There's No Place Like Home

Greetings Everyone!

Well, the last few weeks have been interesting. Jason left Sasebo the last week of August to sail up to Yokosuka, which is outside of Tokyo. Michael and I were going to fly up and meet him at the end of the week, but another Typhoon cancelled our plans. The day before we were suppose to leave, we get an emergency call from Jason to cancel our entire Tokyo vacation including our Tokyo Disneyland adventure. The good news was that Jason was on his way home, so we were still able to spend our last week in Japan together as a family again.

Michael and I made the long journey home. Of course he was teething, which means that he is in a lot of pain and is congested for about a week. Our trip home was extremely long. We had a two hour bus ride up to Fukuoka in order to catch a two hour flight to Tokyo. Then we had a 12.5 hour plane ride to Chicago. We had an hour and a half layover in Chicago to go through customs, pick up our luggage, change terminals and recheck our luggage in the domestic terminal. It was a site to see, because I was literally running (ok, walking really fast) with all our stuff and little Michael attached to me. We missed our connection by five minutes. I was almost in tears at this point, but I composed myself for Michael. Then we waited three hours to make the two hour flight to Baltimore. My parents were waiting for us when we crossed the finish line. It was nice to see some friendly faces again. It took us 28 hours to get home, but it was nice to have a home again after traveling for so long.

We have been home for over a week now and I think we are finally adjusting to the 13 hour time difference. Luke, our loving 80 pound Yellow Lab was so happy to see us. Apparently he was depressed this summer. It is funny seeing how much Luke and Michael interact now. They are so cute together. Michael cannot stop saying "dog-dog", I think he missed Luke as much as Luke missed him. We had such a wonderful time with Jason this summer, and we look forward to seeing him over Christmas. We made many new friends in Japan and just love the Japanese people. They are all so friendly and helpful. We all even learned a little bit of the language, well enough to get us around at least. Jason will be out-to-sea (I cannot disclose where exactly) for most of the Fall. He is awaiting his orders for our next tour, so I will keep you posted on where and when. Take care and we look forward to catching up with all of you.

I only have a few photos to share. Upon our return, I purchased Michael a Thomas the Tank Engine train table and train set. He loves it. He cruises around the table because it is a perfect height. He plays so well with the trains too. He is doing so well with his walking. Jason and I worked a lot with him this summer, but yesterday he took six steps on his own. It will not be long now until I will have to baby proof the entire house, but it will be worth it.

Love,
Jen, Jason and Michael