Oh October!

October came and went with lots of fun, a trip to Greece in between, and finished with a fun Halloween evening.

The first weekend of the month my friend Michelle and I (who both share a love {bordering obsession} for Hamilton), hosted a girls overnight to listen to the soundtrack, do fun face masks, and spend the next day relaxing by the pool.

Here's the rest of the month's memories for October. :-)

1. Water beads and color-changing cars. Entertainment for hours!
2. Playdate at her favorite indoor play with a good friend.
3. Oktoberfest came to Doha and we enjoyed having a night out!
4. Birthday party fun with face painting.
5. We squeezed in one final water park visit with friends before the weather changes.
6. The girls have started enjoying painting their own nails.
7. After school playdate with her bestie.
8. Baking cookies for their classes!
9. There's a delicious vegan pop up at the girls' school and we've been enjoying the popsicles and donuts. 

1. Laughter with friends is the best on a Thursday night. 
2. Along with pizza and a movie with friends!
3. Created a new chore chart for each girl to help with household responsibilities.
4. Reading with Daddy.
5. Moms night out with these lovely ladies!
6. Sprinkler fun on the new playgrounds the compound has added.
7. Panda masks our friends brought us from South Korea.
8. Zoey the meerkat wanting to be let back inside.
9. Reading to pass the time before gymnastics class.

1. A fun brunch with friends and delicious food!
2. We've been carpooling with friends and they love getting to ride in each other's cars.
3. Pretend school after real school during their playdate.
4. Swimming and South African braai with friends.
5. Dinner date night with this handsome guy.
6. And a good excuse to get frozen yogurt afterwards. 
7. Olivia: "Mommy I made you!" Thank you sweet girl, ha.
8. More carpool fun with these guys!
9. A standoff between kitty cat and okapi, hahaha.

1. An apple for each of their teachers at their 3-way parent teacher conferences this month.
2. Cooking class to learn how to make Enny's amazing noodles and spring rolls.
3. Zoey protesting the suitcases and packing cubes being pulled out...vacay is coming!
4. Singing "You've got a friend in me" with her class for Performing Arts.
5. Grade 1 has presentations on Who We Are with books they made of celebrating their culture. Madi's book included her American celebrations like Fourth of July, as well her her Norwegian Constitution Day celebrations, Azerbaijani Novruz celebrations, and Qatar National Day.
6. Packing prep for the airplane ride entertainment.
7. 8. and 9. Painting boxes to collect and organize their artwork and papers coming home from school.

We are ready for November and {hopefully} cooler weather soon in Doha!

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Halloween 2019

This Halloween came up quickly for me and while I had every intention of making shirts for the girls (the design was even made already!), the actual execution of printing and ironing them on did not happen after we returned from holiday in Greece.

I had about one hour on Wednesday, the day before Halloween, before school pickup and decided what the heck, let's just see if there's anything. I headed to H&M in the mall near the girls' school and - jackpot - Halloween shirt on sale for 15 qar and buy three get three free. That means we snagged these headbands and shirts for around $12.50. WOW!

As our neighbors started to see decorations put up they were quite disappointed with our modest collection of them at home. They also decided our house was not "snoopy" enough and Madi took it upon herself to make a "snoopy" picture to put up on the front door. Love it.

 We had friends over that evening for pizza and compound trick or treating. There was lots of candy and scary houses and the kids had a blast. Marli surprised me with fun earrings her hubby made with his 3D printer - how cool!

Happy Halloween from these three cuties!

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Greece Holiday

A few months ago some friends stationed in Europe asked if we'd be interested in meeting them in Crete in October. The dates lined up perfectly with our own school break and we booked shortly after!

We met up with our friends in the Athens airport and then headed over to Crete together.

We spent our days laying on the beach, catching up, and letting the kids run around and play.

We headed downtown and explored the downtown Heraklion, visited the Cave of Zeus, and a Dinosauria Park.

We had to say goodbye to our friends and our fun time together. It was such a memorable time and we hope we can go on holiday with them again soon!

There was some time before our flight to Athens so we visited the Minoan Palace of Knossos.

We arrived at our Air BnB in Athens and relaxed that evening. The next day we did lots of walking with our first stop being the Panathenaic Stadium, then the National Garden for some playground time, the Temple of Zeus, grabbed lunch at the famous Kostas, explored the shops at Plaka, and finally took the Happy Train to give our feet a rest.

Our second day was filled with more walking - this time around the Acropolis ruins and afterwards the Acropolis Museum. The girls loved exploring the ruins and we had fun taking pictures. They also discovered an intense love for grilled corn on the cob. :-)

We visited Greece for the first time back in 2014 when we did a cruise and that evening I decided to see what pictures we took then and discovered we accidentally stopped and took a family photo at the exact same stop - how cool! What a difference five years makes, ha.

The next two days were very relaxing and easy-paced. We headed in a taxi to take the tram up to the highest point in Athens, Mount Lycabettus. The afternoon was spent playing in a playground that was recommended and slowly walked our way back to the apartment and grabbed dinner along the way and dessert at Little Kook, a restaurant with themed decorations. We ended the evening with a glass of wine on the amazing balcony our apartment had to offer.

Our last day we ventured onto public transportation to go to a park / playground along the water called Flisvos Park. The girls loved taking the train and enjoyed the park all day. We came back to the hotel and enjoyed one final sunset not he balcony along with some dance parties and lots of laughter.

We had an amazing time in Greece and feel very fortunate to have time to explore more of this beautiful country!

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