latest discovery: coffee jelly

while out yesterday for lunch with jeremy, we checked the drinks aisle at the marufuji and i found a yummy concoction: Glico's Dororich: a smooth coffee & milk jelly drink.

coffee jelly isn't anything new to me though, the starbucks here in japan have carried a coffee jelly frappacino for about a year and since i tried it, i've been hooked!

i found coffee jelly mix at a Kaldi Coffee shop while out and about a few months ago.  i have yet to make it, i'm waiting to have the baby first, then to try my hand at making it with a homemade frappacino.  i'll have to look at the packaging and post it up...and then search for it on the internet so i can buy more, since Kaldi seems to rarely carry the same thing for long periods of time...kinda like the coffee flavored gum syrup i can't find anymore.

maybe i'll just have to hit up mio's mom's coffee shop in mizuho/hamura and buy more coffee and gum syrup to last me for a while...

adventures in food

it's been about 2 months since the last post and since then, i've flown to texas and georgia and got to visit family and friends in houston, fort worth, san antonio, and valdosta.  a week after, we trekked with our japanese friends to Youkkai to Nagashima SpaLand and to Mie prefecture to go to Ise Shrine and Nabana no Sato Illumination.  it was quite an extensive trip with lots of flying and drive, but it was well worth it to see everyone...and have everyone see me with my little belly bump!

we got to eat tons of food in texas: pappadeaux's, pappasito's, no hamburger palace (*sniff*), but givral hoang's vietnamese sandwiches, bubble tea, and tons of home-cooked meals at my mom and dad's (bun thit nuong, bun bo hue, goi cuon, banh xeo, uuuugggghhh)

here's jeremy attempt to make his own goi cuon (spring rolls)...he got better the more he practiced. =P

i'll eventually do a massive photo dump on facebook, since i'd like to keep this blog strictly food and crafts.  i'm still working on finishing the rest of tameco's basket liners, slowly but surely, i'll be done in a week or so.  i didn't realize it was so much work...or time to devote.  i'm so tired these days, it's really hard for jeremy to drag me out of bed.  i haven't made anything for myself yet, but i have some ideas floating around for a quilt for the little one.

i finally finalized the guest list for the baby shower and i started a registry on babies'r'us ( i know...how generic ) this week, but i seriously don't know where to start.  it feels weird to invite people to a party to celebrate the birth of a baby and then to ask for gifts.  if i was the prepared parent i should be, i should have all this baby crap already...or be able to finance it.  in any case, we can afford it all, but the ladies really really want to throw me a shower...they've been waiting for the day i got pregnant for YEARS.  horrible memories of them dragging me to the office ladies room and making me tinkle on stick cloud my brain.

while out in mie prefecture, out by Ise shrine, we got to partake in Akafuku mochi, which has been in business for over 300 years.  i wish i took a photo of my mochi, but i guess i'll dig one up online.  we also got to have this awesome sweet potato ice cream at Akage Yokocho:

i finally found a place that sold ice cream mochi by the singles and not surprisingly, i love it.  Chateraise down the street on the east side carries about 6-8 different flavors and i got to try the matcha green tea and the adzuki bean one.  deliciously sinful: pounded rice cake on the outside, green tea and vanilla ice cream on the inside. *drools*

on the holiday on the 18th, me, fer, and his friend lorna wandered over to ozaku to find the columbian restaurant...which i did eventually find after hungrily searching for half an hour, only to find that it was closed. =(

so we went to a lawson to get a snack to tide us over.  while searching for something to nosh on (settled on salmon onigiri ), i saw a can of asahi adzuki bean hot soup.  i didn't buy it but i've been searching for it ever since.  today, while walking in the base exchange, i checked out the DyDo machine and they had something similar below, so you know i had to buy it on my way out and sample it.  sweet and tasty, reminding me of the adzuki bean soup jeremy had at Akafuku Mochi.

 

after grabbing a billion groceries at the commissary, i went home to tidy up my craft room and try this recipe for baked potato soup that jeremy has been begging me to make. it turned out quite good and i replaced the chicken broth with chicken boullion cubes and added a dollop of sour cream to the soup when serving.  it's really a nice comfort food to have on a cold day and jeremy loves it, which means, i can keep making it and enjoying it versus getting the salty one at the chili's *yuck*

 

ok, i'm gonna head back to my room and keep working on the basket liners!  see you in a few weeks!

everything and all at once

well, it looks like i managed to start something and like my usual self, i start a billion projects all at once. i'm watching the TX vs. A&M game, it's 4th QTR and we're up 42-32 (whew!)...so i hope we keep that lead. i mentioned to the husbandface if we could have a UT themed baby room, then he asked "what if it's a girl?" of course, she can be a little longhorn, just like her mom!

