Life is good!

 I know, it has been a week, (a week!) since I last posted.  I am ashamed.  But I have been busy you know.  It isn't easy to unpack your entire household goods and get settled into a foreign country.  It has been going very well.  I did come to the conclusion that Dan is a jumper-inner, and I am a toe-dipper.  Dan wants to go out and do everything now-now-now.  I want to take it slow and get settled in, and then get comfortable before venturing out.  I want to start with small ventures and gradually work my way out.  Dan wants to get out and go now-now-now.  However, he has work to adjust to, and I have a home to make my own.

This is the good sized hall closet upstairs.  The movers stuffed a bunch of things in here. It was frustrating because I could not unpack things into this closet until I had taken out the stuff inside it and organized it.  See how full and crazy it is?!

Much better, after I spent an afternoon working on it.   

Last Saturday Dan took the older kids out and went here!  7-11!  They came back with fun goodies. 

Callie is wearing some of her treats, and showing her chips and"melon soda".   They found it to be quite the thrilling outing. 

The kids get out at 12:30 every other Wednesday.  So this Wednesday I took them back to 7-11 after school, because I hadn't been there yet!  The traffic is a little disorienting when it is on the opposite side of the road. 

This is the sign to the base.   

I let the kids all pick a treat from 7-11 and Callie chose this large ice cream cup. They only had these tiny little spoons and she certainly got a lot on her face. 

 The kids did bring home some more melon soda.  I thought it was a little weird.

Delaney wanted a picture of her drinking melon soda too.

Things I get to see.

 I went on a little stroll this evening.  Well, probably a 2 mile stroll.  We live less than half a mile from the seawall, which extends a mile down the base.  It goes further, but currently there is construction a mile down, so that's as far as you can go.

 This is the sea wall.  It is lovely for running, especially since there is no track and not sufficient sidewalks to safely run.

Check it out!!  I know all you can see is a grayish blob, but it was a Manta Ray!  Really!  Marian and i were so excited!  It was swimming right below us!  How cool is that?!

The view downriver from the bridge.

The view upriver from the bridge. 

The glorious sunset!

Hmmmm.... I should have zoomed or cropped.  I thought this was neat- kind of a little Zen Garden behind this building.  The little rock garden and cool trees there.

Random

 Guess who started school?!  I had to fill our tons of paperwork- which I went in and did on Tuesday.  They have a 24 hour wait period before the kids can go to school, so they didn't start till Thursday.  Which was fine with me, but the kids were lobbying for one more day at home.  Since school started last week, I didn't want them to miss more than necessary.  This year Marian is in 6th grade, Callie is in 4th, Delaney is in 2nd, and Joshua is in 8th.  There are only 2 schools here right now: Elementary is K-6 and the High School covers 7-12.  So Joshua is in High School now!

They were good sports.... except that kid on the right.  

Check out this nifty feature!  We have an awning that can be rolled out or  pulled in.  Awesome with the rain! You can also see our metal storage unit back there.

Look who is thrilled to be sprung from the kennel!  He still has 3 weeks left for his Quarantine, but that can be done here at the house.  He was SO happy to be back with us.  He seems pleased with his larger, luxuriously green yard.

Rylee came with Dan and I to the Friday class to get our driver's licenses.  Isn't she adorable?! 

She was also quite amazing. I gave her the kindle, with Minecraft to play, and there was nary a peep for the 2 hours it took to go over the material and take the test. 

Heh heh heh.  Dan is taking his test.  Good news, we both passed and as of 1600 Friday we are both licensed to drive in Japan!

Sights to see

 Things move at their own pace here.  You can't do much till you take the Newcomer Orientation  on Monday (usually, since Monday was a holiday, ours was on Wednesday.) You can't drive till you take the Friday class.  Then you have to pass a test to get your license and you can't register a vehicle without a license.  We are purchasing a van from off base, which adds a week and a mound of paperwork to the process.  Sigh.  Anyway, when you get here, you already know you will be on foot for a week.  It isn't the end of the world, and the base is only 6 miles long, so it is all doable, just incredibly inconvenient at times. (Especially if you have to buy groceries for a family of 7!)

However, it allows you to see fun trees, like this one!  They do some neat tree cutting.  

Walking the crew to the food court for dinner.

I think it is nice to see walking and bike riding as a way of life.  I think it is great, but I'm not a fan of hoofing it in the heat, or schlepping 50 pounds of bags from the commissary. So you know I am counting down the days till I am mobile!

