Since coming to Okinawa, we’ve repeatedly been told that when shopping in the base stores here, that if you see something you like, get it right then, because it will be gone the next time you go back. Apparently this is very true when it comes to Christmas. I listened to this advice, so the majority of the kids’ presents were bought in September. I was shopping for some other things back in the begining of November and saw artificial trees, so grabbed one. The stores are sold out of trees, it’s not even December and they won’t be getting anymore. The shipment of live trees goes on sale at 9 AM Saturday. There is a grand total of 375 live trees coming to Okinawa for the 1000’s of families stationed here. While I’m dreading putting together an artificial tree and keeping the kitten from climbing it, I’m just glad that we have a tree.

Occasionally I tease Jeff that I had to move half way around the world to get a decent sized home with counter space and a dishwasher that actually washes the dishes. Now I can add another to the list. When we were expecting Sean, we found a wonderful wall hanging at a Christmas in July sale, at the time I had debated getting 2 because they were so great, but only got one. As we were expecting Catie, I searched online, contacted the church that had the sale to try to track down the vendor, but just didn’t have any luck. So here I am shopping at a Christmas bazaar and ta daa

I was so excited, it’s the same size and style that Sean has, down to the stitching around each animal. So today we went out and bought a drill (the one that is here is a cordless that no longer has batteries and the corded is in storage) and hung it. We also picked up a few Christmas decorations. I think I’ll save the decorating until next week. We’ll have to wire the tree to the ceiling, because the cat will be sure to climb it.

And unfortunately our icicle lights apparently are in storage too, so we’ll have to use lots of other strings of lights. I think my strategy is going to be to use as many Christmas lights as I can, because with the weather and scenery here, it just doesn’t feel like Christmas.

Well Thanksgiving has come and gone, and I guess we have a lot to be thankful for. Jeff was able to be here for Thanksgiving and he won’t be here next year. Some really nice neighbors had us over for Thanksgiving dinner, the food and company were great, and they have the whole Disney movie collection, so Sean and occasionally Catie were entertained (okay, the adults were watching too). The have some beautiful furniture including floor to ceiling glass china cabinets, and Sean and Catie left the house with them still intact, despite some close calls.

Jeff was off to Bangladesh this morning at 4 AM. He thinks he’ll be at the embassy in the capitol helping to coordinate relief efforts there. I’ll update when we know for sure. Hopefully it will only be for a few weeks and he’ll be home in time for Christmas. This was an on again off again trip, Friday afternoon we thought he wouldn’t be going for a few more days, then the call came that they were leaving early Saturday morning. Of course, Saturday was supposed to be my day for myself, and we were planning on Christmas decorating before he left, so that will still need to be done.

As for Christmas presents, Sean and Catie really don’t need too much. Sean is getting a remote control Scrambler( a Bob The Builder character), a memory game with animals in houses, a kiddie scooter, a racing car track with two race cars that you shake up to make them go, and some other small stuff so far. Catie is getting a doll stroller, a sit n spin, a matching game, Fisher Price circus train, and market. I would get her the fisher price farm, but they don’t have them here.

For some reason, Sean has been asking to play checkers lately.(?) I don’t know where that is coming from. And we didn’t have any checkers. So we pulled out a chess set and set up just two rows each using the pawns. It gave him a good idea of how to play. Then we went to do our shopping, with the goal of picking up a real checkers game, which we did find. We waited to play until Catie went down for her nap, since she didn’t like being excluded from the game earlier in the day. Unfortunately, Sean melted down during the game and wanted his king returned to the board after being jumped. Needless to say the game was ended and it was time for his nap. After naptime we rode bikes to the park, well Sean rode and Catie pushed her tricycle. We had found a daddy doll (www.daddydolls.com) by the side of the road earlier and fortunately I knew whose daddy it was, so we were able to return it. They had been turning the house upside down all day looking for him. I’ll need to get daddy dolls for Sean and Catie before Jeff deploys. Sean did great riding his bike today. I raised the seat for him, he’s grown so much lately his knees were almost up to his chin, and it was much easier for him to pedal and get some speed. So as I said, there’s much to be thankful for.

