Caleb's First Day of Pre-School

Last night we had Caleb's pre-school orientation, and he started school today! His teacher is Ms. Grace, from Romania, and she is very sweet. Caleb is in a class of 18 kids, and all of them are of Middle Eastern descent. We are excited that he will be immersed in the culture, and for the new friends he will make.

At orientation last night, Caleb walked right into the classroom and started playing with the other kids and toys.

 The school has an area called 'The Village' where kids can play and pretend. There is a post office, bank, fire station, supermarket, pizzeria, and doctor's office. Once we got to the Village, we had a hard time getting Caleb out because he was having such a good time.

 He's ready to ring up your groceries and take your money!

 There is also a nice covered outdoor play area that the kids visit a couple times a day.

Caleb was excited to go to pre-school this morning! The first week the kids only go for 2 hours a day, and next week they start half days.

 Getting ready to walk into school!

He walked right into his classroom and started playing with the kids. When he realized I had to leave he started crying, but that stopped shortly after I left when they brought out he bunny and turtles :). When Nathan picked him up this afternoon, his teacher told him that everyone in his class was scared of the rabbit, except for Caleb. They said he walked right up to it and grabbed its ears, haha! He has had a lot of practice with our cat...poor Twix!

We love you Caleb, and we know you will have a great year at your new school!

The Park

A park we like to visit at one of the schools re-opened this weekend, since school is getting ready to begin in a few days. Over the summer, they re-finished the track this nice blue color, and all the play structures were dusted off and watered down. The boy played and crawled and ran around, we enjoyed the cooler evening playing outside.

The sun sets are getting much earlier, and now they are more than a couple hours earlier than when we arrived almost 3 months ago. We watched a pretty sunset this evening before leaving the park. I love the orange and blue colors of the evening sky!

After the boys went to sleep, I opened my kindle to check email. We leave our kindle out during the day so Caleb can watch some shows. I have parental controls turned on so he can't buy shows (anymore), and he can watch all the trailers he wants :). What he watches appears on my carousel, and today I was cracking up with what I saw: Sesame Street Letters, All-Star Alphabet, Happy Holidays Elmo, Elmo Saves Christmas, Cars, Elmo's Potty Time, Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, Elmo Visits the Doctor, Elmo Guess that Shape and Color, Sesame Street 35, Jonah Veggietales, Bob the Builder Heavy Digger, Dinosaur Train, and Curious George. Someone watched a lot of trailers today, haha! 

Afternoon with Friends

Today we got together with Abeer's family for lunch and to hang out for the afternoon. Since moving to Kuwait, she has been so sweet to us, and we enjoy the times we get to spend together. Today we also got to meet Abeer's husband and father, and we really enjoyed talking with and getting to know them. Nathan and Nabyl hit it off well, and her father seemed so kind. I'm sure we will be seeing more of them in the future.

Abeer prepared a delicious lunch for us, she went all out and made a traditional Pakistani dish of mutton and rice, beef stroganoff, pasta, salad, chicken cutlets, pizza toast, and mac-n-cheese and french fries for the kids. It was very flavorful, and I wish I thought to take a picture of the spread before our plates were cleared.

After lunch, we sat around and talked while the kids played. Firas and Caleb ran around, built a house, played guitar, and watched TV. 

Rachel also plays the guitar and she has a beautiful voice, and she and Nathan played us some good music. 

Faris and Ben were so cute playing together. Every time we see Faris he is doing something new. Now he is crawling and leaping. He's an active little boy, and I'm sure these two will be partners in crime.

We had a really nice afternoon with their family, and appreciate the wonderful hospitality. Thanks for a fun day, let's do it again soon!

 

Registered for Preschool

Caleb is registered for preschool, and he starts this Tuesday! We are thankful to have great preschool options, and we and Caleb are very excited for him to get started.

Quick story, we had to bring (2) 4x6 pictures in advance of school starting, so they can label his cubby and put his picture on the classroom door. We got Caleb's picture at a photoshop, and when I opened them at home, they were wallet size pictures. I went back to ask for 4x6, and they said, madam, they are 4x6. I thought inches, but of course they use the metric system here and the pictures were 4x6cm. I'm still adjusting :). 

Here's this happy boy's school picture, we LOVE his smile! More to come next Tuesday after his first day of school!

We can drive...legally

Nathan and I went to the traffic department with a few others today to get our driver's license. It was an uneventful trip and let's just say, in theory we passed :)

Happy Thursday!

