Ringing in the New Year!

Wow, I can't believe it's 2010! Where does the time go? We had a blast ringing in the new year with some of our new friends! We are so thankful for them. It was Kenny & I along with 3 other families. There was tons of junk food, games, music & more junk food!

We've been trying to get out & experience Japan more. This weekend our friends the Miners took us to Showa park. It is a huge park with tons of Japanese gardens, playgrounds & all sorts of other things to do. It used to be a military base, if that helps you understand how big this place is. Since it is so big, we rented bikes to ride around the park. Well, the Japanese people did not design their bicycles for my 6'2" husband...It was hilarious to see him on that thing!!! He was either hitting his knees on the handlebars, the bell or trying to peddle with his knees outside of the handlebars. At one point, we had stopped to the the Miners' girl (and us) play at one of the playgrounds. We were getting back on our bikes & there was a Japanese family pointing & laughing at Kenny trying to ride his bike. Unfortunately, I was too busy laughing & trying not to fall off of my own bike to capture this on camera. Hopefully there will be another opportunity for this!

Here is my 1st attempt at adding pictures to a post....let's see if this works

Lora, Amanda, Me & Hillary

Kenny & I with the Japanese drummers

Me, Amanda & her girls on the "rolly slide"

Kenny & I at Showa Park

Merry Christmas!

Well, Christmas night is winding down here in Japan & just getting ready to start in the states. Other then being a little homesick a few times, we've had a great Christmas! On Christmas Eve I cooked a traditional Christmas meal. Turkey, dressing, mashed potatoes, gravy, rolls, green beans, green peas & 2 pies! I was exhausted!!! This was my 1st time to do all of the cooking...luckily, I've had one of the best cooks out there to teach me. Thanks Mom!!! Overall I think I did pretty good. I was a little concerned we'd have a Griswald moment & the turkey would go kaput, but it didn't it was great! We had Kenny's friend Do & his family over for dinner. It was so fun to have other people around.
After they left we cleaned the kitchen & I got started on the traditional Greene family Christmas breakfast....scaled back slightly for just the 2 of us. It included homemade cinnamon rolls, egg casserole & baked fruit. YUM!!!! This morning when we were eating breakfast I realized the good thing about being in Japan...I no longer have to fight my Dad & Rebekah for the gooey cinnamon rolls in the middle of the pan! =)
Since we went to Hawaii on our way here, we didn't do big Christmas presents with each other this year. But Santa did bring me the complete series of Gilmore Girls on DVD & a Netflix subscription...both of which will be great when Kenny has to go out of town.
Tonight we went to have a Christmas dinner with some of the singles in Kenny's squadron. It was nice to hang out with some of our new "Air Force Family". I am so thankful that we got to celebrate the holidays with our real families before we left Little Rock though.
I guess that is it for now....MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!!!!!

Can't sleep...

So it's 12:30 am here in Japan...after laying in bed for almost 2 hours trying to go to sleep I figured it was time to get up for a while. It's incredibly frustrating to be so tired, but can't get to sleep. Unfortunately, this has happened the past few nights.
Things are still going well here, although this week has been a little tough for me just thinking about Christmas coming up. I absolutely love the holidays! Spending time with family, cooking, buying gifts for people, Christmas music, the lights, the smells and most importantly the ultimate reason why we celebrate the birth of our Lord & Savior! It just doesn't feel quite like Christmas yet to me. Yes, we got to celebrate the holidays with our families before we left Arkansas, but I've still been pretty sad thinking about not being with them next week. I know Kenny & I will have fun. It's just a little tough that this is my 1st Christmas in all my 29 years to not be in Little Rock, Arkansas with my family. Please pray that this time will be a smooth transition for me & that I will be able to enjoy the holidays.
Other than being a little homesick at the moment, everything is great. Kenny is slowly starting to get into the swing of things at work. He won't really start getting busy & flying much until January. So it's kinda nice to have him easing into it, that means he's home a little more right now. =)
Well, I guess that's all for now...

Japan - Week 1 =)

What a week! So much has gone on this past week, I don't even know where to start. On Thursday, we had our first experience eating off base....we went to Joyful Honda (and no, it's not a car dealership) with a group from base. It is a huge Home Depot-ish, pet store, Wal-mart etc type place. They also have a grocery store & food court. We only had time for the food court on Thursday, but that was plenty interesting! Kenny & I were walking around looking at pictures on menus, & I found something that looked like postickers (which I love) so I decided that's what I wanted. We went to the counter, pointed at the pictures of what we wanted & paid with our Yen. It was fun!
After Joyful Honda, we went to the car dealership to officially purchase our car. We got to pick it up on Monday!!!! It is so nice to have a car now. I tend to have minor issues with the blinker....it's on the right side of the steering wheel, instead of the left side. So needless to say I turn on the windshield wipers quite often. =) But at least I haven't pulled a Kenny yet, he was loading the car at the BX while I was walking to the post office. He was going to pick me up there. He got there & told me that I had missed a "Silly Situation" as Will would call it. He got in the car, only to realize that he had gotten in on the wrong side of the car. Instead of getting our & walking around the car, my 6'2" husband crawled through the inside of our compact rental car to the other side. I was crying I was laughing so hard by the time he finished telling me about it. =)
Friday was a huge day....we got our house!!!!! We also got our household goods. Such a blessing. They moved all of our stuff in & we were 90% unpacked in a total of 2 hours. It is so nice to have our furniture and all again.
Saturday & Sunday were not so fun for me....Kenny & I had both been fighting a bug of some sort, and it got the best of me on Saturday. I spent most of the weekend in the bed with fever, chills & aches. No fun. But I have the best husband ever! He took such good care of me while doing his best to organize the house at the same time.
Fortunately I am feeling better now, not 100% yet, but better. Monday we got our new tv, tv stand & car. We are starting to feel normal again. Ben's Uncle Mark took us back to Joyful Honda to look around more & to another mall called Mori-town. They had a really cool grocery store. We bought some food to experiment with for dinner tonight.....
Overall things are going well for us in Japan so far. They are having an inspection on base this week, so there isn't much going on by way of social activities. I still haven't really met any friends our age yet. Please pray that we will meet some new friends soon.
That's all for now...I'm sure there will be more to come soon!