Sleep hasn’t been the best around here lately. We still set the alarm clock, but really haven’t needed it. Between the kids and Miss Kitten, it seems like there is always someone up.

On Saturday we were really motivated and went over to Torii Station for a 5k. The night before we did the routine of packing bags, breaking down the stroller and baking muffins to have them ready for breakfast on the go. We knew that we would need to leave around 7am to get there in time for registration and hopefully a t-shirt. Not a problem. Sean was up at 5 am and loudly refused to go back to bed, which woke up Catie. We made it to the race with plenty of time to spare, so we went to the beach to look for sea shells for about a half hour. Then warmed up and ran. Jeff ran with the kids in the stroller(lucky him!) and I got to run by myself. The course was reversed from the previous run. So it was a killer up hill at the start. Jeff said that his quads were sore the next day from pushing the stroller up the hill. Afterwards we hung around for the awards ceremony and the raffle. For after race snacks they had bananas, water and coffee. They also had frozens turkeys waiting for the raffle. Sean kept asking to eat turkey and we had to explain that a) they weren’t cooked and b)what a raffle was, that not everyone was going to get turkey. During the awards, Jeff took Catie down to the park because she was bored, Sean stayed with me, playing in a cooler of ice ( and it wasn’t a warm day). Well, Sean was rewarded for staying, one of our numbers was called, and he got to go up and get a turkey. We already have plans for Thanksgiving, and it wasn’t involving us needing a turkey, so we’ll have to have some people over for dinner sometime to help eat it. And we’re not entertainers.
So that was one night of not full sleep. Kitten is the main problem. She loves chewing on the kids so much that she meows and then yowls, wanting to get into their rooms at 2 and 3 in the morning. We bring her into our room, give her a fleece blanket to rest on, let her chew on our fingers, but then she’s back at there doors. This is happening every night. So last night we finally bansished her to the kitchen, closing her in there with a bowl of food, her litter box and a fleece blanket in a laundry basket. She seemed pretty happy. However, Sean is sick.

So he was up ALL NIGHT coughing and coughing. Usually benadryl will do the trick for him and slow down the postnasal drip that causes the cough. I was only able to find some chewable benadryl, not the liquid that we usually use and it has not been any help at all. So we listened to Sean coughing and then kitten started meowing and yowling at 5. We could hear her, but it wasn’t as loud as when she’s right outside the door.

Grandma Patti returned to Florida yesterday, so now we are adjusting back to normal. Sean was up until 9:30 last night, very quietly puttering in his own room. Of course, when we had gone to put them to bed Sean decided he wanted to sleep in Catie’s room, but that only lasted for a few minutes. And Catie is happy that mom can’t be lazy and leave her home when taking and picking up Sean from school. She loves visiting the teachers and playing on the playground there.

Before Grandma Patti left, we took her to the butterfly gardens and the aquarium. Pictures of the aquarium are shown in the gallery, this was our third visit there. what we saw this time that was new to us was how they developed Fuji’s artifical fin and all the fins they tried before finding the right one. Since we were sans camera, I took a disposable camera and still have to get the pictures developed. At the butterfly garden they have lots of tree nymph butterflies inside a netted building along with a few other varieties. They are huge black and white butterflies that are native to this area. When we first arrived on island, we had been out walking and one landed right on Sean. We later learned that they are attracted to red, and he had had on a red t-shirt. At the garden, they have red ball caps staged all around, and they get covered with butterflies, so hopefully some of the pictures will come out. Catie was scared to death of them and whimpered whenever they came near her.

