Quad biking in the desert!

Over the last weekend (aka Friday) we went out to this spot along the waterfront a little ways out of town to go quad biking. We went in the morning to try and beat the heat, yeah right! By the time we were through it was well into the 90's! It is getting hot here fast. Lily did a really good job keeping her hat on, something we are working on. We went with a few other family's and had an altogether great time! Lily didn't know what to make of it all when Greg took her for a rider until she saw David, then she figured if he liked it then it must be okay! We are so glad that we were able to fit this experience into our time here in Saudi.

Lily and David on their own quad (don't worry, it is only for a pose!)

Lily and her Daddy

Even Oliver got to go for a little ride

Lily and her Mommy

After a morning in the sun it is nap time all around

Good and Tired

It has been awhile... again

And here I thought that I was doing so well at updating the blog, then all of a sudden nothing for 2 weeks! I am sorry. There isn't much to tell, not much is new in our day to day lives, we are just waiting to find out when our Visas might be done so that we can start to figure out travel plans. The fun part is planning the travel and thinking about everyone we get to see. The reality of the travel is the not so fun part, but there is that wonderful reward of seeing loved ones at the end of it that makes it all worth it!

Greg is still working hard here in Saudi, on his current job here, thinking and feeling out his new job in Oz, working on the visas, doing the fun legwork of looking at possible houses online... He keeps very busy and we love the weekends when he leaves his computer off (this rarely happens though!) I give him a lot of crap for working so hard, but it is his job, he is good at it, he (mostly) enjoys it, and he takes great care of us, so I often end up taking back the crap I give him in the first place.

I am trying to enjoy the time that I have left with someone to take care of the housework for me, and help watch kids when I have shopping or a coffee to go to, or just to have someone stay in with Oliver while he is sleeping if Lily wants to go outside. Right now we are all a bit spoiled, everyone getting what they want pretty much right away.

I made Lily play-dough yesterday, and she seems to like the way it feels when she smashes her hands in it. She hasn't put any in her mouth yet, but it is home made, so when she does at least I know what is in it. This is more than I can say for the sand that she likes to put in her mouth outside right now. I think she likes the grittiness of it when she crunches it in her teeth. She is doing really well, mastering a few words at a time. When she wakes up in the morning she says juice first thing, you can see where her priorities are. Greg is amazed at how much liquid Lily can pull in in one day! Lily still loves to go outside, and she will grab your hand and pull you to the door if you are ready or not. She expects to see her friend David (aka DeDe) at the park, so as she is headed for the door she says pak (park) Dede! David and lily are great friends, and we are going to miss the Lopez's very much when we leave. They are so cute together the way they recognize one another, tell each other important things in their toddler language and play together.

Oliver is growing so fast! I can hardly believe it, and as he grows and gets older he is happier to be on is own a bit more, which saves my back! He still sleeps on his tummy, and he still sleeps all night. He wakes up as the happiest little boy in the morning, but this morning was special because he was on his back when I went in to pick him up! So he flipped (or rolled) sometime last night or this morning! We are so proud. He hasn't done it since, and I have been watching and waiting for it, but there it is, he can roll now so we have to be extra careful where we set him down. He is starting to take little naps during the day again, much to my relief!

Both the kids got shots last week, Lily got her 18 month checkup and shots, she is right on. She weighs 22 pounds, and is in the 25% on both weight and height. Oliver weighs 17 pounds, and he is in the 90% on weight, and the 50% on height. He is a big boy.

That is it for now, Later in the day I will try and post a few pictures for everyone to see.

SLB Eid Party

Last Thursday there was an Eid party on the compound, lots of people were here, I haven't seen that many people here with SLB before. We spent a few hours outside watching the people and visiting. Lily was too little for any of the games, but we watched other people play. Greg was volunteered to call out Bingo numbers, he was a good sport and did a good job of it. At least one of us helped out.

Lily making new friends

Shuja took Lily around the party for awhile to show her off. She has no problem going around with other people, and it gives me a break! Shuja gave her a little cotton candy, when I went to get her she couldn't stop smacking and licking her lips! I think she liked it :)

Lily hanging out with Shuja, he gave her cotton candy!

Greg took Lily on the camel for a ride, their first camel ride. He was smelly! And I guess he was pretty bumpy. I am glad Greg wa there to give her the ride, there was no way I was getting up on him. Lily didn't know what to think of him, she couldn't stop staring at him!

