Picture Challenge

This week I decided to try and get out my camera everyday and take a picture of what had made me happy that day...
Day 1: I Got a new shower curtain and colored towels for my bathroom.  HAPPY!

Day 2: My roommate brought home "Fazulia" for dinner!  My favorite and the first time I have had it again since coming back here = VERY HAPPY

Day 3: Was at local grocery store in the office section (I am being very generous with that statement) and I saw this notebook!  It made me think of my good friend Heather - who always says "White Rabbit" on the 1st of the month. = Lots of Happy Memories = I had to buy it!

Day 4: More furniture in my room and the perfect place to sit and read or study!  My room is really big and this side of the room was very empty.  By roommate suggested I move one of the Ma'glisses from another room into my bedroom = Another Happy for the week

Day 5:  Attempts at being Crafty...the whole point of being crafty is being resourcefull with what you have available, right?
I couldn't find cookie sheets  to make cute magnet boards, but I did find metallic serving trays and fun contact paper to decorate them with to give as gifts for Christmas!

Day 6:  My roommate found lights for our tree!  We had convinced ourselves that the tree was perfect and did not need lights, but really Christmas trees needs lights and these are fabulously quirky lights dancing to their own tune.

 

It's Begining to Look Like Christmas!

I brought with me a few fun Christmas things, but was surprised when a friend recently gave me a Christmas tree!  So I got creative and with the help of Pinterest made some ornaments from Cinnamon/Applesauce/Glue.
I began with buying 1/2 a kilo of Cinnamon (that is a lot of Cinnamon if you are wondering - I will have Cinnamon for a very long time)
Then I made my own applesauce for the very first time.
Then I also made my own glue for the very first time, because I am not a patient person and the store I went to did not have glue, so rather than going on a search for glue in my new city - I just made it from water/sugar/flour/vinegar.

I also baked for the first time in my new house.  It took me a bit to figure out the new oven, but I think I got it.  And my Cinnamon Roll Cake turned out beautiful!

My tree...we plan to add a popcorn chain soon.  Keeping with the natural/rustic theme!

A quick trip to Petra

Sometimes I love living here just because I can take a day trip

with friend to a place like Petra.

We spent several hours walking about the site that would take days to properly explore.
We saw lots of rocks.

Really Big rocks and after driving for several hours surrounded by a very flat desert the
sudden transformation of environment was impressive to take in.

I even rode a horse but forgot to take pictures at that moment.

 

It's been awhile...

Summer has passed quickly with lots of studying and some visiting of sites such as this that have been around for awhile...

 

 

 

 

Weekend Trip

So happy to be at the Beach!

View from our table at dinner.

I can't get over how blue it is!

Grateful Wednesday Week 2

Today has been a good day...
1. I am feeling like myself again and have energy to enjoy the day!
2. I can't believe it is already Wednesday again - the week goes by quickly when you are sick all day Monday and sleep through most of the day and Tuesday.
3. Grateful that I felt well enough to go to class on Tuesday and partcipate in my turn to help lead our class review - we had so much fun popping balloons, playing What Time is it Mr. Wolf?, Charades etc - all in the name of learning some Arabic!
4. Getting this picture of my favorite time of day here.  I love when the sky is clear and blue.  I love when the shadows are scattered on the otherwise mono colored buildings giving it some character.
5. Water Day - Once again woke up early to get that shower I missed yesterday - so glad for Water Wednesday and laundry day!  I choose to picture my neighbors laundry rather than my own - I think it has a bit more character.

6. This afternoon enjoyed some study time at Starbucks, and this week they had Soy milk!  So I enjoyed a new frappachino called Mocha Cookie Crumbs or something like that - very yummy.
7. Came home and watched the sunset while "Walking with Leslie"
8.  Decided I had time for some baking and made some Peanut Butter Bread.
It has definitely been a good day.

