The goings on

There has been a lot going on but a lot of it escapes me right now.  For most part we've been up to the usual things: math, reading,  writing, reading stories,  the littlest ones playing the days away, pretending all kinds of amazing things, some projects, doing lots of random stuff around the house.  My husband had to be away on business, so we were on our own for about a week and a half.  It's been a very busy couple of weeks and very educational in unexpected ways.   I think the kids have learned a lot about friendship and being a good neighbour, when they saw all the various people helping us out in big ways and small.  They also see that we do our best to help others as well.  When our pipe burst (AGAIN) and flooded the building  and our neighbours turned out in force and helped clean up the mess and then when we were essentially without water for a day and a half more than one family offered us bottled water, or to use their kitchens, bathtubs, etc I think they heard the message loud and clear and it isn't something that will ever be forgotten.  I think especially in a community with lots of immigrants, your friends and neighbours become your family, which is another special thing about making aliyah.  If one opens one's heart and gives up on certain preconceived notions about people, one can connect and relate to many other people, who even though we are all Jews, are very different from each other in many ways.   But I digress.  The three years old is finally done getting toilet trained.  The four years old is very proud of herself for figuring out how to write some numbers and in general is getting more mature.  The seven year old discovered crossword puzzles and baseball.  Apparently he is also still flexible enough to put his foot into his mouth, literally( as is the eight year old, I am told).  The eight year old is also progressing nicely with his english reading (he is already a reader in hebrew), enjoys using fancy words and has discovered his mechanical side.  The baby learned how to sit and discovered books for eating and other entertainment.  There were lots of random discussions on many different subjects, lots of scribbling, imaginary and otherwise, we have to work on spelling, because my sabras often tend to skip vowels all together when they attempt English writing, it's pretty funny:)  My husband is the geography/history person around here, so he plays all kinds of ad hoc geographical games with the kids of the "how many english speaking countries can you find on the map, how about spanish speaking?", etc and then throws in all kinds of historical trivia while they are at it.  I discovered that I can speak hebrew better than I thought, a very encouraging thing, really.  So, thank G-d, as always, busy, at times crazy,  at times very challenging and mostly very very sweet and uplifting and wonderful and most certainly educational times  around here.