{Church callings}

Church callings.... I was released as second counselor in the Relief society presidency back in May, i believe. Since then i have been subbing in the primary as a teacher. That's been wild, but it's been nice and easy. :) I have been trying to enjoy only worrying about a lesson every sunday. :) I had been wondering WHEN they were going to give me another calling. I was starting to worry that they were waiting to call me as a president in primary or a counselor, since they will probably be redoing it in a month or two. We are in a branch where people are needed.  In the meantime of having no calling people have been asking me to do various things in different areas for young women's, relief society and primary.  Shane has been the ward clerk in our branch. For that calling he leaves early in the morning and stays for a few hours after church every sunday. Sometimes he has to go to the church during the week, depending if one of the counselors wasn't able to make it. It will be nice when a few more families move into our branch. :)

Well, we got a call on Tuesday that the DISTRICT President wanted to meet with shane and i on Thursday. We went in and he asked shane to be the 1st counselor in the Branch Presidency(Bishopric). I thought i could handle that because he will be gone only a little bit more than he already has been as the clerk. Sounds good. Sounds alright. Then i walk into church today and President Sego of our branch wants to talk to me. I thought it had something to do with shane's new calling that they were going to announce at church today. He ends up asking me to be the 2nd counselor in Relief Society Presidency again. I enjoyed the Relief society so i am fine with that. As i sat down and started thinking i just thought "wow, that's a lot of work". BUT at the same time i feel peace. I know his calling and mine will bless our family, and it feels right. What's funny is that with each new step in our lives and in my own life, i can see how i have been led or guided to the point i am currently at. And together i can see how we have been led and guided to where we are currently at as a couple and family. And how we have been prepared. So, while it seems like two very busy callings combined, it feels right. We both feel like it's right and we both feel at peace. Thank goodness. :)

{1 down, 2 to go}

Okay, so this post is full of randomness. :) Randomness is probably NOT a word, but i like it here. One down, two to go refers to my little fish here. Gavin can swim on his own now. He had to pass a swim test in order to be able to swim in the deep end and to be able to jump off the diving board.  He had to tread water for one minute and swim 25 meters. He did it. He is doing great in the water. That sure does help me in knowing at least ONE of them knows how to swim now. 

 Tanner is getting better and better every time we go to the pool. I try to take them often enough to help them learn. We usually spend two hours and i really work with them on their swimming skills. I taught them how to go under without plugging their nose and instead, blow bubbles out of their nose. They did it , but it's still so new and weird for them that it will take a bit of time before they are constantly doing that instead of plugging their nose.  Here is tanner swimming on his own.... He swam half of a 25 meter all on his own, but still has that swim where he looks like he is drowning when he swims. He is cute. :) He is almost there.

 No pic of Jaydon. He is glued to me the whole time. :)  Today he was a bit more daring than he has been this summer. Last summer he was fearless. This summer is a different story. He jumps into me, i taught him to blow bubbles in the water. He will let me put him under the water for a quick dunk, and i was able to get him to push off the wall to me. So, he is doing all of that really good. Today was a big break through.

 On our way home after watching the huge fireworks show that Churaumi Aquarium puts on every year.... Jaydon was upset when the camera light flashed. :) Part of it is that he hates sleeping in that chair. I don't blame him. I would hate it too. Usually by the time he is completely asleep the whole top half of his body is laying flat completely to the side. It drives me insane watching how uncomfortable he looks. I always try to fix him, but he continually falls back over.

 Two love birds watching the fireworks from a distance....

 Gavin sharing his drink with Jaydon. So sweet. I love Tanner's face here. He looks like a deer in the headlights....

 On our way there....

 The boys playing with grocery sacks. They thought it was hilarious when they turned the sacks into a cute little outfit, or whatever that is. I am not sure what Gavin is doing in this picture. He always has some strange poses he likes to do and i usually have to tell him to cut it out because i want some kind of decent looking picture....otherwise he would end up looking strange, like this one, in every single picture. :) He is a funny one, that Gavin is. :)

{Boys will be BOYS}

I had soooo much fun taking these pictures of my boys. They are the sweetest little things and they sure do love each other.  We recently moved Gavin into his own room and put Jaydon in with Tanner so they share a room now. At first Gavin and Tanner were pretty upset about the change.  But since we have done it Jaydon and Tanner are becoming better buddies. They are really enjoying each more than they ever have. Gavin still doesn't like having his own room. It makes him nervous. He needs  a nightlight at night and sometimes wakes in the middle of the night and turns the hall light on and leaves his door open. One time he came in my room saying that he hear footsteps. Poor thing.

