So how has everyone been? What's everyone been up to? As for me, just been hanging out, staying home. Cooking, baking. Watching the Hills on MTV and repeats of the Osbourne's. Hell's Kitchen on the Fox Life channel, Bones and "So you think you can dance" on the Fox channel and Cold Case on AXN. I've got 2 lunch dates with friends planned, one on the 20th and one on the 26th (one is to an Italian restaurant and the other is at my favorite Indian restaurant). Just chillaxin' basically. Someone asked me about the amount of homework Branden got over the Christmas holidays and while I took a pic before we headed to Guam, I didn't get around to emailing the picture yet. So, I know she'll read it here anyways, and be happy I finally got around to it. Sorry it took me so long, gomen ne. ; ) This pic of above is of the Christmas holiday homework Branden got this year. So this is the load he got as a 2nd grader. Two sheets of Japanese and loads upon loads of math sheets.
Multiplication worksheets, he got 4 of them 50 problems on each side, so 100 problems per page (front and back) So 400 math problems during the couple week Christmas break. Yup, they really drill the math into their heads. And I sorta think that's okay because they get it, like really "get it". Memorize it and all the reps they do it's like etched into their brains forever type stuff. ; ) ; ) I wish I could have learned math this way when I was little too. They go through this stuff like 800 times - 1000 times a month, between homeworks and the reps us parents are supposed to stamp off when they do them in front of us at home. Drill type stuff.
The addition and subtraction. They still have them do this but only 1 worksheet each. That way they remember this stuff.
The Japanese, B got 2 worksheets of this.
See the worksheets, one sheet is the multiplications between 2-5 and the other page is the multiplications tables of 6-9. The kids can do this stuff in their sleep, they really get an awesome foundation down in elementary school. Anyway that's a brief little look at the homework they got over Christmas break. All the kids turned their homework back in on the first day back from the winter holiday. Branden returned back to school last Thursday January 7th and Noah returned January 8th but Noah had only a half day.
January 8th, Branden brought home this paper. It's a project his 2nd grade class is doing. Like mini biographies of themselves. They were due Wednesday January 13th. What time was he born? 9:19am. Where was he born? Honolulu Hawaii. What was the first thing that happened after he was born or first thing said? The doctor mentioned B had a dimple. ; ) How he was at age 1, 2-3, 4-5 and at age 6. They wanted pictures that matched the age groups they asked about. And stories. They said to ask your mom. ; ) So, as you can imagine Branden and I have been talking about his baby years and I have been regaling him with my sleep deprivation stories, the first food he ever ate tale etc etc. He wrote it all down nicely. Noboru read it through and he brought it to the school on Wednesday with his fellow classmates. They are gluing and making some project from this mini biography. And I look forward to seeing it when I attend observation day at the end of this month.
Branden and Saya-chan and Nozomi-chan and Kouiki-kun came to play last week. It was so cold outside that I had them come in the house, they went upstairs in Branden's room and Noah's room. Noah's room has the toy boxes and Branden's room has the keyboard. They were good, quiet and polite so it was fine they came in. And frankly I was worried the kids would freeze being outside.
Kumon has been closed for a great deal of the winter holiday. Especially near the New Year's holiday. The Kumon teacher gives little study type presents to her students and I like that, I think that's nice. the kids enjoy it. He received 2 plastic folders for holding his homework packets. 1 eraser, 2 garigari pencils, which Branden just loved, 1 glue and a lollipop. I bet all of her students enjoyed her gifts. ; ) What else have I been up to?......
I went through the shoe closet in the genkan (boring mundane stuff but hey it really happened, lol) and I am sort of thinking these are getting a bit small on Noah. No, we're not talking foot falling off the foot bed or anything drastic but I can definitely tell these will be outgrown soon. These are a size 8-9 in Croc sizes, lol.
After poking around in the shoe closet, I found these. Hmm, Branden was wearing Crocs even when he was as young as Noah's age? Not that it matters but, I didn't realize,anyway....Noah can put these to good use. And yes we will buy him a new pair of yellow or orange near Spring but great he can use these as well though.
Size 10-11, the next size up and the size Noah will need this coming Spring and Summer.
