January

The month of January has been a bit of a blur and very few, if any, pictures taken. I'll see what I can recall...

• Clara Grace ended up with a slot for a private swim lesson. We had to put her on the waiting list but were fortunate enough to get the slot. We just finished week three and I am very pleased with her progress. She will continue through February and if they are offered in March I'm going to do my best to get her in then too. In order to swim without a life jacket here on the base, children are required to pass a swim test and get an arm band. Even with what she is doing now, the instructor didn't sound promising about her passing the swim test any time soon. However, like I said, I think she is doing great! She is floating, swimming under water, juming in, and able to move rather quickly. I'll admit that she often refers back to the doggy paddle technique when the head is above water though. She is becoming quite a young lady though. She and I are so different but we seem to be able to find a middle ground. She is really doing better with how she treats Zach and problem solving before yelling at him for touching something of hers. It seems that every few months I see a noticeable growth in maturity. I notice that she is getting so big too. She was stuck at 30 pounds for about three years. This year alone she has gained 7.5 pounds. As much growth as she is making, she is still a small fry. She said her current sneakers are too snug. I thought they were a size 10, checked them and they are a 9.5. We are looking for a pair online, but I'm not digging the selection. We have decided to stop her riding lessons for safety reasons, with the promise to resume (if she is still interested) when we get back to the states. She handled it well.

• Zach is really picking up quite a few words! He is pointing to lots of things and adds the sounds to lots of the animals. He understands so much of what we tell him too. He is a sweetheart, and the ladies at daycare says he takes care of the little girls. However, he takes nothing from the boys or he uses the chompers. We are working on that, but I had to sign yet another incident report yesterday. These reports are not super frequent, thank goodness, but he is a bit of a brute. He loves cars, trains, and airplanes. Charlie took him to work to pick up some papers last weekend. He showed him around the trucks and all. And he said a pilot taxying (how do you spell that?) by waved at Zach and that it was thrilling for him. Getting him to leave was not easy. The train table is a big hit for him. And books! If you need to divert him, usually the offer of reading a book will excite him. At bedtime he is getting cranky with me when I put a stop to the reading, but it only lasts until the lights are out. All in all, he is a really happy guy and thinks the world of his big sister. It is so hard to think he will be two years old in just two more months. He is growing like a weed too. He needs new shoes too and we'll be ordering a size 6 for him. Luckily, it is just ordering the same exact shoe, new size.

• Charlie is doing great. His physical therapy this week has been hard but rewarding. He said he feels like he is turning the corner and feels like he will progress quite a bit in the next month. They have him on a schedule to get him back to running. He is also really enjoying work right now. And of course he is still loving the Harley. Due to the cold weather, he hasn't been riding as much now but he ordered some cold weather accessories so we'll see how much he enjoys it. He is slated to have a short deployment within the next few months but no more details than that at this time. I have seen so many commericials about "opsec" (operation security) that are quite humorous actually but I hesitate to share more details. Of course these things change as well so we'll see. He has to be off limited duty to do it anyway.

• I'm doing really well too. I did have a minor dental set back. At my last appointment I had two very small cavities beginning and a silver crown I have had since grade school needed to be replaced. I was able to quickly take care of the small cavities, but the crown has been a bit more drawn out. He removed it but was concerned I might need a root canal, so after doing whatever he needed to do and putting a temporary on there I am to go back next week to determine if anything else needs to be done. Then when the porcelain crown comes in they will complete the process. Although I am not enjoying all this time I am spending at the dentist, it is kind of nice to be losing my "silver tooth". You do not know how many students over the years have informed me that I have a silver tooth. I was a bit concerned that I might need the root canal because after everything he did that tooth was quite sensitive but now it is starting to feel much better and I am even doing a little chewing on that side. On other news for me...I have decided to pursue a little more education. I will be attending Walden University online and getting my M.S. in Education with a specialization in curriculum, instruction and assessment. There are people I work with that have this particular degree from the same school and I am fairly confident it will go well. If I hunker down and do it continuously, I can complete it in 18 months. It is a bit intense from what I have heard but with appropriate time management it should be ok. I just got my acceptance letter this morning and will start classes February 28th.

That is our month in a nutshell. Well, it seems like I just wrote a novel. I'm going to work to get some pictures over the weekend and post them. The kids seem to change so quickly! It is hard to believe that we are almost at our halfway point of this tour. There are so many good things that have come from being here, but are very much looking forward to returning to the states.

