Christmas in Hawaii

Christmas in flip flops? Sure!

Leo and I made it and are enjoying the 80 degree weather. We are staying on Pearl Harbor Navy Base and have spent the last few days getting settled and exploring the base a little. It's pretty beautiful here. We will be here almost two weeks.  We'll definitely have time to venture off base, to the beach and spend a little time exploring the island.

It's been a little lonely today, but it's hard to be too blue with this cutie for company :)

Merry Christmas!

Christmas in Japan

We were able to celebrate Christmas as a family together before Leo and I took off for Hawaii. We had Christmas Eve on the 22nd and our Christmas on the 23rd. Nathan and I were worried it would feel pretty weird doing it early, but we were happily surprised at how real it felt. 

Our last shipment of storage stuff arrived on the 21st, so we broke out some of our Christmas ornaments and had fun putting some finishing touches on the tree.

 

Stockings! 

Oh, the excitement going to bed on Christmas Eve!

Tons of fun ripping into the gifts they've been staring at under the tree all month!

The boys playing with their new gifts.

We hope you all had very Merry Christmas, too!

Leo's 2!

Leo had a roaring good time at his 2nd birthday 'party.' Wilson took the day off of school to help Leo celebrate. The three of us hit up playgroup together, had a fun lunch, picked up Dad early from work and then went to the zoo and had dinner at Coco Curry House - Leo's favorite restaurant. When we got home, we did presents and cake. By the end of the day, Leo was exhausted - turning 2 is hard work!

He loved his lion cake.

And even blew out his own candle!

When we told Leo it was time to open his presents he ran for the Christmas tree! Once we redirected him to his birthday presents he did a good job ripping into them.

Wilson practiced some great self-restraint when Leo wasn't ripping fast enough.

When Leo opened his new lion backpack and lunchbox, he immediately put them on and left the party for "school." 

Leo picked chocolate cake and we partied with some animal plates sent by Grandma.

Happy 2nd Birthday, Leo! We sure love you a lot!

Hawaii

Leo and I are headed to Hawaii for another round of doctors. Tripler Army Medical Center in Honolulu is an even bigger hospital than the Navy one in Yokosuka, where we went last month. The good news is that Leo and I will stay in Hawaii until all the test results are back and meet with the specialists there. So, we're happy to not be sent away to wait around for answers. The bad news is that we fly out December 24th for appointments starting on the 26th. The next available appointments weren't until February. We're planning a long trip to the States to see family soon, so Nathan's unable to take any leave for him and Wilson to come with us. It will certainly be a Blue Christmas for us!

Here's Leo showing Lion the ropes.

Snow!

It got cold enough to snow here this morning! We spent about 10 minutes watching it before we decided to get suited up to go play in it.

Sadly, once we got out there the snow had stopped! The boys still had fun and stayed warm running around in their new suits. We're hoping for some more snow over the holidays. If we've got to deal with the cold, might as well have some snow!

Decorating

We're getting in the holiday spirit here! They bring one load of trees to the base so you have to get one early or you're stuck with one of the neon pink, fake ones they sell out in town. Ours is a little crooked and we don't have any of our regular ornaments (they arrive with our last shipment on December 26th oddly enough!) but we're happy it feels like Christmas in our house.

The boys had fun decorating their gingerbread men tonight.

Love this time of year!

Sensei

Today Wilson's sensei sent home a gift. He really loves all three of his teachers. They always have smiles on their faces and big hugs for Wilson. Sometimes when I ask him to do stuff around the house he responds, "Hai, Sensei." (Yes, teacher)

Playgroup

With Wilson at school for a few hours every day, Leo and I have had some great one on one time. We do things like play at home together, run errands or hit one of the many playgroups that the base has to offer. So far Leo still likes to play on his own, but he sure likes being around and watching the other kids. Here is a picture from today's playgroup. He's checking out a cutie little girl he likes named Amalie.

