Our weekend was busy; full of new places, food and things.
It was good to get out and do something as one can feel a bit claustrophobic here at times. So, we started with our typical grocery shopping adventure on Thursday evening.
Before we could gather our strength to grocery shop, we decided to eat outside for the first time since I arrived. We chose Johnny Rockets, and had a great dinner outside in the 91 degree heat of the night. It's dark here by 5pm right now, and thankfully once the sun goes down, the heat is more tolerable. Anyway, I was super happy to eat a yummy burger and drink a coke. :) With a full belly, I did the grocery shopping. It best to shop on a full tummy, but that also means I end up without things I needed because I was too full to think I needed said things. I made up for it the next day.
Friday's are days of worship here, so naturally, we did just that and then were off to buy a dryer to help make laundry less of a headache. I'm told I am spoiled to have a dryer... I happen to think it's necessary with a family, especially for towels, sheets, and bedding. It's not as hot as it was, so things are taking much longer to dry. If the towels don't dry fast enough, they stink, and I hate it when my towels stink. To find our new dryer, we ventured to a new store and got a few more groceries in the process. By the time we had accomplished all this great fun, our tummies were rumbling. We topped off this adventure with homemade tacos. They were so good!
As a side note: Dryers are not a normal thing for people to own here, they don't vent to the outside, and they have a tank for condensation that must be emptied after drying a load of laundry. Learning new things here, every day! So, maybe, I am spoiled.
Saturday morning was upon us and it was time to get out once again for a bagel breakfast. This time a new location at a mall. And we waited and waited and waited and waited....You get the picture. We weren't the only ones with the swell idea to eat bagels for breakfast. You should have seen the line to get into the brand new IHOP that just opened here! Crazy people!
After waiting for what seemed like ages, we ate, walked through a couple stores, and then hopped in the car to drive next door to the next mall for our daughter to look at a store she saw a skirt in a couple weeks ago. It is literally right next to the one we were in. As in side by side malls... Malls! Malls, everywhere!
She didn't find the skirt she was looking for, but did find two others she had to have. While waiting, our cutie 4 year old eyeballed some candy next to the checkout counter in this store, and asked me for some. It of course is for sale, and not a free for all, like she had hoped. I let her down gently and told her, we had to pay for it, and she happily walked away and found something else to look at. About 5 minutes later, a local woman, dressed in her local garb, walked over and gave our sweet girl a box of nerds that she had purchased for her. What a sweet gesture, and completely unexpected in more ways than one. One thing I have noticed is how much the local people here value children. They love kids, All kids. We said our thank-yous as I stood in awe of the kindness extended to us.
That adventure was done, so we headed home for a nap before the next and final leg of our adventurous weekend.
We ventured to a neat place in town called the Souq. First up, dinner, since we had skipped lunch after our later than expected breakfast.
Something new to us, Iraqi food. Here we are enjoying the delicious dinner:
It was more food than we could eat, and was fun to try something new. Thankfully we saved the walking for after dinner so we could burn some of it off. The souq was a bit like being in another country within this modern country. Very interesting.
This man was singing and making bracelets, so we had him make one for this little lady. If you look closely you can see it on her arm. In the picture above this one, she was a little intimidated that he was making it just for her, and singing her a song. So cute.
After that we saw things we can't un-see, and smelly things like camels, pretty things like Arabian horses, shops galore with everything you can imagine in these shops.
It was a busy weekend for us. We even had nice people let us in to lanes when we had our blinkers on! It was a miracle! :)
My dryer was delivered Sunday night, and I washed towels and sheets and had them all dry in a matter of a few hours instead of hanging all over the upstairs taking up space. Yay!
Spoiled? Not so sure. Certainly thankful!
We topped off the night with bath time.
I don't know about you, but I certainly can't imagine a better bath where goggles weren't a part of the party. Love these two and their spunky, funny personalities.