This was the karaoke area. It's called the pool bar but it's hardly a bar type bar. Considering it's a family resort. It's not a seedy bar where people are getting sloshed type stuff. It's a "bar" where families can eat a meal with their gold cards if they want. Get free popcorn throughout the night. Old grandmas and grandpas can hold hands and watch the youngsters sing and dance. Young kids and even wee little babies sat in their strollers with their family's and a cool place to gather at night to sit back and hear the live music and further enjoy being on vacation. So while technically a pool bar yes, most people were sitting here weren't even drinking alcohol. Well some were.... but the majority were families. A little girl in her swim suit in the shot in the background of this pic, a lifeguard off duty and she's wearing a dress. This was the hour where the staff had to sing and us guests could sing if we wanted. 2 female off duty lifeguards sang a Madonna song.
I had a strawberry daiquiri minus the alcohol. B had a Sprite.
Noah had a tropical juice blend, and Noboru ordered a beer.
This Russian young family man, sang a Beatles song. He had a wonderful voice, he could really sing!!! He also sang a song in Russian. A few Korean guests sang some Korean hits, excellent voices we heard that night! We cheered! And a teenage Russian kid, sang a Bon Jovi hit, but the only words he knew were...."it's my life", and then he said, "It's my life" and basically just said that through the whole song. But none of us minded, we all clapped and cheered! It was just a good mood. And at least he had the guts to give it a try, ne! Everyone with their families, everyone relaxed. No one being snarky to anyone. It didn't really matter if you sang well or shattered glass, you were among friends. Everyone clapped. It was a very cool night.
Free popcorn. And Noah just enjoying the songs, so entertaining.
The last song for the karaoke hour was this older Russian lady, she got up and she belted out a Russian song, it must have been a very popular classic because all the Russians cheered the minute she started singing, we didn't recognize the song at all but we cheered and clapped as well. We were trying to figure out the percentage of the guests. Our last 2 times, meaning the 2 times before we stayed here, we thought it was about 40% Japanese tourists, 40% Korean tourists, 15% Russian tourists and the other percentage was misc. However this time it was completely a different percentage of guests totally, very very few American tourists as usual for Saipan, Guam lots of Americans tourists, etc, but Saipan not so much. We figure this time... it was about 45% Korean tourists this time, 45% Russian tourists (that's 90 right?) and about 6% Japanese tourists only. 4 % misc. We didn't really see too many Japanese tourists at all. But everyone was so amazing and really nice it didn't really matter. Just a whole relax vibe going around the whole place. I do however, wish I would have brought my Korean phrasebook, that I bought before we went to Seoul a few years ago, I think it would have come in handy. Or I wish I had that computer translator thing available while we were staying at the PIC. I use that on my home PC when someone leaves me a message on my blog for example in a foreign language or for trying to translate song lyrics it's cool and easy too. It's easy to translate but while on vacation at the PIC, we just winged it. And smiled a lot. : )
The omelet toppings to choose from. I chose onion, green and yellow peppers, mushroom and cheese omelet both mornings.
The kids each had orange juice. I had fresh squeezed lime juice and hot coffee with my breakfast. omelet, potato wedges and crispy bacon.
My 2nd plate for morning, belgian waffle with blueberry and whipped cream and some more crispy bacon.
The kids corner in the buffet, though they could get food from all over the buffet. We ate at this buffet for dinner 2 nights. Chicken nuggets and fries, many different types of sandwiches.
Dinner by candle light.
His little cheeks stuffed with food. : )
Garlic butter shrimp on skewers, chicken on a skewer too.
The nightly dessert table, every night had something different. They also had a soft serve ice cream machine in the back corner.
My eaten chicken and shrimp skewers were just finished and I was onto round 2 for supper this night. I had a really nice big salad. And 2 cheeseburgers without the burger. You know very little known fact, I once went 2 years without eating ground beef of any kind. It's true, unusual fact but true and one I seldom share. Now I will eat ground beef though no problem. That night after eating all the shrimp kabobs and chicken skewers, I sorta was meated out for the night. And that's okay. So, I got a cheeseburger without the burger. The boys and the hubby loved the mini make your own cheeseburger area and had plenty of ground beef though for the 4 of us. Ha ha ha. : ) I was content with my burgers the way I made them though.
