Summer Fun: Spending the day at the beach and also enjoying a nice packed picnic lunch...

August 9th, our family went to our closest beach to our house. Our closest beach is located in Ibaraki prefecture. 

We brought our UV beach/pool tent that we usually bring...so that we can sit under it... when we're not in the water. Which we spent 99% of our time in the water. : ) We brought the Costco bag which had cookies, chips, paper cups, napkins and a trash bag (spare grocery bag) and extra sunscreen.

2 bottles of pink lemonade, plenty of ice for our cups and rotisserie chicken sandwiches were in the cooler.

Our picnic lunch. We also had a big bag of Country Ma'am cookies too. : ) It's just...as you know...swimming always makes people hungry. : )

Each of our boys got new floaties/ innertubes. Cool chocolate donut ones with sprinkles. These came from Amazon.jp. 

Quenching that thirst. 

There was a place to fill up their donuts for free with air. Noah just filled his up and Branden was about to go and fill his up too. Which he did. : )

Hey! I recognize those 2 choco donuts with sprinkles! Hi Branden, hi Noah!

Hello Noboru. And a smiling Noah. 

We spent the entire day there from 8:30am until 3:50pm-ish. While our area/part of Japan where we live... has been relatively cooler than normal, weather-wise most of the summer. On this day it was a super hot and scorching 36 degrees C. Which is 97 degrees F for us Americans.

I always want to make sure my kids have a very nice summer. Whether we just do a free activity like going to the beach. Or having a backyard BBQ. Or having a movie night at home or even going to the movies. I just want them to enjoy their summer. Because...they're my kids and I love them. : )

Summer is so awesome!

Ibaraki is way less populated than Chiba. Although we live on the edge of Chiba and in a very rural area. So when we go to the beach...there's people. But only "Ibaraki" amounts of people. Meaning just a few. 

For about 3 minutes Branden was a double donut. LOL. That's only because Noah was boogie boarding and asked B to hold his donut. : ) Bran ended up boogie boarding too and Noah had to be a double donut for a bit too. : )

An extremely happy Noah! Just enjoying a "chill" day at the beach! I love this picture so much!

After a few hours, the kids just went in the ocean without any donuts or anything. They just jumped around. Talked each others ears off. And enjoyed the rest of the day. 

That's Bran, just splashing around enjoying the rest of his day, with his family. Noboru and I enjoyed most of our time in the ocean splashing around and talking too. Watching the kids. And talking and splashing some more. An excellent way to spend the day, if you ask me. : ) 

We drove home. I jumped in the shower first. Only so that I could blow dry my hair. Everyone took turns showering after me. I didn't wear a stitch of makeup. But, I was clean and had freshly blow dried hair. We all put on some fresh clothes and went out for dinner at Saizeriya that night. We were all super hungry. After spending an entire day splashing around and swimming all day long. Saizeriya is a very affordable Italian food chain restaurant. I had a salad and rigatoni/stove pipe pasta. And a drink bar. The kids each picked 2 Italian dishes. They each picked meat sauce spaghetti, but I think Noah picked pizza and Branden picked a doria. Noboru picked a different type of pizza and a different type of pasta. We all had the drink bar. It was a fun day! And a nice way to end the day. I definitely didn't feel like cooking, so it was nice to take a break. We all went home and had some shave ice. And ended our night watching good TV. 

Beach Family Fun!

Tuesday, July 26th was the day our family was heading to the beach. We're lucky in that we have near-ish Ibaraki beaches to go to and near-ish "Country parts" of Chiba to go to too. Anyways the day before we went to Costco and bought a rotisserie chicken, dinners rolls, sliced cheese etc. I like using the Costco dinner rolls for picnic sammys in Japan because if we used regular bread they'd be soggy by lunch time and these keep our sandwiches perfect by lunch time. I made Bran and Noah 11 of these sandwiches. 5 each, plus 1 extra. A perfect amount for the boys. Noboru and I had 4 each of these packed up. The ones in this picture had Swiss cheese on them.

These ones had cheddar. A sprinkling of salt and black pepper. Miracle Whip and some crispy lettuce. We also brought two 2 liters of lemonade with us. Chips. I definitely pack a great picnic lunch. Extra sunscreen. Napkins, cups, you name it, I brought it. : ) 

This was a short 40 minute ride from our house and we decided to hit the one of the many beaches in Ibaraki. Our first time hitting a beach in Ibaraki by the way. This beaches waters are rated on some scale in Japan and it's rated as AA for having very clear water. Sand still looks dark gray to me but the water was quite clear. How was the weather? Hot! Humid melting sauna like hot. But the grayest colored day you'd ever see! So gray. The gray didn't bother us at all. It was a weekday, the beach was pretty much deader than a doornail. And that suited us just fine! Perhaps the gray kept everyone away? Awesome! The boys always have a play partner in each other. Good thing they are brothers. I was an only child growing up and so I can see the difference. 

