Where we are Now

I sadly stopped updating this blog. I have to say that I dislike when people start up blogs and then after a couple of posts (even though I wrote more than just a couple), they never update it again! But now I am guilty of such a thing. I know nobody else cares but I feel like I need to wrap this blog up. I'll give one final update on the many changes that have happened since I last updated and then I'll tell you where you can find all of our new adventures!

So shortly after my last blog update we found out a lot of exciting news all in the same week. One piece of news was Chad being assigned a new base! In July, we moved from Okinawa to Missouri. His new base is Whiteman Air Force base in the very small town of Knob Noster, Missouri. So far, we love it here! We are so happy to be back in America! We have even had 3 weekends of visitors so far and we haven't even been here a full two months. It's nice to be closer to our family and friends! The area around base reminds Chad and I a lot of where we grew up so we don't mind that it's a lot of country. We do have to drive a good 50 minutes to get to the majority of shopping, but we do have Walmart within 15 minutes, so it's not bad. I do say that if we moved here straight from Michigan we probably wouldn't be as impressed but since we are coming from overseas and have lived without the American conveniences for three years, we'll take it and not complain!

The other big piece of news is that we're expecting our first child! I am actually due in just 10 days! And that's partially why this blog hasn't been updated. I've been blogging all about my pregnancy in a separate blog which you can find by clicking here. So if you want to read all of what's been going on with me in the last 9 months, that's where you'll find it! I'll hopefully continue to update that blog with updates of Mason's (spoiler...It's a BOY!) first year(s) as well.

Since I always talked about Myah, I'll give you an update on our dog as well. She made it back to America with us. She did so well on the flights! I'm sure it wasn't fun for her (it wasn't for me either), but I'm so happy she made the adventure back with us. So far since we've been back, she hasn't had any issues with her previous skin itching condition. YAY! I'm praying that she is fully recovered and it's not seasonal or something like that. It's such a relief knowing she's not itching anymore for both us and her I am sure!

Lots of good life changes for the Owens in 2015. We're happy to be back in America and start our new adventure as a family of THREE! Thanks for reading my blog and hope you continue to follow me on my new blog!

2015 Update!

Wow! I can't believe it has been almost 3 months since I last gave an update. That's probably because not much has been going on.

After Thanksgiving, Chad went to Guam for 3 weeks. While he was gone, my friend Blossom took me to 2 different Thai restaurants. All the food I tried was delicious! I love being adventurous! I also pampered myself and got a Christmas/Winter pedicure.

A Christmas tradition for the Japanese is to eat KFC. It made me laugh that this was a nail art option!

Chad came home just in time for Christmas! I'm glad he was able to be here for Thanksgiving and Christmas because being over here without family is already lonely enough; I can't imagine being without my husband for the holidays. We opened our presents from each other Christmas morning and then Facetimed each of our families to open their presents with them. I am so glad that's the last Christmas that we have to spend so far away from home!

We celebrated our 3 wedding anniversary on January 6th. We both took the day off work and spent the day at one of my favorite beaches picking up sea glass and just enjoying the beautiful day! We went to a Brazilian Barbecue restaurant for dinner called Bovinos. It's an all you can eat restaurant and we both left there stuffed!

Myah is doing well, her skin condition at this point is getting better but it's still there. We took her to the on base vet to get an opinion but they were pretty clueless as to why she was itching and basically just told us to give her benadryl. So we did and that worked for like 3 weeks but then she started becoming immune to it. We took her to the off base vet again this last week. He thinks she is allergic to dust mites. He gave us some medication to make her stop itching but said there was nothing he could do for the dust mites. His advice to us was to remove all the carpet. That made me chuckle, since we live in base housing and don't have that option. Even if I did own my own home, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't just trash all my carpet. So, the medicine he gave us is working miracles! She hasn't itched since she has been on it. I really hope it's not temporary and she starts growing hair back where she has lost it from itching.

I'll leave you some pictures that I have taken over the last few months on my phone!

I tried sushi again & actually found some that I liked!

We ate at Genghis Khan for the first time, it was delicious!

We love taking walks at the sea wall!

We've had to take Myah to the vet several times for skin issues.

Myah is loving life!

