Christmas in the sun

I am doing totally rubbish at my Christmas planning. Truth be told I was pretty horrendous at doing Christmas in England where I wish it could be Christmas everyday was playing from about September and trees and decorations were for sale as soon as the Easter bunny had hopped off. But here without the daily reminders that the season is approaching the weather a very pleasant 2osomething degrees I have done nothing to get ready. This is particularly bad as I am sure international posting dates have now long passed and so none of my friends and family will be receiving gifts or cards.
Not that they ever got cards when we lived in England mind you; but now that I am far from their presence and cannot gift them with my delightful company I feel slightly bad about it. If I didn't send a card I could give a hug and a hearty Merry Christmas to all I met.
I now realise they probably would rather have had a card. Even if I just wrote from Gillian on it with no message. I may send something electronic if I can work that out.

We do have a tree up; a very scrawny looking artificial tree from Lulu which the kids were allowed to choose a set of decorations each to adorn it with. So it is a scrawny unco-ordinated tree with flashing blue lights. I actually love it- there is something a bit 1970's naff about it which appeals to me. I almost bought a white one for that truly nostalgic feeling. I remember my cousins having a white tree when I was a kid and I always thought it was lovely.

I am also baking some Christmas biscuits next week with Lexy for a Christmas bake sale at school. The kids have a festive concert at school next week so I should feel more in the Christmas mood then and I can dash out to Bawadi mall and get them all a few presents. Hopefully Santa will find us but it is a bit doubtful. I seem to remember one of the reasons given for how he manages to get round the whole world in one night is that he doesn't visit Muslim countries because they don't believe in him there. Do you think if we get one of those Santa stop here signs he will see it on his way to Europe?

I'm trying to come up with some more ideas to get the festive feeling flowing. We could always go to the cinema to see Scrooge although I'm a bit dickensed out with Great Expectations. We could have a card making evening and the kids could make cards to send to their friends. We could go to the carol singing evening at the Rugby Club. I could get some spices and try turning that bottle of Argentinian wine into a mulled beverage. It all still feels like we're faking Christmas as it doesn't really happen here. I'll start a piggy bank for a trip home next December and wrap it in tinsel.

Finally relaxing

This year Eid- al Adha and National Day coincided to give us a week long break. K has been working non stop since Sept and was glad of the break. We mainly chilled out and did nothing but we chilled out and did nothing on the beach in Dubai one day and chilled out and did nothing at the zoo another. We took the kids to the Hilton a couple of times where we chilled out and did nothing. I say nothing but now when I am reading I am no longer doing nothing but am intently studying as I have signed up for another course with the OU for feb. The best thing is reading for "work" feels much the same as reading for chillin'. Yet I get to feel like I am using my time wisley instead of wasting it.
My first assignment recieved a gobsmacking 94% leaving me only one way to go from there. I have submitted my second assignment and we will see how that goes.

The next course I have signed up for is Approaching Literature (A210), so in order to get a head start I am reading Great Expectations atm. It was all going well until yesterday while I was sitting in the car waiting to pick the kids up from school I read that Mr Jaggers lived in Little Britain. I realised that I had read the next two pages with that bit of the brain that reads things without having a clue what they have just read while my imagination was off thinking about the TV show little Britain and if the writers were Dickens fan and was it the modern take on Dickensian style satire of the state of our nation but mostly do those guys just really like dressing as women.
I have know idea if Little Britain was a real part of London in Victorian days or not but am glad I am finally reading great expectations as like most people I am vaguely aware of the plot but have never got round to reading the book.

I was really tied between taking the Philosophy course or the Lit. one but opted for Lit this time round plenty of time to pursue philosopy in my spare time. I have been getting into philosophy bites podcasts. they are little 15 minute interviews with various philosophers discussing a particular area of philosophy. Really accessible - I even understand what my brother was babbling about that night a few Christmasses ago when he was drunkenly trying to explain Plato's cave.

quiet house shhh

Why have I felt the need to whisper for the last three days? I don't know but since Clo went on the desert camp it was mighty eery around here. There seemed to be no sibling squabbles although Clo is not the only person the rest can fight with. Then today Lexy and TJ had a row over nothing in the kitchen. All three wanted to turn the can opener on the custard. They all must have sensed on a deep level that something is slightly adrift whenever one of them is gone for a while and teh bit of their brains that makes them cause agro on a daily basis was subdued. If you have a more scientific answer do leave it in the comments. All I know is when a quarter of the children are gone it is about a 100 times quieter.