Branden was ready for dessert. : ) Gold card hanging around his neck. : )
Noboru had the Japanese style beef over rice and miso soup, he also had 2 full plates of crab legs.
And I was ready for my dessert. Homemade cookies baked daily. I had a sugar cookie, an oatmeal raisin cookie, black forest cake and chocolate cake. Boy was I stuffed. This was the first night we arrived. After this is when we went back to the room and then onto the bar and then for a nightly swim.
Branden swam so much and ate so much he fell asleep right in his chair. His coke float half drank. We woke him up before we left and he walked into the room. We said we could go listen to music and then swim or call it a night. Both of the kids perked up and said, let's go. Not really sure where they got the extra energy from, but we went and listened to the people sing ad then swam.
This was my meal from the buffet from the 2nd night. I had the veggie pasta dish.
I had a salad and a fruit plate after my pasta. That pineapple was so sweet!
Dessert from the 2nd night. This time he had a cone that matched his shirt, ha ha ha! : )
A clean plate so Noah got dessert as well.
My dessert from the 2nd night. I had a pistachio cookie, yumm. A baked cheesecake and pecan pie.
Okay and so I had 1 last dessert, an ice cream cone. But I will have to blame it on peer pressure (wink wink) everyone was eating them so I caved and had one too.
Our last day there, our final breakfast. A veggie and cheese omelet and bacon. And yup, I had the same belgian waffles with blueberries and cream afterwards too. : )
The dessert table, at lunch.
Another pic of the lunch desserts. : )
We also had lunch there before we headed to the airport. I had this sandwich and fries and this time no dessert, only fruit. Until I got up and had my final serving of.....
Pineapple, the super sweet pineapple, and that's when I got my last slice of cheesecake and a chocolate macaroon cookie. Had my last Sprite and the kids finished their meal, we all went to the restrooms and the PIC people drove us to the airport.
Our flight took off at 3:30pm, though we arrived at the airport at 1pm. 3 hour flight. So we landed around 6:30, 6:45pm. But by the time we deplaned, and went through customs and got our car, it again was around 7:30pm. We went and had Saizeriya in Narita, cheap Italian place to eat. And then we headed home. We all took showers and went to sleep. This was the sign as we left Saipan, said, "goodbye and thank you for visiting" how incredibly polite we thought! : )
The kids full of energy played in the kids area in the Saipan airport.
Branden played. And then some more kids came and a few more came. Soon it was a kids play fest going on there.
Maybe it was because it was an evening flight or maybe because they played so much in the play area at the airport, Noah slept seriously the entire flight back to Japan. Branden stayed up for about 30 minutes but after that he fell asleep too. Noboru watched Japanese comedy programs on his ipod and I read a book. I didn't get my meal in the plane because I was still full from my lunch buffet plus I knew we were eating at Saizeriya when we arrived. Noboru ate his though, the kids didn't eat theirs because they were sleeping. Anyway that's our Saipan mini vacation in a nut shell. : )And a tiny little update:
My dad is coming to spend some time with us here in Japan. He arrives tomorrow/Sunday August 23rd. We will be having a family BBQ this coming Tuesday, just same typical stuff we always have but my dad will be here joining in the fun! He leaves August 27th. The boys can hardly wait to see grandpa tomorrow, he'll arrive around 1pm sometime. And I figured if I can't get this Saipan post up today it will have to wait until after my dad leaves. So, that's why I am trying like heck, to get it up now. I'm going to be sorta missing in the blogosphere until August 27th. But I did want to try and get this up and posted. Have a great weekend everybody!!! : )
Ahhh, so how's every one's Summer break been going? I'm sure you all have been enjoying it a bunch! : ) What have we been up to since we got back from Hawaii? We've been enjoying ourselves a lot. But mostly just hanging around the house, but still enjoying every last moment from Summer that we can. So long story short, we've been making the most of it! Still every week we've been buying tons of fruit. We prefer fresh, but a can of peaches or pineapples for lunchtime as a side dish, isn't so bad either. We do consume lots of fruit around here. By the time the Summer ends we will have had our fill of the Summer fruits! Lately I am starting to see nashi/pears starting to come in season. : ) 
Still been buying garigari popsicles like mad, we have... we have! And the affordable 98 yen a pack kakigori flavors of popsicles.
