Last Sunday, we visited Aburatsubo Marine Park in Miura City, Kanagawa. It's about one hour drive along the Pacific Ocean from our home in Kamakura. We can enjoy the beautiful scenery from the car window. There they have a huge aquarium for all kinds of fishes. Also they have excellent shows of dolphins, seals, fishes and so on. You can enjoy the whole day there.

These penguins are called "Rockhopper penguin".
Look at their hair!! Cool, eh?

Jade's 3rd b-day!

November 26 was Jade's 3rd birthday. Even though it was Saturday, my husband had to work as he had a group of customers from Taiwan. She and I prepared all kinds of things for her birthday party for the evening. Oh, look at this adorable card!! It was from her teachers at her pre-school in the town. It tells her actual weight and height along sweet messages from her two teachers!! So sweet!


Anyway, we two spent a great time preparing cakes, food, beverages and played a bit in the nearest park just three houses away from ours. She was so HAPPY all day long and I was happy for her!! When her dad got home, we started our small birthday party for her! Isn't it so great of her to wait until 19.30??? She even didn't have a bite of the cake!!



Most of her friends at her class are already 3 yrs old, so she waited and waited this day!! She used to say "I'm 3 yrs old... (in a small voice) I mean almost 3...." But from now on, she can say I'm big enough and I'm 3 yrs old!!

Well, a happy birthday to my dearest daughter, JADE!
We love you so much, honey!

Autumn colours in Kamakura, Shonan

We Japanese enjoy autumn color of leaves around this time every year. The place where I live is again famous for this and we have tons of visitors from Tokyo Metropolitan Area every weekends. So the traffic is really heavy and we're always stuck on the middle of the streets. This is one thing we hate here in Kamakura, but we're so happy to enjoy these beautiful nature all around us!








These two photos are from Zaimokuza, Kamakura.
A beautiful sunset on the Pacific Ocean.
So nice and peaceful...

Baking sweet potato at yard

Last Sunday, my husband made a small fireplace with bricks at our yard to enjoy baking sweet potato (and potato). It was our first time to do so. My daughter and I collected dried fallen leaves from our backyard to burn in the fireplace. She was so excited about it as she once experienced at her pre-school in the town and she loved it!

Anyway, it didn't take much time to build the small fireplace and we were soon ready to set fire. We also made a coffee with a vintage Pyrex coffee pot to keep us warm. It's getting chilly here in Tokyo Metropolitan area, too.

After a while, we could eat yummy baked sweet potato and potato with hot coffee. It was so delicious!! We've never had thought about doing this kinda thing at our own place, but it's really great to enjoy "outdoor activity" at home!

Busy weeks

First of all, sorry for my long absence!
I've been too busy to update my blog these past weeks. My full-time work at a German company in Tokyo keeps me busy as well as my online shops. I'm now managing a big project at office and it just started. Lots of meetings keep me really busy these days. And I'm receiving more orders for my online shops I manage. But I'm doing just all right!!

Every day, I get orders for bags, fabrics and zakka. These days, I'm especially busy as people are now shopping for Xmas. Yesterday, I shipped 5 Hawaiian bags and 1 Pure linen tote from the local post office to Europe. Those small bags are the most popular at the moment. Probably to give away as a Xmas gift as the price is reasonable?

http://www.h7.dion.ne.jp/~atelierj/
"Chibi Hawaiian Bag"
USD 12.00

Yesterday, I posted our sweet potato digging.
Right after that, we were invited to
eggplant picking for free of charge!!!
Wow!

Have you ever seen a flower of eggplant?
It's a small purle color and so adorable.
Looks so beautiful.
Who can imagine an eggplant will bear
after this pretty flower?

My daughter didn't help us with sweet potato digging,
but she had a so much passion for picking up eggplants!!

If you know any good receipe for sweet potato and eggplant from your own country, I'd love to know!!

Sweetpotato digging in Kamakura!

Last Sunday, we joined "Japanese red (sweet potato) digging" organized by my daughter's pre school here in Kamakura. It was our first time to experience this for me, my mom and my daughter. We were quite excited. Since we were grown up in Tokyo Metropolitan Area, we seldom have chance to visit rural land.

We were so lucky. The weather forecast said it would rain over the weekends, but the rain delayed to Sunday afternoon. So we could finish the digging before it started to rain!!


The red potato wasn't hard to dig out. What you have to do is just dig the soil a bit with your gloved hands, no tools needed. Voila, some sweet potato are here for you!


We harvested about 4.5 Kg! That's quite a lot, isn't it?

It was so strange that my daughter didn't enjoy digging. Usually she loves playing with sand/mud at her pre-school. But not this time. She says she doesn't want to, and just kept standing there with empty plastic bag... On the other hands, me and my mom did enjoy the harvest time a lot!!

what I've found in Osaka

Look this building I'd found in Central Osaka.
Very interesting, eh?
This is called "Organic Building" in Minami-Semba, Osaka.
I was so suprised when I happened to find this one standing besides the street!!



The next one is another interesting one, you see.
This is a man-shaped street light.
I found not just one but several lights like this on other street in the area called, American Village very near Shinsaibashi, Osaka.
So funky!!

Osaka is fun to visit, for sure!

Business trip to Osaka

I had to fly Osaka from Tokyo to do some business last week (it's faster than Shinkansen, just one-hour flight), and I spent one night there. Look at the plane I flew!! I wonder if you recognize this anime character, but it's called "Poke-Mon", a very popular anime among little children all over Japan for the past few years. The flight was at 10:00 AM on a weekday, and there were no kids around. Only adults wearing business suits (including myself!!). It was a bit strange experience. If my daughter were with me, she should have been so excited to see "Poke-Mon" all around her. Even the seat cover was "Poke-Mon" printed.