A Day Of Exploring...

So today we went on an adventure to explore some more of the island. As we get more comfortable here, we find ourselves wanting to adventure out off the base and see what is out in the Japanese culture. Boy is it fascinating!



We went to the mall today and I tried some milk tea ice cream. It wasn't disgusting (well Kyle thought it was) but I probably won't order it again. After that we went to this cute boutique in the mall and I got a very unique and cute bracelet. I really liked how different it looked. After that we went to the arcade, and played a very unique popcorn game. First you pick a flavor (since we can't read Japanese we just went with a random one...it ended up being powder cheese) Then you had to crank the machine to "make" your popcorn, and after a few minutes of vigorously cranking this machine you got the most disgusting popcorn ever!!! We laughed alot, then gave it to our friend...he ate it all! Brave!   

Our next lovely adventure was the photo booth...and boy are those interesting! First you put in your 400 yen (appx $5) and think GEEZE that is an expensive photobooth. Then we walked into this HUGE photo booth, where we picked 9 backgrounds. We then began posing for these pictures, and by posing I mean Kyle leaning over like he has osteoperosis because the camera was so low. As we took the pictures we realized that they had tons and tons of lights and reflectors and a quite elaborate set up with green screen technology and everything. So we continued on our adventure. When we got out we waited and waited and waited for our pictures...no pictures. Only to find out there was an "editing" station. We sat down to edit and realized they took glamour shots of us...as in it looks like Kyle has make up on they did so much editing. Laughter is an understatement to our reaction to this. I frantically tried to figure out what to do to undo the editing of Kyle's face...one problem, we don't read Japanese to figure out what the buttons mean. Here was our results.

Next we went to the "Vending Machine" Resturaunt or Arashi's. It is called the vending machine resturaunt because you walk in, put your money in a vending machine, press the buttons for what you want to order, sit down, and someone brings you your food. It is quite good and quite cheap! Kyle ordered fried rice which came in a skillet like fajita's do in the states. That was really neat. I have no idea what I ordered but it had noodles, some sort of meat (I think ham), and some broth. The broth tasted fishy because it was a fish sauce based broth. I really enjoyed the meal and was proud of myself for ordering completely blind.

While at the mall we saw this lady who was selling fresh baked bread from a van...no joke the bread was cooking in the back of the van. Not sure how but it was cooking away. Anyway I wanted to try it and figured what would two or three bucks hurt. I picked a random bread, since she didn't speak English. OH MY GOODNESS!! This was the best thing I have ever eaten. It was a soft, warm, melt in your mouth strawberry bread. Words can not describe how amazing this bread was. The inside was like the texture of cotton candy with the flavor of bread. None of the sweetness of cotton candy just the texture and richness of a warm loaf of bread. YUMMMMMMMMY. I did not take a picture because we devoured it in a couple seconds.

Next thing we dropped our friend off who had joined us for a joyful day of adventures and decide to go look at some animals. We've known we want a pet but weren't sure when. We were also in limbo over a dog or a cat. Kyle has always said the only way I will ever have a cat is if he is all black with green eyes! So we walked in to look around, we told the lady we were just looking and weren't sure if we would get a cat yet or not. She said they had a cat that was about two years old and had been at the on base Kennel for a few months, which is a long time. Since they needed to get rid of him he was free. If we choose him, we would just have to pay to have him neutered. We asked her to show us him...there he was an all black cat with green eyes. After about a minute of playing with him I looked at Kyle and we both silently agreed he was THE ONE. We paid for his neutering and took that ball of fur home! Kyle named him Ninja, and boy is he cute!

Our next adventure for the day was trying out McDonald's and a Food mart which is just a gas station. McDonald's was so incredibly different! The food was fresh, people were nice, and the place was clean. There weren't five thousand kids acting wild. They were all playing and behaving just fine, the lady behind the counter bowed to us and everything...oh yeah and we got these super cool cups for ordering a large combo. We want to go back a couple more times to get a bunch of these cute cups! The food mart was really cool too. We got this apple tea that comes in a carton. They give you a super tall straw to drink it out of and it is delicious! It could be a little sweeter for our tastes but definitely something we will drink regularly (also super cheap). We also got some donut like things, they are so cheap and taste even cheaper. For some unknown reason though I keep eating them, guess they are kinda good. Well that was our adventurous day of exploring. Tomorrow is church and probably going to the local farmers market to get last minute produce for the week.

An Update from Japan

Here we are in Japan!

We arrived safely! We were greeted by our fantastic Sponsor. He and his wife stocked our hotel room full of yummy food, turned in our housing application, got our hotel room, showed us around base and countless other helpful things. Our hotel room had a very unique (ugly) bathroom...