I haven't done a photoshoot like this one, with the boys, in a long long time. :) I tried playing with the color on some of them to make it fun. I like most, but some i don't like. I kept it anyway just for the heck of it. Now i have some pictures i need to go print off and hang on my walls!! finally! ALTHOUGH, i really want some of them by the beach. That will be my next attempt. That will be a bit harder for me working with that kind of light, but we will see what i can do. :)

I realize more and more how different boys and girls are. Sometimes there is too much testosterone here in this house. More than i want to deal with. :)  BUT i deal with it.  Boys are just MADE to be rough, tumbly, crazy, and different than girls.  There way of play and love is wrestling and sports.  It's wild to me. :) haha! When they get excited they want to pounce someone, when they get mad they want to pounce someone, when they want to show who is boss they try to pounce someone, and so on. :) I think i am getting used to it and realizing that's just the way it is. SO, while boys seem to just be destructive in so many ways, i luckily have learned the soft side of them as well. I live with FOUR of them so i better be learning! They love to be loved, they love to cuddle, they love to be taken care of, and they do get emotional, and MOST definitely have a soft side. SOFTER than my girly side sometimes. So, while boys seem to instinctively have that ROUGH side to them, i would say everything else about them isn't too hard to identify with. They are big bears on the outside, but opposite of a bear on the inside.
I really love my boys

{Finding the joy in it}

So, its no surprise to any of you that my photography the past couple of years isn't like it used to be. Basically, i think i got started in photography from the beginning because of the extra money i could earn AND because i really did enjoy it. I was so excited about pursuing this talent that i could actually earn money at. If it was something i didn't think i could enjoy then i wouldn't have done it in the first place.
My mom and dad have a very old SLR camera when i was in college. I remember i used to play with it a lot and the pictures turned out beautiful, i thought. The old SLR was awesome.

Anyway,I didn't give myself much time for learning and play before i started getting paid for it.  I charged 35 bucks for a bunch of pictures that i would give to them on a CD. We were going through school and i found it as a good opportunity for me, and a great thing for friends who wanted to get cheap pictures done. I can't say if they all liked the pictures i took. I just don't know. But i sure hope they did.  And to hire a photographer these days can be expensive. REALLY expensive. AND the thing is, I could never go to a department store photographer after being a photographer. I am repulsed by the pictures they take and how much money they get for it. Sorry, hope that didn't offend anyone. :)

So, after we moved to Texas i remember just quietly telling certain people that i do photography. Nobody there seemed interested in getting pictures done, which was so strange to me. :)  That's when my fire for photography seemed to die. Before i knew it, i was forgetting to take my camera everywhere we went.  The idea of getting paid for photography again didn't sound desirous to me in the least bit.  I still feel the same way here.

I feel like part of it is because THE JOB part of it is what takes away the enjoyment of photography for me. Not only that, but i also feel like i have so much to learn still. I feel like i want to KNOW exactly what i am doing before i jump back into it. I know what i  know, but i want to progress. I don't want to stay where i have always been with it. SO, i won't start it again until i feel pretty comfortable with everything it takes to be a good photographer. I also want to FIND THE JOY in it that i used to have.  i am going to work on that first.

SO, i am going to start taking pictures again, but just for ENJOYMENT. :) And just of my family, AND MAYBE the occasional friend that i want to practice on.  I am starting to learn for myself what photography i really enjoy and would love to do and which types i can do without.  I really really love creative, abstract looking pictures taken with a wide angle lense.  Love it. I like motion blur photography and the really cool Tilt-shift photography. That's where you take a scene and can somehow make it look like a miniature scene. It's so unique and cool. So, i am going to try to get my creative juices flowing to be able to come up with abstract and unique scenes. Honestly, i don't know how to do much of any of it. I don't even have a wide angle lense. :) I would love to get one, and it would be easy to have my dear husband buy one for me IF i were going to get paid to do my photography, but since i am NOT it will be harder to convince him to buy me one. :) I will have to see what i can do. ;)
But for now, here are a few pictures of just a few things we have been up to around here lately.  I did a little something to a few of the pictures that i really like. :)  It's the mood and feel of the picture that i really enjoy.

Reading and reading...

 Playing outside...

