It's a beautiful day.....

I'm been absent a bit on here due to a crazy schedule AND nice weather!  Yes...the nice weather is finally here, folks!  And we're taking full advantage of the fact that the evenings are cool and the sun doesn't burn off the top layer of your skin anymore.  So we've been outside as much as possible.

We've had a lot going on these last 2-3 weeks but it's all been good and fun stuff that I'll update the blog with over the course of this week.  I was doing so well updating on a regular basis but then I got out of the habit and it's hard to get back into it. I know that I'll be glad to have these updates some day to help me remember our days in the UAE.  So here goes the first quick update of the week.

1) We threw a birthday party for our pastor at our house.  It was nice to have the church folk over and of course to eat foods from all around the world since everyone brought something to share.

2) Min and I started golf lessons here at the Rugby, horse and golf club.  We had our first lesson last Monday and are excited for our 2nd one.  He said we're naturals!  Just kidding...but by the end, we'll be ready to join the beginners tournament, I hope!

Take a look, it's in a book.....

I am back in the UAE and officially over jet lag.  It's always my goal to make it to the first weekend and then I can sleep in and let myself relax as much as I need to.  It was a good weekend of visiting friends, relaxing and reading.

Yup, I said reading. If you know me, you know that reading isn't on my top list of past times.  I'd rather be in the kitchen pretending I'm Martha Stewart.  But my MIL gave me her copy of The Help for the plane and I just couldn't put it down!  Every night I came home from work and read it...and read it. I loved it! I want to read more good books like that.  Now, I just have to find them.  Did you read it?!

Also, it's time for all things pumpkin and apple!  I made pumpkin bread and pumpkin chocolate chip bars.  I found them on my friend, Jen's blog.  I think this pumpkin bread has been on her blog for the past couple years and I've made it ever since.  It really is a good recipe.

You can find the recipe here.  It's called Downeast Maine Pumpkin Bread.  I took it into work and people asked for the recipe.  People who probably never made pumpkin bread in their life.  It's that good.  Although, I think almost anything pumpkin or apple is pretty darn good tasting in the fall. 

Show your support......

Last night our Oasis guys football (soccer) team played against NYU Abu Dhabi campus.  It was a blast and felt like we were actually going to watch a football game in the fall....minus the chill in the air, sweaters and blankets.  We were sweating like crazy. Abu Dhabi is sooo humid compared to Al Ain. 

 A very small fan supporting his daddy.

 The Oasis team showing their support for CURE International. 

The CURE logo was on the back of their shirt.

 We lost but I think everyone had fun all around.  Considering we have a team with a mixed age range --some men have been married for a bit meaning that they have some bellies that probably weren't there when they were in college.  NYU brought a large team so they had fresh players for both halves.  We might need to do some Get In Shape boot camp for the Oasis team before the next game.

Shake, Rattle and Roll......

Every morning since March, I make a fruit (with lettuce) shake for breakfast.  I love my fruit shakes. They are easy, tasty and a good healthy breakfast. 

This means that my blender gets lots of use.  I bought a fancy, shmacy mixer when we moved here which has been well worth the money due to the amount of use that sucker gets from me, Trey and Melissa.  One of us are always making something and especially on the weekend it probably gets tired.

This mixer has the blender attachment which worked like a dream....until one day it got tired. The motor works great but it won't turn the plastic thingy-ma-bob on the bottom of the glass container anymore.  I tried to figure it out, but gave up because I realized that I had a blender attachment on my food processor.

Ever since oh probably June, I've been using the blender that goes onto my food processor (thank you Jenna--that thing also gets a ton of use!) .   Then just this week, it decided to get tired, too. Not the food processor --that still works. Just the blender. The motor works great and even the plastic thingy-ma-bob that turns the blade, turns when I do it with my hand....but not when I put it on the base.  What the heck. 

I hate extra gadgets. I don't want to buy another blender.  So I started using the food processor now.  But the liquid shoots out the side sometimes which makes an agrivated girl when trying to get ready for work in the morning and you end up with mango-strawberry-romaine-lettuce water on yourself.

Anybody have this same problem?  The motor on the actual gadget works.  The blade turns when I do it by hand.  It just won't work together when I put the glass blender canister on the base.  Do I need to get the plasticy thing on the bottom replaced somehow?

