I'm tired...

...and now I know why... I have anaemia... I went to see my doctor the other day to pick up the results of some analysis I did a few days back and well, I've got anaemia. So I'm back on having iron in the mornings and trying to think even more about what I eat. It's not the first time I'm like this and actually I should have known and recognized the symptoms because I'm usually like that Duracell rabbit and lately I just want to sleep... Anyway, better late than never so here we go, having to get up early in the morning for that wonderful iron drink and then one hour later I can have my breakfast. The worst part is that I'm on this thing for 3 months this time. That's a long time....

Anyway, I'm glad it's nothing worse... So I'm still smiling. ;-) And even more so since I found this song on Youtube:

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WW - The beach at night

Please visit the other participants in WW as well.

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Houdini's got a new house

I'm quite tired of finding Peluche, our Houdini hamster, in different parts of the house every morning so today I sent the kids to buy him a new cage. This time we bought a plastic cage, which hopefully will keep him inside. ;-)

I hope this will do the trick.

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Music Monday: Pedacito de mi vida

This is an old Peruvian cumbia that reminds me of my favorite Peruvian TV series, "Néctar en el Cielo". Not that I've watched so many Peruvian series since I'm Spanish and not Peruvian, but that series really is one of the best I've ever seen.

In case someone would like to have a look at the series you can have a look here (it's in Spanish):

Come join Music Monday and share your songs with us. Rules are simple. Leave ONLY the actual post link here and grab the code below and place it at your blog entry. You can grab this code at LadyJava's Lounge Please note these links are STRICTLY for Music Monday participants only. All others will be deleted without prejudice.

PS: Because of spamming purposes, the linky will be closed on Thursday of each week at midnight, Malaysian Time. Thank you!

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Wii Fit Plus

Yesterday, at last, I was able to buy the game and the balance board. I've wanted to buy it for a long time, but since money is a true issue here, there was never any chance of getting it. But yesterday we finally got it. *doing the happy dance*

My first impression is that it's great fun! It's a game I can play with my kids and have a great time. Unfortuantelly my results were not too great, BMI 25,8 and I should loose 10 kgs (20 pounds). I will do my best to achieve that in 6 months. :-D

Sorry, haven't got any time to blog right now. It´s my turn to jump on the balance board and do some hulahops. :-D

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Commenting and Blog Hops...

Oh my, sometimes there's NOTHING going on and sometimes there's just way too much. *lol* I'm participating in 2 events on the net right now and honestly, there aren't enough hours in the day. ;-) I'm trying to visit as many blogs as I possibly can and I leave as many comments as I can, but there's no way I'll visit all the blogs this weekend and by the looks of it, I won't be making the 1000 comments challenge either. But hey, I'm not sad because I'm having a ball! I promise I'll get back to everyone that's been commenting on my blog this weekend and I'll visit all of you as soon as I possibly can. So please let the comments flow, I LOOOOOOVE getting comments. After all, that's what makes blogging fun, isn't it?

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No-Go BlogHer

I'm participating in No-Go BlogHer this weekend and these are my answers:

When did you start blogging?

I started blogging in 2004, while I was still living in Sweden. It was a blog in Swedish and I had it for about 4 years. It was my most popular blog so far, with about 1000 visitors a week.

Why did you start blogging?

I was about to move to Morocco with my kids and I wanted a way to keep in touch with people and also give a different point of view on living in Africa, Moslems and travelling with kids.

What is one thing you are going to do this week that is WAY cooler than going to BlogHer?

Pass. *lol* I don't think I'm going to do anything cooler, but that's just the way life is, right? ;-)  

Share a post that you think says a lot about you or is your favorite. (share the link in YOUR post so we all can see)

I just wrote a short introduction about myself:   http://mediterraneanmom.blogspot.com/2010/08/hello-im-blanca.html

I hope I'll find some new friends this weekend. :-D Take care everyone! 

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Hello! I'm Blanca

So you're curious about who I am? Ok, fasten your seatbelt and enjoy the ride!

