Update

I guess it's time for an update.  I am really missing home today, my friends, family, and of course, my puppy.  It's really hard to make friends when you're not really involved in anything.  I know we have only been here for three weeks, but it doesn't take long to start feeling lonely.  The plan when we came here was for me to not have a job, and stay home to work on sewing instead.  Hopefully once my sewing stuff arrives it'll help distract me of this alone-ness.  If that combined with church activities and activities with the fire spouses doesn't keep me connected enough I guess I'll have to look for a job or something else to do.

We are more hopeful this week about our church situation.  We visited a church on Sunday (Resurrection Day), called Calvary Chapel.  It's a fairly small church, but it was obvious that the people there love the Lord and the pastor is burdened for the lost.  There were lots of young couples, but we didn't really 'meet' anyone.  We decided to go back to this church again and see how it goes.  I think that we are both just so desperate for friends that we're at the point that we're not going to be too picky about where we go to church.

Here is our housing situation:
Good--We know where we're going to live!   Bad--We can't move in until next week... Which means a whole month living in a hotel.
Good--The house is much larger than we expected.  Bad--We didn't get to see inside the two units we had to choose from before we made a decision.
Good--The house has a nice big yard on a corner lot across from an elementary school.  Bad--This isn't really a bad, just not really another good, the house is an older home.  They're trying to get most residents on Kadena into newer updated housing.  But we don't really mind the oldness (at least we don't think so).
Good--It's an actual house, not an apartment.  However it is attached to another house on one side.  Not that big of a deal.

All in all we are VERY happy with what we ended up with and feel that God really blessed us with more than we could have expected.  (We were expecting a tiny apartment in a big tower with no yard).  We can't wait to move into the house, especially me.  We've already gone around at all of the furniture stores that we know of looking for a new couch.  Minimal luck so far, but we have found a couple of options.

Aaron has started what is called FTAC this week.  I guess it's like an orientation for anyone who is at their first duty station.  It last for two weeks.  He had to be there at 7:30 this morning and it's 5:30 and he's still not back yet.  Hopefully it won't be like this the whole time!

We have enjoyed finally having some wheels and being able to move around the island some more.  It's getting easier to find our way around and we're even learning to navigate without a map/directions at times.  We visited a dam this past weekend called Kuroshiki Dam a few miles from the base.  It's beautiful.  There is a huge park and it looks like they have a stage for performances in the summer.  There's a beautiful river and lake.  We have also been trying the local cuisine.  So far it's yummy!

What I really love about Okinawa so far is just how many things we have to explore and discover.  Sometimes that's also what's hard about it for me because I'm the type of person who really values familiarity. But this is good for me and I'm enjoying it a lot!

Here are a few pictures: