Random

My dad is infamous for his breakfast hour stories... Actually, stories may be too generous.  Usually it involves reading a section of a newspaper article or part of a book he is reading.    Abbey fell victim this particular day.  John, Mom says to tell you it was story number #57..

Naomi wore her new ballet outfit all day today.  She was very proud...

Happy Birthday Maddie Moo!

Tuesday was Maddie's birthday and we celebrated all day long (still celebrating actually...).  I intended to do a blog post dedicated just to her and her birthday and hopefully I"ll still get to that but this one is just to recap her birthday adventures.  Jason and I were at an overnight retreat the night before so we didn't see our birthday girl until early afternoon.  Jas bought her flowers as has become his tradition for his girls on their birthdays.  By the time we got there, her birthday fun was already in full swing.  They had french toast for breakfast, and since Maddie had decided that she wanted to make her own cake this year, she, Annie and Paula had already started on that. 

Working hard in the kitchen...

All three girls like to "help" when it involves tasting but Maddie is usually the only one who will stick it through until the end...

Maddie got to pick what she wanted to do for the day and she opted for a trip to Citymall.  We are going to the waterpark tomorrow with friends so we decided on an indoor activity since it is so hot.  Maddie wanted her favorite pizza from the food court at the mall...

Everybody else had Nando's- one of our favorite chicken places.  Here's Annie and Paula with their "chicken espadata"

After lunch the girls went shopping and Jason and Da sat at Starbucks and had coffee.  Of course we had to go to Claire's and look for jewelry for the birthday girl.  We also made a trip to the megastore to show Paula around a little bit.  After shopping Da and Annie took the girls to see Toy Story 3.  (Jason and I already took them once which reminds me of another post I intended to do... another time)

While they saw their movie, Paula did more shopping and Jason and I went to see "Eclipse"- very amusing with a bunch of squealing Lebanese teenagers!  And before anyone asks, NO, I am not one of "THOSE moms"- whatever that means.  I like the Twilight series, I read the books, I liked them, I enjoy the movies.  That is all..

After the movies we headed home because Maddie still had not finished decorating her cake and she still needed to open presents.  

Hard at work..

Practicing with the icing..

The finished product!

Present opening fun..

Naomi was SO proud of the pony tail holders she picked out for Maddie all by herself

Opening her digital camera from Da and Annie

She screamed, "ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!?!"  just a little excited...

 

Time for cake!  By this point it was 10 at night, no one had dinner (we had a late lunch) so the birthday girl and her sisters had chocolate cake for dinner

Sweet Naomi wanted to help with the decorations.  Here's her contribution...

(I'm guessing you can't tell what it is- a very small piece of wrapping paper taped very securely to our balcony door in the living room...)  Thanks Naomi!

Happy Birthday Madelyn Faith- we love you!!

Woman's Beach

On Monday our adventure for the day was going to the woman's beach on the Mediterranean.  Just as a disclaimer to the photos on this post... I wasn't entirely sure if I was allowed to have a camera there so I was trying to take them quickly without drawing much attention so they aren't great but you get the idea...

There are multiple woman's beaches along the coast of the Med in Lebanon.  Any women can go but they are specifically designed for the Muslim women who cover and would not go to the co-ed beaches.  It's a place where they can relax and enjoy the pools and the beaches without the restrictions of their coverings.  At many of the beaches there are stands to get Henna tattoos and they have pavilions set up with loud Arabic music if you want to try your hand at belly dancing.  (sorry folks, no dancing therefore no pictures of dancing at the beach we went too...)

The beach is right on the highway that runs along the Mediterranean but it is completely blocked from view and no men are allowed.

These beaches are typically less expensive and less posh than other co-ed beaches in Lebanon which are more catered to the high society of Beirut.  This one is great though and the girls love it.  There are tables and chairs set up under pavilions but right by the pool and the beach.

Below I'm standing in the same place that I took the ocean shot of, I just turned around to get the pool.  This is one of three pools and two kiddy pools.

Abbey and Maddie were so happy that Annie and Ms Paula wanted to get in the ocean with them.  I"m too much of a wimp- the rocks kill my feet (very rocky beach) and the salt water kills my contacts...

Naomi's favorite part is playing in the sand...

Always such fun to spend a day in the sun!  Paula brought these adorable towels to each of the girls that were perfect after showering off bucketloads of sand...

Family Fun

My parents and a dear family friend, "Ms Paula" arrived yesterday afternoon (right on time with all their bags-PTL- they had very short connection times).  I thought this would be the perfect chance to write about our time together and in the process write about some of our favorite things to see and do around Lebanon.  First things first, though- when grandparents arrive there is always much build up to all the treasures that will be found within the suitcases- and wow did they all three bring the mother load this time!   The girls had so much fun getting into their goodies.

