Trip down memory lane…

I felt like I needed to preface my next post “Lehanos In Oki” with a quick trip down memory lane. Kulia, or as I once knew her, Sister Asakura-Muramoto, is one of my oldest friends. Really, she is almost 40! No, I’m kidding. I first met Kulia when we were in the Missionary Training Center in Provo, preparing to serve on Temple Square. I remember looking at her name tag and thinking, ‘That’s a mouthful!’, and then I nailed the pronunciation and I’m pretty sure she was impressed, lol! We have been friends ever since.

We went through all of our training together at Welfare Square

(Driver, Asakura, Zeh, Me, Jungfleisch)

Training at the Humanitarian Center

(Me, Driver, Wilcox, Jungfleisch, Asakura)

Meetings

(Jungfleisch, Driver, Mullie, Me, Zeh, Asakura, Wilcox)

Outings

(Driver, Me, Jungfleisch, Asakura)

(Grayson, Reeves, Me, Asakura)

(Booty, Asakura, Me, Jungfleisch and that might be my cute companion in the back, Cuvellier)

Christmases

(Me, Asakura, Grayson)

(Christmas dinner)

New companions and training. I’m convinced that we are still such great friends because we were never companions. I don’t know if I could have kept up with her pace!

(Asakura, Me, Jungy)

(Me, Gonzy, Asakura)

(Me, my sweet Yuey, Jungy, Asakura)

This crazy lady who stole my camera and camera case and took a picture of herself defiling my case is also in most of my pictures. That’s Wilcox, she’s gross.

Kulia and I even opened our field calls together.

Kulia: “They made some kind of mistake, we aren’t going to the same mission!”

She went to Colorado Springs Mission and I went to the Boise Idaho Mission

We wrote each other during our 3-4 months in the field…well, she wrote me, I can’t remember if I wrote her, lol! When we left Temple Square to go home she was the first person I called. In fact, I didn’t take into consideration the time difference between Missouri and Hawaii and when I called her, her sweet dad answered the phone and went and woke her up. It was 3am!

 

Anyway, I think it’s pretty clear how much this crazy girl means to me and that’s why her visit to Okinawa was such a special one. Love you, Kulia & fam!

Oki Parks

Recently, Eva and I have been joining our friends from church every Tuesday to experience a new park. We’ve only joined them at 2 parks so far but we are so excited to see what the next year in parks has in store for us.

 

 

 

The next Tuesday we went to Xystus, an indoor play place, because it was a rainy day. Eva played and played, I only saw her twice during the 2 1/2 hours we were there. She could have played all day!

 

 

 

 

 

We’ve also hit up a few parks as a family. This was a good one!

 

Yellow Belt 2nd Stripe

So proud of my little ninjas!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Receiving their certificates

 

 

 

 

 

Major Baker

This whole military “thing” has been amazing! One of the things I really loved about Rich when I met him was his love for adventure. He was passionate about it! In fact, when I met him he was saving up money for a trip to see South America mostly by motorcycle. He’s not the type to talk about and plan stuff and then not follow through, he was going to do this. I have to be honest, I thought it was a little crazy but I was still very attracted to his adventurous spirit. I think that this trip was one of the reasons why he was a little hesitant to start a serious relationship with me. I obviously tricked him into marrying me anyways, lol! He did make it very clear all along that he was still going to take this trip but that we were going to take it together and NOT on a motorcycle. Well, as time went on and we began to talk about adding to our little family, we realized that money was going to be tight and we would need to upgrade one of our cars. I clearly remember sitting in his car in the parking lot in front of our first apartment when he said to me, “Let’s use the money I’ve saved up for the trip.” I was shocked! I knew how much that trip meant to him and because he was willing to let go of that trip for the moment so that we could continue our plans of starting our family, I knew that me and our future family meant more to him than anything. He made me promise that we would still take that trip someday. Fast-forward 10 years and our lives have taken a path that we couldn’t have imagined while sitting in his little green Celica planning our future.

 

This is where the military comes in. Thanks to the military we have had more adventures than we ever thought we would! Rich is living his dream of adventures daily, here in Okinawa. We are all living that dream together and we don’t take a single day for granted. We love the opportunities that serving in the Air Force has given us and are truly honored to be a part of this incredible branch. A month ago, Captain Baker became Major Baker and we continue to feel blessed, daily, for this opportunity.

 

 

Months of fun

I learned the hard way not to trust Eva with gum.

 

Baker Sunday Selfie!

Tears because I she wanted to wear a princess dress to go out but it was a chilly day. I promised her that the moment we walked in the door she could change into a princess dress and all was well.

Our favorite night of the week, pizza, ice cream and movie night!!!

I had to capture this moment in time because my little snuggle bug came crying to me about something and ended up falling asleep on me for over an hour! Best way to be trapped.

This was an interesting day. Everybody was driving me bonkers and when I walked into the girls room and saw this…

…I immediately got on to Arabella. I was SHOCKED to find out that this was MAYA’S doing?!?!?! So not like her to do anything that shouldn’t be done. It made me laugh because this day was such a backwards day.

Baker Sunday Selfie!

Shopping! Getting ready for all of our company that would be coming to visit, Auntie Kulia and family and then Aunt Becca and Aunt Julie. So excited!!!

Maya went to her first dance with her daddy as her date! Since I’m in Activity Day’s and was part of the crew that put this together, I got to witness their date! It was the cutest thing ever and made me fall more in love with the amazing husband and dad that Rich is.

Arabella, just because she is the cutest little, spunky peanut!

One morning I woke up and was just feeling like I needed to get to the seawall for a nice stroll. I was so glad I did. Walking with the sound of waves as my music while pushing my favorite walking buddy was so great.

 

I’ve been thinking that Eva’s nickname should be tornado because lately, she has been just that. I jumped in the shower and was gone for no more than 15-20 minutes and came out to find this. She had literally flipped the cushions just to add to the destruction!

Maya’s Host Nation class picture. Love it!