Lice... ^^; (No, not rice)

I can laugh about it now, but I couldn't back then... I was brushing Juhee's hair one morning to tie her hair like I always do and noticed that there were a few small white.. um.. things in her hair. I tried to brush it off, but it wouldn't come off easily. I thought "it can't be.. it can't be.......", checked Sungjae's hair and saw that he had some too, had a discussion inside my head as to what I should do, and then sent them off to kindergarten/daycare. ^^; Probably wasn't the wisest or the most responsible decision...

Peter and I spent some time that morning reading up on lice. LICE! We couldn't believe it... Neither of us had ever had lice nor knew much about it so we had a lot of reading up to do! We live in Japan, one of the cleanest countries in the world. One of the most hygiene-and-bath-obsessed countries in the world. How could our kids possibly have lice???

We also needed to find out what "lice" is in Japanese... Our English-speaking Japanese friends sometimes joke about how the Japanese pronunciation of "rice" and "lice" are the same and then explain to their non-English speaking friends what the two mean in Japanese. It's usually followed by some measure of shock and horror. I know what "rice" is in Japanese but never paid close attention when "lice" was being explained. Maybe I should have?! :/

Before picking up the kids, I went to a drug store nearby and looked for lice treatment shampoo. I tried to do it without asking for help, but alas... :/ I was shocked at how expensive those shampoos are! We were able to make out most of the instructions from the explanations and pictures but having general instructions online in English definitely helped. That evening, we used our "special shampoo" and our "special comb" for the first time...

Sungjae was the first to get out of the shower and when Peter went through his hair with the lice removal comb, he got lots of eggs and a female too! It was SO GROSS!!! Ach!

I won't go into too much detail, but let's just say that many many hours were spent going through the kids' hair searching for eggs. We learned that I have a talent for finding eggs that are invisible to Peter. I couldn't believe how lo~~~ng it took for us to become completely egg-free. And no, that wasn't a typo. I did mean "us". I sleep in between the kids so did not escape... :( Peter did though! :)

I also did something like 7 or 8 loads of laundry in the first 24 hours after finding out that we had lice and then a few more after that too. Laundry was hanging everywhere downstairs! I don't like using our dryer 'cause it's expensive to run, takes forever, and everything tends to come out wrinkled, but I had to use our dryer once.

This is just some of it... There was lots more... :/

I called the kids' kindergarten / daycare to let them know that our kids had lice but that we're treating it and washing everything. Their teachers checked their hair too and said they seemed fine. Their teachers thought it was kind of funny that I was so horrified and grossed out about our kids having lice. One of their teachers said, "Oh~ It must be because Jenny-san doesn't like bugs!" I guess the Japanese perception of lice is different..?! Their teachers told me that there's been an outbreak of lice in the surrounding elementary schools since fall and so some of the kids with older siblings have had it too. There was another kid in Sungjae's class who had it at the same time. It actually ended up spreading in Sungjae's class so instead of the kids' hats all hanging together on the hat rack, they're being put away into their individual lockers and I think the kids are still being checked regularly. I really hope our kids don't come home with lice again!!!

I bumped into the mom of Sungjae's best friend last week and asked her why she had so much stuff to take home mid-week (on Fridays the kids bring everything home to be washed, but mid-week they don't usually bring home a whole lot). She said that the teacher told her that her son had lice. She had had no clue. I was surprised back then that she hadn't realized, but thinking about it now, I completely understand... We don't brush Sungjae's hair and I don't tend to look carefully at it. It's only 'cause I tie Juhee's hair every morning that I realized...

Anyway...  I think it took us three bottles of the special shampoo, many hours of me running laundry and both Peter and me trying to figure out the best (quickest, most energy efficient, and cheapest) way of drying everything, and many hours of checking through hair and removing eggs. Needless to say, every time I see a speck of anything on our kids' hair now I go on high alert... @@

Man did those little creatures make our "quiet" January a lot busier and stressful than we ever could have imagined!

I'm sure there's a really good reason why God created lice... ^^; Why, God? Why???

"Participation Day" and "Explanation Day"

Today was one of my busier days.

