You're Gunna MIss Me When I'm Gone

So it's been awhile since I wrote. We've been out of our house since mid June, living with friends, then family, then friend's again... and now. In a hotel. A hotel in... DUN DUN DUN DUUUUNN Okinawa, Japan! We've been here for a week now, and although I haven't seen much at all, I am in love.

We went to the airport on our original flight date. After an hour of waiting we were told the flight was going to be delayed half an hour... and then another delay which made us miss our connecting flight to seattle. Missing that flight meant we had to wait to leave because they only flew out of Seattle to
the airbase here once a week. We ended up having to leave Saturday morning at 5am instead of the Thursday at 4pm. We got one more day with friends, so whatevs. The sucky part was we went from a 15 hour airplane day to 30. Fuuuun!

It actually wasn't even that bad. It seems like it went by so much quicker than 30 hours. I'm glad we ended up flying commercial the entire way.

At LAX we were invited to go to the first class lounge before our flight to Tokyo. They had free internet, sushi (which I wish I would have known before we got Panda Express! lol!), alcohol, cappuccinos, Japanese newspapers... it was awesome. Madison slept mostly the whole time, so we stayed there for about an hour to charge things and get online. When she woke up we left so she didn't start getting loud and talking while people were trying to rest. The JAL (japanese airlines) attendants put in Madison's carseat for us, so we just strolled her around in their stroller.

At the security all the Japenese woman lost their minds over Madison. Apparently they LOVE American babies. Especially if they are blue eyed. Give them a blond to boot and you might as well send an ambulance lol. One of the women, you could tell had baby fever. She kept poking Madison's cheek and squealing whenever Madison smiled or giggled at her. It was so cute! Madison was eating the attention up!

On the flight from LAX to Tokyo we had AWESOME seats. Since they were positive if her carseat would fit we got the bassinet row. We had SO MUCH ROOM. Mark could stretch out completely without his long legs being restricted, so I know he loved that. We eat had our own TV that had movies, games, and aerial views from the plan the whole way. On take up and landing the screens towards the front of the plane (one of which was RIGHT in front of us) showed the front of the plan
so yo could see yourself taking off and landing. It was really neat. We had seafood rice snacks, which were kind of like the snacks you usually get on American flights, only these were seafood flavored. They were really good. Mark isn't a fan of fish, though... so I'm sure he didn't appreciate them as much as I did. For the on flight lunch he had roast beef with a roll and I had some sort of eel & rice dish. We both got noodles & sauce, a fruit cup, kimchi, salmon (raw) with I think it was cabbage, and sorbet. For dinner, to be honest, I don't remember what we got. But it was still good!

Originally our flight from Seattle to Okinawa would have been about 13 hours on a AMC flight (military flight). Which meant no awesome Japanese meals, no awesome chairs, awesome personal TVs, or awesome display showing us taking off or landing from the nose of the plane. It was really awesome and made the time fly by.

So far, we are looking at a 5-7 week wait for housing. Mark's command, I guess, is trying to expidite that process. I think he said they were successful before in making it quicker, so hopefully it's the same for us. As much as I LOVE living in a 500 sq ft hotel room (we got upgraded! lol) I would really love to have our own place so I can start making our concrete floors and white walls more homey and less hotel impermanent. I just want a home again. My bed. Madison's room. All of her toys. All of our clothes. All of everything.

We already bought our first car. A Subaru B4 with Twin Turbo. All of the cars over here are old, so ti's a 2003. No sense in buying anything newer when we are only going ot have it for three years... We already have everything for it set up, but here you have to go through a bunch of other stuff so we don't actually GET the car until Thursday. I mean, not that it mattered. Mark JUST got his license yesterday (I got mine almost a week ago, but the car has to go in his name since he's the active duty and I'm just here on a sponsorship.)

So far (off base) we've only been to CoCo's Curry house. I had Cream Croquette Curry with Crab. It's basically curry, with white rice (which comes with every meal) and the Cream Croquette with Crab meat is like a hashbrown made from creamy crab meat. It was sooo good! For dessert we bought an ice cream bar from there. It was basically an ice cream with hard chocolate in between two layers of vanilla ice cream, and the whole thing was wrapped in a semi soft ice cream shell that looked like a big waffle. It was pretty dang good. I mean, it tasted like normal ice cream, but it was still neat lol

I'll be sure to update as I can. The internet at this hotel is horrible, and as I said, it's going to be a while until we have our own place with reliabl
e internet :/

Madison is 8 and a half months old :)

Madison Update :)

I have no doubt that she will be walking around by her first birthday. She is growing so fast, it seems like every time I turn around she is doing or growing something new.
She now has five teeth. Yes, five. I know what you're thinking "How the hell do you breastfeed a kid with FIVE TEETH!? Well.. I don't. Unfortunately, while we were bouncing between places the stress took it's toll and my supply all but disappeared. I was producing so little that all I kept hearing was how she's gotten smaller, she was wanting to eat every 2 hours still (even with solids) and I just couldn't keep up with her needs so I made the decision to switch to formula. I'm glad we made it as long as we did, but I'm also glad I don't breastfeed any more. You might have heard me say before, it was just more stressful for me than beneficial for the both of us. I was resentful of my husband, to be honest, and I know this is best for myself and my daughter. We made it 7 and a half months, and we've been 100% formula for a month and she's already packed on the
pounds. She's going longer between feedings, and sleeping more soundly day & night. Every so often I would try to give her my breast but she would refuse altogether so my plans of hopefully reestablishing my supply once we settled here in Okinawa went down the pooper with a quickness. But, like I said, I am happy with the decision and so is Madison. And that's all the matters :)

She is full throttle crawling, no more row boat action. And standing, too! She walks along furniture and every so often she will let go, or pop up from my lap and stand for 3-5 seconds at a time before plopping down on her butt.

She eats pretty much anything me or Mark have (that she CAN eat at least.) Every time we have food she stops in her tracks, crawls her way over, pulls herself up, and begs like a little puppy dog. Personally, I blame daddy lol. Bananas are still her favorite. She loooves diluted apple juice and bread as well. If you want to do something (like write a blog) just pull out the puffs and as long as there are

some on the floor next to her, she will not bug you lol

Her favorite toy is still her little monkey jungle joystick toy thingy... very descriptive, I know. But how the heck do you give a toy like that a name? lol She's also taken to playing with the wheels of our suitcase. Her favorite toy that isn't a toy (that she still likes more than her actual toys) is her wipes. She will sit there and crinkle the plastic on them for every and be perfectly content. You have to hide wires from her, too. She can't help but pull and yank on them. Like now...

She loves Mickey Mouse Club House & when Geometry Wars (a video game that Mark plays on occasion.)

I think that's about it as far as an update for her... now.