but by gosh, they are growing. :P Go rice go!!!! ha ha ha. : )
Just like on Finding Nemo how they said..."just keep swimming" I will cheer on the fields and say...just keep growing, just keep growing, just keep, growing growing, growing" Ha ha ha. :P
Noah riding his bike Thursday after school!!! Branden was meanwhile riding his bike with friends in our housing community that we live! But he came home at 5pm when the song played throughout the neighborhood though. :P
Then Noah went into our shed and pulled out one of the many balls the boys have. He grabbed a basketball.
Happy smiles!!!! : ) I sat outside in the backyard Thursday and enjoyed watching my son ride his bike and bounce his basketball. The simple things like this in life, make me pretty happy. : ) May sound sappy but it's okay, it's totally true. : )
Go on my son, bounce that ball! And I will watch you and cheer you on! He likes me counting the # of times he bounces it. @_@ Ha ha ha. :P
And talk about perfect timing the DVD's came on Friday (afternoon). We rented, "The Day the Earth Stood Still" with Keanu Reeves, sorry to say it wasn't nearly as good as we thought and hoped it would be. : ( And we rented, "What a Girl Wants" With Amanda Bynes and dreamy Colin Firth.: D It's Monday and we've not yet seen it, hopefully Tuesday night.
If you live in Japan, you probably know that in Japan, Pizza Huts are for take out/pick up or for delivery, meaning no sit down restaurants here for Pizza Hut, bummer. That is, until now, and here's a pic of the Pizza Hut sit down restaurant, meaning you can actually sit down and have a meal. In Japan they are calling the sit down Pizza Huts, "Pizza Hut Natural", the first one opened in Japan last Wednesday night. Two co-workers of Noboru's and their family's went the first night it opened for dinner. We would have went the first day with them, but Wednesday is our family swim day, so it wasn't meant to be and Thursday is Kumon day granted B was outta Kumon by 3:45pm and got to play through the neighborhood still, but we planned for Friday. And yup, again Noboru's other coworker went on Thursday and even sent us a pic with his keitei, lol.:P So we went Friday, a day that worked for everyone in our family, the third day it opened, but it's okay it was barely 3 days old when we went. That way we could go relax and eat and see what we thought. Also, they hope this restaurant is sucessful because if so they hope to open 10-20 more Pizza Hut Naturals across Japan. So, not really sure if this is their test restaurant but lucky for me it's in Chiba! If you live in Chiba, please check it out!!!!! : ) Hubby's coworkers said there was a line, the people who went the first day said there was a long line. When we went on Friday there was no line, granted we got there at like 4:30pm so before the dinner rush. And yes there was a small amount of people waiting to be seated when we left. Please keep that in mind. Hope that bit helps. : )
The prices are VERY fair! Especially for a buffet/all you can eat in Japan.
They still had the "new opening flowers" sitting near the entrance!!!
Now, if you are expecting, pan pizzas and the menu to be like what we have at the regular American Pizza Hut, you may be disappointed. *But* if you have lived in Japan for a while and you love Capriccosa type Italian, then you will SURELY *LOVE* this. For real!!!! They make small thin crust hand tossed pizzas, they bake them in a real pizza oven for that gorgeous flavor. They make them small according to everything we've read, because they say they need the pizzas to bake quick and that's understandable. They also have many types of pizza, margerita pizza, curry pizza, all sorts of pizza. And you can order as many as you want but they do ask you not to order more then you can eat. And we ordered slowly, and we ordered only what we could finish and if hungry we ordered more. We wasted nothing.
Here's a pic of the menu.
The actual buffet part is small. They have sodas and drinks. They have salad, a very small salad bar, real small. they have a lot of Chinese in their buffet which surprised me. And Japanese. They had omelet rice, garlic fried rice, soup, karaage, french fries, garlic bread. I think they are hoping you get filled up on this stuff. We had small salads and the boys shared some fries. But we mainly went for the pasta and pizza. And btw, their goma dressing was fantastic.
This pasta was so good, this one was garlic and tomato. This tasted probably better then the one we get at Cappriciossa and we love theirs, so yeah this is good stuff!!!! And yes the portions are indeed small but that's cool because you can actually try a variety of pastas this way!!!
