I’m seriously thinking of ending this blog due to lack of activity. I first started this blog so that all my friends and family could stay up to date with all our adventures here in Spain, but I could see by the stats that only a handful of poeple get here and by the looks of it, get here by accident and  most are not here long enough to possibly read anything. It takes a lot of effort to write everyday (well, I don’t do that anymore), and so I will see what happens in the rest of the year and make a decision.

Anyway, to the matter of this post..the winner of the “Guess Matt’s age” contest is... You guess it, my only loyal reader, the only one who ever dares leave comments… the only one who did leave a comment…..the very own Mary Tery!! Although she did not guess right, by default, since she was the only one to leave a comment she wins.. (Matt’s age is..does it really matter now?)

I will be setting up M.T with her very own blog which I hope has more success than mine.

Today its Matt’s birthday and many people ask, how old is Matt?? Well, since this blog has so many loyal followers, I’m proposing a contest, who ever guesses his age correctly.. (you will need to place a comment with the answer, I know it will be hard) will win….your own blog..I will take care of everything.

Marco, Bella wish their PAPA a very Happy Birthday, today they made their own brithday cards and blew the candles of his cake. I wish my Matt a very very happy day and tell him I love him and can’t wait to celebrate many more with him.

I will announce the winner in my next post. (If everyone guesses correcly I will choose the winner that made the best comment!!)

Good luck to all!!!

photo flickr eye flashes 

The other day I got a really funny email that I have to share with all of you.. Here goes…

Prepare now for the Beijing Olympics.
Learn Chinese in 5 minutes (You MUST read them aloud) in English and  Chinese

That’s not right!                                              Sum Ting Wong

Are you harbouring a fugitive?                       Hu Yu Hai Ding

See me ASAP                                                   Kum Hia Nao

Stupid Man                                                      Dum Fuk

Small Horse                                                    Tai Ni Po Ni

Did you go to the beach?                                 Wai Yu So Tan

I bumped into a coffee table!                           Ai Bang Mai Fu Kin Ni

I think you need a face lift!                              Chin Tu Fat
 
It’s very dark in here!                                      Wai So Dim

I thought you were on a diet!                           Wai Yu Mun Ching

This is a tow away zone!                                        No Pah King

Our meeting is scheduled for next week!          Wai Yu Kum Nao

Staying out of sight                                         Lei Ying Lo

He’s cleaning his automobile                            Wa Shing Ka

Your body odour is offensive                           Yu Stin Ki Pu

Great                                                                      Fa Kin Su Pa phot flckr by behind dark eyes 

The other morning Bella woke up early and started to “pretend give me a tatto” while I was on the computer writing an email before heading off to my class (I will tell you about the class in another post). Anyway, she loves tattos and can’t wait to have a “real one”, she loves Miami ink and can’t understand why the tattos we let her wear don’t last long and wants the one with the “needle” (Ok, so she’s a bit weird, but those of you who know her know that she is 4 going on 20).

Ok, where was I going with all this, oh yes, ok, so she loves to pretend draw on my arm or anywhere and pretend to give me a tattoo..This particular morning, I was running late and not paying much attention to her and she proceded to give me her pretend tatto..I let her so she wold leave me alone and as soon as I finished typing the email, I headed off to class.

Half way through the morning in my class the guy sitting next to me says to me “Nice Tatoo”, and I say “Excuse me” (well, in Spanish) and he said, “It’s very original”, and I say again “Excuse me???”, He then grabs my arm turns it so I could see and to my surprise, little miss Bella, had decided that this morning she would use a real marker!! not even a pen a MARKER!! The next thing I know is that the entire class is getting up to admire my tatoo and yes, laugh at me..

When I got home I had to take a picture of it and thank Bella for the lovely artwork…Well, at least we know she will have an artistic profession.

When can I go swimming? when can I go swimming????? That is the only thing we have heard for 4 days now!! Poor Marco can’t take it anymore, so finally tomorrow he will be able to go back in the pool after his swiming pool cut incident. The poor thing has been a good sport about it, eventhough I think it has been the hottest days of the summer and all his friends were yelling for him to just jump in….

It has been more of a punishment for us than for him, let me tell you.. Anyway, the picture above was done with a new cool photo website called slide.com where you can convert your pictures into really neat slide shows.. I made a quick one to test it out and its in the header as you can see.. If the music bothers you, you can simply turn it off in the left top corner.. Tell me what you think??

Yes, it might look like a sports injury from the look of the bandaged foot but nop, it was a pool incident. We went over to my friend’s house Marisela and the kids went swimming, they were having a great time when all of a sudden, Marco started screaming and held his foot out of the pool which was drenched in blood. He somehow cut the bottom of his foot with we still don’t know what. I stopped the bleeding but the cut looked deep and seemed to have particles of something inside, so off to the emergency room…

The doctor said the cut was not very deep and put on some new type of band aid stitches and wrapped up his entire foot, as he was doing this Marco said “Are you going to wrap me up like the mommy?“..hahahaa. Poor thing, he can’t go swimming for 4 days or play any sports.. He is very depressed but is being a great sport..

