Thursday, May 7

After I dropped off the kids at school, my parents and I went out for breakfast at El Sardinero in Plaza de San Lorenzo.  It was lovely sitting outside.  Then we walked a few blocks to Feria street for the weekly Thursday morning flea market.

I love all the colors and designs of Feria de Abril dresses and accessories.

This picture is to show the kiddios what bull fighters use.  This is about how close they'll get to bull fighting.  We've learned that the activity was banned in Catalunya a few years ago.  It's still a big draw in Andalucia.  

The kids had been begging to go back to Tapaole, again.  We'd been there so many times that I told them that they'd have to wait for the grandparents arrival before going.  And so, on Thursday, I walked all of them over there, I ordered for the kids, I made sure that my parents had some information on what to order, and then I took off for my first lunch by myself since being here.

The kids are as happy as can be with their Fanta drinks. But Cody was mad at me for leaving.  

I had planned to eat at a sushi restaurant in another part of town, but instead, I went across the plaza to Yamazaki for lunch, so that I'd be able to kiss the kids before they returned to school for afternoon classes.  I thought the food I ordered was delicious, but it was also my first sushi in over 2 months.  Hopefully I can convince the kids to go there with me some day for lunch.  

I ate outside and barely made it back to the school in time to see the kids.  Cody had a bit of a melt-down, which seems to be the trend the last couple of weeks.

That afternoon after school, my parents took the boys back to their apartment, and I walked with Rosa and 16 of her classmates to a birthday party at McDonald's at Plaza de Armas.  It was quite the experience.  There were 4-5 adults with the students.  And it's over 1km walk. Partway along, the kids decided to say hi "hola" to everyone we passed.  Rosa and a couple of other kids didn't participate in this silly activity, but the rest did and it was noisy and funny.  Most of the people said hi in return.

At last we arrived and the kids sat down and their merienda orders were taken.  And then they went into the plaza where a number of organized games took place.  Rosa had a great breakthrough that day.  Usually she clings to me.  But, after all of the game playing and returning to the table to eat, she told me to go away and leave the kids area.  It was wonderful to see her feeling more comfortable.  And it gave me the chance to hang out with the other moms in attendance.

Scott, my parents, and the boys came by to check on us and they ate dinner next door at another restaurant in Plaza de Armas.

Around 8pm we all left (some of the earliest guests to leave the weeknight party) and we headed back to the apartment to go to bed.  It was still quite sunny (sun sets around 9:30pm nowadays).  Here's my dad, mom, and Rosa going up the stairs from our courtyard into our apartment portal.