The boys turned putting away laundry into an amusement park ride for Camille. They lined the basket with a blanket, put a pillow behind her head and put the folded laundry in her lap. I was not a fan of the climbing up and down stairs with my baby in a basket, but I got the “dad said it was OK!” and she was really loving it, so I just held my breath.
She’s not only Queen for a Day, she’s a Queen every day.
Josh and I went to a fundraiser dinner and entertained ourselves with the photo booth. I want one of these for my house. . . so funny.
Camille and I are quite the fashionistas. She’s rockin the cowgirl hat and the feather boa.
So as I was writing the last post about our house, I realized that I really don’t know much about Oman at all. I can find it on a map, and I know it’s on the water, but I really should do some more research before we arrive. So I turned to my friends Google and Reality TV and found this episode of The Amazing Race that was filmed in Oman last year. I remember when we watched it last year were excited to see the Race in a place where our friends lived, never imagining that we would be living there too.
Season 17, headed to Oman. Muscat footage starts at the 6:45 mark. Then there’s a lot of stuff that has nothing to do with Oman, a marriage proposal, etc. Skip ahead to 10:45.
part 2 The next task starts at 5:30. Lots of driving around, asking locals for directions, and getting lost. I wish someone had chosen the other task so we could have seen where they had to go to buy food. At the 13:45 mark they head to the sook (marketplace) for the Frankincense task.
part 3 At 2:50 you see the interior of the sook. 4:45 they head from the market to the pit stop. At 7:50 there’s some Egypt style traffic, but I don’t know if it’s normal traffic or just because she’s driving the wrong way down the street.
The Race also visited Oman in Season 9, but all I could find were the route markers/roadblock/detour segments that someone edited together.
The first 2 1/2 minutes is the part about Oman. It looks like they didn’t spend much time in Muscat, but were mostly out in the desert.
From the Race videos, it appears that I will have plenty to blog about. Good times.
Josh got an email saying they have arranged housing for us. Yea for not being homeless! I wasn’t worried, but it is nice to know that people are actually expecting us to arrive, since I don’t know that I’m actually expecting us to arrive yet.
According to intel via the spy network (really, just regular old email from friends, but I know how some of you persist in thinking we are on a covert mission) our house is a duplex with wonderful neighbors. Lucky for us, maybe not so lucky for them depending on how thick the walls are. They have boys the ages of Carter and Caleb and a younger little girl. Supposedly the kitchen is ginormous — wait, “ginormous” didn’t get flagged by my spell-checker — has it become a real word now? Hmm, I’m going to have to come up with a new fake word . . . hugantic? largantic? hunormous?
Anyway, hugantic kitchen. They must know that Josh and I are all about kitchens. Learning from past mistakes, we are bringing two great knives with us in our luggage. Everything else is negotiable or unnecessary, but without good knives, it’s no fun to cook. Thus, the many nights of Arzak or Otlob in Egypt.
The rest of the house? A “ridiculously large” master bedroom (I’m quoting what I remember Josh reading from the email) and I think there was something about maid’s quarters too. More significant is that it is within walking distance of stuff, since we expect to be car-less for quite a while. “Stuff” is the technical term for Starbucks, a grocery store, restaurants, etc. I think he said Starbucks was close by, I could be wrong about that part. He’s not home right now or I’d ask him. He’s out buying another suitcase to transport all our knives. (Really, we’re not spies.)
Some enthusiastic UCLA fans at our house . . .
Are you filling out a bracket this year?