America Day Parade

 
 
 
Brock's Cub Scout troop got to march in the America Day parade at the beginning of June. Misawa City and the base have America Day weekend each June and Japan Day celebrations in the early spring. The purpose of each weekend is to offer a chance to see things unique to each culture.

America Day is held in the neighborhood just outside the base. There are booths for each state, American food, American music and such. The wives group on base has a booth to show items from Western weddings- very popular with the Japanese!

Brock enjoyed the chance to march in the parade. Check out the pictures- the parade also had icons from American culture such as Star Wars characters and Marilyn Monroe-yes, she was freezing!

The closeup is of Brock and his best buddies the Mansberger boys!

Love,

4Vs 

Gracie and Kia

 
Gracie loves Kia! Kia is terrified of Gracie. Gracie loves Kia! Kia is too small to get away from Gracie. Gracie loves Kia!

(Kia belongs to our good friends the Mansbergers. They graciously bring Kia to visit often and let Gracie play with her. Gracie loves this about them, Kia probaly does not!)

Love,

4Vs 

Misawa Aviation & Science Museum

 
 
 
Misawa has a surprisingly nice Aviation and Science museum. I visited the first time earlier this year with Brock's class on a field trip. There are all kinds of hands on experiment areas for the kids...they can pretend to fly a plane, stand in a wind tunnel, ride in a pneumatic tube, experiment with gravity and lots of other really neat things.

Brock and I had visited once, but took the opportunity of a rainy Saturday morning to take Mike and Grace. It seemed like a perfect idea, but we forgot about Japanese Saturday school. There must have been around eight busloads of Japanese elementary schools there for a field trip. There were tons and tons of little kids everywhere!

We still had a good time, but will have to go back some time when there is a smaller crowd and shorter lines. You can see some of the elementary school kids in one of the pictures with Grace. The color of their hats indicate their grade.

Gracie wore her Japanese nametag to the museum for fun. She visited a Japanese preschool with my neighbor Janet earlier this month. The kids there made her a Kanji nametag which G wants to wear whenever we leave base!

If you come to Misawa, we will take you!

Love,

4Vs 

Oyashio~ June in Japan!

I learned a new word this month, Oyashio. This is the Japanese term for an ocean current that pulls in cold water from the Northern Pacific. What does this mean for the 4Vs? It means that even as late as today, June 19th, we are pretty darn cold up here in Northern Japan!

June is traditionally the beginning of rainy season for this area. As we recall, rainy season lasts till about mid-July. We were cold and rainy when we got to Misawa last July!

May was beautiful. There were even days in the 70s. We have been stuck in drizzling rain and mid 50s temp for a couple of weeks now. To add insult to injury, the base cut off heat to the base early for budget savings. It sounds insane, but folks are rushing out to buy space heaters for their homes. My Texas upbringing is just spinning over this...June? Space heaters? I dug out winter stocking caps for the kids last week so we could watch Mike's baseball game! Strange, strange world!

I am optimistic today because this afternoon, while wearing jeans and a layered long sleeve shirt but no jacket(!), I actually had the chance to see my shadow outside. That's right...to have a shadow there has to be at least a little bit of sun! Yeah! We celebrated by heating stuff up for dinner in the oven so the kitchen wouldn't seem so cold!

Enough about the weather- I am sorry to be so delayed in updating. We will spend some time over the next few days to catch you up. Most recent news is that Brock's school year finally ended. He is done with second grade and is happy to be out for the summer.

Also, we are thrilled to have Mike's brother Matt visiting this week from Dallas. He should be here on Tuesday and we are looking forward to a great visit.

More news soon!

Love,

4Vs

A study of Japanese Azaleas

 
 
 
 
The azaleas are in full bloom in Misawa! There are lots of different colors- maybe even more than I am used to seeing in the states. In addition to these I have seen beautiful white ones and a couple of shades of purple.

Enjoy!

PS- We have had a couple of milestones this week: Today was G's last day of Preschool :) She is looking forward to a great summer and then on to Kinder! Also, please check your calendars- Major Vaughn has been home from the desert for a year! 

Mama-san Mobile

 
 
Lots and lots of Japanese folks in the area enjoy riding their bikes. Japanese bikes are pretty cool. Most of them have way better baskets than we have in the states. They also have a much better kickstand than we have.... Will have to send you pictures on this.

Of particular interest today is the mama-san bicycle. Most of the mama-sans in the neighborhood ride their bikes to work. They always wrap up their bike seats with plastic to keep them clean while they are not riding. My favorite accessory are the handlebar gloves. I am supposing they are used to keep your hands warm while you are riding. My neighbor's mama-san uses these industrial black glove things to keep her hands warm as she rides. For whatever reason, they make me smile each time I see them!

Love,

4Vs 

Deep Sea Fishing

 
 
 
 
Howdy All,
Brock & I skipped work and School and went deep sea fishing in the Pacific Ocean! It was a blast. Got up at 4 and started fishing on a boat with some friends at 630. We caught so many fish that we ran out of fingers and toes to count on. I caught a starfish, 2 fish at once, the smallest fish which popped out of the mouth of a fish that I caught, & I caught some fish in the belly. Try to top that. Brock had lots of fun and caught many big fish. Not sure what they were but we brought them home and filetted them all. A couple folks caught an Octopus which was really quite big with suckers galore. We cut him up too and are relying on our neighbors experience of watching the Japanese cooking channel to prepare him. Probably the most coolest thing I learned in a while was how to get a hook out of the mouth of a fish with a chopstick. Of course I will not tell you how unless you take me fishing and I can show you. The Japanese are pretty different sometimes but they sure do know how to be better than us at certain things. Note to Danny Harris and Matt Cone: I did feel sick on the boat but did not Chum like we did at Leech Lake.
Ureshee (Happy) Summer Fishing to you and your partners.
MSV 

