Zoo and New Friends

We had a fun weekend enjoying the beautiful, but still kind of dusty weather. The dust storms appear to have passed, but a lot of the haze is sitting in the air. I would say a good rain would clean things up, but we will have to wait until next January until Kuwait probably sees rain again. So we shall see when the blue skies resume. Yesterday we went to the zoo. 

The animals were very active.

The elephant was squirting his water at us.

This tiger tried to attack these people who were teasing him with a water bottle. Good thing for double fences!

And this little monkey, was just hanging around ;).

The boys love to ride the train, and every time it passed by, Ben would wave. Sweet boy!

After walking around, we had a picnic and kicked the ball around.

In the evening the boys got their haircut at our neighborhood barber across the street. Caleb likes his hair spikey.

He cut Ben's hair a bit short for spikey, it's practically shaved and looks so cute on him.

Double sweetness!

Today we went down to the gulf so the boys could ride their scooters.

And we met some friends along the way. Sami was very sweet and enjoyed playing with the boys. 

Nathan talked with his dad while they fished, and I talked with his mom and practiced my Arabic and watched the boys. They were very hospitable and gave us tea, cake, and other treats.

After a couple of hours, we said our goodbyes. It was a very nice way to spend the morning.

And ended the day with a scooter race. 

Happy Valentine's Day!

Life

It has been an unusual week here for a number of reasons. Earlier in the week, Caleb, Benjamin, and I witnessed our good friend's 18 month old daughter almost drown. I called for help, and witnessed my friend give his daughter CPR and save her life.  I prayed with and consoled his 5 other children  and witnessed a tremendous sign of relief when we heard her cry. Shortly after, the ambulance arrived and brought her to the hospital. It seems all like a blur now. It was a very scary day for us all, and I couldn't begin to imagine how their family felt. As a mother and with my two children right there, my heart was so heavy. Later that night, it was confirmed that she was going to be just fine, and there was no permanent damage. Thankfully Nathan came home that night from a work trip, and he helped me talk through the events of the day. We saw her the other night, and she seemed 100% back to normal, happy as can be. God was watching over this sweet girl and protected her. Just as I know He protects us all, and most times we never know. Each day is truly a gift from God, and I am so thankful for my God, my Protector, my Savior. Thank you God.

The week was also strange because we had dust storms almost every day, which is untypical for this time of year. There is a constant layer of sand everywhere, people walk around with masks, and it's just all around yucky outside. I didn't take pictures, but here are some I found online of the storms this week.

And then two nights ago, almost the entire country lost power because of a glitch with one of the main power stations. The sun was already down, so we all had fun with flashlights for a couple of hours, and watched in amusement as people walked around outside not knowing what to do without electronic conveniences. We just thought it was our block that was out, but found out the next day it was almost everywhere, to include the International Airport, our big malls, fortunately the hospitals had generator backups. Apparently traffic came to a standstill for hours. More pictures from online of the outage. First one is of the airport!

 This morning it was still hazy, but much more clear. I think we have some sunny days ahead, and good times this weekend with a trip planned to the zoo and aquarium.

So thankful for the gift of each day, and the gifts from above.

Mutla Ridge, a fun day in the desert!

Last week our family ventured back Mutla Ridge, with a few of our friends. Unlike our trip last year where it was very foggy, this year was a clear and beautiful day. On our drive through the desert, we got stopped by a herd of camels crossing the street.

Before going to the ridge, we tried to find an old site from the Gulf War, of bombed Iraqi tanks. The site was a bit farther than we thought, and the turnarounds were sparse, so we decided to head back before getting too close to the Iraqi border!

We arrived at the ridge mid-day.

And immediately all got out of the car to explore.

Wd drove up a couple of dunes along the ridge, but this car had us all beat! 

We found a good spot to hike around and have a picnic.

The kids had fun digging, there is certainly no lack of sand in these parts of the world!

It was a windy day, and we all took turns flying kites that the boys received last year from Grandpa Mark and Grandma Betty. We flew them for the first time that day, and the boys loved them and did great! Our friends twins did a good job showing them how a pro flies a kite :).

And Nathan's a pretty good kite flyer too!

Ben loved flying the kite, but at one point the wind picked up, and away his kite went. Good thing we had 3 of them.

Caleb came with his best kite-flying pose!

And the best part of this trip is seeing all the people trying to drive up the dunes in their four wheelers and inevitably getting stuck! Not some of the brightest driving maneuvers we saw, then again we don't see many bright driving maneuvers here :).

And getting stuck did happen a bit. This man came out to the ridge in a car, by himself, and got stuck pretty far in the sand. Thankfully Nathan and our friends had tow ropes and shovels. It took 3 guys shoveling and pushing this car to get it unstuck!

Enjoying some more hiking before heading home. Our boys love the twins and their little sister, and they had so much fun playing with them at the ridge.

It was fun day, and we were so glad to get back out there again!