Well, we're back! We just spent two weeks in the US visiting family and had a great time! Lots of love and thanks to Grandma for having us over! Grandma finally got to see her new grandson Noah, and Anri and Sara had a blast at the pool, on a boat and in the mountains!



The trip out was long and tiring, but we finally arrived in Farmington and were able to see almost the whole family. Best of all, Anri and Sara got to play with their cousins. The house looked like a nursery school from day to day and it got noisy.

We also took a day trip or two. We went to Lackawaxen, PA to see the Zane Grey Museum.



We also went to Plymouth, MA to look at Mayflower II. Anri wanted the ship to sail out to see with her on it, but she had to wait until the next day, when we took the slow ferry to Nantucket. We spent a day on Nantucket, walking around town, looking at all the pretty houses and letting Tomomi take a look in all the little shops. Tomomi LOVED Nantucket. Very few Japanese know about this place.



In between, the kids went to the Feild Club a lot, and Anri had her first swimming lessons there. We all ate way more than we should have, but we are making up for that now that we are back in Japan.

We took a lot of photos, of course! I'll put up the link to these soon!

On Father's Day, I took the girls up to the mountains for a day of hiking and beautiful views. I didn't even realized it was Father's Day until much later on. Though we had gone hiking before, this was the first trip up Kamuriki, a peak that can be seen from just about anywhere in town.



Tomomi stayed home with Noah, and I took the girls in the car up the mountain to a small parking area on the side of the winding mountain road. From there, it was only about 30 minutes to the top with the first half walking on a gravel service road. The second half was a well-maintained trail. Steeper, but Anri ould handle it just fine. Sara rode in the pack on my back.

On the way up, Anri was a bit scared of bears, even though there weren't any, but I told her that if she sang somgs or talked while walking, the bears would not come near us. So she sang "do re mi" all the way to the top. At points along the way, we were rewarded with beautiful views of almost the entire range of the North Alps. At the top, we could see all of Chikuma, the town we live in, as well as the valley leading south to the city of Ueda. While at the top, we had some snacks and juice by the little Shinto shrine standing there.

We'll be going again, next time with Tomomi and Noah. The hike is easy and it would make a good spot for a family picnic. For photos, click here. This is our June 2008 photo album and photos from this day are toward the end.

Noah became one month old on the 17th, and on the 20th we took him to a Shinto Shrine for o-miya-mairi, a Japanese custom whenever there is an addition to the family.

The ritual done in the shrine is short, involving a Shinto priest pounding a drum and reciting a number of chants to alert the Shinto gods about presence of the new baby. While we have done this twice before with Anri and Sara, this was the first time with a baby boy, and Noah was wrapped in a child-size silk kimono for the occasion (girls in Japan get more lavish attention later on in their development). The kimono was a gift from Tomomi's parents, as is common with these things, and it is specifically designed and sized to drape the boy when he is an infant, while at the same time allow him to wear it when he is five for his Shichi-go-san.

Aside from this, the only other thing that happens when a baby reaches one month is the ordinary one-month check-up. Both Noah and Tomomi are fine.

For the first time in 2 years, we spent Christmas in the US in 2007, taking the long journey to Farmington to Grandma's house and visiting family for 2 weeks.

Anri and Sara had a great time playing with Grandma, Grampie Bob and Duffy (although Duffy's antics occasionally freaked out Anri!) The kids also loved playing with their cousins. It was our first time seeing Nicholas and Matthew, and we were very happy to finally meet them. Anri had a blast with her cousin Emily. The two were inseparable during their time together and Anri's English ability was noticeably improving by the hour. Isaac was great to see too, and I sat there marvelling at just how much he looks like his Daddy. During our stay, we did a ton of shopping for supplies we can't readily get in Japan. We went to the States with two suitcases and returned just within the baggage limit with 6. Anri had her first experience skating and took a ski lesson for the first time. We all had a great time and now that we're back, we've been busy unpacking and getting back into our usual routine. We have over four-hundred photos from our trip, whcih can be viewed here.

Thanks and lots of love to Grandma for having us and to the Fishers for their wonderful dinner the night before we left!

