First Babysitter/Dear Friend

My dear friend Sherry Reimer was Tomoyuki's first babysitter. Recently she kept him for me to go to an Open House at Bethany and Juda's school. It helped me out tremendously. We so enjoy spending these years with her and John on Okinawa, what a treat, who would have thought God would have blessed us and placed us here for such a time as this together. We've been friends now for 10+ years, so we don't introduce each other as "Old" friends, that implies that we are "Old", we say "Long Time Friends", which implies the past, present and future, ha ha ha. We met for breakfast at the "T" House, restaurant on the Kadena Golf Course. We hadn't had a chance to visit in the past few months, with summer and all the busyness of both our schedules. We were enjoying catching up so much and didn't notice that we had been there for 2-3 hours, so when the lunch crowd started coming in we felt like we should go and not stay for two meals, ha ha ha.

THANK YOU to Ai Sei Yochien

Katsue sensei and Reiko sensei loving on Tomoyuki. Reiko sensei is known for her kissing all the children's cheeks alot and Katsue is single, but wants children so bad. They were trying to take Tomoyuki away from each other, ha ha ha.

These are Bethany's sensei's (teachers) at Ai Sei Yochien (Japanese pre-school/kindergarten). We went today to give THANK YOU gifts for them and to the school. Since Bethany has started First grade at Bob Hope Elementary, she will no longer be going to Ai Sei, but will do special events with them and we will continue to join them and host American holiday parties for them, ie Christmas, Easter, Thanksgiving.....

Yoko sensei was Bethany's teacher this year. She was a bit sad, well, okay, we all were, but we assured them that this was not Good Bye, just Thank You and we would still be a part of the yochien. I will continue to teach English on Friday's to the yochien mom's.

This is Mia and Casey, Rika's children enjoying the "Hoola Hoops" we gifted the yochien with.

New BUS

Finally I found the time to get the details of Bethany and Juda on the same bus. Juda rates the micro bus(short bus) however, Bethany does not, sooooooo, not too surprised that this year, the first year ever, they are beginning to place special needs children on the bigger bus to mainstream them. Yippee..... sooo our only request was that Juda have a car seat, as I'm sure by the time he got to school, he'd be dancing in the isle.

It is a huge bus compared to his micro one he's been on for the past two years.

The bus driver and the bus assistant were very nice and Bethany knows a few children on the bus. She was not afraid at all, very excited actually. I was the one who needed this time to get used to the idea. Tomoyuki and I have been driving them in and picking them up everyday, which was working out, but causing us to be gone from home alot during the day, when he could have used some time outside of his car seat to stretch.

Oh Noooooo!

Tomoyuki sporting his new bed. No more back aches for me, he says.

Bethany and Juda sporting their new bedroom. Woooooo, been a long time coming.

Tom, Bethany and Tomoyuki. I find them like this often.

"First a bow then a dress, I know how Bethany operates, I've seen Juda during dress up time", so says Tomoyuki.

But, I still love her dearly, and she loves me, even tho I am just a toy to her.

Mia, Casey, Bethany, Juda and a new friend at a nearby park.

Tom, Bethany and Tomoyuki before I dropped the camera on Tomoyuki's head, they seem so happy.

Tomoyuki after I dropped the camera on his head, fortunately for him it is a small camera.

Michiko and her husband enjoying Tomoyuki. They were so sweet to visit Tomoyuki when he was in the hospital too.

Chihiro Katsuren and Bethany sharing homemade ice cream.

Well...................I've done it again, gotten so busy and have neglected posting. We have all been semi sick, you know when your not sick enough to spend time in bed, but not full functioning either and it seems to be lingering and starting the cycle over again, yukkkkk. Tomoyuki is much stronger this go round and is managing quite well. We did however make a trip to the ER the other night, and after a chest x-ray, we returned home much more confident that he was going to be fine.

Our friends the Katsuren's daughter went to Seattle this summer for a few weeks for a home stay. Upon her return we offered to prepare a meal for her of her favorite american dish she had while there. She requested Spaghetti and homemade ice cream for dessert. Well the spaghetti part was a given, but I don't have an ice cream freezer any longer. After a few phone calls we acquired one from none other than an American family friend. The evening was great fun. We were blessed with their entire family and our neighbors Candy and Cho to translate for us. Fun, Fun, Fun.