And this different plate of pasta was spicy, but so good and came with eggplant, this was delicious. We loved spending last Friday night at Pizza Hut!!! : )
Perfect size and so unbelievably good, a wood fired pizza versus a gas pizza, no contest, the flavor was wow!!! Each of our boys had their own pizza, I had my own as well. We enjoyed ourselves last Friday quite a bit!!! :P
Noboru came back with this plate? I asked him, were ya trying to make a face with it? Sorta almost looked like a smiley face. He laughed and it was an accidental face, he said :P. I had 1 sweet potato battered in tempura and the hubby ate the rest.
Noboru on his 2nd serving of pasta now and on his 2nd pizza now. @_@ Hey, we wanted our money's worth!!!! Ha ha ha. And heck, why not enjoy eating out once in a while, right? : )
And we each got our own soft serve with cornflakes, because this is Japan afterall, gotta have those cornflakes in there for good measure, right?! Yumm. :P
And this is a pic of the inside of the restaurant. Noboru joked and said it didn't resemble how American Pizza Huts look like inside at all. And I agree. I like American Pizza Huts *but* you know, I also really like this Pizza Hut Natural as well. Both totally different but both totally good. And the price of 1500 yen or whatever for unlimited pizza and pasta is pretty fair considering the quality and flavor is top notch and delicious and considering this in Japan and things ususally cost about this much anyway. Now for the info in better details. This restaurant is located in Sakura, Chiba. So, I think people in the Funabashi or Makuhari area would have an easy time of getting here. Now for me, it's a pain in the butt, since I live way off in the middle of nowhere!!! Ha ha ha! :P But hubby and I agree we will try to make it down there maybe once every 2-3 month's or so. Anyway hope this information helps someone!!! : )
Saturday morning, we all got a very good sleep, don't think I even got up until 9:30am? Chopped up some potatoes, and chopped some onions, mushrooms and bell peppers for omelet fixings.
The boys split a 3 egg omelet with cheddar. And had potatoes and toast and OJ. Hubby had an omelet with cheddar and mushrooms with potatoes and toast as well but with black coffee. And I had a 1 egg omelet with onions, bell peppers and mushrooms with cheddar. Skillet potatoes and toast and a hot caramel machiatto coffee.
Here's a pic of my simple not fancy breakfast from last Saturday. It was much too nice of a day to be inside or be online. So, we spent most of our day in the backyard. Just kicking back and relaxing. Watching the kids play. And then I got started in on supper.
Cream stew for us on Saturday.
Just chopped and fried up the chicken in a bit of oil when it was 100% cooked, I fried up the veggies, didn't add any other oil. When the onions looked sorta see through. Know what I mean? Is when I started adding water, covering with lid and stuff.
A picture of my boys Saturday afternoon, must have been taken around 3pm or so? The stew was boiling on the stove while I went back outside. Watched them chase each other barefoot on the soft grass. Nothing major going on for us this weekend, that's true, just stayed home, but by George we had ourselves a really awesome weekend. :P
A very low key dinner in our neck of the woods on Saturday!!! Cream stew and rice!!! After supper, we threw the dishes into the dishwasher and we took fast showers, got squeeky clean, jammies on by 7pm, no kidding. Just sorta hanging out. Noah zonked out as usual. And B stayed up until 9pm. And then hubby and I watched American Idol. I think my dad said it's now over in the US? He's biting his tongue and nearly bursting at the seams trying not to tell me how it ends. Anyway for us in Japan... and if you are somewhere actually more delayed then Japan please don't read ahead. :P Anyway, Lil and Anoop left last week and this week, Matt Giraud left. I hate to admit it but I agree with the results so far. Sorry contestants, ha ha ha. : )
Anyway am still walking treadmill about 4 times a week, still clocking in 7,000-10,000 steps. Doing my work out dvd's about 3-4 times a week. Wish it were more, but hey, I'm honest. : ) I wish I were a more dedicated exerciser honestly. Ha ha ha.
Sunday, woke up at 8am, because it was community clean up day!!!@_@ And would you believe since it rained around 4am and stopped way before 9am, when the clean up was supposed to start. Anyway it was postponed for another Sunday, this coming Sunday. So, with the kids still snoozing, hubby and I enjoyed coffee. Lazed around. Stood in our house clothes/loungewear all day. The boys and I played a board game, called SORRY! And then we just mostly lazed around until dinner. We had lunch and stuff. Had leftover cream stew for supper. Totally lazy Sunday. :P Ha ha ha. And watched Kyle XY all afternoon on the Sci-Fi channel. They were having a marathon and I never have seen that show before but turns out, I really like that show a lot. And we had this bowl of popcorn and watched Kyle XY for hours. So much fun, just vegging out and relaxing taking a much needed break.
