My New Car!

There are many hazards with buying used cars here.  There is no Carfax and we have heard horror stories of people buying wrecks, odometer roll backs, etc.  We decided to roll the dice with Mike's car and buy a cheap used car from another Western expat and hope for the best.  For my car, we bit the bullet and bought a new car.  I got a Toyota Prado.  It is not made in the US by Toyota, but there is a Lexus version.  It is in between a 4Runner and a Land Cruiser.  I love it!  It has a third row for our hopes of having many visitors!

 Only 10 Kilometers--BRAND new!

 My UAE license plate

American Community School

We did a ton of research before moving here about all of the schooling options and decided that the American Community School (ACS) is where we definitely wanted Olivia (and later Eliza) to be.  Thankfully, Exxon has some pull with ACS and after lots of worrying and sleepless nights, Olivia was admitted in August!  We were BEYOND thrilled.  We figured once that happened, everything else would fall into place and it did.  Exxon paid the deposit and the entire year's tuition back in August to be sure her spot was held, not knowing we wouldn't arrive until January!  We landed January 2nd around 11 PM and Olivia started just 3 days later.  I still can't believe we actually made it there on time the first day.  I hardly remember it; we were all still super foggy from jet lag.

So far, we have been really happy with the school and all it has to offer.  It truly is a community.  It is an American bubble right in the heart of Abu Dhabi.  We have made good friends in the very short time that we have been here.  I am able to volunteer in the classroom weekly, which I love.  We also have to park and walk them into the classroom and pick them up from there in the afternoon.  Getting all of us somewhat dressed and at school by 8 is not always easy, but it is nice chatting with the other moms and seeing her teacher, Ms. Mara, twice a day.

We are still pinching ourselves that we are here, in the school we wanted, and in the villa we wanted (perfect location, only a 5 minute drive from school).  Seriously, we couldn't be happier here.  It all really fell into place and I feel we are never going to want to come home, it is just so perfect!  Here is a little video about Olivia's school.  It will give you some shots of the city and what it looks like here, especially at the very end.

 The (purple!) Kinder hallway, outside her classroom

 The small kinder only playground

 All of her classmates

 I brought up purple cupcakes for her half birthday, January 24th.  Eliza just went and sat down next to her, like she belonged right there.

My sweet, smart, precious, resilient, kind-hearted, loving, beautiful, lovely and darling 5 1/2 year old.  I love her to the moon and back.  I feel like the luckiest girl in the world being her mama.

Our First Couple of Weeks

Okay, so we worked and worked and worked trying to get settled and it was exhausting!!! Thankfully, my lovely neighbor Linda helped find me a housekeeper to come and help me get organized.  Despite the fact that she accidentally threw away my wedding bouquet, she was really helpful.  We also had a ton of shopping to do: new TVs, a few pieces of furniture, storage solutions, food, cleaners, microwave, vacuum cleaner, coffee maker, baby monitors (concrete houses are VERY soundproof!), rugs, etc.  The rooms in our house are also huge and Olivia's single little twin sized bed looked so sad in her huge room.  We decided to just start over and redo her room in her beloved favorite color purple. We had WAY too many trips to Pottery Barn Kids, trying to get it all together.

 I started watering our very dry and thirsty grass.  Eliza asked for a turn.  I went inside to get some things done and walked out to a naked grass watering lady.

 This is a common scenario in our house.  Eliza does something Olivia would never think to do.  She comes and tells me what is happening, borderline freaking out about how wrong it is, and then...

 joins in on the fun!  I love the balance my girls give each other.  Eliza helps Olivia come out of her comfort zone and let loose, while Olivia helps reign Eliza in when she has taken something too far.  They are so good for each other.

 Just in case we needed our Anywhere Chairs monogrammed in Arabic!

 Yep, that is Eliza laying in the middle of the floor with a nap mat that she has taken out.

Something that is incredibly fantastic about living here, there is no kid napping, like ever.  It is really nice not needing to have an eye on your kids at every single second here (this is especially nice when you have a little one like Eliza, who likes to explore and socialize).  The primarily Filipino store clerks are also more then happy to play with your kids while you do a little shopping.

