School Daze

Hello friends!

What a week it has shaped up to be so far, holy cow. It's only Thursday and I'm already tired out. This has been a short week, but for some reason I always think that short weeks feel longer...

So Monday, the girls didn't have school and the parents didn't go to work. It was a religious holiday. It was nice, because the weather was still super great. The girls cousin had spent the night on Sunday, so on Monday, the aunt and uncle came over again to pick her up, and we once again had a BBQ for lunch. It was nice to be outside and we went swimming and enjoyed the day. Once the family left, Seb and Cath studied with the girls some for their exams, which began on Tuesday, and continue for two weeks.

I had a super productive day personally, because I booked my flight back to the USA (July 11 at 1:50 in O Hare, if you're interested!) as well as my train ticket to Amsterdam to meet Brent for our flight to Croatia. I'm glad to have those big details taken care of so the weight is off my chest.

So after the nice long weekend, Tuesday began the first of two weeks of final exams for the girls. This has proven to be a very stressful week for everyone, because if they don't pass their exams they can't continue on to the next school year! But the kids can't study very much without getting tired or losing focus, and I also don think they grasp the gravity of the situation fully. So after hours of struggling through studying on Tuesday afternoon, I went off to study myself at my final French class before the final exam! It was a long class of review, but I still left feeling nervous for the exam. It's been over a year now since I've been in school and actually had to study and prepare for an exam, so that's also kind of odd to realize. I feel like I just finished school but it's been so long...

Wednesday was literally the worst day. The girls fought all day long no matter what I did to try and stop them. They were misbehaving, they wouldn't listen to me, and they wouldn't study well with me for their exams. Of course, this lead to their mom getting involved and yelling and the girls going into time out. It obvious that they are feeling the stress of these exams and so am I. Their parents are coming down on them hard to study, but yet all the studying falls on me, because the parents don't have time to study with them. I can't tell which of us is more stressed with this week.

Their moods slightly improved after we finally got through a sufficient amount of studying and went outside to play on the trampoline and swim in the pool. I thought things were looking up from here, but then after dinner they were back to their shenanigans of fighting and crying. Bedtime was not nice with the parents, since the girls were being so awful. I hope this passes, because if everyday for the rest of this week and next week is like this, I literally think I will come apart at the seems, and probably they will as well!

Today, Thursday, I met Michelle at our favorite café and we walked around the Thursday market in town for a while in the sun and just talked about life. She is such a good mentor to have in my life, and I'm going to miss her when I leave. I was asking her all about the education field and her job history and how she got to where she is now. I think she has helped me to see that maybe education is the field that I want I pursue, after all.

After coming home, I made lunch for the girls and I. Catherine was in Brussels for work so she didn't eat with us. After telling the girls they were only allowed ten minutes each on their iPads, we watched a little Disney channel together and I took them back to school.

When I dropped them off, I went to my friend Lora's house to have some lunch and to study with her for our French exam.  Of course, we didn't study too much because there wasn't much we could do at that point. If we don't know it, we don't know it. So we just ended up eating and talking about life. She is such a great friend to talk to about everything.

I left her house at 3 to go and pick up the girls from school. We only had about two hours before I left to go to my French exam, so of course I had to make their studies a priority and not mine, and of course, even with their best interests at heart, they fought with me about it and didn't want to do it. Maybe it's because I'm not a parent yet, but I genuinely do not understand how studying is that much different from regular homework? I'm not dumping a ton on them at once, we do it in nice, manageable parts, like we always do with their other homework, and I give them breaks in between and tons of positive encouragement, yet still they fight me.

In any event, despite the struggles, I got them to study a sufficient amount before I had to go to my French exam at 6.

Surprisingly, I feel that my exam went well. I won't know the results just yet and honestly I am not sure when they will arrive. But I have my oral exam next Tuesday so probably at the earliest I would know next Friday. I tried my best and that's all that matters! I'm happy for myself that I did what I could. So now we wait for results!

After the exam some friends and I from class went out to get a pizza and a beer. I wish I could elaborate more but I'm literally falling asleep as I type this. But it was a good time and I am glad I met all of them, they made my time here so much better and enjoyable. I will be sad to leave them.

Now I'm back at home attempting to watch some of the first World Cup match. Go Croatia!

Tomorrow at 5 I head to the Netherlands for the weekend to see Brent for my birthday weekend! Who's excited? Me! Who's tired? Me!

Goodnight everyone
XOXO