Feeling Adventurous

In early October, Chad and I decided to venture out for the day to see what we can find. We literally feel like we've seen almost everything on this island that we ever dream of seeing. I was searching on Okinawa Hai, which is a website full of posts about places around the island, to see if anything looked interesting. I found a couple places that were close to each other, so we headed out the door. Our first stop was the Tomori Stone Lion, which is one of the most recognizable scenes from the Battle of Okinawa. It was kind of cool to see a statue that was there during the Battle of Okinawa that still stands today. After snapping a few pictures, we headed to the Yaese Castle Ruins, which was just down the road. Here there was also a little park, which had a bunch of Cherry Blossom trees. We both agreed it would be cool to go back there during Cherry Blossom season because it'd be really pretty! That was the extent of our adventure, so then we started heading back toward base. We took a bunch of back roads, which is probably one of my favorite ways to pass time on this island. It's interesting to drive around and get lost. The thing is that you never really get lost because you eventually end up at a main road that leads you back to a base. Even though Chad and I feel like we've seen everything there is to be seen on this island, we do still have some things on our Okinawa bucket list. One of the biggest things is to visit a couple more of the outlying islands. Most of them you have to take a ferry to (and some even a plane), but they all offer beautiful scenery and new adventures!

Speaking of adventures, a couple weeks ago I took a big step out of my comfort zone. My friend, Blossom, and I went and got our nose pierced! I'm such a conservative person, I don't have any tattoos, and I don't even have anything else pierced besides my ear lobes. I would be telling a lie if I said I wasn't nervous. I was so nervous! I don't even like needles! But I have to say it was an awesome experience. We went to this guy named Darren Harris, who was very professional and clean. He was highly recommended from people on the island, and I also recommend him to anyone wanting to get pierced here!

We just celebrated our last Halloween in Okinawa, woohoo! Blossom and I dressed up for work as 80's girls. I already had the clothes from the 80's treasure hunt that I participated in while I was home, so it was an easy choice! I had to work until 6PM, then I went home to hand out candy to the trick or treaters. Well... we didn't even get one trick or treater, how sad! We have never got a ton of trick or treaters down our street, but in the past we at least had a couple knock on our door. Later that night, I went back to work to check in the teens for the Halloween Lock-In (I work at a Teen Center). Thankfully I didn't have to stay the whole night, but kudos to my co-workers who did!

Lastly, I'll give you an update on Myah. So my last post, I said that Myah was doing better but since then she started itching again. So we took her back to the vet and this time he said she has fungus. He put her on meds for 3 weeks, which she just finished up, so we'll see what happens next. I think I'm done taking her to the vet though. I truly believe it's just this island that is causing her skin problems. We've been battling skin issues for 18 months now. I just ordered this supplement to put in her food on Amazon that is suppose to help her skin and hair. The reviews look really good so I'm excited to try it out. I can't wait for it to get here! I can't wait to go back to the states where I can actually get Amazon Prime 2 day shipping. It takes about 10 days for a package from Amazon to get to us, so I'm patiently waiting. That's about it for this month's update, thanks for reading!

October Update!

It's been awhile since I updated my blog, so I figure I'd stop in to give a quick update.

At the end of August, we flew home to Michigan for a month. We had this trip planned a few months out and decided that we would surprise Chad's family with him coming home. So the entire time, everyone (but my Mom and a few other people) thought it was just me coming home and Chad was staying behind with Myah. It was a great surprise and of course his family was happy to see he was able to make the trip home too!

We enjoyed our time in Michigan much more this time around than we visited in December because the weather was perfect! It was summer-like weather the first week or so we were home and then the cooler Fall weather came. It was great to be able to go to the Cider Mills and get a little taste of Fall while we were home, since we don't get much of a Fall in Okinawa. One of the reasons we came home when we did is so I could go to my good friend Becca's wedding. It was a beautiful wedding and I was so happy I could be there! It sucks living on the other side of the world because we miss a lot of our family and friend's big life moments!

Chad spent the majority of his vacation working on his truck. He got all the final pieces painted and the truck now drives! He was super happy to be able to work on his baby while he was home.

It was great catching up with as many people as we could when we were home. Of course we didn't get around to seeing everyone. It's just so hard when you're home for such a short amount of time and there are so many people to see. Hopefully we'll get stationed somewhere closer to home next so that we don't go as long between seeing all of our family and friends.

Speaking of where we are getting stationed next, that seems to be the big question that we get asked by so many these days. Where do you get stationed next? Do you get to choose where you go? Where do you want to go? Do you think it'll be in the states? Our 3 years in Okinawa is coming to an end here within the next year. Some days it feels like we just got here, other days I feel like we've been here for 5 years. I think 2 years would have been the perfect amount of time here, but the military tells us we're staying for 3. So we're just trying to ride this last year out. As far as the process goes for finding out where the military is sending Chad, basically in January, they will come out with a list of bases where they need him. He'll get to look at the list and then prioritize his "dream sheet" of where he'd like to go. Then after that it's more waiting to find out where they choose for him! So we still have 4-5 months until we have the answer to your question. We are incredibly anxious to find out what is in store for our future, just cross your fingers it's somewhere amazing (and closer to home)!

