Lake Yamanaka

Last weekend I (Rebecca) enjoyed a time of fun and fellowship with 50 other women from the Chapel of Hope.(our church on base) It was the first women's retreat that had ever been planned through the Chapel and we were very surprised and blessed by the enthusiasm that it generated! I was on the planning team - and though my jobs were quite small - it was still really cool to see all the plans and details come together over the last few months.


We all traveled to Lake Yamanaka, which is at the foot of Mt. Fuji. We were blessed to be able to use the Retreat Center of SEND International for the weekend. The theme for the weekend was "All Occasion Prayer" and we enjoyed a terrific speaker and great time spent in small group discussions. We brought and prepared all the food for the weekend and women signed up in teams to help take care of meal prep and clean up. On Saturday we had free time to enjoy walking around the lake and checking out the great views of Mt. Fuji.


Japan tends to be a place where many Navy spouses feel very isolated. Although it has many wonderful opportunities, it is VERY far from friends and family and many spouses are out to sea for much of the year. Child care options are very limited and women with infants and small children often feel like there is not very much support for them. All that to say, it was wonderful to be able to come together and share our hearts and to see that we're not as alone as we may sometimes feel. I will look forward to pursuing friendships with many of the women that I got to know this weekend and I will pray that we can continue to support and encourage one another!