Playing Dress-Up

What's more fun, sunglasses, or hats made of doll dresses? The girls can't decide.

More Vacation Information

 

 Our room had a kitchenette and a balcony with furniture so

we often made our own meals and ate on the balcony.

 

The hotel also had a restaurant, where we dined twice. Here is a salad we ordered the first day.

There was a semi-private pebble beach which the girls really enjoyed

 

A view of  the beach

 

Ruth likes her water wings

 

Esther loves these new shoes

 

At a cafe in Ulcinj

In Our Hotel By the Sea

We took a short vacation in June, between Bar and Ulcinj. We stayed in the Apartment Hotel de Lara-we admit that the name was a selling point :). The Adriatic is beautiful, well worth the 10 euro extra per night for the sea view room! This is a view from our balcony window.

Crayon Trouble

Ruth loves to color with crayons. The only problem is, she doesn't limit her "artwork" to the coloring book. In the past week we have confiscated the crayons because she colored on the walls, the table and the back of her sister's chair. She has also colored on puzzle pieces and her magna doodle. Fortunately we have been able to get the crayon off of everything, except Esther's chair (which is covered in cloth).

One day she got ahold of a sharpie, and added some original artwork to her books. Luckily they were board books and some water and a microfiber cloth cleaned them right up.

 Esther likes crayons too, but she prefers to color internally. Did you know that a black crayon, if sucked on, will "bleed" on your face?

Don't color on that, no, no, no.

Sidewalk Safety

When walking on the sidewalks of Podgorica, there are several obstacles to watch out for. The biggest one is cars. Often cars are parked on the walk, not just on the curb, but taking up so much room that the pedestrians are forced to walk on the road. There are even some areas where you need to watch out for vehicles actually driving on the sidewalk for as many as 50 yards!

Other things to be on the lookout for are the remains of sawed off signposts. One neat thing here is that they incorporate trees into the sidewalk, leaving a square or round hole for it to grow out of. But these create other dangers. The roots may push up the concrete, or if the tree dies the hole may or may not be filled in.

Then we have manholes which could have the standard fitted metal cover level with the pavement, or a giant slab of cement sticking up 6 inches above the rest of the walkway, or no cover at all, leaving a gapping hole to avoid.

Those who text and walk, beware.

Shoebox Showcase

Esther's goodies

Ruth peeking into her shoebox

Our princess in her shoebox "bling"

Passing out the Shoeboxes

The week of Orthodox Christmas (January 7th) there are Christmas programs and the children who register and attend receive Samaritan's Purse Operation Christmas Child shoeboxes. We took the girls to a program. It was packed. Ruth really enjoyed it. Especially the present. We've participated on the "giving" side in the States. It was a neat opportunity to be on the "receiving" side now.

Entering the story

Continuing from the recent Christmas season, Ruth really enjoys pretending to be Mary. She loves to be wrapped in my scarf, or put a small blanket over her head. Sometimes she will ball up another small blanket and call it Baby Jesus. She spent hours playing with a toymmanager scene and loved watching "Larry Christmas" which is what she called any of 3 different Veggie Tales Christmas DVDs. She even watched one today.

Update: Picture added