So the shakes.  What do we put in our shakes? 

• Romaine, spinach or another kind of lettuce I can find here
• Frozen fruit such as mango and strawberries. Those are my favorite.  I add blueberries sometimes too because they are so good for you but they can make the shake a bit "grainy" in my mind.
• Banana--this smooths the shake out
• Water.  We tried coconut water but it didn't make any difference so I just do plain ol' water
• (You could do yogurt, but I don't because I am trying to ditch dairy due to sinus stuff here and Trey doesn't really like yogurt.)

Goin' to the zoo, zoo, zoo.....

On Sunday night when we returned home, this is what we found on the chalkboard in our kitchen from Min.  Apparently, we live in a zoo.  Poor girl.  Drinking the Pioneer Woman's iced coffee in our fridge for those things is worth it! I'm just sayin', the iced coffee from Pioneer Woman's blog is so fabulous.  What she says lasts her 3 weeks, lasted us 1.  I never used to drink coffee. Now I'm addicted.  I'm trying to do half decaf, half regular to eventually get myself to mostly decaf and then nothing by winter.   The heat makes you so exhausted here that you need some caffeine to keep going.

Anyway, on to the above chalkboard.

1)  Min had to get the cleaning team from the hospital to come clean up the dead cat. She was so freaked out by herself that she couldn't do it.  I'm with her!  She said she went inside while they were deciding how to get it.  It was in our courtyard area by the hose.  Maybe it was looking for water.  All you cat lover, don't think about it. I'm not a cat lover so it's easy for me not to think about it:) She keeps making the face of what it looked like and I just can't stop laughing. 

2) Cockroaches.  Unfortunately they are reality here.  Not the kind that you get from being dirty. These are the big suckers that come through the pipes if you don't flush your toilets daily or use the drains.  So when we go away we have to spray stuff and then plug up the drains.  By the time we get back, the water in the toilet is all dried up due to the heat!  That even happens sometimes in our guest bathroom if we haven't used it in a while.  I try to make a conscience effort to flush it each day because I don't want to see any animals in my house but if I forget, sometimes I have a dried up toilet and then I tip toe around the bathroom to make sure that I don't see any cockroaches.  If I do, you'll hear me!  I just start yelling and Trey just starts walking towards the special spray immediately to save the day. 

3) Lizard. Hmm....I don't see many of them so I don't know where that came from...but it was outside on our porch. Hopefully it is eating all of the other bugs that I don't want in the house.

All of that deserved the iced coffee in the fridge.  Min, you can have our iced coffee anytime!

Knock You Naked Brownies from the Pioneer Woman

Min made these brownies from the Pioneer Woman. And they truly are delicious. Check out the recipe and trust me these are worth all the small steps it takes to make them! Here's the almost final product... they still needed the powdered sugar layer!

Burnin' Rubber

You know how in New England we put snow tires on our cars for the winter months and then change them back to regular tires when the snow all melts away? Well, a similar thing happens here. Because the roads get so hot our tires have to be changed more frequently. Our car went to get new tires and check these things out!

Only problem is- we got the car back and there was this huge oil footprint in the passenger  side of the car. Now, about 4 weeks ago our car was detailed and all cleaned up! It made me so happy. I guess next time it should be new tires then the detailing!

On to better things- this granola recipe from Min's college friend! Let's call it The Best Granola You Have Ever Tasted In Your Whole Entire Life- is that too dramatic?

The Best Granola You Have Ever Tasted in Your Whole Entire Life (for short we can use the first letters TBGYHETYWEL):

1 cup oats

1 cup wheat germ

1 cup oat bran

1 cup coconut

1 cup sesame seeds

1 cup flax seed

1 cup flax seed meal

sprinkle cinnamon and vanilla over all ingred.

1 cup honey 

1 cup canola oil

 Throw all that stuff in a bowl and give it a good mix!

Bake at 300 for 40 mins on a jelly roll pan. Smell the vanilla and cinnamon filling your kitchen- it smells like you are baking a cake!

I also added almonds, dried blueberries and dried cranberries- get creative add whatever you would like. A bit of advice though- don't skimp on the honey, it's not as good without it all!

