Sun Peeking through the Clouds...

Well, the past few days, I have been battling my own grumpiness, stemming from who knows. I have felt pretty stressed at work for various reasons and the issues at the bank yesterday was just the cherry on a sundae of difficulties.

I have found that living in a foreign country, things that are simple back home, tend to be more difficult. Small tasks like going to the grocery store bring along with them a heap of challenges. Overall, I embrace these and take them in as part of living in a different culture and place. But there are times, when my positivity has been deflated and sitting at the bank for two hours waiting for a seemingly non-moving line only to be unsuccessfully sent away for something that cannot have been foreseen and not by any means anyone's fault per say, when well, I just can't take it. You know how it is, little things become big things and the rest as they say, is history.

Last night I attempted to combat my bad mood by taking Lucas to the pool to swim, where we played and swam for 2 hours! That was a great idea! We came back home refreshed, with no trace of my bad attitude about the earlier events of the day. We had dinner and went to bed early.

Unfortunately, a few frustrations today reminded me that our lovely swim in the pool did not wash clean away my attitude. :(

After school, however, Lucas started his new Soccer Club. He has been really looking forward to being on a team and was SUPER EXCITED to start today!!! Many of his friends are also on the team (Majken, Solveig, Si, and a few other boys and girls he knows and plays with at recess).

He had a FANTASTIC time! Watching the joy on his face while he played washed away the negativity that has been creeping in and for an hour, I just got to be a MOM! I was not teacher, leader, person responsible for other kids. I was just Lucas' Mom, watching him practice soccer. It was really cool!

 Lucas, Majken and Solveig stretching at the beginning of training.

 Coach demonstrating the stretch.

 Not so much like this little buddy!

 Running around the cones.

 Look who's all geared up to GO!

 Learning to dribble properly with the top of his foot.

 Almost got away from him....

 Around the cone!

And back. 

 Little Man was fouled, getting ready to kick the ball in. 

They are playing a scrimmage game.....remember those sweeeeet pennies from PE class?!?

 KICK!

 Lucas' friend Si is to the left of him in this picture.

 LOOK at him GO!!

 A very humorous listening game near the end of training!!!

 Switching places in the listening game. SO FUNNY!

Just a few more stretches!!

After returning home, dinner, and the nightly homework time, our day was almost done.

When what to my wondering eyes should appear, in my email inbox oh so near.....

.....admission to my desired Masters of Education program, you hear?!? 

Excitement brimmed on my face, ear to ear.

As I pressed the "CONFIRM ACCEPTANCE" button with no fear! :)

 So, with a wonderful evening, my attitude is gone. Tomorrow is Thursday, so only 2 short days until the weekend and the joy I have when I get time with my (not-so) little Lucas!  :)

Early Release!!

Today, when we arrived at school, I went into the OVEN that is my classroom each morning, straight to my AC unit. . When I pushed the button to turn on the AC, it DIDN"T come on!!!!! Neither did the lights. When I mentioned it to Camilla, she said, "ya, there's no power." WHAT?!?!?! We found out that a substation in the area blew (or something) and we had no power, or any idea when it would be back on. By 9am, we were told that we would be sending the kids home at 11am. All of the classes on the third floor (where Grade 3, 4, 5 are) were outside for the morning. It was still cooler outside than inside. We spent the morning outside, going from class to class.

We should have power tomorrow, which will be good because I lost 5 lessons with my kids today. As nice as the afternoon could have been (now that's another story), to lose the instructional time is hard...there's only so much time in a unit...

I'm not sure what the status is. I suppose we will hear if anything else happens or if they were unable to get the power back on for tomorrow. Who knows? For now, I'm just trying to encourage Lucas to finish his homework so we can go to the pool. :)

Guangzhou Friends

Despite how busy things here all the time (and honestly things feel to have been SO BUSY!), I have found myself in a spot I have not been in a really long time.

First of all, living right next to school is AMAZING in so many ways!!  I have no commute and we have a leisurely start to the day without the rush and stress of "getting out the door on time" mostly because we can leave much later to be in time. :) This in itself has created a much more relaxed and calm to our days and more joy that comes with the the "commute" to and from work.

