Oyugikai

It is difficult to describe the whole yochien (kindergarten) experience in Japan unless you've been here. I guess one way to describe it is that they go all out for everything. On Saturday, we spent the majority of the day at Cailey's Oyugikai. I don't really know how to translate that, but the kids performed dances and songs on a pianika (an instument that has a keyboard like a piano but you blow into a mouthpiece to make the sound). The kids had spent the last couple of months preparing for it and I have to admit it was pretty amazing what they can get kids ages 3-6 years old to do. Cailey was in a dance with half of the kids in her class and it was so stinkin' cute! The pictures I took are terrible (we need a new camera, but that is another subject), but I wanted to post them anyway. I was so proud of Cailey, she did such a good job on it.

Happy Anniversary, Shane

10 things I love about Shane:

1. He always puts us (his family) first.

2. I love when he sings to music in the car.

3. He loves the scriptures.

4. He rides in a claustrophobic train for 2 hours a day to provide for us.

5. He is frugile with himself, but generous to others.

6. Our kids think he is the best (especially when I catch them sitting in a dark room playing nintendo on his lap).

7. He is a great gospel teacher.

8. He thinks his assortment of Japanese jokes are funny.

9. He makes his kids laugh during FHE ("hello everybody..." and sock puppets, you'd have to be there!).

10. He is my best friend.

Month of birthdays

After celebrating 3 birthdays in January, we are a little bit tired of cake! I almost talked Cailey into cheesecake, but she couldn't pass up the pink frosting. Here are a few pics from Bryant's 3rd birthday on the 18th and Cailey's 5th birthday on the 30th.

Isaac's Blessing

Yesterday was Isaac's blessing. Since we live on the other side of the world and no one could be here, we thought we would at least snap some photos. We are standing outside of our church at the Yamate ward building. There is a monument in front of it because this is where the first Elders dedicated Japan for missionary work.

Fuji Birthday celebration

Mt. Fuji at Lake Kawaguchiko

Shane did a great job surprising me for my birthday this year. He took us to see Mt. Fuji. We hear that this is the best time of the year to see it. Most of the year it rains so often that there is seldom a day that the clouds don't cover it. We went to a lake called Kawaguchiko and the view from there was amazing. It really was beautiful, these pictures don't do it justice. We were surprised at how close it was to us. It only took us about an hour and a half to drive there.
We spent the day there and drove home in the late afternoon.

Around 5:30 pm our friends from Sendai, Katie Shepard and her daughter Grace (Cailey's friend) came to stay the night with us. They had to drop off family at the airport that day and so it was fun to be able to see them. Katie gave me a great present. She watched all of the kids while Shane and I went out to eat. We went to find a restaurant by the Yokohama eki (train station) where there are hundreds of shops and restaurants, but because it was New Years day(the biggest holiday of the year in Japan), almost everything was closed. It was so weird to see it like that! We finally did find some that were open and ended up eating at an Indian curry restaurant.
It was a great day for me. This year's birthday/New Year's celebration will be hard to beat.

For the sake of tradition

A few years ago we started making gingerbread houses out of graham crackers before Christmas. We really enjoy it (maybe it's all the candy...) and so it has become a family tradition. Graham crackers are hard to come by in Japan, but when we were in Sendai we knew of an import store where we could get them. This year we wanted to do it again, so we looked all over Yokohama for graham crackers. Shane finally found some and ended up paying about 8 dollars for a small box of nasty tasting no-name brand graham crackers, all for the sake of tradition. Why didn't I just make real gingerbread?? Because you can't get molasses here either. Anyway, we had a great time making them so I guess it was worth the 8 bucks.

Happy 4 weeks

Today is Isaac's four week birthday. These first weeks of life are counted by the days and weeks for me. Each week is like a milestone..."wow, I made it another week." The aftermath of this birth has been much better for me, but still, the lack of sleep and demands of a newborn are not easy. I have been on my own (without help from our wonderful families who came all the way to Japan to help me) now for over a week. The hardest part is the morning when I don't want to get out of bed but I have to because I need to get Cailey out the door to school and take care of Isaac and Bryant.

If this picture of Isaac looks like a mug shot, it's because it is. Since Isaac was born in Japan, there has been a long list of things that we have had to do so that we can take him back to America with us. He got his Japanese visa this week and now we have to take him to the US embassy to get a passport, birth certificate, etc. We took this picture of Isaac for his passport. They are very picky about the picture, and it is not easy to get a newborn to cooperate. Eyes open, looking forward, on a white background, head size between 1" to 1 3/8 ", etc.