We live for weekends!

January is almost over and we are back in the swing of things.  We've made it three weeks into term two of the school year with only nine more weeks until spring break! (But who's counting, right?)

We enjoy our weekends and days off so much.  Here are some ways we've spent our free time lately...

Ice skating at Al Ain Mall.  They have walker/assistance things for the kids, which I think are ingenious;  They help minimize broken bones.  I might even be brave enough to try.  Lol!

This was their first time ice skating and they loved it!

The view looking up from the ice rink.  It's so pretty!

Global Village is a huge world fair in Dubai where they have many different countries selling goods and food as well as shows, rides, and other entertainment.  We got some really cool stuff there and enjoyed learning more about different parts of the world.  It's so huge that it's hard to see it all in one day but here are a few pictures of the places we went there.

From this picture you can see lots of different types of shops inside each country...pottery, textiles, perfumes, rugs, toys, etc...  

Africa had tons of cool wood carving stuff.  

We bought some local honey from this guy in Yemen.  He was very knowledgeable about his products.

Nice canal that runs around so you can take a boat ride to the cut down on the massive amount of walking.

They had an amusement park full of rides.  We had to ride the ferris wheel, of course.

The view from the top.

Olivia and I got matching female kandoras from Egypt.  

Can't wait for the next adventure!

Christmas

 We had a really wonderful, relaxing, stress-free Christmas this year.  Here are a few thoughts I've had about this holiday season in the UAE:

They do have decorations here!
I was really very impressed by the presence of Christmas decorations here, especially since this is a predominately Muslim county.  The malls and hotels all have 'holiday' trees up.  The country has been decorated for National Day for several weeks...the country's colors are red, green, black and white so the lights on the streets, roundabouts and buildings are a good excuse now for us to pretend it's for Christmas.  But it's not the same...

I MISS CHRISTMAS MUSIC!
I can't believe I'm even saying that...but I only heard it a couple of times out and about.  It made me sad.  We tried to compensate by playing our old favorites in the car (and sometimes having impromptu sing alongs, lol)  but it's really much different than hearing it everywhere you go all the time (as annoying as it gets, I know.)

Not having family around is hard!
I miss our family Christmas get-togethers...even though we were so blessed back home that we were invited to attend 4-5 per year, which always stressed me out.  I miss buying presents for people rather than sending gift cards via facebook or email.  I miss my mom's decorations; she works so hard to decorate the whole house.

It's next to impossible to find comfort holiday food here.
Finding ingredients for Thanksgiving was difficult enough for us that we didn't even attempt making a big meal this year.  Christmas Eve we searched 4 different grocery stores for egg nog. ready bake cookie dough, and easy mix hot chocolate.  We figured it all out finally but as you can see it's inconvenient to say the least.

Holiday events are different.
I miss our church's live nativity scene that I used to play in when I was in youth.  I miss my school Christmas party and our goodies that everyone brings in the week before the break.  I miss going to friends' parties and celebrating.  Luckily we have made wonderful friends to get together with here and for that I am thankful!

The weather just baffles me!
As unpredictable as South Carolina weather is, we always knew there would be some cold(ish) weather around Christmas.  Two years ago it even snowed.  But here it was 88 degrees and sunny on Christmas day.  Very confusing.


Here are fun things we did and new traditions we started, as well as pics from the big day!


We went to Dubai so the kids could see Santa and participate in some festivities.  It was nice and the British Santa even commented that the gifts our kids wanted were 'very posh!'  Lol!  Here are some pictures from the day...

Christmas tree craft

We went to a fancy Christmas brunch at the Rotana Hotel.  They had Christmas Carolers, Santa, and even Mickey Mouse.

Here is the 'Nativity Scene' outside the hotel.  I had to take a picture...

Yes, those are camels.  Maybe Baby Jesus is in the treasure box?

We made chocolate chip cookies for Santa and drank hot chocolate.

Santa found us all the way over in the desert!

He and the reindeer enjoyed their treats!

Thank you Me-maw and Pops!

Thank you Mimi and Papa!

Both kids got tablets from Santa!

Enjoying their new toys!

Thank you everyone who contributed to make this Christmas wonderful for all of us.  I love my new camera, Mark is enjoying his GPS (and didn't get lost today in Dubai!) and the kids have new toys and clothes that they love!

Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and are enjoying your families, friends, and the reason for the season, our Savior.