Is this real life???

This past weekend was an incredible, exhausting, sometimes scary, more fun than disneyland DREAM.

I'm not sure if what happened last weekend was actual real life or if I was having some out of body Walter Mitty experience. I had to keep pinching myself.

So in my last post I told you about Petra and how amazing it was. I should have a shirt that says "I SURVIVED Petra" because I probably walked 15+ miles in 100 degree dry desert weather. I've never been so tired in my life. Especially because the night before I got ZERO sleep thanks to a very protective dog outside.

So the day after petra we woke up about 7am and made our way downstairs for breakfast, and I've gotta say, Jordanians do a lot of things right.. but breakfast is not one of them. I dreamed of a big stack of pancakes that morning but was sorely disappointed when my only options were runny scrambled eggs, and hot dog chunks with a large glass of Tang to wash it down. (I know I know.. there are kids starving in Africa..) I will stop complaining. After breakfast we packed up our things and left the hotel to make the drive to Wadi Rum desert. Upon arrival we were told we would be taking jeeps to our camp site.

These are the jeeps..

ha ha a little ghetto but JUST AS AWESOME. Driving 30 miles through luscious orange sand and incredible mountains was unreal. Our caravan of "jeeps" reminded me of those movies were there's a little sad village in the middle of nowhere and all the bad guys come on pick ups and jeeps to terrorize the town. I felt like I was in a movie. It was amazing. Although I would like to think that instead of terrorizing villagers we would be handing out cotton candy or spreading Christmas cheer.

We made a few stops on our drive through the desert, one at these sand dunes, a couple at different view look outs and then one where we had a picnic of pita, bologna, nutella, and mushy bananas. ha ha it sounds pathetic, but because I didn't eat much for breakfast ANYTHING sounded good.

We pulled up to our campsites and I don't think you could even really call it a camping. It was like LUXURY camping. I couldn't believe it, in the middle of the enormous desert was this amazing little set up. There were showers, air conditioners, there was WIFI FOR HEAVEN SAKES! We were so spoiled. We got settled into our little love shack and then prepared for our camel ride.

We rode an hour out into the desert on camels and it was SO FUN. Getting up on the camel was wayyy scarier than I anticipated, when they stand up you feel like you're going to fall off the front and then immediately after you feel as if you going to fall right off the back! ha ha you really have to hold on tight. I was screaming and yelping ridiculously and then for the next 10 minutes I listened to the 3 Arabs leading the camels mimic my girlish squealing.... awesome.

Our camels took us into the desert and we watched the sunset, it was surreal. (Wow, if I had a penny for every time I said "surreal" I would copy and paste it a million times) ha ha.. lame joke.
But seriously it was incredible. We snapped a bunch of pictures with the camels and the sunset.

these camels were all up in my biznas the ENTIRE time. I had constant hot stinky breath on my arm.

camels are really stinky

"Hey Jord I want a pic with my camel" ... ahh not too close not too close

this camel has some SASS. too cool for pictures

camel kisses

 After the camel ride we had an amazing dinner and were served a gourmet meal cooked in a hole in the dirt. No really, they cooked it in a hole in the dirt, and it was the best meal I've had so far in Jordan. We had amazingly tender lamb, chicken, rice and an assortment of salads and breads.

We went to bed in our little cottage and woke up ready for another amazing day. We took the bus about 40 minutes to Aqaba.  Our time out on the boat in Aqaba was a DREAM. We danced to my favorite play list (yes I made the entire boat listen to my choice of spice girls, Jessie McCartney, and a plethora of other fantastic hits) jumped in the incredible blue water of the Red Sea snorkeled and saw tons of fish, beautiful reefs, and even a sea turtle. From our boat we could see the countries Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Israel. We enjoyed a BBQ on the boat and partied all afternoon. It was seriously the most fun I've had the entire time. I want to go tomorrow, and I want to fly my entire family here to experience it with us. 

our boat

still can't believe where we are

That's it for today! thanks for reading! MUAH!

dust. dust. dust.

Here in Amman there are a few things I will never get used to.. and one of them is the honking. The constant honking on the streets for no particular reason. They literally drive with one hand on the wheel and one hand on their horn. I can never tell if taxis' or people in general are honking because A. They are telling me to get out of the way B. letting me know their taxi is available C. honking at the cars around them to tell them they need to get over 3 lanes of traffic because they need to turn, after which the other cars lay on their horn because they're mad that this person is slowing traffic.. D. they just want to honk because I'm american .. and blond..and usually follow the honk with a "hey baby!" out the window... creeps. or E. They're just in a hurry and think that if they lay on their horn everyone will get out of their way. It's very very confusing and still makes me go from happy to furious in .01 seconds when someone honks right as I'm walking in front of them to cross the street. THERE IS NOTHING SCARIER. Or maybe i'm just jumpy.. I don't know.



SO much dust this week I can't even begin to describe it.. there is a layer of dust covering my entire apartment and every single window is shut.