These light blue ones used to be Noah's way back when and I took all the jibbitz off the smaller ones and put them onto the navy ones.
Also found 2 pair of sneakers for Noah, Adidas and Nike, he can play in the backyard with these and an old pair of Gap flippies. Some good finds in the shoe closet indeed. I did wash the sneakers and hung them outside and they washed up pretty good.
Getting the jibbitz off and on from shoe to shoe, ouch... did my finger nails a job! Good thing they were short length nails to begin with. ; )
Noah had been asking to make chocolate covered bananas. We make them about three times a year. I'd like to say we do it more often but nope, 3 times a year is about it. I will try to make more effort into making them more though because the chocolate kits are under 300 yen so they are affordable to make. I'll try to make them once a month with the boys.
Nuke the chocolate....then slice bananas in half and done! Couldn't be easier! The kids loved the dunking and the sprinkling and I felt happy watching them get a kick out of making them!
I thought the boys did a wonderful job!
The first day back to Noah's yochien. My friend gave me a bag of cucumbers from her garden. Very nice. I peeled two and ate them with just a sprinkling of salt and the others I used up in a salad.
Thanks to Parents magazine who mentioned these cupcakes first a year or a year and a half ago and I cut the picture out to remind myself to make them someday. I made some yellow cupcakes and then put a bit of Nutella. Good god we love Nutella. Baked them in the oven the day that Saya-chan and Nozomi- and Kouiki played upstairs with Branden and Noah. They could smell these cooking. Branden came downstairs and said, "my friends said whatever you're baking smells good and wondered if they could have some?" I said of course, that's why I baked them to begin with. : )
I could smell the chocolate and hazelnuts from the Nutella. I gave one batch for the kids to eat and 1 batch was for our family for dessert that night.
The kids devoured all the cupcakes on this plate! I was glad these cupcakes passed the taste test. I will be baking more cupcakes with Nutella in the future for sures.
We rented some DVD's. One was a flat out scary movie so the kids couldn't watch that with us. Now, sci-fi, like Star Wars and Terminator, they are okay with. Branden now that he's 8 even likes watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer with me and that's okay. But flat out scary such as, Halloween, Friday the 13th, Amityville, Exorcist you know what I mean is off limits in our family for the kids still. So we watched this after they went to sleep.What scary movie did we rent? A Japanese one about a cell phone and if it calls your keitei....yikes... you will be dead next! @_@ Double yikes! In Japanese, it's called Chakushin-ari. This was so good and so scary, it scared Noboru and I quite a bit during the movie. We watched that last Saturday night after the kids went to bed. The other DVD, we rented was called "The Reader" this was with Kate Winslet and was set in the nazi era. She was a guard at the camps and was tried for war crimes. But the story is more so about her relationship with a young man before she worked at the camps. It was an okay movie, not exactly my cup of tea but good all in the same. I'd never watch it again but it wasn't a grade B or a flop at all. I watched this a night when hubby would be at work because I knew he wouldn't be into this movie at all and this was way too mature for the kids to watch. That leaves 2 new DVD rentals for January still. And we chose, Hachi with Richard Gere (a remake). But it doesn't come out until January 27th? So we have quite a bit of a wait. The last DVD we chose is "Knowing" with Nicolas Cage. It's released already but they come in sets of 2's, so it won't come until Hachi gets released.
What have we been eating or what have I been cooking lately? I'll tell ya, I don't mind, I'll share. ; ) One night, I made a beef curry. I bought a nice sized little hunk of beef, fried up the cubed beef in a bit of oil and boiled until tender. Pretty easy.
For the most part I am still trying to stay on track with my meal sizes. Because I know sometimes my meal sizes can range from good.... to a bit large portion wise. So while I am keeping mindful about it. I'm not going all out and out, crazy about it either, like all fanatical about it..... if I'm really hungry one night, frankly I eat, and enough to fill me up. So, I'm mindful but not going all extreme or overboard either. I'm human, I'll have slips and I'm okay with it.
