Michelle Obama came to speak at the base, to launch a new initiative called joining forces. I had to leave at 6am to get on base in time, so a neighbor was nice enough to wake up early to take them, and then delivered each of them to school. After riding a bus to the field house we had to go through security, then wait and wait and wait. After 2 hours the presentaion finally started. Generals, a senator the husband of the NC govenor were first to speak, praising military families for doing all that we do. Then Jill Biden came out and spoke for about four minutes, followed by a 10 minute speech by Michelle Obama. It was alot of cheerleading about all we do and accomplish even though our spouses are gone, and how this initiative is supposed to improve, work and education opportunities, and increase volunteerism to assist us while our spouses are gone. There was not much concrete. Some businesses have pledged to increase hiring of separating military or to try to employ spouses within there company if possible when they move, but nothing earth shattering or that will really have an impact here.

It was a beautiful day today, look at blue sky behind Sean, no touch ups!

Only Catie had soccer this weekend

Last night a friend slept over and I took everyone to the dock this morning to get them off the Wii.

And here is the start of our garden

It’s that time of year where we are living at the soccer field it seems. Saturday Sean had 2 games back to back

That last photo is one of Sean’s team mates – Christos, I thought it was just such a great picture. Then Christos spend most of Sunday here playing. Then we rushed to see how Sean had done at the District Pinewood Derby. The race had started 30 min late, so we got there in time to see the last 4 heats in the Tiger division

. Somehow Sean managed to take 2nd place again, and not behind the first place finisher of his pack races. I had told him that he probably wouldn’t place since we had raced his car in the open at his pack derby and it hadn’t done so well, but he proved me wrong!
Then it was off to Catie’s soccer game

Here’s a few more pictures. Sean came in second in his Tiger pack at the Pinewood derby. Catie had fun racing too, until she didn’t get a trophy. The medal around her neck is from her field day earlier in the week. So on the way home she was in tears, saying she wanted something special for herself, first a cat, then a dog, then she wanted Calie to be hers etc. When she woke up the next morning all was better.

And here’s a pic from Catie’s birthday party, with her friend Sara getting ready to blow out the candles on the doll cake. She picked a blue dress because boys like blue and a princess because girls like princesses.

Here are some pics from our Va Beach vacation. We lucked out with some pretty good weather for Feburary, unfortunately the laptop died after downloading pictures, so we don’t have the pictures from our mini golf outing, and from the zoo.

It’s still hard to get pictures of Sean, but fortunately Catie still loves the camera

Here are pictures from a day we went up North and made our own Shisa’s at Sachi’s followed by lunch at Pizza in the Sky

Last Saturday and this Saturday, we ventured out to beaches nearby. Sean always says that he doesn’t want to go, he’d rather stay home and play with friends, but once he gets to the beach, he doesn’t want to leave. Here’s pics from last Saturday.

And here are some pic’s from this morning at the beach, I’m definitely going to miss the blue of the water here…

Wednesday, Sean, Catie and I played hooky. After suggesting a trip to the Aquarium, Sean and Catie decided they wanted to go to the Pineapple Park. They like eating their way through the gift shop there.

First we hit the seashell gallery, so they could really work up an appetite. We saw these little guys in the giftshop and want to try making them ourselves

After eating our way through all the pineapple goodies, I bought the stuffed shisa that Catie had been asking for for months. Sean bought a smaller shisa plus two scarry looking monkey shisas, he’s learning math, and likes to try negotiate and buy more things that equal the same as Catie is getting.

After, we went to Ufuya for lunch. The soba isn’t anything special (Sean says it’s his favorite, but he has yet to meet an Okinawa soba that he doesn’t like)

and the kids love the scenery. Here’s the view from our table

After lunch, Sean and Catie had ice cream. This time Sean opted for plain black sugar ice cream and Catie had chocolate

On the way home we stopped in at a glass factory. Fortunately we made it out without breaking any glass. The kids had fun posing with the glass mosaics.

It would be fun to come back and blow glass ourselves here or do another craft (at least in Catie’s case) before we leave here.

The kid’s school concert was last Saturday- they call it Hapyukai in Japanese. Sean was awesome and impressive and had a great time performing. Catie was a little out of it, since she woke up with a nasty cough and need a little drugs before going to the concert. I’m not sure that the drugs affected her performance all that much though, Catie being Catie.

During the final song, all the classes were out on the stage, and you can tell Catie was a little annoyed by the boys performance next to her!

Afterwards we took them out to White beach for lunch and then some time on the beach. Sean thought this rock formation looked like someone on a boat.

The sun has finally returned to Okinawa, so we headed north for a day trip. First stop was the Butterfly garden. Catie requested to go here a few weeks ago, but we were waiting for the nicer weather. Finally!

After checking out the butterflies, we headed to Ufuya- “Big House” in the Okinawan dialect, for lunch. We had read that it was a beautiful place to go, but had no idea what we were in store for-

The restaurant was nestled up to a hill, with dining rooms opening out onto the hillside and waterfalls. After eating a yummy soba and goya lunch, we went climbing up the hillside. There were numerous waterfalls (all artfully man-made)

with various rest stops along the way

and a perfect spot for throwing kids into a pool!

And we finished off our visit with brown sugar/pineapple vinegar soft serve ice cream, which is much, much better than it sounds…