Greg and Lily on the Camel waving

Greg and Lily getting ready to go

Lily on the camel by herself, she couldn't stop staring at it!

Fun at the Park

We went to the park this last weekend.  Lily walked halfway there before she got tired and started crawling.  We wanted to show Greg how she can go down the slide by herself.  She has a fun time at the park, and usually we go a bit later when there are other children around to play with.  

Greg and Lily walking to the park

There she is by herself

Climbing into the slide

She still likes the swing

Greg pushing Lily in the swing

Happy Birthday Greg!

Greg's Birthday was yesterday, those of you who know him know how old he is so I won't share that here!  I think he would appreciate that.  Another year down and lots more to go.  There were lots of changes this last year, and there will be lots more coming up in the next.  It is kind of funny how we age without really realizing it, time just goes by and we need to remember to take time out to enjoy it.  Greg needs to learn to take a little more time for himself, or this is what I think as he works a lot, it seems like all the time.  Hopefully maybe this weekend I will have him for the whole time.  We are going to go shopping, the time has come to buy Lily a new big girl car seat (she is still in the baby one).

We had a quiet night last night, Greg and I played cribbage and listened to the ipod on the new bose dock that Greg got for his birthday.  Great sound.  

Look at me now!

This is a Lily update.  She is starting to do so much!  Her newest trick is to pull herself up, she does this in her bath tub, and she tries on the couch, she succeeds pulling herself up on her walker and her toy bin.  She is doing this very well, I am a little surprised because she isn't properly crawling yet.  The other thing that she does is sit up by herself, which is very good.

Lily has also figured out how to drink out of our Camelbak water bottles, which is great.  Hopefully this will help her figure out how to drink out of straws eventually.  She still likes her sippy cups, and she still tries to drink out of regular cups when we let her try.  
I can't believe how fast she is growing up and how soon she is doing some things.  We definitely have to watch what we leave laying on the floor, or within her reach on the tables.  

Greg and I are doing well here.  The thing that seems to be the hardest to get used to is how late he can sometimes work, and then how tired I am when he does get hoe sometimes.  Lily can wear me out, especially when there is laundry and shopping thrown in our days.  For the most part I am adjusting to taking the buses out in the mornings for my errands, and there are two buses that go out in the afternoon as well, just not to as many places.  Where it gets hard is if Lily is taking a morning nap when the morning bus comes then we don't go out like planned because I don't like to wake her up.  She takes so few naps as it is!  She is in to waking up early, around 6, which is nice because Greg then gets to see her in the morning before he goes to work for a bit,  and that is especially nice, especially when he works through her bedtime.  We will get into a routine, I am sure.

Being silly with Lily

Here are a few silly pictures of Lily.  We were playing on the floor with Aunt Jordyn, and Lily started chewing on her sock, after she had pulled it off her foot, naturally.

She is too cute!

Yesterday she had a strawberry in her mesh baggy, that was a BIG hit.  She also had peaches with her rice cereal for dinner.  They were good too.  We are currently up in North East Texas, close to Nachodochous visiting a good friend of mine.  It surprised to at how much drier it is here than in Houston.  

On Friday Lily went for her first bike ride, she slept through the majority of it, but overall I think it was a good experience for her.  

If I ever get pictures of Saudi from Greg I will post them on here for all to see.  I guess things are moving along, with Greg's visa, and starting ours.  I need to contact the visa center here and get the medical papers so Lily and I can get that rolling, this is what Greg says to do.  We also need 12 passport photos each!  I wonder what for? Even when we get this done it will be another 3 weeks or so before Lily and I can head over.  We miss Greg terribly and can't wait to get there.

A late Valentine

We hope that everyone had a great Valentines day yesterday!  We had a pretty good day, missing Greg though.  We went to chickfila yesterday for lunch, and this giant cow came in, it made Lily stop and stare, litteraly!  It was pretty cute to watch.  We went to a Birthday party last night, Lily did good, she visited for awhile and then went to bed.  I woke her up to go home, and she was wide awake, it took me a while to get her to go back to sleep, but she did and slept until 8am, which was nice for me.  

Greg sent us flowers for Valentines day.  Lily liked them right away!  
Lily being silly, grabbing her feet for her Grams.  She likes playing with her feet!

We have heard from Greg, he is tired, still getting used to the time difference.  It sounds like Saudi is going to be nice for us, he says the compound is green, but the outside is all sand.