Day 5 in Amman, Jordan

We made it! We got here late Sunday night. We left Monterey, Ca Thursday morning, August 7th. We drove to my parents house in Fresno, Ca. Saturday the 9th we got up at 3 AM and my parents drove us to the LA airport. We were so glad they helped us in the airport. We had 10 carry ons, 11 big checked bags, 2 anxious parent, and 6 excited children. Things actually went much better than I had anticipated.  Katie asked me if planes have bathroom. I love to see from a child point of view what they worry about. We got on the plane and had to do a little seat swapping so our family was all together. Our first flight to Chicago was 4 hours. I was happily surprised at how well the kids did on their first airplane ride (Katie and Joseph had flown once when they were 2 and 3 months). We got to Chicago about 6:30 PM. Our flight to Amman was suppose to leave at 9:30 PM but was delayed. the kids and Josh slept at the airport. Katie and Hyrum and I were the only ones awake.
3 AM Sunday morning we finally took off. We flew on the Jordanian Royal Airline. Apparently the Jordanian people aren't very flexible. Everyone was pretty much asleep at take off and by 4 AM they turned all the lights on to serve dinner! After dinner they closed all the windows and turned all the lights off (the sun was just starting to rise). They turned the lights back on and opened the windows back up (just as the sun was setting) and served breakfast at about 9 PM! We landed in Amman about 10:30 PM Sunday night (12:30 PM Sunday California time).  It was a 12 hour flight. The kids did really good and didn't start getting real restless until about the last 1 or so. It was really weird to be the foreigner. All the instructions and everything was written in Arabic with English on the side. The Arabs on the plan were supper friendly. There was a woman sitting near us who wanted to talk. Her English was bad and I don't know more than about 4 words in Arabic so I had to have Josh help translate. She loved Hyrum and held him for awhile. They love to take pictures with the kids. Hannah was a bit wierded out by all the attention and hugs.
At the airport we were all tired. We hauled all of our baggage one more time. We met up with a man that works  for the Embassy and he quickly picked us out. He helped us get all of our baggage and we loaded up in 2 large vans. Our sponsor was their with his 10 year old daughter. The kids enjoyed hearing about Jordan from her, so did I! We got dropped off at our new home. It's huge! They had told us it was about 2500 sq ft. we measured it and it's over 5000! I will do my next post on the house with pictures. We got to bed around 3 AM.
The next few days have mostly been setting things up. The kids and I went on a play date with some families in our branch. We've gone to the pool at the Embassy twice, to dinner at our social sponsors (they are in our branch), went grocery shopping in a huge mall (it's at least 6 stories), and I learned how to get fresh produce online and they bring it right to your door! That's great since I can't dive the government vehicle Josh is using to get around until we get our own. Frankly I'm too scared to drive here anyways. They drive crazy!
Today is Friday (the Sabbath day in the middle east) and we are just about ready to leave for church. Sunday here is just another work day.

This is our house. 

That's all for now. I will add more pictures to my next post!