I feel like so much has happened, my days have been full to overflowing, stress levels have been high and I've gotten out of the sshhhhvung of writing. I've been too pooped to pop.
Things at home have been zoo-y as usual. I thought with the start of the summer vacation the pace would slow. Haha. Silly me. Y and E are in "camp" for 3 weeks - every day until 13:00. After that I'm working every other day so as to share the load of entertaining the kids as fairly as possible with DH. I did the same last summer and it worked out very well.
About 3 weeks ago DH said, "Let's sell this apartment and look for something bigger." He didn't have to tell me twice! We started looking for a 4 bedroom place (the idea being that one room with become an office for him) about 3 weeks ago - 1-5 apartments per day! Don't ask me how we've found the time for this on top of everything else we have to juggle. We found something relatively quickly that we all liked and made an offer that was accepted however the seller is turning out to be a real stinker. Luckily we haven't signed anything yet. DH has a meeting at 10 a.m. this morning with the seller and his lawyer, our lawyer and the agent to try to progress the deal but neither of us have high hopes. DH's background is property evaluation and he tried being a real estate agent here for about 4 years before he got into translations so he definitely knows properties and what to look (out) for. The seller told us he'd replumbed the entire apartment and after DH brought someone in to check, it turned out he hadn't. The seller is also continuing to advertise the place for sale through a different real estate agency than the one we found it through AND he's also advertised it for sale himself on an internet message board. I suppose until we've signed a contract he's entitled legally to continue to advertise but it's not decent IMO and he's the sort that would sell it out from under our noses if someone came along who offered him more. I told DH to do his best in the meeting but not to act desperate. If the answer is no, then it's no and we'll keep looking. We have a young couple coming tonight to take a 2nd look at our place so maybe that's a good sign? All of this has been taking up a lot of time and energy. It's fun looking at places, seeing what's out there, what the possibilities are, what people have done to their places.
During June, Y was enrolled in two extracurricular activities - gymnastics, which she'd been doing since the start of the year, and in June she added soccer. Both activities are offered by the community center which is directly opposite our building. After she said she wanted to try soccer (there are no all girl teams around here that I'm aware of) I took her for a trial lesson. She was the only girl there! I thought that would be a deterrent. She was a bit shy about it at first but I told her how special it was and that she should show those boys what she could do! After that trial lesson she said she wanted to enroll so we signed her up for the last month. And she wants to carry on with only soccer next year too. This kid is NOT lacking in self-confidence in the least. She said, "Gymnastics is boring. I need something with action!" LOL She's very fast and very athletic but very girly at the same time. It's a scream watching skinny, dainty, feminine her rushing around after that ball in her flowery jeans and earrings and bows in her hair next to all the noisy, dirty, smelly little boys. But whatever. If she's ok with it, so am I. She'll tell me when she's had enough for whatever reason.
I had about 2 months of atomic stress at work. Everything got dumped on me at once, huge projects, everything was urgent, deadlines. I flipped out at my boss about it once or twice even. I was close to just giving up. But it's slowed down dramatically. Probably because things generally go quiet once the summer vacation begins. The whole country is on vacation it seems. My sense is that under the surface things in the company are going downhill. The frustration level in all the employees over the workload seems to be very high. Yesterday another person in management announced that she was leaving which took a lot of people by surprise. And I've heard rumors that others are also unhappy and thinking of leaving. I don't want to leave but it may come to that. I don't know. By and large, I'm very happy here. I feel they appreciate me and that I have quite a lot of autonomy. I come, do my work and they leave me alone. Which is how it should be. No one is standing over me with a stop watch. If I have a sick kid or have a doctor's appointment or need to go to the bank before work, no one makes faces about it. There are only 3 men in the company. The rest are women with young kids for the most part. So it's just a given that those kinds of situations are going to come up. And somehow it works. It's very refreshing. I guess time will tell.
T told me that she wanted to work this summer. A lot of the kids in her class have jobs of one sort or another. She got herself hired waiting tables at a wedding hall in town. She went for two nights of training and then the manager didn't assign her a night to actually work so I think she's given up on that idea. Legal working age is 16 which she isn't yet so maybe that's why. In any case, she's been working a lot as a mother's helper for a new, young friend of mine who just had her 2nd baby. T is AMAZING with little kids and babies - a real natural. So this is keeping her very busy and she's making some money that way which is good. I'm happy to see her putting in some effort and DOING something with herself rather than spending the summer in front of the TV and computer and moaning about how bored she is.
E's two new words this week were "halleluyah" and "confused". LOL. In case you're wondering WHY "halleluyah", let me explain. DH was listening to a piece of classical music in which the word "halleluyah" appeared. DH asked E if he could say "halleluyeh". E made a few unsuccessful attempts. So then DH broke the word down into syllables for him and he got it perfectly. So then he went around saying "halleluyah" for the rest of the day. So funny. Also, he is a huge fan of chocolate which until recently has come out as "chok-at". Then last Saturday morning we were discussing chocolate and all of a sudden I saw the realization dawn on his face that "hey, there's an 'L' in there!". So he made a huge, conscious effort to put the "L" in there but he put it in the wrong place so now the word comes out as "CHLOK-at". LOL.
The weather here has finally turned H.O.T. and H.U.M.I.D. Big ewwwww! Hot I love. Humid? Mmmmmm. NOT so much. You want to know how hot hell is? Just come to Israel in July-August! We try not to run the a/c very much - too expensive - so we end up turning it on around 8 pm when we're all finally home to benefit from it and we turn it off around 11 pm. Just enough to allow everyone to get to sleep.
DH's uncle (Mom's brother) passed away in England just over a week ago on the same day that DH's sister had invited everyone to her house for her birthday party. The party got cancelled, of course. There were three siblings - DH's Mom and her brother and sister. DH's mom is now the last one left and she is the oldest of the 3. She will be 89 in October and she is still quite healthy and "with it" although getting hard of hearing. DH and Y stayed with his uncle when they were in England in February. Lucky they went then and saw him! DHwas always very close with this uncle so it was a bit hard for him.
My trip to the U.S. is coming up - October 9. I can't wait. Two whole weeks to myself! It's going to be an INTENSE trip I think but I hope it will be good. I hope it won't be so jam packed with running and doing and seeing that it flies by in a blur and I will hardly feel like I've been away.
Anyway, not much else new here. Just trying to stay COOL and get through the summer vacation in a way that resembles sanity. And find an apartment to buy....
