Those following my blog know that English is not my mother language. I learned English at school but mostly through a Correspondence English course and later on a Language Institute where I got some certificates from Cambridge University (English as a Foreign Language).

Nowadays English is already incorporated in 3rd and 4th grade, my son could have attended on 3rd grade but he didn’t because those classes are after school and he had to stay there a couple hours after school classes twice a week and I thought it was too much, however I think English is a “must to learn” language nowadays.

Last year I found a great online English teaching program that my son could attend at home but we had to pay for it, I’m talking about: Globalenglishkids.com (best view with Internet Explorer). My son did the free trial of 7 days and he loved the course and keeps asking me to subscribe to the complete version.

I’ve been doing a little research online and out of nowhere, without notice, last weekend I was Stumbling Upon pages and I came across StarFall.com. This is an amazing learning site that caught immediately my attention as well as my son’s.

This site is ideal for those that, having English as their mother language, can have their first contact with letters, sounds, words and sentences. It’s useful for pre-kindergarten, kindergarten, first and second grade.

I took a look around the site and I also find it very useful and even excellent for kids that want to learn English as a second language and it’s free. My son loves the site and it’s a deal that in September, when school starts, he will also start leaning English at home with this program. Once my daughter is already in kindergarten I hope she gets interested too and starts leaning English with her brother.

The site has also available the StarFall Store where we can find high quality educational products.

My daughter is afraid of all type of insects and animals, she just freaks out, screams and cries when she sees an unexpected bug. What happened today is hard to believe.

During break time in pre-school she saw a bee, a beautiful yellow and black bee, was she afraid? No. She tried to grab the bee with her hand and she got stung on one finger. I really can imagine the pain she felt because when I was younger I was stung by 3 or 4 bees. My poor baby…

The hand still hurts and it’s swollen, I just gave her some medication for the pain and to reduce the swollen, I believe tomorrow she’ll be ok.

Well, two days ago she hit a iron bar with her forehead and now she has a black spot.

Well, what can I say, growing up is having a lot of experiences, some good but also some bad, all together they will make my kids more alert and aware of what is going on around them.

My daughter was once again removed from the Ballet class because of her bad temper. It is the second time this happens, the first time was two months ago and today it happened again.

She loves Ballet classes but, sometimes, she doesn’t want to do what the teacher says and really refused to do it. When the teacher calls her attention and says that she has to do what the others are doing and not what she wants she gets into her bad mood and makes a tantrum. Once she refused to do what the teacher requested she was sent away from class because, and I understand, if she doesn’t want to do things right why is she in class.

I really don’t know how to handle this situation because she really loves Ballet. I had a conversation with her when we arrived home and I told her if she wants to attend Ballet classes she has to follow the teacher’s instructions. I don’t think this is going to solve the problem because at school the teacher has the same problem with her.

She’s 4 so I hope with time, she will get it but believe me she really has bad temper from time to time.

Suggestions will be appreciated.

Some weeks ago I wrote about my son’s cell phone and my doubts about he having one at the age of 9. I must say I had a bad experience with that cell phone.

First he started calling me to the office 4-6 times a day, although I advised him not to he continued doing so with the excuse that he had important things to tell me or that he just wanted t say Hi.

Almost 4 weeks ago the cell phone had a malfunction and had to go to Nokia to be fixed, quiet and peace returned as well as not so good grades. I now think the cell phone and all the fuss around it caused my son to get distracted and losing his concentration on his school work.

I’m very sad and I regret I did not follow him more closely in school.

Who follows this blog for some time knows that I am a full time worker, I leave home at 8.30am and arrive at 7pm or 8.15pm when my son has soccer classes. He attends a daycare after school where he does all his homeworks so that at night he doesn’t have to do them when he is supposed to be in bed, resting. Usually I don’t worry because I know all the homework is done in daycare and daycare also provides extra works for them to practice what they have learned.

He’s having his 4th teacher this year (3rd grade) due to some factors like teacher retirement, another teacher maternity leave, another teacher medical leave, etc etc. This year was like a roller coaster of teachers and that also affected the students one more than the others. He also started soccer classes in the end of February, another distracting situation maybe.

My son is very active, distracted and talks a lot in class. I’m sure the cell phone contributed to the lack of attention, not only in class but generally. Daycare director told me he’s much calmer since he hasn’t the cell phone.

Today I bought a test book with all the subjects he has in class for him to do some work at home. He’s having his final tests for this year in 2 or 3 weeks and I told him I want him to improve his grades. Daycare director told me not to worry, that this is just a phase, that he is an intelligent boy and he’s going to improve the grades.

One thing I’m sure, he will not get the cell phone back till the end of the school year, and when school starts in September I won’t let him use the cell phone.

I know I’ve been away from this blog but fortunately I’ve been having a lot of paid work on the others, and I barely have spare time to write on this one.

Last Friday the daycare party went really well. The kids where fabulous, all of them.

First there was the Ballet class with the “Spring” dance:

Then, after new clothes and make-up, my daughter danced an “Ali Baba” dance and she was dress like the Ali Baba fairy tale.

My son danced HipHop and he was dressed (more or less) like a HipHop dancer. The trousers are really old but…he likes the way they look.

Before the end of the show a known Reality Show “star” from

around here sang a song and the kids where

all back on stage to dance with her.

After the show there was a lot of food for everyone (each person took something to eat) and I can say we had a nice evening.

With this theme I can’t locate the photos in the right places, sorry!

Daycare is having a party on Friday night and the kids will be the Stars of the party.

This daycare where my children stay after school has children from 4 months to 12 years old. Depending on the age of the children the daycare has several classes and therefore several rooms and activities. My daughter is in the pre-school class and my son in the basic school (1st to 4th grade) class and they only go there after 3.30pm when they finish public school.

