It's Moving Day!!

 Fine.  June 19th was moving Day.  I'm a wee bit behind, and I expect some forgiveness there, since you know, we were MOVING!

The movers showed up on time at 0830 Monday morning.  They brought about 5 packers and got to work.

 I love the Japanese movers.  They laid out a tarp to protect the yard.  They taped padding to the door to protect the frame, and they lay down floor protection too. This is what it looked like.

See, all nice and safe from thumps and bumps.

My dining room and kitchen are all packed up!

Boxes on the lawn, ready to get loaded on the truck. They packed and loaded till 6:30pm.  They got about 4 crates done that night, and most of the house packed.  I was a little grumpy that they mostly packed all the rooms, but didn't fully empty any room.  So it was ALL craziness inside.  But that is what moving is.

Tuesday they were back at it.  They packed, carted boxes to the lawn and then loaded up the crates, which were conveniently in the truck.

Look how awesome the truck is!  I love the fold up door. It makes for easy access and the crates fit perfectly inside.  We filled this truck and another came to take it's place.

 They were wrapping things up at 12:30, while I was vacuuming the upstairs.

This is what our "Do Not Pack" room looked like.  It was the bathroom and we just hucked everything in that we didn't want packed up for 2 months.  Such a mess!  It was fun to sort it all out and make sure it all fit into suitcases.And by fun, I mean NOT fun at all.

 1pm and they were all done!  Goodbye stuff! They left with 11 crates of stuff and it weighed in at just over 10,000 pounds (which was well under our limit.)

 The house cleaners worked on it on Wednesday and on Thursday, we officially became homeless, as we checked out at 3pm.  Goodbye house!  We sure loved living here.

A Little Haircut

Callie has been growing her hair long for several years.  She decided that now that school was over, she wanted to do something else with her hair.  She wanted a hair cut.  So after our last Sunday in Iwakuni, she asked me to cut it.  A lot.

I didn't think to get a better "Before" photo, but I didn't think of it till almost too late.

I took off a lot, which she asked for and she was happy with it.

Last Day of School

Callie's last day of school face.

Delaney, walking out of this school for the very last time.

Rylee, dashing out of her classroom on the last day!

Elementary School Award Ceremony

On the very last day of school, the Elementary School had an award ceremony.  It was significantly shorter than the High School one, thank goodness.

Delaney was recognized for her good grades.

You can't tell, since I was so far away, but she was so cute!

Callie was on the Honor Roll as well. 

She hid in the very back so you can't see her.

I still got a picture of her!

Callie was back up for the coveted Commander's Award.  She had been working towards it all year.

All the kids in school who achieved this award. 

There was another award called the Presidential Award that Callie received.  I don't remember what-all the requirements were, but Callie got it and I was proud of her.

Only 5 kids got this award.  Nowhere for Callie to hide!

Heh heh heh. 

She really was happy, I promise.

This is Callie's teacher, Ms. Billups, whom I love and adore.  Callie loves her too, but hates to have a photo.

Ms. Billups put on a pouty face to match Callie's.

A Little Misadventure

My friend Steph planned a trip to Hatsukaichi, to the big YouMe Town with the delicious pancakes and burger restaurant.  It was her, me, another gal and 4 sister missionaries.  We went, we ate, we shopped, we had fun.  We headed back home, with plenty of time.  Steph likes to take the Expressway, because it is so much faster. 

We were having a delightful time and were nearly to our exit, when we got a flat tire..... just as we entered a 2 mile tunnel.  We managed to limp along to a small turn out and there we sat, 2 feet from zooming traffic.

The driver side wheel was the culprit.  Steph called the insurance company and after much discussion and language barrier issues, we were pretty sure they understood the situation.

Over an hour later, this guy pulled in front of us.

There was some massive What the Heck moments as he directed Steph to pull onto the back of the truck.... with ALL of us inside! It was a little anxiety-inducing to think he was going to drive out of the tunnel with all of us inside and on the back of his truck.

But no, he had all of us get out.  Steph and the missionary with the best Japanese skill got in his truck while the rest of us waited on the side of the incredibly noisy and windy tunnel for another 30 minutes till another truck arrived and we squeezed into it.  It was less than a 10 minute drive out of the tunnel to the Expressway Exit, which has a large area for rescues like ours.

The van coming off the truck.

Yep, there's the problem!

Thes guys had it taken care of in 20 minutes, easy peasy.  They had said it was much to dangerous to work in the tunnel.  And I agree!

Yikes! There is no patching that!

Ultimately, it was just a big inconvenience.  It took about 2.5 hours out of the day, but in the end, nothing was lost but that time. And now Steph needs new tires! 

Birthdays

Callie and I both had birthdays.  Dan was out of town, so celebrations were minimal, which was fine.  Cake and Loot were all that was required, and those happened.  And Callie did NOT want any kind of big deal.  And she refused to let me take photos. Rest assured though, she had a beautiful and delicious ice cream cake and lots of gifts that made her happy.

She was grumpy about the photo, not the new back pack.

And this is all she sould give me the rest of the evening.  No face pictures.  Such a pickle!

My darling friend April bright me this cake on my birthday and I felt special.

And this is the selfie I sent my friend Lynnette (She wet to Hong Kong with me, remember?) because she sent me this gorgeous plate that arrived on my birthday.

And this was a few days later when Steph took me out to Hatsukaichi for lunch (with some other ladies) and the restaurant brought me this. Adorbs!

High School Award Ceremony

I had the pleasure of sitting through a 2 hour award ceremony for the Jr HS and HS kids.  You would think with 256 students in the entire school that it wouldn't take so long.  But you would be wrong.  Apparently 90 % of the school received at least one recognition and many received multiple ones.

Josh was recognized for his good grades.

Marian also had excellent grades this year.

She's so cute.  I love her.

Josh also got something for being an awesome Japanese student.

He does like Jsoanese class, and I expect she enjoyed him because he worked hrd and took it seriously.

One Happy Dog

Life Update

My phone and computer don't want to talk to each other.  So while I figure out how I am going to get my pictures uploaded, I'll let you know what's happening.


Crazy is happening!  School ended this week and I am trying to sort and purge and clean and the kids just want to take everything out and play with it.  It is like having toddlers again.   The house is a disaster because everyone knows the big mess must precede the organization, right?!

I am running out of time though.  The movers come on Monday.  Between now and then I have to  decide what I am going to need for the next 2 months and I need to pack that in suitcases.  And I can't bring too much because I have to haul suitcases around all summer.

We will spend a few days at the hotel here.  On Friday June 23 we will leave and fly to Okinawa.  We will stay there till Thursday June 29, when we will fly to the USA.  We will get to see family at our big-big Reunion the first week of July and that is as far as I have planned. We will hang out with my folks and hopefully with my siblings until August 15, when the kids and I will fly back to Okinawa.

Dan is going to sit on the housing list and hope something comes available on base.  If not, then when we get there, we will find something off base.  My most amazing neighbor Anne, is taking care of Levi all summer till we can come back and get him.  She does love him more than us....

Rylee's AFN Tour

The first graders got to go on a tour of the AFN building.  AFN is the Armed Forces Network- the only broadcasting military station, and the folks who bring us US television here in Japan.  They also make some pretty sweet commercials, since we don't get real commercials like you have to sit through in the States.

Anyway, I agreed to chaperone and I walked 2 blocks with Rylee to get to the building.  

Having 50 7 year olds crowded in a room touching stuff was an experience!

All the kids got to look through the camera and practice focusing it.

They even let them in the Radio room, with the $200,000 equipment.  Thankfully no one broke anything!

I thought it was very interesting, but Rylee said it was boring.