In previous years, our tiny apartment limited the scope of any special event we wanted to hold. But now, with our new home and a lot more space, we were able to have our first large Thanksgiving Dinner, and welcomed friends and family in the area to join the party.

Japan has a labor-related national holiday around the same time, and this year, the holiday was on Friday, so we did our Thanksgiving a day late. Altogether, there were 14 of us, all crowded around short tables in the living room. The guests: Shizuko and Akira, who went to Maui the same time as we did last February, our friends Udo and Tomiko and their kids, Vera and Lukas, Tomomi's cousins Megumi and Kiyomi, Tomomi's aunt Katsuyo, and Megumi's husband, Hayato.

Tomomi cooked turkey, mashed potatoes, made a salad and baked apple pie and pumpkin pie, while the other guests all brought food and drink for all to share.

Once the kids were done with their food, they went upstairs to play, and when I went up to check on them, I found them sitting and watching Toy Story 2.



Everyone seemed to have a great time, and we look forward to doing this again in the future. We hope everyone back in the States had a great Thanksgiving too. Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Birthday, Sara!

It was one year ago today that Sara was born, and we celebrated her first birthday tonight with lots of food, ice cream cake and presents.

Baa-chan and Uncle Kenichi came over for dinner, a big meal with food prepared by Tomomi and her mother, and Anri and Sara had a great time playing with Uncle Kenichi. After dinner and the opening of presents -- all clothes for Sara, and one little pop-up book -- we finally brought out the Baskin-Robbins ice cream cake and sang Happy Birthday.

Sara couldn't quite blow out the lone candle on her own, but with a little help from her big sister Anri, it was out in no time.

Anri gave Sara a present too. Anri drew a picture of Sara, with very long hair and wrote Sara's name on it in English. Below Sara's name, Anri wrote "age 1" in Japanese. There's more writing on the top right side, but nobody is reall sure what that is!

Here is the drawing. To enlarge it, just click on the image.

Yesterday was the annual Halloween Party in Kamiyamada, and this year, Anri had a new costume!


She dressed up as Kiki the witch from the Miyazaki animated film Kiki's Delivery Service. Lots of people recognized her outfit, since this film is very popular. Anri's broom was a bit too heavy for her to carry around, but that's what Daddies are for. She and the other kids went all over the town getting candy and other treats from the various hotels and businesses that agreed to play along. Nobody here knows what trick-or-treating is, so it had to be explained to everybody and a large number of places agreed to participate.

More photos of this day, including Daddy's costume are viewable here.

Anri celebrated her first Shichi-go-san, a holiday meaning "7-5-3" that honors girls age 3 and 7 and boys age 5. It is a big milestone for kids in Japan, and the day typically involves getting dressed up, visiting a shrine to ask for prosperity, and taking lots of photos.



Anri's day started at 8am at Shizuko's salon, where she had her hair done up in the traditional style, complete with ornaments. Then it was off to Zozan Shrine in Matsushiro, a district of Nagano City. The purpose of the shrine visit -- more for the sake ot tradition than belief -- is to ask for good health and prosperity in her life. After a few photos and much admiration from others at the shrine, we headed off to the photographer's studio for pictures.

Anri was a good girl throughout the photo shoot, and stood smiling most of the time. We are very excited to see how the photos turned out, but we'll have to wait a week or so until they are ready.

In the meantime, there are some photos already viewable from our own camera and from Tomomi's cousin Megumi's camera. To view these photos, click here.

Summer vacation has come and gone, and it was a hot one. The weather in parts of Japan reached the highest temperatures in 74 years. Nagano's heat was not record, but it was hot enough to make our move to a new home very tiring. It's just about done, now, so starting today, we will begin the monumental task of unpacking everything.


The new house is a rental, costing us about the same as the small apartment we were in. We have double the size now, plus plenty of storage and a yard for the girls to play in. Moving was a task, and we owe lots of thanks to Paul and Leon Hale, who drove up from Nagaoka for a day to help with the large firniture items. And thanks to Tomomi's brother, Tadahiko, cousin Megumi and her husband Hayato who helped with the last minute items. The heat was tough at times, and I went through bottles of iced tea every day (barley tea, non-sugar). The only thing left to do now is disconnect the internet connection here and take the computer over to the new house.