Then try your best to let it cool before you start picking out those huge junks that lump together!

Sunday Morning Breakfast Recipes

Good Morning! Don't you just love the weekends? We sure do! We love spending lazy mornings in our pajamas and cooking delicious things to eat!

What's your favorite breakfast recipe? Can you share one with us?

One of my favorite breakfast recipes is this French Toast Casserole. The best part is you can make it ahead and all you have to do in the morning is throw it in the oven and you can lay in bed while your house is filled with the aroma of goodness! These are the sorts of recipes we can use at the Inn to trick our customers- they will think we have been up all morning baking!

French Toast Casserole

1 loaf of firm white bread (or Texas Toast) cubed

10 eggs

1- 8oz package of cream cheese
1 ½ cups of half and half

¼ cup maple syrup
½ cup melted butter

Cube and layer half of bread in 9x13 pan. Cut cream cheese into small pieces and spread over bread. Cover with other half of cubed bread. Mix eggs, half and half, syrup and butter. Pour over bread cubes and press to soak. COVER AND REFRIGERATE OVERNIGHT.

Bake 45-60 minutes at 350 degrees.

Serve with maple syrup (be sure to get the real stuff, you New Englanders know what I mean) Mmmm... good!

And I look too good to be wearing this.....

I want to introduce you to a friend of ours. His name is Mr. Saleem and he is our tailor here.  We love Mr. Saleem because he makes clothing that we love for about 1/3 of the price that we could buy it.  I had a few dresses made, a skirt and a shirt for my vacation to the States.  If you bring him a picture or something you already have, he can make it so well.  You can even draw him a picture and he'll do it.

So when I was in Lebanon, I found this great store that I loved but every dress was over $200.  I wanted 3 dresses in there.  I took the catalog from the store home with me.  2 weeks ago I went and bough the fabric at our favorite 3-story fabric shop.   You can either show them the picture and they will direct you towards the best fabric or you can search around the store on your own until you find something that you like.  Last week, I brought my handy dandy catalog with me, showed them the dresses and they directed me to the basement where I found the lightweight cotton I needed along with a jersey stretch fabric that was necessary. 

Then I was off to Mr. Saleem with my catalog and new fabric.  I'm always a bit nervous to see how it actually turns out.  One of the dresses needed a crooked pleat across the front but he did it well.  When we have our initial talk about what I want made there are a lot of words flying around like "same-same" (this means that you want it exactly the same) and this last time he kept saying to me "self-same" (he used this word to mean the fabric should all be one color).  Sometimes I get nervous about all the same-same and self-same stuff......I am wondering if the product will come out in any way the SAME-SAME as I have in my head.  Was that the correct usage of the word?!

Then I couldn't find the exact ribbon I needed for around the waist, but he took 2 ribbons and made his own rendition which turned out okay in my mind. Not my favorite, but okay.

Didn't he do well with the ruffles? 

 We've become professionals at changing in the car since he doesn't have a changing room.  He used to --well, that is debatable as it was barely big enough for me to remove a dress over my head without hitting my arms on the ceiling, but it was still a place to change.  It's a good thing we have tinted windows here on the car:)

This is dress #2.  You can't tell but it's a jersey knit at the top with a crooked pleat along the front. It's a cute dress but the ribbon isn't exactly how I wanted it to be. That's not his fault, it just doesn't exist here.  At home it would be super easy to find, but then again we wouldn't be living in the Middle East if EVERYTHING was EASY to find.

Anyway, tonight, I decided to bring my dresses home for the final try-on and I loved them.  My favorite is the navy dress with ruffles.  He did those with flat fabric. It's amazing.  He did such a great job.  Dress number 2 is fine also and if I wear a sweater over it and a scarf around the neck I think I will like it more. 

So, each dress turned out to be roughly $40-$50 for the fabric and the tailor.  Not so bad from $200+ to that.  I'd say I won on this one.  1 point for Jessie.

I'm a chiquita banana......

This weekend, Min made 2 good recipes.  She made a chopped salad that had radish, green onion, cucumber, hot pepper, chickpeas, dill and yogurt. She chopped it all up and then added the yogurt in.  It was really tasty and we ate it with chicken from the grill.

