Count your Blessings- Name them one by one

In no particular order, a list of blessings that have come our way from living on a remote, cold, and small base in northern Japan:

1. Friends that allowed us to use their car to drive to Aomori for our snow adventure trip when our car ran into problems.  And then allowed us to keep driving the car until we could figure out what to do with ours.

2. When we junked our second car (mentioned above), strangers (and angels answering a prayer) responded to our FB plea and are letting us borrow their car for two months while they TDY. We just have to make to June and then we PCS.

3. When the fitness contract was removed for the second time in six months, stopping me from teaching yoga at the base gym AGAIN, I have loyal yogi friends who filled out countless ICE forms (comment forms), requested me for private and group yoga sessions, and sponsored some Key Spouse Yoga events so that I could keep teaching. A blessing for me and for the welfare of this base.

4. That my kids have the chance for positive, cultural exchanges.

5. That the school class sizes are small so that my kids can be recognized for good work.

6. That my kids got to meet the Jabbawokeez dance crew since they are a part of the Hip Hop class at the youth center.  Josh and I paid a lot of money to see them in Las Vegas, we got a free performance since we live overseas.

7. That I have a sweet husby who goes through the trouble to nominate me again for Military Spouse of the Year.  

Bear and Bub with the Jabbawockeez dance crew

Just a fun pic- look at the huge icicle in our backyard!

Pants had a cultural exchange with a Japanese Elementary

Bear got five awards- Principal's list, Academic achievement in Physical Education, ELA, Science, and Math

Annual Awards night

Marie Kondo is good for the military

As we start to prepare for our move from Misawa Japan to Enid, Oklahoma, it became clear that it is time to purge.  When we arrived here three years ago, our kids were in a different phase of life and we have just held on to the leftover items because there was no motivation to get rid of it.  We have to divide our home into three different shipments- the big shipment HHG (household goods) which will leave in May, the more essential day to day items, Unaccompanied Baggage, that will leave in June, and the things that we will cart around in suitcases until we have somewhere to live in OK.  We have no extra room in our house to sort all of this and so it is necessary to get rid of things that are not needed anymore.  We used Marie Kondo's philosophy of discarding.  It seemed fitting as we are in Japan and there was the Netflix series and her book to learn from.  I really liked thinking of the things that bring us JOY and the things we are going to keep.  It seemed so much easier to make decisions this way.  I do not think we discarded enough to be featured on her show, but I was surprised at how much we have been holding onto in our little Misawa home:

Clothing- 7 bags
Papers- 2 bags
Books- 2 boxes/crates
Komono (miscellaneous) 18 bags

Every time I took a load to the thrift store on base I felt a little bad for the employees there who have to sort through my junk.  Maybe someone just arriving here can benefit for it.  Life comes full circle here in Misawa!

Bub and our seven bags of discarded clothing