Here are all the girls in our new clothes with Ms Paula.  We're getting ready to head downtown to our favorite restaurant...

Naomi was very proud of her new hair bows ("I look just like Sarah Ann!" -her cousin-)  

Sadly I didn't take pictures of our spread for dinner.  Called meza- a wide variety of salads and we got some grilled meats as well.  BUT, here are the girls, Ms Paula and Da (my dad's grandparent name) eating Bliss House ice cream- one of our favorites!

Our jet lagged travelers got a good nights sleep, we got up and had crepes for breakfast (one of Jason's specialties) and then loaded into the car for a road trip to Byblos- one of our favorite escapes out of the city.  I guess several countries in this part of the world have a city that might claim this, but according to many Byblos is one of (if not THE) oldest continually inhabited city in the world.  Here are the girls at the beginning our our typically 45 minute drive- all smiles.  Almost two hours later when we finally got there (traffic can be a bit unpredictable...), the smiles had faded a little but we had lunch then all was well.

We (or more specifically the girls) had hoped to be able to climb out on the rocks but the water was too high so we had to just walk along the concrete ledge beside the water.  Here are the girls a few years ago at Christmas with their cousins climbing out on the rocks.    I don't think the tide has been this low since then, but every time we go they want to climb on the rocks...

And on a side note, here's the octopus that we rescued.  It was stuck in a pool of very low water and we moved it to deeper water...

Anyway, back to today's trip.   Since Paula has never been here, Mom and I did the tour of the old citadel with her.  There are phoenician ruins, along with a crusader castle kind of all on top of each other.  It's right along the coast of the Mediterranean so pretty much any direction you turn there is a beautiful view.  Naomi and Abbey came with us to the ruins.

Notice all the yachts in the background out in the sea..

A view looking back at the castle...

Always love climbing on all the rocks that would probably be incredibly off limits at any site like this in a different country--  here, anything goes...

Pretty view...

Maddie opted to say with Da and Daddy in this little coffee/ice cream shop.  It's built into the wall surrounding the citadel right in the middle of the shopping area.

Catching up on American Girl doll news...

This is what happens to your car when you forget that you put a bottle of sunscreen on top of the back wheel, since your husband has already walked away with the key.  

And no trip to Byblos is complete without a stop for Gelato on the way home.  Yummy!

It would have been the perfect end to the perfect day, but when we got home, Jason opened the trunk and things had shifted and the ceramic pot that we bought crashed to the ground.  Sad...

Hopefully I"ll be able to replace it.  The stand is lonely..

Mom and Paula bought lots of fun things too (that I didn't get pictures of).  Thankfully I also bought these fun pictures and coasters.  They are Lebanese sayings painted in fun, bright colors on tile.  One is a wall hanging and the others are coasters.

All in all a great end to a great day!

Happy 4th!

Maddie has been on a cake making kick, so we decided she would be in charge of our fourth of July cake.  I let her get on all-recipes to look for something she thought would be fun and easy for her to do.  But then we came across this cake and HAD to try it!  It was so much fun to put together and actually pretty easy.











First you make a yellow or white cake.  I did a yellow cake from scratch combining two recipes that I found online (recipe at end of post)  and I was very pleased.  It had a lemony flavor and turned out very moist and yummy.  You need three 8 or 9 inch layers (my recipe made 8 inch layers).  You dye one red and one blue and leave one white.  Leave the blue layer as is and divide the red and white each in half with dental floss or a sharp, serated knife.  Set a red and white layer aside and stack the remaining red and white layers with the blue layer.  Cut a circle out of the middle of these three.  You will have this:

 

You can discard the outer red and white rings and the inner blue rings, but instead I crumbled them up and stirred in some left over cream cheese icing, topped it with cool whip and had another cake out of the deal.

To assemble you but a white layer on bottom, ice it and then put a red layer and ice it.

Then you put the outer blue ring on and put a thin layer of icing on the inside of it to help the inner layers stay together.  You then fit the inner white and red cirles into the larger blue circle.  Make sure the top is level and ice the cake with desired frosting.  I used a cream cheese frosting recipe but I should have realized that wasn't the best idea in the Beirut humidity in my kitchen with no AC!  It was a little drippy but the cream cheese icing combined with the lemony cake tasted great!

It was melting fast!

Such a fun surprise when you cut into it!

This one will definitely have to become a tradition!  One of the blogs I saw about this cake had a white chocolate frosting recipe that I might try next time to avoid the melting factor...

Such fun!

For more 4th of July fun see this link:  http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=179346&id=529238198&l=a9baa148d1