High Five For Friday 10/18

Hello Friday!

{ONE}

I decided to take advantage of the Columbus day sales going on and did a bit of online shopping. I am usually not a big online shopper, but with J.Crew, I know my sizes in each style and who can resist 50% off everything?? My shopping cart was up to 13 items at one point, but I somehow managed to get it down to 3. Old Navy had some cute stuff for great prices as well, but I only got a few things seeing as they gave me cash back to shop later. I am a sucker for marketing ploys. 

(1, 2, 3, 4, 5)

{TWO}

On Tuesday I dropped by the post office and found 4 packages waiting on me! It was seriously like Christmas. Packages are always excited, but for some reason living in another country makes it 10 times as great. 

I got my Tory Burch purchase finally! Ok, it might just be a phone case and not a beautiful new pair of riding boots, but it made me pretty happy. 

I won the very first giveaway I ever entered. It was on My Sweet Savannah and it was a gift card to Olive Lane Paper and Gifts. I had been waiting for a phone case I loved to be restocked but never did so I ordered all of this fabulous stuff. I've worn the necklace two times already and love it!

My very sweet friend Sam sent me this package as a surprise. She knew I was missing fall back in the states and sent me some fall goodies as well as some cute stuff! It was such a wonderful surprise! 

{THREE}

The other day I found an awesome store right down the street. I thought it would be like a Goodwill because it is called the reuse store. The bottom floor had used furniture, home stuff, electronics, etc. It wasn't goodwill quality, though, it was almost like new. The top floor was all clothes, shoes, etc. I would compare it to a very nice, organized version of Plato's closet. They had some cute stuff, but Jake was impatient  wanted to go do other things so I didn't get to browse much. I did find a super cool retro looking Patagonia pullover, which happens to be my favorite item of clothing, for only $20. I didn't get it, though, because Jake pointed out I probably wouldn't have many opportunities to wear it over the next 3 years. 

{Four}

Yesterday's post I talked about my field trip to the Yomitan Pottery Village and the Zakimi Castle Ruins. I found a great place to put my dish I got from the pottery village and it is getting some great use.

{FIVE}

I started running again. It took putting on my UK shorts and socks to get even slightly motivated.

Running is a struggle for me. You can read about my struggle here, here, here, and here. This spring, I had started running and even finished a 5k. As always, my running started to fizzle out. This summer I discovered bikram yoga and never looked back. I hardly ran all summer. Now that I don't have a bikram studio to go to (sad face) I have been trying to get to the gym. Since I've been here I've gone to zumba once. My goal is to get into running again, but we will see how it goes. If anyone has any tips for people who hate running, feel free to share them.

Jake and I have some exciting plans for the weekend! I hope the weather is good and that everything goes as planned. 

Do you have any fun weekend plans? Did you do any Columbus day shopping? Any running tips?

Yomitan Pottery Village and Zakimi Castle

Yesterday I went on a field trip. It was a real deal field trip with a bus, name tags, and sack lunches. I was probably just as excited for it as I was for any field trip in elementary school. This field trip was put together by the spouses club here on the island. I was excited to finally meet some other wives and get to explore the island some more. 

We met at the community center and boarded the charter bus. Then, we headed to the pottery village in Yomitan. It is a very old village of 45 artisans who make and sell their pottery. We wandered around and looked at all of the cute little buildings where the potters had their stuff set up. All of the bowls, plates, vases, etc. were so beautiful, yet so expensive. I would love one of the beautiful sink basins to put in my dream house or an entire set of bowls, dishes, and glasses. But, that wasn't going to happen so I just got one pretty little dish to put in my room for jewelry/odds and ends. 

My dish

We then headed to Zakimi castle where we explored the museum and had a small lunch on a hill overlooking the Yomitan Peninsula. 

After lunch, we went to explore the castle ruins. This castle was built in 1400 by the Chuzan Kingdom who ruled over central Okinawa during that time and later united the Ryukyu Kingdom. Only the walls were left, but it was still very interesting to see. The walls were so intricately built with stones perfectly placed in order to last many centuries. There was a beautiful 360 view of the island on top of the walls. 

New Friends

And there it is, an adult field trip! It was fun and I can't wait until next month's field trip to the Botanical Gardens.

Blogger's Digest Blog Hop

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The Blogger's Digest is a place for bloggers to share their latest {or greatest} posts and build connections with other bloggers. Thank you so much to everyone who has been linking up, I've been hearing a lot of great feedback! You are guys are linking up and visiting each others' blogs, exactly what a blog hop is supposed to be! We have new bloggers linking up every week, so be sure to keep coming back and making new connections.

