These are pictures of us at the beach in Manzanillo, and Alexandra for her school program. She cried before she got on stage, and this is the only picture we have of her before the program.
Hola! It has been a while since I posted, and we have been very busy. Life keeps us that way. We made a weekend trip to Manzanillo, Mexico, and it was a great time. The kids were good, with only a few glitches. We found a hotel that is right on the beach, and was less than $50 dollars a night. The have a pool, and the breakfast was included. Overall, we loved it, and are planning another trip for the week before Christmas. Manzanillo is a 3 1/2 hour drive from Chapala, and is a major port town in Mexico. The beach was very nice, and the weather was warm. When we first arrived, the kids were hungry so we decided to go to the Burger King because it had a playland. We parked and walked in, and Alan must have been a little car sick or something. He threw up all over the floor as we were waiting to order. Needless to say, I was mortified, and we left with no food. Luckily, there are not a lot of sympathy pukers in Mexico, because no one seemed to notice. He was fine after that. The kids loved the sand and they could have stayed there forever.
Here is me and Alan on our first day of school, and me and Alan at his school program. He was dressed as a Christmas ornament.
I
took a job. I wasn't sure it was the best idea, and I am still wondering, but I was offered a job at a ...... you better sit down for this..... a preschool teaching English. The school is called Tohui. I have no teaching experience, so I couldn't tell you if I am doing a good job or not. I guess I speak English, so that is the only requirement other than showing up. The classes have about 1/4 English speaking students. It is actually a very good program, and it is right down the road from Alexandra's school. I can take Alan with me, and he is in the Maternal program at a discount. He is there for about 2 hours including eating lunch, and then he is at recess with me, and then he takes a nap and we go home. I was a little nervous about putting Alan in there, but he seems to be doing good. So far he hasn't made as much of a fuss as Alexandra did when I took her to preschool. They also speak only Spanish in Maternal, so he will be learning that as well. It could work out really good that the kids can both get some good exposure to Spanish in the next year. I have spent 3 weeks there so far, and I am catching on. If you would have told me several years ago that I was going to be a preschool teacher, I would have said NEVER! It is a bit challenging, but the best part is that only 1/2 of the day I teach English with the help of the Spanish teacher in crowd control (there are 21 students total), and the other 1/2 I am a helper to the Spanish teacher (crowd control). We also have another helper in the classroom with us. It is a definite eye opener to me on how 4 year olds act. I wonder how Alexandra acts at her school. I also think she is ahead of a lot of these kids in speech. They are planning on giving me my own classroom after Christmas, and split the class so that I only have about 10 kids at a time. I am actually looking forward to that. It doesn't pay much, but it does cover the kids tuition, and I am finished when they are finished. School here runs from Mid Aug to the end of June, so they only have 6 weeks off during the summer. Since Alexandra is only right up the road (about a block away), I walk up there right at 1:30 and bring her to my school until 2:00, and then we all go home. It works out pretty good. I could have never gotten a deal like this in the US, I could have, however, made a lot more money.
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