it's 49-39 now, less than 3 minutes on the clock, eeeek!

so i have to work backwards, since i uploaded pictures in chronological order but they posted all ass-backward.

i finally started knitting again, nothing special, just another scarf, but look at the yarn i picked up. it was from a year ago at last year's annual craft fair on base. mrs. colleen uchiyama spins her own yarn at home and the results are amazing and beautiful. it's taken me a year to decide to use it, it's just too pretty to knit and contain it in one form. i like scarves, but i'd like to imagine that if my knitting or crochet skills were better, it would be a beanie or hand-warmers. i guess i'll need to stalk her again and get some more before she leaves...or i do.

here's what i started yesterday at the thankgiving dinner party at the glapions.


i started this today, since i have about 2 weeks to get them done before i head out: some basket liners for tameco's baby room. it's gonna be a dallas cowboys theme. 2 down, about 6 more to go and a changing pad cover.


over the weekend, jeremy put the baby crib together. since i declared it a 'daddy-only project', i sat in my sewing room putting together this little guy from http://saltnpaper.blogspot.com/. they've got a bunch of other neat paper folding projects too, so i'll have to favorite them to keep up.


last weekend's baby shower for tameco. this was all gissell's planning and ideas, but i got to put them up. it was a super classy event. turns out, she's an events planner!


i bombed manda's door! birthday bomb! this year's theme was t-rexes, so i poured confetti all over her front door and planted little plastic dinosaurs all around, with balloons, streamers, and her birthday presents. i got this ridiculously awesome baby t-rex for her too, i just couldn't pass it up!






a couple of weeks ago, i met up amanda for her birthday outing to the round 1 in hachioji, she had made me some purple clay roses with glitter. she's getting so damn crafty now!



a daruma i painted at the craft fair this year. totally worth the 500Y. it's supposed to be like a sugar skull for dia de los muertos...but close enough, since i free-handed it!




a pretty hand crafted choker i bought from tamae's friend at this year's annual craft fair. i was disappointed about the number of vendors there, but some of the booths more than made up for it.



and an early birthday party for me from thursday class: a delectable 5 course italian meal with antipasti, pasta, seared crusted scallops, dessert, and great coffee.


so to end it on a good note, i'm glad that the holidays are around, finally some extra days off for me to rest, relax, and unwind with the projects i've been putting off for forever. TX won too! Hook Em Horns!

furrrever

wow, i can't believe it's been that long. nothing much has been going on, other than work, going TDY, jeremy going TDY, trips and outings. i don't think i've made anything in a long time, but that will change soon, i hope.

the latest scoop is that there will be a mini-me come april 2010 and i have so many plans for the little one. homemade clothes and toys, tons of photos to remember what it was like being pregnant, but it hasn't been what i expected. i've completely drowned myself in work (from the hours of 8am-5pm) and when i come home, i crash. no morning sickness to remember how the first few months were like, just a sonogram and a memory of a teeny tiny eensy weensy little fluttering heartbeat. sometimes, i can't even tell i'm pregnant...or i forget. other than gaining a little weight, not much going on the in the buddha belly department.

in any case, pray for change and that i get my creative streak back. i'm hoping to make special something by a certain day, a project to work on with manda, since she went through the same thing i did, and to make some neat stuff...i don't care what. i'm starvicating for A&C.

progress

this week was a productive week:

early on: initiate download of a bajillion movies and videos, mostly oscar contenders

tues/wed: talk to the head cheese about my future at the office: outlook looks good and changes seen in the horizon

wed night: found the okonomiyake place and had dinner with barbara...later on, birthday bombed evie's door

start:batter, pork, cabbage, corn, bean sprouts

end: yummyness

thur night: engrish crass & a good coffee

fri night: karaoke at evie's with manda, barbara, and nicole...and actually sang

sat: bummed around all day because i felt like i was getting sick, that,
and i was tired from friday night (4am??!!), did laundry,
cleaned out the fridge and pantry,
went to the commissary for groceries

today: woke up early, went to the yuzawa-ya in kichijoji with connie and her daughter audrey, bought some stuff to make a necklace, tested the miso salmon and sake butter recipe,
and made the necklace!

miso salmon with rice and sake butter and spinach salad
(similar to the one at cheesecake factory)

final necklace
close up of the beads, chain, and connectors, i used some old faux pink pearls i had laying around and got some green teardrops and pink sakura beads
all in all, very satisfied with this past week, however short it was...

i wish we had 3 day weekends more often though, work is a drag...i guess that's why it's called work...argh.

