Typhoon Day!

This week was interesting. In between a National Holiday on Monday (Respect for the Aged Day) and a National Holiday on Friday (Autumn Equinox Day), there were 2 days where school was cancelled due to a typhoon headed our way. We did get a little of it, but nothing bad at all. In fact, it was not much more than a bad rainstorm here. Hooray!
By Monday, it had already been raining for four days straight, so when we saw a break in the clouds, we headed out as fast as we could!
We went to Sanuki Mannou Park,one of our favorite parks here. There was a lot of bouncing and boinging and sliding, so I sat my pregnant self out on everything.

Here are some pics:

One of the reasons why we love this park is because there are green, rolling hills throughout the park, which is a very rare site here in Japan.

Fun times! I love National Holidays, and Japan has A LOT!!

August

Oops..it's been a while :) August was spent pretty much trying to avoid the heat! We went to the beach a lot, and no one got sunburned. Hooray! August here is summer vacation (yep, only August), so there were several activities going on throughout the month.
First, the Gokai Rangers came to the mall! The Gokai are like Power Rangers, and they put on a fighting show for the kids. My kids are still talking about it. No pictures--the line for taking pictures with them wrapped around an entire department store. So, I thought I would get a snack while Fox stayed in the line with the kids. When I got back 7 minutes later, everyone was done taking pictures! What? They made everyone go in groups of five and take only one shot. Wow.

Next, we went to Ibuki Island, a settlement famous for its fish used in dashi. I thought I took pictures, but I guess I didn't. And that's fine, because nothing is happening on Ibuki Island. We just wanted the ferry experience, so we took the 25 minute ferry over, walked around, and came home. Ibuki Island is crazy in that all of the homes there are uphill with no car access, so everyone uses scooters. Then, they take the ferry to Kanonji to do their grocery shopping. It was kind of fun to see everyone on the ferry with the gifts for their ancestors, since it was Obon.

Our stake had a primary activity that was so fun. Again, not many pictures...I need to use my camera more! All of the kids did different physical exercises, which I'm sure tied in to a spiritual topic, but it was all in Japanese. Afterwards, they had a scavenger hunt for the golden plates, and then bound a huge replica of the golden plates together. Then, we all helped sew and package Otedama, or bean bags, which are really popular here and used in occupational therapy. These bean bags would be sent up north to the elderly and children affected by the earthquake.

Here are our friends Chinatsu (we taught her when she was 4! And now she's 8!), Konomi, and Spencer writing letters to send with the bean bags:

 

The "gaijin" table :) Holden, the Shumways, and Cash and Coco working on their letters and packaging:

 

Afterwards, we went to Subway, which is a huge deal, since they have wheat bread. Subway is 1 1/2 hours from us, so we have only gone one other time. It is expensive but very, very worth it!

And here is Coco, being her crazy self:

 

Nothing else too new. The kids are very excited about mommy's growing belly. Coco is convinced that she also has a baby growing under her belly button, and she wants to marry that baby. Hmmm. Cash really wants a boy baby. Today, he told me that if it's a boy, we should name him Antonio. If it's a girl, we should name her StinkyBottom. So, I think you can see where his preferences lie. We'll know for sure September 14th!

Enjoying the Cool of the Evening

Cash's preschool had its "Enjoying the Cool of the Evening Festival" (literal translation from the Japanese title!  Very awesome!) on Wednesday.  It was a fitting title.  Earlier this week, a typhoon passed nearby our little city, which pushed all of the humidity away and actually gave us a few cool evenings.  It was so fun!  We brought along our new friends, the Shumways, and had hot dogs and yummy banana ice cream.  The kids played games to win prizes, and the night finished off with all of the kids relaxing in the dark auditorium to an Anpan-man video.
My camera died after recording this video, but you can see Cash at about 50 seconds.  We didn't realize he should have been wearing a summer jinbei, but now we know!
Here is the Kanonji Yochien's Bon Festival Dance:

Hagi No-oka Park (And Picture Upload!)

Cash and Fox go down the slide at the park instead of taking the stairs.  They have this in a lot of kids' places here, like preschools.  Instead of bumping into each other on the stairs to get to the playground, all the kids just take the slide.  I think this is so neat!

So here are a few pics of Hagi No-oka Park, a free kids' pool and park up in the mountains near our home.  The water is the perfect depth for 4 year olds, which is awesome.  Cash has been swimming every day in school, so it's been fun to see him strap on his goggle and swim cap and go underwater without fear. Go Cashy!

 

Cutie Coco!

On the Way...

Hip Hip Hooray--Look Who's on the Way!!!