Dan and I were able to take the Newcomer's Orientation on Wednesday. It was instructional for the morning, and a driving tour for the afternoon.  We got a little tour of the base, and then a trip out in town.  The bus windows were horribly dirty, so I didn't take many photos from the bus.

This store front was neat enough, I took the chance.  Sorry about the awful blurry blobs; that's all from the bus window! 

We stopped by the train station to learn how to buy tickets.  I'm not sure I'll ever be able to use the machines, but the ticket window folks usually have enough English (I was told) to get me what I need.  This was across the street and so pretty. 

My "I was there" shot. 

This is the bus statin outside the train station.  Dan is enjoying donuts from the pastry shop on the corner.  It is always good to know where to get tasty donuts!

We had 20 minutes to stroll the area.  Fun! The little blue signs had the name of the shops in English, which was mostly helpful. 

I just liked the "Mojo Curry" sign. 

Awesome supermarket.  You could not tell what a lot of things inside were.  A lot of the products had no distinguishing information on them in English or pictures.  But it was bright and fun!

The bus drove us to this iconic bridge.  I guess it is a big spot?  It was pretty, but we couldn't get off the bus, hence the awful picture through the window.  I'm sure we will go back sometime for a better photo.

The Orientation was mandatory and from 8:30- 4:30.  They did provide free child care for the kids, which was nice.  It was like an all-day date for Dan and I!

And did I mention that while Dan and I were Orienting, the movers were delivering our household goods?  Yep.  We could look down from the window on the 2nd story where our class was, and we could see the movers moving our stuff in!  It was crazy.

I thought it would be nice to not have to do it, but it wasn't.  The 3 older kids were there "helping" our Sponsor, and I think they just made up destinations for the boxes.  Nothing is where it belongs.  And the Japanese movers are happy to unpack for you.  I had though it would be nice to have the kitchen and books unpacked.  Um, no.  No, it was not nice at all.  I thought they would just unpack and stack, but they actually put the kitchen items away.  They put them away in random places.  I am going to have to rearrange the kitchen at some point.

Same with the books.  We had a book shelf in each room.  However, the books were not unpacked in their designated rooms.  So they books are all jumbled together in the wrong rooms. Those also will have to be rearranged sometime.  It has helped me realize that I like unpacking directly to where stuff belongs.  That way, when the box is empty, I am done with it.  Now, once the boxes are empty, I will still have a ton of work left.  And let me tell you how motivated I'm going to be by then.... Not at all!

But it is all part of the adventure!  Semper Gumby!

Welcome to Iwakuni!

 It has been a fun couple of days!  We flew in Friday afternoon, and had a fairly relaxing Saturday.  Dan went on a walkabout to get to know the area before sunrise.  I wasn't sure I wanted to go exploring because it looks kind of complicated.  NAS JRB NOLA was a pretty straight shot through the base, but this was more circular and seemed confusing.

 This is the view from the balcony on our Temp Lodging (military hotel).

This is the sort of housing most folks get here- the Mid Rise Towers.  They are not too bad, and pretty nice inside.

The Branch President actually lives in that mid rise that overlooks our building.  He and his wife stopped by to say hello and offered a trip to the commissary.  Since there is a kitchen in out hotel room, and no food sources without a 10 minute walk, I jumped at the chance.  It was nice to look around as we drove there and kind of get an idea where we were.  The commissary was closer than I thought.  It was also a lot tinier than I thought it would be! We got sufficient to last through Wednesday and I was happy.

I also felt braver.  So I took some girls with me and went on my own walkabout.  We discovered the food court with all the comforts of home: KFC, Burger King, Pizza Hut, Taco Bell and Subway. Oh, and there was even my favorite, Baskin Robbins!!  I saw the school and managed to find our house from there.  I was able to show the girls their new school, and where we'd be living soon.  We checked the doors, but the house was locked tight!  We peeked through the window and it looked okay, but small. There was much whining by the time we made it back to the room.  We probably walked an hour and covered a mile or so.  

We walked back to the Food Court for dinner.

Sunday friends from Facebook picked us up and drove us to church.  Church was small, but awesome!  It was nice to get out and make new friends.  The best part was a gal who gave me contact info so I could have an emergency contact when I signed the kids up for school.  That evening we went to the Branch Pres's house for dinner.  That was really nice.  And yummy.

