Trash & Treasures

We finally finished our wood project!! When we first moved here we stumbled upon someone’s old, trashed, left for dead on the side of the road, china cabinet. I could see why it was thrown out; it was stained, missing some shelves, missing a drawer front… some of the wood was even rotting away. But Steven and I saw the true beauty within.  We left the top half to the trash, there was no saving that thing. But we were able to take some wood from the top to repair the drawer front and add a shelf.

Once we got it home Steven went to work sanding it, and cutting/gluing wood, while I went to work trying to find fabric and paint. Steven got his part done in about 3 days… I on the other hand took FOREVER to find fabric. It was about 3 trips to Satwa (the only town to find fabric) a few trips to malls and shopping centers and a lot of hunting online. Once I would find something I thought I liked, I would spend forever debating on if it was right or not, only to go back to look at it again and find it was sold out. I found these pre-made curtains that were cute, but pricy. Again by the time I said, “Fine, those will do.”  They were gone.  I finally got my decision making skills together along with a trusted friend and decided on this:

It’s not great, but it’s the best non-Arab lookin fabric I could find here in the Middle East. Next we had to decide on paint. That was easy! Or so I thought. It was going to be blue, that way if we found better fabric later, blue was neutral enough that it would hopefully still work… well Sky Blue, ended up looking much more like Smurf Blue, and I was not about to have a giant Smurf sitting in our kitchen area. One more trip back to Satwa for another gallon (which was under $5 btw). This time we went with National Blue.

 

After I finished painting it for a second Steven gave it a light sand which made the Smurf blue show up in some places and actually gave it a nice refinished look.

Next we painted the hard ware silver and hit the whole thing with a gloss finish varnish. I just have to finish sewing the curtains, but it’s pretty much done, and it only took 4 ½ months! Ha! I’m pretty happy with the way it turned out, especially since we spent just under $30.00 on the whole thing.

And now we have a great place to hide our food and dishes!

MEACH Trip '12

Back in the first weekend of March we went on our first camping trip here which took us over to the mountains of Oman and the beaches of Fujairah. It was our church youth groups 2nd annual MEACH trip (Mountains + Beach), and it was one of the worst camping experiences of our lives.

It started off well with great people, and great food, hopes of singing songs around the camp fire, the light of the full moon over head... we had no idea the night we were about to be in for. The drive up was beautiful. You had to have a 4 wheel drive car to make it up the mountain so we left our rented Nissan Sunny and squeezed into an SUV with another family.

Once on top, we started to set up camp. We pulled out our tent and noticed that the wind had picked up. It was soon too windy to put our tent up on our own so we helped another couple put theirs up then they helped us. We had hoped that the wind would die down once the sun set, but that didn’t happen. As the sun set, the wind picked up, and the temperature dropped. It was FREEZING! (well, not really… but if it drops below 60, that’s pretty much freezing here)

Our friend JP, who is the manager of Texas Road House, and also an eagle scout, was in charge of dinner. He made these awesome little packets meat, carrots, and potatoes that just had to be thrown in the fire to cook. It was so smart of him and made for super easy clean up, and it was amazing!

After dinner I had my very first banana smore. JP’s wife, Ana, brought bananas to eat instead of graham crackers since she can’t eat gluten. All you do is slice open the banana, stick in some chocolate and marshmallows, wrap it in foil and throw it in the fire for about 10 minutes. If you have never had one, I totally recommend trying it.

It was only about 10 by the time we could no longer handle the wind so we attempted to call it a night. Some of the students stayed up and continued with their campfire songs as we headed off to our tent that was obviously not made for desert wind camping conditions. The entire night we had sand blowing in on our faces, and our tent collapsing on our heads. There was no escaping it. Steven had to keep the walls of the tent up with his feet, and even still they closed in on us. I kept praying, “Lord please stop the wind, if only so we can have some rest, please make it stop” but someone else must have been praying harder because the wind kept on howling all night long. We maybe got about 2 hours of sleep all night.

The next morning we woke up to goats all over the place and one lone donkey begging for food. The wind was still there but we managed to do some exploring of the ruins that were there.

After breakfast we packed up and made our way down to the beach. And our old friend Mr. Wind joined us there as well. Good thing the beach was beautiful and the sun was out!

After a few hours at the beach and some lunch, we headed home for some much needed sleep & showers. Though this camping trip may not have been a success, it was still great to get away and out of the city. Hopefully in the future we can try it again and have a better out come and much less wind.

a long over due update

So it’s been almost 3 months since we have posted anything and a lot has happened since then. This will just be a short update with the hopes of a decent post coming soon (with pictures & everything!). Sorry of such a long delay!

