Viper Award

Madelyn has been working for weeks on a group project at school. They wrote a story, illustrated it on the computer, then recorded narration and sound, and made it into a movie. The story is about a group of friends who are turned into french fries. Their adventure continues as they try to turn back into people.

All the stories from all the classes were judged and given awards at today's school assembly. Madelyn's group won the award for best narration and sound. It was very exciting when the French Fry group won, and half of the auditorium erupted into cheers.

Madelyn was so happy to win a prize, and loves her golden viper award. Now the question is, to mail or not to mail?

Lu Lu's Fru Frus

We have 2 weeks of packing before our big move. We are not shipping anything back home. We've mailed a few boxes, and are filling 3 suitcases and 8 boxes at exactly 50 lbs a piece to check on the airplane. It would seem obvious that purchasing anything extra at this point would just be stupid. Well, I was talking to a friend a couple days ago about this same thing, and she says, "So, I guess you won't be stocking up on those cute little girl dresses at LuLu's to take back with you?" I responded, "No way - we have no more room!" Then I got to thinking, that's a really good idea. Hope needs beautiful dresses, and at $6-7 USD a piece, I really should stock up! It helped matters not a bit that I went grocery shopping at LuLu's today and their dresses were all 15% off. So I went a little crazy and bought a few dresses for every toddling age. One more box to mail home...but such cuteness!

Bracelet Bonanza

After completing their first edition of Sweet Sugar Magazine, the girls took a page out of their own book and had a bracelet-making bonanza yesterday. They made 45 bracelets to take to school today and share with their friends.

Squinty-eye Smile

We love it when Hope gives us her squinty-eyes smile.

In Print

Jon printed the girls' magazine this morning. It looks awesome!

Sweet Sugar Magazine

The girls wanted to produce their own magazine today. The photo shoot that started out as a fashion show turned into "Sweet Sugar Magazine". Madelyn has done all the writing for the articles. She and Cailin both took photos. Emma was an enthusiastic model.

Hello, Teeth

You can see Hope's teeth are growing in nicely. Such cute little chompers. One of my girls took this picture today. They were doing photo shoots all day with our old digital camera. I'm beginning to experiment with Photoshop actions, and ran a couple different things on this photo to get a vintage look, and to lighten up some darkish colors. Pretty fun stuff.

Abu Dhabi Kindergarten Art

While I was waiting for Emma to be dismissed from class one day last week, I was enjoying this bulletin board made by one of the other KG2 classes. (Please excuse the crummy panoramic paste job.) It shows Abu Dhabi by night and day, with lots of tall buildings, mosques, cars, trucks, parks, strollers, cats and sunshine. I, along with all the other loitering pick-up parents, was very impressed.

Pass the Peas, Please

After five babies, you would think I'd be experienced with the whole baby food thing. Well, I am, if it comes in little glass jars and is available in every color and flavor of the edible rainbow. Here in Abu Dhabi I have only been able to find a handful of one-ingredient pureed foods - pears, peaches, carrots. And those come and go. You can never count on anything being on the shelves from one store trip to the next. Devoid of the temptation of convenient prepackaged goodness, I got to blendin' and made the most beautiful pea green puree I've ever seen. It is seriously a gorgeous color. I don't have any normal ice cube trays, so we made these cute heart and star-shaped pea portions. I love making my own purees - the frugality, the good ecology (no more wondering what to do with all those little glass jars), and the healthiness, too. Will I still blend my own when we are home, and those abundant cute little jars beckon me to buy in order to make things a little bit easier? I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

Clay Play

The girls and I made a clay flower garden this afternoon. It started out with just Emma and I, but as soon as Cailin saw we were making roses (Cailin's middle name is Rose, so has an affinity for them), and Madelyn saw that we were making something darn cute, everyone joined in. Cailin made the bunny and carrot dish, Emma made the ladybugs and bees. Madelyn made butterflies and then a nifty clay bridge supported by toothpicks leading to the bunny's lair (behind the garden). The roses were fun to make, and reminded me of these cupcakes that I plan on making for Cailin's birthday when we get back to the States; where fruit roll ups are cheap and plentiful.

rock-n-roll, baby

Hope is a happy rolling baby. We often find ourselves asking each other, "Did you move Hope?", and "How did that baby get over there?"

Camel Milk

We all had our first taste of camel milk. You can click on the images above to see larger and read journaling.

Wadi Warning

About 6 months after we first moved to Abu Dhabi, our windows were looking incredibly grimy. We were excited to see the window washers appear and begin to scrub and spray. That excitement quickly turned to dismay as we realized our windows were not water tight, and that we had puddles blossoming under each and every window. Curtains were wet, beds were wet, carpets were wet.


Now we dread the coming of the window washers, but at least attempt to prepare ourselves by laying out towels to keep the wadi from invading our oasis!

Living Room Sailors

The couch cushion dilemma: Do we allow the kids to unfurl their fort making creative skills, or do we prolong the life expectancy of the couch cushions and stem the tide of stuff flowing everywhere? This morning creative play won out, and the girls spent hours on their "ship", imagining, playing Uno, and coloring.

Another good one

I'm happy with this one, too...(after a little photoshop face swapping!)

family portrait

My dad took some pictures of us this afternoon. This one is my fave!