Family, Friends, and Fireworks

4th of July has always been a richly celebrated holiday in my family. My oldest son's birthday is near the holiday so we usually make it a combo party. This year, like many years past, we travelled to Georgia to spend glorious hours with our loved ones.

I also took this time to say good-bye to my extended family for 3 years. I cannot believe how big my nieces and nephews and cousins have gotten. It made me the saddest to think how much more they will have grown by the time I see them again. Luckily, my family is very good at showing the youngest ones pictures of us so that they remember who we are. Although I will forever be known to my youngest nephew as "the one who bought me my Little Einsteins video". hee-hee.

A wonderful man at the end of my Dad's street in Grayson, GA, let off a fireworks display for the whole neighborhood and more. It was the largest private display of fireworks I've ever seen. Actually the only larger public display I've seen was at Disneyworld on 4th of July. It was amazing.

We also visited the World of Coca-cola in Atlanta. It was a lot of fun. We especially liked our encounter with the Polar Bear.We were glad to return back home again. My animals missed me.... This week we are putting my car up for sale, sniff! I will miss my beautiful 4 Runner so very much. Since I am not working now it doesn't make sense to keep that payment and insurance and the gas prices right now.

Love you to my family for making our trip to Georgia so wonderful. I can't wait to see the Fireworks displays in Japan.

5 Months and Counting Down . . .

Well we've made it to June. May was so incredibly busy for us. In 30 days I went to Georgia, WVA, and Colorado and saw a lot of my family members. My beautiful Niece, Kathryn Danielle graduated from High School. My son went to Prom this past Saturday and he graduates next week. Very hard to believe it has arrived!!

We had a very successful moving yard sale this past Saturday. What was left we are selling on Craig's list or have donated or given away. My husband is diligently working on getting the house ready for sale. The rest of us are too. So very much to do. I just had to take a break and do some emailing and blogging.

Even though it has been a royal pain to clean out all of our stuff, I know it will be a good thing. When we return to the states we won't have as much junk. We want to build our own house when we return. We just haven't decided where. That's another adventure....

Our new pool is completely installed and beautiful. The kids are already enjoying it. After the 90 degree weather this past weekend, we were able to take a dip as well. I can't wait to really enjoy my backyard this summer with my kids. This is the first time I will not be working since my youngest was born. He's 12 now. He is absolutely thrilled that Mom is spending the summer with him.

The house will go up for sale in about two weeks. Just doing a thorough cleaning, touching up paint and changing some bathroom fixtures. All of the heavy work is done. I will miss our home. We have been very happy here. We are praying that the house sells before we move to Japan. If it doesn't we've decided to rent it out. That should be interesting, but we'll cross that bridge when we get there.

5 months left. We've known about moving for 6 months and it went pretty quickly. Hard to believe it is really going to happen. Thank goodness we are on schedule with everything. I feel so lucky compared to other families who have had so little notice that they are going overseas.

Time to go jump in the pool!

April Showers, May Flowers

My birthday in April was very nice. My beautiful best friend sent me lovely flowers and gifts. My loving husband bought me chocolate, dinner and a comedy show. My Mom gave me a delicious ice cream cake and I received many, many wonderful birthday cards from my family and friends.

I'm 38 this year and the happiest I've ever been. De-stressing your life is sooooo refreshing!!!

I just returned from a trip to my Grandmother's to drop off my China and Crystal that I'm not taking to Japan. Just the beginning of my sorting, downsizing and packing. I realized that I really have 8 different things that could happen to my personal possessions:

1. Went to Grandma's
2. Going to my Dad's
3. Long-Term Storage
4. For Sale
5. Thrift Store
6. Express Shipment
7. Regular Shipment
8. Taking it with us on plane

You could really say 9 if you add the stuff I will throw away!

Anyway, today was very eventful for my husband. Today was his last day at his command. He is happy and excited, he is on leave for 3 weeks then it's off to school until October. Luckily school is here in VA. He received a NAM (Naval Achievement Medal) today.

The other Good News is that we received our Family Entry Approval today!! It was the last bit of paperwork we needed to know that we were 100% going to Japan. We will give a copy to the travel folks, so that they can schedule our travel and a copy to personal property, so that they will actually ship our stuff to Japan.

So, things are going along smoothly. We are getting excited about our trip to Denver to see our good friends John and Jennifer. Then I will be moving my sister back to Georgia and watching my niece graduate from high school. So, May is very busy for us.

June will be even busier, but that's another post!!

Can't Wait To Meet New People

This is just a quick update. I had created a Yahoo Group a few months ago for Navy Families stationed or going to be stationed at NAF Atsugi. It is titled AtsugiNavyFamilies. A wonderful lady created an awesome group for Yokosuka entitled YokosukaNavyFamilies. I have not been able to locate another group like it, so I decided to make my own.

