A Lanudry List of Happenings

We've had a very big week. Within the past 7 days the following events have taken place.

• Moved into our base housing. (A very big deal to happen so quickly)
• Received our household goods shipment (3 weeks early, almost faster than our "express" shipment)
• Purchased a Honda Odyssey (A necessity for hauling kids in 3 car seats around)
• Visited another Japanese pre-school for Josiah (Most likely will start this week.)
• Ammin was promoted to Major (Surprise!)

Its funny to think that we left our townhouse and silver Honda Odyssey in Northern Virginia only to move halfway around the world and move into another townhouse and buy a...silver Honda Odyssey. We are still up to our eyeballs in boxes yet to be unpacked, but we are S L O W L Y making progress. The house itself has all the style, warmth, and charm that one would come to expect from a 1950's era hospital. I do not say this without appreciation for the home the Lord has provided us. Considering the options available we are very happy. The house was clean and in good condition. It just has a very institutionalized feel to it. As has been the case with most of our military moves we have managed to stay one step ahead of the base housing renovation plans. I'm sure ours will get a wonderful modern makeover as soon as we leave in 3 years.

Another 1950's iconic characteristic of the home is the neighborhood itself. In order to live in the townhomes, versus in an apartment style mid-rise building, one must have 2 or more children. There are bands of kids roaming the neighborhood all the time on all manners of transportation. Scooters, skateboards, bikes, roller blades, you name it. As you can imagine the area is very safe (yeah, its a Marine base, the local community is very safe as well) and very kid friendly. One could easily lob a Nerf football from either our front or back door and hit a playground. Obviously Josiah and Levi love this aspect. We have a small yard, but its an end unit so we have a bit more room for them to run. Its very modest, but again, even a small patch of grass is more than those in the mid-rise building behind us. In stark contrast to how neighbors seem to interact back in the states, around here people actually spend time outside and talk with their neighbors. Sometimes it might be to ask the other parents of they've seen their children anywhere but hey, the base has a full perimeter fence so where are they going to go? (No, Levi hasn't wondered off again, that was just a joke)

Anyway, all that is to say that we are starting to get settled in and even the institutional feel of the house dissipates the more we unpack and and turn it into our home. It is 4 bedroom so it has plenty of room for the boys to sleep and play. We are embarrassed to say that one room is already almost entirely filled with their toys alone. Note to Grandparents: No more toys for the boys this Christmas!

We've got a long weekend coming up so we're looking forward to getting out beyond the bounds of Iwakuni and doing some more sightseeing. We'll keep you posted!