Keeping up with the Rosses

After several weeks of hosting family here in Okinawa as well as traveling abroad to see family and friends, we spent this weekend as just us. I have relished all of our time this summer with family and friends, and I haven’t exactly looked forward to this transition back to just us. Just ask my mother who recently spent 2 weeks here with us. So I’m actually quite proud to report that despite a lot of rain, a potty-training and newly tyrannical 2-yr old, and my own knickers in a twist, we had a pretty darn good weekend.

We intended to spend Saturday at a local beach (read: netted; read: the only kind we’re going to since Isla’s recent box jellyfish attack) but weather forced the local beaches to close. So we re-visited the pools near the hotel we stayed in when we first arrived to Okinawa last summer. The kids truly enjoyed the day, which means I was also able to enjoy the day! When we were ready to leave, Isla and Asher allowed me to get them all showered and in dry clothes there in the extensive locker room. Then we headed to the car, the two of them hand-in-hand (a very recent, and very heart-warming development) and eating their complimentary popsicles.

Today, we went to the parent’s room at the gym here on the base. This place is a strange little set-up of a few treadmills, bikes, stair machines and weights in 1/2 of the room, with a baby-gated area of almost zero toys and a flatscreen tv playing cartoons in the other 1/2 of the room. So although I had to break a few times to mediate kid dramas and once to take Asher to the potty (where he successfully peed for the first time in a public restroom- that’s a milestone, right?), I got a solid run in on the treadmill. We came back to our house and spent the afternoon and evening with friends- playing in the rain, playing inside, playing at the playground later when the rain had stopped, coping with Asher’s tyranny, etc. Good times!