Clara Grace is asking to be fed, so I'll skip proofreading and post now so forgive me any glaring typos please. I'm off to the kitchen...

Another lengthy update

Wow! So hard to believe my last post was about Halloween. Lots has happened since then, and I'll take you back in time as the post progresses. We have been so busy between the events below, preparing for the holidays and just day to day living. I try to snap pictures when I think to, but time to sit down at the computer to update the blog just seems really scarce. The kids are growing up so quickly and it seems they change each day. Zach is a mess, but a sweetie. He is so physical and coordinated. Clara Grace is turning into a lovely young lady, but still goofy and loves to perform.

This picture is right before bedtime Christmas night. Clara Grace is all bathed and dressed in her new American Girl pajamas that match her doll's pajamas. I just thought she looked so pretty sitting there. By the way, after much debate, she chose to name the doll Quinn. I'm assuming it is because we have watched the movie Santa Paws about five times over the last few weeks and there is a little girl named Quinn in it. Here, you can see Zach having a blast on his little battery operated four wheeler. Luckily he was beginning to get the hang of steering by the end of the day. Let's hope he doesn't regress over night. He also got the hang of dragging it into position, climbing on and taking off.

Zach is climbing onto it for the first time on Christmas morning while Clara Grace looks on.

Cheese! He is such a little ham!

Santa came!

Clara Grace and Zach are playing with toys after getting to open one gift on Christmas Eve.

Clara Grace and I made snickerdoodles to leave for Santa. She did most of the work, including cracking the eggs. At this point though we launched into team work.

These next few pictures chronicle our first trip to Ganesh, and Indian restuarant in Iwakuni. Everybody raves about it so we decided to give it a shot. It IS yummy! This is my plate.

Charlie's plate

Zach got a little from each of us, and although he was quite a pistol, he seemed to like the food.

Clara Grace got the kid's meal. She and Zach both got a yogurt drink, but she enjoyed refilling her water cup from the pitcher on the table more than anything.

This is the same day as Ganesh, but it was without Charlie and Zach. Clara Grace and I joined a couple of ladies I work with and their kids for a day trip to Hiroshima. We met at the train station and rode it into Hiroshima. We went first to the children's museum, then ate at McDonald's, stopped at a Starbucks for a sweet treat and then Cafe du Monde for beignets followed by some window shopping and then they took me to the Peace Park where this picture was taken of me and Clara Grace. At this point, I have now been to both Nagasaki and Hiroshima and to each city's peace park.

Although I took tons of pictures at the museum, I am trying to limit the number of pictures in this post. The museum was lots of fun and the language barrier wasn't too much of an issue as it was so interactive. They are looking at a big screen of them inside the game, and if you look at the screens to the left you can see it too.

This was LOUD!

This is a group shot of the ARFF Christmas party that they do each year for the Tsuta Orphanage that they sponsor. We had tasty food, Santa came and the kids ran around playing and bouncing in the bounce house.

I finally got Zach to sit down with his big sister as Santa went through his bag of gifts, handing them out to each one.

The Single Marine Program sponsors an event each year called the Thunder Run as it is a drive for the Toys for Tots donations. Charlie joined it. It was his first group ride. A band was there and a lot of the Japanese riders come on base for this. This picture is of Charlie and Clara taking the toy to drop in the bin.

Charlie is suiting up for the ride.

The kids and I walked down to the corner to take a shot of them before they took off.

The same band that played for the Thunder Run played for the Christmas Tree Lighting event on base. It is nice. They offer free hot cocoa, cider and cookies while the high school band and chorus put on a show followed by the band mentioned. Some prizes are raffled off and the tree is lit.

We were rather proud of Clara Grace as she was selected to perform in living history wax museum the school put on. The students chosen dressed as their historical figure, memorized their biographical information and waited until their "button" was pressed to tell their stories. Clara Grace was Amelia Earhart and did a fabulous job. She did this all day long, with a lunch break, as students/parents came through throughout the day. My class visited first thing in the morning. She seemed a bit nervous but I had so many people come to me and say what a great job she did AND she was among about seven of those that did it that was invited to present at a school advisory meeting the following week. I was also proud of her because of the mature way she handled missing out on a field trip. The first grade had a field trip to pick mikans but she honored her commitment to be Amelia.

