Sarah's Brother's Wedding in NYC

We travelled back to the States to share in the celebration of Sarah's brother's wedding on July 29. Jon, Sarah, and Olivia were officially in the wedding party, while Annabella was 'officially cute' in matching dresses with Olivia.

The new couple: Chris & Leanne Harrington

Sarah and Annabella on way to the reception.

Jon and Olivia had fun blowing bubbles together!

Annabella & the Buddha

Not much to say here ... other than that Annabella seems to have taken a real "hands on" approach to engaging the Japanese culture.

(This was a little train set for kids to play with, complete with a plastic miniature of the giant Kamakura Buddha.)

Our First Visitor from the States

We had the priveldege to host Rebecca Sup from Cornerstone Church (my church in Milwaukee 1998-99) for a day recently. She was in Japan to visit her sister in Tokyo, and it worked out for her to come visit us in Karuizawa. She was very brave and took the Shinkansen (bullet train) by herself for about an hour to see us. What a pleasure to welcome her!

It was very encouraging and even 'validating' to have someone from a supporting church come and see first hand what our life is like here in language school. We had a lot of fun together showing her around, and telling funny stories, as well as recounting stories of God's faithfulness to us in these first 4 months.

We look forward to welcoming other friends in the future. :)
Please come and share in this vision God has given us for Japan!

Jidoukan Summer Festival

Here are some photos of a festival that we went to at the New Karuizawa Jidoukan (local play-place for kids). Can you spot Olivia and I in the crowd? (Enlarging the photo will help!) We all had lots of fun playing all the special games and singing songs - although Annabella took a nap during most of it. Actually, Sarah and I traded off watching Annabella sleep, and joining Olivia in the games.


Check out the genkan (entrance area where everyone takes their shoes off). All these shoes from so many kids made it tricky to find your own pair!

Fun with my new friends (by Olivia)

Hi, this is Olivia. I want to tell you a little bit about my life here in Japan.

I had a fun time a few days ago with 4 of my new Japanese friends from the nearby Jidoukan - a play place for kids like me! My friends invited me (and Momma) to come to a special place called Omocha Ookoku (Toy Kingdom). It is a fun little amusement park only 30 minutes from our house. They gave us free tickets too ... that made Daddy happy!

This is a photo of the 'Heart Princess' that we met. She was so beautiful and we wanted to take our picture with her. I was so sad when she had to leave, but Momma told me 'that the princess had to go take a nap'. I guess even princesses need nappy-naps too. :)

This place had so many fun things to do. Little cars to drive in, huge play stores with lots of play food, play shopping carts, and even little play rice cookers! For lunch we all ate lunches that we brought. Momma made me a peanut butter sandwich, but the rest of the kids all had obento lunches. They had little onigiri (rice balls wrapped in seaweed) which their mothers had made into happy little faces with little vegetables pieces. They were very cute.



This final photo is of all of us looking at the Merry-go-Round. It was so special! We could have watched it all day long. Our Momma's all let us ride on it, and it was so fun! My very own horsy ride!