So, talking about the party, all these children, all classes, will be the Stars of the party, even the little ones will have their share in the show.

My son will take part in a Hip-Hop dance and I still don’t know what he will be wearing.

My daughter’s actuation will be more complicated, she will be in two actuations actually, ballet (from ballet classes she attends in daycare) and one from her daycare class. For the ballet I already requested my mom (she has a sewing machine) to make me some wings. For the other actuation a mini-skirt is needed as well as make-up, red shirt, scarfs, etc.

As you can imagine, parents are not told what the show is about so we just have to follow the instructions the teacher gives us regarding clothes and make-up and go to the show.

Well, my son keeps being very mysterious about the secret girlfriend but I knew through a school friend that the flowers were a success.

He asked a friend to give the flowers to the “girlfriend” (he’s too shy) and it seems that the class (she is from another classroom) was delighted with the flowers. Teachers and school personal was called to see the gift and a glass flower pot was arranged to put that special present.

This is a interesting relationship, he almost never talks with her and they “date” from the distance. His personal messenger on MSN Messenger is now: “I love B. like I never loved before”.

This is beautiful and I really find this interesting. Innocence and love are in the air.

Ok…I know…he’s 9 so…in 5 or 6 years I’m sure I won’t find this “secret girlfriend stuff” interesting!!!

I find this so amusing. My son, who recently turned 9, has a secret girlfriend. He refuses to say her name, I just know it’s from his school but not from his class and has a twin sister. Interesting.

He’s preparing an envelope with something inside, he doesn’t let me see and tomorrow he wants to buy a flower to give her on Valentine’s Day. I’m also trying to find a poem online for him to give her.

It’s a kind of strange “Romance”, when he wants to give her something, he gives it to her twin sister that afterwards will give her sister and the same way around. They avoid contact due to shyness.

This is really “innocent love” and it’s so embarassing for him to speak about it. Today he brought a small fluffy dog that, when pressed, he makes the sound of a kiss and say “I love you”. He spent the evening pressing it but refused to tell me who gave it to him.

“Love is in the air”!

We are in the Carnival season. Carnival involves masquerades and street parades.
Today most of the schools participated in a street parade in the city. Each school chooses a outfit, and all the kids are dressed the same way.

Other schools, like the one my kids attend, prefer not to participate in the parade and make their own fun party at school. All kids were free to choose their outfit, usually they masquerade according to something they like.

My son’s outfit is a Ninja and my daughter’s is a Princess. They were really excited today and they even got up early in the morning to get dressed. (It’s also my son’s birthday - Next post)

I was waiting to transfer the photos from my camera to the computer to write this post. Unfortunately the photos are not good in fact we can’t see a thing.

Wednesday it was Dani’s swimming class. He goes in the school bus to the local swimming pool to have his class. As I’ve been at home with Catherine I took the opportunity to assist his class. We were in a corridor along the swimming pool and we could look through the glasses. I took a few photos but the flash reflected in the glass and we barely see the water.

No photos but I have this moment on my head and he was happy that I was there and I’m happy because I was able to do something I can’t do when I’m working, keep in touch with my kids activities.

Yesterday it has been a very busy day. Usually we are quietly at home, playing, watching TV, go out for a cup of coffee. Due to Catherine surgery we haven’t gone out and everybody come in. Catherine received the visit of my in laws, my two BIL, two SIL, two nephews, my best friend and her son and a few phone calls. It was a really busy day.

Catherine was really very surprised with the visits as that doesn’t happen often and she was really happy and spoiled.

Today, it was the first day she left the house after the surgery, but didn’t get out of the car. I did something I usually am not able to: pick up my son at school at 15:30. It felt so good and he was so happy. Usually it’s daycare that picks him up and I pick him up at 18:45 after leaving work, but once I’m at home due to Catherine surgery I’m taking advantage of everything I can’t do when I’m working.

He already did his homework and is now watching a movie with sister.

I love this so much, my dream is to follow my kids, be able to work from home, pick them up at school, help with homework, but life is not always what we want and I’m lucky to have a full time job and a salary at the end of the month.

After my daughter’s Christmas party, I had a word with her teacher. As a point of reference is the fact that she’s the youngest preschooler on that school, she told me she’s a very smart girl, very talented, she already draws as if she was older, she always colors inside the lines, etc. etc.The thing that really upset me and made me very sad is the fact that, the image she has from me is from the mother that arrives home and has to cook and is in the kitchen. The teacher said: “your daughter misses you”. Oh boy!! that hurt.

Working from 9 to 18:30, arriving home at 19-19:10 leaves me little time to be with her and my son, I admit it, but there is nothing I can do to avoid it. My bosses don’t want to change anything on my schedule, for them I could leave at 19 or 20:00 they don’t care. I have this job for 13 years, I have my status, my salary and with my age, I can’t afford losing it, I can’t live without it, without the salary, I would if I could.

I have to adjust time, make it longer, at least try.

• Instead of spending the lunch time blogging in the office I will start coming home and do some laundry, prepare dinner in advance so that I have less to do when I arrive home at night.

• Establish bath time to prevent me from saying 10 times that it’s bath time.

• Leave blogging, checking emails and twitters for after the kids are asleep (if I’m still awake)

What else can I do?

I realize that she ask for my unconditional attention, I guess too much attention, she wants me to leave everything behind to give her all the attention. Sometimes I have to refuse because I have other things to do and she has to understand that. It’s like: I give one finger and she demand the hand.

Of course this is always my forever dilemma, and for those that followed my other family blog know that, I always wanted to be a WAHM but that it’s not possible here unless I had married a very rich man and that’s not the case.

I have to continue to search ways to manage and organize my time, but what I realize is that time goes by, kids are growing up and I’m missing it all.