Anyway, other tidbits to share???
Well May31st, we will do the community clean up this is the postponed day, oh the joy, oh the fun! not! : )
June 1st is the first day, Noah switches over to the summer uniform. It's been marked on my calendar for the past month. June 1st, June 1st, yochien summer uniform is in effect, for my sons school, it's like stuck in my brain. I better not forget, I better not forget. :P
Visit Noah's school June 4th, I got it marked down already. Observation day for me.
"Daddy's visit the yochien day" on a Saturday, June 13th. I made sure to type that into Noboru's Ipod touch so he has been in the know about that and had taken the day off. For that already. But still it's marked on the ol' calendar on the fridge. Just so I can doubly make sure! :P Observation for the dad's.
Branden's field trip to where we live, lol. June 17th, The rice fields behind our house, the Yuka-sensei is taking B's class. And I am to make him obento for June 17th. Read the note about it?, yes, marked it on the calendar, and everything!!!! And no, karaage for obento *again* lol. He will take either sandwich or yakitori. I have my heels stuck in the ground for this one. And I won't budge and it's not even June yet!!!! Just let the kids ask me for karaage. I know what my answer will be. :P Nope, nope, no no no. ; ) The Yuka-sensei said in our town she feels the best fields to catch crawfish are "such and such" rice fields (there's a little creek near by the fields, the same one we go to.) Which happens to be the fields right behind our house, lol, go figure, I didn't know, sure we go catching there ourselves but I didn't know it was that good. I wonder if I should observe the kids on their field trip from my terrace. Should I wave at B? LOL! Nah that would embaress him. Wouldn't want to do that. :P Since they will have lunch along the rice fields, should I ask them to lunch in our backyard? Nah that would not be roughing it and I think they wanna rough it. Ahh well, I'll at least get a birds eye view of my son all day long, that day!!! Ha ha ha. They also asked for any parental volunteers that would like to tag along. Noboru said he might go with B's class. Since he's into the crawfish guy stuff anyway. Perhaps another dad will tag along as well. Maybe Genki's or Kouiki's dad.
TV Talk, Have lately gotten into Kyle XY, like I said. Am still big into Desperate Housewives, Cold Case, Dexter, Law and Order SVU, Ghost Whisperer, American Idol, Sex and the City. And Gossip Girl. I also catch Martha Stewart whenever I can or Jamie Oliver's cooking program whenever I can on the Food Network too.
In the news....Also, did anyone read this news that happened in New Mexico last week? It's about a mother who suffocated her 3 year old son. Killing a child is horrible enough, but this mother suffocated him, had second thoughts, performed CPR on him, brought him back to life and then changed her mind and suffocated him yet again! What sort of person does this? What was that poor child thinking the last 10 minutes of his little life. This story just makes me so sad! I have a 3 year old little boy myself and I tell you this story bothered me to my very core. It broke my heart, it really honestly did. And I hugged my son so tight and told him how much I loved him after I read this story. I hugged both my sons tighter this day. She said, the reason she killed him was because, and I quote, "she did not want him to grow up with no one caring about him" This story was so heartbreaking to hear. I have since went and looked at his little picture about 10 times.: ( Poor little boy. He didn't deserve that, no child does. Kids are so innocent, they're so good and wonderful. Sigh. Deep breaths. Anyway, sorry but I had to discuss this tragedy because it upset me a great deal. Sigh. I really hate it when people hurt kids. : (
Anyway, with my kids fast asleep in dreamland, it's time for me to enjoy my down time in front of my TV with big fluffy pillow and blankie and get ready for a new Ghost Whipserer to start at 9pm tonight. Have a wonderful week you guys!!! : ) Edited to add, no Ghost Whisperer tonight? It's not on. Bummer! So season 2 ended then, right. Grumble grumble. Aw man, this bites!!! : ( Oh well, I see Titanic just started. Okay have a lovely night and awesome week you guys! Back to the TV, I go! :P