See the water sprinkler system for the front porch, got nicely installed by Noboru. He did an excellent job, you can barely tell the sprinkle is on each plant. The flowers are loving the daily water and hubby likes that they get watered on their own. : )
And from looking at our house straight on, you can't see the water sprinkles at all. He was pretty happy with the job he did. I was too, he did a great job. : )
We also bought a wind chime and it now hangs on the front porch, every night we can hear the light sound of the wind chimes and it reminds me of my childhood home in Denver. We always had a set of wind chimes on our front porch as well. : ) This wind chime was under 600 yen at the Besia super store place. Such a good deal and it makes me smile when I hear them, so I really like it. : )
We've also had 2 family backyard BBQ's since we've been back from Hawaii. And was it like 2 or was it 3 BBQ"s before Hawaii, meaning from June to July.... I forget but I think it was 3. So, so far we've had about 4-5 backyard BBQ's total for Summer 2009. And we really enjoy them a lot. We will be bbq'ing all the way into September for sures. It has rained a lot in Chiba this Summer, lucky for us the brunt of it was while we were in Hawaii, so we sorta squeaked by the worst of it. : ) Chicken and the potatoes on first in this pic.
Pork and beef on last.
Mostly everything was done, hubby was outside you can see him through the patio window, he was getting the last bits outta the BBQ and coming inside. : )
Cheesy grins......meanwhile the boys eating their dinner! : )
Yakiniku was so yumm! Here's my serving, I had marinated BBQ chicken, baked potato and corn, ps, doesn't corn and potatoes taste so yum from the BBQ? They get added flavor from the BBQ, I think. That delicious grilled flavor. : ) Lettuce for wrapping my meat and rice with. We all had fruit for afterwards, watermelon or grapes or both. And then garigari's for dessert. And yup, we use plastic mats for dining unless we have company over or for holidays like Christmas or something. But for just day to day, not trying to impress anyone of course. These are our regular mats, easy clean up just wipe with a rag. Nothing fancy.
What is this? While it's my couch covers, they're in the MPV, and about to go into the big washers at the laundry mat. If you have kids, you'll know how little messes can come out of nowhere, right. When the kids were small, we decided we would either have to get an easy wipe up couch like a vinyl-ish or leather type couch. But then we wear shorts a lot, practically everyday for all of us in Summer and we worried our legs would be sticking to the couch in Summer, lol. So we decided to just get a couch that can be unzipped and be washed. So, we looked high, looked low. We bought this couch at Ikea when we first moved into this house. It zips and the covers are washable, machine washable. So that was right up our alley. Once a year, every Summer, like clockwork, we go and wash it at the laundry mat. Spray and washed, treated before it went into the washer.
The 2 washers are our stuff inside.The one on the left is the light light tan or off white area rug that sits in the living room. I don't even have to tell you how many spills have happened on that carpet since it's last washing. Kids, what can I say. So, the area rug was treated with Spray and wash and washed and the couch covers on the right went round and round.
And into the dryer they went.
Trying to put everything back on is the nightmare part, the washing part is the easy part, ha ha ha. It's the slipping them all back on that's the hard part. No wonder I only dare do this once a year.
The fishy towels I lay down every summer it's comfortable for the boys to lay on and it also protects the couch.
And had to put the rug back after it dried out back for a few hours and then phew, I was done.
One dinner I made a really nice beef curry. I usually just make chicken curry but this was nice.