Hotter than heck. Grayer than heck. There were a few scattered people here and there. 

The current was naturally moving the kids one certain direction. So, Noboru was talking to Noah about that. Something to look out for.

With boogie boards in hand.

The waves were really good sized here. Not huge but not weak waves either. The kids had so much fun riding in and back out again and again. 

Noah is so ready to catch the next wave in this pic!

We brought chairs, we had our cooler with drinks and our sandwiches and fresh peaches. We had our chips in the Costco bag, cups, napkins, trash bag for collecting wrappers or trash after lunch, sunscreen. There's my towel right there, I had just come from the water and snapped this pic. So, I dried myself off a bit.

A pretty dead beach! And very few people. There was however, 3 lifeguards on duty 2 girls and 1 guy very friendly and nice.

And zero people on this side.

After a few hours of boogie boarding, it was time for lunch.

Having tons of  good food is so nice, because as you know swimming makes people so hungry. Hahaha. : ) We had Ruffles, sour cream and onion and taco chips, we had all sorts of chips. We had the sweetest fresh peaches. 

And the world's worst cupcakes ever ever EVER. Oh well, live and learn. These were a complete dud! We did however reapply some sunscreen regardless of the gray day right after lunch.

Noboru bringing the boys their boards.

Such a good daddy. Tying Noah's shorts. These Gap swim shorts you don't even need to tie them because they're like glued on there, but Noah likes them tied anyways and Noboru always ties them for him. : )

Noboru in his swim trunks. Yep he swam too. For a long long time actually. And I swam as much as the kids did. 

Summer is so nice. No stress. Just family fun time. Gray day? Who cares really. It was such an awesome day!

Happy Noah. Beach family fun...totally! : )

Throwback Thursday. Family Vacation Honolulu, Hawaii 2013...

Since it is June, I thought this weeks TBT could come from our family vacation we took also in June, just a few years ago. We usually take a family vacation every summer and it's usually to Hawaii. This was the year 2013 and our family once again hit the island of Oahu for some much needed rest and relaxation and some family fun. And this time was super nice, because my mom flew from California to spend the week with us in Honolulu. Back to the pic. Just about to head from Japan to Honolulu. The seats in first class to Honolulu are these really big slanted type seat configuration. The window seats... just have 1 huge seat and it is slanted. The seats fold all the way down to beds or comfy recliners. They're so comfy. And a huge screen for watching on demand movies and a nice side table with reading light and plugs to charge tablets and stuff. Of course we book ended the boys. Noboru was in the first seat, then B, then Noah and I was last. That way we always kept a watchful eye on the kids. : ) 

Enjoy your flight kids. And I will do the same. And I'll also be keeping my eyes on you guys. : ) 

Dessert cart. Yum! After a full course meal. They wheeled the dessert cart around. There are a few desserts to choose from and also a huge cheese and fruit platter.

I picked a strawberry sundae and watched Oz the Great and Powerful. And a whole bunch of other movies too. 

We spent many many days at the beach. Fave beach? Kailua! : ) Noah and also Bran boogie boarded. I did too. My mom enjoyed the beach a ton and so did Noboru. 

We always bring a lunch and plenty of drinks with us. And a whole lot of sunscreen.

What lucky kids! The luckiest! : )

My mom doted on both Bran and Noah most of the days and in between eating her salad, she also found time to sit and drink her Perrier and read her book of the month. That time it was Fifty Shades of  Freed. Those are her reading glasses. 

Summer vacations are for eating meals slowly. Creating lots of fun memories. Eating, talking and laughing! And enjoying some very fluffy blueberry pancakes, crunchy bacon, eggs and hashbrowns and sipping good ol' American coffee!

Going to touristy places...because you can! : ) And it's fun! : )

Because grandma gave each of you a disposable camera and told you 2 to takes lots of pictures from your vacation. And you both did. And there is Noah taking a picture of his lunch that he was just about to eat! I love this! : ) 

With hat...

Without hat and both wearing their new shark tooth necklaces...

Dole Whip pineapple deliciousness!

Anyway that's today's TBT from 2013! : )