Spring is just around the corner

Recently the daytime temperatures have been rising, the sun has been shining and the first of the spring flowers have started to bloom.  In the past I used to love this time of year.  The first cup of coffee while reading a magazine on the deck, throwing all the duvets outside to freshen up in the sun, starting to clear out the garden ready for spring planting and having the washing dry outside within half a day.  

Unfortunately with the onset of pollen allergies this time of year has turned into a horrible time where I try to stay inside as much as I can, go through boxes of tissues each day and feel like my throat and ears are going to drive me crazy with their itchiness.   I try to avoid taking medicine, but usually give in at some stage during the day.  I have even started taking notice of the predicted pollen count for the week.... the table below shows that Friday is going to be particularly bad - I can hardly wait!  I never thought I would ever say this, but I am so looking forward to the arrival of summer!

日付	2月27日 (木)	2月28日 (金)	3月1日 (土)	3月2日 (日)	3月3日 (月)
大分市	少ない	非常に多い	やや多い	少ない	多い

Advent Calendar

These posts really are going all over the place... but for my own sake it is a good record of things that have happened over the last few months so please bear with me and my random photos from the camera!

For Christmas 2012 I made my first niece a "Christmas Town" advent calendar  so I wanted to make my second niece an advent calendar too (all things must be fair and even!).  As always I started it a bit late, but thanks to the unfortunate fact that I ended up off work and on the sofa for a week due to having the mumps (not a nice experience!) I managed to get it done and sent away in time for the first day of December.  All of the felt ornaments come off and one was put into each pocket for each day, along with a small treat.... most of which I think made it to my niece!  Hopefully I will be organised enough each year to get the treats to fill the pockets and have them sent away before the start of December.  Gotta love the 100 yen shop for things like this!

Bee meets bee

Following on from the last bee post.... Here is a random photo of a bee eating a bee.  No idea what was going on, but it sat still for about an hour just slowly devouring it on the post of our deck.  I have heard that Japanese bees are smaller than western bees, but have the power to work together to kill larger bees who come to take over the hives - swarming together to make their invaders overheat and die.  Unfortunately it looks like this poor bee had lost all its friends.... definitely a case of safety in numbers, or not in this case!

The bees were back

Another post from quite some time ago!

In 2007 we started our journey into the frustrating world of bee keeping.  At that time we relied on people telling us when they found swarms of Japanese honey bees and we would go and collect them, bring them home and put them into our homemade boxes and hope they stayed.  We tried to think about the perfect place to put the hives so the bees would feel at home.  Unfortunately they would always stay for a bit, but not more than a year - eating all their honey before they took off for better pastures.

A few years ago my husband bought two new boxes which were designed to attract the bees to them, in theory meaning we wouldn't need to go and actually catch the bees and bring them back.  Yet again we sought out the perfect locations, bought special lilies to help attract the bees and waited and waited and waited a bit more.  Not much luck...  So the boxes were thrown into the garage a couple of years ago when life got out of control and we figured eventually we would get around to getting them out in the perfect location again.

Roll around to last year.... the bees came back... in the garage... where we dumped the boxes a couple of years ago. There were many debates about what to do - I was particularly keen to get them moved so that we could get in and out of the car without worrying about how many bees were going to join us for a drive.  It was particularly important to me that they were moved because we had my brother, sister-in-law and 1 year old niece staying..... I didn't really feel like having to take them to the emergency room if the bees decided to swarm while we were getting into the car.

My husband was just so happy that they were back that he was determined to let them be and refused to try and move them.  They got very active during the day, but as my husband was at work most days he never saw it.  They never stung us, but it did get a bit frustrating having to try and reassure any visitors who came to the house that they were our pets and therefore perfectly safe.

In the end they made quite a lot of honey, but just before we were about to harvest some of it they were invaded by bugs, ate most of their own honey and then ran away.  At least it solved the problem of having to move them.   Now if I could just get my husband to move the box out of the garage we may not have to go through the whole thing again this spring!

Soba Making

My family from New Zealand comes to visit us a lot - which is great, but means that we are always looking for new places to take them that will interest them as well as my kids.  When my mother came to visit in December we decided to try the "soba making experience" in the town next to ours.  The town is trying to promote themselves as a soba town so have started a place where you can go and they will help you to make soba noodles or actually learn to make them professionally over a number of sessions if you want to.

It was the second time my son had made soba and so we let him do the whole thing.  I found it fascinating.  I never realised there were so many complicated steps in getting the dough formed perfectly and then the dough rolled to exactly the right shape and size.  I would never be patient enough to do it each time and  I could never remember all the steps!  From memory it took about and hour and a half for the whole process.  The other thing that impressed me was that there was zero waste.  All bits that were stuck to hands were carefully scraped into the mixture, every speck of flour was carefully swept up from the table and reused. 

Masaki's favorite part of the whole process was using the huge knife to chop it all up.  He has now decided that after he becomes Olympic champion he is going to start a soba shop....
The soba was all taken home and it was quickly devoured by all!

Hatsu-Bon

I am getting a bit behind on the posts now... photos of nieces and nephews seem to be flying into my in-box from all directions. Very grateful!

These photos go way back to August... it was the first "Obon" since my mother-in-law died, which is quite a big deal here.  Obon is the season where deceased come back to visit for a few days and check that everyone is doing okay and looking after things in the way they should be.  For about a week before hand there needs to be someone at the house all day every day to receive visitors who come to pay their respects, leave an envelope of money, drink a glass of cold tea and then go home with a little bag of goodies.  We had a total of 163 people come to pray... which means 163 cups of cold tea... and 163 envelopes of money to open, count and record who gave how much.

As well as the envelopes of money, the relatives and close friends give lanterns, baskets of packaged foods surrounded by plastic flowers and boxes and boxes of beer. 

I am in two minds about the whole process.  I like the fact that it is a time when people can remember the recently deceased.  I like the fact that the whole family gets together for a few days.  What I don't like is the commercialism and waste assosciated with the whole thing.  All of the food baskets cost a minimum of about 10,000 yen (often up to 20,000) and are on lovely wooden frames etc. which are all thrown away.  The value of the actual food is probably only 3-4,000 yen.   A lot of the food is also wasted because there is so much of it and it can't be opened until everyone has already gone home - ie. you can't use it when all the family is gathered and it would be most helpful!   The lanterns are also thrown away... each one again costs at least 10,000 yen....

My biggest gripe is about the big monstrosity in the corner of the first photo.  It is basically a lot of plastic flowers and some plastic doves with lots of silver glittery stuff (which is now keeping crows out of my garden!).  It cost 90,000 yen (on special) .... it was burnt when it was all finished.... my husband and his sister were expected to buy it... in fact it was ordered for them by my father-in-law and they were given the bill.  As far as I can tell it is not a necessary part of the whole event, but the companies have done such a good job of pushing them on people that they have come to believe they will bring bad luck on the family if they don't buy it.

Anyway, we managed to survive the whole thing and are still getting through cans of crab meat and bottles of beer.  Here's hoping we don't have another event like this in the near future.

Chicken delicacies

 It rained all last night so my big plan to get on with some weeding in the garden flew out the window.  Pulling weeds out of mud is never fun!  Instead I decided to make another garden in the tunnel house and fill it with some peas and lettuces and a couple of rows of spinach and radishes thrown in for good measure.  The other gardens are going so well I'm hoping this one will too.

When I make the new "gardens" I fill the boxes with lots and lots of delicious leaf mould that has been maturing over the past year or so.  It appears that the leaf mould is the perfect breeding ground for stag beetle larvae.  With every scoop of leaf mould there seem to be at least 3 or 4 larvae curled up ready for  metamorphosis in spring.  I have no idea if they would do anything bad to the seedlings, but just to be on the safe side I try to remove as many of them as I can - some of which are rather large!  

I try not to waste things so the larvae get taken to the chickens, who seem to be able to smell them coming and go into a real frenzy.  The largest ones are usually left till last, but within a matter of minutes they are all polished off.  I'm presuming the stag beetle isn't on the endangered population list.... otherwise my chickens may need to be arrested!

Muscles I never knew I had

Before

 When my daughter started junior high school she joined the volleyball team.  She had never played before, but has become a very good server very quickly.  Another girl joined at the same time and unfortunately hasn't been blessed with learning the serving technique so quickly.  After thinking about it a bit more we realised that it was probably because Emily had done a lot of swimming before starting volleyball and therefore had already developed the muscles necessary for serving before she even started.  After a big day with the axe yesterday I am thinking that if I chopped wood every day I could become a professional volleyball server - even if I was only subbed on to serve.  My muscles are telling me that they have worked very hard!  

After

It is the time of year again where we get our wood pile ready for the following year (or actually 2 years later).  I managed to chop enough yesterday to fill one whole row of our wood shed and today put away another rows worth.  We now have just over 4 rows full.... 2 more to go.  Fortunately my father-in-law is enjoying using the chainsaw this year... long may it last!

The good and bad of snow days

Today's post is sponsored by an incredibly beautiful lettuce carrying niece - who could resist writing a blog post in return for such great photos!  I tried to upload the photo to show you but for some reason it wouldn't work.  Maybe next time!