Community Bank Reopening Ceremony

 
I got to help with the banks reopening ceremony last month and we had the General out to cut the ribbon. On right is the local Bank manager Ms Kelli Fienen and another manager from Tokyo named Brian. The ceremony went smoothly with the Wing Chaplain saying a blessing. Chaplain Savage said he had never blessed a bank in his 28 years of service. We had some NCOs fromt he Civil Engineering Sq and a local national help with the ribbon cutting, too. Brig Gen Angelella said he felt at home as his dad was a bank manager when he was growing up.
MSV 

Grace sized car

 
Either Grace is getting taller or the cars here are getting smaller...you be the judge.
MSV 

Lost in Translation

 
Sound like a nice place to visit??? 

The Banyon Tree Golf Course

 
 
Here's a birds eye view of the Banyon Tree Golf course at Kadena AB on Okinawa Japan. I got to visit the base for an Enlisted NCO Graduation Ceremony. There were some Tech Sgts from Misawa that went to the Professional Military Education course that lasted 6 weeks. I had one their from my squadron.
Besides attending some ceremonies I was able to play some golf in the nice warm tropical weather. It was warm and humid compared to our chilly climate up north.
Also, I got to ride back and forth from base to base in a C-21 which carries 6 passengers and 2 pilots.
MSV 

Car Wash

 
 
It may look sunny but it not really that warm to be getting sprayed with a cold hose for a car wash. Grace and Burke helped wash 4 cars today and enjoyed getting sprayed washing off the bubbles. Now that I think of it, our cars have not been washed since we got them last July. We will now be driving the cleanest cars in the neighborhood now that we have ready & willing car washers.
MSV 

Duke!

 
 
This beautiful guy is Duke the Golden Retriever! Duke stayed with us for a week while his family hosted out of town guests in their small home. We enjoyed Duke. He is very sweet and was the hit of the neighborhood with all the children. He has boundless energy and the ability to find and pick up any and everything small enough to fit in his mouth. We learned a lot about picking up around the house during his stay!

We also walked for miles and miles during that week! Our new favorite route is to the golf course and back. A Duke-busting five miler that would ensure hours of Duke "peace" when we came home!

Love,

4Vs 

America's Kid Fun Run

 
 
 
Saturday morning the kids and I went to a kid fun run on base. Mike was working and we missed him, but we had a good time with our friends the Mansbergers!

Gracie ran half a mile. Long legs flying and a running form that reminded me of a baby horse! She had a good time!

Brock's age group dictated that he run a mile, but he bumped himself up to the 9/10 year old 2 mile run so he could be with his friends Jonathan and Jacob. Angel ran and supervised the boys run while I took it easy with G and the half mile.

All we long we preached to Brock that it was a fun run and not a race. "What does first place get Brock?" Reply- "t-shirt". "What does 8th place get Brock?" reply "t-shirt". "What does 202nd place get Brock?" reply "The same t-shirt". Our prep was done. He did great. No overly competetive remarks, total melt downs or tears. Yea Team!

Sorry to be slow on the updates! Vaughns have been doing lots of pet sitting, school projects and such lately! I will get caught up this week!

Love,

4Vs 

Happy Boy's Day!

 

May 5th, to us is Cinco De Mayo, for our Japanese friends is Boy's Day! All around town you can see these carp wind socks flying. The carp look like they are swimming in the wind. Folks usually hang out a carp flag for each boy they have in their family.

Carp are a great symbol for boys. The Japanese consider them to be the most spirited fish- strong and powerful and able to swim upstream and thru many obstacles. Therefore they represent courage and the ability to attain high goals!

These fish are flying on the flagpole of Brock's elementary school. We have one little carp flag flying outside the house. They are one of the blessings that come along with strong winds we have been having lately!

Love,

4Vs 

Cherry Glossoms!

 
 
 

The cherry blossoms are in full bloom here on the base. Yesterday was a perfect day, so nice that the kids and I just played and enjoyed the sunshine all day. It was the nicest weather day we have had all year!

We planned on doing some cherry blossom pictures today. Of course, today was more overcast and the wind was blowing like crazy! Undaunted, Gracie and I went out in search of the perfect cherry tree. Gracie also was on fire to flaunt her new, thrift shop yukata (cotton, casual kimono- $2- what a deal!)

Miss G is convinced that these flowers are called Cherry Glossoms and not Cherry Blossoms because you just wouldn't call any pink and white flowers something that sounds like the word blood to her. So, she is emphatic, they are "glossoms".

The whole family will be out over the weekend taking more spring pictures on base and in town. Check for more glossoms in the next few days!

Love,

4Vs 

Ka-tsu-pa!

 
Last weekend we took the local train into Towada. Towada is a nearby town that for much less money and much less time we could have just driven to, but we were on the hunt for some local culture!

The train was fun. 27 minute ride with nine stops. Train was full of high school kids and old people. We saw some nice flowers and some Japanese horses (just for Grace!).

In Towada we shopped at a few local shops. They have a canal running thru the middle of this area. Our favorite signs were the Danger signs posted along the canal. Ka-tsu-pa is a folklore "water monster" that the Japanese use to warn their kids. Too funny! I had actually heard of him when Gracie and I went to the Komaki Onsen and hotel. Much like our "Boogie Man", Ka-tsu-pa will get you if you don't stay out of the water!

It is our new favorite sign!

Love,

4Vs