Last week was full with paperwork and meetings. Our Saturday morning started off with breakfast for our english class. We had plenty of waffles and such so Candy and Cho came down to join us after the boys ate their fill. During breakfast, one of the upstairs bedroom air conditioners was being replaced, well overdue, a month now with no air in that room therefore no one would stay in it, who would be so daring to sleep in a sauna. So in the afternoon, once the upstairs rooms cooled off we began the "Bedroom Shuffle". You see during the down time of the A/C, Ben moved in with Caleb and Juda moved in with us, (US, being me, Tom, Bethany and Tomoyuki) so yes, you counted right, 5 in one room. What would Extreme Makeover think of us, certainly they would build us a bigger house with American ratings of one person per room. Anyway, we moved Ben and Caleb into the bigger of the two non-master bedrooms, moved Bethany and Juda into the smaller of the non-master bedrooms and kept Tomoyuki in our bedroom, but assembled his new crib that someone from church so generously gave us recently. First time for a "Baby Crib" in 18 years. Yes, that is right, Juda nor Bethany ever used a "Baby Crib", we moved so often when they were little that they slept in "Porta Cribs", poor things. Tomoyuki had to be woken up on Sunday morning, he claimed that for the 4 months he's been here sleeping in the porta crib with a back ache, that he slept like a baby. Yeah right, we didn't believe him, because he always sleeps like a baby, all night long, that is why we are able to go so strong by day, because he gives us a great night sleep.

Yesterday was a big day for our church. We had our first service in our temporary location (probably 9 months). 4 of the 8 Japanese ladies who are in our Sunday school class came over for lunch then bible study, then we whisked off to the ground breaking ceremony for the building of our new church, completion date projected to be March/April/May time frame. It is so exciting to see God at work, answering many/many prayers regarding Koza Baptist Church. Today was the beginning of the demolition of the old Koza church, what a time we live in, how exciting.

Smith Updates

Tomoyuki reading to Bethany, yeah right, he's not even looking at the book.....

Bethany reading to Tomoyuki, that's more like it................

Junko, Shoko and Baby Saran on our way, in the typhoon, to the family court to file Tomoyuki's petition for adoption.

Juda sharing his favorite book, "Go Dog Go" with his first grade class.

Juda trying to decide who to call on for questions to ask him about himself.

Just wanted to update the blog with the goings on of the Smith Clan. Been busy with the school year starting up and both Bethany and Juda are doing quite well adjusting to the new schedule. Tomoyuki and I are staying quite busy by day while they are in school. We have been able to get alot of things caught up at the house, ie...spring cleaning (after summer vacation cleaning) and some Ai no Kesshin work. He is really blossoming since he is staying well. He is now eating bananas on a regular basis with oatmeal cereal, green peas are one of his favorites, imagine that. He is grabing at everything in his reach, jibber jabbering all the time with da da da , blah, blah, blah. Always in response to some silly question we ask him, he is keeping us laughing. Yesterday we went to have our weekly Thursday lunch with Bethany and Juda and before lunch we went to Juda's 1st grade class that he spends a little bit of time daily with. It was his turn to be interviewed, ie, favorite color, favorite toy, what do you want to be when you grow up etc.....he did quite well with signing his answers, we are so proud of him. I shared with his class about Down Syndrome, the class was great at asking good questions and understanding the answers. They are so good to Juda and love interacting with him, as he is quite a funny fellow.

Junko, Shoko and baby Saran went with me today to fileTomoyuki's petition for adoption in the Okinawa Family Court. The clerk said he has never filed a petition for adoption and quite possibly that office has not processed one since Bethany's 5 1/2 years ago. WOW....He was not quite up to snuff with the way the process works. For instance, he thought we wanted to adopt Tomoyuki and Tomoyuki's birth parents......Junko tried her best not to laugh, she didn't tell me what he said until we got back to the car, probably because she knew I would laugh out loud, she knows me oh too well. We spent an hour with this clerk and walked him through the process ourselves. He was a little embarrassed that he did not know the process, however, he did have a manual to check from and sure enough, we were guiding him correctly.

Bethany is so excited about school and reading. She wants to set our books up just like the school library, and she is serious. We bought stickers to put on the binding of all their books. She says the easy readers should have "A" on them and as they get harder move onto "B", "C", etc..... sounds like a plan to me. So we made the first step toward running our own library and bought the stickers.....maybe during this typhoon we'll get motivated to open the library.