Another question that always gets asked is, do you get to take your dog with you? Of course we get to take our dog with us! I wouldn't leave her behind for the world! It's been a tough year for Myah, it seems like it's been one thing after another for her. The last update I gave on her was that she was going through heartworm treatment. I'm happy to say that Myah is 100% heartworm free after going through the painful process to get rid of them! :) For over a year now, she has had a spot on her skin that was first diagnosed as ringworm and got treated like so for months. Only to eventually get a second opinion and find out that it most definitely isn't ringworm but the vet didn't know what it was. We opted to get a biopsy done of it, and got the results back right before we went on vacation. The biopsy report says it's Follicular hamartoma, which is not a tumor. It basically has something to do with her hair follicles in that certain spot, and as long as she's not biting and scratching at it anymore than it's harmless. So at least we sort of have an answer to that. As of right now, she doesn't seem to be bothered by it anymore, so I'm hoping it stays that way. But like I said, it has been one thing after another for Myah. When we got back from vacation, Myah had missing patches of hair, she was itching and biting at herself, and was shedding like CRAZY! I couldn't get her into the on base vet for 2 weeks, and I wasn't about to take her to the Japanese vet that misdiagnosed her for having ringworm for months. My co-worker told me about another Japanese vet that she loved, so we decided to give them a shot. I didn't even have to make an appointment, they let us just walk in. Long story short, they diagnosed her with scabies and sent her home with meds. As soon as we gave her the meds, she stopped itching, which was a relief I'm sure to her but also us because her constant itching was driving me nuts. It's been 2 weeks, and she's taken all of her meds. She itches a little bit now but she is so much better than what she was. I'm hoping her hair will grow back quick and she can be a healthy dog again. I just feel so bad for her, she can't seem to catch a break!

We just experienced Typhoon Vongfong which was predicted to be the worst storm on Earth for 2014. By the time it hit Okinawa, it wasn't as bad as predicted. We got a lot of wind and rain but the high winds that Vongfong was packing died down by the time the eye passed over us. In fact, the whole southern part of the storm just kind of disappeared. We were stuck inside Friday night starting about 7:30PM until Sunday afternoon about 1:00PM. Good thing this is a 3 day holiday weekend for us, so we still get to have somewhat of a weekend! Everything is going fine on this side of the world. I'll try to update more often, but nothing too exciting happens in my life these days! Thanks for reading!

When in Tokyo... (Tokyo: Part 3)

Tokyo: Part 1
Tokyo: Part 2
 
The last two days of our trip were spent exploring the bigger districts of Tokyo.

One night we checked out Shinjuku, which just so happens to have the world's busiest subway station. We took the subway system everywhere so of course we had to experience the busiest one. There were a ton of people! We were packed on the subway train like a can of sardines, and none of the locals had a care in the world. That's normal for them. I can't imagine having to deal with that everyday to and from work... no thank you! Not only was the station busy but so was the outside city. It was filled with streets all lit up with stores and restaurants. I thought it was fun to walk through the streets to see everything that was there. Once we were done exploring there we decided to find our way back to Shibuya, which if you read my previous Tokyo blog post, you know we had already been there once. We wanted to experience it at night time. I'm glad we did! That famous Shibuya intersection was packed full of people and it was just a cool experience. 

On Thursday, we headed out to find the big Gundam Wing statue. By this time, we had gotten pretty good at finding our way using the subway system, so we didn't so much look like lost ducklings at each station. The Gundam Wing statue was so much bigger than I expected and really cool! I'm not a huge Gundam fan, so I'm thinking it would have been cooler if it was a Transformer :) The statue sits right outside a mall, so we decided to go check it out. It was probably the nicest mall we have been in so far in Japan. It even had some American stores like Old Navy, American Eagle, and Krispy Kreme! After shopping around there awhile, we headed toward this huge ferris wheel that wasn't very far from where we were. We found another shopping mall over there, so we checked that one out as well. It was really pretty decorated on the inside, and even had a fake sky ceiling that made you feel like you were outside. We had walked quite a bit since we started our day, so we headed back to the hotel to rest our feet.

Our last full day in Tokyo was spent at the Zoo. Our main purpose of going to the zoo was to see Pandas, which happened to be the first exhibit as you walk in the park, which was pretty cool! I was impressed by the Ueno Zoo, it was pretty big and had some cool animals to see. We even caught a glimpse at two elephants mating, which was sure a sight to see!

One thing that I have heard a lot about since being in Japan is flavored kit-kats. Whenever we would pass a shop or convenience store, I would check to see if they had them. I then researched and found that there was an actual Kit-Kat store that sold all these unique flavors of them. Of course, we had to go find this store! We ended up buying 3 different flavors; chili, cream cheese, and strawberry maple. At the time, those were the only flavors they were selling. I think the flavors are seasonal, but if you're interested you should check out all the different kit-kat flavors there are out there! We tried all 3 flavors and they were all good. The chili one was a little weird to me, it actually had a little spice to it. I did end up finding 2 more flavors at the airport on the way out; raspberry and red bean. 

