Hyotenka

Ghosts of Christmas past.

2009-12-27T06:21:00.004Z

My Dad sent me some old Christmas pictures recently. He's been going through photos and scanning them which is great, I've really been enjoying what he's sent.

I think we (my brother and I are twins) were probably four or five years old, which puts it at maybe 1970 or 1971. I think 1970 is the first year I clearly remember. I remember Dad saying to me "It will be a new decade in the morning." and I replied "What's a decade?" So I definitely remember the 1960's! (Well, December 31st, 1969, anyway....)Our tree with our stockings underneath. I remember my mum always saying "Don't gild the lily" when we were hanging decorations on it, but I think this one might have stood a few more, don't you?!
Opening presents. I clearly remember a lot of the presents we got that year. My mum hooked the blue rug!
Charlie Coco! I LOVED this clown. He had a string you could pull and he said various things. He became my very best cuddly for years afterwards.

My mum in her curly sheepskin coat. I loved the feel and smell of it. I'm in a little white coat and my brother is in a red jumper with his hand on my back. I remember being scared of this Santa and was utterly unaware that it was our neighbour!
Looking at presents. I don't remember that we had a TV at this time, so this photo was a surprise. I don't remember ever watching it, and we were in Germany so it would have been all German anyway.

Mysteries of a Japanese Christmas

2009-12-27T05:00:00.002Z

This was on the bag that Harry's Christmas present from the after school club came in."Nothing wrong with that", you say. And I'd agree. But look at the back -

What????

FINALLY, the musical! (August 8th and 9th)

2009-12-16T10:53:00.001Z

Finally, after how many months, I have got around to putting up pictures of Yoshi's musical. It went really, really well and we were so proud of him! Unfortunately photos were forbidden except in the final encore and curtain call, and at that time I was busy as I was on the door. My friend Tomomi took these pictures - thanks!
Final encore song and dance routine.
Yoshi's elementary school classmate is in the yellow t-shirt.

The entire cast on stage for the final number.Curtain call!
Taking a bow.Super grampa, the hero of the day. I can't explain the plot, it's too complicated and stupid, but it made a great show!
In the lobby at the end, greeting people.
With best friend Tasuku, selling CDs.
Tomomi and I chatting at the end.

Quite possibly Harry's best bug picture yet!

2009-12-11T01:41:00.002Z

A pair of drunk caterpillars, weaving their way back from a year-end party!

Looking for Harry...

2009-12-10T15:35:00.003Z

This is what I find most nights when I go upstairs to check on the kids before I go to bed. Then I have to go on the Great Harry Hunt.

Sometimes he's in our bed, absolutely so if Seiju is here - it's his greatest aim in life to snuggle up with his dad in bed. Finding an empty big bed though will send him into Yoshi's bed, so on weekdays it's more often than not that I will find this:
This is also an interesting insight into Yoshi's nest-building behaviour. We cleaned this room up on Monday night. By Thursday night everything is back around and in his bed again. Sigh.... Under his pillow is an absolute magpie's nest with all his best treasures shoved under. How he gets a good night's sleep I do not know.

Cookie Exchage

2009-12-10T15:26:00.004Z

A few friends, also members of AFWJ have decided to do a Christmas cookie exchange. I had a free day on Sunday so got down to some serious baking. This was the end result!

I made gingerbread stars, oatmeal, cranberry and white chocolate cookies, and parkin (a heavy oatmeal cake made with black treacle/molasses and lots of ginger that has to be left for a week or two after cooking to taste right). These got sent to six cookie exchange friends, Harry's piano teacher, and a few found their way into our stomachs, too!
I saved a blob of dough for each of the boys. Harry made gingerbread men, and Yoshi made that enormous square biscuit you can see at the end of the table. They had them for breakfast on Monday morning with big glasses of milk. Yum! Christmas is on its way....

Saturday night storm.

2009-12-10T15:23:00.003Z

Last Saturday night's Wet Illuminations turned into a full-blown storm. I forgot to shut the bathroom window that evening, and this is what we found when we went in the next morning. The window was cracked open about four inches at most, and the bottom of the window is about head height when standing outside. Most of the leaves have blown away or been packed down into a sodden lump, so the wind must have been pretty strong!