The first grade put on a Veteran's Day performance that was really nice. My little performer put on quite a show too. She did a great job, but managed to stand out. And as an aside, while we were watching (I watched as a teacher and had my class with me) I noticed one of my students looking very concerned at another student. Upon closer inspection, this girl that the boy was looking at looked quite distraught. I leaned toward her and asked if she was ok. She looked at me and said, "It is just so beautiful!" And I have to agree. It was really nice to see the kids sing such patriotic songs.

Halloween 2010

We had a pretty fun Halloween this year. Clara Grace and I did several activities leading up to the big day...decorated a gingerbread haunted house, made halloween cookies and pumpkin shaped jello. She wanted to be a mermaid this year and made a lovely one. I'm still able to select Zach's costume so I decided he would be a fisherman. We also attended the base Halloween party on Saturday, which was fun too. Clara Grace also was able to dress up the Friday before Halloween at school.

I'm also impressed with the way the military families decorate for each of the holidays. I didn't do a good job of capturing the participation but there were lots of people out trick-or-treating and many homes decorated. There were also quite a few groups of Japanese families as well.

As for the pictures, they are loaded backwards in terms of when they were taken. Oops! Clara Grace saw this big cat and had to have her picture made with it.

It didn't take long for Zach to get the hang of trick-or-treating. He would say, "dank oo!"

This is at the halloween party at the gym.

Safari Land

We've heard about this place but it was way more than we expected. However, I'll begin my tale with the spirit of adventure we had as we decided on the spur of the moment to head south. I printed off the directions from information and referrals, we gased up and began our 2.5-3 hour trip to Safari Land. We did great navigating until we got really close. Luckily we found our destination entering from the opposite direction. (We had zero issues departing though.) Here, you see the entrance.

The way this works is you can drive your own car through or ride a tour bus. We drove on. Nothing like seeing signs like this as you approach. This was all we were expecting, so you'll see later on why we had such a blast. There was much more to it!

The elephants were among the first animals we saw. All of the pictures at this point are taken through the glass of the windsheild/windows so sorry for the glares and spots in advance.

See the zebra painted Pajermos (like a jeep, we drive a pajermo mini)...they were everywhere and zipping around constantly. You'll also notice later on a picture of a watch tower. They were all over the place too. These animals just go where they want in this area, except for the rhino, he was sort of penned in where he was at.

This was the next gate we had to drive through. Can you see the watch towers in the distance?

Just in case you are a complete idiot, here is the official warning. Also, I love how the English translation usually is off by a word or two.

These are bear cubs. They were roped off with their mama. She kept pacing back and forth.

Ok, we had a rather interesting experience at this point. We pulled up and were going on and on about how awesome it was to see a tiger so close. And then Charlie leaned his arm against the door, causing the window to start going down. He quickly got it going in the up direction though and we had our chuckle...and were grateful the tiger was so chill.

This was right before we pulled so close to the rock for the shot above.

After we left the tigers, we got out and enjoyed a petting zoo plus little amusement park.

Luckily, I was armed with a nice sized bottle of hand sanitizer, and off we went.

We've seen a lot of kangaroos, but have never been inside and allowed to pet them!

Next, we were able to enter an area with squirrel monkeys. I think monkeys are basically nasty creatures, but this was really neat.

This couple was feeding the monkey.

This monkey was on the guy's shoulder. I tried to get the shot, but the monkey jumped up as I snapped the picture.

This guy was in a pen...no petting him. He doesn't look very friendly does he?

Also enclosed...

These white tigers looked HUGE in person!

This guy was funny! He knew what he wanted and wasn't afraid to ask!

I gave Charlie a little bit of grief wearing Zach's backpack. I didn't expect we'd be out walking around so just made sure I had his backpack stocked with wipes, diapers, etc.

This area was awesome and really nice. There were lots of places for the kids to run, play and learn. We only did a few of them. If we had left earlier in the day we would have lingered in this area a bit longer.

These lion cubs were so frisky and cute!

This elephant was cool. The kids pumped the lever and water shot out of the trunk. Clara Grace paused to run up to it and then kids swarmed so we moved on. She wasn't particularly happy she didn't get to do it.

Ice cream is always a hit!

This had to be the lamest ride ever, but Clara Grace really wanted to ride it. It went in circles (with a little elevation) with lots of annoying barking.

This concluded our experience at the park and we went back to the car. We had such a blast and will likely return before we leave Japan for good. The kids thought it was really neat. It was out in the country and the scenery was beautiful. We had to drive through a nature preserve to get there. Unfortunately, since this was a spur of the moment trip the camera wasn't fully charged so it died as I tried to get shots of the countryside.