 Wrestling....  Yes, that's Jaydon on the bottom get dog piled. He is tough.

 Watching Movies....

 Jaydon letting me take pictures of him. He loves when i take pictures and is willing to do whatever. :) i love it! So, i thought i would make him look angelic in this one! haha!

And playing their DS's.....  Gavin's face is killing me here. I caught him making a new face. This is quite a different face that i haven't really ever seen before. I could not stop laughing at it. hahaha!

{You have to Earn it}

Our BIG Reader!  Some of the kids in the neighborhood go outside and ride on their skateboards often.  Gavin has been hanging out with them a lot and they like to show him tricks. They are a few years older than he is and they are such nice kids.  He decided he really wanted a skateboard. I told him he could EARN a skateboard IF he reads 100 books.  He finally reached 100. I guarantee he has read more like 200-300, but he had to write down and keep track of the books he read AND he forgot to keep track of many books he read. Finally yesterday, he was READY to get that skateboard. He spent ALL morning reading and reading to his brothers, keeping track of his books.  Stories like Magic Treehouse, The Giving Tree, How I Became a Pirate, etc.  He finally achieved it.  We went to the store and he is now a proud owner of his very own Tony Hawk Skateboard. He feels really proud of himself.

Tanner was upset because he wanted a skateboard too.  That conversation was the beginning of our next YOU-HAVE-TO-EARN-IT reward.  I told Tanner i would buy him a skateboard if he can memorize all the 13 Articles of Faith. He was distraught at first that he has to memorize 13! But i had him recite to me the 1st and 2nd articles of faith because he already knows those.  I told him "see, you only have to memorize 11 now because you know the first two already." He got very excited when he realized that. So, I offered a reward to gavin if he can memorize the articles of faith as well, but his reward hasn't been decided.  And i am trying to figure out what Jaydon can do to earn something. Memorizing all 13 articles of faith would be pretty hard for him.

Gavin has finally reached a point in his life, in the past couple of weeks, where he is really starting to feel guilt and remorse for things he is doing wrong.  He told tanner yesterday "you are so mean!" because tanner wouldn't let him read a book he had.  Tanner didn't say anything back to gavin, just walked into gavin's room and gave him the book to let him read it. At first , when i saw him doing that, i wanted to grab the book from tanner before he could give it to Gavin and say "we don't reward bad behavior." But i waited to see what would happen. Tanner handed it to him and then Gavin said "I am sorry, you can keep it Tanner. I can't believe i just said that to you. That was so mean of me." He felt so bad and kept saying over and over "I shouldn't have said that."  This is all very new for him.  And it makes me feel good knowing he is reaching that point where he feels remorse for doing wrong things. He is starting to get it. :)

Tanner is that way a lot with Gavin...loving and caring and kind. I mean, don't get me wrong, he will lash out at Gavin sometimes, but he is such a good example to me of love and patience. He has great love and patience for Gavin and it taught me a lesson because i struggle with patience with Gavin and this example showed me the way i should act, rather than act out of anger. Anger only creates anger and hurt and sadness.

{4th of July}

I am sitting here on an awesome Monday Morning. I say that because it is POURING down rain and has been for about 30 minutes. You have never seen a downpour like you do here.  PLUS, to make it even better there is lightning and thunder. That is what makes a downpour so exciting. The kids are sitting on the front porch watching the storm. I am getting a moment to blog. I love the sound i keep hearing of the rain landing on the patio and the thunder booming and the kids freaking out over the lightning and thunder. :)

Our fourth of July was tons of fun.  Here on base, they did the fireworks show the night of July 3rd. So, we kind of celebrated on July 3rd too. I found lots of July 4th music and played that over and over while i prepared our steak and veggie shishkabobs, with a black bean and corn quinoa salad, rolls, and fruit.  We ate our yummy food and just hung out until it was time to walk over to watch the fireworks. It was lots of fun to watch it together as a family, AND to be able to walk a short distance to get a great view of the fireworks.  They did it at Marek Park. Next year they will do it on the flightline, and apparently that one is the bigger and better show. We will be excited to go to the flightline next year.