Yokosuka

Yokosuka is a larger Navy base in Japan near Tokyo. Leo and I took a quick trip up there last week to visit some doctors and do some tests. It was a whirlwind with two full travel days on Thursday and Saturday and all day at the hospital on Friday. Leo was an angel the whole time. We hear back in a few weeks, but the doctors suspect celiac disease.

Happy Thanksgiving!

We were so happy to have our good friends, Chad and Josie, here to visit for Thanksgiving. We had a pretty relaxed day with a boat tour of 99 Islands in the morning and eating way too much food the rest of the day.

Having a Japanese kitchen with no oven gave me a great excuse to order the meal catered from a nice restaurant on base. We all agreed the turkey was really good, but the sides could have been better.

The boys of course loved the pie. Leo partied the next morning by dumping the pumpkin pie from the counter and trying to eat it all with his hands before being caught. Sorry that I don't have a picture of that!

Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving, too! We are always so thankful for our wonderful friends and family!

Hostess

Nathan is mourning the end of his beloved Hostess snacks by cruelly introducing the boys to them right before they're discontinued. He wiped out the commissary and now we have a freezer full of every different kind he could get his hands on. Here are the boys trying their first (and last!) Snoballs.
Mom - you'll be happy to hear that they are both pink now :)

Wilson carefully carried them to the table after Nathan's talk on how special they are.

Seeing if their mouths are big enough for the treat.

They were.

Goodbye Hostess! 

Well, it'll be a slow goodbye as Nathan's stock piling will probably last us a few years...

Guest room

The Hydes guest room is open for business! We whipped it into shape just in time to host our friends (and first guests!) Chad and Josie for a week over Thanksgiving.

It's pretty sparsely decorated and furnished for now, but we've got the bare essentials. All of the souvenirs we've collected so far have gone in the room and it also features some cool tatami floors. 

So, start planning your trip now. We're booking up with friends and family already marking their calendars to visit in January, Spring and Fall of 2013 - Yay!

Halloween

 

For Halloween the American bases opened their gates and invited everyone to trick or treat. There were tons of American and Japanese kids all dressed up - it was really fun!

We joined our friends Lucy and Lily for the night and went trick or treating at the base and then back to their house for some dinner. Lily was a very pretty fairy.

Wilson and Lily really love each other and held hands a lot of the way.

Elmo was a very serious trick or treater and did a really good job this year getting candy.

The gang kept checking their haul.

Happy Halloween!

Christmas plans

We're beginning to book our two week long road trip over Christmas and New Year's. Our destination is the island of Hokkaido which is supposed to be beautiful in the winter with ice sculpting festivals in the cities and amazing scenery throughout. Nathan would like to hit the northernmost point of Hokkaido - about 25 miles from Russia! I am thinking we will stop in Sapporo and have more time to sightsee along the way. This will probably be our only trip north of Tokyo and our only time to Hokkaido, so we're really excited.  We are saving Tokyo for another trip.

Here's how it's shaping up so far - gleep!

Flower song

Here is Wilson singing a Japanese song he learned at his school.

 

 



99 Islands

The whole coast of Sasebo and for miles to the north and south of the city is a national park called 99 Islands. It's really over 200 islands that are dotted all along the coast. Only 2 are inhabited and the rest are part of the national park. They are so beautiful! Part of our season pass to the Sasebo Aquarium includes free boat tours through the park. We've been meaning to go on this tour for a while, but have either had crummy weather or been out of town. This past weekend we finally did it and it was great!

 

There are 2 boats you can choose from. We took the Pearl Queen for the sunset cruise.

 

 

Here is the other option - the pirate boat! Apparently the crew dresses up like pirates and it's interactive. We'll take this one next time.

 

 

Nathan and I really enjoyed the great views. This island is called Lion Island.

 

 

The boys mostly just wanted to explore the boat.

 

 

 

They had a cute dress up corner that the boys had fun with. I was relieved since I was feeling pretty guilty for not have a matching sailor outfit for Wilson!

 

 

 

Wilson took his role as Captain very seriously and started ordering his first mate to do some work around the boat.

 

 

Pretty fun boat ride! We'll be back.