Simple Christmas Decorations

2009-12-06T06:31:00.003Z

I had one string of white lights and a few red and gold baubles. I piled them into a glass salad dish and stuck the baubles into the lights, then wrapped a string of ¥100 shop tinsel round the edge of the plate. It looks so nice on our table where the fruit bowl normally sits. I'm really pleased with this and it took about two minutes to make!!
The cards either side of the bowl are the boys' advent calendars. Harry's is the one on the left and is a scene of polar bears ice skating. Yoshi's is the Eiffel Tower and features lots of merry Santas doing funny things.

The Wet Illuminations

2009-12-05T11:06:00.005Z

These are supposed to be the White Illuminations but it was sleeting/raining heavily and very, very windy when we arrived in Sapporo tonight. Not a speck of white anywhere in the town! Still, the wet ground made the illuminations fantastic with all the reflections.Looking away from the tower, down Odori Park.
Looking back to the tower.
This woman was playing the electone in a little heated bubble. She had the most amazingly thin sticklike legs!
These blue stick-y things were new this year. They were great as they swayed in the wind and looked very alive. Yoshi reckoned they are meant to represent seaweed. The way they moved was very underwaterish.
A day out with the Glums. Mrs Glum, and her sons Whine and Moan. (Actually we weren't glum at all, just VERYVERYCOLD!)
"I'm coooold! And Weeeet!"
We went to a tonkatsu restaurant for dinner. Harry decided to mail his friend to tell him what we were eating.
Yoshi took this photo of a still slightly manic mother and a rather tired looking father.
Yoshi's dinner. He hates fat so he had small fillets of pork instead of the normal chop with fat on it. Rice, cabbage and miso soup were free with free refills, so Harry and I shared a meal and we all shared the three people's worth of meat between four. There was more than enough!
This was my and Harry's dinner. Two pieces of fillet and one regular katsu. Yum!

Seiju was going to go back to work from Sapporo and we were going to go back on the train, but the weather was so foul that he said he'd take us home then set off again, which was very kind of him. Now we are sitting cosy in front of the stove and he's battling his way through heavy rain and driving winds (the house is shuddering under the gusts!) which will certainly be a blizzard by the time he gets an hour into his journey. Hope he's OK.....

Green Tomato Chutney!

2009-12-05T05:09:00.001Z

This is some of Heather's green tomato chutney. It is vinegary enough to blow your socks off! Yum! My family won't get any nearer than a sniff. Which is fine by me, thankyouverymuch. I had it on some cold roast pork. The boys and Seiju had last night's leftover pot au feu which had sweet potatoes and hakusai (Chinese cabbage) in it as well as the sausages and carrots.

I have been lusting after this pickle since you sent it Heather, but I couldn't get the top off. Neither could Seiju or Yoshi! In the end we had to punch a hole in the lid with a nail before we could get at it. I was so frustrated that I was tempted to just smash the jar but was nervous of eating shards of glass in the pickle!! I've put the rest in a container in the fridge but it won't last long.

Burp!

Home made tortillas.

2009-12-01T10:03:00.003Z

To my great disgust, Costco has stopped stocking the brand of tortillas that it always did, and has replaced it with another brand that contains yeast. We have been in no-tortilla mode for three weeks now and I can't stand it any more! Yoshi has also increased his cereal consumption to levels that I can't sustain. So, time to bite the bullet and search the internet for a recipe! 2 cups of flour, 2 tsp of oil, 1/2 tsp salt, 1 1/2 tsp baking powder and enough warm water to make a slightly sticky dough. Knead for five minutes on a wooden board sprinkled with flour, then cover with cling wrap and let it rest for ten minutes. Then divide into balls, roll them out as thinly as possible, then...
put in a non-oiled skillet for 30 seconds each side.
Yum! The only trouble is that it doesn't make that many ad Yoshi will simply inhale these the next time he walks past the kitchen if I let him.

They should store in a ziplock for a few days (if they don't get eaten first) and can be reheated in the pan when needed.

What you can do with half a tree....

2009-12-01T05:06:00.003Z

..... make a cuddly tree!

Harry is off school till Friday because his class is down with the flu. Last night Yoshi and I took the half tree upstairs and did this as a joke, but Harry was charmed by it, and has spent a good part of today adding lights and decorations to it!
I think this is going to be a new family tradition.... I especially like the octopus in the tree.

HOW DO YOU LOSE HALF A CHRISTMAS TREE????