 We needed new TVs as ours from home wouldn't work here.  We spent a long time trying to make a decision on what to get and I looked over and saw this sweet moment.  What could be more precious?

  

 It would be an understatement to say the driving here is crazy.  It is not nearly as bad as it was in Doha, but still not great.  We saw this wreck within a few days of being here.  I have since seen a motorcyclist get hit by a taxi.  All seemed okay in both of these wrecks.

I couldn't even begin to share how much we have enjoyed having our sweet neighbors, Linda and Les Carter just two doors down.  Les is Mike's boss and Linda has become my and Eliza's partner in crime all over Abu Dhabi.  Linda's close friend, Nina was in town in January.  They had us over to show us how to make some easy and super yummy cookies.  Eliza moved the cooling rack right in front of her in order to get a front row seat.  Gena, behind Eliza, is now our sweet housekeeper.

 We went to The Viceroy Hotel with the Carters for brunch.  Friday brunch is a really big deal over here.  The weekend is Friday/Saturday here.  Friday is the holy day and starting around noon, all of the nice hotels in town have an absolutely incredible brunch.  The restaurant where they have the brunch is right in the middle of the Formula One track and a harbor where some serious yachts are docked.  It is unbelievable.

My cute guy :)  The girls were at home with our housekeeper.

The side of the Viceroy Hotel, facing the Formula One track.  It does not do it justice at all.

 We now own way more Ikea gear than ever before in our lives.  It is really nice that it is here because in a house where closet space is very limited and bathrooms have none! (Nina in the back of the car and Darcey, my other neighbor who has two girls at ACS, Olivia's school).

 Olivia was invited to a classmate's space themed birthday party.  It was quite the elaborate party.  It started at a planetarium and then went to the Gold Club.  They had face painters, cotton candy, a magician, an ice cream bar, open bar for the adults, and tons of food.  It was nice getting to know some of the parents and kids in her class.  Olivia will wait in the longest on long lines fro face painting.  She LOVES it!

 Eliza, Miss Sweet Tooth, getting after some ice cream

Crazy solar system cake

We Are Here!

We couldn't believe we were finally here!  This was the most drawn out move we have ever done and we were so anxious to just get here.  We first found out about the possibility of moving to Abu Dhabi last May.  It took about 7 months for it to actually happen. 

Jet lag was actually harder on us than it was on the girls.  We did have a little help from our friend, Benedryl for us and for them.  The hardest part of jet lag coming this way is staying asleep through the night.  It is also hard to stay awake in the evening. 

My sweet babies just couldn't go on another minute.  Taking an early evening nap with all of the American Girl Dolls carefully arranged by housekeeping.

The girls were both FASCINATED by the bidet.  I heard some water running and came into the bathroom to find this!  She had even put shampoo in her hair.  All of the public restrooms stalls (and the bathrooms in our villa) have little water hose sprayers for "washing up".  Lots of interesting conversations have come about concerning these.  When I asked Olivia the biggest difference between Houston and Abu Dhabi, her response: "the people here don't use toilet paper, but use the sprayer to wash their bums".  True and too funny!

We decided to live in our empty Houston house for two months in order to move directly into our house once we arrived in Abu Dhabi.  I wanted the girls to come directly to their new home and see all of their things and sleep in their own beds from night one.  A few things changed that well thought-out plan.  First, our sea shipment was delayed a week.  Mike didn't receive our container until two days before he flew home to the US for Christmas.  While the movers unpack the boxes and sort of put things away, it is not at all organized.  It is really helpful having things out of boxes, but oh my is it a mess.  Second, our water was shut off for 3-4 days when we first landed.  Something about a huge bill our landlord needed to pay.  Third, something I didn't think about at all when planning, we had no window treatments!  We have HUGE windows in our and Olivia's bedrooms.  There was no way we could stay there until there was something on the windows.  So, we ended up having to stay in the hotel for about 5 or 6 days.  It was actually nice staying there despite having two rooms that were not connected.  Mike and Olivia took one room, while Eliza and I in the other.  It was quite annoying going back and forth and being split up.