Another meal/dinner, I made sara udon, chicken chow mein basically. : )
It was pretty good. : )
We've been making kakigori at home! We have an old school style shave ice maker. It always makes the kids faces light up when we pull it out! : )
My favorite flavor is always lemon. The kids have been asking for striped shave ice, all flavors. And Noboru like strawberry. : )
Another night we had tacos. Both beef and chicken two separate pans, kids had some of each. Noboru only likes the beef, meanwhile I prefer the chicken. : )
This night, I made cream stew and would you believe when I made it, I had no carrot? I was 1 carrot short and I thought and thought and realized I did make carrot sticks that week, so the mystery of the missing carrot solved. But we just had our stew without a carrot, suits me just fine because I really am not a fan of cooked carrots. Granted I eat them but I really dislike them though. Raw ones I love though. : ) But yes we always have something cooking around here. Whether it be a BBQ yakiniku type, or curry or tacos, doesn't matter... but we always do have something cooking here at our house. You'll never go hungry around here, I promise you : )
We're still renting 4 DVD's a month. Thank goodness we dropped it to 4. 4 is plenty for our family. For August we rented 2 so far, one called, "The Lodger" And the other one called, "Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins" That's the title in the US, at least. : ) The Lodger was not very good at all. The movie was slow, seemed to drag on forever and the ending was a total let down. The Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins was really good and funny. I am not a Martin Lawrence fan. And I hesitated renting it. I went online looking for a review of the movie and someone said the same thing, not being a real fan of his but how they did enjoy the movie. It made me wanna try it and they were right, it was really funny. My husband even really enjoyed it. We have 2 more rentals to pick for August.
Another dinner, I made us all chicken teriyaki bowls! Not very authentic Japanese cuisine perhaps. But you know growing up in America I used to love the Japanese food court type meals. And every now and again, I get the need to eat a chicken teriyaki bowl. Noboru lived in the US for so long, he actually really enjoys chicken teriyaki bowl night. Granted, I don't think my MIL would care for chicken teriyaki bowl night too much. Ha ha ha, but we really like them. Just chicken, and mushrooms, with teriyaki sauce. Noboru's was made with thigh meat, he prefers that, and ours was made with skinless breast meat. And some steam veggies on the side. : )
Just real simple, chicken mushrooms, broccoli and teriyaki on a bed of rice. Quick and so yummy. : )
Also, we are slowly gearing up for our annual trip to Disneyland in October! If you've been reading this blog for a while, you'll know that indeed we really do head to Disneyland around Halloween time each year. We take the kids to Disneyland every year in October, because they decorate it so so cool for Halloween. And also B's birthday is October 26th, so it's one of our presents to him every year! And it's a whole family thing that we enjoy. Anyway, hubby got 2 free tickets from his coworker (he said, he had no use for them, we were happy to take them, lol) to Disneyland/or Disney Sea. Two adult tickets. Noah's free to get in. We are getting in free because of our free tickets. And B is a child and student so his ticket is like 1500, or 1800 yen or something like that. So, we will be going to Disneyland or Sea this October for on the cheap.
Also made homemade pizza as well since my last blog post. Again, we cook dinner here at home every night for the most part. So there's always something cooking around here. : )
Finished and ready to eat! : )
The evening, we had the homemade pizza, we decided to just have a small family pizza party for us four. Hubby ran down to the small little country store and picked up 2, bottles of soda. I meanwhile had the boys fill all the cups with ice, meanwhile I sliced all the pizzas and got out the napkins. We picked out a DVD (Coraline because Noboru hadn't seen it yet) and we sat and watched and ate pizza, drank cokes all of us and we don't really let the kids drink too much soda, but that night....we just had a little pizza party just us. After the movie, Noboru took a shower with B. I showered with Noah. And they got their jammies on. We ate dinner around 5:30pm, so it was about 7:30pm now. Kids still awake. We watched an episode of Jon and Kate, then they fell asleep. We put them upstairs. And we had a bowl of popcorn and watched 3 more episodes of Jon and Kate that night. Not doing anything majorly important I don't think. : ) But just enjoying our Summer. The pizza and a movie night was a real hit! : )
Noboru mowing the lawn. And Noah, "mowing" the lawn along side of daddy. : )
The yards looking great, good job guys! : )
Branden's meanwhile swinging! This kid never gets tired of swinging on the swings. : ) This used to be my favorite was I was little too. And I would point my toes and it almost felt like my toes could touch the sky! Anyone else ever do that as a kid too? Ahhhh, I used to love the swings when I was younger. : )
Two days ago, I made karaage. I really like this liquid karaage marinade. It's funny for all my time living in Japan, I always thought of karaage making with dry powder type ways of making karaage. When I first started using the liquid a year or so ago, I thought liquid? How can it be? How does it get crunchy? Hmm, I was sorta skeptical. It basically marinates in this high concentration liquid, for as long as you can, I usually let mine soak for an hour in the sauce, then I get the chicken out of the liquid and coat in plain regular flour. Yet it comes out so flavorful, marinated all the way thanks to it marinating in liquid. It also comes out super juicy. Once in a while I still use the powdery types of karaage mix but these liquid ones are amazing and really are my favorite.
