First Snow in Astana

We had our first snow Sunday night. We bundled Sadie up and went for a walk. We walked to the mall at the end of our block. There is a small play area where we took Sadie for 30 minutes and then we all went to a restaurant to eat. After that we bundled back up and walked home. Monday morning the temperature was -19 Celsius (-2F). Luckily it warmed up a little when the sun came out. By Thursday we are even supposed to be back above freezing.

We have no school next week due to the OSCE Summit that Kazakhstan is hosting. They are basically shutting down the city for this huge conference that all the European heads of state will be at- Hillary will be here also. We are looking forward to a quiet week at home, hopefully I'll be able to post more Sadie pictures next week.

Back in Astana

The weather continues to be OK. Highs in the 40's lows in the 20's. We had our first snow flurries earlier this week. Sadie continues to be super cute. She likes to feed her baby, and push her bunny around in the stroller. She has started to potty train herself and will even tell us when she has to go to the potty. We have little control over our heat; it is steam heat provided by the city. Our apartment is warm enough that Sadie spends most of her time running around naked. Even with the lows in the 20's we've been sleeping with our bedroom window open otherwise it is too hot at night.

Turkey Day Seven

Our last day was sunny again. Hurray! We took a cruise down the bosphorus and saw the Asian side of Istanbul. There are castles and palaces lining the water. One of the palaces has been converted into one of the worlds most expensive hotels. It costs 20,000 dollars a night to stay there. We would have cashed in our retirement savings and spent the night but we were leaving that evening...maybe next time.
In the afternoon we played in the park. Sadie made friends with all the other kids in the area. One other girl gave her some nuts and together they harassed the stray dog by throwing the nuts over the fence at him. As we were packing up our bags Sadie counted all the presents from her Turkish admirers, which were many. One night on the way back to our hotel a group of young men were standing around outside their shops. They all wanted to talk to Sadie. She was a little shy but went around to each one and passed out pistachios. It was so cute to see the macho Turkish men swooning over little Sadie.
Our flight home was smooth but really hot. They airplane was brutally overheated and Sadie had a hard time sleeping. It was nice to get home and back to our routine. The jet lag wore off after about three days and we all started sleeping in normal patterns again. What a great trip though. Istanbul may be one of my new favorite destinations. If anyone gets a chance to go I can recommend a reputable carpet salesman to you.