Gooooooo Cougars!

The long awaited package from the BYU bookstore, which contained birthday presents for Spencer and Christmas presents for Shawn and Sydney, finally arrived in mid-February. I was especially excited for Shawn to open up his gift, not only because he loves throwing the football and playing tackle with his dad, but because we've been pretty successful at brainwashing him to love BYU. Granted, this "uniform" is about two sizes too big (it was the smallest they had), and the helmet fits on Spencer's head, but I think the fact that Shawn looked so adorable in it made it money well spent. 

Check out that smile!

"Down, set, hike!"

Driving Range

Every Wednesday night at Taiyo golf course is family night, offering a huge bucket of balls for free at the driving range. One evening we borrowed kid-sized clubs from a friend, and gave it a go! 

Shawn was especially excited to go golfing, and jumped right in. He's quite the little athlete.

Sydney was a much more timid at first, but with a little success and some encouragement she started having fun. By the end of the night, she was going on and on about how much fun it was to go golfing.

Check out that form- ha ha! Her stiff-armed swing cracked me up.

Kate was pretty content hanging out in her car seat.

Cherry Blossoms

In late January, we did our annual trip up north to see the cherry blossoms. The first year we were here, they weren't quite bloomed when we went to see them, and last year we saw them a little past their prime. This year we lucked out and they were perfect! We drove to Mt. Yaedake in the late afternoon, and the pink blooms were beautiful against the blue sky.

On our way over to the cherry blossom festival, the kids walked in a pack in front of us. It was so cute- you could tell they felt pretty cool leading the way.

Anderson, Jack, Sydney, Shawn, & Henry

Shawn amazed me with his confidence on the playground.

We were sad to see that all the pictures we took while driving up the mountain were a little blurry. Maybe it's because they were taken on the go. We opened up the sunroof in the back, and while I drove, Spencer stood up in the back (like in the movie "Big") to take pictures. Luckily, all the cars just kind of crept along as we admired the trees, but I always felt a little pressure to keep our pauses for pictures quick when we were in the front of the pack.

We pulled over to sneak this picture of Ie island at sunset.

We love getting to enjoy this kind of stuff with our awesome friends!

Sydney spent most of the ride putting on fake nails she got as a prize at the festival.

At some spots the blossoms formed a canopy over us. It was so pretty!

As it started getting dark while we drove down the mountain, these lanterns lit up.

Getting home was a little crazy. Traffic was really terrible, and what should have been an hour and 15 minute trip home turned into a 2.5 hour drive. We got stopped at a McDonald's drive through and ate in the car while we moved toward home at a snail's pace. Once the kids' bellies were full, they crashed and stayed asleep for the rest of the ride home. I can't help but feel a little sad knowing that this will be our last time getting to see the cherry blossoms here, but glad to know that we'll get to see some in the spring in D.C.

First Day at Church

When I saw this sweet dress at the BX, I couldn't resist buying it for Kate's first Sunday at church. We stayed home for three weeks, and by the time we went back she was practically too big for it! But she still looked adorable in polka dots and her tiny tights.

Photo Shoots

Sydney has been doing ballet on Tuesday afternoons on Kadena, so every now and then I'll call Stacey to see if we can invite ourselves over come play at their house for a little while afterwards. Kate and Taylor were both awake, so we wanted to snap a few pictures of them side by side. Taylor is 6 weeks older than Kate.

Mesmerized by the bright lights on the TV.

I love Kate's crossed eyes in this one! Classic.

My little ballerina holding Winston, who I like to call Toto.

A few days later, I took some side-by-sides of all of my kids laying down on the floor. Syd and Shawn are getting so big, and it's crazy to see how tiny my Kate is by comparison.

Sydney: 5 years old.

Shawn: 2 1/2 years old.

Kate: 2 1/2 weeks old.

Big Sister Sydney

Sydney has loooovvveeed having a new baby in our house. She is always asking me if she can give Kate a hug and a kiss, and whenever Kate is chillin' on the floor Syd will lay down next to her and say cute things like, "I'm your big sister Sydney and I'm going to take care of you." She especially likes to hold Kate, and was really excited to help feed her a bottle.

Big sister Sydney in action.

Kate at 2 1/2 weeks old.

Thus far, Kate is my championed sleeper. She'll regularly do (at least!) 4 hour stretches between meals, which has made my life significantly easier. Especially since Spencer had to work the first two weeks in January to teach a Red Cross class.  We were both concerned about me getting thrown right in to having to take care of 3 kids all by myself, but she made it easy on me! At her two week check-up, her growth stats were:

• Length- 21.85 in. (91st percentile)
• Weight- 9 lbs. 1 oz. (66th percentile)
• Head- 37 cm (68th percentile)