Just some more stuff

What to say about life since I've been back?  I've been hibernating a bit (more on why later) so I have been using the time alone to declutter.  Yesterday, it was the bathroom shelves; the day before that, I tackled the "miscellaneous" boxes in the storage room.  After having purged so much just a year before, you would think there wouldn't be that much to declutter!  Sadly, both you and I would be wrong.  I know, I know, scintillating stuff, right?  Life as an expat is so freaking exciting!!

The storage room is a funny space, actually.  (see how I am just moving on there?  go with it)  We use the closet to corral our luggage, one corner to hold large items like golf clubs and giant inflated sharks (the husband bought them in a fit of something while we were in Germany for the boys to use in the pool, which they have, a few times, but they are too much of a pain to deflate between uses), another corner for holiday decorations (mainly Christmas and Halloween--I rely on my vast collection of window clings for most other holidays), and then still another corner holds shelves on which we put bins containing everything from future gifts for the boys to first aid supplies to sleeping bags to office/school supplies.  It's a pretty organized space, overall, and I stick to the regions consistently, but it is also the dumping ground for anything else we don't have a place for or the time to organize.  By the time I sat down to tackle those things, there were 5 boxes/bins of stuff waiting for me.  Admittedly, most of this was drawings/school work/art projects from the boys, but even that needed to be sorted and collected in one place.  A few podcasts later, I had a box full of stuff to donate, a box brimming with trash, and a clear floor once again.  While I was in there, I mentally went through everything we are storing to decide what I would need to bring back with me when I move back and was pleased to note that most of what I thought I would want would all fit in the luggage with room to spare, so we're still doing okay about not accumulating too many things while we are here.

The bathroom shelves were much more difficult to organize, in the end, largely because we have to bring so many products from home (dye and perfume free soaps are either not available here or so cost prohibitive it makes me want to cry and don't even get me started on the cost of makeup) and in such quantities that it's hard to know where to put it all.  Granted, we do use up every single drop, but, in the meantime, we have to find places to store it, so that was my task the next day.  It took me longer than I thought and it was the boys' short day at school, so I was still at it after they got home but I opened up the window in the master bath and was delighted to find I could hear them on their bikes all the way down the block (every once in a while living in an incredibly echoing compound has its advantages!).  They thought it was fun to yell up at me from the front yard, so they didn't roam very far anyway.  Luckily, our single neighbor is on vacation and most other folks weren't back from work yet, so we weren't disturbing too many people!

I'll wrap up with just a few random recent pictures of the boys for no reason, besides the fact that they are cute!  I brought back a new camera for the husband, and he is experimenting every day trying to learn its ins and outs before we head out on our next family vacation:

Family photo day!

Before I left for the wedding, we finally (FINALLY!) got family pictures taken again.  And yes, it had been almost two years since the last time, so we were very happy to do so.  We went to the  Museum of Islamic Art park, so we had green trees, the ocean, the skyline, and the museum itself.  Our fabulous photographer dealt with my crazy kids and their uncooperative tendencies, a miscommunication that sent the husband off without us at one point, rapidly dimming light, and a closing venue and still managed to get lots of shots I loved, which means he earned every riyal we gave him and then some!  Here are some of the (unedited) shots I love so far!

Wedding Week 2015

I made it to and back from the States for my sister's wild wedding in less than a week, and I survived--barely!  The week was exhausting, crazy, great, delicious, surreal, beautiful, laughable, busy, and far too short.  My sister married a nice Greek boy, and it was the first Greek wedding I had attended--it was definitely worth the trip!  I was able to keep jet lag at bay for the whole time I was in Utah, but I was a mess the entire week back, power-napping my way to a bad bout of insomnia, sadly.   I'm not really used to these quick turnaround trans-oceanic jaunts, sadly!