All the beef, onions, mushrooms, potatoes, carrots, the curry roux, you can even see the steam from this pic. It was a good thing to eat on a cold night. Seems Chiba has really been having a cold spell this past week. Like a deep freeze without the snow! @_@
We really enjoyed our beef curry that night.
Another night midway into making nabe. Didn't add the hakusai or noodles yet.
Another great dish for the cold weather.
Also, beef. I like ground beef, but lean ground beef. When we lived in Denver, I would buy lean ground beef I think it said, 93% fat free? So pretty lean. Living in Japan the ground beef at the local stores, have a lot more fat content in it then I'm used to. I would buy the ground beef at Costco because they have lean ground beef, but it's only88% lean, I think? Wouldn't bother anyone else in the whole world. I know. And if I lived closer, to Costco, I'd probably happily buy the 88% and not give it a second thought, because that's still way leaner then I find at the regular stores. However, since I live way way far from Costco that's out. And then I started thinking, there's so many butchers in Japan, I bet they could help me out. So, I went to the little city that Noah goes to yochien in and went into the butcher, a really nice kind elderly butcher. Asked him a quick question. Just basically, would it be possible to get some 93 or 95% lean ground beef? And he said, "of course" Well in Japanese but you kwim. : ) Why didn't I ask this question sooner? Say like a few years sooner? @_@. Oh well, better late then never. Anyway he has been grinding beef for me for the past 2 weeks now. I'm really happy with it. And it's close to me so the convenience factor I love, so that's a plus.
I order 1kg at a time. I made homestyle cheeseburgers and the rest I made hamburg another night.
Some very good lean cheeseburgers. Some onions, pickles, tomatoes some melted mozzarella cheese. Some crispy fries. We loved having burgers last week. Wish they woulda had hamburger buns but hey, they taste just as good on bread. ; )
Another night, I was making fried pork chops and augratin potatoes. First I buttered my dish and started slicing the potatoes, midway, I sprinkled salt and pepper.
And when I was done, I sprinkled some more pepper and salt but just a bit.
A basic butter and flour roux, easy peasy.
Some milk until it got a bit thicker.
Added some cheese.
The cheese melted nicely.
And put the sauce on top and covered the pan in foil and whacked it into the oven for an hour and a half. 20 minutes before I took the tin foil off though for the top to get nicely brown.
And done. My husband loves these potatoes. I seriously mean he LOVES them. He could probably eat the whole thing but he restrains himself. He came back for not only 2nds but he came back for 3rds on these potatoes. The next morning after B was getting ready for school after he had regular breakfast, he asked me, "are there any potatoes left?" And I sadly said just a wee bit but those were for Noah's obento. Hmm, maybe next time I'll double the recipe. ; P
Pork about to become American style fried porkchops.
It was just a simple non fancy dinner. Just augratin potatoes, pork chops and some veg, No big marching band or trombone playing type meal. No bells or whistles just simple easy good food.
I was thinking of baking a blueberry pie. But then I saw how many cups of blueberries I'd need just for 1 pie and realized how many bags of blueberries I'd need and the cost of the pie sounded ridiculous. I mean I like dessert but not a dessert that costs an arm and a leg!! So, I switched that to making a blueberry cheesecake instead. I was going to get Philidelphia cream cheese but this brand was considerably cheaper. 1000 yen for a kg of cream cheese. 89 yen for the coconut cookies. I only needed 1 pack, but bought 2 because I just didn't know. And I bought the sour cream on sale and it wasn't even gonna expire for 2 weeks still. So a double score! LOL.
I think this is definitely expensive for the US. But living in Japan, 138 yen was quite the bargain. I was glad I was able to make it affordably.
I was thinking I'd need 2 packs of the coconut cookies but was way off, I only needed 1 pack and even still, think I could have gotten away with just a half of pack of cookies. I'll remember this for next time. And the light coconut flavor crust was perfect for a NY baked cheesecake.
Yup how much did the 1 pack of cookies make? Enough for 2 cheesecakes. Hmm, yup, definitely will try making just a half pack of cookies for the crumbs next time, plus it wastes less. But again, I didn't know, but I know now. ; )
I only needed 680 grams of cream cheese so this was more then enough however the smaller packs were name brand and actually costlier then this big 1kg pack. Hmm.
