What a great weekend!

Friday we went to explore a bit of the island. We found this fun arcade place that Sam and Bella had fun playing games. Most of the games didn't have any english written on them so it was fun trying to figure out what we were supposed to do! It was fun though! We aslo got to meet Sam's kindergarten teacher and her assistant. She seems very nice and Sam had fun getting to know them both.

Today we went Ms. Phai's Auction again! We got some beautiful pieces! Juanpablo was able to get almost all of the things that he had wanted. I got some pretty stuff. I got cups and saucers to match the plates and bowls that I got at the last auction. And a really pretty tea set. The funny thing is that I don't drink tea of any kind, but now I've got 2 beautiful tea sets!

The set in the front is the newest tea set, the one behind it is the one that I got the last auction.

This is a wooden sword called a 7 Ring Sword. On steel swords the rings on the top are used to catch the enemies weapons while fighting!

This is a wooden weapons set with 8 different weapons. Behind the weapons you can see the wooden Katana sword that Juanpablo also got.

This is a dresser that we got. It's all wood and beautiful! The drawers are really deep and it's really nice!

This weekend was pretty fun so far! Tomorrow we have church. And on Tuesday I have a meeting with the Branch President....I have a feeling a calling is coming my way! Oh, Juanpablo also has off Monday and Tuesday! So, we have an extended weekend to spend as a family! I'm very greatful that Juanpablo is with the Marines right now instead of blue side(with the Navy). The Marines have off Monday and Tuesday, the Navy only has off Monday!

Our cars....

We finally were able to pick up our second car today. That will make it a lot easier. We have a Honda Stepwagon and now a Dihatsu (?) Stepia or something like that. I like both cars. The little one is so cute! And the van has the seats that you can turn the middle seat around so that the middle and back seats face. Sam and Bella like that because they can sit across from eachother!

Tomorrow is gonna be a big day for us. Sam's kindergarten teacher is coming to the house and he is super excited to meet her. Her name is Mrs. Russell. She seems very nice on the phone. Sam will not start school until next week. We were finally able to get everything done and get him completely enrolled in school. I can't believe that the time has gone by so fast and he is already starting school! My baby! He's not so little anymore!

Fun, Fun, Fun!!!

On Saturday we went to the MCAS Futenma Flightline Festival. It was so much fun! We all got a little tanner after being in the sun all afternoon too! They had the different helicopters and planes and you could walk through them and the kids got to pretend to fly them. It was tons of fun! They also had lots of different types of entertainment. They had the Japanese police department there with the K9 unit showing what the dogs could do. That was pretty cool! And they had something that really made me laugh, a Mariachi band! Can you believe it! Here in Japan! It was just funny to me. They also had Salsa dancers and Belly dancers. We ate some weird Japanese food. It wasn't bad actually. Juanpablo got some rice with veggies and some noodles, kinda looked like Chinese food. Sam got these pancake type stuff with some kind of weird filling, looked like refried black beans, but so did not taste like that. It was kinda sweet, I'm still not sure what it was! I got this thing that was like a pancake on the bottom and then cabbage and some other stuff and then a piece of bacon on top of that. It wasn't bad, and I don't usually like anything with cabbage. Bella ate a little bit of everything. I should have taken pictures of the food but I didn't. We were surprised by the amount of fried food they had there. We didn't eat any of that. It was really hot! They had all sorts of games set up where you could win prizes. Sam played lots of games and Bella even went fishing for a prize! There was also a kids play area with moon bounces and mazes and slides. Sam had a really great time. We all did! Bella got into some of the planes and trucks and tried driving. She didn't want to get out of the cockpits of the helicopters. I think we just might have a future pilot on our hands! Sam got to do some wall climbing too! He did pretty good. He didn't make it to the top of the wall because his arms just weren't long enough. But he did make it about halfway! Here are some pictures from our fun day!

Finally!

We are in our house and we have some furniture that we have on loan from the government. So, our house is not so empty any more. We just got a couch and a dinning room table with 6 chairs. We get to use them until we leave from here. I think that's a pretty cool thing that they do. We left our couch and dinning room set in storage in the states. Next week we should get our first shipment. And then by Sept. 15th (our 7 year anniversary) we should get our last shipment with our beds (Yeah! No more air mattresses!). Right before we left the hotel to move in here Sam got a new toy....the funny thing is, Bella loves it.





We have a pretty nice house, the rooms are pretty big and it's really pretty nice. We have 3 bedrooms and 2 baths. We also have 2 balconies! One off the living room and one off the master bedroom. The MB balcony is a little smaller than the LR one, but they both have pretty nice views! The first is from the master bedroom and the second is from the living room.






We went to the beach for the first time today. It is less than 10 minutes from our house and is really beautiful! We went to Araha Beach and there they have this big pirate ship for the kids to play on. It has a zip line and slides and all sorts of fun stuff for the kids to play on. The water is beautiful! And something that I loved, it has a net around the swimming area so you don't have to worry about getting stuck in a current and getting carried out to sea and you also don't have to worry about jellyfish or sharks getting to where you are swimming! It was Arabella's first time at the beach. She didn't really like it very much. She didn't really care for the water and she hated having the sand on her! She got really upset and started complaining whenever sand got on her foot or leg. It was kinda funny. She loves to color on herself with pens and get dirty that way, but don't put any sand on her! Here are some pictures from the beach.