December 30th Steven had the opportunity to preach at all 3 services at church (Fellowship of the Emirates). His message was so amazing that the church hired him on full time just 3 days later! Ok not really... He had been in talks with the church since November, as they were in need of an associate pastor. The church has grown from to over 1000 people in less than a year, and it’s still growing! Steven loves working for the church as the pastor over Community Life (small groups) and Discipleship.

Steven also joined a softball league, which he heard about through church, and we joined a co-ed team which we heard about from the men’s league. We have been trying to teach the kids a little about baseball which has been a lot of fun, and they have come to some of our games as well. We even started watching some baseball movies with them like Rookie of the Year, and intend on watching the classic, The Sandlot, with them soon. Steven’s team is in 1^st place with only 1 loss, and our co-ed team is tied for 1^st, with no losses!

In mid January my position as business development specialist was terminated and I was moved to marketing assistant. After a few weeks and much back and forth about what the company wanted me to do, who they wanted me to work for, where they wanted me to sit…. I was fired, terminated, let go, ended my relationship with them. I am now on the job hunt again and exploring some new adventures. I have considered becoming Emirates Cabin Crew, a preschool teacher, being a part of the marketing team for the soon to open world’s tallest hotel, and following in my sisters footsteps as a gym teacher for The Little Gym. I’m still looking and open for suggestions… what do YOU think I should do? (and yeah I know I already used that picture but hey I still look the same, only my roots have grown out a little more...)

The timing seemed perfect that God provided me with a job and took it away at the same time He provided Steven a job. We have no doubt He is taking care of us and providing for us. He has given us great friends out here, lots of encouragement from family back home, and the strength to endure when all we want to do is hide under the covers.

Please keep praying for us, the job search, and continued purposeful time with our siblings and family out here... and that we would be better and timelier (I would have said more timely but Microsoft Office prefers timelier) at blogging.

Surfing U.A.E.

To continue our weekend with the kids, after our Christmas movie sleepover, we woke up bright and early at 7am to take off for the beach. We promised the kids we would teach them how to surf and after checking the waves and surf report, it was as good a day as any to test the waters. We loaded up the car and packed lunches for the day, got the kids all changed with towels and we were out the door by 8am. In case you didn’t know, Steven was a surf instructor throughout college, and surfed competitively in college. I worked at the YMCA in college as a surf instructor for the summer surf camps. More recently, Steven always helped out with/ led the free surf lessons that Kings Harbor Church always put on in the summer back home. Between the two of us, and the 7 surf boards we shipped over, these kids were going to learn how to surf!

We headed out to Sunset beach, which is just to the right of the Jumeirah Beach Hotel and the Burj Al Arab about 15 minutes from our house. We got unloaded, pulled out some surfboard and started with a beach lesson:

Sammy was the first one in the water while Yousef, Missy and I waiting on the beach taking pictures and cheering him on:

This was the biggest day of surf since we have been here and there were a ton of people out in the water but that didn’t stop Sammy from getting up:

Next was Yousef:

Then came Missy:

All three kids did amazing! They totally loved it and had such a great time surfing. Our friend Amy came down and met up with us and the kids loved telling Amy how awesome that had done at surfing and how they were “professional surfers” now. Amy was also eager to learn so we got her out in the water:

Shortly after she went out Amy was catching waves on her own giving Steven a break to surf too:

Some other friends from church joined us as well and we had a great time surfing, playing smash ball, Frisbee and flying a kite of some local guys that were there. It was funny; the kids were drawn to the only other Arabs on the beach and made quick friends with them. So much so, that Yousef was soon wearing the guys’ glasses and eating their food (even though we had plenty of our own). You gotta love the hospitality of the locals here.

The next day was National Day (much like the 4th of July) celebrating the day that the U.A.E. declared its independence. We were invited by a family at church to go water skiing on their boat. The family had never been water skiing and it was up to Steven to put on his instructors hat once again and teach them how. Steven grew up skiing every summer at Table Rock Lake so he knew what he was doing:

I, on the other hand, enjoyed a nice boat ride and views of the city:

Also, for those of you freezing your buns off in the states, take note that we are all in the water without wetsuits, enjoying the beach in December, even though it has dropped down to a brisk 75 degrees. (We almost have to bust out the parkas!) If you ever want to escape the cold, Dubai is just a short 16 hour flight away!