The Simple Life at Home

The kids were off school, due to parent-teacher conferences being held from 8 to 12 this morning.  Shortly into my work day, I realized that the teachers would be leaving school once the conferences were over.  Trying not to get my hopes up, I started hoping that we'd get to leave early as well.  I mean, face it.  There's not much to do at a school when there are no students and no teachers.  But no one seemed to know for sure.  The office manager, who was hired just before me in the spring, didn't know what happened and the principal was down in the gym all morning for the conferences.  We were bored silly up in the office, giggling and laughing and just hanging out.  Eventually, we made our way down to the gym and asked if we'd get a half day too.  To our surprise and delight, the principal said we would.  Whoo-hoo!!

I decided to take advantage of the time off and run up to the mall to look for a pair of khakis (which she needs as part of the school's travel uniform for her trip to Amman with the Forensics team next week) and a plain black blouse and pair of pants, which she'll need for her performance piece.  We found the khakis and a blouse, but before we found the black pants, we ran into friends. Emily stayed with them at the mall and hung out while Daniel and I went off to do the grocery shopping.  By 3:00 I had gotten the groceries and (most) of her clothing needs for her trip.  I was so excited as I had planned on having to do it later and now here I was, when I had planned on still being at work, having that done already!

Ibrahim agreed to drive carpool for youth group tonight, and then he ran an errand or two, so I ended up with over 2 hours alone in the evening.  And do you know how I spent it?  I did laundry (with a dryer!).  I made a huge batch of meatballs so that I can make our favorite family recipe for spaghetti and meatballs tomorrow.  I tidied up.  And I had an amazing peace about it.  It felt so good to just be able to care for my home in peace and not be in a rush and a feeling of being overwhelmed.  

I miss just being a homemaker more than I ever thought I would.  I've been so frustrated ever since we moved because I just haven't been able to get caught up and get the house fully in order.  Today, I was reminded of how good it feels to just care for my home and family.  

One benefit of living here in an Islamic country is that you get the Muslim holidays off as well.  So the second Eid is coming up  the day after Thanksgiving.  (Please don't ask me to explain what Eid is, or why there are two of them - I honestly have no idea.)  Now generally people get off 3 days for Eid, but since I work at the school I'll have off a week for Eid, plus Thanksgiving Day.  With weekends, I'll end up with 11 days off!!!!  I can't wait to just have some time to focus on finishing up all that needs to be done here at the house.  Pictures will then be posted, I promise.

In the meantime, I'll keep plugging away and hope for more days like this one!