Auntie Itsuko

One of the many blessings of being married to Rod is to be a part of his extended family in Hawaii. His parents along with aunts, uncles and cousins live in Hawaii on the island of Oahu. We don't get out there nearly as often as I would like but fortunately for us his mom and aunt come out to San Diego at least once a year sometimes even more. Esther (my mother in law) has one sister named Flora. Rod and his brother grew up calling her Auntie Itsuko so the kids and I call her Auntie Itsuko. Rod has told me on more than one occasion how she was and is his favorite aunt hands down.

Over the years I have grown to love her so much and now that my kids know her they too can share in the sentiment. When we are in Hawaii she takes us to nice restaurants and lets us use her car. When she is here she plays with the kids tirelessly and makes Rhett feel like he is the greatest thing since sliced bread. She educates us on the Japanese culture and the proper way to drink hot tea. The rest of the year she sends us care packages that are not only filled with several treats but even more impressive all the time she has to spend in order to send them. After taking maybe a bazillion photos from her visits to San Diego she goes home and prints out each picture and organizes them in an album for us. I just counted and over the years she has made us eight photo albums. In addition she makes a point to have lunch at fast food places day after day always ordering a kids meal just to get the toy for my kids. Now that Emmie is old enough to enjoy the toys she makes a point to get a boy toy and a girl toy. After we received our last care package Rhett said, "boy auntie sure eats a lot of happy meals."

She is one of the very few people that love me enough to read this blog and I wanted her to know how much the San Diego Kaya's love and appreciate her. Also Auntie since you do not have a Facebook account here are the pictures you have been waiting for. If you had a facebook account you would have been able to see them much sooner....just a suggestion.