 

Who: Baby #3 (Girl, I tell ya, but I'll let ya know for sure next month!)
When: late January 2012
Where: Most likely Japan--not too keen on flying back 36 weeks prego.

So this should explain the lack of blog posts. When I'm not laying on the couch or playing with the kiddos, all of my internet time has been spent browsing gorgeous food blogs. And then eating sandwiches for dinner.

Fruit in Japan

Last Saturday, we took the missionaries and went with our friend Takuya to pick strawberries. A local strawberry farmer was trying to get rid of all of his leftover strawberries--it is no longer strawberry season. Strawberry season is generally in winter, around the time everyone is making their Christmas strawberry shortcakes. The winter strawberry season means that all of the strawberries are grown in greenhouses. We still had a lot of fun picking the strawberries and learned quite a few lessons about fruit in Japan, such as:

1.) Strawberries must be refrigerated immediately. We picked 2 huge boxes and 2 hours later, they were rotting. They are so delicate!

2.) Pieces of fruit should not touch each other, excepting grapes. When you buy strawberries in the store here, they are in a plastic package laid out in little rows and are not touching the other strawberries in the package. Cherries are in the store now, and the cherries come from America. But first, the cherries are weeded out--only the darkest and firmest cherries make it to the shelves. And of course, the cherries do not touch each other. All of this hand selecting makes fruit expensive here. 12 cherries is about $2.

3.) If someone has an excessive of fruit, you will become the receiver of that excess of fruit, such as strawberries. We learned this lesson last time, when bags of mikans would be left on our door. Right now, it is biwa (loquats). We have been given biwa almost every day this week. If only my kids would eat them! I think they are really yummy.

4.) If you are transporting fruit to church--let's say a tray of strawberries you had hand selected and arranged for an hour late Saturday night to give to the members the next day--probably not a good idea to put the tray of fruit on top of the car while you are buckling your kids in. I learned this the hard way when we heard a big clunk as my beautiful pan flew from our roof while driving off. It rained the rest of the day, so the only evidence of my strawberry disaster was our flattened metal pan, found in the parking lot of the library.

5.) Randomness in the fruit world here. Pineapples, lemons, and honeydews--all imported from the U.S.--are cheaper than when we'd buy them in Logan. Medium size watermelons are still $20. Apples are pretty much around a dollar a piece. Interesting.

Good times though! We were able to keep enough strawberries to stock up in our freezer to make smoothies with my birthday blender. Hooray!

Goings on...

Nothing too new here--We got a new couch that is American-sized! And a dehumidifier that sucks the moisture from the air. It gets so humid here that the dehumidifier will get full of water in a few hours. We got these lovely items from a thrift store that had a 50% off sale, so we are excited.
Here's what's up with:

Fox: I'm not sure many of you know this, but Fox teaches 11 preschool classes a week. He was sick last week, so I got to teach for him for a few days. Lucky! He has a fun job with the cutest students! I would have never ever ever imagined Fox as a preschool teacher, but he loves it and does a great job with it. A lot of his free time is spent making flashcards and drawing educational posters for his preschoolers. Right now, he is working on a wall mural in our school, and everyone is thrilled with his artistic abilities.

Cash: is busy being a fun 4 year old. School is wiping him out, and he often lays his head down on his desk near the end of the day around 2. This makes his teachers think he is sick, so he has learned to tell them that he is well, just sleepy in Japanese. He is very big on imaginative play, which I love. The other day, I asked him why he was going to the bathroom for the third time in an hour, and he said, "There is an alien inside my body controlling my pee-pee buttons." Heehee.

Coco: I am still figuring this girl out! She is so much fun and a sweetheart, but still insists on everything scary. She has all of her Scooby Doo books memorized. We watched Tangled and kept pointing out the princess in it to encourage some girliness. The next day, she wanted to play Tangled and would only pretend she was the war horse, Maximus. Oy. She picks up on a lot of random Japanese words and will yell them out while she goes to sleep. This girl is either talking, singing, or screaming from the time she wakes up until she falls asleep. Still taking great naps, though! She can't wait to go to school and often puts on Cash's stuff and waits by the door:

 

Amy: I am doing great! I have picked up a few more classes, so I am teaching 7 a week. In strange contrast to Fox, I love my adult classes the most. My students are so interesting and eager to learn. I just started working on an afghan with my birthday present: yarn! I have had a few hard and isolated days (we are really in a small area, so I haven't been able to socialize a ton) and some homesickness lately (oh, cheddar cheese and tortillas--why aren't you in Japan?) but nothing too bad. I am learning a ton everyday but unfortunately not too much helpful Japanese--more like local slang!

Still having issues with pictures--some day soon I will figure this out!