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Thanksgiving week
November 26, 2007
We spent the week in Tokyo exploring barely a fraction of what the city has to offer. Clearly we need to plan another trip! We were completely taken aback by the size of the place and the sheer number of people. It was quite different from Okinawa! The subways are extremely easy to navigate and the people are so friendly we frequently had English speakers approach us and offer to not just point us in the right direction, but to personally walk us there. But if we did get lost then there certainly wouldn't be a lack of things to do. A major train station typically drops you off in an underground city of shops and restaurants that leads up to a high-rise or two of residences and often museums, hotels and doctors offices. Anything you could ever need is right there. I am convinced that you could live there for years and never touch the street level.
We've put together a video of our adventures so grab a cup of coffee and enjoy!
More Tokyo photos.
Posted by Kimberly at 07:50 PM | Comments (5)
Thanksgiving Party
November 16, 2007
Today was the Thanksgiving party for playgroup and we had a little Thanksgiving picnic in the park. Since kids and picnic baskets were involved, this was not meant to be anything fancy. Thanksgiving-inspired means turkey sandwiches and craisins! I thought I would bring sweet potato fries but had a little problem buying the sweet potatoes! The ones I got were not the ones I expected when I cut into them. So I did some quick Googling and stumbled across a recipe that made them DE-licious! It's called daigakuimo which means candied sweet potato.
INGREDIENTS:
* 1 pound sweet potatoes
* 1/3 cup sugar
* 1 tsp soy sauce
* 2 tbsp water
* 1 tsp sesame seeds
* Vegetable oil for frying
PREPARATION:
Cut sweet potatoes into bite-sized pieces. Heat the oil and fry the sweet potatoes at 350F until brown. Mix water, sugar, and soy sauce in a pan. Put the pan on low heat. When the liquid turns sticky, remove from the heat and add fried sweet potatoes. Quickly mix the potatoes with the sticky sugar. Sprinkle sesame seeds over the coated sweet potatoes.
It's super easy and quite tasty. I would highly recommend this for your Thanksgiving dinner! I think I was supposed to cut the potato into wedges but I had already started making fry shaped pieces so I kept that shape. And technically you should use Satsuimo but I think it would work with any type of sweet potato.
Once we got to the park, we discovered a school was having a field trip there today and it was pretty crowded. But the language barrier has never stopped Mia before and she quickly joined in on the fun with the school kids. Japanese schools teach the kids that they should clean up after themselves. They don't hire janitors in the school. The children do the work. The park is no exception and when it was time for them to leave, they first had to clean up the park. I found Mia picking up trash around the park with her new schoolmates. Here she is listening to some sort of instructions that I couldn't understand, but maybe she did! She tries to blend in, but is just missing the hat!
Posted by Kimberly at 02:06 PM | Comments (1)
Christmas Caroling
November 15, 2007
We always sing when we're in the car and yesterday Mia asked to sing "a different song". Since we're trying to get into the Christmas spirit and I figured she'd need a little while to learn a new song, I thought I'd break out the Christmas tunes. So we started on Rudolph and lucky for me, we get to sing it all the time now. By WE, I mean I get to sing most of it and she gets to sing a the last word per line. That is unless she gets distracted...
Posted by Kimberly at 05:08 PM | Comments (0)
First baby pictures
November 14, 2007
Everything looks good! Clean bill of health. Apparently this one is a little camera shy as well since he/she wouldn't uncover his/her face!
Posted by Kimberly at 11:25 AM | Comments (1)
Let the Christmas Season begin
November 13, 2007
Every year it seems that they put Christmas stuff out earlier and earlier. I don't know if it was any different in the States this year, but we saw Christmas decor popping up in September here this year! By October 31 they were already clearing out the Halloween candy so that they could have the space for all of the Christmas candy. We've only had about 2 days so far this year that we can even stand to wear our "winter" clothes, meaning long sleeve t-shirts. But I like to take advantage of it when I can because it's hard to get into the Christmas spirit while sweating in a tank top and shorts. So to encourage the festive mood, I thought I'd get a head start on some holiday Cocok's toes.
Here is Mia singing and dancing in one of her "winter outfits" that I mentioned!
Posted by Kimberly at 02:13 PM | Comments (0)
Home Improvement
November 12, 2007
We've been a little lax on the decorating lately. I think we just lost steam as it took so long for our shipment to arrive and never found that enthusiasm again. We planned a barbecue with a few friends because of the holiday weekend so thought we should cross a few of the easy items off the to-do list. So a quick shopping trip and voila...
All house photos
Posted by Kimberly at 12:36 PM | Comments (1)
Welcome to the 3rd Trimester
November 10, 2007
We're in the home stretch... sort of. Here's to 27 weeks.
Posted by Kimberly at 07:54 AM | Comments (1)
Ikura
November 09, 2007
Mia has this amazing ability to modify her behavior whenever the camera comes out! She usually devours these Ikura and we end up getting an extra order just for her. She's been doing this since she was pretty small and it isn't typically a piece that sushi newbies get. So when they see the baby devouring caviar, it usually results in some pointing and whispering. Every time I've tried to get a video of this she decides to not cooperate. So this is about as good as it's going to get I think. And I may stop trying-- in the spirit of support for "Operation Get Mia to Eat".
Posted by Kimberly at 10:44 PM | Comments (0)
Let's talk about toilets
November 06, 2007
I don't think we've discussed this topic yet, so we're a bit overdue. When you walk into a bathroom, you might not always find a toilet that looks like what you would expect. It's always a good idea to check for signs on the doors. Like these:
You probably want to go into the door on the left. Because if you were to enter the door on the right, you would find something that looks like this:
And that isn't usually what I expect to find when entering a bathroom. Apparently this is a traditional Japanese toilet. I did get the honor of trying this type out once when there was no other option. I think I'll stick to the Western style.
As long as we're talking about Western style toilets, I might as well mention that when you do find them (especially in residences), they are often pretty high tech. Who knew toilets could have features? These have jets to wash yourself after you do your business-- spray, pulse, changing angles for cleaning um, different parts. Then the thing blow dries you off... Some play music or make a water sound if you need help getting started or some cover to finish up. We've got automatic flushing, automatic toilet lid closing, deodorizing and sanitizing. They've thought of everything! I had no idea.
And last but not least. I think I have previously mentioned how kid-friendly this society seems to be on a whole. But when we were at a kids place I noticed a 3rd sign on one of the stalls that didn't correspond to the 2 I am familiar with in the picture above. When I checked out this stall I found what I can only assume to be a child height toilet! 
Posted by Kimberly at 01:14 PM | Comments (2)
I love to dance
November 04, 2007
Mia has always loved to dance. These days she turns the music on herself and demands that someone at least come watch, but usually has to participate as well. "Daddy, want to come dance with me?" Who can say no to that?
Posted by Kimberly at 05:01 PM | Comments (1)
Gyukosendo Cave
November 03, 2007
Today we went to Okinawa world and Gyukosendo Cave. The cave itself was pretty impressive, and then afterwards we walked around the traditional craft village that featured artisan works including pottery, glass blowing, sugar cane processing and beer/sake brewing. There is also a Habu museum and show where Mia got to see and touch a real live snake and who would have guessed that she loved it!
Posted by Kimberly at 05:46 PM | Comments (0)
Twinkle Twinkle variations
November 01, 2007
Posted by Kimberly at 03:21 PM | Comments (1)