Bits and Pieces...

Americans love peanut butter! It's true, we do! And we have a love for peanut butter ice-cream. I am pretty sure... there are at least 3-5 different types of peanut butter ice cream in your average American grocery store, at any given time. And as you know, I even make my own here in Japan with those big tubs of Kirkland vanilla ice-cream as my base. Needless to say, I was pleasantly surprised to find this for sale in the little city nearest my town last week. Skippy brand peanut butter popsicles with a peanut butter soft inside/filling. So, for testing purposes, I had to buy some. Noboru happened to be with me the day I was in that store and asked him if he wanted one. He was like yikes...and no thanks. : ) Hahaha. So just picked up 3, for the kids and myself to taste test. What did we think? Branden said they were a 6 out of 10 for him. 10 being the best. Noah....said that he didn't care for these at all. And that to me, says a lot because he can usually find something nice to say about anything and everything. So for him to not like these. I was now curious to try for myself. I tried mine last and I have to say... I wasn't blown away by this. And would I repurchase this? Never! And this is coming from a peanut butter loving family....so that should tell you something. Let me explain in better detail. For starters peanut butter icecream is delicious and this was more so a peanut butter popsicle. No big deal...I knew that, when I bought it. But...the outside or regular part of the popsicle had a very bland flavor to it. Meaning if you didn't know it was *supposed* to be peanut butter flavored...you may never guess peanut butter. So the outside Popsicle main flavor was bland and didn't really taste like anything. The inside filling was weird. Granted it tasted a bit more like peanut butter, but it was just really unimpressive. 

Anyways...regular life still going on here daily. Of course. And on this day I made green chili enchiladas.

1 large chicken breast. Boiled. shredded and seasoned. Corn tortillas bought from Kaldi, slightly skillet fried beforehand and blotted with paper towel. Shredded my big hunk of cheese. And started to roll them.

Baked in a 350 degree oven for 30 minutes. This gave me time to make some Spanish rice. And get some ice out for our sodas.

Chicken cheese green chili enchiladas and a side of Spanish rice some chopped up lettuce on top of my enchiladas for a healthy little crunch. And a coke with ice. Yum! : ) My family love these!

Ordered 2 new pair of Vans for B. Because his feet keep growing. He keeps growing.

ABC Mart is an official retailer/seller of Vans here in Japan. 

Bran is now a size American men's 11 in shoes. And a size 29 cm. 

A preppy navy blue pair and a black and white checkered pair. 

Beats just came out with new ear phones/buds. 

Bran picked black.

Noah picked blue. The sound on these is absolutely incredible. Even better that the last model of Beats ear buds. 

Thanks Dr. Dre.

Cart pic from our Costco run last week. 2 rotisserie chickens. Dinner rolls. Big shrimp and bacon. That's it. Our total came to like $40 or $45. We can have shrimp 2 or 3 times in March now. And we had rotisserie chicken sandwiches last week with these rotisseries for supper that night. The kids also took some rotisserie chicken sandwiches to school the next day too in their packed lunches. 

Noboru and I went to Coco Ichiban Curry House last week for our once a week lunch date.

Anything new to add? My hair is done now...thanks to me going to the hair salon last Friday... and I am happy to have gotten it over with. My hair is as straight as a pin now and freshly colored and trimmed too. I was there from 9am until 1:20pm. A lot of sitting. And 2 hot coffees and 4 chocolates (for free) and an amazing shoulder neck and head massage too (for free too). Still an a-line lob. : )

Branden and I decluttered... the heck out of his room this past weekend too. We were relentless with it. We still have to do it 2 more times to call it done. But a step in the right direction.

Family game night...

What have we been doing at our house? Well with Winter happening and snow still on the ground in our town. Yes there's still snow in the rice fields and in yards in my town, 10-11 days later or so, which is so unusual. @_@ We have been staying home and staying warm. We've also been having family game night as usual. We played three rounds of this Jenga-esque type of game last weekend. Sorry the name brand Jenga game is like 2800 yen (US $25!!!) Which is outrageous. And this knock off/"no name" brand one... was like 750 yen or 800 yen, 10 years or so when we bought it. My kids go through periods of when they want to play this a lot and times when they won't touch it at all. But they've been on a Jenga kick since Christmas/winter break and all January too. This pic was taken last weekend and we played 3 rounds of this. We also played 2 rounds of this the other night after homework. 