We woke up July 4th and went to our branch pancake breakfast.  Our branch here feels like family to me. It's so nice knowing i have a branch family here.  We went and had bacon, eggs, hashbrowns, and pancakes and chatted all morning with friends.  We went home and prepared for our fun get together with our branch friends at Maeda Flats.  It was sort of a farewell to some good friends, plus a 4th of July get together.  We went to the beach at 4:00 p.m. and swam for awhile. It was low tide so everyone went out searching through the tidal pool and some did snorkeling. Around dinner time we started up a fire, and everyone roasted their hot dogs over the fire.  There were about 40 of us there on the beach. We had the beach all to ourselves.  I loved the smell of the fire combined with the smell of hot dogs, ketchup and mustard. That with the sounds of laughter and chatting, and the feeling of sitting back and relaxing. It was awesome. The sunset was BEAUTIFUL! It was amazing.  When the sun went down the adults pulled out the fireworks for the kids.   They all had sparklers, and some of them were hulked up sparklers. :) So, they were bigger and brighter than you usually see. There were about 15-20 kids running around the beach with their sparklers. You can see the reflection of it on the water, which was really pretty. The smell of the fireworks is heavenly. Is that weird?  It was just a great night. We lit fireworks that flew up over the ocean and exploded in the air. It was such a fun night with friends. Another fun memory made. I love it.

Then July 5th is when Shane and I went to the Kerama Islands with our friends.  And that story is in the post below this one....

{Kerama Islands}

Shane and I woke up bright and early on Thursday morning, July 5th, and followed our friends to the Port. We took off from the port in a charter boat at about 9 a.m. and headed to the famous Kerama Islands. I keep hearing so much about the Keramas, and we were so excited to see it. It's a chain of about 22 islands and only a few of those are actually inhabited. We went here to do some snorkeling. Half of us snorkeled and half of us scuba dived.

Here we are coming close to the Islands.  It took about a 30 -45 minute boat ride to come up to to them, BUT we wanted to go all the way around the back side of Zamami Island, so it was about a little over an hour boat ride. There were about THIRTY of us on the boat. It was sooooo much fun. No picture can do justice for the beauty of this place.

 This is the first spot we came to for snorkeling. We went to a few different spots and jumped off the boat and snorkeled for about 30-45 minutes, jumped back on and the driver took us to some other spots where we snorkeled some more. It was beautiful. Endless coral. The dark spots you see in the water here are deep crevasses in the rock/coral. We saw the crown of thorns, which is a poisonous type of starfish that we hear about all the time, but we had never seen until now. There are so many different varieties of FISH. They are so beautiful.  Some friends found a BEAUTIFUL shell , about the size of your head. It was gorgeous. Unfortunately it was occupied so they couldn't keep it. :)

 Here in this picture below,we are looking for our second location. Our second spot for snorkeling and scuba diving was a bit more tricky. There was a really strong current going on. They let the scuba divers do some drift diving. Basically it's just where they go to the bottom and let the current take them. It was taking them really fast. It was crazy watching them from above at how fast they were going. He told the snorkelers to only go in if you feel confident in your swimming ability. I guess we felt confident , so we jumped in. The current was pulling us and we had to swim back to the boat going against the current. I have never felt a current so strong. At first i felt like i was going NOWHERE. It was crazy to feel a current like that for the first time. But i started using my arms along with kicking as hard as i could and i made it, slowly. :) At this spot where the current was strong, it was beautiful. Just mounds and mounds of coral life and fish. And about 25 feet down right under us was a shark. The shark was a good sized shark, about the size of shane. It was so awesome. Shane yelled to everyone "shark" and we all swam towards the shark and started following it. After we got out and started talking about our experience we all laughed at each other for chasing a shark. :) Pretty funny. Who does that?! But the scuba divers were even closer because they were down at the bottom.

 More beautiful scenes...

 And more... The coral here is extraordinary. It seems endless. There are holes, and mazes and crevasses all over the place for the fish to swim in and out and around. If there was a perfect home for a fish surely this is it. Coral ranged in color from purples, blues, greens, pinks, orange, etc. And the different varieties of coral was endless as well.

 And more.... The weather was perfect that day. 90 degrees, partly cloudy.

 And more.  This picture below is Zamami Island. It is an inhabited island. You can ferry your car here. But it's very expensive. Can you see the bridge off in the distance?

 It's hard to tell in this picture, but there is a small little waterfall coming off those rocks. If you look closely enough you might see the goats that are standing right on the ridges of the rock  close to the waterfall. The goats are white. Mountain goats, i guess?

 This spot is where we kicked back and relaxed and had a party.  The water was so calm right here. Just before we reached this spot we were in some pretty big swells. We were rocking all over the place. And a bunch of us sat on the front roof and we were getting knocked all over the place. It was so funny.

