Sorry for the long absence. I am sure you have been lost without me for the last 10 days. This going back and forth between Riyadh and Khobar is just really too much. I spent last week back in Riyadh to finalize some things for the house. Side note, the things I am finalizing are not actually proper work. My husband is doing all the hard work and has been since the beginning and I have just been giving my opinion (Thank you!).

So, I spend a week there then I come back here and need a few days to recuperate and before you know it 10 days have passed without me contributing a thing to the world wide web and everyone is the poorer for it.

For all of you who celebrate Christmas I hope you had a good one. I always imagined what a nightmare christmas would be if we celebrated it. With the size of our families and the number of little ones in them we would all be broke by the end of the year. We don’t really do gift giving in our Eids except for the kids. And mostly it’s some pocket-money, sweets, little things. The holidays here are more about spending time with family and visiting people who we haven’t seen for a while.

Little B’s birthday was a few days ago. It was on the day we were traveling back from Riyadh to here. S and J woke up early and made a birthday breakfast for B: Scrambled eggs and a smily face made of Ketchup. Then they made an adorable sign saying “Happy Bday B”. They were so sweet with him all day calling him “birthday boy” and constantly singing “happy birthday” to him in English and Arabic.

We went for a quick lunch on our way back in a lovely italian restaurant called Piatto. We had a chocolate fondant with a candle in it for desert and we sang happy birthday. B looked confused (as he did on his first birthday) but also amused. The kids shared the desert and the adults didn’t (because the kids massacred it within seconds of blowing out the candle).

We have just over 2 weeks before moving back for good and I am getting nervous… I need to get in a lot of doing nothing before I head home. There is no “doing nothing” in Riyadh. there is a roller coaster of life that happens when you are there. You are either on the roller coaster or in line to get on the roller coaster.

The little one in my tummy is doing somersaults as I type. I went for a scan last week and all was fine, He’s a little small but still within normal range. My dr told me “he’s in the 20th percentile” so I said “Alhamdulilah (thank God) He’s still within normal range”. So he replied “That means 80% are bigger than him!” I said “It’s ok, I’m not competitive”.

Coming up in the next week. B’s little birthday party (really little and basically because I want to see how he will react to a room full of balloons). My birthday! And a post about how I react to my children’s over reactions. That’s all I can promise for now and can’t even promise if those will get done lol.