Also, important to note is sometimes... games change as kids get older too. However we still play Sorry! About once a month still... that's one of our favorite board games. This pic is of my 3 (2 sons and hubby) all playing a game together. But this game is a survival game and Branden and Noah have been playing this game since November 2017. Branden's classmates also got really into this game too. It's a multiplayer game. So a lot of times Branden and a handful of his classmates will have a private game going and they invite Noah to play with them too. Bran is such an amazing older brother. You can hear your teammates talking which is why they are wearing earphones. Then a month ago...Noboru was intrigued and asked the boys "what are you guys playing" they told him the name of the game and he said...I want to play too. So he downloaded it and Noboru has been playing it for a month now. Then Noboru told his 2 closest coworkers about this and they fell in love with this game so much. And now...they have this group and they all know each other and they all play this survival game. They're *really* into it! Noboru can't wait for the kids to get home from school to play with them. And as soon as Bran walks in the door after I bring him home from the train station after school...he tells his dad and Noah..."let's play after dinner" And so as a girl...I don't personally find this game interesting at all. Gomen-gomen. But I am so happy that they have this 1 thing that they're all reall super into. They want to play this. And so that's what my family has been doing. They laugh at the kitchen table and play this. Sometimes they're all over the living room sprawled out and playing this. It's family time. And they're having an absolutely amazing time together. Dad time is so important. Dad's spending time with their kids is very important and same for us mom's too... spending time with our kids, quality time so important. Heck..family time is important period. : )

I enjoyed watching the 20/20 a few weeks ago about Kim Jong Un's childhood. And his siblings childhood. How they were educated overseas. It was very interesting. 

A new game show in America. I am enjoying it a lot. It's called Child Support. Fred Savage is the host. I adored him on the Wonder Years. A contestant has to answer 10 questions and if they don't know the answer, a group of kids can try to help him or her answer it. The show was created by Ricky Gervais and he is the one who interviews the kids and it's so funny to watch him interact with the kids.

You go Fred Savage. He's a really mellow relatable host. 

Ricky asking the kids a question. Hopefully they know the answer.

One of the answers, one of the kids said...was so funny Ricky did this!!!

Child Support is a very funny game show. My kids love this game show and they watch it every time it's on. 

The Good Doctor is such a phenomenal show. I love this show. This pic was taken a week ago. But this week was a good episode too. It was about organ donors. A man had been in the hospital for ages hoping for a transplant. He was an alcoholic and ruined his own liver. And he was finally at the top of the organ donor list. He was weeks away from dying. And The Good Doctor (Dr. Murphy) and his coworker went to retrieve the organ from another hospital. Anyway it took the entire show for them to get back to their hospital. The guy on the top of the donor list had tested positive for alcohol in his system and they ran the test twice and asked him. Did you drink? And he finally admitted he had 1 glass of champagne because his daughter graduated law school. Yada yada yada. And he wanted to feel "normal" and so it was debated should they still give him the organ? Doctors debated it in private. They argued. One said...rules are rules. And someone said don't tell them he had a drink. And in the end... they did not give him the organ at all. With 30 minutes to spare...to get the liver into someone... they sent the liver to a 3rd hospital to the 2nd person on the top of the organ donor list. And the guy at the Good Doctors hospital was moved to the bottom of the transplant list. 

Last week, I picked up these things from Costco. Frozen pizzas to toss in the oven for a weekend lunch for the kids. Breakfast pastries. Cheese was for pizza and chips for the killer nachos I made last week, they were delicious. And a weeks worth of meat from Joyful Honda meat store. And veggies and regular food from Besia. 

I did buy my final makeup remover. I will not be buying anymore. I am now trying them all out and testing them and deciding which one I like the most. I also bought a Kanebo powder puff for my Becca powder. 

This is what it looks like. I like that it's in a  tube (travel friendly). I like the way it smells. It's light and clean. A scent of somewhere between soap and very light pinch of lemons. It smells clean. Anyway now for some current updates.....