My cousin, two of my sisters-in-law, my dad, and I spent most
of the week making this happen.  Actually, the whole family
pitched in, and, thanks to the really great prep work my mother
did, we had everything we needed to turn your standard
multipurpose gym into something we were proud to show off.

You can't see it but there are lights behind the fabric on the screen
behind the head table--it was a comedy of errors when my sister,
sister-in-law, and I tried to figure out how to do make this work
one night!

My cousin who came in from New York for the festivities.
My brother and sister also came from Japan, my sister
and niece from China, and I came from Qatar--we were trying
to win the award for most miles traveled to get to a wedding!

My mom and I during the reception.  Do we look a teeny bit tired to you? 

The bride and I--she is probably looking over at the dance
floor--she spent most of the night dancing the night away.
Her newly acquired Greek dancing skills were impressive!

It really was a whirlwind trip!  We had so much fun; meeting my sister's new-laws and their family was a highlight, as was getting to see some of my own far-flung siblings for the first time in a long while.  And the food!  I had this pork dish at the rehearsal dinner I will be trying to replicate for years...just as soon as I move back to a country where pork is legal!  And I could have eaten my weight in spanikopita...delicious!  Hopefully, my sister learns how to make it all and teaches me soon!

Musical notes

We are beginning to wade into the world of musical instruments and lessons, with just a little trepidation.  Okay, that's a lie, with lots of trepidation.

You see, J got to sign up for some after-school activities this year, and he decided to go for two: baseball and ukulele.  But then baseball turned out to be just too hot for him (it was still really, really warm when the activities began and he was just not interested in being that hot, which I completely understand).  And he has really, really enjoyed ukulele.  J loves music, actually; he likes to sing and has really good pitch and he can sing back any tune he hears.  But he doesn't know how to read music yet, of course, and we do want him to play something in the near future, but I'm not sure he's quite ready for piano, nor do we have a convenient piano teacher friend around as we have often had in the past.

So we got J an ukulele for Christmas.  And he really likes it!  He and the husband have even played a few impromptu duets with the husband's guitar.  I think they are going to put together a number for a little musical get-together at our neighbor's house next month.  I got him an instructional song book as well, and he has already taught himself several more chords than the three he learned at school.  We also went and got a cute little stand for him (a fun trip that required us to track down an obscure music store in the middle of the city that turned out to be a musical paradise).  The ukulele itself was a boot sale find here, virtually untouched, the exact model I was looking at on Amazon, owned by a tween who couldn't wait to unload it for next to nothing even while he was trying to convince his mom that these very well used video game figurines were worth way more than I thought any one would ever pay.  His loss, my and J's gain!  It's even green!

But we are still on the fence about piano lessons.  J likes to teach himself things and really, really doesn't like to get things very quickly, so I worry that the piano will be too frustrating for him right now.  So I think we will wait for a bit, for all our sakes!

iStory

Sometimes living here is like living in a paradox wrapped in an enigma hidden under a mystery.  On the one hand, the seemingly simplest tasks, like going to see a doctor to get a vaccination, for instance, or registering for school or opening a checking account, end up being the most complicated things you have every done in your life...and you have to do them, and re-do them, almost every week sometimes.  It's exhausting!

On the other hand, every once in awhile, a task that seems impossible unexpectedly turns out to be easy-peasy here in Qatar.  Recently, I cracked the screen on the husband's old iPad.  Cracked is really a generous description: it was sitting on the top of the printer, I lifted up the top thinking I had a hand on the iPad, but instead it slipped out of my grasp, hit the edge of the desk on the way down, and landed in the trash, the screen reduced to an ugly spider's web of destruction, with shards of glass falling from it as I took it out of the trash.  The hardware inside was fine, surprisingly, but the screen was toast.  Now, this is, as I mentioned, the husband's old iPad which he never uses anymore, so it wasn't a crisis...except that this is also the iPad we take with us when we travel alone, without the husband, so we have one for each boy, the old one and mine.  Have I mentioned how important our iPads are for travel?  Especially when I'm by myself!  Travel time is screen time, hey hey hey!

