Birthday Fun!

 

My birthday was on Saturday and Tom and I got to spend the WHOLE day up there alone, without kids! Big big thanks to Zach and Megan and their three kids for taking care of our redheads for the day. It was so fun to be able to talk and finish a sentence without having to stop 5 times and deal with something in the middle of it (=

Tom gave me $50 bucks and told me to spend some alone time in the bookstore up there (= Is that a man who knows me or what!? We had a nice lunch and leisurely walk around the mall and the even had the chance to see a great movie. So fun.

Tonight someone here in town gave a little "ladies' birthday tea" for me which was really sweet. Lots of students are coming back in to town so it was nice to see folks again after the summer.

So it has been a nice, drawn out birthday (=

No WAY!

Well folks, it would appear that we are approved for our visas! This has been a long road and we are hoping to have all the paperwork finished in a couple of weeks. Eid holiday ends on Monday so we will start submitting lots of paperwork with stacks of little photos of each of us with our blue blanket as a background. On our previous visas we had stacks of photos of us with a white background and were told that now we need to have BLUE backgrounds....(= ah yes.

Anyway. Just wanted to share if you hadn't already heard.

Catching up

Ryan says: We're home!! I don't really remember it but I'm just generally happy and smiley about everything!! I love my suitcase!

Here is a bit about what is going on around here for those of you feeling out of the loop.

1. We returned from Germany about 9 days ago. Settling back in has been wonderful and a bit weary at the same time. Lots of small repairs around the house which are a bit dicey to do since:

2. It is Ramadan and our first one to experience during the summer months. The other previous 5 have been in the cooler months. Because it is hotter there are almost NO shops and business open until after the sunset Iftar meal when they break the fast. Some things are open but it is random.

3. Both kids have been/are sick. None of us had even a drippy nose all summer and the night we got back, Ryan's nose started to act up. I am more and more convinced that the local lore of air conditioning making you sick has a lot of truth in it! I'm sure the SIGNIFICANT amount of dust in the air has something to do with it too!

4. We had another surprise office inspection for our visa process. This is our 3rd inspection. And yes, we hauled all the appropriate furniture to the studio apartment we have been renting as Tom's office for the sake of the visa. And yes, they never bothered to go see the office for the 3rd time (= Our living room carpet and wing back chairs have been going back and forth across Buraimi each time.

5. The AMAZING news is that we now actually have our visa approvals!!!! We would have gotten our stamps etc, but the Eid holiday puts everything on hold for one week. But it would be reasonable to assume we could have our visas and border crossing cards in the next two weeks!

6. Tom probably will continue to be a sales rep for the American company selling specialty wall and ceiling products. To that end, he flew to Doha for the airport job for a quick overnight. It was very encouraging and has been a big learning curve! He has lots of other contacts for jobs but who knows if they will end up as an actual sale. He is still very much learning this field at the moment.

7. Most of our friends connected to the language school are beginning to return which means that Layla's main playmates are almost all home. Not soon enough is all I can say!

8. We are evaluating preschool options for Layla now. There are two options, both of which are very different from each other. We need to decide by about September 10th which is the start date for both schools...supposedly (= Both schools have already postponed once!

9. We've had a bit of internet problems since we've been back to trying to Skype or do much on line for any length of time has been a bit irritating. That is part of the reason I haven't done much. Nothing like watching your photos load three times in a row....

10. We are super grateful for our summer and for returning home! We feel very blessed to have our lovely, familiar home to return to (=

Now it works!

Below are the pictures that went with the previous post. These are friends in town and our two oldest girls love to play together. Their little one is the same age as Ryan and HALF the size. She is just like a dolly (= We have other friend with a little girl who is almost 8 months older than Ryan and she is the same size as this little gal! So he is definately the big boy on the block!

The large plate of rice is very very typical eating style out here. We all get a little yogurt-type of thing and pour it on our little portion of the rice and dig in (= You may notice the piece of flat plastic laid out....this is the removable table cloth. Just open the door and shake shake shake.

Each person also gets a little plate of veggies. Recycling is of NO interest to anyone out here so 6 little trays of the exact same thing are plastic wrap and included with the meal. I'm not sure if you can see the pile of fried food...that is also a staple at Ramadan!

 

 

Ramadan

This is what I call speed blogging. I am hoping to get a wee update in before Layla wakes up. Ryan has already been up and is back down again so I have that wonderful little zone of time where I am the only one awake!