In-processing

God has really been taking care of us! With the exception of 1 thing, everything has gone extremely smooth for us. We get to move into our house on Friday, and they can deliver our stuff on Friday!!! If they couldn't, we would have to borrow furniture until they could. We are so ready to get settled in our house. We were only guaranteed a 2 bedroom place, which only has 1 bathroom. But we are getting a 3 bedroom with 2 bathrooms!!!!!! We are so excited about that.
We are really ready to have a vehicle! We've done lots of walking. It hasn't been too bad so far, but once we move to our house on Friday, we won't really be within walking distance of the BX & Commissary. We have found the car that we want to buy for me, but there is one little problem. They only take cash or yen. Having the money is not the problem, but we are having trouble getting the cash out of the bank. We think we have it figured out....I'll keep you posted! We will be taking our driving tests tomorrow to get licensed to drive in Japan...on the other side of the road. =) We are hoping to rent a car on base for the weekend so that we can run between our house & the BX/Commissary to buy the necessities that we did not move with us.
Tonight we are getting our 1st home cooked meal since we've been here! We are very excited about that! My brother-in-law's uncle & his wife are here too. Cheryl is a teacher in the DOD schools here at Yokota. They are having us over for a late Thanksgiving dinner. Yum! They have been extremely helpful to us so far by driving us a few places that were a little far for walking.
It's been a long week of in-processing for Kenny & just kinda waiting for me. I think we will both feel better once we get settled in our house. We are ready to make Japan our home.

Japan!

We have made it to Yokota Air Base! Our trip here yesterday went exceedingly better than we could have ever imagined! We were in the upstairs of the plane....that's a HUGE airplane!!!!!! I've never been on a plane that big before. We were lucky to be in a exit row, so we had tons of leg room. The airlines in the US need to take some lessons from Japan Airlines! It was the best flight I've ever been on. Once we got to Japan we easily got our luggage & through customs. The airport was not nearly as crowded as we had anticipated. Then it was time to find our bus to bring us to Yokota, which with good directions from the base we went straight to.
Probably the worst part of the day was that we had to wait 2 hours before the bus left (it runs on a daily schedule) and then it was a 3 hour bus ride! Needless to say we were tired of sitting!!! We got here, got checked into the hotel on base & got some dinner.
Now, we are experiencing the jet lag at it's best! We were both awake at 4:45 am! Not my idea of a good time.
Today we are going to try to get our local cell phones & figure out the lay of the land a little. I'll keep you posted!

The Big Adventure!

The last few weeks have flown by faster than I could have ever imagined! We had a lot of fun getting to see friends & spend as much time as possible with our families before we left. I am so thankful for the wonderful relationships God has blessed me with!
As is typical with most things....they never go quite as you have it all planned out in your mind. Well, getting ready to leave Arkansas was no different. We left on Sunday morning, so on Friday mom & I began washing clothes to get everything packed back into our 3 suitcases each. When I got home that night I put a load of whites in & went back downstairs. Mom & Dad got home about an hour later and the washing machine had stopped, with clothes & water inside. Front loading machines are great until the door is locked with your clothes inside & you are moving to Japan! I didn't realize they were stuck until Saturday morning. Mom & Dad decided to not tell me until then. Fortunately, through some tag-team effort we were able to figure out how to get the door open & drain the machine. Rebekah was great to help me finish the laundry at her house!
Our last night at home was spent with our families. Kenny had dinner with his Dad & his wife. Mom & Dad took me to Faded Rose followed by a stop at Copeland's for cheesecake to go. We then went to Rebekah's house for a good game of cards. (Ben was gone too, so it was just the 4 of us.) Just like old times!
We are having a blast in Hawaii!!! There will be pictures & a post to follow on that later.
We will be leaving here on Friday morning to head to Japan. This will be a long day for us! About a 9 hour flight, a 2-3 hour wait in the airport, then a 3 hour shuttle ride to the base. Please pray that everything goes smoothly for us...that we will get all of our luggage, find the shuttle, and somehow overcome the language barrier.
More to come later!