I had to be at Juhee's preschool by 10:00am for their "(Parent) Participation Day" performance. They have these days I think twice a year and today's was her last ever one as a preschooler.

They had lots of little mini performances showing the moms (and the couple of dads that came) what they've learned and how they play at preschool.  It was really cute and very Japanese-y! :)

So the preschool thing was supposed to be from 10:00-10:30 which would have left me and the one other mom from Juhee's preschool class who has a son who will be attending the same elementary school, plenty of time for us to get to the elementary school for the 11:00 "Explanation Day".  However, it ended closer to 10:45 so we RAN out of the preschool, drove down, and then RAN into the elementary school and up the stairs to the fourth floor.  We made it in just as the Vice Principal started speaking - so thankful that two other moms who have kids in the same preschool saved seats for us! But before we went in, we had to get our information packs. I said Juhee's name and the teacher at the registration desk actually went straight down the list past Juhee's name, the only name written in English. So when I pointed it out to her, she looked up at me in surprise. :) I think she was expecting a non-Asian to go with the name written in English. ;) She then asked me to speak to the VP after the meeting as there were a few things that she wanted to discuss with me.

The mom from Juhee's class has a son already in that elementary school so it was great having her sitting next to me.  I asked her questions about different things that various teachers informed us parents about, and filled in two forms with her that needed to be submitted as we were leaving.  I almost ended up buying double the number of PE clothes than I needed!  I spoke to the VP afterwards and I could see the look of mixed alarm and relief when I introduced myself to her.  I knew I needed to speak to somebody about how Juhee's name would be written and sure enough, that's what she wanted to speak to me about too.  So we discussed various options and came up with おうじゅひ.  Now I can go start making the hundreds of labels that I need to label everything for elementary school.  And no, I'm not exaggerating!

The Principal greeting the parents; The VP thanking all of the parents for attending - everyone bow!; Moms looking at PE uniform sizes - short sleeves & shorts all year round, names are all stitched on, all special order; When we were leaving, there were kids outside for PE, despite the fact that it'd been snowing earlier that morning and was still super cold, they were all in short sleeves and shorts with their school uniform blazers thrown on top of beams in the playground area of the field... 

It was nice meeting her and putting behind us the tension of who-are-the-foreigners-and-how-much-Japanese-do-they-speak from the school's point of view and how-understanding-are-the-Principal-and-VP-of-this-school from our side.  I told her that Peter and I would like to meet with the two of them sometime to officially introduce ourselves and explained that although Juhee would only be a student there for one year, that if there was anything we could do to help in terms of English, to just ask.  They both seem really nice so seriously seriously Praise God for that!!!!!

I was supposed to have lunch with the moms from Juhee's preschool class, but as I would have been very late (due to the "Explanation Meeting"), I organized a last minute lunch with the moms from Juhee's preschool who would be going to the same elementary school.  They were all up for it and we had a great time!  It's great to have friends already before going into our next big adventure of unknowns.  The moms and their kids are all really nice too so I'm looking forward to hanging out with them more.  We went to an Italian restaurant really closeby that I didn't even know existed.  The food and atmosphere were great!  Price was reasonable too.  We all found out each other's first names and decided to go on a first name basis.  Going from Last-Name-san to Abbreviated-First-Name-chan is a big step here in Japan!!!  We talked about preschool things, elementary school things, kids' after school activities...  I found out that there's one more kid from the same preschool who will be attending the same elementary school too.  We're all in a similar phase so we didn't really have a shortage of things to chat about. ;)  Today was hopefully the first of many hangouts together with these moms. :)

Lunch with the moms; my delicious seafood risotto which came with a salad appetizer, a drink, and creme brulee dessert all for about $12; lots of paperwork for me. SO GRATEFUL for God providing awesome friends who are willing and wanting to help.

Thank you, God!!! :)

Ehomaki

So in Japan, on the last day of Winter or "Setsubun", they have a couple of traditions, just like Americans (used to) have traditions followed on "Groundhog Day". Groundhog Day is February 2nd, Setsubun is February 3rd.

