An Empty House and Sad Dogs

All of our "stuff" is gone. The house is oddly empty.... We're ready to get the show on the road and start our new adventures in Dubai.

We are camping out in our house tonight and tomorrow night then we head off to Ohio to visit Larry's family in Columbus and then mine in Geneva. My youngest sister is getting married on July 26. Larry and I will celebrate our 19th anniversary on the 22 too! Wow, that is a lot of years. We've been on many fun, exciting adventures together, but this one is by far the wildest.

I remember a few weeks before we were married we went camping and had several mishaps - I cut my head and head to get stitches and Larry fell over a waterfall and scraped up his leg. We said that we were putting the capital A in adventure. Who knew almost 20 years later we would really be putting the A in adventure.

Packing day

The movers arrived on Monday, July 14 (which also happens to be my good friend Karen's birthday and I forgot - :( ). Here are few pictures of our boxes. The house seems to empty. They will take the boxes away today. Our stuff will put on a truck and driven to a ship and then off to Dubai. It will take about 45 days to get our things. The girls will start school before our the shipment arrives. But that is ok, we will be just fine on minimal supplies and our adventurous attitudes.

Elle's 9th Birthday

Elle's birthday was on July 1 and her party was on July 13 with her friends. Some of them could not come because they were on vacation but it was still a blast.

Another Big Milestone - Dani's Graduation

Today our little girl graduated from 5th grade... though it's called continuation here. Braeburn is the most awesome school! We are sad to leave it. Below is one picture of a whole bunch of the kids from today and one that Ms. Feldman took a few weeks ago. I also included a video of today. Its so great to see the kids having fun.

We got a villa!

Larry found the most amazing villa for us!

• between the 2 American schools (which we thought we could never find in our price range)
• a few blocks walk to the beach
• a few blocks walk to a water park
• 11 villa complex that shares a pool and gym
• 3 km from a nice mall (that happens to have Ski Dubai in it)
• 7 km from the grocery store (which is a little far, but that's ok)
• close access to major roads

A family hike

Larry was home for a week. It was so nice to have him home! We went on a hike to one of our most favorite places. We call it "the View." Its in the reservoir behind our house.

Two Milestones

Milestone 1 - Renee graduated - Hurray!!

Graduation was awesome. My friend Tracy and her daughter, Julia took Dani, Elle and me to the main campus of UCONN in Storrs for the graduation ceremony. It was about 2 hours. Afterwards we bought a few things at the bookstore. It was nice to see the campus. I had not been there before as all of my classes were at the downtown Hartford MBA campus.

Milestone 2 - Renee resigned from her 20 year job - scary. :(

Bittersweet to leave a job that I've loved for so long... I'm sad to leave but also excited about the future. I will miss so many people. I've spent pretty much my entire adult life as part of T³. I started this job in late September, 1987 and my last day will be May 30, 2008. But life goes on and I will be fine. I already have an interview with a company for some contract work - and I wasn't even looking!