A few things that make me happy...

The money here is so colorful and pretty

 Henna Hands (and a fun afternoon with new friends)
Can anyone find in the design an apple, arch, flame star, cross and flower?

 Gifts from new friends in my neighborhood! Cookies and Dates

New Places, New Sights, New Things

 My new bedroom is coming together

 My new bathroom

 This room is going to be fabulous!  Now it only has a small table and sheet curtains, but I have ordered a M'gliss that I am so excited about!  Will post pictures once the room is complete.

 My favorite room of the apartment - the roof balcony!  It is huge and once set up will be perfect for having guests over to enjoy the view and cooler weather of fall/winter.

 My tiny kitchen.  It is going to take some creativity to cook in here, but it is all coming together (and I have a side room/hallway type area that will be the 2nd half of the kitchen, so all is good.)

I am just happy my kitchen is indoors.  Most people living in houses have a totally separate room from their house that is the kitchen.

 View from my bedroom window.  Cannot forget for long that the desert is just outside

Catching Up!

I don't even know when or where to start!

Me in my "old" house not long before I moved again.

I got to spend some time with Dad and Mom!

I spent a little bit of time in Greece...

And this is my favorite part of my new apartment - the balcony and view are amazing!

More pictures to come!

Celebrating Easter

I have had the best day in a long time.  Mostly because I have something to look forward to and get ready for!  Celebrating Easter.  It looks a lot different here...but I am having a friend over to dye eggs and so today I baked colorful cookies and prepared my Resurrection Eggs.  I have already told her the Story and explained how we use the eggs with objects inside to help up Remember and teach our children the importance of Celebrating Easter.

Also rainy season has begun.  For the last few days every afternoon has brought a shower of rain.  Don't think you can tell but the picture on the left is of my street during my first rain here!
And in the center of the pictures is my new favorite find from Pinterest!
I have printed it and put it on my wall, I have also saved it as my desktop background.
So much to Celebrate!
 

Time with Family

 

Hello from Here
It has been awhile...not much going on here.  No fun weekends away or day trips to historical sights.  Life has been rather routine being in class every morning and just getting life done.  But this weekend has been good.  Starting off with some wonderful house guests who are so encouraging and thoughtful.  For example, bringing me home this Capri-Sun because she remembered me mentioning last night how much I loved them as a kid!

 

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.