Home Sweet Home November 20, 2010

After a fabulous week in Oman, we’re now back at home in Dubai and life is returning to normal. There were no smoked salmon and marscarpone omelettes this morning, and the fresh mango smoothies also thin on the ground. There was no butler to tend to our every whim and someone has swiped the in-villa dining menu.

I have to admit to missing the sea view when I opened the curtains this morning. We live on a very pleasant suburban street but it’s not a patch on the teal ocean and pristine white sand that greeted us in Zighy Bay.

On the upside, we all woke up in separate bedrooms. Groans from the girls’ room were ignored for at least half an hour, and big brother, delirious to be reunited with his entire Lego collection, played happily until we called him for breakfast.

It’s funny how quickly we all fall back into our normal routine. The girls are chuffed to be back in their own cots and performed their usual squealing and giggling routine as we turned out the light last night. In the past 7 days they have significantly increased their vocabulary so last night we all got proper “bye byes” as we left them, and this morning, “mummy, wow”, which was rather nice. I do hope I continue to hold such excitement for them for at least another 18 years.

We now talk about “shoes”, “socks”, “milk”, “pool” and “sand” (extremely useful when you live next to the desert!). They have also mastered “please” which is great as big brother seems to have temporarily forgotten that the word exists. Maybe they can teach him something after all?

 

 

The Sort Out May 29, 2010

In three weeks time it will be my son’s 6th birthday party. The venue has been booked, the invitations distributed and the excitement is building.

In preparation for this momentous social occasion, I suggested we have a clear out. Having invited his entire class it is fair to say that the haul of gifts will be fairly substantial. So, in order that he actually appreciates what he owns, we have started sorting through his current toys with a view to sending some of them to the charity shop.

My son takes this all in good spirits as it’s not the first time that we’ve had a purge and besides, he’s fully grasped the concept of ‘out with the old, in with the new’.

While I was having a shower this morning I armed him with a huge IKEA carrier and instructed him to fill it with anything he no longer plays with. When I joined him, he’d managed to place all his toys in a giant heap on the floor and was delighted with the spoils of his actions. “Look Mummy, I LOVE this”, he shrieked as he laid his hands on a Spiderman quad bike that hasn’t been seen in months.

We also managed to find Mr Potato Head’s ears, Lightning McQueen’s remote control and the wings to a Singapore Airlines A380 model.

The “I’m too old for these babyish toys” pile included anything to do with Bob the Builder or Fireman Sam which have been dismissed as “boring” – the ultimate put down from an almost 6-year-old boy. The girls have benefited from a few new toys too which I think is just my son’s way of making sure certain things don’t leave the building. By passing them to his sisters, it not only looks as if he is performing a selfless donation but he can sneakily pinch them back when he thinks I’m not looking.

Having filled the first carrier and agreed that we’ll have another go tomorrow, I thought the whole process had gone remarkably smoothly. We had no tears and tantrums, no prolonged debate over what stays and what goes, in fact the whole experience was pain-free.

As I sat at my laptop reflecting what a good boy he can be, my son came racing into the study armed with a Lego box. “Oh great” he says, “while you’re on the computer, shall we look at which of the new sets I can have for my birthday?”.

A class act April 28, 2010

I am convinced my twin daughters are destined for the stage. Over the past couple of days they have perfected the art of ‘the grand entrance’ and in doing so, have provided hours of amusement for the rest of us.

We live in an old villa in Dubai. Old in Dubai means anything that was built more than 5 years ago. We’re not talking a Georgian townhouse or 18th Century farmhouse. It has no architectural merit that I can find. In fact, armed with his Lego collection, my son could have designed something far more attractive that would have impressed Kevin McCloud and generated a spread in Homes and Gardens.

Anyway, the point is, the girls room in our ‘old’ house has a slightly strange layout as the curtains are not at the windows, but instead, hung above an opening that would have originally been the doorway to a balcony. At some point in its lengthy (!) history, the owners have obviously decided that the balcony was unnecessary and instead, incorporated it into the room by filling in the space with floor to ceiling windows.

So, what we’ve ended up with is a room with curtains, behind which is a much smaller room that has floor-to-ceiling glass and is therefore about as cool as a sauna. Given that this is the girls room, we try to leave the curtains shut as much as possible in an attempt to keep the temperature down.

The girls have now cottoned on to the fact that they can crawl through the curtains to the other side. They have also realised that by then crawling back through one of the other openings at either end, they can ‘surprise’ the waiting audience on the other side. Cue much hilarity.

By leaving a moment for dramatic effort, they can then burst through the curtains to applause and laughter. And if they do it simultaneously, with one twin at each end of the curtains, they generally get a cuddle for being so clever.

I’m just wondering at what age will RADA take them?