later, gator!

spoke too soon...

i got to finish thad's curtains when i went home early because i wasn't feeling well...now to get through the rest of this week...and the LeMay team. i hope we win this award, we need bragging rights.

i'm excited, just when i thought i wouldn't be getting to hit the slopes again for another year, i got an invite for sunday to go snowboarding. i'm excited. really excited. i hope it don't break anything...just my ego.

time to hop in the shower and get ready for bed...and figure out how to purl!

night night loves!

feb vs nov

i thought that november usually had a lot of birthdays because everyone copulates in february because of valentine's day and the results of all those couples....copulating...come out in november...case in point: moi, a november baby.

but this months seems fulls of birthdays, first noriko, then eric and andy, eugene, shizu and evie. that's alot of presents to buy. I managed to get a cute purse for noriko and a cake, and for eric, i made him some sequinned pasties. now for shizu and evie...

here are pics from the table decoration contest and a snapshot of the pasties...XXX fun!



i have yet to go snowboarding...that's something else i'm working on...now if only i can finish making these curtains for thad...i think this was one of those times i should have used the "hobby card" = don't turn my hobby into a job...so i agreed and got suckered into making curtains for him, beggars can't be choosers, so he'll have to live the rest of his natural life with the prototypes i've made...

jeremy is still gone and life is exceptionally boring, although quiet, without him. i like the quiet, but if only i could get him to stop making so much noise everywhere he goes...

february

february has had a good start. aside from jeremy being gone all this month, which sucks, i don't have to worry about fixing dinner or keeping the house clean, because i pick up after myself.

on sunday, we (me, tamae, kumiko, rumiko, hiromi, izumi, and shizu) went to a 'table decoration' show that showcased the winners of the tokyo table decoration contest (read: interesting table setting, centerpieces, and ambiance creation). lots of nice table settings, which made me want to invest in some nice china...but i know the movers will eventually break them.

they had alot of pottery and china vendors. i wanted to go to the noritake and the arita vendor, but we had to leave early. but at least i got to see the inside of the tokyodome and the tokyo dome hotel, which has a nice chinese buffet.

i plan on going snowboarding soon and figuring how to knit all those neat yarns i bought from mrs. colleen uchiyama. she handspins these yarns, let me tell you, they are pieces of art and beautiful.

here's a cool video i found on Spike:

Ultimate Canon Rock | Viral | SPIKE.com

awww man...

i embroidered a scarf for loulou and made kairi a little cape from the pink fabric with the crowns on it, but i forgot to take pictures of it. maybe if i get to see her with it on, i'll take a picture of it. i finished our christmas stocking ages ago, i must take pictures of it...which i'll do as soon as i remember.

now, for my next projects...knitting and shrine-making.

merry christmas, loves! see you next year!

sooooo...

i got help on the blog overhaul, but it wasn't much help. i finally have my very own christmas tree and sad little wreath on my door. gold and burn orange of course. all the presents underneath the tree are my birthday presents...*giggles*

i started working on jeremy's and my christmas stockings but i didn't get to finish, so i'm hoping i'll finish it tonight. i painted some banners for the kid's christmas play at the chapel tomorrow. nothing fancy, but helping out a friend.

so here's what you missed, wow, i have't done anything since february...when work got CRAZY...:

february: got butt-naked at the hot spring in the freezing cold. snow...lots of snow...and nekkidness

march: officially became a sworn-in member of civil service...i'm a government work-horse now

april: my sister turned 30 and cried....seriously

may: jeremy deployed, along with g-money, brandolonius, and galvan, all i had was johnitra and dreyson, my little mans


june: johnitra left me for georgia, i'm still waiting for her to end this charade of moving and to come home to japan

july: brewster left his asian mamma

august: nothing much

september: jeremy returns! adjust to having him back around

october: halloween and the bestest costume evar!

november: officially turned 18 again, awesome presents

now: just hanging out and trying to make it more like christmas here. i got a bigger wreath today from the bxtra because it was almost 50% off and got some stocking holders for the floating shelves.

still need to make those damn stockings...

been buying copies of 'cotton friend,' it's pretty good and has alot of cute patterns, i'm currently on the country look, flat riding boots, sweaters and knits...running now too, so we'll see how this goes...

overhaulin'

so i totally spent most of today overhaulin this blog, i'm not done yet and there's more to come!

wicked

some days i like to toot my own horn

and today seems to be the day that everything i do seems to reflect my awesomeness... toot toot!