I should have wrote this blog sooner because I'm sure I'm forgetting some amazing details and stories to share but what can you do? We had a great time in mainland Japan and have already talked about going back possibly for a long weekend. We'd love to go see (and maybe climb) Mt. Fuji. We only have a year left on the island, so we'll see how it all plays out. I hope you enjoyed reading about our Tokyo trip and if you have any questions, just ask!

We are currently stuck inside because of Typhoon Neoguri. We are safe in our cement house. There have been some reports of cars being tipped over and a building crashing down, but other than that all I see is rain and wind! Stay safe all my Oki friends!

Tokyo Disneyland and DisneySea (Tokyo: Part 2)

After finding out that we were going to be stationed in Japan and researching the country, one of attractions we were most excited for was Tokyo Disney! We honeymooned in Disney World so Disney holds a special place in our heart. Finally after being here for almost two years, we were going to experience it! Japan has 2 Disney parks, Disneyland and DisneySea. I had heard DisneySea was better, so I decided to the save the best for last. On Tuesday, we headed out bright and early to Disneyland. I tried to buy our tickets online in advance but since my MasterCard was not issued in Japan, it wouldn't let me. I had read that once the park sells the allotted amount of tickets for the day, they don't let anymore in. For this reason, we decided to get there before the park opened at 8:30AM.

Disneyland was much like Disney World's Magic Kingdom. They have the castle that looks similar to the one in the states and many of the same rides. We must have picked a perfect day to go as we didn't have to wait long in very many lines for all the rides. It was nice! We did get rained on a couple times throughout the day but nothing major that would ruin our day. The big thing in Tokyo Disney is the flavored popcorn. There were a ton of people with Disney themed buckets hanging around their necks which contained popcorn inside. We decided to try the Carmel corn, which was pretty good. One of my favorite parts of the day was watching the parade. It was cool to see all the different floats, characters, and performers. We hadn't seen any Caucasian theme park employees so we were kind of surprised to see that some of the characters were not Asian! Speaking of ethnicity, we stuck out like a sore thumb, which isn't surprising but we got MANY stares. Whenever we saw other white people, we would ask each other where we thought they were from based on their clothes, look, and accent lol. We even had this group of Japanese teenage girls say Hi, Hello to us while waving and when I said Hi back they acted like a celebrity just talked to them! So funny!

On Tuesday, we were not in a big hurry to get to Disney like the day before because we had already bought our ticket for the day. We slept in and then took the 30 minute or so subway ride to Disney. Once we got off at the main station, we had to take Disney's monorail to Disney Sea. Their train was super cute. The windows were in the shape of Mickey and so were the handles that people are standing hold on to. Once we entered DisneySea, I was in awe. The park is so visually appealing, it's wonderful! The way it is set up, is that you walk through like different countries. When you enter the park, you're in Italy, and the streets are decorated like so. This is definitely one of the best and most unique Disney parks that I have been to. It's a must see for anyone who can make a trip to a Tokyo, in my opinion.

Compared to Disneyland, a lot of the rides are geared toward the older population so we had a lot more fun here. The first ride we went on was the Toy Story one, which is just like the one in the states where it's a 3D experience where you shoot to score points and compete against each other. This was our longest wait, which was about 45 minutes. We noticed that our wait was so long because people who had grabbed a fast pass ticket earlier in the day were able to cut in front of us. After seeing that, we decided to get fast pass tickets for the rest of the big attractions as that seemed to be the way to go! The way fast pass works is that you grab a ticket and then you have to come pack at a later time and basically get to cut everyone else in line. It was nice but I don't really think the system is fair.

So while we were waiting for our time to go on the ride we tried some more popcorn flavors. The first one we tried was Strawberry, which was pretty good. I liked Carmel better but Chad thinks it's a toss up. The next one we tried just to say we tried it was Curry flavored. I found it absolutely disgusting but Chad said it was alright. We ended up feeding most of it to the hungry birds.

We didn't stick around to see any of the shows, even though I would have liked to. It started raining as we were getting ready to leave and with this being the 3rd straight day on our feet, we needed the rest! One thing that I found different about the Japanese is they would just sit down in the middle of the sidewalk to rest covered by their umbrella to shade them from the sun. They also are really serious about their parades. People were sitting down at their spot for the parade hours before it started. Nothing wrong with any of it, just found it different than American culture. Overall, we had a great experience at the Disney parks and I do have to agree with everyone that I've talked to and read reviews on, DisneySea is the better of the two parks. It's awesome!

If you haven't already, make sure to check out Tokyo: Part 1 of our trip! Tokyo: Part 3 will come shortly!