I had a new member join yesterday and it was exciting. My hope is that I will be able to meet lots of people at Atsugi and we will all be able to communicate events and share our life and experience in Atsugi as well as help and welcome new members who will be coming to Atsugi.

I cannot wait to get to Atsugi to meet the people I've already had contact with. They have been such a huge help to me and I want to thank them in person!

Check, Check, Check, Working on the List

March has arrived! Busy, Busy, Busy, this and that, oops! What did I miss?

Work has been crazy finished up inventory for a gift shop. Soooo many things to count and re-count. Whew! Glad I made it through. So Good to be DONE!

Dolly and Jenks are doing excellent and glad we don't have to see a vet until the end of October.

The Japan PCS list has been reduced by a few important items. We have been found acceptable for overseas assignment. DH's package has been turned in and moving through PSD approvals. They should send for family entry approval next week.

We finally received the last regular travel passport we were waiting for. Next week we will go to see Dam Neck to apply for the No-Fee Passports.

We have also set up the appt for April for the Personal property scheduling. The boys and I have appt's for a dental cleaning in April too. Bryan goes in March to get ready for Braces as well.

Check, Check, Check, Busy, Busy, Busy......What's next?

February is Here

Wow! Just finished watching the awesome SuperBowl! Go Giants!

Whew, lots of changes for my family since Christmas. I have changed jobs and Michael started a new one. I am sad to leave my Kirkland's Family and happy to have a new one at Beach Treat.

We have received our first round of passports, the regular travel ones. We went to the post office to get them and had them back in TWO weeks. We were very surprised. It was $64.00 for the pictures for our passports from Walgreen's. The passport cost was $376.15 for the four of us. The adults were $98.05 and Bryan (12) was $82.00. Wow! Be prepared for the costs associated with overseas moves!! We have been warned that once we get to Japan, it could be close to $10,000.00 to move into a Japanese rental home. Yikes!

Michael and I have finished the required physicals prior to overseas screening. Bryan goes on Friday for his appt. Michael had to get a Meningitis shot and a shot for Tetanus.

On Tuesday, we all have our dental screening and hopefully our paperwork from the first passports will be back so that we can apply for our no fee passports. We have heard that the lady at Dam Neck is very mean, we will see.... I think if she is nasty, I'll let her know about her reputation.... maybe that will help someone else that has to go see her?

I have also purchased two more books about Japan. One is the "DK Eyewitness" book on Japan. It is like a lonely planet guide to Japan. It has maps and a whole bunch of info about culture, food, happenings. It breaks Japan down into sections and talks about hotels, restaraunts and entertainment venues. The second book is "The original point and speak phrasebook" by Toshiya Enomoto. It is a really cool book for people traveling/living in Japan that need HELP! with translating all kinds of stuff! It has pics with translations that are phonetic as well as written. You can go to a train station and say "excuse me" and point to the phrase in the book that asks where the bathroom is..... I really like it. It is very funny and functional. I ordered it from Japan Center in the UK. It cost $43.00 to have it airmailed here and took two weeks to receive.

DH and I did attend the Fleet and Family Service Centers, Overseas Relocation class and Boy, was it worth it! We found out all kinds of info, from money we didn't know we would get to the fact that they have changed how much weight you are allowed for your express/unaccompanied shipment. It used to be 1000 lb's for everyone, now it is by rank and we only get 400 lbs. Very sad about this!! If you are going to be going overseas, you definitly should take this class it was very informative and allowed me to confirm what I knew and to learn things I didn't know.

Dolly and Mr. Jenks went back to the Vet at Fort Story for their 2nd round of rabies shots and have an appt soon for their FAVN blood test to make sure their rabies antibodies are up! I do have to correct the fact that the vet only gave me one copy of my original rabies certificate. The second time around they gave me the correct 3 copies.

Well, that catches us up for now, except I am more anxious lately about going then I was last month. I don't think the nervous, am I going to be okay feeling will wear off for quite some time. But the more I learn about Japan, the Japanese, and the other military families there, I know I'll be just fine.

Hurry up and Wait!

It's December. Very warm here in Va Beach. I have all of my Christmas shopping done and wrapped! I have started a new part-time job with Kirkland's at the mall. I really enjoy working there. We are super busy because of Christmas.

We finally received an offer on our townhouse. It looks like we will close before the end of December. This will definitly help our budget!

I still have so much to do. We haven't gone to get our passport pictures yet. I think we are going to wait until January. I also have to get my medical records from various places to go to Oceana and start my medical file for overseas screening. I still have to go back to the Dr. for a well-woman check up. You have to have one of these within a year of moving.

Hurry up and wait, that's how I feel a lot, because the anxiety of having so much to do is always in the back of my mind. I just need to relax and enjoy the holidays, I have the next 9 months to deal with everything else! I am constantly reminding myself that this is the last time I'm putting up decorations in the US for the next 3 years! Merry Christmas everyone!!