I have to admit that I am not a parent who jumps for joy when the school calls and says that school is closed for the day because of snow.  I love my children, but I also love my quiet time at home.... alone....  Of course the children were more than happy that we were blanketed in snow and spent most of the day outside making snowmen and an igloo.  They informed me that it was a romantic igloo as it was Valentine's day.  The romance came in the form of 4 little snowmen inside the igloo - two on each side.  Not exactly my idea of romance, but I guess it is the thought that counts!

On a not so happy note my lemon tree and one of my feijoa trees didn't enjoy the snow so much.  The lemon tree was completely toppled over and I lost about half of the feijoa tree.  Fortunately it is the side of the tree that doesn't produce vast quantities of fruit and it looks like the remainder of the tree is fine.  A trip to the plant shop tomorrow should hopefully find a replacement lemon tree and it forces me to use

up the lemons that were on the tree a little more quickly than I otherwise would have.  I think another batch of lemon honey tomorrow will start the ball rolling. 

New Quiet Book

I finally finished my third quiet book not quite in time for Christmas..... This time I stole a lot more ideas and did a lot more fiddly sewing... the main site I used is http://www.imagineourlife.com/  She has some fantastic ideas and lots of free templates.
Now I just need to wait for another niece or nephew to come along so I can try some more ideas!

Snow, snow and more snow!

Today's post is courtesy of a very cute shot of a cute little boy chewing on his mother's nose..... gotta love it!

Since lunch time yesterday we have had a pretty big dumping of snow (for these parts anyway).  We spent all last night groaning every time we heard big lumps of snow falling from the upper level roof onto the lower level roof and then onto the deck.  We're hoping it hasn't done any damage to the solar panels.  There have been phone calls going backward and forward, but as predicted school has been cancelled for both children so we are all at home camped in front of the fire with afghan cookies in the oven.  The best place to be on a snowy day!

These photos were kindly taken by my son... who was excited to find so many animal footprints in the snow.  I was just happy that I didn't have to venture outside to take them!

Proudly Sponsored by.....

Today's update is proudly sponsored by my very cute nephew.  He is only about 6 months old but he has decided that he should do some bartering with me and that he will send me a photo of himself in exchange for every blog entry I do.  As I have never seen him in person and have seen very few photos of him I've decided to take him up on the challenge and try to catch up on my very neglected blog in the process.  　As a warning, they are going to be very random entries!

 

 We have a large tunnel house (about 24m long) that until this year has been very under utilised.  The main reason for this is that in the past when I have tried to plant things in there my father-in-law has always decided out of the blue that he needs to use it for seeding something or other and ends up pulling all my stuff out just as it is about to really start producing.

However it seems that he has now decided he has no need to do anything in the tunnel house so I think I have free reign over it.  Time will tell if this is correct or not!

The house isn't heated, but will still get up into the 40s on a sunny day in winter so I figured I could probably plant something and get it to grow if I kept my fingers crossed correctly.  I built a few beds and filled them with some horse poo and lots of rotted leaves and so far have managed to get some radishes, mesclun lettuce mixes and some spinach to seed.  I also threw a few bean seeds into the ground and a few are now poking their heads through.  Overnight temperatures are pretty low so chances are they won't do very well, but it is fun to try.  

I also found some very cheap passionfruit vines that I have managed to keep alive and will hopefully take off as spring approaches.

Passionfruit vines

While collecting the horse poo I found a pile of old glass doors at a friend's house which looked like they needed a new home.... they are proving to be great for raising the temperature a little more for starting off some seeds.  There are already a few tomato seedlings poking through as well as some random flowers and peas.  Hopefully they will get a bit of a start and can be planted into the new beds before the weather gets too hot for them.

Spinach, Mesclun, Radishes

I have always had an asparagus bed in the tunnel house but this year I finally got around to putting a box around it and filling it with... you guessed it - horse poo!   I'm hoping we are going to have the tastiest asparagus ever this year!

I'm guessing that I have now managed to get about a third or more of the tunnel house under control.  It is a great place to retreat to in this season, but by June and July visits become far too hot so I'm enjoying it while I can.

Next decision... more beds or not... sleepers are heavy to cart around alone!

Seedling "house"

First Time Visitors

I am lucky to have many New Zealand family members who seem to love Japan as much as I do (or perhaps it is just the great company.....). Most of my family have been here at least once and there are a few who make the pilgrimage annually.  However our current visitors (my sister, brother-in-law and 2 year old niece) are making their first trip here so it is interesting to see their reaction, rather than the reactions of the regular visitors.