There's the really old tradition of throwing beans inside homes while saying "Demons out! Luck in!" to chase out demons. They eat all sorts of beans too. Many kids around Japan including Juhee and her friends, made demon masks this past week. I'm sure Sungjae will be making a mask next year too. A parent dresses up as a demon every year on this day and runs around the preschool grounds terrorizing the kids. As with the past two years, Juhee cried when the demon was at her preschool and had trouble falling asleep at night, even knowing that God is stronger than any demons and that it was a pretend demon with a daddy inside. I really don't understand why they do this at Juhee's preschool. After all, it's a Christian preschool and not even all non-Christian preschools do it, so why do it? Why teach the little kids Bible stories and prayers to the One and Only Almighty God and then confuse them with traditions that teach the kids to think that throwing beans at demons is an effective and necessary way of chasing out demons and bringing in luck for the next year??? Especially when the Bible clearly teaches us to not play with demons!

Anyway... :///

There's a relatively new tradition in Japan for this day too, which is to make a specific type of 김밥 or makisushi rolls called "Ehomaki". I didn't know anything about it until last month, when one of the ballet moms asked all of the other moms to order "Ehomaki" through her as her friend owns a 7Eleven. The moms talked about how it wasn't something that they did when they were kids and that 7Eleven made it popular a few decades ago. The power of marketing... The start of a new "tradition"... Anyway, here's what my friend sent to me to explain the whole thing:

Ehomaki is a long sushi roll which you eat all in one on the night of Setsubun, while facing silently toward the year's “lucky” direction with your eyes closed, wishing for perfect health and praying for prosperity of business. It is said ehomaki-eating comes from men making prostitutes eat sushi for fun in the Kansai area. You make ehomaki with seven ingredients: cucumber,teriyaki eel, sweet fishflakes and kanpyo are rolled in seaweed representing the seven gods of happiness. By doing so, people hope to bring happiness into their lives.

Only five ingredients are listed above. In ours, there was a Japanese-style sweet egg roll and something pink too... I think it might have been some sort of fish egg but I'm not sure.

So I ordered a couple for our family so we could try them out and so that I can talk about the traditions concerning Setsubun, including this new one, with our kids. I've found through experience that it's better to be proactive than reactive... They are with many other adults who will guide them otherwise.

Here's part of what I wrote on facebook:

Thanks to one of Juhee's ballet friends' moms, we enjoyed a new experience today too: eating "ehomaki" on "setsubun" (Coming of Spring Day). ... You're also supposed to eat it all in one go without closing your mouth... So you don't bite off a small bite, put it down, chew, swallow, and take another bite. You chew swallow chew swallow chew swallow etc until the whole thing is gone. I ordered a "mini" and a "regular" but there was no way we could have eaten the rolls like that, even the mini one! I could see why it started as a tradition for heartless men in the Kansai region to delight in seeing prostitutes suffer as they forced them to eat these big rolls. Anyway, the origins have become mute as it's now become another way for some Japanese people to try to find more blessings in their lives, the 7 ingredients all having a special meaning, a prayer being said while eating it, facing a set direction that is supposed to bring luck for that year. We obviously didn't follow the traditions while eating it, but it made for interesting dinner conversation with the family. Even Sungjae knew that God is not pleased when people pray to other gods. And that neither eating nor facing a particular direction is necessary for our God to hear our prayers.  Thank goodness the rolls were delicious!!! 

And here's what we ate:

The wrapper explains how to unwrap it, the ingredients, nutritional info, and
which orientation to face while eating one's ehomaki.
This year's lucky direction was east-north-east.

Delicious, but definitely too big to eat without stopping. Well,
unless it was really important for you to do so...

We cut ours up into smaller pieces. Much easier to eat and share!
Sungjae didn't eat any, but the rest of us did. They were delicious. :) 

They really were delicious! In the facebook messages going back and forth after everyone ate their "ehomaki"s, the moms talked about how their kid/s did a good job eating the "ehomaki" all in one go, about how for some of the younger siblings it was their first one. One of the moms mentioned that her husband crawled in through the window that evening after work wearing a demon mask and that the one that was most frightened was their cat!

