Fall and summer recap

Wow here we are in FALL!!! Amazingly enough it actually feels like fall here in Jordan. There is an overcast day the first one since, oh I would say March and the temperatures are cooler. Like not boil you alive in 10 secs. Ok it was never that hot here this summer. We actually had a very pleasent summer too. So fall is here my favorite time of year. Yet we wont be going to the orchard (they dont have them here. Our apples are actually improted from the US!), or the pumpkin patch. There won't be any hayrides or bonfires and dare I say no smores!! I know tragic right? Either way I am excited for fall.

Now here is the recap of our crazy hectic summer that I never really wrote about other than our vacation (which I am still not done with).

May- We went to Cairo- before it got crazy but just barely and welcomed new friends to Jordan

June- We were on vacation for 21 days in Europe. Returned to Amman and tried to adjust back to life without greenery, going to work, and hardly any suitable playgrounds.

July - We celebrated yet another birthday of our country away from it. Though we thoroughly enjoyed our time at the embassy party. We saw fireworks, had a bbq, played games, listened to music and enjoyed lemonade and watermelon. What more says Forth of July anyways. Trust me there were plenty of American Flags and kids dressed in their best patriotic attire to rival any town in the US. Other fun July stuff was swimming, lots of cookouts, trying to navigate life during Ramandan when not participating in the fast, and the very very small beginning of potty training.

August- rolled in with a non-specific threat to the embassy and americans so we had our 1 week long Terror Snow Day. We enjoyed this week off with dinners and bbq's with friends, going to the mall, and finding fun activities for the whole family. We had to cancel our trip to Israel since it was during this week but it will be made up later. I continued to drag my feet about potty training but LL was determined to push ahead. We finally found the best playground in Amman. It is shady, has trees, the equipment is not broken, they are baby swings, sandy ground, and most importantly there are not sawed off rod iron bars poking out of the ground randomly. You know the little things. It costs 2 jd (3.5 US) to enter but is totally worth it.

Now here we are to September- We have been once again bbqing it up with friends, swimming and those last days of summer type things. Not to mention the whole Syria thing... Yeah we were almost sent home. By almost I mean I had finally gotten around to packing a go bag and had even made the lists of what would be in the suitcase. I did not go so far as to pack the suitcase but I was close. I looked into flights and had downloaded 3 mickey mouse club house, 2 bubble guppies, and 3 sesame streets for the Ipad for the plane ride. We were ready, We said yes we will go, We called our parents and said we will be coming soon. Then the president changed his mind and things were put on hold. SO we waiting with held breath to see what congress would do and now here we are at the end of the month still waiting with all plans of coming home put on hold indefinitely. So what would you do? We packed up and went to Madaba, Mount Nebo, and the Dead Sea with some friends for a much much needed relaxing weekend! Pictures and a post coming later (well maybe). I have taken over as chair of our playgroup and we have welcomed tons of new members. We hosted playgroup and had a very messy yet fun playday. Finally we have this week/weekend where LL was admitted to the hospital, we pulled her out, and now S's ankle has finally had enough. It is swollen, bruised, has a buldge, and he can't walk on it. SO looks like we will be back to the dr's office with him on Sunday. Now LL is feeling a bit better. Which means we are off to the playgroup welcome picnic today in just a few minutes. Wow time is flying by. Oh and two last things for September. The potty training started full force then was put on hold by her getting sick we will try again next week and we finally did book plane tickets to go home and see our families. WOOHOOO can't wait!!

Well that is what we have been up to. I will try to get back to posting. I think I still owe posts about cairo. Oh well the time will come when I will get organized and back to writing.

Happy Fall Everyone!!

Venice, Italy June 15th and 16th

 The day arrived that we finally made it to our last port. Were we saddened by this? Yeah just a bit but we were ready. It had started to get hard with LL in such a small space. She loved playing on deck but not having her toys and especially her bed had started to take a toll on all of us and now that we were coming to the end we knew we were a mere days away from being back to it all. Now on to Venice. The boat arrived in Venice in the afternoon of what felt like the hottest day of the trip. Uuuggghhh. When we finally arrived and were cleared to go ashore we packed up the stroller and were off. The line to get the bus was 30 minutes long and the lady said the walk was maybe 20 so we decided to walk. We then made it to the people mover and discovered that the busses were dumping everyone there and the line for that was hours long so we just walked into the city. It was hot. We had not even made it to the city and we were done. Then when we did make it and it took us over an hour to go maybe one block we decided to turn around and go back to the boat. We should have done our homework. We knew Venice was full of bridges but we had no idea they were all stairs. Taking a stroller was not fun at all and we just could not handle it. Instead we spent our first afternoon in Venice on the ship at the pool and just lounging around.
 

Sailing into Venice- We were the 6th cruise ship in port!

Evangeline was one of LL's favorite crew members on board.

Looking out over Venice

Making waves

She thought it was hilarious to Belly flop into the water

LL loved the kiddie pool

 We had a snack and a nap, then after it had cooled a bit we went back into the city with LL in the baby carrier. That was not much more enjoyable but much more manageable especially as it cooled down. We quickly discovered we went the wrong way into the city the first time and it would not have been so bad with the stroller if we had not gone in the direction that we did. We ate dinner at a lovely restaurant. LL chased pigeons around a square while S checked for our hotel information using their WIFI. The boat was overnighting in Venice but we had to disembark the next day and needed to figure out where we were going and how to get there. We found an address and a map. We then wandered for a bit looking in the different shops and were intrigued by all these groups of young men and women dressed in weird outfits. Apparently they were bridal parties and for the bachelor and bachelorette parties they go all out. We saw one group dressed up as Native Americans, complete with the bride wearing a canoe. They did war cries and danced and of course drank. We saw another group dressed up as ballerinas. All heavily drunk and if you paid the bride she would dance. It was kinda crazy but they looked to be having tons of fun. We eventually found our hotel and headed back to the ship by 9 o’clock. We finished packing and went to bed.
 

Climbing stairs and chasing pigeons hat more could a girl need

In the morning it was a lazy thing. We had breakfast and waited for our time to leave. We took the latest time figuring we had no rush to leave. There was some delay in leaving though and where we were supposed to be off around 9:45 we didn’t leave the ship until closer to 11 or so. We then tried to get a taxi and were ignored and turned down because we were only going into town and the drivers wanted the larger fair of going to the airport. We walked again. This time just to the people mover but it was rough hauling the stroller, toddler, 3 larger suitcases, 2 backpacks, LL backpack, and a camera bag. We eventually got on the people mover and headed to town. S and I walked to the bridge closest to our hotel and I waited on one side with the stroller and one suitcase while he crossed over and checked into the hotel with the rest of the stuff. Then he came back and we took the rest of it over. We were pleasantly surprised by the hotel. The room was huge! It had a ginormas bathroom and air conditioning! They provided us with an awesome travel cot for LL and it was perfect. After we settled in we asked the concierge what we should do with one day in the city. He gave us a map and outlined the path to follow. We saw the Rialto Bridge, Saint Marks Square, took a Water Taxi, sat on some world heritage (where we were told “ do not sit on the world heritage” lol) and finished up with a lovely dinner. After dinner we went for a gondola ride at sunset then returned to our hotel for a nice quiet evening. In the morning we would be off to ride the train out to Bellagio for the final part of our vacation.

View from the Rialto Bridge

The Rialto Bridge

I just loved this lantern

"Do  not sit on the world heritage"

Pigeons!

Again people loved giving her food for the birds.

waiting for the water taxi

The view of the Rialto Bridge from the water taxi

Doesn't everyone color this way?

Family gondola ride