I get asked about this a lot. Max goes to year ’round school, which means he has a short summer (about 5 weeks) and longer Spring Breaks and Christmas Breaks (a month each). At first I was unnerved, since we’d just moved here, and he was in school all of a week or 2 before his month-long Spring Break commenced.

But now I really like it, because we can travel when others don’t, and we don’t have to travel when everyone does in the summer (and it’s too hot). That’s how we were able to go to Paris for a month.

Max is wrapping up his Spring Break now. We’ve done so many things this year:

• Aquarium
• Disneyland
• Play with friends
• Museum of Man
• Homework
• Crafts

In fact, I feel like we haven’t had enough time!

Anyway, that’s the scoop on year ’round school. I really love the school he goes to, The Language Academy. But that’s another post.

One of the benefits of both me and my hub working from home is that we can take off to do fun things with Max mid-week. He gets out of school early on Thursdays, so I try to plan a fun activity. This week we went to Seaworld.

They’ve got a special where you pay for a day and stay all year. And I am all about getting cheap season passes here, so bonus!

One thing I’m adamant about, having lived in now Orlando and San Diego theme park-ridden towns is this: never, ever, ever go to the theme park in the summer. Right now, February is the perfect time to go. It’s warm enough and the parks are dead. Dead. No lines. No whiny kids (besides your own). It’s a totally different experience from waiting 2 hours to ride Pirates of the Caribbean.

This Seaworld seemed to have fewer rides than the one in Orlando. Max was a little big for the Bay of Play, but he loved riding up the Skytower and seeing all of the bay and San Diego (so did I).

The animals here are amazing. I’m always reading in the paper how Seaworld rescued a local sea lion. We saw dolphins playing with their toys, sea lions and the cutest otter ever performing for applause, moray eels (they’re weird) and my favorite: rays. They’re so affectionate.

Now that we have passes, we can go back any time. I always try to limit us to 2 hours so that we have just a taste but not enough for a meltdown (though Max did crash at 4 pm when we got home).

Enjoy the pics.

It seems we have more quiet, at-home NYEs these days than we used to. Last night we played another marathon of UNO (Max and I are on what we’ve dubbed “Team Creative” and strategize on how to beat Papa) and ate chocolate covered waffles, chips, bread and cheese. And champagne, which, compared to wine, is a bit expensive here. Where they make it. Whatevs.

So our super-nice landlady gave us the keys to her apartment to watch the fireworks at the Eiffel Tower. After an endless evening, we traipsed up the stairs. The tower lit up with sparkly lights…and no fireworks. We waited, since I was convinced the firework lighters were on strike (a French joke. I made a funny). But non.

We went home a bit disappointed. Turns out they cancelled them because of a terrorist threat. Really? What would the terrorists do? Kill us with sparklers? Sigh. Yet another story for the books.