My nick on the internet is Blanca. I'm aged 42, but really, age is just a number, right? I actually feel a lot better now than when I was 30, so I'd say my best age definitely is here and now. *lol*

I was born and bred in Stockholm, Sweden, but I'm Spanish since birth (Spanish dad/Finnish mom). At age 20 I decided I wanted to go back "home" to Spain, so I spent 6 years studying at a Spanish university. After that I returned to Sweden for 12 years, got married to a Moroccan I met in Spain, had my babies and realized I wasn't happy with my life so I needed a change of air. In 2005 I moved with my kids to Morocco in North Africa. I left my then husband in Sweden. My kids and I spent 4 years living among Moroccans in a small town close to the Spanish border. When we first came I didn't speak a word of Moroccan Arabic and hardly any French but I had to learn, the hard way, by talking to people and making a fool of myself. *rotflao*

I finally got divorced in January 2009 and moved back to Spain with my kids in September the same year. Since then I'm "young, free and single" and enjoying every minute of my life. ;-)

I have 2 wonderful boys. A is 13 years old and G is 11. Both were Special Needs when they were younger. A was born with severe MAS (Meconium Aspiration Syndrome) and spent 3 days on ECMO. Due to the lack of oxygen at birth the doctors told me he probably never would speak or walk, but today he's just like any other teenager, just with some added flavour. G suffered from severe allergies (food, soap & detergent, paints, grass, leaves and ... and... and...) until he was 6 years old. Thank God both of them are ok now.

I work as a teacher at a small private school. We help the students with their homework, teach them how to study, prepare them for their exams. I teach all the subjects for grades 1 - 6 and I also teach English up to University level.

I love studying languages and I speak Spanish, Swedish and English fluently, and I also speak some French, German, Danish, Norvegian and Moroccan Arabic...

I also love to take photos, scrap book, card making, stamping, dance cumbias, chat, travel, read, cook, go for long walks, meet my friends...

Well, that's me... Any questions? *lol*

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I want to be a billionaire

Oh well, not really... I don't think I'd be happy having so much money, but I sure could do with a little more than I have right now. I've been low on money before, but never like this. If I only buy fresh  bread (nothing else, not even milk...) and not every day we probably will make it to the end of the month but hey, what kind of a life is that? Luckily enough I bought quite a lot of beans last month, at least we won't starve...



It's August, my and DS2's birhtday is coming up in 2 weeks, I still didn't get DS1 a present yet (his birthday was in July when they were in Morocco with their dad) and I really need to buy stuff for school. But no money... :-( I'm getting a bit desperate, because I work a lot but since the school is new there just aren't enough students yet. I really really love my job so I've decided to stick around for some more, hopefully things will get better as soon as school starts. But what do I do until then? Suggestions anyone?

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A link exchange project

This morning, while doing some commenting (boy, am I behind on that challenge or what?) I came across "A teacher's link exchange project" and since I definitelt need more links for this blog I decided to join. It seems like a really easy thing so I'm game!

If you too are looking for more links to your blog, come join this project!

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El Cóndor Pasa

I think this is probably one most famous tunes from Latin America. "El Condor Pasa" is a Peruvian song composed by Daniel Alomía Robles in 1913. There are several versions of this song. Simon & Garfunkel made a version of it in 1970, translating the lyrics into English.



This is a version in Quechua, the native language of millions of people in Peru, Bolivia and Ecuador.

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Wednesday already

The weeks are really flying by... It's Wednesday already, it's 1 PM and I'm working at home. My goal for today is to finish at least half the book of Lengua (Spanish) for the 5th grade. What I do is to copy the grammar parts and look for excercises that work those areas.

I don't really teach the normal way, because my job is to help the kids with their homework and explain those things they didn't understand in class. I really love my job, and I don't mind at all explaining 13829475023 times in a year what a noun is. *lol* I have a lot of patience with my kids and I see myself as the teacher's helping hand. Thanks to my job, the kids understand better in school and that makes the teachers' job a lot easier. I know a lot of people look down on us private teachers because they think that the parents pay us to do their kids' homework and it's not at all like that.

