Food, Glorious Food...or not so glorious!

I am amazed at how much the Japanese love fish. We went to a Japanese market the other day and it I can tell we have been a bad example to Brooklyn. She went from fish head to fish head saying "Guys,  guys, come see this one. That is so gross!" I mean, it really is nothing compared to when Papa would take us to the market in downtown Mazatlan and the pigs or half cows would be hanging from the ceiling. Still, it is pretty gross. 

This was kind of interesting and incredibly unsanitary. Just use the tongs and pick up which frozen "item" you want. Not sure what any of them were except for maybe a hamburger patty. 

On the other hand, I have found something I will truly miss when we no longer live in Japan. Okinawa salt cookie Ice cream. It is possibly the best flavor of ice cream I have ever tasted. 

The kids and I went to a Japanese furniture store. Nothing like a "little" furniture to make you feel like a child. Either that, or feel like you could never sit on anything made by the Japanese because it would probably break. 

Another GENIUS idea- looked for the flusher for a while until I realized it was the button on the floor. 

We miss skyping with family on Sunday evenings, but story time with Daddy is the best ever!

A bit of a rough week!

This week was a bit of a rough week. We started out with Brooke being sick (which sometimes is not a bad thing because it slows her down a bit) but this time it was not that case. Not feeling well made her especially cranky and I feel like she has learned to whine with the best of them. (We are starting a sticker chart which I hope will help this next week.) Of course when one gets sick they share it with the others and Spencer has been there and so has Curtis. All different symptoms but all not feeling the best.
Here is Brooke with her swollen green eyes. She had green goop coming out of them all week.

In the meantime, I have found that stickers can be the most entertaining thing around!

Spence had another doozy, ran into the door at the gym. Can't really tell from the pic, but it was a nice big goose egg. 

We had some friends come over and made this cool play dough. It is 1 cup conditioner and 2 cups cornstarch. Entertained ages 1-11 for a full 45 minutes. 

Thursday was a rather rough day because we found out my Grandma Jensen had passed away. She was very healthy and then got an infection that took her life 2 days later. What an amazing women she was! I loved the way that she gave selfless service everywhere she went. Every year she sent you a birthday card with the sweetest hand written message in it. She sent them to all her kids, grandkids and great grandkids. 

 I am so glad my kids got to meet her (Spencer for the first time) just a couple weeks ago. It breaks my heart that I only have one grandparent still here on earth, but so happy that my children have 2 amazing sets of grandparents that love them so much. 

OnThursday after I got the news I was crying at the table and Brooklyn came and wanted to know why I was crying. After I explained it to her, she said "we can say a prayer and Jesus will make you feel better." She then proceeded to give one of the sweetest prayers I have ever heard. Her faith is amazing. I know exactly what the Savior meant when he said become as a little child. 

Friday was date night and Curtis and I were so excited to get a babysitter and be out by ourselves. It was an adult game night at the church, but only about 4 couples showed up. We played about 5 or 6 rounds of knock-out and then went out for ice cream.  It was fun to be doing the same thing Curtis and I started doing in the beginning of the dating stage. It had been a long time. 

Saturday Curtis won the hero of the day award. He took the kids to the aquarium and gave me a good 5 hours of me time. Of course I took a nap and then just enjoyed some quiet time. We are really going to enjoy our year pass there. 

We hear bugs are a bit of a problem here. This beauty was at the church. The sad thing is I think this is one of the smallest we will encounter. Oh Boy!

Hopefully we will have more adventures in the near future. 

American Village

This week was a busy week- which it was kind of nice to have things to do. We FINALLY moved into our home and are so excited to be here. The next exciting thing will be to get the rest of our stuff. We have government furniture right now and it is nice (all except for our bed- I have one word for it....nightmare). Our stuff should arrive in about 3 weeks. The one nice thing about not having all stuff is our house seems very large with a lot of open space. That will not be the case when they deliver 4,000 lbs of stuff! Yikes!

Our cars and house

Don't be deceived, that is 4 houses in 1, not all ours (wouldn't that be awesome). Quick funny story- the day we picked up our keys we went by to check it out again. We had gone by on Sunday and met the neighbors that live in B (we live in C) who happen to have a very large dog. So when we went by with the keys Brooke wouldn't get out of the car because she was afraid of the dog. That lived next door. That was in the house. And they have a fence. So Spencer and I got out and walked around while Brooke screamed in the car. When I came back she was screaming and crying because she had wet her pants. It kind of reminds me of a dog that gets really excited and then pees on the floor. She does the same thing if she is really mad or scared. I was not happy about it at the time, but I can laugh now. Poor girl is never going to go next door and play with the little girl her age because she is terrified of their dog. 

The day we moved in someone took our kids for about 8 hours- it was awesome. Curtis and I took a break and went out to lunch. You can't really see it, but that is the ocean behind the golf course. It was a pretty sweet view.

This Saturday we spent the afternoon at the American Village. I know, we are kinda pathetic still sticking to the American things, but I am sure we will get more adventurous as time goes on. We found a FROZEN YOGURT place which I was super excited about. The yogurt was pretty delicious, but the toppings were sub par. They have a bunch of shops, restaurants, a play place, a beach, etc.

Here are just a few pics from that evening. 

This is the hardware store. They have these strollers at a lot of places and Brooke loves them. She asks me to spin her in circles the whole time we are shopping.