We have a few days left for Ramadan and this is a crazy month in particular! Because of the heat (August is really the hottest month) there are NO STORES open at all until 4pm. Then all the restaurants and food stores open for about an hour and there is a slightly mad rush while folks emerge from their houses to get some food. You can buy a set meal at the restuarants....no choices just "how many people are you feeding?" and then you get a plate big enough for it all. And of course a plate of fried food....

They usually break their fast with some dates and laban which is like a thinned out plain yogurt drink. Then they eat a pile of fried foods and I think they go pray at this point. After a big, they'll tuck into a larger dinner like we bought last night. See the photos (= We had some friends over and it was a lovely time of trying to help the kids remember how to eat with their hands and leaning over the plate and keeping the smaller ones from walking ON the plate....

Ugh. my computer is not recognizing the photo card so I can't upload any pictures. Must EVERYTHING break at the same time!?!? There is only so much Tom can fix at once. grrrrrr.

Anyway. The 3-day Eid which is the celebration at the end of Ramadan will start on Wednesday. It is a big holiday for a few days before and a few days after and then life will settle back into more of a routine. We will have Layla in school by the 10th as that is the start date for both schools we are considering. I am now getting worried again that she won't want to be gone 5 days a week. While she is a very bubbly and outgoing personality, she has a strong homebody/introverted streak like I do. Yesterday morning she curled up on my lap and said "Can we just have a mommy, Layla and Ryan day today?" Poor kid. I said yes, though I knew we did have to go out later (= Oh well.

oops ! I hear her little footsteps (=

"What in the world is she doing???!"

This is what was going through our minds the other day when we were taking pictures of a clock tower. Layla said she wanted to pose in front of it, so we let her. Then she started doing this and we were just a wee bit surprised!! The bottom photo is what we were taking pictures of....a good 3 stories above her little head (=

 

 

 

 

Catching up

We have been on the move. It seemed an enormous effort to clean up the house and pack our things for Switzerland. It was so sad to say goodbye to the house we have been using in Kandern. We can tell that Layla is really struggling with the travel...we've stayed in 3 places the last four nights and the last two places she's said "can we stay here forever? It is SO BEAUTIFUL!" 'Tis true - the places we've stayed have been gorgeous. Switzerland is unbelievable. Everywhere we go we are just saying: Look at that! Look a that house waaaay up there! Look at that waterfall! Layla gets in on the fun and comments about how beautiful everything is.

She has started to want to pose for pictures. She enjoyed posing before but it was just for the camera. Now she wants to stand in front of whatever we are taking pictures of. Switzerland was PACKED FULL of tourists from Japan and Mainland China and if you know them (to generalize, of course) they LOVE the silliest poses. I don't mean they are goofy, but they always like to do a funny little pose for the camera. So Layla was cracking them all up and everyone started taking pictures of her wherever she was posing. I'll find the picture Tom took, but one time she actually laid down on the ground on her side and put her chin in her hand. It was SO hysterical. I'm sure people wondered why we'd taught our daughter to pose this way.

We are staying two nights in Kandern here at a very unusual house. It is actually an old factory building with a crazy history and a couple bought it and are slowly renovating it room by room to provide a retreat place for artists to come and work. It is a huge project and they are doing it themselves. So we have this wonderfully eclectic room and when you open the door it is like stepping into a huge barn stuffed full of big power tools and antique furniture! We have access to the kitchen/cafe area that has all these different tables and chairs and a great little kitchen we can use.

Tomorrow we take a train north and will stay put for about a week. We are looking forward to that! We've heard that there is a petting zoo near where we are staying and I'm sure the kids will be fascinated. Ryan still gets all stiff and excited and yells when he sees a cat or dog. He'd probably practically pass out if he could pet a bunch of animals!

Out and about

Here are just some random pictures of places we've been. It is hard to believe that we leave here next week!

"Cousins"

Layla only has one real cousin (hello Lucy!!) but she loves to claim other people as her cousin as well (= True to her nature to be undeterred by any explanation or physical proof, she just believes what she wants to believe.

So regardless of what Layla thinks, the lovely Erin here is Tom's second cousin...(I think that is right.) She was in town for TWO weeks but was so busy we were only able to have lunch with her once right before she left. It was great to get caught up though we missed the chance to meet her new hubby since he wasn't able to travel with her.

 

 

Ryan is trying to walk!

Ryan really likes to wear this sparkly sunglasses. They just crack me up. Here are some random photos of the last week or so (=