I’m listening to James Blunt right now. And a little John Mayer. Not on the radio, but in my living room. Calvin has been on a piano kick since we took down the Christmas tree and hooked up the digital piano in its place. He hasn’t really played since he stopped taking lessons 3 years ago, but the way he’s playing this week it’s as if he never quit.
We moved the piano overseas with us because we hoped he would continue to practice/play, but this past year he was busy learning to play the guitar and saxophone (his school band instrument). Since we moved to Bahrain this summer our piano hasn’t been working (fell victim to a 220 power surge) and I was afraid it might be fried, but Josh the amazing handyman/electrician/fixer of all things went and bought a new power source, rewired it, and it works perfectly now.
Calvin has been looking up music (he likes to play by chords, like you would play a guitar) on the iPad, propping it on the music stand instead of sheet music, and playing and singing all of his favorite songs. It makes me happy, especially because he sounds good. It’s much more soothing than listening to him practice the saxophone.
“So you’ve had a bad day . . .” No, it’s actually a pretty good day. Especially when you’re playing. Keep making music, baby.
One of the hardest parts of having a dog (besides dealing with his crazy), is that there isn’t anywhere for him to run. Dogs aren’t allowed in any parks and since we’re in a city without a yard there isn’t anywhere for him to stretch his legs and sprint. We found the the beach was a great place for him to run, but it’s about 1/2 an hour from our house and isn’t practical for everyday. But . . .
Near our house is this huge undeveloped area of land that runs between the water and the highway. We decided to take the dog out there and see what happened.
It’s not the greatest video, since he’s so far away you can only see a speck of a dog, but it was impressive in person.
The kids all had fun and aside from a little mud, the only other drama was that Caleb lost his shoes. He took them off somewhere out there and couldn’t ever find them again. I even offered a reward (paid from Caleb’s allowance) to whoever found them, but no luck.
traumatic encounter with mud
She bounced back pretty well once she got her hands clean
Calvin found this fossilized seaweed embedded in a rock
By the time we left, Micah had chased the thousands of birds off the land and into the water. Job well done.
My kids are addicted to electronics. Two weeks of Christmas vacation and worn out parents hasn’t helped. I’ve chosen the path of least resistance lately — if you fight over it, I’m turning it off. Otherwise as long as you take turns watching your sister, I’m happy to have you not interrupting my own love affair with electronics. I can handle the remote, my laptop, phone, and still knit a skirt. Multitasking at its finest.
But I got tired of seeing unwashed bodies still in pjs (or just underwear) late into the afternoon and eventually my threats of unplugging them weren’t enough to squash the bickering. The final straw was when we wanted to do something fun as a family on New Year’s Day and you would have thought I was marching them off to Auschwitz. Dour faces, attempts to smuggle PSPs and iPods into the car, and moans of, “Why do we have to go?” caused me to sarcastically declare 2013 as the “Best Year Ever!!”
What was the torture we had planned for them? A visit to the camel farm and the Bahrain Fort. The camels are fun because there are about 500 of them and it’s open to the public. No tickets, no admission, no hours. The female camels are grouped in pens, but the males are each tied in place so they have a small area to themselves. (We deduced this after a bit of camel underside investigating).
s t r e t c h ! ! !
one of the girl camel pens — there are over 500 camels on the property
As you can see from the photos, they enjoyed it, but it still didn’t keep them from complaining about the second stop on our tour: the Bahrain Fort. We already had one failed attempt to visit it under our belts. When Nana and Poppa Chartier were visiting we followed the GPS through some sketchy looking back roads until we got to a locked gate. The black flags and the guy shouting something in Arabic via the mosque loudspeakers made us reconsider and head home. This time since I had the more reliable GPS with me (Josh), I knew we’d find it.
At least Josh ended up in the same wrong spot we did (and I momentarily felt vindicated), but then he continued on down the road and found the entrance quite easily (remember, persistence is not my gift). It turns out there’s a beautiful museum that serves as an entrance and introduction to the fort. Something the GPS would have taken me to the first time if I had known to type in “Bahrain Fort Museum.”
