Sunday

This was a "practically perfect" day.

Sunday School was great. Thanks, Renee.

Covenant Players presented a message in drama at chapel. They were good. Ms. Amber gave me info for Josiah and Jamin. She graduated from ASU and now travels with Covenant Players. She had names and mission opportunities etc sponsored by a campus ministry there.

During the "meet and greet" time I discovered a new family will be living in the same subdivision as us.

This afternoon we headed to the ocean - AGAIN. Rodney, Windy and the kids found themselves there too.

Maggie and Stacia (gotta work on social skills and sharing with this gal)


Arielle & Gracie


Benji


Nolan and Molly - I love this photo

We all drove over to the subdivision. What fun when Rodney pulled up into our driveway to talk to us...our FIRST VISITORS!!!! Then the husband from the family at chapel showed up. Are you ready? They are going to live directly across from us. ::snort::

Choosing Joy!
©2009 D.R.G.

~ Coram Deo ~
Living all of life before the face of God...

MY BOYS ARE COMING!!!

My boys are coming to Japan. I'm so excited. OK - OUR BOYS are coming to Japan. They won't make it for Christmas, because they have to work, but they think they can fly out the 27th and they'll be here for two weeks.

I went right out and tried to find samurai swords to give them for Christmas....wonder if they'll settle for samurai or sumo kokeshi dolls?????

We must remember to check into this whole "dependent ticket" thing next week.

Choosing Joy!
©2009 D.R.G.

~ Coram Deo ~
Living all of life before the face of God...

Shopping and Relaxing...

Arielle and I went to the "big" Bazar sponsored by the MOSC today. We bought Christmas presents for grandparents and the girls.

Mom, I almost bought you a most unique nativity - until I found it was the "seven gods". ::snort::

After lunch, Arielle and I met up with Windy and Molly (Mollie?) and explored shopping spots in Misawa. We went to a Y100 store, Sundays and Sanwado... I shortened Windy's life by two years on one of the narrow roads...but what's a few years amongst friends? ::snort::

We are looking for the same sorts of items, student's desks, futons, shelves....it was a fun day. I think it will prove productive too.

My wonderful husband, Michael, spent the day with our three youngest....something they greatly enjoyed. Jared was helping a friend put up a shed. We all got home about the same time. Mike suggested we pick up a chicken and.....go to the BEACH!

Our Beach - 2 miles from "home"

Hard to relax with the waves flinging these things against your ankles. ::snort:: This is ONE jellyfish.

Back at the TLF Michael and the boys played two hours of basketball. They're showered and settling down and I decided to check email and throw some photos up.

Choosing Joy!
©2009 D.R.G.

~ Coram Deo ~
Living all of life before the face of God...

One step forward...THREE steps back

1. I was told by our rental agent that if the base gave us the lease on Friday we could pick up the key on Friday.

2. Our homes passed inspection Friday a.m.

3. We showed up at the base housing office and they asked us to come back Monday to pick up the lease. No ONE can look as pathetic as I when I say, "But we've been in TLF for 11 weeks with 5 children." ::snort:: She gave us the lease and asked us to come back on Monday to take care of the rest of the base paperwork. We'll start to receive the allowance for living off base overseas.

4. We went to the rental agent's. She'd said she'd call Friday and hadn't. Turns out she was out all afternoon. I suspect she thought she was safe telling me we could pick up a key Friday as she knew its not typical for the base to give out leases the day of the inspection....but SHE didn't figure on my pathetic routine. ::snort:: ANYWAY - we CAN'T get a key until Monday because the carpenter still needs access this weekend. ::sigh::

5. We stopped by TMO (to schedule delivery of our household goods). They said it shouldn't be a problem to get our shipments in this upcoming week...but they "can't schedule it until we give them a copy of the signed lease." They also are unaware that there is a subdivision of 12 new homes that is going to be ready on Monday. ::snort::

6. We stopped by to schedule phone and Internet hookup. They can't do that because they "can't schedule it until we give them a copy of the signed lease." They also said that it will take up to 3 weeks to get service because "Koishi, she gonna build out in no where!" ::snort:: ::gasp::

7. Bottom line....we didn't sign the lease, receive a key, or schedule anything yesterday....yet we spent a full day not doing it. ::SNORT:: As I said, the lesson I'm learning this week is that around here the key is to be politely patient.