I think for many people it's now something that they do just for fun. I can't imagine people actually believing that either tradition will add any happiness to their lives or health or business prosperity for that matter... But I know that many do have false hopes in such things and that's the part that saddens me. With so much less effort, they could have so much more if they had Jesus and that their hope lies in gods that do not see, hear, or speak...

Pray with me for the people of Japan...

February Focus

Happy Lunar New Year! :)

Hope all of you have had a great start to the new year.

At the end of January, my parents ended up visiting for a few days during Lunar New Year as my dad had a few days off. It was my mom's third time visiting us, but my dad's first. Things have changed a lot since my mom visited us twice within our first six (very stressful!) months here so it was good for her to see things again. It was also her first time going to the churches we work at as she wasn't able to the first two times she was here. It was a super busy but great visit and the kids are a few more toys better off than they were before going to Toys R Us with their grandparents ;) Our fridge-freezer is much better off too! :)

Peter also preached at the end of January for Asaminami Bilingual Chapel. It was his first time preaching for ABC, the new church plant. He continues tolead praise at each of the Saturday afternoon services and will now be taking part in small group preparation classes every other Saturday after the services too.

Peter turns a year older in February. Happy birthday hubby!:)

I'll be teaching English at "Smile Club" again this Friday, 7th, at Asaminami Chapel. There are some new friends of mine coming this week so please pray that they will continue to come, even on the days that I don't teach English.

My two "Kids Brown" Friday afternoon English classes continue this month and it looks like we'll be adding a new class from the new school year in April - yay! The class will be on Thursdays and taught by one of the attendees at Asaminami Chapel.

Peter continues to attend Japanese conversation classesat the local community center. Pray that he'll continue to make good connections there with the students and teachers and that his Japanese listening & speaking skills will continue to improve.

I'm doing lots of prep for Juhee's Elementary School this month and I'm thankful for the other moms that are willing to do things together with me and share information with me.It's great to have friends around! :)

Towards the end of the month, I'll be teaching my last two "English Time" classes at four of the classes at Juhee's kindergarten. For the oldest kids who will be graduating next month, including Juhee and her buddies, it'll be my last time with them. I'm so sad!!! :'( I pray that God will continue to bring them to Him and that maybe through English classes or a continued interest in English, or some other way, that they will continue to be connected to good Christians, Christian organizations, and churches who can share the love of Christ with them continuously as they get older. Please pray with me for these precious kids!!! NONE of them are from Christian homes.

Pray that I'll be able to complete my Annual Ministry Report and that we'll be able to get out newsletters in both English and Korean this month. They're high on our priority list but somehow still somehow managed to get pushed back with all of the urgent needs. Lots of prayers for this one please!

Peter and I are going through 2 Corinthians during our couple devotional times. Reading this reminded me of all of you who continue to check in with us and pray for us and the work here: "For we do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of the affliction we experienced in Asia. For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead. He delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will deliver us again. You also must help us by prayers, so that many will give thanks on our behalf for the blessing granted us through the prayers of many." 2 Corinthians 1:8-11 We don't feel that we've "received the sentence of death", but we do often feel "so utterly burdened beyond our strength". Thank you for your prayers. It's great to have people around us that we can share our burdens with and that we can rely on for prayers. Thank you. :)

Thank you so much for your constant prayers and encouragement. :)

Our Monthly Support is now at 85%! The support from approximately 50 individuals/families giving regularly + 16 churches currently make up our ongoing Monthly Support. THANK YOU!!! :)

A few facebook posts...

Now and again I write updates on facebook.  Here are some that I wanted to remember/share on our blog too from the past few months:

December 24th
Sungjae doesn't speak a whole lot of English, he mostly speaks Japanese, but there are a few things he always says in English. One of them is "Mmmm~ smells good!!!" I love it when he runs into the kitchen, says "Mmmm~ smells good!!!", asks me what I'm making and then asks me to pick him up so he can see. 

Well, today, after bath time, he had to go #2. So while I blow-dried Juhee's hair, he did his business. When he finished he called me so I could wipe him. However, I forgot to take a big breath BEFORE going in so nearly passed out.  He very innocently asked why I was opening the window and informed me that it's cold. As Juhee passed by the downstairs toilet to go to our bedroom upstairs, she said, "Ewww! Stinky!" A few seconds later, Sungjae followed her up the stairs and said, "Mmmm~ smells good!!!"