Then we needed a treat.  We always need treats actually.  Min froze banana halves.  Then she melted all natural peanut butter in the microwave and covered the bananas with it.  Then drizzled melted chocolate on top.  Mmm...mmm. Tasty.  They weren't the prettiest looking dessert you ever ate, but they tasted good. I guess that is if you like bananas, peanut butter and chocolate.  If you don't like them, you lose.   And I have one more left in the freezer!

She's like the wind.....

 

 Last night, our hospital Social Activities committee sponsored ice skating at a local rink here.   We had a lot of fun but almost none of us know how to ice skate really well. In the beginning, more than half of the group was holding on to the side wall but eventually everyone let go and were moving right along. 

It's funny that I was trying to help people skate as I can barely stay up myself. I was working on teaching myself how to skate backwards last night.  Not so good at that one.

I need a little help from Nancy Kerrigan. 

Lady In Red......

Last week I told you that I received this fabric for a gift and I wanted to make a dress for Eid which is the holiday that immediately follows Ramadan.  My goal is to use the fabric on the left.  It's a little too flowery for me, but it will be fine for here.  We will go visiting lots of friends of the hospital and I want to make a dress.  Some will wear pretty crazy dresses (like the prom for us) and others will wear more of traditional type dress.  Anyway, I need a style that is conservative enough for visiting families here but also fun and I don't want it to look like crap on me.  Silky fabric can be tricky for women with hips!  I knwo most people don't set out with the goal of getting a dress that looks bogus when they put it on, but I'm just sayin'.

Anyway, can you help me come up with a style that might work well for me? It needs to be long. It can be sleeveless and then I can wear a sweater or something with it. Otherwise it can have sleeves to be a bit more conservative. I'm not trying to look like a woman in a jean jumper, though --you know what I mean, right?!

I was looking through some dresses at this website.  What do you think?  Could any of them be made long?

I looked at Banana Republic, too for dresses and found a few I like. Some of the short dresses I could make long and some of the long dresses aren't so bad.

Help me! I need your clothing design help.  It's so fun having a tailor who can make a dress just from the picture.  You can't imagine how inexpensive it is here either.  I can't wait to show you the two dresses I dropped off last week to get made.   I found them in Lebanon when I was there but they were way too expensive. I am getting them made for less than 1/4th of the price. It's fun going to the fabric store and then finding designs you like.

Give me your comments or suggestions of places to look.

The first amendment wasn't written for nothin'.........

Blogging is fun, but reading the comments you leave is even more fun!  Whether you are reading this post through the blog or Facebook, I want to hear your voice.  Holla' at your girl.   I want to know who reads. 

Last night we had some friends over from church.  We made pizza and tried to take artsy pictures of them so that you would think that they tasted really good and maybe it will make you want to fly over here and visit us.  The truth is that it did taste really good.  And I promise that if you come to visit us, I'll make you pizza. You want anchovies and corn?  Fine, I'll make it. But first you have to fly over here.

We made b-b-q chicken, buffalo chicken and veggie. 

And then like all good church friends, we got competitive

and played a bunch of rounds of Pass the Pigs.  That game always makes me laugh and actually I'm not that competitive, I just pretend to be. I rolled my pigs with gusto. 

Match made in heaven.....

 

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY TERRY!

(That's what they call him here and I like to blend in with the culture, so I call him Terry now, too:)  

On Sunday we celebrated 7 years.  What did we do?  Go to work and then I went to the pool and he went to soccer.  That's how we roll around here.  

Those things keep us sane which keep our marriage happy.  

But we took off today to celebrate by running errands. Isn't that romantic? 

Actually to me it is. Trey doesn't love to run errands especially when it's 1 million degrees outside.

But today he did. We went and picked out fabric so that I can make 2 summer dresses I've had my eye on.  I'll update you on that later this week. 

This kid is always doing things to make me laugh or shake my head.....

but we always have an adventure.  Can't complain that life has been boring.

Who knew I would have lived in 2 separate countries by now...except God.  

 Trey insists that he didn't.  Should I believe him?  His mom warned me

but I didn't take her advice.

Here's to 7 + 7 + 7 + however many more God has for us years of marriage.