In the middle of the move, we took a day off to go to the Gunma Safari Park and let Anri see some animals. Located in the next prefecture from Nagano, the Safari Park is the drive through type, and Anri had a blast seeing zebras and giraffes walking right past her window. Later on, we got a photo taken with a lion cub. Look in the photo below. That is a real lion I am holding. Anri was a big scared it would eat her.

It's been a long time since I actually made an entry. Sorry about that. With my new kindergarten classes that started up again in May, I have had little time to update everyone with news and photos. But, at long last, I have a free moment, and here's what went on with us during Golden Week.

Golden Week, the week from April 29 to May 5, is a popular time for Japanese people to get away from work and enjoy themselves for a little while. While many choose to take trips overseas, we stayed in country, enjoying the mild weather of Nagano and taking a trip to Yokohama for some shopping. The first day of Golden Week, Tomomi had a hula lesson, so Anri, Sara and I hiked up a nearby mountain with Tomomi's cousin Megumi and her husband Hayato, to the ancient Mori Shogunzuka tomb. Sara was in the baby carrier and Anri hiked up all by herself! We had a small picnic on the grassy lawn there before heading down.

The next day, we took a trip to a local zoo to let Anri see the kangaroos there. After a picnic by the river, Anri saw the three kangaroos at the small, old zoo in Suzaka, just north of Nagano City. The roos were sleeping, of course. It was the middle of the afternoon. So we went to a nearby park with a pond where I took Anri on a rowboat for half an hour. Anri insisted on rowing the oars with me, so we made a little game out of it. She can row, but only if we sing "Row Row Row Your Boat" as we do it. And, Anri could not stand up in the boat. That was most important, of course. Tomomi watched from shore, taking video as we passed by.

On the 1st, we got in the car and drove to Yokohama, the more fun and much more popular neighboring city of Tokyo. The drive down to the Tokyo/Yokohama area went without incident, except for the last stretch into Yokohama itself, where we missed an exit and ended up taking a circuitous route to the Yamashita Park area. Sara cried when she was hungry, but otherwise slept the whole way. Anri was quite entertaining, asking us every few miles, "Is this Yokohama?" Hearing this question every minute or so was pretty funny, in restrospect, but I told Anri, "If you see any mountains, then we aren't there yet."

We arrived at the New Grand Hotel at around 3pm. After checking in, I took a restless Anri around the old lobby and parlors of this historic hotel. MacArther once stayed here, I read somewhere, and the old wing of the hotel is charming in a style you never see anymore -- certainly not in Japan, anyway.

Anri was running around uncontrollably in the parlors and it only got worse later on when we went to Motomachi, the big shopping area here. As we went from store to store, Anri was not at all content to stay nearby. Just as she is always off visiting other classes at kindergarten, Anri repeatedly broke loose from our hands and took off around the store, picking up and playing with things as she went. Going from store to store in Motomachi, Anri seemed to think that we were not in Yokohama, and kept asking, "Daddy, are we going to Yokohama?""

Anri, we are IN Yokohama. This IS Yokohama." Five minutes later, "Daddy, are we going to Yokohama?" Sigh.

Anri's Antics amused the store clerks, especially the ones in Baby Gap, where Anri was playing shopper with fervor. The whole time she was taking items off racks, holding them up against her body and asking, "Look at this. This is pretty, isn't it?"

After a tantrum thrown in the Motomachi Starbuck's, we knew that dinner at a restaurant later on would be a bad idea, so we headed back to the hotel, dropping by a convenience store along the way. It was here that Anri decided to run laps around the store while Tomomi chased her. On return to the hotel, we were thoroughly wiped out, but we got a new Kitamura wallet for Tomomi, and the evening view from our room was beautiful.

