Let My Muffins Go!!!!!

One of the many interesting things that has happened here almost became a culinary disaster! Four days after arriving we decided that we would break out the blueberry muffin mix from home and make muffins for breakfast. We knew our oven's handle was gone but we were still able to creatively open it. After a few minutes we were smelling the wonderful aroma of the familiar muffins from home- Then the disaster happened! The door to the oven would not open. Our entire family began to panic: "Oh no! What are we going to do? We are going to starve! This is going to be a waste of one of our precious muffin mixes from home! Quick, get something to get this door open!"

As many of you know, Matt is "Mr. Fix-it." He found a pair of pliers and two wooden spoons. We pulled as hard as we could on the door and Matt pulled the precious muffins out with the spoons and pliers. We all sighed a big sigh of relief and ate our muffins with joy. Needless to say we had to buy a new oven. The owner of the flat said, "They don't need an oven. They have the stove-top and the microwave." The first two pictures show Matt's creative idea for retrieving the first pan of muffins. The third picture below is Matt successfully pulling out another pan of blueberry muffins after our new stove arrived.

School Days!

Thought everyone might like to see Madison and Matthew Ray's school. .

They attend the school in the picture-Honey Bunny! They are slowly but surely getting used to their friends who speak a different language. Here they are on their first day of school. (FYI-they don't look this happy every morning!)

Madison told us yesterday that she was tired of not knowing what her new friends were saying. She said, "I say to the little girls, "What is your name?!? and they don't answer me!" We told her that they are probably asking her the same question in their language. That explanation didn't seem to help! A lot of people here call her Barbie! She is not impressed (yet!)

Stay tuned for the next blog of Meredith's school, activities and friends!

Laundry Balcony and Professional Laundry Man

Laundry is a different story here in Egypt! We have a washer but dryers are not common here at all. Our washer holds a VERY SMALL load of clothes and takes about 2 hours to wash. When the spin cycle begins it sounds like a bomb is going off in our bathroom. Then the washer begins to jump and dance until it makes it's way to the potty near by. When it is finished, we push the washer back to the wall and take out the clothes. Two days after we arrived our clothes got trapped in the washer for 3 days!

Here is the view from our laundry-drying balcony and here is the "now professional" laundry-hanger outer! It took Matt a while to get used to the cold air up here on the 5th floor!

Trip to the Pyramids!

Our first trip to the pyramids was 2 days after we arrived! (We were a little delirious.) We all rode camels and toured around the great pyramids and the Sphinx. The kids loved it! Here's Matt and Madison on their camel.

Airport Arrival

Well, we still don't have DSL but we were just dying to see if we could blog anything! This one picture took 10 minutes to download. So, we are just going to try to blog a few every few days to catch you up on life here. We wish we could blog everything! It has been an amazing ride to say the least. Life each day is a new adventure. All is well and CRAZY!!!

Here are the kids sitting on all of our luggage when we arrived here in the country. We think they look pretty refreshed after 22 hours of travel!

Still Waiting!!!

We are still waiting on DSL so we can blog some pictures of our life here. As soon as we get it we will blog away!!! Just to catch you up on life-REPAIRS, REPAIRS, REPAIRS!!!!!!!!!!! Kitchen sink (top and bottom), both potties, washing machine, rotten floor issue, and today we had to buy a new stove!!! The next thing will be to find paint, window treatments, and cover the existing couch. At the rate we are going we should have this place fixed up by the time we are ready to come home for a visit!! (Ha!)

We just wanted you to know that we will be blogging pictures and stories soon! Don't give up-we really want you to keep checking the blog.