All You Can Eat Desert!

The kids had a day off from school on a Monday, so we went out together for all you can eat lunch nearby. It's pretty cheap, about 1,000 yen for adults and 780 yen for kids, you can stay and eat for 90 minutes, which is more than enough time to stuff yourself and let it rest until you feel like desert. Speaking of which, I sometimes feel like I'm paying for all-you-can-eat cotton candy and ice-cream. After about 10 minutes on the real food, the kids are off to the desert bar!

Here the family is lined up in front of the restaurant.

The cotton candy making machine..

..drink bar..

..ice-cream..

..cakes..

..sushi..

..salads..

..fresh meat and veggies for cooking..

..closer up..

..table grill for BBQing the food..

..dad busy at work cooking..

..a very full Jordan..

..girls on their way to stack up a plate..

..pre-fried foods..

I'm sure there was more food, but that was a lot to dig into!

Meet Chester

My friends told me I was insane, and I have to admit, I think I've got a bit of an insanity gene running through my blood and DNA and all that. To add to our happy (and full) household, I threw in a dog!

Here's how it happened:
I'd been thinking of getting the kids a dog for a long time, but I got pregnant instead, so the dog got put on hold. Then I got to thinking, Jordan is at home alone most of the day, with me to play with, and I really don't want to be the one and only toy he has, so a dog would be ideal, maybe when he's about 2 or something.

I met a friend of mine on the road who has 5 small dogs, and asked her where she got them. We chatted and she said she could mention to the local pet store she visits that I am on the lookout for a dog. She said if I got one around 6 months old, it would be way cheap and have all its shots already. I said I was thinking next year sometime, when Jordan would be older and potty trained.

Two days later she calls me to say her shop had 2 dogs that hadn't been sold, and so the prices on them had dropped dramatically. Would I be interested? I said I'd go see them, but I really wasn't interested in buying a dog right now, a baby, starting work again, broke, you know, lots of good reasons.

So, I IMd my friend Renee to say "I'm going to look at a dog and I need someone to talk me out of buying it!" Big help she was! Once we got to the shop and met our Chester, she fell more in love with him than I. Jordan, he really could care less, he was more interested in the plant dirt, but oh well. We brought Chester home and he has been with us for a couple months now.

In case you're wondering, we gave Daddy the honor of naming him since it was a complete surprise, we decided it should be Daddy's dog, you know, forcing him to accept it?

See, I didn't really ask for permission. I sort of asked Art in the morning, "How mad would you be if I got a dog?" and he said, "Well, make sure it's a big one cause if you get a dog we're having hot dogs for dinner for a week!" and since he was so silly about it, i figured he wouldn't be too upset. But as the time came for daddy to get back from work, I sort of chickened out and hid in the bathroom with Jordan, you know, giving the baby a bath, and let the kids deal with daddy's fall-out. Honestly though, the shock of the dog overrid any anger, and after about half an hour daddy and doggy were friends.

Chester is a long-haired miniature chihuahua. He probably won't weight more than 2 kilos when an adult. I thought chihuahas were yappers, and they are, but Chester is a very quiet dog, we hardly hear a peep from him. He is also pretty well potty-trained, with the occasional accident, and honestly, he is adorable. But not as cute as Jordan!

Chester's favorite humping partner..

Favorite sun-spot..With his big sister Juli..

and his best friend Renee..

sleeping on the floor with Jo..so sweet..both of them..great friends..

in his new sweater, trying to get away with Jordan..enemy number one..must hide from Jordan..

Finally

I am finally starting to catch up. But to be fair, I sat down to do my blog on more than one occasion, and either I had a baby start screaming at me, a dog pee somewhere it shouldn't, or the stupid blogger site was having technical problems and after 20 minutes of hard work on an entry, it wouldn't upload anything. Frustrating to say the least, but here I am trying again!

Still Here!

Just in case anyone was wondering whether I'd forgotten about my blog or not, I haven't. But being mother to a little Boogah is exhausting and time consuming, we are not in the stage where I get 5 minute breaks, just enough to log into blogger, then I'm off to entertain, rescue, feed, wash, or play with someone who is very tiny. As it is, he's pulling at my toes trying to get my attention.

So, that's the latest...

Of course, there's tons more going on, maybe this week I'll catch up!

Friendly faces

Just a few pictures I've gathered over the month:

Jordan on the piano--must be from all the Baby Einstein he watches!

Our friend Emma--growing up beautifully! She's the same age as Janina and we've known her since they were in kindergarten.

Me and my smallest babe!

Our good friend Patti and Jordan--Patti lives nearby and is part of our foreigners in Hashimoto group!

Emma in her pool--it takes up a good chunk of her garden, but definitely worth it in the hot Japanese summer.

Jordan standing by his new toy boxy--now if he'd just play with the toys and not everything else in the living room!

My two darlings on the computer--probably watching Avril on You Tube!! OH NO--AVRIL AGAIN!!

Our fall cucumber seedlings ready to be replanted

Jordan trying to feed himself somen noodles...not successfully but very entertaining!

Off to the matsuri!

We took a trip to our local river bank for the local matsuri--complete with vendors, crowds, friends and fireworks!! It's a fun yearly event, but never so much fun as when with friends who add to the excitement and enjoyment! For more pictures and information about Japanese matsuri, see my blog A Foreign Mother in Japan

On our way, along with our comfy beach chairs!

A view of the matsuri.

Our little group of friends...

...Jordan in his stroller..

the kids found a place to sit near the banks.

the beginning of the fireworks show!

Happy Birthday Claire!

It was our friend Claire's birthday, we had a little celebration for her--and for our other friend Kaz whom we didn't get pictures of--sorry Kaz!!