2009-11-29T10:58:00.002Z

We thought we would get decorating tonight. BUT we can only find the bottom half of the Christmas tree. It's quite a big and twiggy thing. We have looked in the new upstairs room, in the store room and shed. Nothing. Nowhere else it could possibly be! The males even went off to Baachan's to see if we left it in her garage during the reform. But no, no luck....

I am now wondering if it got tossed out by the builders. There were a few random boxes and bits of lumber that I had left in our very dark and inaccessible storeroom and I told them they could just chuck everything left into their skip. I am now thinking that the top of the tree had fallen down behind the lumber (it was balanced along the top of it) and I took out the main bit and left the top without seeing it........ Ooops.

Ah well, it was a donated tree anyway. Just one of the many things in our house symbolising the loss of friends who moved back to their home countries. Time to buy one for ourselves.

In flu news - I'm just about better but still have head cold symptoms and am deaf in one ear. It feels like there's fluid in there somewhere. I managed to stay out of bed today all day till 3pm and even cleaned up with the family but Seiju did all the heavy vaccuuming etc. Crashed like a toddler this afternoon and had a deep, hard sleep till 5:30 when I was woken up to yakisoba made by Seiju and the boys!! Very nice. Lots of carrots and onions in it and no meat. He did rolled eggs and sliced cucumbers as well for Harry so a great improvement on the past couple of days of food.

I feel like I was sat on by a big, heavy, pig!

2009-11-28T02:14:00.003Z

It's Saturday lunchtime and I am fully dressed and sitting on the sofa for the first time since Wednesday evening.

My temperature is gone (since last night) and the bone aches are mostly gone. All the coldy symptoms are still there and I am deaf which is very annoying. I'm also bone tired! I think getting up and eating a bowl of cereal has done me in. I might have to go back to bed....

I don't think I would recommend this flu thing as a good method of getting a few days off work!

Seiju is doing sterling work. He's kept the washing machine running and has even put most of the laundry away as it dries. He's kept the kids fed (Macdonald's and instant ramen mostly but I'm not complaining and they most certainly aren't) and gotten them off to school yesterday. Right now they are out at the home centre and then the model shop so again, all the males in my life are happy. And I'm happy because it's quiet.

It is snowing - proper snow with big fluffy flakes falling straight down from the sky. The garden is white but the road must be warmish as it's staying black there just now. It's very peaceful to watch. I think I might just have to go back to bed and lie there watching the snow fall for a while.

I'm a bit fed up with this flu thing by now....

Oink for the third time

2009-11-26T06:55:00.002Z

* Updated!*

Shock, amazement! Seiju just called to say he told his boss that I have swine flu and he's been given tomorrow and Monday off to come and look after us all! So he's on his way home right now. Thank goodness. Yoshi was doing a good job looking after Harry but it's nice to feel safe again.

Now I've got the swine flu. Bleh.

Can't afford this. I have had to cancel today's and tomorrow's classes and probably Tuesday's as well. I feel bad because I was feeling ill but I kept on plugging away at yesterdays's classes so I've probably infected 40 people....

Going back to bed.

My frog is going backwards....

2009-11-24T10:47:00.002Z

Got to get a GRIP.

Halloween candy did me in. Then the Christmas stuff bought for the school party! Oh dear.

I spent today packing up the students presents so that all the candy is now firmly out of reach. Time to get back on that wagon.

Food Fight. Again. Sigh....

2009-11-22T08:13:00.003Z

Harry is the pickiest eater ever. Given the choice he would exist on a mostly white diet - white rice, white bread, tofu, milk and yoghurt. He can be persuaded to eat apples (with the skin off), cucumber (ditto) broccoli and carrots and that's about it for vegetables. He won't eat anything mixed up or that has touched something else. This limits dinners to the most basic nursery food and at nine years old I am sick of it.

Last week we had a huge tantrum (shamefully, probably on both our parts by the end....!) over him refusing to eat broccoli that had been stir fried and had slightly changed colour in places. I was livid; he screamed and spat, I yelled, and it went on and on till he was actually screaming over a half-chewed mouthful of broccoli. At that point I had to leave the room as I was going to do something violent if I didn't. He actually screamed over this mouthful of broccoli for 45 minutes. The kid has stamina. Eventually he swallowed it, and we had a long heart to heart about how much his pickiness and worse, tantrums over it all, have ruined mealtimes for all of us and made me hate cooking. Seriously, I look into the kitchen when it's time to start dinner, and feel sick.

