Houji-cha

Houji-cha, or roasted green tea, is a great Japanese alternative to black tea and a fantastic after-dinner tea. Highly recommended.

Anyway, we drink lots of it and Miki has learned how to prepare it for us. In fact, she has on a few occasions sampled the finished, brewed product.

Here she is measuring out a few cups for afternoon tea time.

Happy 3rd

Unfortunately the plans to celebrate Miki's 3rd birthday this past weekend were cancelled because she got sick. Runny nose, watery eyes, cough, all in all, she was a ball of misery for 3 days! Hopefully we'll be able to 'raincheck' the event and organize a belated party before we depart for Tokyo next month. Stay tuned...

In the meantime, as a family, we were able to have a small party at home. Miki had a cupcake, a helium-filled balloon that she absolutely loves and a few gifts from Nana & Grammy to open.

'Giddy Up!

The weather was beautiful today, albeit a bit chilly in the shade. Miki's good friend, Imogen, turned 5 years old today and to celebrate her mom and dad arranged for horse rides for all the young attendees.

And here we have Miki's first experience riding on a real horse.

Sold

Someone finally bought our car. I really do hate to part with it, it's been so reliable and good to us over the 7 years we've owned it. With 2 girls, however, I do realize that it was getting small. Needless to say, I'm absolutely thrilled that we don't have to deal with vehicles for at least 5 years! It's either train, bus, bicylce or by foot for us at least until 2014.

The house still has not rented although we did find a couple who are extremely interested. Keep your fingers crossed...

Miki & Sam are fine. Miki is 3 years old this Thursday. Ericka's been planning a small birthday party for her on Valentine's Day. Sam is starting to teethe (is that how you spell that?) and she is putting on the chunk, much to our satisfaction.

Nana, Aunt Heather, cousins Evann and Sully will be here on the 1st of March for a few days. We are looking forward to their visit.

It snowed here today. Very cold and blustery. I went home for lunch and started a fire in the woodstove for the girls. The snow did not stick and it has now turned to rain. Dreading the cold, wet pedal home this evening. Oh well, as the saying goes: "Suck it up!"

Over the weekend I purchased a new (low-flush) toilet and sink for our upstairs bathroom. A good friend is going to help me install those plus retro-fit banisters for our staircase; housing codes for stair railings have changed since the house was first built.

We saw Slumdog Millionaire over the weekend (thank you, Neil), a great movie. It has inspired me to seek out the book, I'm curious how much, if any, is based on real events/people.

Kimono

Miki has seen many photos of kimonos and a few of her books have characters in them who dress in a kimono. She has recently expressed interest in wearing one herself when we go to Japan. She talks about it quite a bit actually. Well, we are not 100% sure where this one came from, although I'm fairly confident that it was given to Miki a year or two ago by a visiting teacher. At the time it did not fit, obviously, so Ericka put it away knowing that one day she would grow into it.

Grow into it she did. Here she is dressed up for a fashion show. Or for an evening at the sumo stadium with green tea and sushi!

Eye 2 Eye

Ericka was goofing around with the camera...

Gift Wrapped

In Japan there is a deep-seated custom of gift giving and it is "expected" of us when we return in March to pay homage to all those who have helped us with this transition, and believe me, there are lots of friends and colleagues that we owe a hearty thank you to.

Last weekend Ericka and Miki decided to make their own gift wrap paper. Brilliant. E's got all these old sponges cut into various shapes, with a little bit of paint and some detailed instructions, Miki set to work stamping the wrapping paper.

Sam looked on.

Tick tock tick tock

I just about have our car sold and the house was looked at this evening by another potential renter. I'm not worried about the car, but this lack of a serious renter is starting to get to me. And now that it's February I feel like Captain Hook being stalked by the clock!