Today is Thursday. Sorry no TBT for today. I went out to lunch this Monday with my 2 girl friends. We had an awesome lunch and whole afternoon chat session at Coco's restaurant. Lunch was delicious and the drink bar is amazing. I love their hot cocoa and so that was nice. Also we, my 2 friends and I are also going to the movies tomorrow morning/Friday. We are going to see, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri. In Japan it's just called Three Billboards. However...snow is expected in the area where we live...the snow is expected either tonight or tomorrow. And we have agreed if it snows...we will cancel our movie date. But if it doesn't snow, we will meet up at 9:10 am tomorrow.  Because of the upcoming snow. I went and did my weekly shopping yesterday. Went to Costco. Joyful Honda and Besia. Yet again. But it was necessary because if it does snow...you certainly don't want a house with no food in it. I want to make sure I have a house fully stocked with food. That way...if the snow hits us and hits us hard. We will have a good 6 days worth of food. So phew. Taken care of. I bought a rotisserie chicken at Costco yesterday and so I am making taquitos for supper tonight. Taquitos and refried beans and spanish rice. The beans I boiled and finished this morning. After Noah gets home I will refry the beans. And make the rice. The taquitos are easy to roll. I will roll them... but won't skillet fry them until Bran gets home tonight. Noboru is home from work today, so he will be happy about taquito night tonight. : ) Tomorrow night for supper we're having curry nabe because with me being out at the movies...maybe depending on the snow, I need an easy to make dinner. Anyway that's enough for now, just wanted to touch bases with everyone real quick. : ) 

Noboru's birthday...

Noboru turned 46 years old, on January 18th. I baked him a yellow cake with chocolate frosting and we had vanilla ice cream on the side after we got back from the restaurant for his birthday dinner. 

Luckily for us Noboru didn't have work that day. And Branden didn't have school that day either. The kids had a dentist appointment though... before the birthday dinner. Noah had school and so we could head straight to the dentist and then to dinner a lot earlier since Noah got off school that day at 3pm. The kids had zero cavities and all looked great at the dentist. They got their teeth cleaned. And off to dinner we went. Everyone had a pasta plus mini pizza and drink bar. Their food here is absolutely delicious and Noboru really enjoyed it. 

We ate and talked. And talked and ate. We had many refills of drinks. And had a pretty great meal. 

Branden's hand. He was sitting to my left so... super hard to get a pic. But yep dinner was nice and then we went home and had cake and ice cream. : )

Star Wars: The Last Jedi opening day...

Last night our family went to go and see the Last Jedi on opening day at 6pm. Everything went off without a hitch. Dinner was finished baking by the time I brought Noah home from school. We 4 all ate. Baked ravioli. I quickly put everything into the dishwasher. From 3:20-5pm we were home eating or relaxing before the movie. And at 5pm we left to the small city nearest our tiny town and we arrived there around 5:40pm. Folks were buying tickets for various movies. Thank goodness I already did that...that morning. So the males all went to the restroom, the 3 of them and I went to the girl restroom by myself. And we all met up in front of the concession stand. We quickly got all our movie theater stuff. Popcorn and sodas. And we went and got ourselves seated. There were only about 25-30 people watching Star Wars the Last Jedi and that was so awesome. A total bonus and plus for living way out in the inaka/countryside. And most folks were sitting in the center/middle seats/section. So nobody even remotely sat near us. So super nice.Look how happy the kids were in this picture!!! Branden, omg you guys....all Friday he kept saying...I can't wait for The Last Jedi....I can't wait. Clearly he was super happy about seeing it. So were the rest of us too. : )

In our seats. Everyone already turned their cell phone volumes way down and Noboru was doing that in this picture too. Yay...in a couple minutes we will be having our minds blown...by the Last Jedi!!!!

