Hosting an exchange student for a week is a whirlwind experience. On the one hand, you only have a week to show him or her all that you can of your home town. On the other hand, it’s only a week.

This is our second time hosting a Japanese student, and it’s been a good experience both times. Although last year our student ended up getting sick with the swine flu right after he left us. The poor kid was sick for their Disneyland trip, and our family had a few people down from sickness as well. Out of 240 boys, I think 70 of them got sick. This year we didn’t have those annoying swine flu issues, which was nice.

Kazuki came on a Tuesday, which was also the night of our ward Halloween party, so Ryan ended up picking him up alone. By the time everyone got home, it was bedtime, so we basically said hello, here’s your room, welcome to our home. The next day we sent him off to BYU. Even though it had snowed that night, they took the kids to a farm for some farm type activities. He said he rode a horse, but that’ about all I know about that day. I had to take John to a basketball game and then go to rehearsal myself, so the rest of the family had dinner with him, and then played that great ice breaker, the Wii. He started to warm up to the kids and had a good time.

Thursday he was done with school earlier, since he didn’t have to go all the way to BYU. That day our students went to a local junior high and went to classes there. They had buddies who spent the day with them, and he said it was fun. We decided to go to Gardner Village for dinner that night. The place was all decked out for Halloween, and we thought it would be fun.

The whole concept of Halloween is strange to him, since they have no such holiday in Japan, but Kazuki was a good sport, and I think he enjoyed dinner, at least. He ordered pasta and finished it all.

Friday morning I drove the carpool of 7 boys to BYU, and it was fun to listen to them chatter in Japanese. I felt like a taxi driver. By the time he got home, we were just getting home from our Halloween activities for the day, so we had a dinner of pizza, and then got down to the business of carving our pumpkins. Again, a new thing for him, and he must wonder what in the world we are doing, but we want to show all the aspects of American life at Halloween time, so we dived right in.

Saturday we had a fun day. We all went to John’s basketball game in the morning, and then had McDonald’s for lunch. Kazuki had written in his letter to us that he wanted to eat a really big hamburger at McDonald’s, so we wanted to grant his request. Then we went off to have some serious fun. The weather, while not raining, was overcast and cloudy, but still warm enough for outdoor activities. We went to Trafalga in Lehi and spent a few hour in the pursuit of having fun.

We played mini golf, rode go carts, rode the merry go round and even the bumper boats. Well, I didn’t ride the bumper boats, because someone had to take pictures, right? And I couldn’t get my family to promise not to squirt each other. They did not promise, and they ended up doing quite a lot of squirting.

So you can see why I didn’t want to be involved in all THAT, right?

We timed it just right so that we were leaving in the afternoon just as it started to rain.
After dinner, we dressed Kazuki in a “costume”, or actually, he just put on a cape, and we geared up to go trick-or-treating. Unfortunately, it was POURING rain about then.

Trick-or-treating was less than fun. I’m afraid he didn’t get the whole FUN idea of it. We made it around 1/2 of our neighborhood, then stopped in for donuts at our neighbors, and came back home. Just as we got home, the raining subsided. Ugh. The girls, after changing shoes, wanted to go back out, but Kazuki and John were done. They decided to stay home and hand out candy and watch tv instead.

On Sunday, we got up nice and early to attend the live broadcast of Music and the Spoken Word.

We did a little Temple Square sightseeing while we were there. We couldn’t stay long, though, because we had to make sure we were back in time for primary. So, it was a long day for all of us. The afternoon was spent in naps, playing games, and doing puzzles. We had a nice steak dinner and the kids even played outside.

Monday the boys went to BYU for more activities/lessons, and then we met them there at 5:30 for a closing social. The banquet was yummy, the program was too long. When we came back home, we gave Kazuki some American gifts.

Tuesday we had an early morning, waking everyone up by 5:45 to say goodbye. Thankfully Ryan drove him to Provo, so I could get the kids ready for school.

It was a good experience! The kids are already sad that he’s gone, but hopefully they will have a pen-pal in Japan, and some fond memories.

Busy, Busy.

I’ve got a BUNCH of pictures that I meant to do blog posts around, but instead, I’m going to just lump them all together and tell you a little bit about them. Think of it of a bunch of mini-posts!

My good friend Lisa just posted about our fun time at Witches Night out last weekend. Since she used my pictures, I feel perfectly justified in sending you over to her blog to read about it. So, go HERE for the fun details.

Natalie finished up her volleyball season. They even had a tournament this year.

This is my favorite picture. She’s the one ducking away from the ball. Love it! But in her defense, that was just one time. She’s actually pretty good, and she’s got a wicked serve.

This one is a little dark and kind of blurry, but she JUST bumped it. Can you see that blur that is the ball there?

The girls and I went to see Thriller by the Odyssey Dance Theater. It was, as usual, AMAZING! I enjoy it more every time I see it!

I spent a day with my parents making and bottling applesauce. They have the apples, the know-how, and all the proper equipment, so it was much easier to go to their house and do the work with them, than to bring the apples here and do it myself.

They’ve got the operation down to a science, and it’s all set up outside! Which keeps your kitchen from getting totally stickified from apple juice and sauce. Jenna was home from school that day, so she even helped. Here she is with my dad.

I ended up with 26 quarts of applesauce and about 13 quarts of apple juice. Yum!

Every where you drive in Utah County, there is construction.

And every road that gets to my house is torn up. My friend Tammy wrote about the ongoing headache or the construction on her blog HERE.

My kids have been working on entries for their schools’ reflections contests. “Together we can” is the theme.

I’m relieved to NOT be in charge of our school’s reflections program this year. I have scrounged around and gotten prizes, but I’m not in charge. Happy Dance!!! But the kids are still entering, and since they are due today, we got 6 entry forms, 6 media release forms, and 6 entries ready last night (and this morning. Who am I kidding?)

We picked up our Japanese exchange student, Kuzuki, on Tuesday night.
(Sorry about the sideways picture-erg. — Fixed)
He seems like a nice kid. Yesterday he went to a farm with his school group, then had sloppy joes (we want to give him the American Experience, right?) and then played Wii with the kids. Tonight we plan on taking him out to dinner. We’ve also got carving pumpkins and trick-or-treating on the agenda. He won’t be here long, so we’re trying to make his stay enjoyable. Too bad it got so flippin COLD here all of a sudden! He and the other boys were playing in the snow yesterday, so I guess they don’t mind.

This picture just does my heart good. For any of you who have had little boys who hate reading, you’ll understand my frustration. All of my other kids are very advanced readers, and were reading well by the end of kindergarten. Two of them were reading before Kindergarten, actually. Then, my youngest is all boy, with no interest in reading or any of that school stuff. But he’s finally getting it. He can actually put words together and he told me the other day “I love reading, Mom!” Thank you Mrs. Barker!

Do you ever feel like you are “up to your neck”? Well, here’s John in the sand.
He let his sister and some random boy bury him while at Thanksgiving Point’s Dino museum the other day.

So, there you have it. A bunch of random mini posts! Stay tuned for pictures and the run down of all of our fun Halloween activities!