We Made It August 18

We made it!

Well, one of the biggest hurdles was made!!! We made it safe and sound to Saudi Arabia! We had two flights. One from DFW to Dubai and another from Dubai to Dammam. The first flight was about 13 and half hours. We rode in style in business class! Macey did well for the majority of the flight. She hardly slept, which was hard on us to keep her quiet while other were sleeping. I gave her some melatonin shortly after having dinner on the flight. She did fall asleep for a little while but woke in a panic because she didn’t know where she was. Towards the end of the flight I finally had to take all electronics away from her so she would settle down. I felt really bad for about two minutes while she screamed because she was made at me and others were sleeping but she settled and fell fast asleep! Caley on the other hand was quite the opposite. I gave her melatonin and she slept a good 6-7 hours. She woke up in a great mood and was playing with the flight attendants! Michael and I slept off and on throughout the flight when we could. We arrived in Dubai and had a four hour layover. So, we treated ourselves to the lounge. The lounge for Emirate covered most of the third floor in Dubai and was very large! They had a kid’s area which I must say was very boring. There was a toddler slide and picnic table for them to play with. There was also a 360 game unit but the girls don’t play that so they were running around pretended to play different characters from shows they knew and had a good time. Our last fight was a quick flight lasting about an hour and half. They fed us a meal which I found myself scarfing down because of the short flight, but wanted to eat, afraid that we might be waiting in very long lines at the Saudi Airport. Both girls passed out before this flight even began! So needless to say they were very cranky when we got into the airport which work to our advantage! Because they were both crying wanting to be held, which we couldn’t do with so much stuff, we arrived at the line for immigrations. There were about four or five people in front of us but because the girls were having a meltdown, the Saudi men had us go to the front of the line! Not sure if that was to get us out of there quickly or because that wanted to help us. Any ways we flew through there and went to get our luggage. Oh, what a nightmare that was, not really but we packed WAY too much!!! We ended up checking a total 11 bags plus we had four backpacks and other stuff! Again way too much! We know for next time! So we headed to customs which was just put all your bags on a belt and a guard looked at the stuff. We loaded all of our stuff and headed to the Aramco office but before we got there we were met by Andres (our friend who lives here), Tim (Head of Aramco Schools) and Michael’s principal Keith! They had a bag of cookie which helped perk the girls up! They were super sweet! We headed to the Aramco office got our temporary id cards and headed off to our new house.

The drive from the airport to the camp is only about 30 minutes which isn’t too terrible, I thought it was longer! It took an SUV to carry all of us and a truck to carry all of our luggage! We arrived at the gate of the camp were asked some question which we didn’t know and we proceeded first stopping to get the keys to our house. We drove down a main street named Surf Street and the turned onto three different streets before figuring out which street/house was ours! I have to note here that teachers/families are not usually housed in this area (why we couldn’t find the right street) because they are normally reserved for executives… The camp is just growing so fast that we were truly lucky to get one of these homes. So now back to the house…The house belongs to the original houses that were first built by Aramco many years ago! That being said there is not a single wasted space in the house! We have a three bedroom one story home with a huge room that is for the formal dining and living area much like the one we had in Texas but I’m thinking it’s wider and longer. There is a kitchen area that can be closed off by a door, two bathrooms a really nice size backyard with a good size covered patio! Oh, and we can just walk about a quarter mile and we are at the beach! The house came furnished which will do but I am so ready to have my bed to sleep in but I’m sure everyone feels the same way!

Our first night we walked the path to the boardwalk and went to the coffee shop. I tried an Arabic drink that tis called mint lemonade. It was different at first but grew on me! The girls got to see they beach but really couldn’t see because it was already too dark, they could hear the waves (small ones).

On Sunday the 18^th a bus came to pick us up to take us to lunch at the hobby farm aka where horses are kept but there is also a restaurant to eat at. We meet some other new teachers as well as some that have been here. We shared stories and had a nice time.  Although Macey had been up since about 2 in the morning she was tired and basically slept on Michael’s legs throughout the entire meal! We got her to wake up by asking if she wanted to go see the horses, boy she perked up and was very excited to see them. Both she and Caley have talked nonstop about visiting the beach and seeing the horses once we arrived in Saudi. I’m glad we were able to fulfill their wishes so quickly. We also went for a swim at the pool nearby. As we came in we met this sweet couple with a 6 month old baby girl! We started talking and they live really close to us. She is a stay at home mom and he is a Doctor who treats adults and children! Excited because we will choose him to see all of us instead of the company just giving us one! They are from California and have been here for about two weeks.

Tomorrow Michael goes to work for the first time. He is nervous as anyone would be starting a new job! This will be my first day at home with the girls. We may go down to the beach and play around before it becomes too hot. By the way the weather is HOT!!!! The humidity is the worst but everyone just keep saying just get through August and September and then we will have about 8 months of really pleasant weather!

We are so excited about our adventure and the many more friends we have and will meet. The girls seem to be enjoying themselves but we’ve only been here about 24 hours. Thank you for all the well wishes and prayers. We love and miss you!