Cherry Blossoms!!!

I was so excited for a beautiful day out...we had wanted to go see the cherry blossoms for the last couple of weeks and the weather wasn't cooperating, but we thankfully it was nice this weekend! We drove up Montobu (past Nago) to go up Mt. Yaekabe...since the weather hadn't been great lately and the wind has picked up I had to take ANOTHER ocean picture...with waves :) I wish you could all see how pretty it is in person!

I apologize from the beginning - they're a little out of order, but you'll get the idea :)
When we got there we weren't sure where to go or where to park and there were a ton of people everywhere...so after a little wandering a car moving we figured it out, parked and starting walking towards the festival. I saw a sign for cherry blossom gelato with no eggs (apparently that was important) HAD to try some...it was ok...made with Japanese weird milk so it wasn't great, but I've now eaten cherry blossoms, you could see the bits of plant in it - I laughed, Adrienne wrinkled her nose :)

We did a little walking around, picture taking and Adrienne had to get her "festival fries" usually the french fries are REALLY good - these weren't the best and they had weird chicken on top...better luck next time!
We seriously took a million pictures to get a decent one, I was apparently having a weird face day - who knows!

THE END...of the festival :) There was a park on the other side of the giant painting



The lady we asked to take our picture didn't really understand the digital camera, I have 8 pictures of Adrienne and I, it was pretty funny


You can see the dots of pink all the way up the mountain, it's absolutely beautiful!

Adrienne was driving so I was snapping pictures with both cameras out the window, Adrienne had to tell me me to watch out for branches a few times!!

I had a good time playing with my camera features - I wish the pinks had turned out a little brighter, but it's amazing to see how many cherry blossoms there are!
This was the view from the top of the mountain - cherry blossoms with the ocean out in the distance...I may never live in such a beautiful place again.

Today we had Cindy, John, and their boys over for lunch - we laughed a lot and it was a really nice afternoon! Night service at church tonight :) I'm glad I'm feeling better, I have nursery duty! This week our children's minister is moving, Alyssa is in my class so her last day is Wednesday...busy week! We're also meeting about 1 of the first graders moving up into my class, so we'll see how that goes...always something new around here!

Baby showers...chapel

It was a pretty quiet week - Adrienne got sick and I'm fighting the germ infestation...I think I'm losing ground though :) We went to Heather's baby shower - kind of a funny shower...yes there were games ( I survived) and presents...but it was in the Lanai room at the golf course, we all ordered our own food and when it came to present opening you could chat or you could pay attention...it was just kind of random - but fun all the same :) When we came in their was one of those blow up bears with the baby blocks and apparently it was on sale so the church bought it for their many MANY MANY baby showers (the military takes go forth and multiply VERY seriously!) It was a little random, but I suppose it was easier than random decorations!

Kim and Adrienne putting the bear away

Heather and baby Grace...poor thing already got her first sunburn

Maggie was dancing and jumping...that's Kelly's daughter - her curls are ADORABLE!
The blond in the blue shirt is Pastor's wife Carol


My kids celebrated Nathan's birthday with a cake and silly faces - OH MY!

On Friday we did chapel - we did a little Valentine/love chapel - poems, verses, 5 songs...a little mini program ;) the kids did a good job - you could tell they've been sick...a little tired, but they did well!

Bella's 5!!!!



Make a Smilebox postcard

Update...

Not much to say this time, but I know I've been a bit of a slacker about my blog...so I'm blogging anyway :) My kids are in charge of chapel on Friday so we've been practicing our parts and our songs...it's a combination of Valentine poems, verses about love, and songs...they're doing pretty well and will be ready on Friday to knock their socks off ;) I have to say I have a few drama babies...so it's pretty cute how seriously they take the performance. And not to sound bias, but my class does the most interesting chapels (and I can actually hear and understand them!) I think my favorite project this week was illustrating the first part of Psalm 23...we had been going through it, explaining what it meant and then they drew lots of little pictures to help remind them of what it means - they did a really good job and I was impressed with how much they thought each picture out so that it made the verse apply to their life! The rest of the week was pretty typical - report cards went out on Friday...everybody improved in one way or another, so that felt good to know that all our hard work is starting to pay off :) We also had another birthday party this week so that was rather exciting for them - big cake fans my class! I got to talk to Jen and Sara via conference call on Skype which was wonderful - I miss my girls SO much! This weekend was quiet - it ended up being rainy and cold so instead of being outside we were homebodies...read, graded, movies, slept, talked, emailed, a little shopping, church...very relaxing! Hope you are all doing well - miss and love you all! PS I've been missing my blog comments and emails :) hint hint....

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday is just a picture you like with a caption...thought I'd try it, since it's Wednesday in America :) A friend has Wordless Wednesdays so I followed the link....http://www.5minutesformom.com/5396/wordless-wednesday-a-canadian-moment/ and then made my own.

Cheryl sent this picture of Ellie to me...how can I not be counting the days till June 15 (144) with a face like that?!?

Good times!

Well, 2nd quarter is officially complete...the year half over, UNBELIEVABLE! I finished everything but pasting in the comments on my report cards and they're better than last quarter so that made me feel good that we're making some progress :) I was laughing at my kids the other day...it's been cooler here, much cooler than we were told for sure...it's been 50's during the day but down to 40 overnight...anyway, I've been turning on the heaters in my room and my kids are so cold they seriously rush through their work so they can sit close to the little heaters!