This is the beautiful view that we have from our villa.  We feel so very lucky to have landed here.

 This is what I walked into our first morning in Abu Dhabi.  I literally walked around from room to room and then went a laid down in Olivia's bed for about 45 minutes, completely overwhelmed and no idea where to even begin.

 Our bathroom.  Notice there is not one cabinet or drawer in the entire place.  Where in the world were we going to put all of that.

 I stated buying packs of my favorite sponges when I went to Costco when getting ready for the move.  I just kept tossing them into a back cabinet and didn't realize how many I had accumulated.  I didn't know if I would be able to find these here (I can, actually) and wanted to be sure I didn't have to waste precious suitcase space on sponges during my trips home during the summer.  Looks like I will be okay for a while :)

Sweet Maya made it!!!  She arrived a day earlier than we thought and we were still in the hotel.  She had to be boarded until we got out of the hotel.  She was SO EXCITED to see us when we went to pick her up.  It was so good to see her!  She slept for almost 24 hours straight once she ran around and gave the place a once smell over.  Poor thing must have been so stressed at almost 14 years old.

 Olivia's favorite thing in the world to eat delivers!!!!!!  What could be better?!

So Long Texas

It seems like I just posted about GTT (Gone To Texas).  Here we go again!

It was not easy or fun cleaning out the last bits out of our house.  We finally just ended up putting a lot of stuff up in the attic and told our tenants to please leave it alone.  We shall see what condition all of it is in when we return in 4+ years. We went down to the wire on this one.  We even sold my car to Car Max the morning we flew out!  We got there as soon as they opened on New Years Day, just a few hours before our flight.

 We rented a U-Haul and loaded up all of the furniture we borrowed for two months to return it to its owners and then headed to Nonna's for a few days before flying out January 1st.

ALL of our bags, packed and ready to go!  We each got 2 checked bags (8 total) and 2 carry-ons (we limited ourselves to only 5).  We also checked golf clubs, two car seats and a stroller.  It was NUTTY!

 On the way to the airport in the huge van for the luggage, Eliza was sacked out!

She was so excited to finally go to Abu Dhabi

 Thank goodness for porters!

We couldn't resist taking their photo in front of all of the Texas stuff at the airport

Getting on board with all of our gear.  I had to take a photo of the ridiculousness.

:) Helping sister get on

Ray Girls getting settled in for the 15 hour flight to Doha

This was the first time I could actually relax in months.  After all of the ordeal of getting ready for this move and being sure all we needed made it to Abu Dhabi, we deserved a couple glasses of champagne!

All plugged in and ready for take-off.  They were watching "The Little Mermaid"

 Mike was sitting next to Olivia and because she was so exhausted, she fell right asleep.  I was wrangling Eliza and could not get her to go to sleep.  Mike and I switched and he just bear hugged her until she fell asleep.  Well, it looks like I drew the short end of the stick.  After Olivia slept soundly for about 5 hours, she was up about every 20 minutes complaining that her feet were hot and needed a cold wet washcloth...Eliza slept almost the rest of the flight.  Once Olivia got up, I let her watch another movie and tried to get some sleep.

The girls enjoying some breakfast. It killed me that the girls got white place mats and all the luxury of business class.  What a waste! :)

 We survived the long haul flight!  We landed in Doha and got to go to the First Class terminal that was finally finished right before we moved from there.  The girls got to watch yet another show.  I am sure their poor brains were on overload with all of the visual media!  The girls were awesome during our travels.  I am still amazed at how well they did.  Hopefully when we fly home this summer, in coach when we are paying, I will have the same report!

 Amazing lounge--free buffet, free order anything on the menu (or off...we ordered Butter Chicken for us and Alfredo for the girls), and free bar.  It had a hot tub, showers, and a spa. If only we had had a longer layover...not really! :)

 We even got a luxury private bus to our connecting flight to Abu Dhabi.  The Gulf States really know how to do luxury.

 We arrived in our new home!  O looking cute while they try to gather it all up.

Here we go!