Last Tuesday afternoon we decided to try and battle the dust storm and venture our way over to fruit salad. I had an instant headache and felt like my chest was going to explode, it was horrible! We take clean amazing air so for granted each day. There are multiple  news report talking about the dozens of people in the hospital.. and how some parts of Jordan got up to 107 degrees this week! GAH! people are literally walking around town with those hospital face mask things on.

Okay wait let me back up, FRUIT SALAD. you guys this place is the nectar of life. So the one I ordered was basically 5 different kind of ice cream with, I kid you not, 10 different delicious fruits all over. Papaya, mango, cantelope, strawberries, oranges, grapes, apples.. I could go on and on.  It was pretty enough to be a wedding cake. (these pictures don't do it justice) I felt really bad for complaining to Jordan that my ice cream took 20 minutes to  come out because when it did it was seriously a masterpiece. I guarantee the people who make those do not get paid enough.

Okay on to the next thing we did.. OH! So I guess I should tell more about what I do everyday.. Most days I get up, pick up the apartment, eat breakfast, listen to a couple conference talks and get together with the other wives and either have cooking classes/ Arabic lessons/ go shopping/ make a big breakfast together/ watch movies or just hang out, but lately I've been trying to try a few new things. (Pause for dramatic effect...)  I've started trying to do family history!!!! I don't know why I've put it off so long.. but my mom could tell you, I've been avoiding it like the plague! and I don't even know why! Its like you hear all of these stories about the amazing feeling you get while your doing it, and the way it brings you closer to family and the blessings it brings, and in my head i'm thinking.. "wow that sounds great, but no thanks i'm fine." RIDICULOUS!  I think its because I was just overwhelmed at where to start.. but one day this thought popped into my mind. I can spend 4 hrs trying to figure out how to set up a stupid blog, but I can't spend even 1 hr helping to save souls!?!? There's just no excuse for that. So I popped my self a bag of popcorn and a large glass of my favorite juice with sprite mixed together, played some Mo-Tab on my phone quietly,  and sat down to change my ways. I'm still trying to figure out how to set everything up, and it took me about a week to find my membership number, but a start is a start! So, if you are like me and can think of every reason in the book NOT to start... stop making excuses and just DO IT.

In other news..I've started gettin' my craft on! Check out these hats I've been making for the orphanage when winter comes! so exciting.

Okay I've stepped off my soap box and will now continue to tell you about my week.

I learned something very important this week.. apparently I've been lied to my entire life because I just found out that when someone says "here eat this appetizer to tie you over until dinner" It's actually "to TIDE" ... WHAT? my whole life I've been saying "TIE" which I feel like makes way more sense.. because tie means to hold or keep together right? Am I the only one that thinks this is bonkers?!

Other than the things I've mentioned above Jord and I also love adventuring together. We went to King Husseins car museum last week and it was LEGIT. We posed in this really awesome tent in the mueseum.

Moving on to more important things..


Here in Amman things are going fantastic. We are currently sitting in a sweet hotel after a large delicious dinner in the city of Petra. yes you heard me PETRA like where they filmed Indiana Jones and where Moses is said to have walked... "said to have". Not to mention it is currently the 2nd wonder of the 7 wonders of the world.

We left early Saturday morning and stopped  at 2 crusader castles on the way, they were INCREDIBLE. We sang hymns in huge tunnels and explored deep dark ones that seemed to go on for miles and just expolored like little kids in a candy store. I am in awe of the humans who made them with the limited resources they had. Everything was absolutely incredible. After both of the castles we stopped at "little petra" which itself was magnificent. I'm not sure I know an adjective good enough to describe it, so you will just have to look at the pictures.

This is where people would shoot arrows out of to protect intruders. 

Jord and his friend Vaughn

We got to our Hotel and had an awesome dinner before we hit the hay to rest for the big day. We got up at 530 am after not getting any sleep (stupid barking dogs outside) and packed our 4 liters of water in a backpack and started walking to Petra. I had ZERO idea what to expect in Petra besides the awesome rock sculpture thing that everyone knows about from Indiana Jones. Little did I know, that was just this beginning. Petra goes on for miles and miles and miles. There are 3 different main hikes that take you to other awesome views.. the high point.. the monastery, and where they did sacrifices. Again, there is no way to describe the magnificence of what we were able to see. I kept trying to make myself soak everything in more because I knew how amazing and lucky I was to be there. I wish walls could speak because I can't imagine the things they have seen dating back to even before Christ.  I was in awe.

The Monastery

This view was so beautiful Jord and I sat down alone and sang "For the Beauty of the Earth" together. A moment I will never forget. 

Okay, another thing I've learned is that the country Jordan is home to the CREEPIEST cats evah. They look like kittens but are in fact full grown and just starved. They also live in dumpsters and are everywhere. They creep me out so bad. Every time I walk by them i'm scared they will go crazy and jump on me and start eating me. So so so creepy. 

Anyway. That's about the adventures we've had so far this week. We have a few awesome things planned for the rest of the weekend so I will be posting again soon!

LOVE AND MISS YOU ALL.

Masalema!