Got snacks...check! So anyway....what did we think of Star Wars the Last Jedi? Oh my freaking gosh you guys!!! It was amazing! And no we did not find out who her parents were. Someone very important dies in this movie. I will NOT say who, no spoilers from me. THIS movie was so good. In the Star Wars The Force Awakens. My feelings were...I hate or dislike Kylo Ren a.k.a. Ben Solo. Why would he kill Hans Solo? When Hans clearly loved him so much. So yes my feelings were from the last movie. Kylo Ren... strong intense dislike. But this movie.I liked Kylo in this new movie 90% of the time...and then disliked him very much 10% of this movie. He seemed much more human in this and I could see the inner conflict in him. So a definite improvement from the last movie. Rey, I lovelovelove her. She is so freaking amazing. Other characters. Were lovely, like Rose. Also, loved seeing Carrie Fisher's real life daughter have a small role in this. I like Billie Lourd a lot. Just finished watching her on American Horror Story Cult this season. She is amazing and talented all on her own. So yep...loved seeing her in this. And loved that she wore her mom's princess Leia cinnamon bun hair-do from the 70's. Loved it!!!Didn't say who dies. Didn't say how it ends. Didn't say what happens. Only said that I liked both Rey and Kylo in this. And this movie was freaking fantastic. If you do get the chance and you like the Star Wars franchise at all. Definitely go and check this out. We will most definitely be buying this on DVD whenever it comes out. 

After leaving the movie theater in the small city nearest us, we drove back to the rural town we live. This is a tad blurry but it's so funny. Because it's honest and it's true. A train was running through our town and as you can see, there is no convenience store or building or bright buildings around. It's pure dark rural town lit up by 1 lone train. Noboru *always* says...the trains in our town remind him of the cat bus in Totoro at night that went looking for Mei in the movie. LOL. : )  Anyway Star Wars the Last Jedi? Two thumbs way up from us. : ) Have a fantastic weekend everyone. : )

Last Saturday. Buying a gift for a Secret Santa. Drone flying fun. No more Advent calendars for us. And omg, that Christmas Pepsi...

Last Saturday, I slept in until 7:30am. I was so refreshed. I woke up. Set the hot water pot downstairs. And while it was heating up. I jumped in the shower, washed my face with some Basis face wash. Shampooed my hair with some Pantene shampoo and conditioner. Washed my body with the regular scented Biore body wash. And got out. Got dressed. Did my eyebrows with my ABH pencil. And wore no other makeup that day. I went downstairs with a towel on my head with my clothes on/fully dressed meaning no house clothes. And had a nice hot coffee. And read through a stack of emails. Read the online news. Blow dried my hair. Then made some pancakes. Everyone smelled breakfast and came down the stairs. We ate. And I told everyone. We would be leaving by 10:30am. To go and buy Bran's secret Santa gift for the girl whose name he picked randomly in the Santa hat. It's a secret Santa for his English club. The limit is 1000 yen/US$10 bucks. We went out and purchased her gift at a body shop place that sells really nice stuff. Bath bombs, super nice ones. It's a shop in the little city nearest us. Not a LUSH or Body Shop chain. We just live too far from those. But this shop... I have purchased stuff from there... before. I love the quality and scents. We bought her a very nice gift set. All in the scent green apple (there were yuzu scented, rose, all sorts of scents, but Bran picked green apple for her, because he said that smelled so nice). It had bath bombs, 2 of those, a hair wrap thing, when you're in the tub. Some lotion. It was all wrapped up and gorgeous. And it was exactly 1000 yen. I know this girl will love her gift. Bran has to give it to her.... this coming Thursday. I also asked the girls working there, to wrap it Christmas style and they did a fantastic job. We came home. Had lunch. And the 3 of them went and spent about 2 hours in our backyard. Noboru flying his drone. 