I have a daughter and a son. Love them both. Stink and all.  

December 10th
need to sleep... it's one of those nights. i have so much to do but my brain's too tired and too wired all at the same time. sleeping late tonight is not going to help me be effective (nor nice/patient/not-cranky) tomorrow... turning off my laptop, going upstairs and lying down might help... 


i leave you with a photo of one of our family's newest menu items. i don't know what this fish is called  but i had it at a friend's house and it was good so i tried grilling it for dinner too. i'm the only one in our family who's willing to eat the heads though. hopefully the others will start eating the whole fish soon too!

(lots of friends replied to inform me (in 3 different languages) that the fish is called "shishamo".  i later found out too that this type that always has eggs is not the original but a specially bred type.  original shishamo do not have eggs all year round.)

November 21st
Made a big pot of chili, first one since Spring. Been a while so forgot the onions - oops! Still tasted good and got thumbs up.  A big pot of chili used to last us at least two meals. Now it only lasts us one and a half... Must be because I forgot the onions!

(A few of my Japanese friends actually came to ask me about this one. It was hard for them to understand... ;P)

November 20th
Yay! Visa renewed so we're ok for another three years. US driver's license renewed ONLINE so ok for another five years. Everything here still seems to be in-person and paper/cash/stamp-based so being able to renew such an important document/ID card online was like a dream. 3 years ago things like that to us were normal, now they seem like amazingly high tech luxuries! 


Been drizzling the last few days even though my weather app's been telling me that it's only supposed to be cloudy. God, please don't let it rain tomorrow. My little Sungjae's really really looking forward to his field trip to the zoo... May tomorrow's rain all fall now and may there be no rain tomorrow. Clear blue skies would be a bonus. 

October 6th
Juhee's first tooth came out. She was so startled when it came out that she came to us crying holding the tooth in her hand. 

October 4th
Recent quotes from my precious little Juhee...

"So what happens when my baby tooth falls out?"
"An adult tooth will grow in where the baby tooth used to be."
"But I'm going to go to Elementary School! I'm not going to be an adult yet!"

Juhee didn't want to eat the small pineapple chunks in the yogurt dessert I made. When I told her that that was going to be her afternoon snack, her reply was "But I can't eat pineapples. I'm allergic."

"Mommy, you're allergic to apples, right? But how come you can't eat them? 'Cause they make you laugh?"
"Huh?"
"You said it makes you feel funny."

I love my little Juhee   

October 1st 
For me, praying and planning for the summer teams that came - the events, planning, the people who would attend the events, the cooperation between us, Hiroshima EV Free church, and the summer teams, the fund raising, budgets, etc - started last winter. Today, we treated the pastors, wives, a full-time volunteer staff member and his wife, and our PI team to lunch, followed by a time of giving feedback re STM2013. It was great to be able to discuss things openly in an environment of mutual trust. Everyone's objectives were the same: to be able to do even better next time, to be more efficient and effective in reaching out to the people of Hiroshima. It's great to be around people who are willing to hold a newbies hand, who are willing to take the time to explain, who are willing to try new things and even take a risk. I thank God for surrounding me with people that I can grow and learn together with. It's humbling to be here! 

(Didn't put this pic on facebook, but this is what my meal was. A special udon with egg in it as it was during the Moon Festival period. In the fall, lots of restaurants in Japan have egg-themed food, including McD's with their Moon Burger (or something like that). We have yet to try it, but apparently it's not bad.)

