Living It Up

So what have these two been up to the last few weeks?

They've been having all kind of adventures...in America! For the second year in a row, the grandparents talked us into letting Lee Anna and Sawyer make the trip back to the states to spend some quality time with Mimi, Papaw, G.G., Grandpa, and of course Jesse the dog, and have some good, summer fun, American-style!

 Sawyer and Papaw got bumped up to first class for their last leg of the trip to Florida!

Apparently they thought the 3 at the end of the movie title meant they were supposed to go see it that many times!

 By their third time seeing it, I bet they could have almost joined the cast!

They played putt putt for the first time and totally loved it! Lee Anna even got a hole in one! When they finished the course, she begged to do it again, and then said, "Well, can we at least just walk through and look at all the holes again?" 

They also spent lots of quality time in the water--in the pool, at the beach, and on the river!

And they've had all kinds of other adventures that I don't have pictures of, including a fishing trip where both kids actually caught fish! We're glad they've had so much fun, but we're ready to have them back under our roof again. When I told Sarah Claire they would be back soon, she said, "Yaaaaay! And I will hug them!" I'm sure there will be lots of hugs all around tomorrow night. Come see us, guys!

Out on the Town

A few nights ago, we ate dinner out and took a little after-dinner walk. Here are a few pics I took while we were out...

It's that time of year again. In less than two weeks, most of the folks in this part of the world will begin fasting from sunrise to sunset for 30 days. Several weeks before Ramadan, these little lantern shops start popping up all over the city. The folks in our country use them to decorate for the month, usually hanging them outside their flat or at the entrance to their building, although you can also buy a mini lantern on a keychain, or one as large as a small automobile.

Sarah Claire befriended this donkey on our walk. She really wanted to pet and hug him, but thankfully was content to have her picture taken with him.

Speaking of hugging, she has also gotten into the habit of stopping to hug most of the trees we pass. I'm not sure where this comes from, but I am sure that it makes for a dirty little girl by the time we get back home. 

And check out my fancy new shades! They were purchased on the same walk. We passed by the entrance to the metro (our subway) station, where there is always an amusing assortment of goods for sale on the street. That night we saw fruits, vegetables, sunglasses, Ramadan lanterns, shoes, shorts, t-shirts, kitchen bowls, pots & pans, blenders and other small appliances, and popcorn. We resisted most everything, but I did come away with this high quality pair of sunglasses. They may resemble a brand you've seen before, but if you look closely, you'll see that they are quite unique! 

You may be wondering where our older two munchkins have been lately. Well, they've been off having adventures without us for the past few weeks. I'll post more about what they've been up to soon!

Patience Pays Off

So this year's Fourth of July post turned out pretty cute. Here it is if you missed it. However, what you may not know is that that post was a whole year in the making. Last year, on Independence Day 2011, I came up with the idea for the "Happy Fourth" photos, and tried valiantly to get those two successful shots. But it was not to be. Unfortunately, the photos came closer to wishing you a  "Scrunchy Third" than a "Happy Fourth." Take a quick scroll through the pics below, and I think you'll see why I chose to forego the 4th of July post last year. 

What a difference a year makes!

A Special Holiday Message from Sarah Claire

Get it? 

We hope you had a great Independence Day!

Don't Try This at Home

Imagine my surprise when I found this view outside our front window this morning! Nevermind the fact that we're on the third floor. The A/C in the flat next door to us needed to be worked on, so this guy just crawled out the window and had a seat on top of it for a while. He had a lot more confidence in whatever was holding that A/C up than I would have! A few minutes later, he crawled back inside, and another guy climbed out and did the same thing.

I've never considered air conditioner installation a particularly perilous job...until today. Thankfully, all of them made it safely back inside without incident.

Birthday Girl #2

Our second little princess also had a birthday earlier this month. Here are a few pictures of the celebrating we did.

Since big sister had blueberry muffins on her birthday, Sarah Claire insisted on having them, too.

And this is what happens when your three-your-old tries to get her ice cream cake out of the fridge herself! We're lucky it was still edible at all!

 We salvaged enough for everyone to still get a piece.