MIHAMA KIDS PARK

I think you pay about $5 per hour per kid, but it is indoors and they absolutely loved it. Great place to go when it is so stinkin humid outside!

I think this is Sunset Beach

Can you believe we actually got one with him looking at the camera!

She is learning how to pose for pictures

Brooke took this one- not bad except for the blurriness. We can blame that on the hazy weather .

Last Week of Play Time

This week was Curtis' last week of having a nice schedule. He starts seeing patients at 7:30 tomorrow morning.  I am very grateful that he will be on a regular schedule and hardly ever have to work a weekend (like maybe 1 a year). Hopefully his days won't be too long and we will be able to play a little throughout the week.
This week we tried to take advantage of Curtis getting off early. (Man Emily, I don't know how you remember all the things you do every week. It was only 6 days ago and I already don't remember.)

We have been to 2 beaches so far. I don't think we will ever run out of new beaches to go to, which is pretty awesome.  The first was Torii Beach which is on the military beach Torii Station. It was nice, but there were a lot of rocks on the sand it was pretty rough of the feet.

The kids enjoyed the splash pad that was on the other side of the sand probably more than they did the actual beach part. 

The other beach was Tropical Beach. This is a Japanese beach so there were a ton of locals there. The sand was perfect for making sand castles and the water was clear like a swimming pool. I wish I would have taken more pictures, but it was so bright that day I could hardly see the phone! The funny thing about this beach was that they played Japanese music on the loud speaker. It was a good thing you could kind of drown it out if you were busy chatting, because the music was awful. It sounded like something you would hear at a mourning ceremony for the dead. Non stop.

We found a little kimono (I think that is what its called) and Brooke tried it on. We didn't buy one yet, but I am sure we will before we leave.

We drove up the coast to the Churami Aquarium. It was about an hour and a half away, but probably only 40 miles. The speed limit is so slow so whether you are on the expressway or not, it takes forever to get somewhere. The land looks much different as you drive up the coast. I think this is more where the wealthy Japanese come to vacation. They have a lot of nice hotels and shorelines and it doesn't look nearly as ghetto as it does around our base.

 On the way we stopped at A&W for dinner. I know at some point we will go to non-American places to eat, but it is kind of hard. You don't even know if places are restaurants or hardware stores. Besides that, I am not a fan of fish or anything from the sea- which really limits  the things you can eat in Japan. If I could read a sign I would be happy to stop for some fried rice or beef and broccoli. At the A&W there was a lady passing out balloon animals. At first I was hesitant thinking we would have to pay or tip her. Not so, not in Japan. The kids were super happy about that. They also had a shelf of kid books you could look at while you wait for your food. Pretty incredible for a fast food place. The down side is our food looked like it came off the dollar menu. Tiny hamburgers, tiny chicken sandwiches and some nasty fries with no salt. I don't know about you, but the reason I eat fries is for the salt! No salt, no good. 

The Aquarium was pretty amazing. I couldn't believe the size of this tank. We got a year pass so we can go as much as we want!

These whale sharks are like 30 feet long (or something close to that) 

We didn't even get the chance to explore it all because we got up there too late. Good thing we can go back. Brooke really wants to see the dolphins next time.

We had to make a stop at the restroom while at the aquarium. First I see this sign outside by the drinking fountain. I am not sure why you would need a separate drinking fountain just for gargling water, but apparently you do. I have seen some pretty awesome signs around so I decided I will share my favorites with you as they come along.

The next thing was the bathroom. Brooke walked into one stall, totally normal. Of course there was a bidet and the toilet seat was warm (which by the way, yes, I did try it out and it was pretty much awesome. Not only did it shoot a little cleansing water, but it can also shoot air to dry you off afterward. I must say the Japanese are genius sometimes). Then I open the next stall and my first thought was "something went terribly wrong with installation of this toilet"!

Then I remembered they call them "squatty pottys". I don't even have the slightest clue how you would use a toilet like this. I hope to never have to find out because guaranteed if I do, I will have to make a stop at home for a quick outfit change if I have to try.

One night we went out for Tepanyaki. Curtis and I thought the "show" the chef put on was pretty cool. Spencer even watched while he juggled the bowls and set our food on fire. Brooke, on the other hand, wanted nothing to do with it. She either hid under the table while he was cooking or backed away as far as she could to keep herself from the cooking. Sometimes I don't know what to do with someone who is so frightened of everything.

The other day we tried to drive to get the car looked at at a shop. It was raining so hard, I felt like I was driving through the ocean when the wind would blow.  I couldn't see a thing and didn't know where I was going so I may or may not have let her know I was a little scared. Now she is afraid of the rain. She told me she didn't like Japan any more because of the rain. Hopefully we don't have to go anywhere mid week this week because there is another typhoon expected to come. 

One day we walked to the grocery store for just a few things. I thought it would be nice since there was a nice breeze outside. When we came out of the store it was raining. This rain was like a heavy mist. I am not sure how to describe it except for standing with your face and 2 inches from a mister. By the time we got to our hotel we were soaked. The whole time we were walking I couldn't help but belt out "Singing in the Rain" the entire time. 

I wish you could tell how wet we are in this picture

We get to move into our house this week and we are super excited about it. Tonight we went by to meet the next door neighbors. They just happen to have a 3 1/2 year old daughter. I know that is not a coincidence. I thank our Father in Heaven for answering our prayers with our house. I sure hope we love it!