Youth Conference

I got asked to be the district young women's secretary. I was pretty excited about it. Our district is a military district which covers all of Okinawa and an area called Sasebo, which is in south western Japan near Fukuoka and Nagasaki. My first real activity since being called into the district young women's was youth conference. (Youth conference is a weekend activity for the youth in our church, ages 14-18.) It was held at a youth hostel in Naha. The building was up on this big hill with a beautiful landscape around it. There was another group using the building as well. They were Japanese elementary kids that followed us around and treated us like movie stars. One kid would come up to everyone and repeat what seemed to be the only phrase he knew in english. "I am fine. I am fine." Over and over. He was pretty hilarious.

 We slept in these tatami bunk beds. Luckily there wasn't enough leaders to fill our whole room so I stacked a couple extra mats under me. Those beds are hard!

I thought this tatami room was really cool. This was the leader's headquarters. The balcony looks right out to the ocean. You have to take your shoes off before coming in any of the tatami rooms. We even had to take our shoes off for the dance.

 Everything was so pretty.

 The food was not my favorite. We ate lunch and dinner at their cafeteria and let's just say, I was a little hungry. Those potatoes on the left...cold. Gross. The breaded shrimp patty...cold. Gross. And I didn't even try the other "mystery meat" on my plate.

 The view made up for the nasty food.

 This is Heather Fryar, the young women's president. She has been really fun to get to know and work with.

 This was my first experience with a squatty potty. Apparently I was facing the wrong way. Really, what is the point of these? Like I said on my Instagram, it's like going in the woods, only you're in the bathroom. Sounds fun, right?

The rooftop sunrise devotional was one of my favorite parts. I think I may have needed this youth conference more than the kids. I definitely left with a spiritual boost.

I still feel 18 years old inside. I looked at these kids and kept thinking, wow. Has it really been over ten years since I was in young women's? I enjoyed being around them all. They do a lot more activities on the district level since we don't have a ton of youth and I can't wait to get to know them all a little better.  

Halloween

 Halloween has come and gone!! The time is flying by and I am in shock that I am already making some final preparations for Thanksgiving. 

The kids of course enjoyed Halloween. We started out with our branch Trunk or Treat. I wanted to put the bottom picture on because it was better lighting and better quality, but Jack wasn't looking so great. So I put both. :)

 We were a random hodgepodge of costumes. I, of course always want a theme of some sort, but my kids had other plans in mind. Oh well, maybe next year. They had both been wearing their costumes around the house for weeks before Halloween, just waiting for the actual "Halloween".

Our friends the Hurst's, had my favorite theme of the night...

Nacho Libre.

 Henry makes a very convincing Nacho.

We had a lot of pumpkins this Halloween.

Anderson started drawing them. Even though they are a little creepy looking, I was so impressed that he could actually make the circle and stem and eyes. This is a first for him.

 After seeing a post on a blog I follow, I decided to paint a pumpkin. My first canvas painting, and I must say, I enjoyed every second of it. Jack was at school, Anderson was at a friend's house, and it was just me, in a quiet house, painting. I might just try a Christmas one next!

 Then there was the pumpkin we carved! We started out with three pumpkins from the store and this one was the only one that lasted long enough to even carve. The others went moldy. Luckily the kids didn't seem to care.

 Anderson got the flu (twice now!) but was better in time for the big day. They were so excited to go trick or treating. It was fun walking around the neighborhood with them. I love seeing them so happy and excited about something.

And the best part of it all was that they never noticed when I threw 75% of their candy in the garbage! I'm so mean.

Dinner time

I do not like dinner time.

Instead of sitting down, enjoying the meal that I just spent the last half an hour or more making, we spend the entire time trying to get our kids to eat. Mainly Anderson. Jack is pretty good overall, but he has his moments of claiming that he doesn't like something. After forcing him to eat it, he chews it a couple times only to find out that it actually tastes good. Anderson on the other hand despises anything with the label "dinner". "What kind of dinner is it?" he asks. And no matter what I say, unless it is pancakes, quesadillas, or pizza, he insists he doesn't like it. Annoying. I refuse to feed him pancakes, quesadillas, and pizza on a regular basis, and in return, we get a meal time full of frustration. We could leave Anderson at the table for an hour and until we actually hand feed him, and make him eat it, it will still be sitting on his plate. The boys often go to the park by our house after dinner and Jack will be long gone at the park while Anderson sits there saying over and over, "But I actually don't really like this." He can't go to the park until his dinner is gone and even that doesn't seem to help. I'm sure he will eventually grow out of this awesome phase, but knowing our luck, he will be 15 before it happens. 

Ugh...

Fukushuen Gardens

We went to the Fukushuen Gardens in the city of Naha. My friend described it to me as sort of a mini Japanese version of Central Park. It's right in the middle of the busy city and yet when you walk in, it's very peaceful and serene. It was built for an anniversary of some sort of relationship with China, so the architecture has a lot of Chinese influence. 

This is a shisa or shishi. It's a cross between a lion and a dog. They have these everywhere in Okinawa. They are always in pairs. One with it's mouth open to protect from evil spirits. The other has it's mouth closed to keep the good spirits in. People often have smaller versions on their houses.

This little Japanese boy shared his fish food with Jack and Anderson, with a little persuasion from his mom. There were tons of fish and turtles just waiting for them to throw some in.

You can walk behind this water fall. We tried to get Anderson to go in for the picture but he was too scared. He wouldn't even get close to it. 

These were my favorite.

As you can tell, we were having fun!

Okinawa Churaumi Aquarium

 We went with the Hurst's to the big aquarium here. It is in such a pretty spot! The view was extremely beautiful. You can look straight out to Ie Island (pronounced ee-ay, I believe). 

You never get tired of seeing that beautiful water.

 I was looking the aquarium up on Wikipedia and it said that the Ocean Expo Park, where the aquarium is, was originally built in 1975 for the World's Fair. After the park began losing tourists, they built the aquarium to revive the area. It's a great aquarium, but the day we went it was so crowded! 

We've seen this fish when we snorkeled out at Zamami island!

 When you google Okinawa, there are always pictures of this huge whale shark tank. We have been showing pictures of it to the boys since we found out we were moving there. As soon as we walked up to this area, I said "Jack, look!" He turned around to me and with a huge smile said, "Best day ever!" It was priceless. He has been dying to go there and he was just as excited as we hoped he would be.

 We even got to eat lunch right next to the whale sharks. The kids could barely focus on their lunch. They were too busy watching everything swim by!

 We thought the aquarium was a cool building. It had some fun architecture.

 We ended our day with the outdoor dolphin show and a stop at the park. The kids thought these nets were so fun. I thought it would be cool to have a smaller version in your back yard. Endless entertainment!