Yes that is green tile everywhere haha. Our hotel experience was less than decent. We were greeted by many many centipedes and after many complaints eventually were allowed to switch rooms. Everytime I have stayed on-base it went perfect. Not this time. I do have pictures of the bugs but I doubt you want to see them. Luckily the next day we got a car...

Meet our very adorable Honda Civic. Notice the steering wheel is on the other side of the car. We learned to drive and got a 100 on our test and are now "professional" drivers. At least that's what the Japanese call us. Haha! Shortly after getting our car Kyle got off work with the greatest surprise ever...

Keys to our HOME!!!! We were shocked, the day before at our housing briefing we were told housing was 99.7% full. Talk about an answer to a prayer! God blessed us with this amazing home with a gorgeous view and newly renovated. We are the first tenants since renovations took place. Here is a few pictures of our home.

Left is the view from our Kitchen, dining area (part of the kitchen), and guest bedroom. Center is our living room and right is our Kitchen! We are super excited and can not wait for our stuff to get here so we can make this house a warm and inviting home.

"Now therefore may it please you to bless the house of your servant, so that it may continue forever before you. For you, O Lord God, have spoken, and with your blessing shall the house of your servant be blessed forever." 2 Samuel 7:29.

-Kyle and Amber

Here We Go Again

Here, we found this great little Greek resturaunt that was delicious (ignore my lazy eye haha). We had Spanikopita and Gyro's. It was fantastic!

In case you did not know I have been baking for the troops! During the week I make cookies, muffins, or some other baked goods and give them to the guys and girls who are at tech school for them to enjoy. As a thank you the Chaplain staff and White Ropes gave me this fantastic gift basket. I was completely suprised and so very grateful. They even gave me Japanese Cherry Blossom since we are going to Japan! So nice of them!

Here Kyle was bringing out his inner child...yet again haha! We were wandering around walmart and he found the helmet of all helmets. He was adamant I needed to take a picture of his dinosaur pose.

This is one of my current projects! I am crocheting a scarf. It is almost done and I LOVE it! It is this beautiful rich blue that is similar to a classic blue jean look, thus it goes with everything.

This was taken at the airshow and we both have the most goofy faces! We went and had a great time. Got a funnel cake and watched the planes do lots and lots of super neat tricks. We saw a plane that was silent until after it passed you then it was ear shattering loud. So neat!

Baking! One Sunday afternoon we were hanging out with the Sugg family, whom we have become quite attached to and will be very sad to leave. Anyway, the girls and I decided to bake away. Puffer (the one on the left) lasted the whole time while Torrie lost focus and ended up jumping on the trampoline with Kyle. We had a great time baking up desserts. Yummy!

This is another one of my current projects, the Kay in me has come out and I am loving doing this Thomas Kinkaid puzzle! It is so much fun but a challenge. I find myself getting lost in figuring out each piece and I now know why Gran-Gran loves them so much.

And the best for last. After much hard work Kyle has graduated Tech School. He did a fantastic job getting a 93, 97, 97, and 97 on the four tests. Making his final average a 96! We are now not very patiently waiting on orders. Hopefully we will be in Japan soon and have a home of our own. However with him having graduated has come quite a schedule change. Kyle was asked to work Swing Shift, meaning he now works from 4 pm to Midnight. Both of our schedules are adjusting to this change, we are choosing to be excited about the adjustments starting considering we will be 13 hours ahead in Japan.

Until next time

-Kyle and Amber!

We Survived the First Six Months!

HAPPY 1/2 ANNIVERSARY!

September 19th, was our sort of anniversary! We decided to celebrate our six month anniversary. We had a fantastic weekend! On Friday we had a date night at Samurai of Tokyo, this wonderful asian resturaunt. Saturday we spent the day hanging out with Kyle's friends and classmates, and Sunday we went to a young adult couples class at church and had a wonderful lunch/dinner with Ms. Sally and Mr. Keith!

Where to begin...

POOL! Because there are free pool tables for us to play at on base, Kyle and I have taken up playing pool. Right before this picture was taken, I WON! For the first time ever I beat Kyle at playing pool without cheating. It was very exciting considering half the time we play I cheat so unbelievably bad and the other half Kyle doesn't just beat me, he slaughters me in pool.

This picture makes me laugh so hard, because Kyle is notorious for yelling at me that I take up the entire bed when I sleep. Friday evening I took my nightly shower and when I got out of the shower I was greeted with no where to sleep but the couch. Fortunately the flash on my phone woke him up enough to scoot over.



To all the nerds and WOW junkies, we were browsing through Hot Topic because Kyle had a 25% off coupon when he came across the "Epic Purple Shirt". What an awesome find! He was very excited, so he tried on the smallest size they had (medium) and it engulfed him. He very sadly put the shirt back on the shelf and prepared to leave, when a very nice employee offered to look behind the Plexiglass display and go figure a small! Needless to say this made his day.