September 25th
my ice-cream-loving little three year old was eating his creamy strawberry popscicle and about 2/3rds of the way thru, looked at it and sadly said, "大きくなってない" ("it's not getting bigger") 


i had a good chat with juhee's teacher last week. she told me that both the bully and juhee have "leader" qualities, one of the reasons why the bully has thought of juhee as a "rival" from the beginning. juhee's teacher said that the bully recently realized that the way she leads is not good and is in fact, turning kids away from her. she's realized that if she *doesn't* hold the other girls' hands to keep them by her and tell them that they have to play with her and cannot play with juhee, then they *won't* play with her because she's bossy and aggressive. but with juhee, kids just naturally tend to be around her and want to play with her. the teacher said that the other kids are now rallying more to support juhee too as they're also learning how to deal with bullying and are becoming less afraid of the bully. juhee's teacher said that the bully herself, is trying to change. it obviously won't happen overnight, but we're grateful for any signs of improvement. 
thank you everyone for your prayers!!! please keep praying for our little ones. 

September 11th
  God is amazing. Who would have thought that all that time spent watching Sesame Street would help a 16 year old boy with autism enjoy his English tutoring class and help the teacher to be able to understand him better. Who would have known that Elizabeth Yang coming to visit would have opened up such an amazing opportunity and more. God's plans are always so awesome and mysterious.    

Urgent and Important

There are too many things that I have to do.

A lot of them are urgent and important.  Urgent to the point that they should have been done yesterday (like my Annual Ministry Report), or last month (like the ministry & financial report in Korean that was due 6 weeks ago).  It's not really OK that I haven't met these deadlines.  It's not really OK that I haven't finished my 30 units of Bible Study that I was supposed to have completed by earlier this month.  For goodness sake, they gave me 5 years to do them and I'm not even half way through! :(  It's not really OK that we haven't written to our Korean supporters for almost a year, especially when more than half of our 13 supporting churches receive their newsletters in Korean and a lot of our prayer support comes from them.  School paperwork and payments need to be looked through and paid.  It's not really OK that I've had to ask for more time to submit Juhee's preschool class's yearbook entry either.

And these are not things that anyone else can do for me.

I used to be so good with deadlines.  I was never early :P but I wasn't late either.

But now...  I can't seem to meet most deadlines...

There are lots of things I have to do.

A lot of them are urgent and important.  Groceries need to be bought, healthy (and sometimes not-so-healthy) meals and snacks prepared, obentos made, laundry washed / dried / folded / put away, house cleaned, bigger clothes / shoes bought, kids washed, Juhee needs to be taken to and picked up from after school classes, school and church meetings need to be attended...

Some of these are things that can be done for me.

So sometimes, we eat out.  And now, hubby always does the dishes.  And sometimes, he folds and puts away the laundry.  He always takes care of the vacuuming and the trash.

I had to do a load of laundry in the evening yesterday 'cause Sungjae wet his pants as he woke up from nap time at daycare.  His sheets got wet too.  And if anything gets soiled, the teachers rinse it so he came back with soaking wet clothes, sheet & blanket in two heavy plastic bags.  He has more than one blanket, but he only has one sheet that covers the bed-thing and I didn't want soaking wet things in plastic bags smelling like rags so I had to wash it all last night.  I started the laundry and then went up to put the kids to sleep - and ended up falling asleep.  I woke up when Peter came back from Wednesday night prayer meeting and thought about the laundry that needed to be hung up to dry but immediately fell asleep again.  I woke up a few more times in the middle of the night thinking about the laundry but was too tired to get up.  I thought about how nice it would be if Peter realized that the laundry was still in the laundry machine and hung it up to dry...  It was such a pleasant surprise to find all of the laundry hung and dry when I came down this morning!!! :)  Praise God for awesome hubbies!!! :)

There are still too many things I have to do.

But I'm grateful that I have a hubby who helps out at home and friends that I can go to for help too.

I'm being broken and humbled.  I'm being challenged and stretched.  God is growing me and making me better.  And I know that sometimes, even though I think I might fall apart 'cause of the stress, pressure, and urgency of everything, I know I'm not going to break.  'Cause my God is a loving Father... :)

.......

I'm so not looking forward to the report that needs to be completed in Korean...  I never had to write big ministry or finance reports in Korean until we became missionaries...  I opened it up before I opened up our blog just now 'cause my head knew that it has to be done and today's the first time I've had time to do it in months.  It's one of four documents that make up one report for one church that was due over a month ago...  So I really shouldn't be writing a blog post, but I needed an outlet. :)  My heart needed to write about normal stuff before having to go into report mode again...

