning and I have to say I like it. I don't know that I feel younger but it was definitely a pick-me-up.

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Every now and again I become super aware of how shallowly I - and most of us, I suspect - breathe. Breaths that barely keep us alive. And when I become aware of this, I make a conscious choice to take huge lungfuls of air and am amazed at good it feels. Why don't we breathe like that ALL the time?