Ice Cream

When I got home from work today, the boys were playing and laughing together, and I thought they need some ice cream this evening.

After making his way down the stairs, Tes, the boys, and I went to our neighborhood co-op and got some....Baskin Robbins :)

Caleb made friends with the workers at the ice-cream shop. One of the guys made a cat-call sound to Caleb, and he did it right back to him. It was hilarious and we were all cracking up!

 

 

Both boys enjoyed ice cream.

After ice cream, we went to the playground outside the grocery store. When the sun goes down, the kids come out around here! Caleb had fun on the swing and he was acting superman. Ben was just trying to stay awake, so shortly after we made our way home.

We had a fun impromptu evening getting ice cream, making new friends, and playing outside.

Hey guys, what about me?

We had a good week at work and a fun weekend. It ended up being low-key, like most of our weekends have been, and we like it like that. On Thursday evening the Embassy hosted a social hour. They had music, food, and lots of kids running around. The weather is just getting cool enough where the evening are starting to feel really good.

On Friday we hung out at home, I went grocery shopping with Ben, and we went swimming at the Embassy in the afternoon. Caleb spent the morning coloring, stickering, and Bob the Buildering :).

Ben is becoming a fast crawler and he follows us around the house. All the crawling makes this little boy hungry. He is a great eater and chows down on whatever we are eating!

And a cute little eater, don't you think?

He does pretty good for just having 4 teeth, I think he is working on another on the bottom.

All done!

Ben is very sweet with Twix, and she seems like him too. She is probably thankful to not have her tail pulled or get sat on!

That afternoon, we went swimming. The boys love being in the water and are getting very comfortable in the kiddie pool.

Caleb is learning how to put his head underwater, and he is getting very brave picking stuff off the bottom of the pool.

Ben is a floater, and he likes to lounge in the water! I think he is looking more and more like Nathan.

Swimming = big dinner and an early night sleep

Nathan and I had a couch date. We ate this delicious veggie pizza and watched the Great Gatsby, which we thought was a great movie. I read the book in high school and thought the movie was very well done.

We also spent some time decorating. Our place is feeling like home, we just need to get some pictures on the walls.

Saturday morning we hung around the house. Caleb loves to listen to Nathan play the guitar (I do too, he is getting very good)! Caleb like to make everything a guitar these days, and Nathan is very patient showing Caleb how to strum :).

 This afternoon, our friends Joe and Susan came over for dinner and our boys had a fun afternoon playing.

 This was the first time we really saw Caleb interact with another kid. He usually plays alongside them, but today he and Nick were laughing, talking, and chasing each all over the place.

We had a fun afternoon with friends! 

Here they are in action...don't worry, Ben had a smile on his face most of the time, even though he was probably thinking, he guys, what about me?

 

 Hope you have a good start to your week!

He Prays

Caleb loves saying the dinnertime prayer. We were able to catch it on film one night :)

 

We have stuff

Our household shipment arrived yesterday, and we were excited but also dreading receiving it at the same time. We have lived without our stuff for 2.5 months and have been doing just fine. There were definitely things we were happy to see, and others things we said, why did we pack that?

The truck showed up in the morning, and a team of 7 men were ready to unload.
Caleb wanted to help the minute they arrived.

They were friendly and hard-working, and they really liked the boys :). Caleb made friends with the men quickly and was a big helper.

Ben had no problem finding a pair of hands to hold him. 



When he was not being held, he watched in awe as they brought boxes into the house.

Caleb was very happy to see his pooh bear train and wagon.

Where's Ben? He's hiding in a box of toys!

And toys these boys have. It was like Christmas opening all of the boxes, and fun to see the boys playing with the 'new' toys and books.

After some snacks, high fives, and handshakes, the movers left. They did a great job!

Tes came over later that day to watch the boys so we could unpack. She also helped me unpack things in the kitchen when the boys napped. She was a huge help, we are very thankful for her!

 

One of my favorite items to receive, was Elizabeth's old glider. It feels so good to rock in it again with the boys. Thank you Elizabeth!



And Caleb was happy to see his rocker too. This was Nathan's when he was a little boy. Thanks Grandpa and Grandma P!

Nathan and I stayed up late looking at pictures to hang on the wall. The pictures are my favorite things we opened. We enjoyed reminiscing about the memories we made at each place we traveled or the milestones we experienced together. 

 

The boys enjoyed their 'new' playroom today. Nathan did a great job organizing the space, amongst many other places in the house - thanks dad!