It made a lot of cheesecake filling.
I think if I wanted to be fancier, I should have used a spring form pan etc etc. But, ahhh. For a midweek dessert this was perfect and we actually liked this way, it was easy to cut.
The blueberry topping I made myself, I just added a little sugar, water and lemon juice in a sauce pan and heated up and reduced until it got to the consistency I wanted. Some recipes say add, cornstarch for thickening etc. I kept mine simple, water, a bit of sugar and blueberries and a bit of lemon juice. We ended up with 2 blueberry cheesecakes. I think next time I'll make a strawberry one. But we loved the blueberry cheesecakes for sure.
I'm not really a new year resolutions type gal. I figure, why make em' if I'll probably only break them anyways, knowing me. ; ) So, none for me. But I told myself that I would get the boys photos all gathered and into order. I bought these for 400 or 450 yen at Besia/Cainz Home. One for Branden and one for Noah. I probably need about 5 each for Branden and 5 for Noah to even make a dent in being caught up, but...a starts a start.
I bought these because I have pictures in 4x6 US sizes and also the Japanese L size and some in different sizes and the free size this book was worked best for me.
I also have a medium sized plastic box with scrapbooking stuff inside. And that is also greatly behind as well.
Here's one of Branden's pages, with a bit of information, also in the little pouch is his hospital wristband nicely sealed up. An actual pic of my Ob-gyn in Hawaii holding Branden, who delievered him so he can see what she looked like. I am going to do more with this page but, I did this page a few years ago.
Lots of stickers (acid and lignin free). Different papers designs and colors.
I've got a lot of work ahead of me.
Stickers for borders.
I have a baby and also another book for kids and so I have been trying to get the boys scrapbooks done and also the photo albums I bought at Cainz done too.
Noah's scrapbook, shades of purples and blue his is called "watercolor" And I liked it for a little boy.
Loads of those acid and lignin free stickers and embellishments for scrapbooking. Again not showing off, I'm sure some people might have more supplies then me or whatever, I'm just trying to make sense of this madness called my scrapbook and photo books. ; ) I wish I had a better system or way of keeping my stuff but since it's not really a hobby type hobby of mine and I seldom do this, I don't make the space for it.
Every trip to Disney Sea or Disneyland we've taken, I have to go and make copies of the pics and then I'll use these Disney stickers and embellishments to be a bit more creative. I think, if I would have done this even once ever 3 month's I wouldn't be so behind. I'm *so* behind that I am wondering if I'll ever catch up? In a way I think...just give up, don't do it. It's too much work. But then in a way, I think how great it will be when I get finished. Either way, I am going to give myself until March 1st. I'm going to go slow and try and get as much done as I can. I'll try to keep a bit of progress on this blog on how I am doing until March 1st. I may even have to extend my date who knows. But for now I am trying to shoot for March 1st.
So many embellishments, yarn, name plates, mini card stocks. I think I'll need more beach things. But I'm going to go as far as I can and hopefully catch up a great deal.
I have been giving my Fiskars paper cutter a workout. And basically been in a photo book and scrapbooking zone lately. For a lot of people they have a gift or talent with this. And I am in awe and honest admiration they're gifted with this. With me, I would certainly say I don't have this gift or talent, ha ha ha, it doesn't come naturally to me at all. I'm just doing the best I can to store some memories for the boys is all.
What am I doing with these? The ones I got at Besia/Cainz Home. I'm not making scrapbooks out of these or making them fancy at all. No fancy stickers or doodads, I don't think for now, but we'll see. I'm just making simple photo books with them. I am not saying photo albums because mine actually have words and stories so they're more then just plain albums but way way less then a scrapbooks. So not as good or cool as a scrapbook, but at least a step above a flat out photo album. But nothing wrong with albums either though.