 At our party spot, we could jump in without our fins off and without our safety thing around our kneck. We could just swim free. It was GORGEOUS. And it's not scary swimming in the ocean...at least here it isn't. We jumped in off the boat, and we jumped off the second floor of the boat as well. There was coral, but not in the area directly under our boat where we anchored it.  It was pure white sand straight down. With the clearest water i have ever seen in an ocean.  I think you can see down at least 80 feet down.  Crystal clear. Right on the back of the boat, we pulled out the grill, grilled up some bratwursts and hot dogs, cranked up the music, chatted, ate, swam and had fun together. It was perfection.... aaahhhh, seriously. That is heaven to me. Love and beauty and making memories. Here below are some paddle boarders. They were the only one's out on the water, besides us. We had our own little party to ourselves in the middle of the water.

 Some of our friends swimming, and the above picture is showing them grilling up our food.

 Enjoying our ride back to the port. When you ride out in the middle of the ocean, outside of the reefs there are big swells and it's so fun hitting them. :) Water was endlessly splashing us. It was so funny. 

 Our good friends. The couple on the right holding up their peace signs are moving tomorrow. I am sooo soo sad. I love their family and i absolutely love her. She is such a good person in so many ways. I love being around her. I don't usually feel so sad about someone leaving that i havent' known for very long. She is the most genuine, kind, caring, bubbly person i know. And the other girls holding up peace signs next to her is such an awesome person too. She and her family leave in august. :( That's the only bad side to being in the military...having to say goodbye to your friends.  The other couple on the left side are awesome too. They were our sponsors for our move here. They are fun and great friends.

  These past two weekends have been wonderful getaways for us, but they cost money. So, we probably won't have another date until August. In august shane and i are heading to Tokyo to climb Mt. Fuji.  And while we are there we get to go to the temple. Hallelujah! I thought living over 2 hours away from a temple was hard. BOY was i wrong. That was so simple compared to now. ;)   I am VERY passionate about traveling, which leads me to this....

I think i am high maintenance in a way. In so many ways i am not, but in some ways i am. I really LOVE having things to look forward to. I need it. Whether that's right or wrong, i don't know...but it's something i NEED. It keeps me going. And i have been feeling so blessed to get to do the things we do and see, and to get to know so many wonderful friends from all over the world. I am so passionate about seeing something new, seeing a new part of the world, and learning about other cultures, which is why it's so perfect we are in the military. I am like a sponge and can never get enough of traveling and making those kind of memories and learning new things. I know this lifestyle isn't for everyone, but it is definitely for me and our family. We love it. We love it here. I am already sad thinking of the day we will have to leave here. I just try not to think about it and try to soak in as much as i can. There may be a day where my boys get tired of it, and when that day comes we will probably slow down, but for now this is all they know. And moving and traveling is all i have ever known from the time i was a little baby.
My parents drove everywhere. We didn't have money to fly so we drove to see family and drove to our vacation spots.  My mom's parents lived in California and my dad's parents lived in Illinois.   All growing up we lived in MANY different houses and states. We lived in Oklahoma, where i was born, then moved to Ohio, then moved to Michigan, then moved to South Carolina, then moved back to Oklahoma. And in all those places, we drove to see family. Our longest drive was from South Carolina to San Diego, CA.  I have been able to see majority of the United States because of my parents. Those are my best memories...traveling. Amongst all that we had quite a few vacations to various places. The longest i lived anywhere was in Oklahoma where i was able to attend middle school and highschool(7 years). Then i moved to Idaho where i went to school for two years, then moved back to Oklahoma for a short moment, then moved to Utah(where i lived for one year) and then moved back to Oklahoma. Shortly after i moved back to Oklahoma we moved to Minnesota.  I went to school there for a little over a year, i think. Then i went back to Rexburg, where i met Shane. Then when Shane and I graduated we moved to Ohio, then moved to Texas after that and then moved here to Okinawa.  So you can see that moving and traveling is all i have ever known. I am passionate about it. I like seeing how people from different areas of the country act compared to other areas. I love seeing the different scenery. So, now you can see why this lifestyle is part of me and who i am.  That's probably why i NEED to travel and why i need to have that to look forward to. And you can see why, for me, it would be hard to settle down in one place for longer than four years. I think i would have a really hard time settling down in one spot.   But sometimes things happen that we don't expect, and when it does happen you just conform to it and you learn how to do it and you learn how to enjoy it. So, if that day comes then so be it. I am sure one day i will get tired and will be ready to settle down, BUT for now, i ENJOY the movement and diversity. :) It's too exciting to pass up.