Besides preparing the Lengua-classes for the coming year I need to find fun ways to teach English vocabulary. Most of my kids at work have problems with English, because unfortunatelly it's still a subject most schools don't pay much attention to. I wish I could change that and make the kids really enjoy the English classes. So if anyone reading this have links to sites where I can find games in English, please leave me a comment. ;-)

Oh well, it's time to get back to work! My own kids took their bikes and went for a ride so I'd better use this hour or so to do some serious work. *lol*

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Countries I've visited

I love travelling! I wish I could travel a lot more but unfortunatelly my financial situation doesn't permit me to travel as much as I'd like.

I found this map over at The Travelling Suitcase:


visited 6 states (2.66%)
Create your own visited map of The World

If money was no problem I'd love to go to:

• Europe: Vatican City, Itsly, France, Russia and Ireland.
• Africa: Benin, Cameroon, Gambia, Ivory Coast, Kenya, Senegal, Egypt, Equatorial Guinea, Ethiopia, South Africa, Tanzania and Togo.
• Americas: Peru, Bolivia, Argentina, Dominican Republic, Panama, Paraguay, Uruguay, Puerto Rico, Cuba, Venezuela, Costa Rica, Mexico.
• Asia: India, China, Japan, Cambodia, Vietnam

Oh my, I still have a lot to discover.... ;-)

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The August Challenge

Oh my, am I crazy or what? I just joined the August Challenge over at Harriet & Friends and I'm still a bit nervous about this one. You have to make at least 1000 comments on other blogs during the month of August. Since it's August 3 today that means about 40 comments a day... I'm not sure I can make that but I will give it a serious shot, because I love getting comments and I think it's fun to give them too. Hopefully I'll meet some great bloggers to, because when you comment a lot you seem to get to know the person behind the blog a lot better too.

Well, this is the button, in case someone else wants to join:





I wanted to make a ticker to keep track on my comments but the page seems to be down right now, so I guess I'll have to stick to the old fashoned way of a pen and a piece of paper. ;-)

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Music Monday: Birthday Song

Happy Birthday, the Mexican way.

Come join Music Monday and share your songs with us. Rules are simple. Leave ONLY the actual post link here and grab the code below and place it at your blog entry. You can grab this code at LadyJava's Lounge Please note these links are STRICTLY for Music Monday participants only. All others will be deleted without prejudice.

PS: Because of spamming purposes, the linky will be closed on Thursday of each week at midnight, Malaysian Time. Thank you!

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WW - Malaga at night

Here are some photos I took one night when we went to Malaga. I'm sorry, they are quite blurry, I still need to make friends with my camera, specielly when it comes to take photos at night.

One of Picasso's famous statues. Picasso was born here in Malaga.









More WW participants at: August 2

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WW - Going to Ceuta

These are some photos I took last time I went to Morocco. There are several ways to go to Morocco from Spain. Since I always go to a town very close to the Spanish border I usually take the ferry from Algeciras (Spain) to Ceuta, which is a Spanish territory in the north of Africa, and from there I go by shared taxi to my town.

The harbour in Algeciras.

The harbour in Algeciras.

Leaving Algeciras.

The coastline of Ceuta.

The coastline of Ceuta.

More participants in WW are found here: August 1.

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Sunday Seven – Episode 248

OK, it´s 9 AM and my DS2 woke me up half an hour ago... Today is going to be a GREAT day, I can feel that. So I've decided to do a quick meme just to get my brains working.... Here we go, it's time for SUNDAY SEVEN:

Name seven candle fragrances you think you’d most enjoy in your home.

OK, this is an easy one, since I loooooveeee scented candles. I have candles in the kitchen, living room, bathroom and of cause in my bedroom. My favorite fragrances are coffee, vanilla, cinnamon, pine tree, rose, lemon and chocolate, in no special order. As often as I can, I turn off the lights and light some candles instead. I guess I'm just a romantic after all. *lol*

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