1. Ericka from This Crazy Thing Called Life - Bloglovin
2. Poekitten from Many Waters - Bloglovin
3. Mary Leigh from Thrift for Today - Bloglovin
4. Amanda from Happily Ever After - Bloglovin
5. Nancy from My Little Criatura - Bloglovin
6. Keren from Fabulous Farm Living - Bloglovin
7. Mackenzie from Bell Bliss - Bloglovin
8. Shannon from Mamamusing - Bloglovin

If you are interested in being put on the list for co-hosting, contact me at piganddac@live.com

1. DIY Rustic Cupcake Stand - Root & Blossom
2. Spicy Chipotle Chicken with Sweet Potatoes in Gravy - Patience in the Jungle
3. Cloth Diapers for Dummies - Joyful Life
4. Pumpkin Buttermilk Waffles - In the Kitchen with Jenny
5. Natural Homemade Jewelry Cleaner - New Mama Diaries

Let's get this party started! How to join along and gain some followers:

• Follow your host and co-hosts on at least one social media platform - we all follow back!
• Submit a post from your blog.
• Share your social media links {Bloglovin, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, & Instagram}
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• If you "like" someone's Facebook page, leave them a message with the link to your page if you'd like a follow back, otherwise they won't be able to find your blog's page.
• Link back to the blog hop in whatever way you feel most comfortable - the more people who join along, the better for all of us!

An InLinkz Link-up

Cafe Gold Hall and Tug of War

Friday night we headed out to dinner at a nice place down the street we hadn't tried yet. It was a restaurant with lots of different small plates and sushi plates. We didn't know how much to get, so Jake ended up still being hungry when we left. Mcdonalds happened to be next door and we had been wanting to see what it's like, so Jake went and got a hamburger. It was pretty much the same as any Mcdonalds hamburger in the states. They did have quite a few different menu options, though.

Yes, that is a chicken and a hamburger together in one sandwich

After Mcdonals, we saw Gravity in 3D at the movie theatre on base. It was a very different and cool movie. I would recommend it if you haven't seen it. It was nice to have a typical date night. We are starting to finally feel like this is our life rather than something temporary, like a vacation. 

Saturday we had planned on going snorkeling but the weather wasn't cooperating. The day started to get away from us until Jake suggested we go to a cafe up north I had heard about and wanted to go to. We hopped in the car and made the 20 minute drive up north near another Marine Corp camp. We drove into the parking lot of a large, strange looking building. As we walked into the cafe, I realized this wasn't just an ordinary cafe. Every thing was made of wood. The tables, the stools, the floors, the walls, and all of the decorative structures. We paid 800 yen (around $8) just to get into the place. We sat at an interesting wood table and ordered lunch. We had heard they were famous for their taco rice, a very popular dish on the island. This dish was created due to the American influence on the island. It's basically a plate of rice with taco meat, cheese, lettuce, and tomato. Jake got the giant plate of taco rice and I got a steak sandwich. The food was amazing. Jake and I ate every single bite of our very large and delicious meal. 

Wood everywhere

Famous taco rice

After we were done stuffing our faces, we headed downstairs to where our map indicated the tour began. We are not quite sure what to expect. We walked right down into a limestone cave. There were stalactites/mites every where and lots of pottery and sculptures placed all over the walls. We continued our tour out back where the entire back hill we a beautiful garden. In this garden were tons of different rooms with different types of wood tables. It was like this place was made to have a giant party with different rooms, yet we were the only ones there. We wound our way through the garden looking at waterfalls and sculptures and then up through a few more different rooms. The top level was filled with tons and tons of bonsai trees. It was seriously the neatest place, but we still aren't quite sure exactly what this place is. 

After our visit to this interesting cafe, I made Jake stop at what I thought was a farmer's market on our way home. I was so excited, but it turned out to be a market full of American food products like Peter Pan Peanut Butter and Folgers Coffee. There was also this interesting thrift type shop with old American stuff. We were kind of confused so we left after taking a lap around the place.

We stopped at our neighborhood beach for walk and for Jake to scope out some fishing spots. 

We later went on a shopping adventure at the commissary and saw a guy out walking his bull. Yep, that's a big ole' bull just walking down the road. 

We spent the night enjoying the beautiful evening in our back yard and then facetiming our friend's back in the states who will be joining us here in January. We keep forgetting about this time difference thing and ended up waking them up at 6 am. Sorry guys! 

Sunday morning, Jake was needing a little slice of home so I made him biscuits and gravy. We then headed down to the capital city, Naha, for the annual tug of way festival. We were not sure what to expect, but as we got closer, we stumbled upon the rope in the middle of the road. It is the world's largest rope, so it took up almost one whole lane of the road! There was a parade down the main street, Kokusai, with dancers and drummers. We got there at the very tail end of the parade, but still got to see some of it. 

The streets were lined with vendors selling food. We tried some yakatori, which is some sort of skewer thing. We kept telling ourselves that it was chicken, but we weren't quite sure. 

Before the tug of war starts, there is a ceremony that takes place, uniting the two ropes together. There were so many people there that we could not see a thing that was going on. We could not even see the giant rope lining the street. We were supposed to volunteer with crowd control during the tug, but I wasn't feeling well after the weird stick meat and because of the large crowd and the heat, so we made the long walk back to our car to go get something substantial to eat. 

so many people

The beginning of the ceremony

We stopped at a delicious sushi restaurant where we ate our body weight in sushi and ramen and then headed home. 

Sushi Gen

That pretty much sums up our weekend, even though it is continuing into today and tomorrow since Jake is off. Tonight (it's late Monday night here) we had friends over tonight for a Columbus day cookout. it was nice to entertain in our new place and catch up. 

Linking up with Sami and Kimberlee