All of which means we needed to get the screen fixed.  I turned to one of my two best sources of information here (both are Facebook groups--what does that say about me, I wonder?) and searched for places that could repair an iPad screen.  There were many listed, with mixed reviews, but one was close to our house, so one Saturday the husband and I headed over to a pin I had dropped on a map that was supposedly close to where this store was purported to be.  Remarkably, we found it on the first try (this really is remarkable, directions are difficult here).

So we walked in, handed the iPad to the guy behind the counter and said "we need this fixed."  He took it, walked through a door behind him, came back, and said "that will be 150 QR and come back tonight for it."  Wait, what?  For approximately $41, the screen is done and the iPad is restored, in less than a day?  It seemed too good to be true, but, guess what, it worked?  Later that evening, the husband picked up the iPad...and it is as good as new...?  I'm at a loss!  For context, to get the same repair made in the States would have cost us $250.  The unit itself is only worth $300 on a good day, probably really much less.

And yet here, in crazy Qatar, $41 in one day.  Amazing!  And perplexing....

But hey, we got it fixed, and that's all that matters!

New and news

So I've been at this particular blog for over a year now and it's time for a little reflection and and a bit of a refresh, I think.  Hence, new background!  Oooohhhh!  Yes, I know it's nothing special; I am limited by my lack of html knowledge, so this is what you get, but at least it's something new to look at for a little while.  And I like that the colors reflect those of my sunny home!

Turns out, you, the people, my tiny band of faithful readers, are a confusing lot, if I go by my pageview stats.  You leave me with a conflicting picture about the kinds of posts you like.  By and large, you seem to prefer the posts with pictures, naturally, though it is still a struggle to get myself to find or take relevant shots and/or remember to include them all the time.  But I'm working on it, I promise!

You also really, and I mean really like any health or family emergency stories I write.  I get this, of course, because that's where the drama is and who doesn't like an exciting tale?  And, of course, almost all of you know me/us personally, which means that you are honestly concerned about us and want to be reassured that nothing too dangerous has happened to us here.  But, luckily, our medical emergencies aren't too frequent (knock on wood!), so you will just have to wait for those kind of posts.

You also appear to like travel posts, which is good, because chronicling our adventures abroad for posterity is really my main reason for blogging at all, so those kinds of posts are going anywhere.

Yet my most popular post of all was the only political statement I've made here, and I can't really see myself doing that more often!

So, where does that leave us?  More pictures--check.  Family emergency tales--sadly, check, because we are who we are, and we will undoubtedly run into further family craziness abroad.  Travel posts--check, we have many more trips coming up.  Politics--not so much.  Really folks, I rarely even know what's going on back in the States and only vaguely know what's happening here, so I wouldn't count on more in this vein!

And just to make this a real post, a few tidbits from around the web:

It's a little late, but here is Dave Barry's assessment of 2014.  It made me laugh!

Also a bit late for New Year's resolutioning but just in time for fighting back in February, the art of mini habits.  This has the potential to rock my world!

A comprehensive (if perhaps a bit too cautious) list of safety rules for kids (don't be turned off by the reference to preschoolers in the title; the article is really applicable to kids of all ages).

Life in the not-so-fast lane

Oh, I've been missing blogging lately, but for no good reason.  Not much has been happening, so I guess that's my excuse: I honestly don't have all that much to blog about!  But when has that stopped me before?!  So, quick updates all around:

The boys were able to dress as "someone famous" for school last week, so E chose Superman, of course, and J hemmed and hawed until the night before and was stumped until we found this pants and vest ensemble that he liked and then we had to find someone iconic who wore a vest.  A quick Google search for "famous people wearing vests" revealed...about a million pictures of Justin Timberlake.  Umm, no, thank you.  Then the husband suggested Thomas Edison, who wears a vest in almost all pictures we have of him (who knew?  The husband, apparently!) so I explained to J that Thomas Edison invented the electric light bulb (Like these in the ceiling?  Yes, just like those...only bigger.) and the phonograph (What's a phonograph?  Oh, a record player.  What's a record player?  Umm...let me look at some of his other inventions...just a second...) and the movie camera (Wow, that's cool!!).  He said everyone was impressed with his costume, so high fives all around.  Parenting win!

