Christmas Journey - Part II

After leaving Vicki's parents house in MN, we headed to NC for a visit with Vicki's brother and his family (Brian, Rebecca, Nathan and Jared). Our daughter Nicole and her children (Aubrey, Christopher and Thomas) came to be with us for a couple of days to celebrate the holidays and spend some time with Mark before he leaves for Abu Dhabi. We had a great time and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. Aubrey got to sleep in a "Big Girl" bed for the first time and did a great job! We had a great time and got a chance to cuddle with the grandkids. Auntie Rebecca took every chance she could get to snuggle with the boys and help give Nicole a break to rest a little. Of course Grandma couldn't resist snuggling too. Mark got a surprise gift from Brian and Rebecca of a NUK! You will have to ask him about it. Nathan and Jared loved having Aubrey to play with and she enjoyed them just as much! We will miss them when we are in Abu Dhabi quite a bit!!!

The Christmas Journey - part I

Another page in our lives is unfolding and we find that Mark has been given an opportunity of a lifetime to go and work in Abu Dhabi, UAE. He will be helping them to start their training program for their new industry of nuclear power. We are very excited at the possibilities before us: from learning a new culture to all the potential travel that we can do from a much more centralized location to the various places in the world that we long to explore. He will be leaving the US on Jan. 13th and has an initial contract for 2 years.
In preparation for leaving the country, we decided to travel around to see everyone. We started in Detroit to see Micheal, Dana and all the kids. Jack and Charlie are growing sooo fast and really, really cute!
After visiting with them for a day, we continued up to our house where we had a quiet Christmas all by ourselves. We really enjoyed the few days of quiet and each others company that we had there!
After Christmas, we headed up to and across the upper peninsula to Wisconsin and on to Minnesota to visit our great friends John and Nora. Mark and John went ice fishing while Nora and Vicki did a little lunch, visited with Mom Costello and just had great fun with each other! We were also able to catch up with Vicki's high school friend Barb and her new hubby Rick. The six of us met at a local restaurant and had a wonderful time catching up with all that has been going on in our lives and what the future might hold for us.
After visiting with our friends, we headed to meet Vicki's brother Don and his wife Tessie for breakfast. It was very nice visit.
We make a quick stop in Duluth to see Vicki's grandmother, Edna Victoria, whom shares her birthday with Vicki and whom Vicki is named after. She will be 100 years old in February 2010. It was wonderful to see her and Vicki didn't want to leave but we needed to continue our journey south to her parent's house.
Next on the stop was Vicki's parents, Don and Betty. We stayed for a couple of days and took them out shopping and to dinner. We had a very nice visit with them and got them set up on their new computer so that they can Skype with us while we are in the UAE. Believe it or not, both of them took lessons from Vicki on how to get on to Skype and make calls. They are both proficient at this time and looking forward to staying in contact with us.