My Brother's Coming!

It's been about a year since Tony and I have seen any family. And it's been even longer since I've seen my brother Brian! Well I think I get to see him for a couple days next month! He's in the Navy and cruising around this area for a while so we've been hoping to get a chance to see each other and now we think we'll have it! I highly doubt my Dad ever thought his oldest child and youngest child would ever meet up in the Middle East-pretty crazy!

I got to see Brian at my and Tony's wedding in 2004-his youngest daughter Brianna was even my flower girl-and the cutest flower girl ever if I do say so myself!

Then in 2005 his family drove all the way down from Fargo to Fort Worth to celebrate Christmas with us! We had so much fun-there's nothing better than celebrating Christmas with kids in the house! They get the best toys! And my parents flew down too! It really made my and Tony's first Christmas in our first house special.

We all loaded up and hit the Fort Worth Zoo-I know, we kinda look like the mob in all the black huh?

Speaking of the Crume family liking to wear matching clothes!!! LOL! Here's my sister-in-law Teresa, myself, and my mom in our matching Christmas p.j.s! (And our matching cosomos!)

Dad got his first opprotunity to read The Night Before Christmas to his grandchildren which was nice (He's read it to me EVERY year (even over the phone once!) so it was fun to continue the tradition.

We had such a wonderful time...I can't wait to have a big family Christmas again! Even though it will probably be a while before we get to do that, I'm still so happy to get to see my brother for a couple days!!!

Keeping Busy

I think I start every post by saying that nothing too exciting is happening-and that's true for this month too! Abu Dhabi seems to lend itself to laziness...especially since everyone delivers! Well with me not feeling well last month Tony and I fell into a little rut of ordering food every night and skipping date nights. Well last week I made a deal with him that if I cooked dinner Sunday through Wednesday, Tony would take me out for a date night Thursday (remember our work week is Sunday-Thursday here) and Tony readily agreed. Well so far I've been keeping up my end of the bargain and Tony's been eating well! So Thursday night after he gets off work we're going to a movie and then we're going to BBQ to give me a night off! Providing I cook tonight of course!

We're still playing poker on Friday nights. I've been getting second or third lately but have yet to get first! (Good thing you get money for second and theird place too!)

Let's see, what else. I've been doing a lot of cross-stitching. I'm making Christmas stockings for Tony and me! When I was little my Grandma crocheted stockings for the whole family which was really special. I got the same pattern and tried really hard to make Tony a stocking and it just wasn't happening. So I decided that Tony and I should start our own tradition and I'm cross-stitching us stockings. I used a really big brand name for the patterns so when we have kids I can find a pattern for them too. I finished mine a few months ago-all I have to do is buy materal for the lining and the back...and then hand sew it all together!

I'm about half way done with Tony's which will feature a river and some deer when it's done. I'm really excited that I should finish by Christmas!

That's about it right now! Just wanted to say hi to everyone and prove that I'm going to get better at this blogging thing!

Internet Problems

Well, all of you in the States probably haven't heard but we've been having internet problems over here. Some ship dropped anchor and severed two internet cables (rumor is it was on purpose) so our internet has been touch and go lately. Sorry to all the people we haven't written back in the past few weeks!

We haven't been up to too much. Tony is a happy boy though! When he got his promotion last summer we decided that he deserved a little congrats present but we had the whole Germany vacation going on. Well, a few weeks ago he FINALLY got his present. It is the biggest flat screen tv I've ever seen!!! It doesn't even fit in the entertainment center so it's sitting on the coffee table! The best thing about the humongous tv is that for the first couple days I noticed the tv stretched out shows so ALL the women on tv looked so much fatter! I loved it! And then I mentioned it to Tony and he adjusted the ratio so now all the women are back to being skinny.

We still have poker night every week and I don't want to jinx it but I'm doing pretty well! I haven't gotten first yet but all except two times I've gotten second or third (which you get money for!). Tony and I are also talking about taking a vacation to Italy, Austria, and the Chech Republic in the next couple months! I know-we've already been to Austria-but we want to go back to Hallstatt so bad!

Also-we may be moving! No, not back to the States-to Al Ain which is about an hour and a half away. Lockheed is hiring a bunch of new people so they're getting more apartments and the ones in Al Ain are really nice. Al Ain is much cleaner and prettier than Abu Dhabi. Besides, this apartment is really ticking me off. The seal on the bottom of our guest toilet is broken so the bathroom flooods every time you flush it, my kitchen sink is leaking, the fridge makes a really high pitched sound most of the time, and the washers in the laundry room STILL aren't fixed and the one in my apartment has had to be repaired three times in the last week! Yea-I want to move! Since we'd get nicer housing, Tony and I are thinking about staying another year or so. We'll let everyone know!

Well that's about it! I guess I should start taking more pictures because I don't really have any new ones to post! But here's a cute one of Kieley helping with the laundry! Oh-speaking of Kieley, she went to the vet a couple days ago and she's officially mange free! Yay! So we can get her fixed anytime! We also bought a crate for her when we're gone because she ate two pairs or my favorite heels and my cell phone all in one week!

Hope everybody's doing great and we miss you all!