The next day we woke early and got out by 9am. The weather was nice, so we got a cup of coffee in Yamashita Park,, a harborside park across the street from our hotel. Anri saw the boats in the harbor, one being an old luxury liner. We then took the Sea Bass boat, a kind of touristy water bus, to the old red brick warehouses -- in the Minato Mirai area -- now serving as a shopping center. On the way, we passed by a pair of Japan Coast Guard ships, something I had never seen before. From the dock, we walked to our first destination: the big ferris wheel in Minato Marai. The largest ferris wheel in the world, we figured this was Anri's treat for the day. Tomomi was scared. Anri was thrilled. Sara was sleeping the whole time.

From January 28 to February 2, we headed off to Maui to visit Grandma and Bob at the Four Seasons. It was a long-awaited trip for us and for Grandma, who finally got to meet Sara and play with Anri for the first time in over a year.



At long last, Anri got to play on the beach, both with Mommy...(below)



...and with Grandma...



The unusually rough waves made swimming a bit too much of a risk, so Anri's beach time was limited to wading and trying to stay up against the strong undertow. She quickly got into the routine of picking up clumps of recently moistened sand in her hands, waiting for the wave to come in, dropping the sand in the water and then sitting down while the undertow brought everything back out to sea.

Anri also got to make a sand castle. Her first, although Daddy helped out.



We were "blessed" with a week's worth of Kona winds, which meant that our flight to Maui from Honolulu passed over the beautiful north coast of Molokai, but also meant that there was rain at some point almost every day. But that didn't at all spoil our fun. Anri was so happy to be with Grandma, the two of them actually got on the bed and started jumping together!



It was a great trip, and we were so happy to be able to see Grandma and Bob again. We are already thinking of going to CT for Christmas.



We took a lot of photos from this trip. To see them, click here.

Right on cue, Anri says, "THREE!" when asked how old she is. Her third birthday was today, and just like on Christmas, she was in heaven over all the presents she got!



Anri had a great birthday cake, brought over from the local bakery by Jii-chan. Among other presents, she got a Candy Land game, a Barbie doll and a big box of wooden blocks to play with. It was the second very happy day in a week for Anri!



The Candy Land game was especially great. She insisted on playing it no fewer than 8 times on her birthday alone!

Halloween is well-known in Japan, especially by children and their parents, but the actual trick-or-treating that kids so look forward to in the US is strangely absent wherever you go here. It was a nice surprise therefore, when we took Anri to her first Halloween party in Kamiyamada Onsen today -- a party which included a march around town to receive treats.



Anri picked out her costume on her own, from a selection of outfits at the local Toys R Us. Her choice: Umm...a punpkin fairy, I suppose. She liked it, is what matters, we supposed, so that is what she wore all day today during the party and trick-or-treating.

The event was part of the Kamiyamada Onsen Soba Festival. Throw a food event of any kind in this country and the Japanese will flock to it! Kamiyamada Onsen is the hot spring resort area of our town, and features a number of small and large hot spring inns -- most of them in the traditional Japanese style. Tyler Lynch, an American who is the Proprietor-in-training of the Japanese inn, Kamesei, invited us to go to the party, which he led. Either he, or somebody else, went through the enormous trouble of making arrangements with numerous local businesses to hand out candy and snacks to the costumed kids walking about town. Without this kind of preparation, nobody would know what they were expected to do in the face of trick-or-treaters.



The party began with a march in front of the costume judges. Then, small groups of kids began carving jack-o-lanterns, another relatively unknown Halloween craft over here. After a telling of the story of Halloween, the kids, over 130 of them, were divided into about a dozen groups and led to the various participating hotels, shops and other businesses for their treats. It was a lot of walking, but Anri would later go home with quite a bit of sweets and snacks. One place, a fruit stand, gave out a banana and a persimmon to each child. Some places gave out individual treats, while others gave out large bags of stuff. One of the businesses, a photographer's studio, had stools set up outside for a group photo of the kids.



Halfway through, Anri got tired of all the walking and chose to ride out the rest of the way on Daddy's shoulders. She never tired of the events, though, and had a great time wearing her little orange...pumpkin, uhh, fairy (??).

For more photos of this event, please take a look at the album Anri 10-2006 in our Photo Gallery.