Stormy Days..

On Wednesday night, we went into TCCOR 4. We're prepping for a typhoon to hit us. (no worries, it shouldn't hit us directly - phew). It should hit us tomorrow, the front bands will hit us today (probably tonight). Yesterday, on our drive back from the base, we got stuck in microbursts. Honestly, I don't think I've ever driven in rain that was coming down so hard. Well, maybe the how much, but certainly not the size. The drops were BIG which is what made it so hard. We got through it though (Tim was, of course, behind me in his car), and made it home so we could pull everything off of our deck and into the house.

God certainly watched over us yesterday as the only times that it wasn't pouring were when we pulled everything inside and then when Kadie got ho
me from school. Shortly after, it was pouring down again. LOL Here's what we saw yesterday... One of the weirdest things I've seen since we moved here.. The water was acting VERY funny, you could actually see how the wind was blowing in a circular pattern. Even creepier, I could sit here and watch as mini tunnels formed in the clouds (when I say mini, I mean mini, they never even started to pull down). It's all good though, nothing actually ended up happening.. And today? Today, we're looking at this.. Talk about the calm before the storm. Aside from being COLD (WOOOOO HOOOO for that one), it's just cloudy outside. Heck, right now, I see blue sky - we all know that won't last though.. :P










In the meantime.. Molly decided she was a seamstress last night, and played with my measuring tape for a while. Apparently, she watches me too much because she threw the measuring tape around her shoulders like I do.. LOL

Old Things..

I love finding old pictures. ESPECIALLY pictures I thought were lost and gone forever. I've had a small image of this picture for a long time, but not the full sized image. For some reason, I hooked up a hard drive to my computer today, and found that Tim has always had that photo. :) It's one of my absolute fave pictures that I've ever taken, so I can't even begin to describe how happy I am to have found it!

Kadie and Tim at Disneyland in May 06

Firsts..

So I know it's been a while. .Goodness, I have TONS of pictures too. I guess since I hadn't posted, I felt like I couldn't come back and post. I have way too many pictures to even think about getting started on posting, one day I might get them all up.

We've been VERY busy lately. A few weeks ago, Tim came back from a "deployment" - I put it in quotes because we've had underways when he was on the Princeton that were longer. Anyhoot, he did and saw some neat things while he was gone, and we had a great time going to the pool and hanging out with friends this Summer. :) Ever since he got back, we've basically been go, go, go. We've had a lot to deal with and do since he got back, but today was a very fun day.

First off - today was the Mikoshi Parade on base. It's an open base event, and since we are watching our friends' kitties while they are back in the States for the next few months, we KNEW we wanted to get on base early in the day. THANK GOODNESS we did too - on our way back from Homes, the traffic was insane!! We didn't see the parade (we had other things to take care of today), but here's what we DID get to see of it..

OH - if you don't know what an open base event is, it's basically a "goodwill" type thing between the Japanese Nationals and the Americans. It literally means the base is open to everyone. There are areas of the base open (mainly parks, the food court, and McDonald's), but most of it is closed off to anyone who isn't DoD. For the open parts, it can be INSANE. At the last open base event that we went to, we left our house mid day, and it took us TWO HOURS to get onto base. We had a great day during that event, but man, it was WAY too long to get there! Since we knew about the insanity the open base events can be, we made other plans for today.

They included adding a new member to the Haworth household!!! Our first pet!! So.. Meet Sammy (Samantha - Kadie named her).


We picked her out after I fell in LOVE with a pig-nosed (or FRT) turtle. He was WAY too much money (about the equivalent of $400 without a tank, etc that we'd need to take care of him), and we wouldn't be able to import him into the States when we left here as his species is actually "vunerable." I was sad to give him up, but you know, we got the PERFECT first pet for our family. :) The girls absolutely LOVE her, and while she's sleeping now, she was very active earlier today! Who knew, a hamster that's not active in the evening?!