I let him pick one food that I'd absolutely promise NOT to put on his plate, but told him that from now on he must eat everything I give him with NO FUSS. I showed him the plate I'll use, smaller than a saucer, so it's not like I'm insisting he eats a great deal of anything. He agreed.

Today Seiju and Harry and I went out to our local ramen/Chinese restaurant that we all like. (Yoshi was with a friend.) Harry ordered ramen and specified that it should come without beansprouts or onions, which I let slide. We warned him that he would have to eat the steamed spinach that comes as a topping in that shop. He agreed. I actually had him repeat the words "I will eat the spinach on the ramen" so he couldn't claim he'd never agreed. The food came, and he promptly removed the spinach to another plate, claiming he'd eat it later. Of course he didn't. When Seiju offered to help him he folded his arms and clamped his lips.

We sat for an hour past the time we'd finished, and he refused to eat it. Finally I gave him a five minute deadline and told him that if he didn't eat the spinach by then, he would not come with us to that restaurant again for a year. That is not to say that we won't go. He'll just have to sit at home and wait for us. He flatly and not-so-silently refused. So I picked up the spinach in a bit of plastic and we went home, him screaming and sobbing all the way.

Seiju has completely lost patience with him and has said that if Harry doesn't eat the spinach (we are talking about 5g of the bloody stuff) then he's not getting any food from us at all. So dinner time rolls around. I made a high tea style meal with scones and jam, fruit and yoghurt as we'd all had lunch out. Harry loves scones. Well, except when he decides that they are evil poison and must not be touched. :(

I warned him in advance that he was not going to ruin any more mealtimes with his sobbing and spitting, so he had from now until dinner was ready to get the spinach eaten or he'd have to sit in his room while we ate. (About 40 minutes.) No dice. Sat there with his arms folded and waves of hate coming out at me, then sobbed, then kicked, screamed and wailed as I removed him to his bedroom. Seiju went in and told him that we both agree and this will go on as long as he wants it to.

We ate, and then said Harry could come down again. The table is now cleared, no more food is available till tomorrow morning, and he's watching TV. He is SO STUBBORN.

I know you shouldn't get yourself into this kind of position with your kids, but he made promises to eat properly, to not make a fuss and to just grow the hell up a bit that he didn't manage to keep for more than about three days during which I was foolish enough to cook only food that he likes.

Lovely times here right now. GRRRRRR

First Snow

2009-11-22T04:29:00.004Z

Yoshi took this picture yesterday, on our driveway. It snowed about an inch but it's pretty much all gone again by now.

I am not quite sure when to say first snow was this year. It snowed with flakes in the air that didn't stick on about the 1st November. There have been numerous days since that it did the same, but the first time it went white was about the 10th November.

Carrot Soup and Soda Bread

2009-11-22T04:27:00.002Z

I made carrot soup and soda bread one day last week. Carrot soup is ORANGE!! Yoshi loved it, Harry had to be persuaded to eat it. Sigh. The soda bread with lovely warm butter melted into it was delicious.

Oink? Oink, or half an oink??

2009-11-11T14:59:00.002Z

Harry was unwell last Saturday (7th November). He woke up feeling bad and by about 9am had a temperature. He had all the flu symptoms just like Yoshi had, and by 2pm his temperature was up to 39.9C so off we went to the hospital. He was so sick he couldn't stand up and Seiju had to carry him in to see the doctor.

The test was negative but apparently more than two thirds of them are, as often the virus has not had time to build up. Still, judging by the symptoms it was flu, so Harry got all the Relenza and stuff that Yoshi got a couple of weeks ago, and we came home.

Gave him the first dose of everything and put him into bed. He slept hard and very heavily for about three hours. I kept going in to check on him because I was worried about him, but he slept till about 7pm when he woke up soaked in sweat. His clothes were wet, so was his bed, and his hair looked like he'd just gotten out of the bath. His temperature was down to 38C, though. Poor Harry was a bit disorientated as he thought it was the next morning and couldn't understand why it was dark.

Seiju gave him a bath while I changed the bed, and we tucked him up again for the night. He slept fairly peacefully though he did call out a few times for me, and he said he had strange dreams. Sunday morning the temperature was almost gone, though he said that he felt weird and his legs were "fluffy". He lay on the sofa all day and by Sunday night he was back to normal!