Monday was Labor Day.  It sure complicated things, flying in on a holiday weekend!!  Dan and I did get out nice and early for a run.  I meant to bring a camera, but forgot.  And I'm so sad I forgot it!  We ran along the Sea Wall (which is similar to the Levee) and it was gorgeous!  The only other exciting thing of the day was walking over to the Thrift Store with Delaney.  It was a nice place and the folks there were full of information.  Melissa (our sponsor) came by to take us over to visit Levi.  The poor dog was so excited to see us, and so incredibly distressed when we did not take him home with us.  He was trying to climb over me as I physically stuffed him back into his kennel.  It was depressing.

This is what the vending machines look like.  I can only identify half the things in most of them.  They are kind of fun!

Today I got a lot accomplished. I walked to the school and got all 4 kids registered.  I thought it would be faster, but five million pages of paperwork take a while.  Today, it took 2 hours. But I got it done.  We did have a minor snag when they asked for Dan's original orders.  Um.... we lost those.  Somewhere between checking in for our flight back at Seattle, and landing here on Iwakuni, they disappeared.  So we haven't got any.  Don't ask me why there was only one copy.  I was able to talk the office lady into accepting Dan's web orders and area clearance, since family authorization and all the kids's names appeared on that.

Next was van shopping!  We decided we wanted something that seats more than 7.  A lot of folks here don't bother to get a vehicle, because you can walk or bike the whole base.  We wanted to have a spot to offer if someone needed a ride.  So we went to look at a van that seats 8.  It looked like it would fit our needs, so we comitted.  Now we have to pass paperwork back and forth and it will be at least a week till we actually have a vehicle to drive.

That's mostly okay because we can't drive till we take the Class on Friday and then pass the drivers test.

A fun house off base.  I like the roof.

What the streets right off base look like.  Check out the awesome blue roof on the right.

 Same thing.  We're in a rural area and they grow lotus here!  I'm not sure if it is the same thing that the lotus blossom is from, but apparently the root of the lotus plant is a dietary staple.

After the successful van-looking, we secured ourselves a house! Let me be clear that this was a miraculous thing.  Housing is getting scarce around here as they move more people here, and the construction has not kept up with demand, and a majority of housing is in the apartment-style towers, which is not thrilling unto me.  Housing will not issue you a house or put you on a wait list till you are boots on the ground physically in their office.  And yet..... and yet, they held us a house (with a yard!) AND scheduled the movers for us, before we even arrived.  It is crazy.  And I'm not gonna complain or ask too many questions.  I'm just going to thank my Heavenly Father for this huge blessing.

So we went to the housing office and did all the paperwork.  We called the movers and confirmed that yes, we would LOVE them to be here Wednesday morning to move our stuff in.  Then we took a little trip over to look at the house.

Here it is.  I have no idea why there is no grass.  I hope we get some.  If not, I'll plant me a vegetable garden.  Since that is not allowed, I bet they'll get me some grass pretty quick then!

Dan in front of the uninspiring duplex we'll call home.

The view our my new bedroom window!

How I feel trying to figure out how to fit everything in the tiny-tiny bedrooms.

I am super-excited about the good-sized pantry though.

My kitchen is a nice size and has lots of cupboard room.  And drawers.  I'm happy to have more drawers.

My new back yard. Perfect for Levi!

The living room and dining room, which I think is going to be all living room.  It is a tad smaller than our old one, which was pretty small.

The washer and dryer are off the breakfast nook, by the kitchen.  I'm happy with it.  We're going to try to fit the table and chairs in here and make it the regular dining room.

That concludes the house tour.  I may take more photos once it is full of our stuff. Now, let me tell you of the Catch 22.

Dan can't really start his check in process till he takes the Newcomer's Orientation class.  Neither of us can get a driver's license till we take the class.  So you see, things are at a standstill till we do this class.  The class is usually offered on Monday, but this Monday was a holiday, so it was moved to Wednesday.  Thus, Dan and I have to take the class on Wednesday. But wait, our movers are arriving at 8:30 Wednesday morning.  And we are scheduled to officially take the keys at 8:30 Wednesday morning.  Aaack!  What to do?!

The solution is that our utterly amazing sponsor, Melissa is going to hang out at the house, sign for our keys, and accept the house hold goods delivery.  It is a little nutty, but I'm excited to let someone else make the decisions on where to put stuff!  Well, Callie is going to help out.  The 2 little girls will go to the provided day care, and the 2 older will spend the morning at the room, and after check out, they'll hang out at the new house. Dan and I will spend the day doing the Orientation and it will be a fun surprise to see the house when we are done!

Never a dull moment! And I have to say, I LOVE it here!  It is incredible and I'm so glad.  Hopefully I'll still be thinking that in a month.