Here is a peek at one of Noah's pages on his photo book (not his scrapbook). And I left space to write stories and I am calling this one, "bibs bibs who has the bib?!!!" Note Noah is wearing a bib on all these pics except the 2 where he was at home naked just wearing a diaper in his high chair, lol. I'll put little blurbs under each picture and a story or two and that is it. And I am making both of the boys scrapbooks too. But since I am so behind, I will make them quite a few quick and easy photo books. The reason I have 2 pics of him naked with no bib, is because I wanna tell him when at home we were so carefree we let him eat in diaper and that's it and any food spill just got cleaned up in the shower. ; P
This page will be called, me and my brother. The pics covered are where I am in. And I will make little blurbs under each picture and a bigger story in the space I left, something in my own words, to my son Noah. I think he'll appreicate this so much when he gets older. And the 400-450 yen for the albums at Cainz was definitely easy on the pocket book. Definitely not nearly as cute as a scrapbook for sure but save worthy all in the same.
I filled up one for Branden's yochien years. And I still will probably need another one to finish up Branden's yochien years. So, B will get 2 photo books for his yochien years. And I am writing little things under each picture.
The page on the left is when he was a pink badge and went to the sweet potato dig! I left a big space to tell him a few stories that are fresh in my mind. I think B will really like this book when he's older.
The page on the right is of one of his ensoku's/field trips. And I'll give him a story.
When Branden was a blue badge and he had that sleep over. All the blue badges had to spend a night without their parents. All the fun he had, I have the pictures of and I'm going to write to my son how I cried and missed him so much during that night and the next morning he was just fine and I felt so silly afterwards!!! : ) All these stories I want to write down and put them behind the protective plastic that way he'll always have those pictures along with the stories behind the pictures. Anyway...I'll keep you all updated with this little project I'm working on. ; )Branden's news: Well if you're quick and caught the pic with the choco bananas then you would have realized he wears glasses now. ; ) Kids at the elementary school in Japan get their eye vision tested in the Spring and in December/Winter. For ichinensei, when he was a first grader his eyes were fine. And last Spring if you recall, his eyes were tested and he was flagged. He had a borderline test, so not a flat out fail yet not a pass either. The note said take him to an eye doctor which we did. The eye doctor said the same thing. Not a flat out fail and not a pass either. I wanted him to get glasses last Spring because if he needs them he needs them. The doctor said he'd stamp the paper and so we gave it back to the school. Anyway this December, he was flagged again. Surprise surprise. We were sorta expecting that. When we were in Guam, I took him to the eye doctor. $40 for the exam and the eye doctor said he definitely needs glasses. We didn't find a pair we liked at all and plus we have insurance in Japan so it was better for us to get them in Japan. The day after we got back from Guam, we went to the eye doctor. The eye doctor said no more maybe's. He needs them. We spent 2 and a half hours at the eye doctors that day. They gave him the best eye exam. We left with prescription in hand and went to the eye glasses store. We found a pair we loved. They were pricy 25,000 and considering he's growing and will probably need new ones once a year or I'm not sure how fast a kid's head grows, lol. But he needs them and so that was that. They were ready January 6th, his glasses were delayed because many businesses are closed for the New year holiday. Anyway he's happy, he says he can see WAY better. Anyway that's the news about Branden. Also he's running in some marathon? First week of Febuary or something like that? @_@ It's not required but all the boys in his classes signed up for it so he wants to too.
Branden and Noah have their dental cleaning and check up January 26th. They go twice a year, every 6 month's like clockwork and they got postcards in December saying they need to come in December. But December was so crazy between 2 Christmas recitals, a MIL visit, getting ready for our trip, all the Christmas whatnots. Plus the eye glass caper. But we had made this appointment weeks ago and so they're ready.
