Breana's ASD Graduation

Breana's Graduation went off without a hitch. Breana was melancholy about not being with her pals in Vernon, but as the night wear on you could see her level of excitement rise. Breana graduate with honors and therefore she got to wear the red braided honor cord ... proud papa and mama. The venue for the graduation ceremony was the gym and not the auditorium, regardless the layout was beautiful, and it was quite comfortable.
The American Ambassador to Qatar was on hand to present the "ambassador's award", my camera was not handling the low light / distance combo...



Chamber Singers sing the Qatari and American National Anthems ... and then they sang a lovely melody entited, "For Good". (Click on the above words to see the video)

Got It!!

Michelle and David Carlson teach with us at ASD. They have become our second family over here. They are from California, that's Michelle with Breana during the post grad festivities.

Breana and her buds, Matt, Jeff and Sean . Can you guess which of them is responsible for Breana's hair?

Conor, Tori and Dominic were also there to celebrate with Breana.Breana, Torey and Zoe ... Grads of 2010.

Doha Musings 4 - Sailing

The heat right now is really starting to crank up. It's 9 am and outside its already 34 C and 61% humidity. It's suppose to get up to 40C today... With that in mind it kinda limits your options when you look for activities for the family. So when you look around what definitely becomes appealing is anything near the water.
The sailing in Doha is wonderful. There is small yacht club that is on the grounds of the Intercontinental hotel.
They have laser and catamarans, quite a wide variety of boats to learn on. Our school also has a short day on Tuesdays.
The kids catch a cab to the beach and they get to sail of an hour an a half. If you're a sailor you know that there always bunps and bruises when you start. Both kids, this week, moved up to lasers from the boats they started on, pekos. The lasers are much quicker and more responsive. When I picked them up after their lesson this week both of them had rather large bumps on their heads. The booms swing around fast and if your not alert ... pow!

Conor was knocked clear out of the boat with his skiff capsizing shortly thereafter.
They were unsure about liking the sailing initially but, they both seemed to really enjoy it now.
The temperatures are at least 2-3 degrees cooler on the water plus the breeze. It makes for a pleasant afternoon and it gets the kids off the computer and outside
The next step I think in the fall will be learning how to scuba dive, which is also run through the hotel. I think that might be one for the whole family.