Isabella helps likes helping her brother bringing him things and making sure he is ok…

As you all know, and as I keep reminding you, I will be turning 39+1 (oh what the hell, the big 40) very soon. Well, every day I look at myself in the mirrow and I can see the small (some big) changes that my face and body have gone through, throughout the years…and it isn’t until you see pcitures of yourself that you truly begin to really notice the change.

Well, on Sunday a very talented photographer friend took some pictures of me in a park and well you can Click Here to see some of the results…For those of you who haven’t seen me in a while, you will probably notice the changes more than I and for those who see me everyday, well..Same old me…

I actually like the way they came out and I’m starting to accept my age better and better everyday. By the time Oct 1st rolls around I will have gotten a grip on the situation.

Bella learns how to crawl, check, learns how to walk, check, learns how to ride a bicycle, check, and now we can say bella learns how to swim, check!! Yes, a 15 day intensive swimming course and she is ready to go… Isabella is a very quick learner and our neighbors joke around that if the Olympics were not next month she could have easily entered and won a medal..hahaha, other predict she will be walking on water by the end of the summer.. But for now we are just happy she knows how to swim.

She is very scared of the water (we think, it’s the only thing she is afraid of), so it took her longer to let go and get swimming, but her fears are slowly going away, so let’s see what she will do next week!!.. Above is a quick video of her new achievement..

This weekend was a nonstop party for me.. With the announcement of my new drivers license my friends decided we needed to celebrate (any excuse for a girls night out) so on Friday night, the girls and I went out to dinner and a night of dancing around town..We got home early well.. very early for Spain just before 4 am.. We left when people were just starting to party.. Put it this way we finished having dinner at 1 am…

On Saturday night we were invited to the David Bustamante concert. Most of you probably don’t know who he is and I didn’t either but I found out he was the 4th runner up of the very first Operacion Triunfo contest, Spain’s version of American Idol. Matt’s friend is a friend of his and his guitar player Pablo Padilla . We hung out with Pablo backstage before the concert and briefly met David Bustamante, a very nice down to earth guy. The concert was in a little town called Novelda, a very small little town, but the concert was great, it started at 1 am (yes, we are in Spain, everything starts a little later than usual..) and we were home around 4 am…

Sunday, I was exahausted and just hung out in the pool making sure Isabella didn’t drown!! She just learnt how to swim and is a little too brave.. I will share that story tomorrow…..

Finally, it is over!!!! I just got back from the driver part of the Spanish drivers license and I passed!!! It was an ordeal just like the one to pass the written part. And after several driving classes I was ready for the final test.

I had to meet my driving teacher at 7:15 am in our “autoescuela” and from there 4 of us were on our way to the dreaded test. An argentinian guy who had already failed one time, a guy about my age that already had driven for a while but never got around to getting his drivers license and a 18 year old kid. We all packed in the car and headed towards the examination area. On the way the teacher reminding us of all we had to do, the rotondas, stop signs, etc…

Once there, we were surrounded by about 20 or more “autoescuelas’ with their corresponding students. We got off the car and had to wait for the examiners to come..We were all praying we got a good one because passing this test is a little knowing how to drive, a little luck and who is giving you the test. We got lucky and got a young guy who seemed nice.

I was then told that I would go first! I got in the car, my teacher next to me, the examiner behind with the guy who had been driving for a while but didn’t have his license yet. He said, get comfortable and when you are ready go.. I put on my seatbelt, checked all the mirrors, adjusted my seat and started the car. I had to back up and there were people everywhere from the other auto escuelas but I was on my way. I took a deep breath and said to myself “you can do this”. He made me turn right, then left, I passed a stop sign, he then asked me to parallel park where ever I wanted but there was no space so he told me to go into a parking lot and park there, luckily the parking lot was front parking so I went straight in.. He then said, ok thank you next!!!! I said “what, that is it?”, “Do you want more, he asked”, “No, thank you I replied”. But I thought to myself, what did I do so bad that its over…It could not be this easy…he filled in a paper and gave it to my teacher. I switched seats with the other guy and my teacher looked at me through the rear view mirror and gave me a thumbs up. I couldn’t believe it.

The other guy started to drive and got so nervous his car clonked out, then when he went to parallel park he hit a tree behind us, and when the examiner gave him another try he just couldn’t get it in and he failed. We went back and we got off and the other two got in. At that point I was pretty sure I had passed but until I heard it from my teacher I wouldn’t believe it. When the other two came back, I found out that I had indeed passed as well as the other two and that the examiner said to my teacher when I got out of the car and the other two went in..“It will be hard for me to pass people after seeing that girl drive she raised the level”...He did ask me when I sat in the back with him..”Have you driven before?”..

And so, I’m a legal driver.. I must thank my teacher for her patience with me and all the good wishes and prayers of my friends and family.. My neighbor last night gave me a printed stamp of a saint and told me to say the prayer written on it before doing the test and to place it in my back pocket and that he will help me. She said all I needed to do in return is go to his church in Valencia and light a candle.. and so when I found out I had passed, I called her and said “We are going to Valencia”.

I know need to wait for about a month to actually receive my drivers license, but in the meantime I could drive with a photo copy of the passed exam..I also have to place a big “L” on the back of my car for a year letting people know I’m a new driver and to be careful with me and can’t drive over 80 kilometers per hour.… And so ends my drivers license experience, that I think has been one of the most stressful situations in my life..

photo flckr by gwen