Happy Christmas

Merry Christmas everyone!

I just wanted to take some time to wish all my little friends a very happy Christmas. I hope you have all been good boys and girls so that Santa could bring you some nice toys this year.

I think Christmas is good because you get to spend time with your family and have lots of yummy food as well. I hope you will all say a big thank you to your mums and dads for making the day a happy one for you. I hope you are being good, too, and not fighting with each other or being naughty. Did you know that there are lots of children who don't get any nice presents, or any nice food. Isn't that sad? And some children don't live in nice houses with families who love them. There are some children the same ages as you who will even have to go out and do work at Christmas, and every other day, because they have no food or enough money to buy anything. So you children are very lucky, aren't you?

I hope you all got some nice gifts. I did. I got one of those tablet things.

It's lots of fun. I can play Angry Birds and can do my blog and get some bargains in the sales, too! I think some of you might have got them, as well, but some of you are too little. Another thing I got was chocolate. I love chocolate. It's so yummy. I'm not sure it really goes with turkey, but maybe I'll get used to it.

Look what Grandad got, by the way!

I think that might be the biggest lollipop I have ever seen! It's even bigger than Grandad!

I like shopping at Christmas. Some of the stores have lovely windows. I saw this one in a very big shop called Bloomingdales. Isn't it nice, with all those cute little teddies?

I also saw one window with a very cute Christmas village in it, with a train!

One of the nicest things about Christmas is that people are kind to each other. I wish they would be kind to each other all the time and not just Christmas. Maybe you cubs can show them how it's done. You can be kind to each other so that other people can see how they should behave. Sometimes, when we're kind to each other, we can get a really nice warm feeling inside, and that's the best feeling ever! Try helping your mummy by keeping all your toys nice and tidy. And help your daddy by doing the things he asks you to do. It will make them very happy, and it will make you happy, too! Much happier than being naughty, actually. So, will you do that? Do it for me. Do it for your mum and dad. Do it because it's the right thing to do, and when we do the right thing, it will always make us happier than when we do the wrong thing. I think all my little friends will do the right thing anyway, because they are all my special friends.

Remember why we have Christmas. It's not just for getting toys and having fun. It's to remember that Jesus was born, which is a very important thing. He wants you to be good, too. 

Have a lovely day, remember to be good and not to eat too much! I'll be back soon with another blog. Until then, this is your favourite lion signing off and saying Merry Christmas everyone!

Love from your little pal Bryan. 



National Day

Hello again, everyone!

Here is another blog post from your favourite Lion! Now, you can see from the picture of me that I have two flags. They are the flag of Dubai, and the reason I have them is because December 2 was National Day in Dubai. They celebrated 41 years of being, er, Dubai. That's nearly as old as Grandad!
There were a lot of flags about. Big buildings had giant flags on them. Cars and buses had flags on them. Even people had flags on them! I even saw some yummy cakes which had been made to celebrate National Day, in the baker's window. Don't they look nice?

Another big thing they did here was to have a parade. I don't know about you, but I love parades! We had a great view, too, because Grandma and Grandad live in a big building and we could look down at the parade from the balcony. There were lots of people down on the street, so it's a good thing I didn't have to go down there. I'm only little, so I would probably have got lost, or someone would have stepped on me, or something! So we watched from 30 floors up, and we had some people over to watch with us, while we scoffed some yummy food - Grandma got some Cinnabons, which I love! And cheesecake! Anyway, we got to see the whole parade, and we took some pictures.

On this picture you can see some camels. I like camels. they are so nice and friendly. They have big humps, which make them tricky to sit on. In Dubai they have camel races. Grandma says we might go and see some camel racing in a few weeks. But these ones were not racing. They were just walking slowly. Camels also make a really funny noise. Not as funny as your daddy when he snores at night, but not too far off!

On this picture there are some Arab people playing bagpipes. I thought only Scottish people played bagpipes, but these were definitely not Scottish. Bagpipes make a funny noise, too, but at least they can play some nice tunes.

There were some things called floats, too. Now, don't ask me why they are called floats. They don't actually float, as far as I can see. They are really lorries dressed up to look like things. This one was my favourite. The blue bit is meant to be a Metro train. They have the Metro in Dubai, which is a train on stilts. They go over your head and they don't have any drivers. On top of this one are models of some of the buildings in Dubai. There is a model of the world's tallest building, and also a model of the building we live in! Also, if you look closely, there's a model of an aeroplane. I think it's a model, anyway. If it isn't, somebody did a bad job of landing! haha!

There were some fun characters in the parade, too. I saw a blue dolphin, an octopus, a zebra, a rhino, a ninja turtle and a dragon! I don't know what they had to do with National Day, but all the little cubs seemed to like them. I'm not sure where the other three ninja turtles were, though. This was the red one. I forget his name. Maybe he's going solo these days.

We had some marching bands, too, with some girls twirling batons. Did you know that Grandma used to do that, a long time ago? There were also some girls waving flags about. The marching bands were quite loud, with big drums and things. And there were some big balloons, a bit like the ones in the Macy's parade but not as interesting. I was hoping they would have one shaped like Spiderman, or maybe Snoopy, but these ones were just square and white, with writing on them.

Anyway, I hope you like the pictures. You can see it was an interesting day. At least it was nice and sunny. You might think it's always nice and sunny here, but we did have a very big thunderstorm a few days ago, with lots of rain and lightning, which was scary! At least it didn't rain on the parade. It would have been a shame if all those people had got wet.
Well, it's time for me to go, but I will be back soon with a nice Christmas blog. I hope you are all being very good, so that Santa will bring you some nice things. I'm hoping for a tablet, but I'm not sure if I've been a good enough lion to get one of those! You have to be extra good to get a tablet, Grandma says.

Until next time, this is your pal Bryan saying Bye bye for now.