Meanwhile, the boys are on February break this week (not to be confused with spring break, in April), so we have gone to the beach, driving through moderately treacherous mud flats and a few even more treacherous long stretches of soft sand on the way, and collected all sorts of wonderful treasures, including a brain coral about the size of an actual brain and some of the most amazing shells we have every collected in all our many beach adventures.  (We also had to help dig one of our friend's Armadas out of the sand before we left, but we managed not to get stuck, thank goodness!)  We have also gone to the children's library where I volunteer and I let them choose all their own books (normally I am much more prescriptive than that, because I'm me), so we have ended up with ten I Can Read books about super heroes, a couple of Skippy Jon Jones books, some non-fiction 100 Facts About books on fossils and nocturnal animals, and eight Amelia Bedelia books...I sense a certain sameness coming up in our bedtime reading sessions!  We have also been back to the dentist for a consultation on J's teeth and we may also go to the doctor's office for a booster shot for one of J's vaccines, because what is a vacation without some medical visits, right?

Even though we had J's birthday party two weeks ago, I took down the last of the decorations...yesterday, just in time for the husband to have some folks over for a (delayed) Super Bowl party: two Canadians, another family from America, an Egyptian-born American, and a Brit (who was also born elsewhere, I think, but I am not sure where).  We were all dutifully surprised by the outcome, just late to the party (What were they thinking??).

The husband lost his passport last month (it was tragic) and applied for a replacement on Jan. 13th.  It finally arrived on Sunday, but when we went to go pick it up at the embassy, we were told we needed to get a police report from our local police station reporting it lost.  When we went to the station we were told we could only fill out the forms for a police report of that kind between 6am and 12pm (it was after 2pm at the time), so the husband came back the next morning, at which point he was told he needed a letter from his employer stating that he had could receive a lost passport report, so he emailed his boss, came home, printed the letter from his boss, and we all went back to the police station.  An hour later, he was fighting with the big wigs in the head office because his letter lacked the correct stamp, which should have come from HR, apparently, but eventually they relented and let him get his police report.  We stopped off at the embassy, only to find out that they were closed for consular business on Mondays.  So we still don't have the passport, but we take solace in the fact that it is, in fact, here in the country, and he will be able to get it soon...we hope!

We are also, at long last, getting some family pictures done on Wednesday, assuming our photographer's very pregnant wife doesn't go into labor!   We last had these done almost two years ago in Cleveland, so I am very much hoping we don't have to reschedule and that they turn out well (our photographer is very talented, so I am sure they will be great!).

We had thought about going to Dubai once the husband's passport materialized, but we've thought better of it since he will be back in Dubai in May for two conferences back to back so it would be smarter to join him then, particularly since most of what we want to do is inside anyway, so the weather won't really matter.  And I am gearing up for Wedding Week 2015, my sister's big, fat Greek wedding extravaganza!!!  I fly out alone on Monday morning and the husband will be managing the kids for the week, so I've got a detailed schedule made for him and I'm stocking the fridge with provisions.  I think the last time I flew anywhere by myself was when I went to my friends' wedding in Canada something like 9 years ago...maybe more?  So that in itself will be an adventure!  I can't wait!

I'd like to say the posting will get back to normal this week, but with the boys' vacation and then my own trip back to the States, I'm guessing things will be sporadic until near the end of February.  But I will be thinking bloggy thoughts and posting whenever I have a spare moment, so don't think I will abandon my tiny reading audience entirely!