You know how the Kingsmen are the British special team and the Statesmen are the American team. Well there is a roping lasso guy in the American team. And ever since my kids have been watching the trailers for that. Bran has been roping things in his spare time, ps they have zero idea I bought them the DVD already. Oh and also important to note. About 3 weeks ago...I saw the new Christmas edition Pepsi. Noah's holding one in this picture. I didn't buy it... but I first wondered if it was Crystal Pepsi. But by one glance... you can tell it's super cloudy. So I knew it would be nothing like Crystal Pepsi at all. Also it looked cloudy, okay I just said that.... and for some reason it looked super overly sweet to me, because it was cloudy, don't ask me why. Something just gave me the vibe of...I do NOT want to try this. So when we were at the mall buying Bran's secret Santa gift. We all grabbed a drink at the store before we left for the drive home... back to our rural town. I grabbed a sugarless jasmine tea by Ito En. My most favorite drink. And the kids each picked a Lipton Lemon tea at first and I thought okay. And then they saw the Christmas Pepsi. I told my kids....you have never tried it...and if you wanna try it...you can for sure, your choice. : )  But I did say....to me...imo... it looks way too sickeningly sweet. They still wanted to try. So...they put their teas back and each grabbed one of these. When we were in the car. We could smell this overpowering sickeningly too sweet smell. Smelled like...Chipu Chaps. Strawberry Chipu Chaps. Or...something but OMG...it smelled super sweet. I didn't say anything, because it's already been purchased and it is...what it is and sips have been taken. Noboru picked a bottled iced coffee, fwiw. As we were driving down the rode. Branden said. It tastes funny. I said...what do you mean. He said...tastes weird. We drove some more. And then Noah said word for word..."I don't like it...it's too sweet...tastes like cookies mixed with cough drops." @_@ That image is STILL in my head even now...cookies mixed with cough drops? OMG. And I thought...just Chipu Chaps was bad enough. In any case...if you ever wanted to drink a liquid strawberry Chipu Chaps...try the Christmas Pepsi. On the other hand...if you don't like overly sweet, like me. Avoid it. I am so glad I avoided it. However I did still...smell it...and smelling it... was more than enough for me. Blech. 

Okay Bran...dad's taking video of you now...that drone takes the best, most smoothest high resolution video. 

Oh my gosh...I'm in the house prepping supper. And throwing the lunch dishes in the dishwasher. 

Branden's gift for his secret Santa person. Squeak. I'm so excited. High school in Japan is so fun, you guys. There is a light at the end of the JHS in Japan tunnel. : ) 

Saturday's simple supper. Chicken teriyaki bowls. Chicken breast, button mushrooms, broccoli on a bed of white rice. Mine was smaller than Branden's and Noboru's. Noah's and mine were about the same size, pictured here. Theirs were double the size of ours, which they need. Saturday was a very chill day. And I'm not just talking about the weather either. It was so relaxed and restful. We made sure to buy his secret Santa gift. They spent some time outside. I meanwhile stayed inside our toasty warm house. We had a nice simple dinner. And enjoyed 20/20 on TV. The Meghan Markle interview called...The American Princess. Loved this 20/20 very much. After that we watched ghost stories on another channel. Saturday was a very nice day.

Oh and...we're not doing Advent calendars this year. When my kids were little they looked forward to them every SINGLE day. Could *not* wait for their daily chocolate and the count-down to Christmas. But last year...I could tell...maybe at age 15 and 11. They just weren't as excited about it last year. I went and bought them the coolest Kylo Ren Advent from Star Wars... from Kaldi, last year. I always immediately bought them right before Thanksgiving. A few times last year...my kids would go... 2 and 3 days and they wouldn't open them. And would open them and eat 3 in a row because they had missed a few days. A clear sign...yes that they just weren't into it anymore. And I quietly got to thinking. Maybe they just outgrew them. And if they did. That's okay. I have always bought Advents for my kids because it made my kids SMILE. Not because it was blog worthy. Do you know what I'm saying. And yeah at the end of last year...I was deeply thinking...maybe I shouldn't buy them next year. So now to this year. I'm at Kaldi...sipping on that free coffee mini sample. Looking at all the Advents. They didn't have any Star Wars ones for older kids this year. Hmm. But I saw a Toy Story one that looked very cute...but my kids seemed a bit old for that...and a Mickey Mouse one. I called my boys...on my cell to their cell. This was a few Saturdays ago. And I said..."Branden...ask Noah if he'd like a Toy Story Advent or a Mickey Advent? Mickey looks very cool and retro." And...he asked Noah..."it's mom...she wants to know if you want a Toy Story Advent or Mickey?" I could hear Noah thinking in the background going...ummmm. And Branden said..."Just get Noah one...I don't need one mom...I'm just not into them anymore, but thank you" And Noah finally answered after hearing that and he said..."can you tell mom, I don't need one either" Like a sucker punch to my gut ya'll...My face maybe looked slightly devastated, shocked or in mild to mid pain???? LOL....Because the Kaldi lady was staring at me, she knows me well and likes me, always chits chats with me and I her but this particular morning she was looking at my face and...she looked a tad worried. LOL. Was my jaw wide open...or on the ground? I never ever ever... want my boys to feel guilty...or feel bad about growing up and getting older. I **want** my kids to get older. Duh. And be happy about it. That's part of life...so while I was still on the phone..as best as I could muster... I tried to...give a non-chalant..."oh...okay not a problem. Talk to you later." And I left Kaldi without any advent calendar this year. And yes, I did tell the Kaldi lady..."seems my kids don't want any of these this year" She's about mid 50's, so I am sure she has kids much older than mine, so I am sure she could relate on some level. And for a few days I was sorta secretly sad. But now...I'm so totally over it. Onwards and upwards. I write these little snippets on my blog... of my true daily or weekly musings. Because maybe...just maybe someday...it will be your kid who has outgrown an advent someday in the distant future. And maybe you will feel a sad twinge too. And you will remember me writing about this from my heart...with all my most sincere feelings....my refreshing candor and honesty. And hopefully knowing someone else went through it too...will make you smile that's it's just something we as parents...we all go through. 