Tomorrow, January 19th is gonna be busy as heck for me. Branden has observation day tomorrow, so I'll be there of course. Noah's school also has a PTA meeting tomorrow at 10:30am? I'm thinking I have to go, but am also considering bailing too. Hmm decisons decisions. And I'm usually not one to blow things off. Not that I'm a saint but you kwim. Anyway my reasons are because I *have* to be at the grocery store tomorrow. Like seriously they're expecting me. That sounds odd but let me explain. You know how I ordered ground beef from the butcher at that small mom and pop type shop and I wondered why I didn't ask sooner? Well, anyway, I started thinking. I see Besia carries whole chickens around Christmas. Not any other time mind you, but they sure do around Christmas. So, it got me thinking. So, as I was shopping last week. Clearly the not shy me. Went and asked the meat guy. I was really polite and just basically asked him. " You know how you sell whole chickens around the Christmas holidays?" And he said yup. I said are they available only around Christmas or are they availble any other times? Because I noticed they're fresh whole chickens not frozen ones. They must be coming someplace in Japan. He said, you're right, and they are available year round except nobody ever needs any, but if you ever do, order the chicken 5 days in advance. I could not believe my ears!!! So, I then said, that's perfect because I only make the trip down here once a week anyway. So, he ripped out his notebook and said he'll order me one and I said, I'll come 7 days from now. So he said okay the 19th morning, and I said yup. He took down my name and number. They know I'll be there since I go every week anyway. And so, he ordered me the big 2kg whole chicken and so I have to go and pick it up tomorrow. So either I'm gonna squeeze observation day, PTA meeting and a weekly grocery run (whole chicken pick up) in between the time the kids are in school. Or do the observation day, chuck the meeting and go to the grocery store and not be in such a frenzy. Decisions decisons.
Wednesday the 20th is when I'll be going to have Italian with 2 of my girlfriends. Other then that my week looks quiet and good. I'm sorry it took me so long to catch up. : ) Have a good week you guys. : )
News about me: I did color my hair. Okay not major news but an update at least. : )
This Haiti earthquake has been major news hasn't it? It's so sad. I've been keeping up with it on the news. Anyway I better publish this before this thing gets way way way too long. Whoops. : )
Two days before New years eve. Our family had a big clean up of the entire upstairs and the day before New years eve, on the 30th is when we cleaned the heck out of the downstairs. If you don't live in Japan, you may not know. But in Japan it's pretty much custom for a family to do a great big family clean up right before New Years. You got to have a clean house to ring in the new year. This is a tradition that I really love. As odd as it sounds, I like ringing in the new year in a spic and span house. I pulled the mattress right off Noah's bed and vacuumed underneath. Do this a lot of the time anyway, so it was pretty clean under there, hmm. But felt good to get it done though. Cleaned every inch of Noah's room, windows, blinds, vacuumed, dusted. Washed his bedding then moved onto Branden's room, then our room, then the upstairs toilet, then the shower/bathroom. And laundry room. We all jumped in and helped with music semi loudly playing. It was fun and we kicked butt on the upstairs. We stopped at 2pm and started around 9:30am, so we got a major cleaning done upstairs. Next day would be the downstairs.
It was 11am in this pic, but we started that morning around 9:30am again, I first started with the toilet downstairs. Noboru cleaned out his paperwork. The boys fixed the books in the bookshelves. Then Noboru cleaned the fan above the stove, he took this puppy apart and cleaned it spotless. We were all busy cleaning on the 30th and so was our whole neighborhood. We counted 3 neighbors washing cars. All ladies were wiping windows etc. 
The boys Windexed the big patio windows. They were a great help!
I spot cleaned the walls downstairs.
I cleaned the blinds downstairs. As I was cleaning the blinds, "boy next doors" grandpa was washing their vehicles. I semi watched him wash the vehicles while I washed up the blinds. He noticed me too and gave me a wave! :P
Vacuumed under the couch cushions.
Vacuumed under the couch. With the kids cleaning, the hubster cleaning, me cleaning, the neighbors cleaning. We had music, we sang, we jammed to the Black Eyed Peas.
Now it's 1:24pm and we knew we'd stop at 2pm. We got a whole day of good cleaning and we were ready to ring in the new year in a clean house indeed. Last but not least I cleaned out the fridge. And this right here is the ice holder where our automatic ice maker drops the ice for our fridge. I washed it out good and thorough. And then we were done. We felt really proud, like we really accomplished something. We did diddly squat from 2pm until dinner time. Just rested and lazed around in our nice clean house. We went to the grocery store the day before and bought a weeks worth of groceries, so we were all set.