Oh, so we also got a second car today. Juanpablo will be stationed here on Camp Foster where we live, but the rest of his unit is on MCAS Futenma. So, if he needed to go over there unexpectedly and the kids and I had gone out somewhere then he wouldn't have the car and would have no way to get there because it's kinda far. So, we went to the same place we got our van (B.C. Motors, in case any of you ever need a car in Okinawa, they are really good!). I still haven't taken any pictures of the van, I keep forgetting and when I remember I don't have the camera. I'll take pictures of both cars once we pick up the other one. It's a really cute little car. It's big enough that we could fit the kids in if we needed to, but it's pretty small! It reminds me of a mini cooper. All in all it was a pretty great day! Lots of fun! I also got my license so now I'm legal for driving in Japan! So, yeah, it was a good day.

Hot and Humid....

Boy was it a hot and humid day today! Juanpablo, the kids and I walked to the Exchange again today. But we made the mistake of leaving here at like 2:30 p.m.....the hotest and most humid time of the day! It made it seem like a much longer trip and took longer than usual. I wonder if we will ever get used to the weather here. It reminds me a lot of how the weather is in Brazil, and so I'm hopeful! I did get used to the weather when I was there so I hope that the same thing will happen here. When we go visit, even if it's the middle of summer, we will probably be freezing! The humidity here makes it seem way hotter than the temperature says. Even in the shade it's hot, though it is a little better. We are very excited to be getting our car tomorrow! And Sam can't wait to move into our apartment. He keeps wanting to do it today, he doesn't understand why we can't just move in now. Quite frankly I can't really understand that either. Don't know why we had to wait so long. I guess they just don't have enough housing people working in the office. The Air Force is in charge of all the housing on Okinawa and so we have to go over to the Kadena Air Force Base to sign all the papers and then go to the housing office on Camp Foster (where we will be living) and get the keys. I don't know why we can't just do it all at the same place. It's really kind of annoying. Kadena AFB is only like 5 miles from Camp Foster, but it takes about a half an hour to get there without major traffic! There are a lot of people here on Okinawa! I'm not sure when we will get Internet set up at our house so I don't know when I'll be posting on here again. I'll be sure to get some pictures of our new to us van and post them tomorrow. It will be Juanpablo's first time driving here in Japan. I still don't have my license. We couldn't do it on the same day because we didn't have anyone to watch the kids and we couldn't bring them. So, I'll have to do it soon. It's actually pretty easy, just 30 questions and they are pretty straight forward. I'm a little nervous about driving on the wrong side of the road though! And I'll probably keep going to the passenger side when I'm supposed to be driving! Today when we were walking to the Exchange I was watching the cars driving by, and most of them had 2 or more people in them. Then I saw 2 cars in a row that only had a driver, and I'm not kidding, the first thing that pops into my head is "How is that car driving? Where's the driver?!" It took me a minute to remember that the people in the "passenger" seat were actually the drivers! hahahaha! Sometimes I make myself laugh! I mean Japan is pretty far technologically, but they aren't that far!

Auction...

We just got back from an awesome auction! They have it about once a month and they have all their stuff super cheap to start. They had lots of things that went for $1 and had like 12 different little figures and stuff like that. It was awesome! We got a $100 trunk for only $17! And a beautiful set of 6 bowls and 8 plates that are real stoneware for $11! And lots more! We arent' unwrapping the stuff now cuz in a few days we will be moving into our house. I'll post some pictures of our beautiful new stuff once we move into the house. Oh, we also got this set of intricately carved real jade balls! I'm really excited about those! There are 3, 1 big and 2 small. They are a ball within a ball within a ball, there are like 6 balls in all! They come with bases that they sit on. It's so nice! I'm so excited about the beautiful ball that I just had to unwrap it to take a picture to show you all! We got those for only about $20. And they are real jade!

I'm just so excited about the auction. They had a really pretty wood and marble side table that was marked for $400 and it sold for $114 (we didn't bid on it cuz we had walked there and had to carry everything we bought!) Juanpablo got this warrior figure that he is really excited about. It's pretty cool!

We got lots of other fun new things too. It was a great day! And since this website has gotten the kinks worked out that were preventing me from posting pictures now I can go back and post the pictures on the other post! Yeah! It's been a great day!

Japan....

Well, 1 week ago we arrived in Japan. I guess technically 1 week ago right now we were still in a plane flying over the pacific ocean, but it's close enough. We haven't gotten to see much of the island yet. But, we did get a car yesterday. They have some crazy stuff here when it comes to cars. We can't actually pick up the car until Tuesday because they have to take it to get the JCI inspection. It is a Japanese inspection that has to be done every 2 years. So, we bought the car yesterday and they will take it to get the JCI on Monday and then we can get it on Tuesday. We also got offered an on base apartment which we accepted. It is pretty close to where Juanpablo will be working so that's good. We got to tour it yesterday and it's pretty nice. We forgot to take pictures of both the car and the apartment, but we will get pictures once we actually have the car and apartment and then we'll post them here. Sam and Bella are really liking Japan so far. It's very hot and very humid, but it's nice. Beautiful!