Saturday was much warmer and absolutely BEAUTIFUL! It was nice to have a day to talk to people, catch up on some sleep, clean, watch TV...all good things! Sunday was church and later Adrienne and I headed to the sea wall to sit and chat with our root beer floats...we got side tracked listening to this amazing violinist playing outside in American Village...we bought her cd for the car, can't remember the name right now, but she was amazing! Anyway...we don't usually go to the sea wall during the day, but it was so nice and it had been so long since we've been able to go...wanted to share a picture of why we like it so much there...and this isn't even it at it's finest :)

Sunday night was also the beginning of Sunday Night Live at Neighborhood every 1st and 3rd Sunday so that was awesome and afterwards a bunch of people went to Foster food court (we of course had to be signed on which is always an adventure!) but we had a great time laughing and talking with everyone. Monday I got some time to talk to Kevin for the first time in over a month...excellent talking to you...stop stalking, comment please! :) Sorry for the side note, anyway, Monday we were supposed to go to Rocky and Gina's house along with a bunch of people from church and I don't know the last time I laughed for so long or so hard! We had amazing grilled meat and veggies, salad, potato salad, corn, Gina's SUPER yummy dips and chips - we had a great time playing the Wii - everyone played at one time or another during the day and it was a crack up watching everyone! Adrienne's competitive side came out with Robert, his visiting mom, and Kiana!
Amid all the excitement of the Wii Sage (who if you've read Adrienne's blog has a hilarious idea on how we're going to meet our future husbands AKA Japan Man!) asks if she can have cardboard for the hill. UMMM??? So they have this rather large hill out their backyard and at some point in the past they've discovered that you can easily slide down on cardboard and not get hurt. So this is HILARIOUS to watch!! Gina took a turn, so did Azaela (Lissette's mom visiting from Portugal), all the kids...so I of course needed a turn - SO FUN!! Adrienne took a turn finally and then we decided to do a little race. I had a slow start, but it was still really fun. I almost fell off my cardboard I was laughing so hard! On another run I did slide off a bit, but lived to tell the tale! Anyway - incredibly fun day...off to start a new week...might go see the cherry blossoms next weekend - there's a festival for the next month or so because of the blooms and the pictures we've seen are amazing, so I'm excited!

Kiana surfed ALL the way down the hill - it was impressive! Her parents on the left are really nice (Jerome and Stacy) and Isaiah is possibly the cutest little boy! Their middle child I think was still at the bottom of the hill playing after riding down.
On your marks, get set, go!

Seriously, I was trying to go...it just wasn't working out very well for me!


We made it!
Apparently we were racing back up too...I won that one!

Back...

It's been FOREVER since I've blogged...just not in the mood I guess, Adrienne says I'd rather talk to her than blog...I'd rather talk to all of you than blog I think is the problem :) Anyway to back track the last 2 weeks...We had a week of prayer at church the 5th-9th....awesome to come together every night for prayer, singing, and fellowship! Rocky's wife Gina is back from the States finally :) and they had us over for dinner on Tuesday - grilled veggies, steak, baked potato (with the world's BEST sour cream dip stuff on top....SERIOUSLY addicting!!!) That was a really fun evening with lots of laughing, they're an awesome couple and we had a really good time at their house! That week I even got Adrienne to eat crab legs for dinner...I had seen them for a really good price and I LOVE crab but Miss No Fish that I live with...well she was brave and said she'd try it :) So I boiled it up and she just stared at me not knowing what to do with it. I laughed so hard...cracked the legs apart for her. She said it tasted ok, but still looked like the actual animal...but she did try :)


Saturday was Adrienne's birthday so we spent the day doing whatever struck Miss Birthday :) Chicken sandwiches at one of our favorite bakeries...found Dr. Pepper to go with it (yes, we do know every vending machine in the vicinity that has it!), shopping, reading at Starbucks (ok the reading was my suggestion after she suggested Starbucks), yummy dinner at Tony Roma's, funfetti cake and TV catch up...not the most exciting birthday I'm sure, but we tried :) and it was a nice day! Sunday was church - I had my first turn in the nursery :) One of the ladies, Heather, had her baby less than 2 months ago and Grace was my only baby...I loved sitting in the chair just rocking :) she's absolutely darling with her red hair! Afterwards we had lunch, grocery shopping, grading...report card time :( . This week had been pretty mellow - trying to do report cards - YUCK - I hate keeping a real grade book...give me a computer program ANY day!! Tuesday Gina invited Adrienne and I for dinner and a movie - Rocky had class so we had a nice girls night...we had Chili's - Adrienne was excited and I had very good fajitas :) chicken and mushrooms YUM! We saw Bedtime Stories (2nd movie on the island) had to splurge on popcorn....so good! The movie was really cute - Dad, they had stories out of their head :) it was a nice surprise of an evening :) The rest of the week has been typical...glad it's Friday and a half day for report cards...did I mention I hate them? Sorry I haven't been a faithful blogger or emailer...thankfully we've been busy :) Love and miss you all!!

Prayer request

Most of you either know or know of, my "San Diego" Sara...gotta differentiate somehow... :) Anyway, her mom had breast cancer during the time Sara and I were in college and beat it - unfortunately it is back and has spread tremendously. I'd appreciate if you would be praying for Sara and her mom Pat...their family and friends are all praying for a miracle. If you'd like to check out the blog http://patriciaours.blogspot.com/

Thanks for your prayers!