Top 10

Top 10 Reasons I'm Looking Forward to Going Home for the Holidays
(beside the obvious...spending time with loved ones, of course)

10 - Christmas is lonely when your hubby is deployed
9 - two words: real tree
8 - I need to test out the family's "Cat Whisperer" theory*
7 - It's been many moons since I've seen snow
6 - time to gorge on my mom's cookies
5 - meet the new baby in the "family"
4 - my MacBook is broken (already...) - I need an Apple Store ASAP.
3 - serious Uno playing with Papa
2 - Silver Maple Chinese food
1 - getting to use the porch as a second freezer - genius!

*When I was home last summer, the family cat, Bailey was having some issues with marking in the house. During my stay, he had very few "incidents," giving me the title "Cat Whisperer." We'll see what happens this time around.

Light Conspiracy

I was planning on sharing some holiday decoration photos tonight, but unfortunately it seems that the Christmas lights are out to get me.  I set up my classroom tree last weekend, only to find midweek that one of the light strings burned out - in the middle of the tree!  Of course, being the perfectionist that I am, I HAVE to fix it.  Add lights to the shopping list - check.

Which brings me to tonight.  Even though I won't be here Christmas day, I decided that I couldn't forgo having a beautiful tree set up in the living room.  So, I began to set up our lovely, prelit, and much to my chagrin, artificial tree, by flaring out all the branches, making sure there are no gaps, etc.  Then I plug in the tree and what do I find - a section of the lights are out.  "No problem," I think to myself.  I bought an extra set of light in case this happened this year.  As I was putting on the new string of lights, half of them suddenly go out on my new string.  Seriously?!  You've got to be kidding me.  I was so frustrated that I just stopped and now my tree is only partially set up.  Now I need to get more lights for both trees.  Grrr...

Thankfully, I can find solace and Christmas tree beauty in other places.  Our church always has beautiful trees set up in the sanctuary.  Last night at a women's event I got to sit right by them and enjoy their glow.  The pictures just don't do it justice!

For those of you artificial-tree-experts, I have a question for you: do I take off the old lights that don't work and are intricately wound around each branch?  It bugs me that they are on there and don't work, but at the same time, I can't imagine trying to take them off.  It's quandary, I tell you....

A Week's Worth

I've got some major blog catching up to do!  Last week started out so well - probably because my dearest sent me a dozen red roses to school.  Now, that's the way to start off the week!

Thanksgiving was spent with friends.  It was a delicious meal with everyone pitching in (I brought the cranberry relish - something I couldn't burn!).  Here are some of my closest girlfriends here in Oki: Tritia (top), Emily, Jennifer, me, and Laura (left to right)

The following morning started with a trip to CoCok's with friends.  My toes are the silver and white ones on the bottom.

Then off to the annual Thanksgiving Bazaar on Foster to stimulate the economy in time for Christmas.  It was fun to peruse through each table and display and still learn about this crazy culture that I have learned to feel comfortable living in.  I have always loved looking at the glass ball buoys that are found up north on mainland Japan (these were used long ago by fishermen), but I had never seen these cylindrical ones before.  Apparently, these were used in netting octopus.  Interesting....

Of course, I loved seeing all the various Shisa statues.

That night, a bunch of friends rented a room for karaoke.  As always, it was a blast.  Here we are getting down with the YMCA.  

But, some of my favorite moments of the week, especially on my days off, were spent cuddling with my two furkids and watching the turbulent ocean waves outside.

I have much to be thankful for. 

 And now, on to holiday decorating and crazy hours at work!