We are currently in TC1, or Typhoon Condition 1, as a typhoon is approaching Okinawa, and so is Tom. He should be in Tokyo now, returning from a week in Chicago at a conference and visiting with Andy. We are hoping that he will be able to make his way back tonight, if not, he will stay in Tokyo til the Typhoon literally blows over.

First Day of School and some

Yes, they are all growing up. Juda and Bethany are in 1st grade, not together, but they see each other often throughout the day, this helps Bethany out tremendously, and me too!

As we make our way to school for the first time for Bethany. Juda is an old pro at this since this is his 4th year going. I managed to not cry........at least not in front of Bethany.

Mr. Kenny is Juda's teacher again this year. He is picking up where they left off a few months ago, we are so pleased with Juda and his teacher/aids and his progress.

Bethany's classroom. She is in the middle of the pic in red. She is sitting beside Sam, a very sweet boy. So far all is going well, we have just completed week one though. It was a great week, I made my way in there on Thursday and had lunch and recess with the two of them. Their lunch time overlaps, makes it nice for me, I don't need to eat lunch twice.

Juda got a much needed accessory in the mail this week. He was so funny looking around the house, opening the door to look outside, at night he looked up at the stars. We will begin wearing them gradually as the first thing he wants to do is take them off. It will be a challenge, but nonetheless, we will work through it.

Technically Tomoyuki is not sitting up on his own. It is just a technicality, called a laundry basket. We are in between stages. He is not satisfied to lay on the floor and roll around, the swing doesn't offer him much exercise, just entertainment, so I put him in the laundry basket, that lasted about 1/2 an hour of fun and enjoyment. He is wanting to grow up. I guess that is warranted as he is 9 1/2 months.

A few days in Shizuoka Japan

Well....We finally made it to Shizuoka to spend a few days with the Gordon family and to pick up some much needed paperwork to get Tomoyuki's adoption started and filed in the family court of Okinawa. Of course there always has to be some excitement, so how about SPOTS (they were bright red, this pic does not reveal the full effect) . Upon our arrival to Japan I noticed a few spots breaking out on Tomoyuki. As we drove to the Gordon's (2+ hours from Tokyo) I mentioned to Micah, "Does it look like there are more and more spots appearing on Tomoyuki??" Well, yes, there were. So many that when we arrived, Sarah thought he might have the "Chicken Pox" and we took him to the DR. before we could let him be around too many folks/babies. As it turned out, he had the "Summer Flu" a great virus with a 24 hour fever then some folks get spots like Tomoyuki. Sadly enough, we did leave the virus in Shizuoka and the Gordon's are dealing with it presently.

Here we are preparing to be entertained by Hannah and her ballerina's, of course enjoying a cup of tea and cookies while we wait. There is no such thing as "Tea for Two" at the Gordon's, it is more like "Tea for Twenty Two"!!!

Hanah, Emma, Bethany and Aya entertaining us and doing such a fantastic job.

Juda felt a little left out and thought he'd give it a try.

Madi, Kaz and Jason trying their best to enjoy such a femine event.

Erica getting her neck scratched by Tomoyuki while Ricky, the head of this household, tries to relax for a moment.

Bessy enjoying the most recent Ai no Kesshin baby girl. She was the smallest baby I'd ever held, so precious. Bethany told Sarah, "I know we can't have this one, but can we have a baby girl this small some day?"

Mason, Ando, Akihiro and Megumi preparing dinner. What a well run household.

Ako, Sarah, Micah and Lou working hard on paperwork, well Micah was taking care of the baby.

Akihiro and Micah, my means of transportation upon arriving in Tokyo. They did such a good job finding me at the airport and getting us safely to Shizuoka. Good driving Akihiro and good talking Micah, to keep Akihiro awake and me informed and updated on everyone.

Ando tried from the minute Juda walked in the door to be friends. But Juda was a bit overwhelmed with the whole event that he just wanted to do his own thing. This is on our way out the door to head back to Okinawa. Thanks for not giving up Ando, you two will be friends for life.

Baby Einstein entertaining Tomoyuki and Shouta while the baby girl sleeps away. Actually, I think Shouta is more entertained by his own hand at this point. His arm is casted due to surgery on his hand. They made the cast so big so he wouldn't pick it up and hurt himself with it. They underestimated him, he was able to wack himself pretty good a few times.

Dr. Juda checking out Tomoyuki.

Ballerina girls, oh so beautiful.

Everyone flew like champs. Good to know before we head to America in December. Of course this 2+ hour flight is no comparison to a 14 + hour one, woooooo, looking forward to that.