{Our getaway to Nagannu Island}

Shane gave me a getaway for my birthday this year.  We headed out the last day of June on Saturday morning bright and early. We dropped the kids off with friends of ours at 7:30 am.  We went and loaded on our bus that took us from the air base down to Tomari Port. This picture below is us on the bus. :)

Here we are are Tomari Port getting ready to get onto our boat that will take us to the uninhabited island of Nagannu. The island is about 1 1/2 miles long and about 1/2 mile wide.

 Here is our boat that took us to our destination. It was about a 20 minute ride. There were fairly LARGE swells out in the middle of the ocean. It was a fun ride. :) Some girls next to us put their arms up in the air as if they were on a roller coaster ride. haha!

 This Japanese guy was our tour guide. Yes, he spoke English. :)

 Here we are pulling up to our island. See those huts? We stayed in the second to last one on the right. It was awesome being right on the beach hearing the waves crash.

 Our little hut. Sorry, these pictures are so dark. Our darn waterproof camera is weird. We haven't figured it out yet.

 We did some snorkeling first thing when we arrived. We found this starfish. This isn't the usual STARFISH you are used to seeing. This is a different kind of starfish. It is like a pillow. It's really cool. I think it was mating season because there was a certain fish that kept charging me whenever i got near its home. It was so funny. He was as big as my hand, but when he started charging me it totally freaked me out! haha! I was just waiting for teeth to show or for him to ram into me. bahaha! There were a lot of this certain kind of fish and when i got near their hole in the coral, which is obviously their home, they got soooo protective. They kept chasing off other fish too. I am thinking they had eggs to protect.

 Eating our yakisoba in the outdoor restaurant gathering area.

 Enjoying our ice cream cones! :)

 Walk like an egyptian....

 Here we are combing the beach for shells. I am not kidding when i say that this place is AWESOME for finding shells. We found HUGE shells, all in one piece. I found about 300 BUTTONS!!! Buttons are basically a really cool looking "button" that clams use to protect themselves in their shells. I should post a picture. They are becoming popular because you can use them to make pretty jewelry. Well, i hit it BIG with finding TONS on this island! We found a few with every step we took. We found the largest clam shells you have ever seen. One that we decided to take home with still stuck together on its bottom end, but it was opened up at the top. It weighs about 20 lbs. It's huge. This is the place to go to for shells, not joking.

 Eating again.... :)  Not sure what i am doing here. hahaha!

 Feeling ready to take on the sharks after eating his japanese bbq dinner...

 We woke up bright and early. 5:30 maybe. We looks sleepy. This is sunrise. It was a beautiful sunrise. We combed the other side of the beach for shells that morning. The beach was formed by coral. This beach is loaded with coral everywhere. Some spots are just piles and piles of coral. Amongst that mess of coral you will find WONDERFUL finds. :) Shane found me a glass fishing ball! woohoo! It's not one of the LARGE ones, but still i am so excited about it.

 Mango juice ....soooo good. Mango juice and ice cream is a big thing here and i LOVE it. :)

 This is what they served us for breakfast. Interesting. French fries, soup, grilled sandwich , and coleslaw that tasted like sesame seed. hhmmmm....

 Taking a picture with MY camera just before leaving. See all the rocks? There were lots of rock formations. AND when we walked down at the tip of the island early in the morning, we came upon a spot where shane spotted about 5 reef sharks. I followed him, climbed through the water to get to another rock formation that was sticking out of the water and we watched these sharks chasing after food. They are soooooo fast. We couldnt' capture a good picture of them because they were going so fast. One of them jumped completely out of the water. It was sooooo cool seeing that in REAL life.

 Sunrise ...

 See those islands? Those are the Kerama Islands. It's a chain of about 22 islands and only 4 of those are inhabited. Shane and I are going their the day after 4th of July with a group of friends to do some snorkeling. I cannnot WAIT!  It's one of the most beautiful spots in the world as far as Clearest water and one of the best spots for scuba diving and snorkeling. Healthy coral reefs, with numerous and diverse sea life. I will post pictures after we go. It takes about a 45 minute to 1 hour boat ride to get to the spot we are going to.