Love Affair

These two. Together always.
If Frankie is awake, then Lily is right behind her, all day.
Of course Frankie drives her mad, pulls her ears, her tail, bashes her with the odd toy. But most of the time, the two live harmoniously side by side.

7 Months Old!

Because Dads make the best jungle gyms ever.

Cheeky

"It's not what you think Mum, Lily is sitting here because she loves me - not because I have pinned her down by the tail...again"

Still alive and kicking

We are all still, healthy and happy... most of the time anyway.

It has been a big couple of months getting used to our new 'normal'. Naz flying backwards and forwards to work in Australia, and Piper and I establishing our new routines.

There hasn't been a lot of spare time so I apologise for all the missed Skype dates, lack of email responses and more obviously the blog updates.

I am happy to report that this time next week Piper and I will be home in Australia. Back with Naz and our friends and family for Christmas.

I am still working up until Christmas but will hopefully catch-up with everybody during the month we are home.

Below are a few snaps from around the traps lately.

Lazy afternoon at Safa Park - the weather is so lovely right now. I love Dubai winter.

Emirati woman making traditional Gaimat (doughnut like balls covered in rich date syrup)

Gaimat - I could eat far too many of these

Piper dressed in uniform  for school photo day

Nice palm right? Wrong, it is a mobile tower in disguise!

Our fluffy baby Lily is still kicking along but now much happier the weather has cooled down!

This weekend it rained properly for the first time in nearly two years. It was a spectacular stormy day with thunder lightning and plenty of flash flooding! Dubai is not built for rains and it causes quite a mess. Piper and I made the most of it in the afternoon and played in the rain and went on a puddle jumping adventure.

Apartment living and middle eastern weather compromise

Beating the heat... early morning beach walk fun

Weekend Camping Trip

Last weekend we embarked on a camping trip with friends. Originally we planned on heading to the Empty Quarter down near Saudi Arabia, however, on Friday we woke to one hell of a sand storm! So camping in the middle of the world's largest sand desert was certainly not going to be a good idea.
We revised our plan gathered up our passports and drove north accross the UAE to the northern most point of Oman and camped at a beach called Dibba. Thankfully Dibba is surrounded by mountains and cliff faces so we were quite sheltered, unfortunately a lot of people had the same plan so it was a busy little camping hole.
Dibba is small Omani town on a large bay, popular for it's beach and sand dune 4 wheel driving fun. As the crow flies it is only approximately 60 kms from Iran across the Strait of Hormuz (which goes somewhat to explaining the strange night sky activities, no heart attacks please Nanna's we were safe).

Naz and the boys had purchased a sand board in preparation for the Empty Quarter so they were more than happy to test it out at Dibba. We also kept ourselves amused with lots of swimming, sand castle building, beach cricket, mountain climbing (although the O'Briens only made it half way up the mountain..... it was difficult carrying Piper and then Lily decided she was going no further and dug her little paws in).
As much as Piper loved running around the beach and swimming nudie rudie for a weekend I think the happiest O'Brien of all was Lily! She swam, rolled in the sand and dug her little heart out.

Sunrise - 'thanks Piper for making sure we were awake early and did not miss it'

Piper, Lily and Laura

Mornng sand board and play in the dunes 'best friends'

Yes that is a streaker on the cricket pitch!

I think her favourite thing about camping was swimming and playing nudie rudie

Aargh still having camera issues. Mountain climbing.

Our family is complete!

Look who arrived this week!! Piper was so excited about Lily arriving that she woke at 2:15am on the morning we had to go to the airport and did not go back to sleep.... as you can see it was all worth it.