Huge multi million dollar museum
old city, new city
Of course we bypassed the museum and wandered around the grounds, cause why look at photos of it indoors when you can explore the real thing? It turns out that inside the museum are free headsets that will take you on an audio tour of the fort and grounds: the history, how it was built, who lived there, what the big moat was for, and other such trivia (I’m assuming — we didn’t discover it until the end as we were leaving so I didn’t actually listen to it). It would have been extremely helpful in answering questions like, “what was this room for?” Or “was this their bathroom?” Next time we visit we’ll be better prepared. Third time’s the charm, right?
Storming the castle
everyone comes to this spot to get their family photos taken. We probably will too before we leave.
What’s in here mom? Their bathroom?
He decided the upper tower window is where the archers must have stood to shoot arrows at enemies.
Our Flat Stanley visitor from the states in front of the Bahraini flag
PS: They did apologize for complaining about going and admitted that it was a pretty fun day after all (but they still wanted to play X-box as soon as we got home).
A much anticipated box of yarn and needles arrived in the mail today. Too bad Carter is out at a sleepover and missed the first session of Chartier knitting class. It’s actually a good thing he wasn’t home because between Caleb repeatedly asking “Is it my turn yet?!” and Calvin, in response to my praise of how quickly they picked it up, questioning, “There’s not really a knitting gene, is there?” I was about maxed out.
“under the fence, hook the sheep . . .” (a learn-to knit rhyme)
Add in Camille begging, “Me Mommy? My yarn?” and trying to pull the free ends of all the balls of yarn and a dog who likes to grab them and run off for a good soft chew . . . in spite of all the distractions, I had two excellent students tonight who are on their way to creating a hat and a scarf. I was really impressed by how quickly they both caught on. I had taught Calvin the basic knit stitch 4 years ago and he remembered right away and moved on to purling and knitting on circular needles.
“back through the fence and off we leap!”
Caleb started from scratch. All I did was cast on, show him how to make a knit stitch three times and he was doing it on his own. Some of my easiest students ever (thus my comment about the knitting gene. If there is one, they certainly have it!).
In case you think knitting isn’t a manly enough activity for them, I’m thinking about getting them this book. Real men do knit.
If you are very good this year you might end up with one of their original creations under the tree next Christmas because I don’t think there’s much need for a big red scarf here in Bahrain.
One thing I’ve always said about Caleb is he makes us laugh every day — sometimes intentionally, other times not. He has a favorite blanket that is made from a double layer of fleece, held together by knotted fringe all around the perimeter. Some of the fleece knots have worked their way loose and he has discovered he can climb inside and use it like a sleeping bag.
On this particular morning he climbed in, stuck his feet through two small spaces in the bottom hem, tied up the fringe around his shoulders and then walked around wearing his blanket. He thought he was hilarious until he wanted to get out and realized he had tied the knots too tight and was stuck inside.
I spent the next ten minutes alternating trying to pick the knots out of the fleece and doubled over with laughter. It didn’t help that Carter kept coming up with scenarios like, “You’ll have to go back to school wearing your blanket! It will be like a diaper and we’ll have to hose you off to get it clean!” Meanwhile Caleb was panicking that he’d never get free and I had to keep stopping to wipe the tears from my eyes so I could see the crazy tight knots. I guess we were funny enough that Calvin got out the camera to capture the moment.
Our holidays haven’t been anything exotic, but since Josh has had a few extra days off, we’ve tried to do some things around the island that we haven’t tried yet.
Like ice skating at the rink they have here. We had it all to ourselves. 3 BD (about $7.50) got us skates and some very bumpy ice.
It was a maze of grooves on top of other grooves and my skates skittered around on top of the ice instead of cutting in. It didn’t slow the boys down any though. They went flying around, trying to skate backward and knock each other over. Understatement of the day by Calvin after taking a tumble: “Ice is hard!”
Um, yeah. It’s cold too.
Local “Zamboni.” Guy with a push broom style blade and another dude with a shovel. No wonder it’s rough.
The best part about bumpy ice is that she could run around in her shoes and not slip.
I thought this sign was odd, but Josh said it’s probably cause they don’t want people sitting around taking pictures of girls skating. OK, that’s creepy.
But I wouldn’t blame them for wanting to take pictures of this girl skating.