Our dinner from 2 nights ago. A nice basic little simple salad, with tomatoes thanks to B's plant he brought home from ninensei. : ) lettuce and cheese and croutons and Italian dressing. A corn on the cob, steamed broccoli, do we eat our veggies around here or what, lol. rice and some very delicious karaage. We had fresh and really sweet watermelon for dessert. : )
Two days ago, but earlier in the afternoon, same day we had karaage. The boys were playing in the backyard and Noah comes in saying, "we caught a really big spider come quick" So, I run outside and *shudders* they were indeed right! This thing was so big, I could actually see his fuzzy hairs on his spider body. Yikes! Yup, I am a big chicken when it comes to creepy crawlies of any kind. Not wanting to outright kill it though. I had the boys carry him in the net and throw him into the rice fields and jungly area behind our house. So, I don't think he went into the water and death by drowning is what I'm saying, there is a buffer of just wild before the rice fields start. : )
This pic dosn't do him jusitice he was a monster...a real brute of a spider! : ) Hopefully he'll never crawl back up the hill and find his way back to our place again.
Noah and frogs! Hmm, this kiddo has been a big lover of frogs since he was a wee wee little guy! From even a couple years back, he's been on this blog every summer with some frog friend or other. And yup, same thing this year too. Every day he finds frogs outside. One day this week, And I am seriously NOT kidding you at all. He gave his frog friend for that day, a ride in his basket of his Thomas bicycle! "He doesn't have to hop mama, I am giving him a ride", "okay that's really nice Noah" 20 minutes later, I went outside and told him he's probably due back to have lunch with his mommy frog, since it was nearing our lunch time too. "Okay he said" he picked him up outta the basket and off froggy went. I love the stories kids tell, and the imaginations they have. The stuff that comes outta their mouths. Their imaginations are endless.
The other day it reached according to our outside themometer, 90 degrees F. It was a total scorcher of a day! So, hubby unwinded the slip and slide and they got into their swim trunks and off they went! Here's Noah sliding all the way down!!! Go Noah!!! : )
And Branden sliding all the way down as well!
Noah smiling at Noboru in this picture! : )
This thumbs up pic was by complete surprise. I was actually zooming in on something completely else. And Noah said something to me, I looked over with camera and the zoom on half way and he gave me the thumbs up. I clicked. But it was completely unexpected, ha ha ha. But I guess it means he was just really having a great time! : )
Two very close brothers. They have each other so they never run out of having someone to play with. : )
Just laying down and letting the sprinkler sprinkle water on them! : )
Noboru and I were just watching the boys. But Noboru LOVES the slip and slide, so he got up and started running and slid. @_@
A totally soaked back, so he just kept going down again and again.
A much better slide this time Noboru! Ha ha ha. : )
Goofing around! Being silly! : )
Noah wiping out! : )
Noboru now tired from sliding so he called it quits for the day. But he watched, as did I. : ) And then......
It was time to pull out the little backyard pool! And this time I was going in!!! But I waited for the pool to fill first. : )
Boy oh boy, does he sure love the water! : )
He's so silly! : )
And of course B needed water to the head as well. : )
They sure kept cool that day! I took a few more pics and then I went in myself.
Noboru sat right there, and he sat right there after i got in as well. I kicked with my legs, rolled around 100 times. I went under and held my breath with both Branden and Noah. In short.....we had ourselves a blast!
The boys looking through the pool. : )
Brotherly shot and then I went in. I stayed in the pool for about an hour and a half. My hair dripping and soaking wet afterwards. We had to ahve a garigari after all that playing in the pool was finished. Then I went in and started supper real quick. : )
We always drain the water and then let it dry upside down on the back patio. This pic taken before we flipped it upside down. Ahhh what a good day. : ) 
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