 She loved the handmade personalized necklace that Lee Anna made for her...

And all three kids had fun playing with the new additions to SC's kitchen--wooden slice and bake cookies and a wooden birthday cake set. They even had their own bake sale!

And this was in the birthday box from Mimi! She loved being Smurfette, and walked around singing the Smurf song for a good half hour.

Happy Birthday, Little Princess! We love you lots!

Birthday Girl #1

It's high time we got some birthday pics on the blog! June is birthday month for both girls, so we had a fun week with lots of celebrating! Lee Anna chose to have her party at a local water park again this year, and we all had a great time enjoying the sun and water.

 We made some fun cookies n cream cupcakes (with Oreos on top and inside!)!

Here she is blowing out the candle on her birthday blueberry muffin (which she requested weeks in advance).

She got to open one gift before we left for the water park that morning. Daddy sent her on a little scavenger hunt around the house for it.

 One clue was even hiding in the freezer!

 She had a wonderful time with lots of sweet friends!

 And Sawyer had a pretty good time, too!

She got to open the rest of her gifts when we got back home, including this cute outfit from her cousins. We had a wonderful day celebrating our beautiful eight-year-old. We love you, Lee Anna Belle!

Eating Out

When people move from one country to another, they usually have to make major adjustments in what they eat. Usually. We have had to make some minor adjustments to our eating out fare, but overall we have it pretty good! We don't have Taco Bell, Moe's, or any other Tex-Mex fast food, but we get all the McDonald's, Burger King, Hardee's and KFC that we need.We've taken a few pics lately to demonstrate the similarities and a few subtle differences. 

Here's Sawyer holding the Hot Wheels cars he got in his kids' meal at Hardee's.That's pretty normal, but ...

Lee Anna is standing in that same Hardee's. We're the only customers at 12:45 on a Saturday afternoon! The work crew was still coming in when we got there, and there were no other customers. Not one. The locals have a little different eating schedule. They were packed out by 4:00, and probably stayed busy until the wee hours of Sunday morning, but noon:45 was too early for lunch!

Most of the fast food joints have play places like they would in the states...

And the burgers and fries are pretty similar to the American originals.

One thing we see more of on this side of the ocean is sleeping children. Like eating schedules, sleeping schedules are also very different here. Families don't typically have a set nap time or bed time, but they just assume that if their child is sleepy enough, they'll fall asleep--which they do, all over town! And this week, Sarah Claire acted just like a local. On the way to Burger King for supper yesterday (at about 5:30) she fell fast asleep in the car. She snoozed for about 20 minutes before waking up to eat with us. No one who saw us even batted an eye at the sleeping toddler, though, since we see kids sleeping like this everywhere we go.

We are so grateful to have all these places to go and eat. (When we don't feel like just having them deliver!)

We're Smiling!

Can you guess why we we're all smiling around here?

We are officially finished with our 2011-12 school year! Second grade and kindergarten are in the bag for these two. Today was our official last day. We've been winding down for the last few weeks, but today we really finished everything up. 

We finished our last two read-alouds--A Little Princess and a wonderful biography of Gladys Aylward. My goodness, that woman had some adventures! We probably could have finished the read-alouds a little sooner if I hadn't had to keep stopping to wipe my eyes and swallow the lump out of my throat. I just love that my kids are being exposed to such wonderful stories--fiction and non-fiction!

We celebrated with a special End-of-the-School-Year lunch, and then a surprise trip to a new little children's museum that just opened near us recently. "Museum" might be a generous term. It's really just one big room, but they had lots of fun, educational activities. First the kids got to go "shopping" in a big fruit and vegetable market, then they had to weigh their food to determine how much it costs. Since they see these kinds of scales used regularly, they loved getting to do it themselves.

When they had finished shopping, they put on doctor's coats and stethoscopes and played doctor with a big skeleton. Then when they finished that, they got to build little cars and towers out of some special building blocks. And all that playing cost just about $5 each. We will definitely be going back there!

And, since this will be my last school-related post for a while, here's Lee Anna's last writing assignment of the year. Her assignment was to write a story about a trip into space. Enjoy!