Going to the movies to see The Justice League...

There are just so many good movies out right now. I asked Branden and Noah on Thanksgiving, if you guys want to go and see the new Justice League movie, then let me know and I'll go and buy the tickets on Friday/the next day and we can go and see it, Saturday. Both the boys were like, yes!!!! We want to see that!!! I said okie dokie. And so Friday morning, as I was out running an errand (buying 2 more loaves of bread from the bakery, so we could finish up our turkey, which yes we did) and also bought some mugicha and also some jasmine tea. I did buy 3 movie tickets. And left the movies as soon as I purchased the tickets Friday morning. I showed the kids the tickets as soon as they got home Friday after school. And boy were they stoked for Saturday. I was too. Our movie started at 11:55am. Nearly/almost 12 noon. And we already had our tickets. We left our house at 11am. Because we live way out in the middle of the deep countryside. And have to drive up to the small city nearest us. To our nearest movie theater. We arrived around 11:30am. And everyone went to the restroom. And around 11:45am, I went up and ordered our snacks at the concession stand. Branden said, he wanted nachos and a large coke. Okay, got that for Mr. Dimples. And Noah said... he wanted a half caramel and half buttered and salt popcorn. Okie dokie, got that. And for myself, I picked a small caramel popcorn and a small drink. Both the kids shared the nachos and they both shared the large popcorn. They always share their movie snacks, with one another. : ) 

Hello Branden, hello Noah!!! A pic from our afternoon at the movies Saturday, November 25th. Branden and Noah were most excited to see Aquaman!!! I swear it must be all the swimming my kids did when they were little! LOL. 

We grabbed our snacks and entered the movies. We found our seats right away too.

Everyone turning their phones off.  What an excellent way to spend a Saturday afternoon. At the movies as a family. I wish Noboru could have gone with us, but he had work. But he'll be at the next movie with us though. : )

Anyways, what did we think about The Justice League? It was so good!!!! Aquaman, the gorgeous Jason Momoa was amazing in this!!! Wonder Woman was so wonderful in this too. I love Gal Gadot. She's so super cool and gorgeous! Let's hear it for brunettes!!! Woohoo! But for me...I felt that The Flash stole the show. He was absolutely hilarious. He cracked me up a bunch of times. Possible spoilers now... so avoid or read at your own risk. But when they were thinking about bringing back Superman from the dead, they really needed him. The Flash said..."is he going to come back as Superman or more like Pet Cemetery?" LOL! And when Superman was brought back...at first he was discombobulated and attacking Wonder Woman and Batman and everyone.... and The Flash said..."ewww Pet Cemetery!" LOL.  The Flash was just very relatable.

The next movie we will go and see is, the new Star Wars. It comes out in Japan December 15th. Which I think.... that's the same date it comes out in America too. Our family is huge Star Wars fans. So we will go and see it immediately. We have watched every single trailer for this like a billion times already. We can barely wait!!! So super exciting.