Well, it’s been a busy week with no pictures to show for it. We went to Ryukyu Mura, kind of a living history museum of Okinawa from the Ryukyu dynasty time, with Gma Patti. There were dancers with costumes and dances from that time period. Sean went to school because he is afraid of the shishi mae, which they also have performing there. They had old houses which had been brought from different parts of the island, a pottery factory with a kiln which ran up the hill to get the heat hot enough, and a demonstration of how they make brown sugar from the sugar cane which grows all over the island. The brown sugar was super yummy. We ate lunch there and were just in time for another dancing show with much more elaborate costumes.
Jeff and I attended two Marine Corps Birthday balls this week too, so we’ve been on the run. Unfortunately, at the second ball my camera was stolen, and I hadn’t downloaded the photos from Ryukyu Mura,( or the naked kids in the tub with the kitten) so those are all gone, along with our Ball pictures. I hate being without a camera, so needless to say Rebecca and I were skyping and searching online for cameras this morning and found one with free shipping (to her) and free memory, so when it arrives, she’ll turn it around and send it to me. Now James just has to remember to send me the bill for shipping of the last package!

Today we took Grandma Patti to the Nago Pineapple Park. On the northern part of Okinawa they grow pineapple and here they have a processing plant, store and a pineapple garden showing all different varieties of pineapples. To start, you get into a pineapple mobile, which takes you through the gardens.

After that there is a sea shell gallery, which Sean really enjoyed after finding shells and coral at the beach last week,

after that was pineapple wine tasting, juice tasting and food tasting with every type of food with pineapple in it imaginable.

Here’s Sean checking out the shisa outside the pineapple park. After that you would think we would be full, but there was still a little room left, so we went to a restaurant right across the street for lunch. The meal was delicious, Sean had Okinawa soba, Jeff and I had various terriyakis and Grandma Patti had shrimp. I’ll try to remember to take pictures of food in the future like Rebecca, but it was very good.

Happy Halloween, it was our busiest day of the year so far, and even if it wasn’t, it sure felt like it. We started the day by getting Sean into his costume (a pirate one that was too small) and off to school. Then back home to get Catie into her princess costume. She started crying a minute after getting it on and didn’t stop until I took it off. And I got dressed up in what I used to wear to work, so I looked like a doctor. Grandma Patti dressed up as a Grandma, and off to school we went again. As at all Hanazono functions, the children started off with a song and dance. Then the parents were asked to join in on another song and dance. Individual pictures of the children and accompanying family were taken on the stage. Games were played. More pictures were taken.

Each class then had it’s own halloween pinata, which the moms were in charge of breaking for the children. Our pinata came down after the second hit, but still required alot of beating until it opened up. At this point Catie was super tired and ready to eat all of her candy that she had gotten in a game.

But the activities weren’t over yet. After getting back into class lines and more talking, Seans class was sent downstairs to change clothes or put their art smocks on over their costumes. And the teachers and moms of the older classes were setting up for lunch. I told Sean that we would be leaving because Catie was too tired to stay and eat and really needed to go home for a nap. He said that he needed a nap too and wanted to come home with us. So home we all went.

After naps, time to get back into costume! I showed Catie her princess dress and she kept pointing to the dress she was already wearing. Needless to say, Catie went as herself. Some friends of ours were wonderful and invited us to their block party, with bobbing for apples, dinner for the kids, basic pre-trick or treating fun. Sean had a blast and enjoyed playing with his friend Aiden, who was Batman.

At 6pm it was off to trick or treat. I ran home to pass out candy and Jeff trick or treated his way home with the kids. In previous years, Japanese nationals were invited in to trick or treat. Apparently there was an incident earlier this year at an open to all festival on another base that raised alot of concerns, so the trick or treating by the was very limited. They were only allowed into the front portion of the base, MPs were on hand to enforce this, and only 200 3rd graders and their parents were invited. So I had tons of candy, expecting a turn out like there had been in previous years, but no Japanese nationals going by our door. Toward the end of the evening, we loaded up the stroller with candy and headed towards the front gate to give away candy there, and managed to give away 8 bags to trick or treaters, but still had alot left. As I was walking to the front gate, I passed by a section of fencing with a Japanese mom and 2 kids sitting in their car, watching the trick or treaters on the base. I went up to the fence and gave them some candy. The mom and kids were very happy to get to participate, even in that small way. I think it’s unfortunate that trick or treating was limited this year.