Back to reality .... holiday update

Wow two whole weeks of holiday has gone by! I was saying to the kids on Sunday that I really didn't feel like going back to work and Tiger promptly asked me 'why not? You've had loads of holiday time!' This from a kid who is in the last throws of his 2 month summer holiday.

So what have we gotten up to during the past 2 weeks?

Week one

Himself was away on a business trip to Frankfurt so the kids and I were home alone. Since I never have time to clean my entire house from top to bottom (I'm a very bad housekeeper) I decided to enlist some help. I rang my mom and asked her if she felt like coming round to help me with the kids rooms. You know it's always nicer to have someone clean with you keeping you company and keeping you going. The rest of the day is a blur ... but the kids and I managed to pass it.

Tuesday my mom & dad arrived early and by early I mean just after 7:30 .... even the kids were still asleep. My dad has been working on a car (at our place since they live in the city and have no garage). So as soon as we all had coffee and the kids were up my mom & I started.

What a job!

We cleaned Tiger's room from top to bottom, sorting toys and clothes and washing and dusting ever last recess. The afternoon was spent on Cat's room.... and let me tell you my girl is a true collector and does not like to get rid of anything. (she get's that from her dad... okay and maybe from me as well).

Himself came back home briefly on Wednesday, long enough to pack a bag

 and then he left again, to drive to Romania (this is a 1769.69 km or 1099.67 mile trip). He was allowed into the country despite not having a visa (read about the visa saga) only the van is registered on my name and they wanted him to prove that I was his wife. He told them that he could show them some photo's (he had his camera with him) or that they could call me. They did neither. On the way back out they were difficult again so he told them that since they let him in they had to let him leave the country again.

My mom decided to sleep over and so we spent the rest of the week cleaning, washing windows and curtains and floors. My dad & I built 2 dog houses and 2 dog runs so the dogs at long last is now out of the house (during the day). I can not explain to you how happy I am about this.

Tiger on the other hand was seriously upset about the fact that Duke & Gus now have to be tied to their respective dog runs outside (it's a necessity since Duke and jump over all our fences and because the property is so big re-fencing is not an option). He called me a dog prisoner, and cruel and hateful and mean and cried and when he realized that none of this was going to make me change my mind he decided that he would run away.

He ran up to his room, packed a bag, came down stairs to where my mom & I were sorting the laundry and told me that if I did not let the dogs come back inside he was going to run away and go and live on the street. I told him fine cause the dogs are now going to stay outside whether he ran away from home or not. And so he left.

When he go to the gate he noticed that there was post in the post box which he then brought back to me. 3 Hours later I had convinced him that running away from home was not such a good idea (no bed, no food, no Wii, no dogs, and that the police would just bring him back home). Sent Cat out to the gate to get his bag and told him to unpack it. (it contained 2 t-shirts, a pair of socks a pair of sleeping shorts and his favourite hoodie).

Week two

Himself got back from Romania on Friday night (00:30-ish). After getting some sleep we left for Italy at 15:00 on Saturday afternoon.

Let me tell you the trip down could not have gone better. The kids were as good as gold! We have managed to lose the car charger for the portable DVD player so Cat had taken a book to read and Tiger some cars to play with. This is all they took. I was worried about them getting frustrated and bored but no, they slept and played and Cat sang to herself and the 12 hours just flew by. That is for them, I can tell you that Himself was pretty damn tired when we finally drove into Caorle.

The kids told us that we could sleep until 10 the next day. By 9:30 they could wait no longer and stormed into our room declaring that it was time to hit the beach. And so we did.

We spent roughly 5 hours on the beach every day. Just floating around enjoying the sun. The kids loved the fact that the sea was so calm and that they could walk and stand just about everywhere. We missed the waves, we are used to great big white waves that throw you around and knock you off your feet (sigh, Balito). But it was good.

Cat once asked me if he was single

To the kids dismay we also slept a lot! However, we quickly discovered that they were quite happy to watch Hannah Montana and SpongeBob in Italian. O and Cat was thrilled to catch a couple of episodes of Magnum.

(My daughter is in love with Tom Selleck).

We had lunch and dinner with friends and went out for drinks a couple of the evenings. And we ate gelato! and ate gelato and ate gelato!

It was hot and relaxing and everything a holiday should be.

O wait I forgot.

On the last day we took the kids down to the beach for one last swim. And they made a friend, an English speaking boy named Harry who had just arrived that morning with his mom. My kids being the shy and timid kids that they are immediately chatted him up finding out his life story and no doubt sharing ours (at one point I overheard Tiger say/brag to him that he had two passports). I said to Himself that I would go back to the apartment to start to clean up and pack our bags giving the kids a bit longer in the sea. It was all going well until, I stepped outside to get some shoes and the door closed behind me, With all the keys and phones inside!

There is no way of getting into this apartment without the key! We tried. The people who rent us the apartment lives 2 apartments away but they were not at home. Needless to say my darling husband was NOT amused! I walked into the village to see if they were at their shop but as custom the shop was closed (all the shops close between 12 and 5). I walked passed all the spots I could think of finding them, no luck. We couldn't call them, and for all we knew they were out on a boat (the had mentioned something like that the night before) and no one would be back before 5.

I was not popular with my family, unfairly I felt since really I could not help the door closing behind me unexpectedly. But it was hot and we had planned on leaving at around 15:00. And then they appeared, I had missed them in the village, they had gone to the beach looking for us. So after everyone had a good laugh the spare keys were fetched and we were back inside to finish the packing and cleaning.

We left at 16:00.

The trip back was nearly as good at the trip down. The kids were good as gold again (I really can not stress this enough we were amazed at how brilliant our kids behaved), only it rained for most of our trip through Switzerland and we had an hour long detour because a part of the highway was closed but we made it back to Alsemberg in 13 hours.

The weekend was spent in a haze of cleaning and doing laundry and sorting things out for coming back to work. The kids are also going back to school on Thursday so Himself will have to sort them out with clothes and school supplies this week.

Can't believe the summer is over, but there is always next summer to look forward to and we have big plans for next year. We are planning on going to Australia to visit some family and friends not seen for many years and today a dear friend sent me an email asking me if I would be interested in a girls trip to the Med. Yeah! Count me in!

Caorle Beach



The beach is super organized, you can rent 2 deck chairs and an umbrella to be used only by you during your stay