Here's the birthday girl in the birthday hat!

And Claire's son Yuji, who loved the mango mousse cake--courtesy of Costco!

Most of the partiers!

..a bit closer..the food was great!!

Keeping up with us--video of the Boogah!

Enjoy this little remix of some camera videos we took of Jordan!

A few family pictures

Just a few pictures of the family, from our day at Nagashima...

Loved this one of Jordan, we left him with Janina while we went on a ride, he wasn't too happy about it!

Art and I took a breather at a nearby cafe, and of course we took the boogah!
Jordan loves sitting on shoulders, something about being up so high?
A lovely family shot one of the ride attendants took of us...you might see this again in your Christmas card.
Another family shot, minus Jason the photographer.

Half a Hamster

By request, here is the story of our 'half a hamster':

Janina finally talked me into letting her get a hamster, after a few hamster-free years. We went to the local home center to choose one out, and 2 hours later the kids were sitting in the car waiting for me, the hamster in its little carry-home box. I got everything else loaded, shut the car up, jumped in to drive the new addition home, Janina says:
"Mom, I can't find the hamster!!"
"What do you mean, 'you can't find the hamster', isn't it in the box?"
"I let her come out to play and she ran under the seat!" (DUH!!)
"What!!?? Why would you let the hamster out of the box in the car?? Of course its going to run away, it's a stupid animal with a small brain and loves trouble!"

I jumped out and started searching the car (we have a 7-seater Toyota Ipsum, a lot of space to hide). Half an hour later I gave up, we couldn't sit in the parking lot forever, for all I knew, the thing had already run out the door and found a new life in the grass. But I gave Janina an earful and scared the crap out of her, that maybe hammy was in the engine and as soon as I turn it on that was going to be the end of hammy, and no way are we going to buy a new one, etc... she was pretty much in tears (though she can be a tough nut!)

The next day we caved and her dad took her down to find another hamster (after all, we had the food, the cage, the wood chips, all of it waiting for a cute hamster!). Brought the hamster home, put it in the cage, went to empty the car and what do we find?? Hamster droppings in the back of the car--damn that creature--it's made a home in our car--and we have 2 cats as well, dangerous living! And so here we are setting out food and water in our car twice a day for the thing, and I'm feeling that my life is being controlled by our pets. So, Art gets tired of having a hamster living in the car, it's really not a proper place for a hamster to live, and he decides to catch it, how hard could it be really--it sneaks out for food, you got it!

Two hours later Art comes back in the house for refreshments--no hamster--it seems we bought ourselves a clever little devil--it pokes its nose out for food--watches Art, dashes out for food and is back under the seats somewhere before he can react! Well, he finally caught the thing, and now we are the proud owners of 2 hamsters--not for long!!

Unfortunately there's a jealousy issue, and hamster number 2 can't handle being the one and only, so poor little hamster number one who survived the car, loses the battle and we make another little grave in the backyard for her (in total, we probably actually have about 12-1/2 hamster graves around Osaka). So, hamster number 2 is now hamster number 1 and I've given up on remembering names. It's just 'the hamster'.

At this point of time our cats still lived in the house (actually, now it's just cat--we had to relocate one of them due to bad behavior). But this cat, who is really good, seems to have absolutely no interest in the hamster. We could leave cat in room with hamster and come back to cat in room with hamster. Cat didn't sit there eying the snack, cat didn't sit there wooing snack out of cage, cat didn't even seem to know snack was right under her nose, so we didn't worry. Hmmm--cats are clever and know how to wait! One day, hamster 2 disappears. Kids searched the rooms, the house, the yard, no hamster whatsoever--but we've gone through disappearing hamster tricks before, and they always manage to find their way home.

Three days later Jason is cleaning under his bed, and comes out yelling--I found some legs!! Ooooh, yuuuck!! Gross fascination--Jason found the latter half of hamster number 2, and we know what happened to the poor little critter. So, with tears and morbid fascination, (and lots of yelling at cat!) we buried half a hamster next to 2 other hamsters.

And that's the story of half a hamster.

Having a Hamster

I finally realized why my parents adamantly refused to get us pets--well, we had a few here and there, a guinea pig once, (or maybe twice), we tried a dog, didn't last long (poor thing got sick) and when we were all considerably older, we got a cat.

The reason my parents didn't want pets was because--

FIVE KIDS IS A LOT OF WORK!! WHY ADD TO THE RESPONSIBILITY??

My kids are pestering me for a hamster (actually, they'd like 3 hamsters, but are willing to settle for one.) I resisted and resisted and resisted, but they eventually wore me down. I have gone down fighting though, and am milking this for all I can get. I said:

"OK, but this is the deal--
1. You will do 90 minutes of study time for 40 days, once everyone completes their time, you can buy a hamster (emphasis on the A).
2. You will buy the hamster, the cage and all accessories with your own money.
3. You will keep the hamster in your rooms, not in the living room, or any other public area.
4. If I find myself taking care of the hamster, the hamster will find itself living in the yard with the cats!"

So far so good. Three days into the deal and they are completing their first 90 minute study period, guess we'll see how it goes in a couple months--hehe. (I secretly hoped the 'deal' would put them off the hamster, it almost did, but they decided to persevere, and so...we may have a hamster soon! Of course, we have 2-1/2 hamsters buried in our backyard from hamsters who've been part of our family over the years--ahhh, the hamster stories we tell..)

Newest Niecelet

Some adorable pictures of my newest niecelet Ami and her family! We can't wait to meet her in person, and are sad to be so far away! (Please see her blog for more great pictures!)

Sleeping like a doll!

Auntie Auty and cousin Trini

Big sis' Marylin

Grandma and Papa Dave

Papa John and cousin Trini