OK...  I think I'm ready now. :)

Love you and miss you my friends! :)

January Focus

Happy New Year! :)

You know those times when you think about doing something so often you end up getting confused as to whether or not you actually did it and then you end up thinking that you did? Well, that's what happened with "December Focus"... Sorry!

December was a super crazy month and so we were grateful for less craziness towards the end. Well, it was less craziness in terms of church-ministry but was more craziness in terms of family-ministry as the kids were at home for winter break. We had fun doing stuff together and just relaxing sometimes. It's great that the kids are a little bit older and so they sometimes sleep in till 8:30 or 9am and they can go downstairs, turn on the heater, and play by themselves / read before I follow them downstairs. It was so nice to have a few relaxed, slow mornings!!! It was really nice to be at home with the kids too! :)

Well, the kids started back at kindergarten / daycare today, so I started prepping last week and this morning was still a crazy one! I love my kids but it was nice to have a bit of alone time this morning. :P

Juhee finishes kindergarten in March. Please pray that shewill enjoy her last three months! I can't believe it's been almost three years since she started and she could only say a couple of words in Japanese. And now, she's one of her class's leaders and the teacher often asks her to help the new kids that come in during the year, like the new girl who started today. Pray that fights / bullying will be kept to a minimum and that she'll graduate kindergarten with lots of memories of fun and laughter!

I received a whole bunch of paperwork today that I need to fill in for Sungjae's daycare application. All of it is due by the end of the month. It requires help from other people, so pray that everything will be done smoothly and on time too. There should be no problems in Sungjae continuing at his daycare but just in case, please pray!

Peter starts back at his Friday morning 3-hour Japanese lessons this Friday after their winter break. Pray that he'll be able to build relationships with the people there and that it'll give him the listening & speaking practice he needs to supplement his book-learning at home.

This Friday I'll be teaching English for the babies & toddlers' "Smile Club" in the morning and then my two "Kids Brown" classes in the afternoon. I still need to do a lot of prep for the new book and materials, so pray that I'll becomfortably ready (do you know what I mean?) by Thursday evening.

Peter's preaching on Saturday, 25th during the Asaminami Bilingual Chapel service, so pray for his sermon prep and the interpreter.

During January, I'll be focusing my "English Time" at the four classes I volunteer at at Juhee's preschool, on the song "Hallelu, hallelu, hallelu, hallelujah, praise ye the Lord". It's part of their curriculum for this month. I'll be singing it with them in three languages - Japanese, Korean, and English. I sing the language specific parts and they sing the "hallelu, hallelujah" parts. I did it two years ago and it was a hit. Hopefully it'll be a hit this month too! And hopefully, the kids will remember "hallelujah" and that God is a God of all nations and understands all languages!

This might seem like a bit of a trivial one, but we would appreciate your prayers... There's a Japanese kids' game using a stick and a ball called "kendama". The oldest kids at Juhee's preschool all have kendama lessons every month and will be tested on it next month. Juhee's the only one in her class who can't do it and her parents aren't of much help! Peter's been trying to learn it and he's getting the hang of it, but isn't at a level yet where he can really teach her how to do it. Juhee's classmates are pretty good at it! Pray that Juhee will at least be able to do enough to pass her kendama test next month. :/

Here are some BIG prayer requests for 2014:

1. That we finish our first term well. We are expecting it to finish in March 2015.

2. That we will remain open to following God's leading in terms of where He wants us to be during our next term (2016~2020ish), who we will be partnering with, and what ministry He wants us to be focusing on. This will probably involve traveling, lots of talking with lots of people, and LOTS of prayer so please join us in prayer!

