Giving thanks!

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving last week! Days just fly by, so of course I am behind on the blogging. Jesse and I were so fortunate to be back in Houston for Thanksgiving with our families last week, something we did not think we would be able to do! The highlights for me were:

1.  Celebrating my mom turning 60 (a big deal!) by going to dinner with the family and giving her a scrapbook of cards and letters from all of her close friends.  Also had a spa day with mom and sister!

2.  Doing the Turkey Trot on Thanksgiving morning with my husband. What a fun way to burn preemptive calories and benefit a worthy cause at the same time!

3. Getting to sit around two dinner tables with so many family members in one day is such a huge blessing. After the last year, we have so much to be thankful for! Jesse's grandfather and his wife were in town and my grandpa came down from Dallas to be with us, too.  Glad we had some quality time!

4. Turkey...and more turkey.  Roasted, fried, injected, stuffed, smoked...love all of it! So lucky to have a variety of yummy turkeys and leftovers thanks to my sister's hours of hard work and a loving father-in-law who likes any excuse to deep fry things!

5. Going to our home church and reflecting on how amazingly fortunate we are in so many ways.  Even though we are moving and traveling and between houses, Jesse and I are blessed to have such wonderful families and friends all over the world. God has provided, and we give HIM the glory!

BONUS: Don't get me wrong, we have so much and should not be spending money on frivolous things.  I feel really convicted about my longing for some holiday flare because we already have so many Christmas decorations. The problem is that most of our belongings are sitting in boxes halfway across the world, and I do not have access to them, which is both ironic and slightly depressing.  In true Griswald fashion, Jesse made sure we had something Christmasy in our apartment, so after a trip to Lowe's, Garden Ridge, and Target on Friday, we now have our first real Christmas tree! And if we leave before Christmas (which is very likely), we are happy to donate it to a family in need *.  Merry Christmas, y'all!

*If you know someone who would like to have this, email me!

Happy Fall Y'all!

I have always loved this time of year. I am not sure if it is because of my birthday or holidays creeping up or just because I get to wear all of my fall clothes.  This year we get to spend the autumn months back in Houston, which is amazing for several reasons:

1. I get to see our family and friends and enjoy quality time instead of the usual rushed visit.

I got to see Ally who was in town from Malawi!

2. It is football season...enough said. Go Aggies!  And the Longhorns are doing pretty good, too.

Watching the Aggies beat Alabama was priceless!

3. It is hunting season so my husband gets to go to the ranch, drive the tractor around and do manly things (while drinking beer and wearing lots of camo).

Dove hunting at the ranch with Jesse's parents and Grandpa

4. Both of us have birthdays to celebrate a week apart! Yay, happy birthday to us!

Birthday cake (notice how my sweet husband knew better than to put my age in candles...)

5.  The State Fair of Texas and an excuse to eat anything fried! We saw Big Tex for the last time before his demise...

6.  We got to celebrate our one year anniversary in Napa Valley, CA with wine and gorgeous scenery. And we were able to eat our top layer of wedding cake, too. Mmmmm.

Toasting one year while visiting several wineries!

7.  The election. Even though the results were not so desirable, I am fortunate to have had the opportunity to vote and celebrate the freedoms we have in America. So glad we were here to do it!

8.  Being with family for Thanksgiving. It also happens to be my mom's birthday, but more on that later :-) We are going to get to celebrate with ALL of our family this year which is something we had not planned, but I'm glad it worked out!

9.  Getting to see the Christmas decorations go up the day after Halloween is always a treat. It's the time just before the crazy material/commercialism of Christmas takes over, but late enough that Starbuck's starts using the red cups.

10.  The weather is cool and crisp right now, so I can legitimately wear winter boots and coats and know that it isn't really 90 degrees outside like in Abu Dhabi.

All little things, but still important reasons to give thanks.  God's timing is perfect, and we could not ask for a better time to be back in the US! Happy Fall Y'all!

***Side note: You will have to forgive me if I have been flaky over the past few weeks. It is rather difficult coordinating things and planning each day when we have no idea when we are leaving. Also, our phones get terrible reception and only work half the time :-/ My apologies and I appreciate your patience.

Bye bye beach, hello snow!

Wow, I am terrible at keeping up with this thing.  There is so much going on at one time that I find it difficult to document everything in real time, but I have to finish my fall updates before the holidays...

Here is the short version of our move back to Texas in case you were all wondering why we are back in Houston!  A few months ago, Jesse was asked to change roles within the company and be an engineering supervisor which is a huge promotion (and a lot more responsibility). Anyway, the kicker is that this new job is in RUSSIA! Yes, Sakhalin to be exact--a small island just north of Japan on the far eastern side (think close to Alaska).

Because the visa process takes so long and is very unpredictable, Exxonmobil decided that it would be in our best interest to leave Abu Dhabi and come back to Houston in the interim so Jesse can work with his team here.  This happened right about the time that the US embassy in Libya was attacked, so needless to say we were okay getting the heck outta the Middle East.

Once again the movers loaded our belongings onto a truck where they
will stay in Dubai until we can ship them to Russia!

With two weeks notice, we packed up our villa, sold our car and various appliances, and tied up all of our loose ends in just enough time to get on a plane back to the US. We will be here until we receive the visa for Sakhalin, which so far has been a month.  We have a cozy one bedroom apartment and rental cars, and in the meantime I get to shop for winter clothes and boots because it is freezing in Russia and will be snowing when we get there.  We also get to vote and celebrate our one year anniversary and see our families and friends!  More on that later, here are some pics from our last days.

The wonderful families in Abu Dhabi threw us a going away
party--thanks Genung's for hosting!

To the left is the beautiful Abu Dhabi skyline showing the gorgeous clear, blue water. The last day we were there, Jesse and I decided to visit some of the touristy places that we had never been. It just happened to be the clearest day without any sand in the air, so you can see everything perfectly! Our villa was located behind one of the smaller buildings in the center of this picture--very close to the beach.

One of the most famous and prominent attractions is the Grand Mosque.  It's similar to visiting a cathedral in Europe--many tourists come to walk through it each day, and they expect you to have some reverence while doing so.  They actually make you cover and take off your shoes!  

The mosque provides dry-cleaned Abayas and Shaylas and Kanduras, so we felt the need to capture the moment (I can guarantee this will never happen again).  It is a stunning place and very opulent, something you have to see if you come to visit. And if you do visit, I know plenty of people with 3+ guest rooms in their villas who would love to have visitors!

To the right is a camel hanging out at the Heritage Village. They have a small bedouin town set up to show how things looked back in the day (read: before the oil made them very very rich).  I am still sad I never got to ride one of these things.