I am not really sure which super hero this mask is supposed to be for, but I liked the "A" for Awesome Amber. Kyle told me I looked ridiculous and to put the mask down. (After he took a picture). I think we are the lamest married couple on the planet, we go to walmart when we are bored.

Meet the SARK belt, during the hours of darkness on base Kyle is required to wear this reflective belt. What makes this belt awesome is that when the light hits the reflectors, it reflects like nothing I have ever seen. Notice the ZUBAZ pants he is wearing. One day we were going through a box of Clint's (Kyle's dad) stuff and we came across these pants. True to Kyle fashion, he had to have these very "fashionable" pants...he wears them four days a week at least.

Veggies, with us being a young couple who is poor. I am learning to cook. One of Kyle's favorite things I cook is...stir fry! I enjoy this meal alot because as you can see it is loaded in healthy veggies. The stir fry ingredients in the picture was one of my favorite's I have made. I put bok choy, broccoli, mushrooms, squash, carrots, onion, water chestnuts, bamboo shoots, baby corn, and onion in it. What a deliciously healthy meal!

Shoestring Potatoe Chips! If Gran-Gran, Gampy, Karli, or Mom is reading this then you will hopefully smile as much as I did when I found these. We used to eat these as kids with Gampy. If I remember correctly we dipped them in ketchup. Yummy!!!!

And to save the best for last; Kyle has been studying and working so hard and will graduate next week. He has made a 97, 93, and 97 on his first three tests, and is super excited. This week he dropped his ABU's (Camo clothes) and Blues off to get their "Stripes" and AFSC badge. The badge represents his graduation in school and the stripes represent him going from an Airman Basic to an Airman First Class or A1C. He was like a child on Christmas day picking up his clothes after they had sewn on his new badges. I know the anticipation of wearing them on Tuesday is killing him.

And Preparation Has Begun

Just another update in the life of Kyle and Amber!

As you can see we are a bit overwhelmed....preparation for JAPAN has begun. Might I add, it is never ending the stuff to do! This week we are getting medically cleared. Kyle has a full go! I go for dental clearance on Friday and next Monday medical clearance. Prayers that all goes well would be appreciated!

Where to begin! After having a very long and rough month of August we wrapped the month up by saying good bye to Cody, and prayerfully began the month of September. September first rolled around, and we started the month with...a wopping 100 dollar paycheck! HA!

By this point we had to laugh at the timing. Come to find out when Kyle PCS'd to Sheppard I dissappeared out of the system...causing the USAF to believe they had been over paying Kyle BAH and Separation Pay...and take the past money out. Luckily it will all be sorted out come Thursday! However, the DOD's finance office are awful. We were amazingly blessed with a fantastic First Shirt. Kyle's superior, went completely out of his way to help us get everything we needed situated.

Then I got to babysit! Whooo hoooo! Though it was just for two hours, I was so excited to be with children again! I would post this adorable picture I have of one of them playing, but I should probably ask their parents first. I I forget how much fun it is seeing children's excitement about everything. Their love of life! We had breakfast and after breakfast we played with their toy cars. The boys would get in their Little Tykes cars and run them into me. While doing that I would stand up and yell "Super Babysitterrrrrrrrrrrr" while pushing them around the garage! We did this for quite a while. They were very sad when "Super Babysitter" needed to stop and get a glass of water!

So Sunday we visited a new Church that was recommended to us...

http://www.fbcwf.org/safb/default.aspx

And my what a blessing that was! We met some wonderful people and ran into a few we already knew! This Sunday we will be attending a Young Couple's class in the morning and are extremely excited. Kyle knows the instructor of the Class since he is in the USAF also!

Somehow I managed to get into something I am allergic to (pretty sure Titanium Dioxide) and Sunday morning I woke up to a cute rash with not so cute side affects! Thus today was spent washing...and oh my what washing I did. I washed and scrubbed everything I have come near, hopefully these little red bumps will soon be disappearing.

Tomorrow I will watch a friend graduate from his Tech School, and I am very excited! In the evening Kyle will be having a study group with his classmates, for their 3rd block test on Wednesday! Last time afterwards Kyle asked me to cook them dinner, and it was a hit! So tomorrow evening we are having dinner again! For some reason the people here like home cooking much better than the dining facility food. Wonder Why??

Have a wonderfully blessed week!

Love,

Kyle & Amber

Lamebor Day...

This is Kyle and Amber's blog!

Aren't we adorable?

Basically, we decided that since we will be traveling a lot with the Air Force, a blog was the best way to keep everyone (who cares) updated on the adventures of Kyle and Amber. So...the adventure begins, this is where the adventure stops. Lame right?

Hopefully we will get some, more creative posts and updates coming your way soon!?!?

Till Next Time...