2. That we are able to prepare for our furlough well. In addition to trying to live a normal life here during the next year, taking part in our various ministries, and trying to discern our next steps, we will also be needing to prepare video presentations, ppt presentations, marketing material (magnets, brochures), scheduling with churches / small groups, scheduling with PI HQ, trying to find out where we'll be staying, what we'll be driving, where Juhee will be attending Elementary School and ballet classes (if at all?), where Sungjae will be going to daycare (if at all?), etc, lots of logistics. And this is in Seoul and San Jose as we'll be in Seoul for a couple of months before flying to the US. So much to coordinate... Sigh... Praise God for friends like you who constantly intercede on our behalf! :)

크리스마스 & 새해 인사

크리스마스와 새해 인사 메일 보냈습니다. 못 받으셨으면 연락 주세요! ^^

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

We sent out our annual "Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!" email. Let us know if you didn't get it. :)

Thanksgiving & Christmas

Haha, my blog post titles are so boring! :D  They're so straightforward.  I have friends who become energized by being creative.  Creativity drains me.  There was a time when it didn't, but well, people change.  I still like writing though and wish I had more time to share stories and pictures.

Anyway...  I wasn't going to prepare a Thanksgiving meal this year, but it felt weird to not eat turkey and it seemed like such a shame to miss an opportunity to enjoy a meal with friends.

Last year, we had turkey at least 3 different times.  We ordered our pre-baked boneless turkey from Costco's online website in Japan and baked a tiny 4 and 1/2 pound one in our oven too.  We had a great time celebrating Thanksgiving at the Ladies' Thanksgiving Party at Kabe Chapel, and with fellow American missionary families in Hiroshima and during the Ladies' English Class Christmas Party, both at our home.

This year, we were able to just go to Costco and buy one of their pre-baked boneless ones - yay!  We enjoyed a belated Thanksgiving dinner with two other couples on the Sunday following Thanksgiving.  For one couple, it was their first time at our new place and the first time we'd had them over since last Thanksgiving.  For the other couple, fairly new friends, it was their first time at our house and the two couples had never met.  Three of the four are Japanese who have spent over 10 years in America and are fairly Americanized.  One of the fun discussions that evening was when they were talking about things that caught them off guard about Japanese culture when they came back, aka "reverse culture shock".  The older couple shared how hard it was for them and their kids to fit back and their kids never did...  They didn't fit back in America either when they returned for college.  The older couple shared that their lives and the way that they related to many things, cultural miscommunication, etc all made more sense once they changed their thinking - they were really "foreign" missionaries in their "own" country, not just Japanese people who had returned "home".

Juhee & K-sensei; our Thanksgiving Dinner plate - mashed potatoes, turkey, gravy, cranberry sauce, baked mac & cheese, and salad with Dr. Pepper; us and our American-Japanese missionary friends

And here's our Christmas tree!  People here have Christmas trees in their homes too, but they're all fake.  They're also of various sizes and colors, although I guess they tend to be on the smaller side and most are green, but you can get some that are white too.  Juhee's friends had been telling her about how they already put up their Christmas tree and so Juhee had been bugging me for a couple of weeks.  Every time Sungjae sees anything Christmas-y he says "It's Christmas!" :)  This year, for the first time, the kids decorated the tree on their own.

Sungjae loved putting the ribbons on the tree, mostly all in one area :/ he very proudly showed me how similar his decorated tree was to the tree on the box "They're the same!" ^^; Juhee enjoyed decorating the tree too and the two enjoyed decorating themselves with the ribbons too! ;P

After I took these two, I was going to take one more when Sungjae said "Wait! I'm going to go to the back!" And in a very big-boy like manner, he went and stood behind daddy and patiently waited for me to take a picture... My little baby's growing up!

Chronologically speaking, the Christmas photos should have come first, but that just seemed not right.  We had our Christmas tree up before we had our Thanksgiving meal and listened to Christmas music while eating it which was a bit weird, but.. it worked. :)

After being in a country where they put Halloween decorations on Christmas trees, Halloween things and Christmas things are sold together in shops, and Thanksgiving in between the two doesn't really exist, we're not too particular now on the how and when.


And here's a Japanese-y Christmas photo for you that I took the other day while driving (hence poor photo quality, sorry!).  I've seen many many Christmas lights both in the US and in the UK, but I haven't seen many with hearts and umbrellas!  The other side was pretty spectacular too.  Christmas lights around homes/apartments isn't very common here so it was surprising to see one that had so many (the other side was pretty extreme) and such Japanese-y ones too!

The lights around our house haven't gone up yet and may not go up this year.  Peter's still deciding.  TBC... :)