We have a meeting at 9:00 a.m. with the rental agent to sign the lease. THEN we'll retrace our steps and see about a dozen various offices (OK - 5 offices) with the copy of the lease. We HAVE to be out of TLF by next Saturday. We will be moving this week. We pray we move when we have beds, a fridge and a stove. If not, we'll camp out in the house.

After all THAT, we collected the kids and went to the beach. It was a blast. Mike was suitably impressed. I suggested we change "Friday night pizza and a movie" to "Friday night s'mores on the beach"....Arielle wants "Friday night pizza and then s'mores on the beach". ::snort::

I had ordered a replacement of Tim Hawkin's "I'm No Rockstar" along with the new Banana DVD and they arrived yesterday. We watched those and I laughed until I cried. I also got a CD with the songs on them and that was GREAT in the car. We are having a hard time with no English stations in the car.....and few CD'S traveled with us.....

The theme of this week has been "living surrendered". You may note that SURRENDER was Last Year's Memorial Stone (see the side bar)......but Sunday we read some excerpts from CS Lewis in class and were challenged to begin each day this week by committing to "living surrendered"...and wow...what opportunities I've had to live it out. Sometimes with success, sometimes with failure, sometimes with whining...but always with a heart that desires to follow Him fully.

Choosing Joy!
©2009 D.R.G.

~ Coram Deo ~
Living all of life before the face of God...

Yesterday's Adventure

We went out to check the progress on our home. They may well be done by today. We pray.

Jared and I were sure that we were near the ocean. We decided to go find it. I'll save the video for when I'm in a house with Fiber Optic connections. It appears that this Verizon line on base simply doesn't allow me to load videos. I'll post it later. Twyla had called and invited us to follow her to shipwreck beach yesterday...but we had the drama workshop. This all spurred us on to explore by our home....because it was a beautiful day!

THIS is what we found about 2km from our home (is that about a mile)? For a minute, I thought we'd found Shipwreck Beach and thought that would be hilarious as we tried to find it and drove for a couple of hours a few weeks ago....but it isn't.

Arielle came home, got out Apologia and researched for us.

Big crashing waves, lots of wonderful sand, shells, jelly fish, picnic areas, squatty potties, camping spots...

Welllllll.....they must mean us to enjoy the beach as there are restrooms, and tent sites on this sign...not sure about the rest of it....but Jared did make out that this is Momoishi beach on one sign. It's handy for him to be working on Kanji and Hiragana. We were able to verify the name of the beach later on another sign. Cool!


LOOK - the first public basketball hoops we've seen...we are so blessed!


People talk about beachcombing and finding glass balls and floats...but we left it....

I cried when I saw this so close to the house. It's a dream. I LOVE the ocean. I'm so blessed that God put us 3/4 to a mile away...an easy walk....AND it has basketball....we are thrilled.

Choosing Joy!
©2009 D.R.G.

~ Coram Deo ~
Living all of life before the face of God...

Covenant Players in Town

Thursday the kids were blessed to be able to participate in a homeschool drama workshop led by Covenant Players. The games and activities all led the kids to explore the seven elements of drama. We were personally excited that Ms. Amber had attended college at ASU in San Angelo.
Zander calls out animals for others to act out.


Arielle inserts a pencil into a pencil sharpener....

I have a couple of other great photos, but they show faces of others' children so I won't post them. I loved the one that Nolan's group came up with. They were a toaster. They picked Nolan and another boy, Michael to be the toast. Michael's mother and I tried to figure out why Nolan was going down and Michael was popping up.....until the Covenant Player facilitator explained that they'd thought it up themselves. The toast went down white and popped up black. ::snort:: I should have asked Maisha if I could use the photo, but didn't think of it.

We look forward to the Covenant Players presenting the sermon in drama at Chapel on Sunday.

Choosing Joy!
©2009 D.R.G.

~ Coram Deo ~
Living all of life before the face of God...

Today's Adventure

Be sure to watch until you hear Zander's comment on the location. ::snort::

©2009 D.R.G.