It's been a while!

Hello all!
So many things have happened in the past few months...I am still catching my breath! Here is a recap...

We went to California for the holidays...spent 3 weeks and had a great time! 3 days prior a stray black kitten with a missing back toe found us! Grandma came back with us to Okinawa and we have been settling in!

Sofia has grown so much, but still not too much hair! She is starting to understand the potty! We are still working on the letting me know before and getting our pants down in time, but she has totally mastered the sitting and putting toilet paper in the toilet!

She says "mommie", "daddy" and "uh oh" and is working on "kitty" and "cat". She keeps us very busy with general reorganization of the house. Found my camera yesterday in the bottom drawer in the kitchen inside my bamboo steamer baskets!

I am signing her up for day care 1-2 hours M, W, and F for some activities and socialization, and mostly for my sanity...I need to have some work out time! Daddy is going to hang with her at lunch on Tu and Th for some library and whatever else dad can come up with time!

We have decided to return to the states if we can get San Diego or Virginia for our next station. If not we will extend here a year and then come back. We are also looking at Tom's first retirement, which will be possible in about 4 years. Not sure what he will decide he wants to do, but we are checking into Harrisburg, PA as our final location. Of course Tom is going to aim for company management or other type job...trained killer is still in the air, too...ahahhaha....anyhow manager at Radioshack or Cabella's has also come up! hahahahhah! We will see what happens!

I of course will return to Microbiology in a hospital or go back into Biodefense or Public Health. Harrisburg has openings at the City Health Dept. YAY! Many options on the east coast for me! I am very excited!

As for Sofia...we will enroll her in a private school and she will have Japanese tutoring on the side. While we are here we are sending her to Japanese preschool, so she is in full immersion. We will try and continue that to the best we can in the states. We hope to open up another culture and country for her future!

Here are the latest pics....

Finally got a velcro bow on about 10 strands of hair and she kept it there!! What you will also see is that she got into gma's bar of soap and decided to rub it in here hair! Lovely!

You will also see our great parenting ...letting Sofia climb the jumper...it has since been removed!