In Japan, it's pretty common for people to eat soba (noodles) on New years eve, in hopes for a long life, much like that long noodle. And my husband eats a bowl before midnight strikes, usually around 11;30pm. I like that whole long noodle and long life connection, so just like last year. I made spaghetti and meatballs, because spaghetti is long too. ; ) So pasta, salads and garlic bread was our New years eve meal. Yumm.
These meatballs came out so good so much flavor. Some fresh mushrooms and bell peppers.
Making the garlic bread and about to whack it in the oven. Hubby was making the salads.
The garlic bread was now done and about to put it on a plate for all of us to share.
Not a fancy dinner. But a simple basic meal we enjoyed for sures. Spaghetti and meatballs, salad and the bread was for us all.
We watch Japanese programs every New years eve. Noboru enjoys the Japanese programs they have at New years. Susan Boyle was here in Japan and she performed.
She sang, "I Dreamed A Dream".
She did a really great job and she is looking so good these days. I really like her a lot. Good for her! Well done, well done.
We also got into this other program on another channel about this family. They call him "big daddy" because he has so many kids. They show this family every New years according to the hubby. This year I watched and I really fell in love with this family. They don't have a whole lot of money. So they may not be rich in monetary types of ways but they are indeed rich because of the strength and love in their family. The father lives someplace else for work. And they live in a smaller island near Okinawa meanwhile the dad is living on the mainland of Japan. So tanshin funin. The father didn't get pay for the first month because it was a trial so he would get paid for 2 month's after the first 2 month's. Meanwhile the family back on the island near Okinawa where scraping by with close to no money. The mom and the daughter went to the store and were deciding to get hakusai or eggs and put the hakusai back and got the eggs that's how tight their money was. And it wasn't a downer of a show. This family had the best outlook on life that I ever saw. So positive. 
At one point they didn't even have rice. And they couldn't afford to buy it either, so they bought flour and made udon. And again the laughter coming from this house was real and true. I love families like this. To persevere in a way like this was amazing. To be strong even when the chips are down and still be smiling. I respect that so much. They made Christmas cakes in their rice cookers. And the only gifts they got were handmade clay ones the father sent yet they were so lovely and the kids appreciated them so much. This family was amazing. A real feel good type show.
Their littlest child a girl in this pic. The father was not able to be there for Christmas or for New years (he was there beforehand though). Instead he sent the small amount of money he got for a bonus back to his family instead. This story was so good for the soul. We enjoyed watching this on New years eve.
And then we rang in the New year. : ) A very quiet way to spend New year's eve.
31 degrees at night. Actual freezing temps outside in our area of Chiba. Not a spot or dot of snow but shoot it's cold enough it might as well. ; )
We had cinnamon rolls first thing for the New year. Noboru and I had coffee and the kids had milk with the cinnamon rolls.
We went to visit the shrine for the first time of the New year. We walked up some pretty high steep steps.
Some very old steep steps. I imagined how many people walked up before, 50 years prior, 100 years prior and so on. And now us for 2010.
The going down was pretty easy, ha ha ha.
Dragons guarding the entrance. Warding off any evil or bad.
The washing of the hands, this is pretty important and Noboru always makes sure the boys do it right. I did mine after and boy that water was freezing cold.
Hi Noah, my little sweetie pie! : )
Random ladies buying some stuff.
Each of boys, both Branden and Noah tossed coins in. Noboru had to help Noah since he's a bit too little to get a good toss. And then they prayed and then I went and did mine as well.
Noboru doing his.
Then we drove home and then we went for a walk. First family walk of the year. ; )
Walking in the fields behind our house.
Hmm, if I zoom in, I can see my house. We sure like the privacy our house brings us. And with the great big rice fields, we have that protective barrier. Like a rice field buffer zone, lol. We never have to worry someone will peek in our yard, it's just not an issue for us in the country. perhaps if we lived in a great big city. But not where we live. It's very rare a car even drives up our street, and if one does it's a neighbor, lol.
A very very big buffer, with the zoom off, yup that's quite a big buffer. We can play in the backyard and not worry someone will see. Besides we pretty much don't care if someone would see anyways. We're not movie stars. Nothing wrong with someone seeing a family in their yard.
And now we were walking on and farther and farther away.
And farther away even. : P
Posts