Grateful Wednesday

On Wednesday I determined to be grateful
and happy about what the day brought me...
First: I woke up and remembered that I had had a fun Tuesday night with my roomate - out to dinner, Cherry Pepsi and home to study/watch tv while sitting on our new creation of a Ma'glis!  I tried to take a picture but it really did not do justice to the wonderful creation.  We took an extra matress and put it against the wall with the cushions from our uncomfortable chairs and made my new favorite place to sit in the house! 
Second: I woke up to water! - Water + the about pictured water heater = hot shower in the morning to wake me up and get me clean!  So grateful that Wednesday is water day because we were out and those tanks needed some filling up.
Third: Went with classmate to the Waffle House and planned for our part of the class review for next week together.
Fourth: Got some good studying time after class at a coffeeshop.
Fifth: Good time spend in studying the book of Esther
Sixth: Invited to have dinner with a family and spent the evening with them....And so much more!

A Blog about my Feet...

After not seeing my feet for a few months it has been nice to see them again.  I really did not see my feet from January to March for as soon as humanly possible I would put on at least one layer of socks and shoes or slippers.  I was even sleeping in my socks and slippers most of the winter.  So my feet (and the rest of me) are really excited about the warm weather we are now having (dust storms and all!) and being free from layers of clothing.
Something new this Spring: for the first time ever I went for a pedicure and I am hooked. So much fun! My first experience I went for the red color (the nice lady said it looked good with my white skin :), true enough). This week I went for a dark purple.
Purple will always be one of my favorite colors!
Question: Why don't my toe nails grow, my finger nails I seem to have to cut weekly,
 but a pedicure lasts me for months...
So with summer coming to stay for awhile I look forward to more pedicures and fun colors, funny sandal tanlines (I was so excited this last week when I realized I was getting a V tanline from my flipflops and it wasn't just a dirt mark!) and bugbites (you can see I already have a few and am not complaining one bit about them - bring on the sunshine and the bugs that come along with it!

That's all I have to share about my feet today, it has been a relaxing day of catching up and baking.
I tried a couple new things today and think they turned out quite well.

I made a bean salad

And another recipe off of Pinterest - Strawberry Banana Bread
We had been having the best strawberries at our local dukkan, loving having
 strawberries in everything!

 

Celebrating Easter

He is Risen

He is Risen Indeed!
 

I was very excited to be able to host an Easter party with my roomate.  We planned lots of food, punch, dying of eggs and an egg hunt for 5pm.

Thankfully we were set to go by early afternoon because that's when our neighbors arrived!  We had a blast.  And we got to have the party twice because some of my roomates other friends came at the orginal time.  So this year I got to celebrate Easter for two weeks in a row and host two parties - love it!

 

 

 

Enjoying a boat ride on The Nile River!

Just a few really big, really old rocks laying around

Me and the pyramids - would have never imagined it would be so much fun to walk around in the desert just exploring for the day.

No camel rides for me, but I did get a lesson on hieroglyphics, pretty sure I am an expert now...so much easier than Arabic!

And after such a day of history and learning I relaxed with some Nutella Expresso - Wow Yumminess!

I loved so much about Cairo, one of which was this sight - donkeys and horses pulling carts in the middle of crazy modern day traffic.

 

I didn't really think about the advantage of living in Jordan and being so close to
so many historical and biblical sites.
A few weekends ago I got to go on a walking tour at the Jordan River!
It was beautiful and exciting to think about all that has happened here.
Apparently the Jordan is much smaller than it used to be, so the site where the experts believe that Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist is not even in the river anymore, but the believed site is marked and being there helps me picture the scene a bit better.
It also made me think about the songs I have heard sung about crossing the Jordan and entering the promised land - how excited that we look forward not to the physical but the spiritual eternal promised land of heaven when we will cross over that river to join in with those who are worshipping before the throne of the King of Kings.

 

Hello from the Jordan River!
I took this picture while my feet were in the river, behind me you can see across the river into another country.