Is she coming or going

I blogged last week that Clo was about to be home educated. Well, that's all changed again and she is glad to be back at school. I gave her a week off "sick" as she kept saying she wanted to be home educated again and we tried it out. She loved it but missed her friends and some of the clubs at school. I think she has now realised that the things she likes about school outweigh the bad things.

It is a nice school in many ways but they do expect a lot of homework. Clo is not so keen on homework. I'm not a believer in homework for homework's sake myself and find it hard to encourage her to do some of the tasks set.

getting arty again

In England we had a fabulous big consevatory that the kids had named their art room. It was well stocked for any art and craft project and we used it all year round. Since moving here with nothing but our two suitcases each, it has been a slow process to set up home and get used to living and working here. When your starting your life over from scratch stocking up on paints and hama beads and sculpey clay all take a back seat to kettles and knives and bedlinen and towels. The kids brought some toys with them and we tried to buy a few little extras. All the toys we bought broke or were really expensive. Even finding somewhere to buy something was pretty tricky as toys r us hadn't opened here yet and the supermarkets toys were really shoddy quality. I did buy though a very nice set of watercolour paints and they were well used.

Now we are more settled I want to stock up on more art and crafty things. When Clo was off "sick" last week we did art on the patio every morning. Lexy is also doing a correspondance art course. I would post some pictures of our artistic efforts but I need to go out at some point this morning and posting one set of pictures a day is all I have patience for. We were looking at abstract art and we all tried out different styles. I say we as I had to have a go too.

I'm thinking of doing a kind of art evening once a week after school, so the schoolies don't miss out on all the fun. Lexy will enjoy helping me set that up. Last year we set up a theme night on thursdays after school a few times and she loved organising that and coming up with ideas for things to do for pirate night or hawaiian luau night. Now to find places that sell good stuff to do craft with.

Our Garden

K worked like crazy digging holes in the concrete filled sandy patch that was our garden and by lunchtime it really was a garden with trees and soil. Ok. It doesn't look like much but compared to the bare ground it is the most wonderful thing. The Area behind the table and chairs needs fixing next. I won't tell you about K and his crazy plan for a climbing wall up the side of the house. The breeze block doorway is actually a part of the new property. When we moved in it was a lovely semi detached villa but now we are mid terraced as the owner has added on a couple of small apartments to the other side of us. We still think we might lay claim to the patch of land in front of the other house as it is only accesible from our property. We might put some grass there. All in all it is starting to get a bit more of a home here. The only downside to sitting out in the yard is that the road next to our house is as busy as a motorway and huge cars with big engines screech up and down it all evening. Considering it is a residential back road I do not get why it is quite so busy but there you go.

Lexy's brownies

Lexy has discovered a new recipe for brownies. Now it's not Nigella's but it's not as expensive as hers uses tons of 70% cocoa finest chocolate. Lexy is using 100% cocoa powder. They are really tasty though. So now when I face the wii fit later it will cheerfully tell me I have gained weight and ask me what I think the reason for this is.
Anyway I praised her excellent efforts and asked her if this meant she would cook tea. She is now in the kitchen making macaroni cheese. She will have a go at cooking most things and seems to enjoy it.
I have not loved cooking as much since we moved here. The oven is a bit rubbish and I often feel too hot for anything more than a sandwich. The kids and K are not as phased by the heat as me. They seem just as happy to cook and eat a roast dinner when it's 45 degrees outside as when it's a cold dark november evening in England. I can usually go a steak or some chicken skewers with rice and am quite happy to eat takeaway whenever it's on offer especially butter chicken and naan bread from the curry house.

Blogging as procrastination

I really should be doing other things. I have my first assignment due for my OU course, dishes in the sink and washing to be put away and yet here I am. Inspired by an article on women bloggers in the times and knowing how much I enjoy reading about other peoples lives on their blogs I thought I'd give it a go.
I will probably blog mostly about my kids, they take up most of my brain space most days. There are four of them Lexy,Clo, TJ and Kiki. Lexy is educated at home, Clo is about to become home educated, TJ and Kiki are at an international school. I have a split personality between PTA mum and a more radical school is an unnecessary imposition on our lives type mum. If good parenting requires consistency my kids are out of luck.
Home is Al Ain, UAE. Well home is wherever we as a family are and this is where we are right now. K is my wonderful husband and is a schools advisor as well as a great maker of cups of tea.
I may write a little about life here in Al Ain but mostly the culture shock has worn off and it all feels rather normal now.
So if you want to read another mummy blogger chatting about her kids this is the blog for you. Travel, Culture and politics not so much.