Along these lines, I have also continued to draw the line that clearly identifies "work-life" and "home-life." For so many years, I worked late, early, throughout weekends and holidays. I have done so many things over the past few years teaching internationally to "work smarter, not harder." Don't take me wrong, it is not a cop out for putting half effort in by any means, but rather becoming more efficient in how I am working and creating a clear priority for myself. Yes, I still work most nights after Lucas is in bed, but I also leave when my contracted day is over (mostly). I attribute how I work to how Lucas does homework, school nights are homework nights. My weekends are just that, my weekends. My nights are my nights. I have come to realize that Lucas is getting to an age where he is going to want to be spending more and more time with friends, so as always, time is fleeting.

Prior to moving to Guangzhou, I had heard how nice and friendly people down here were, and sure enough, there is an overwhelming amount of kindness, niceness and friendliness. We met a new friend, Uma, at the beginning of the year who lives in the building near us. Uma and her husband are from India and they have a son, Si, who is just a bit younger than Lucas and likes ALL the same things. On Thursday, she wanted to stop over to say hello. Thinking it was just her and Si, I thought nothing of the fact that it was nearly 8:00pm. When I opened the door, I was surprised to see her and her husband, Si and another PTA mom who lives in the complex, Rachel. Inside, I got a bit anxious, suddenly well aware of the time. Lucas and Si played in the play room, cars and Lego. We had a lovely time, just chatting and learning more about each other. And despite the fact that it was almost 9 when they left, it was a lovely time. The family is so very kind. They then invited us over for dinner on Saturday night (along with 2 other families).

On Friday, we had our traditional Family Night, again with the Martinsson's (Camilla, John, Majken and Solveig) at our house. The children ate 2 whole large pizzas, then bounced around the house for the night. Camilla hung out a bit after John and her kids left, which gave us some more time to hang out. It has really been a long time since I have had a friend that I spent so much time with. We are a team at work, we hang out many nights after work, the gym, our kids play together all the time, we spend weekends together, Friday Family nights together, and are there to help each other out. It is a HUGE transition to go from just Lucas and I hanging out together all the time, to having such a strong friendship with their family, one that comes so naturally for all of us, I think, and that provides us the support we need. It is kind of the FRIENDS atmosphere that I always thought was really cool and something that I wanted. When I was younger, I spent so much time with friends, then was a bit lost in that way for a long time. Now, we have a really great thing, for me and Lucas, with such good people who are very close and great friends. At times, the change has been difficult, just because I am so used to doing things alone, doing things our way, at our pace, with no real mid to others, because it was just the two of us that was impacted by our plans and choices. But it has been a good change and a good lesson. It feels more complete, having people to lean on.

On Saturday we went with the school chef to a new market, where they have kitchen ware, utensils, some stationary, and a large food market. Unfortunately, it was not the type of food market I was looking for, mostly wholesale ingredients. Though we did walk away with a new toaster oven!!!!  YAY!

After a long day at the market, we headed home and Chef Lucas made a lovely lunch for us.

This morning, we had a relaxed start to the day at home before having Camilla and the girls over for lunch. After lunch, we headed off into the neighborhood for a hike. We walked very far up a nearby mountain. Though we didn't get to the top, it was quite a hike!!!

Looking at the fish in the "stream" just outside our apartment complex

The street at the beginning of our walk.

"Look what we found, a nine, a nine!!"

The 9

The kids at the gate of the first place we explored.

The not-so-clean-fishing-spot-lake

The 5 of us

L to R: Majken, Solveig, Camilla, Lucas, Me :)

Starting up the hill!! 

Overall, we walked over 2 hours this afternoon, mostly uphill. And we didn't even make it all the way to the top...next time!!

Me....and 2 crazy kids!

We found a snake skin, and luckily, no snake!

Wild bamboo, in it's natural setting. :)

A teensy little stream we found along the road

The kids playing in the stream

Along the way, there was gated land after gated land. This one we found was filled with banana trees. :) and LOTS of bananas.

This was the guy's land. The caretaker arrived as we were walking past.

Fighting with their walking sticks.

Look at the BIG LEAF we found!!!!

The highest point of our hike (photo credit: Majken)

The heart shaped hole we saw in a tree down the hill. SO COOL!

Palm trees

After a long hike, the kids were so tired that they just colored, cut, glued and created for a few hours. They were so quiet and into what they were doing.

You can see the contents of my scrapbooking container spread across the floor. The crafter in me was SCREAMING at their way of cutting out the middles of paper and going through TONS of stickers, but in reality, it has been just sitting there for SO LONG and they have such a great time playing with it and creating every time I let them create with my "special" paper and stickers. :)

And before bed.....Mohawk Man!!!! :)

What a day!