She's not the only new thing we did for the first time today.. LOL Tim's asked me to start cutting his hair for a while now. (Probably about a year). So yesterday at the NEX, I suggested we pick up clippers since I'd been after him since he got back to get his hair cut. (It was BAD.. Just ask any of our friends who've seen him lately - or my vacuum). So today, I tested the waters. I think it looks fairly good - shocked me, I really thought we'd be shaving his hair down to nothingness by the end of the day.. haha!

What else did he do tonight? Well.. He made the best steaks I've ever had. He says thanks to an iphone app.. Goodness, what are we coming to?! I had to snap a few shots of him making the goodness too.. Ohhh was it ever good!! We FINALLY figured out how to get the good steaks from the commissary (holy moly, did I just say something good came from the commissary!?!). Thank goodness, because, well.. uhh.. YUM!

That's about it for today. I have lots of other pictures to come - well, maybe. I have lots of pictures to upload.. let's just put it that way. :)

BTW - if you are on my friend on FB, you can see my pictures. I'll generally upload everything there!

-Sarah

Very Entertaining

So last week we went bowling with our good friend and her daughter. We had such a blast, and I took WAY too many pictures. Molly went bowling for her first time, and she loved it. :) Kadie (of course) enjoyed herself (to some pizza and cookies too), and had decided she wants a bowling party for her birthday. :) Now if she could only figure out what theme she wants so we could tell our other friend for making her cake, we'd be good! LOL

I took way too many pictures, but I'm only going to post a few of my faves. To see the rest, check out my facebook. :)

Other than bowling with friends, we've been keeping busy. This deployment (and hey, even Summer) is starting to wind down, so we're just trying to keep ourselves as busy as possible. Kadie had swim lessons all last week and made some MAJOR improvements. Kid loves go under water and jump off the side. Those that know her know what a big accomplishment this is for her. She's always been very afraid of water, and has always hated going under. Both things are HUGE, and thus, she earned herself a new game. LOL (of course right). We'll spend this week with friends (hopefully at the pool several times), and then next week, school starts!! (YAY)!!

Last Weeks of Summer

Our lives over the past week or so have finally turned towards summer.. Of course, there isn't all that much left of summer, but at least Kadie can't say she didn't do anything at all this summer. :) We've been spending time at the pool on base, and the pool on our deck. Beyond that, Kadie's been involved with VBS all week. I love that there is Catholic VBS here - first time I've ever seen it! I guess it's something So Cal doesn't really have. lol Last year, she went to VBS at The Rock church in SD (non-denominational). She LOVED it, and I was going to sign her up for VBS here for another denomination when I saw that our church had it! YAY!!


Anyways, it's not been too much going on, but we have been busy. Tomorrow is Kadie's last day of VBS, so expect pictures from that!

Our Day at the Beach..

Green Beach Pool.
There's another bigger and deeper pool above us to the left. (complete with water slide that I'm dying to go down).

So anyone who is on my facebook probably saw my post this morning - my friend and I were taking our kiddos out to Kamakura beach. We've been talking about getting out and doing things while our husbands are gone for, well, a long time. So we decided yesterday that we'd head out there today. After oversleeping, and not getting to the base until much later than planned, we decided that instead, we'd go to Green Beach Pool on base.

Honestly, we had such a blast!!! I don't think the real beach would have been nearly as fun. Molly was very nervous at first, but after a while, she really warmed up to it. We played (and had to get out for 15 minutes every hour - that's a little annoying) and relaxed the afternoon away. Kadie even got a slushi - apparently, it's been SO long since she's had one that she thought it was her first ever.. Obviously, she doesn't remember walking down to 7-11 in Duarte to get Slurpees when she was 3-4ish. hehehe She LOVED it, and yes, it dyed her entire mouth - lips, teeth, and tongue - red!

The girls really had a GREAT time and all the kids were totally wiped out. (OK, the Moms were too). :) The girls were asleep pretty quickly for them - especially Kadie, I don't think she'd even been in her room for 5 minutes before she passed out. Even better, said friend and I got tanned!! (well, burned in my case). We'll be heading back tomorrow, so enjoy the pics of the girls in the meantime!!!

V-Portal..

Can go to hell. That's all.