We've successful made it back the US for the majority of the summer. As many of you know, while we are in the US this summer we will be visiting many of our sponsoring churches, as well as some of the churches that have generously given us gifts. We will also be having medical checks and attending the Summer Missionary Conference (a time to gather with other missionaries for fellowship, worship, and workshops).
We have already visited our first church, Prince of Peace in Freeport, IL. Our visit went well and we were welcomed with a delicious potluck. Nozomi really loved the goulash. The only hitch was we hit road construction and had to detour because of a road closed. We got a little lost:( We're not use to traveling without GPS. We will definitely be getting our unit out of storage once we arrive in Wisconsin.
And yes, Nozomi did excellent on the plane ride here. She slept all the way here. The turbulence bounced her to sleep. The real problem was riding in the car. She does not like the carseat. She is used to moving around on the trains or riding in the stroller. She does not like being confined.
We spent our first week relaxing and pigging out on processed American junk food. I'm not going to lie, I ate two Tombstone pizzas this week. We've also be binge watching HGTV. Every episode has Erik or I yelling at the TV "You don't need all that stuff." Our life in Japan is a little less cluttered with very little square feet.
I've also found that soda taste terrible to me in the US. It has a weird after taste. Japan must use real sugar.
And everything is cheaper in the US! Erik has to keep telling me not to buy things. We bought steaks for the grill and everyone commented on how expensive meat is here. We were just amazed we could buy 4 steaks for the price of one good steak in Japan.