I always forget where I have taken different people so as a record for me for when they come next time (because we all know once you have been here once you just can't resist coming again...) I'll briefly record each day here.....

Day 1 - arrived at Fukuoka at about 4pm so a quick ride home on the highway in time for some tea, quick conversation and some sleep!

Day 2 - a slow day while recovering from sinus problems and general tiredness. A visit to Usa Shrine... and that was about it.

Day 3 - A far more active day with a visit up the mountain on a ski lift to visit Rakanji.  Shopping at the mall on the way home.

Day 4 - A day at the big park with Emily.  Lots of slides, running and a huge walk around the lake.  Home for icecream and leg resting!

Day 5 - Today - A HUGE day... Started out by going to watch some of a kindergarten sports day.  Abigail even got to run and get a balloon attached to some snacks.  Next a trip into the mountains to visit my favorite temple, Futagoji.  Peaceful as ever and kind Japanese people as ever, with random Japanese people giving Abigail icecream.  She is slowly learning that a smiling face is more effective than a grumpy one if you want to get treats from total strangers!  A short stop at the park on the way home then a quiet evening for Abigail and I, but a much louder evening for Fiona, Jeremy and Tom at a drumming concert in Nakatsu.  Haven't heard how they enjoyed it yet, but I'm sure it will have been a highlight of their trip.

And that is an update for now - I'm sure there were a few other bits in there, but I'm glad I wrote it as I'd already almost forgotten what we had done!  Here are a few photos in random order...

Change in routine..... for this week!

It is 7pm on Wednesday and I am at home... it is a very strange feeling!  Wednesday is usually my "Wonder Woman" day, but today my husband took the day off so he has taken on some of the transporting of children and I get to actually relax in the evening and tell you about my normal Wednesdays - aren't you lucky!

8:00am Head to elementary school to do a voluntary 15 minute "Read an English book" session with the 3rd and 4th graders.

8:40am Arrive home and make dinner for my father-in-law, daughter and husband ... usually curry, stew or something that can withhold sitting all day.

9:40am Head to kindy to teach a relatively nice, but very energetic 5 year old class for an hour.

11:40am Arrive home after a quick shop on the way home.  Check that the world hasn't fallen apart on the Internet and have a quick coffee.  Finish making dinner and make two dinner boxes for my son and I (completely different contents from the dinner for the rest of the family....) 

2:10pm Go and collect my son from school and drop him home to do his homework.  Race back out the door to be at my daughter's school by 3pm to pick her up.  Race her to piano and sit and wait, watching the clock anxiously....

4:20pm (if the piano teacher hasn't talked for too long) leave piano, drive home and drop my daughter off, pick up my son, making sure the dinner boxes are in the cooler box.  Need to be in and out the door in literally 5 minutes. 

Drive to Oita - this takes between 1 hour 10 minutes and 1 hour 30 minutes depending on the traffic....  Sit and watch my son at athletics for 2 hours (not by choice, it is just too far to drive home in between!).

8pm - leave Oita and drive home again... eating a dinner box on the way - sometimes a little tricky to drive while using chopsticks!  

9:10pm finally arrive home and try to get my son in the shower and ready for school the next day. 

In total it amounts to approximately 180km of driving.

And that is my normal Wednesday!  I think I need to encourage my husband to take more Wednesdays off work......

When this routine first started I didn't bother making the dinner boxes for my son and I and we just bought bento boxes at the convenience store on the way home.  Then the evening trips to Oita increased to twice a week and I was giving my son some maths practice in the car on the way there.... Approximately 500 yen per bento per person (I am not good at not getting a drink or something to go with it).  That makes 1,000 yen per night - times that by two nights a week and then times that by 50 weeks a year and you get..... 100,000 yen!  After we did those sums I decided that perhaps making a dinner box wasn't so much trouble.......

Sprint final

Sorry, I promise this is the last child based entry for a while... I put this video up on Facebook, but forgot to post it here.  This is the final from the All Japan Elementary School Championships... look for the tall boy in red!

Piano concert... again

Lately I have found myself completely unmotivated to write this blog...... but with the school holidays finishing tomorrow I'm hoping that I will be much more motivated to write about some of the things that have been happening around here.  I will be back to the strange things that happen here in rural Japan soon.  I promise that the next time you visit it won't be a brag post about my children, but for now.... 

Update on my son's athletics - he did a fantastic job at the All Japan Elementary School championships and came in 7th overall.  Not bad for only about 3 months practice!  I will hopefully get a video up soon...

Here are the videos for my family of Emily's latest piano concert - she challenged herself to sing this time too... and did a great job!  Enough bragging for today.  Here is some music to get you through your morning coffee.