It was just like watching the progression of Yoshi's flu in fast forward mode! So, did he have it or not???? And what to do about school which has a rule of not going in for 48 hours after the flu fever comes down? In the end I called the school on Monday morning, and on balance the head decided that he wanted Harry to stay away for a day, so we had a quiet day at home. That was the same day as Yoshi's school open class, unfortunately. Harry agreed to be left for a couple of hours if I kept my cellphone on all the time. Yoshi and the rest of the kids were dismissed early so the parents could have a meeting with the class teachers, so I sent him back to look after Harry. By the time I got home they were peacefully curled up in the armchair together watching telly.

Harry's right back at school and perfectly fit again. What a mystery. Or he's Super Strong Flu-Repelling Man. Wonder which??

Harry's Bento

2009-11-11T14:52:00.004Z

The elementary school puts aside several days a year on which the kids have to bring their own lunches. Ideally they are supposed to make them themselves but it's an idea that drives me mad. It supposes that the mothers are all stay at home super-housewives who have time in the morning to lovingly give their kids a detailed nutrition lesson before sending their little darlings off. Seeing as it's a farming community, all it really does is piss off 75 mothers who are busy enough....

Harry sliced the cucumbers and put the stuff in the box. Hope that counts as "making his own lunch" because it's all I was willing to waste time over on a working morning!

The menu - top layer: pumpkin mashed with butter and pepper, raw cucumbers and carrots, rice. Bottom layer: raw carrot and cucumber rings (Harry noticed that they'd fit together so he stuffed all the leftovers in! They did look pretty.) Small slice of grilled salmon, apple wedge, sausage, and frozen squid made for bentos. Too much food, he couldn't eat it all, and this was Tuesday. He STILL hasn't remembered to bring the box back. GRRRRRRRRRR!

Salamander Funeral

2009-11-11T14:51:00.003Z

Ah well, he was four and a half years old, and only had three legs, so I think he lasted pretty long for a little slimy, sticky blob!

Halloween Pumpkins

2009-11-11T14:47:00.004Z

This is one of my Friday classes, towards the end of my pumpkin marathon week! I did 22 pumpkins with the kids in the end - my hands were yellow!
This year one class experimented with carving shallow marks and stapling across them. Very effective!

A music lesson at Yoshi's school

2009-11-10T14:59:00.003Z

Yesterday there was an open class at Yoshi's school, so I went along to watch. His music teacher is a very talented woman who runs an extremely competetive choir after school. I am not sure which order the videos will load, but one of them is a video of the Yoshi's class performing their song in the school festival.

This is not a choir, this is JUST Yoshi's class!

I think they are incredibly good! I am so sorry for the quality of the sound and pictures - I only had my cellphone with me, then I stupidly held the phone the wrong way up for the first few minutes. Don't bother looking as the pictures are far too blurry to bother with, but do please listen!

The next part of the lesson we spent watching the kids play the koto, a traditional Japanese instrument. Of course they are mostly useless and it was very noisy but it was fun for them, and by the end of the unit they will be able to play one or two simple tunes.

Goodbye, Aunty Win

2009-11-10T13:24:00.003Z

Aunty Win and her brand new great granddaughter Amira Rose.

Sorry that I have been very quiet lately - most of it has been busy-ness. The school Halloween party, lots of messed up schedules thanks to swine flu, Harry may or may not have had it..... I will get round to writing more about those things I hope but for now, the main thing that has sent me into blog silence was the death of my Aunty Win on November 1st. She was very ill and it was time for her to go, but I am so sad. She was my favourite aunty when I was small because she was always so bright and cuddly. She laughed a lot and with a loud cackle, and she loved all family so much, especially the little kids. I used to look forward to going to stay with her in the summer or winter holidays because she'd make me "fairy sandwiches" - little bacon sandwiches cut in quarters with the crusts cut off! And midget gems in a paper bag from the sweet shop. (I didn't actually really like the taste of them that much, but she thought that I liked them, so I ate them!)

I'm happy that she is no longer tired and in pain. She was very ill the last few months of her life, and it was hard for her. And I'm really glad that she managed to hang on long enough to see her great-granddaughter Amira's birth. She was so thrilled to have a girlbaby in the family again.

Now, just like last year when my Granny died, I am wishing I could go over for the funeral, but with the swine flu being so rife, it would be bad to take that over with me. Not to mention with Yoshi already having lost three weeks of school since September, and my own school schedule being totally out of whack, I simply cannot take any more time off until the new school year now. I'm feeling very far away from home right now.....