many compliments on how well i'm performing at work, a few of the senior leaders
think i'm doing great and that i deserve a raise...
it's not possible for them to give me a raise since
i'm a contractor, but just hearing it means i'm doing something right
i finally got an offer to become a permanent department of defense employee,
which rocks because i can finally get benefits, but sucks, because i'm taking
a huge pay cut...we'll see if i take the firm offer...

near the end of january, the senior leaders decided to 'reward' me
for my 15 months of hard work by giving me a good tdy to HAWAII!
i thoroughly enjoyed myself, made some new friends and drank maitais every day

last week, i made 75 conversation cupcakes for valentine's day:

then i went to the hot springs earlier this month and it snowed!
yes, my nekkidness was very cold, but sitting in the hot springs was soooo relaxing,
that i'll have to make another trip here again...i got to make paper and 2 postcards at a
paper making workshop:

tonight, my awesomeness made a diaper cake for my friend
tameco's baby shower, i'm so cracked out tired and my neck & back spasm
is starting up again, i think i'll just give up on playing with
my new apple itouch and go to bed, but lookie lookie!

yes, i am this talented. toot toot!

forever and ever

wow, it's been so long since i've posted.

i haven't been able to craft anything, since i've picked up another contract and

now i teach 2 english classes on top of that.

i had so many plans for all the things i wanted to make and now

it seems like i'll never have time to do them.

hopefully, once work calms down and blows over, i can finally

make the time to do stuff i've been meaning to do for tameco's baby, who's

3 months away.

for new year's, on the 30th, we went to kumiko's house for making mochi

and as always, fabulous food. we got to make sweet bean and strawberry mochi

and they were delicious.

one of these days, i'll be able to sit in on her pottery classes and make something...

3 day weekend & gaming

friday night, the ladies

(angie, meco and daughter, taylor, in tow, joss, and the boss, nanners)
came over for craft night. we didn't so much craft as eat pizza, talk,
laugh, and watch daddy's little girls.
technically, it still was a craft night because i taught
joss the slip knot to start her foundation chain for crochet
and i think i taught her the single stitch.
i think...

even if noone got anything done or started, i think it was a great way for us to unwind,
nanners and joss mentioned that just needed to get away,
from what, i don't know, but i know the sentiment,
sometimes, i just want to be alone,
in my own thoughts and feel some satisfaction.
it's not the same when you complete a project at work...
that special satisfaction when you put your blood, sweat, and tears into
something you created with your two hands...

i started on beading a little owl for my keychain and i got as far as step 18
and then it got too hard...that and i can't read kanji, i just read the diagrams.
oh yeah, and my coworkers seem to think i can read kanji because i own
a gazillion japanese craft books and i speak 4 languages and manage to
understand most of nihongo that is spoken to me, which only seems to be spoken to me
when my coworkers are around...the trips to the craft store, the trip to joyful honda and buying tons of light fixtures. i don't know how i managed that, but i knew how to count and knew enough of the words to get me by...

i started a macrame' project for the ipod today but i got sidetracked playing
guitar hero 2, then karaoke revolution party, then karaoke revolution country...
jeremy made mention that i should just go ahead and buy a wireless guitar so we could get encore of the 80s too, so now i gotta think about that...

i wish they made a karaoke revolution game with 80s hits or
just the cure and depeche mode and madonna, then we'd be jammin' and i've been trying to convince jeremy that we need an xbox because they have better games that are cheaper, but he's not buying it...yet

we tested out our new dance dance revolution for wii and that thing is
HARD!
imagine trying to keep track of 4 arrows, staying on the beat, and now
having to avoid stepping on foot destroyers, doing double-steppers, foot stompers,
AND having two controls in your hands, squeezing the triggers and swinging your arms
AT THE SAME TIME!

i must have looked like a complete idiot...

but what idiot do you know that can do all of the above and be
good at crafting, foreign languages, diagram reading, singing, dancing, air guitar and gaming?

that's right, ME!

cooking 'crass'

i taught/hosted my first cooking/english class tonight.
i got 5 students and i'll get to teach them twice a month :
kumiko, sumiyo, rie, naomi, and miwa.

i tried (and i should have tested this earlier but i thought it was foolproof) a pound cake,
and it totally overflowed from the baking dish to the bottom of the oven
and started burning
*grimaces* not my best first impression...

i had to let them go early because they have kids and family to tend to,
but i let the pound cake bake some more and it turned out really well,
so i hope the teaching liaison, tamae, will deliver the finished pound cake to the students tomorrow

i think we'll go easier next time and try something from a box...like cookies.

their english was great for first timers and i was totally shocked to find that they were in their mid-to-late 30s. and here i am, 25, no kids, teaching them to cook/bake...
it should be the other way around, huh?

i think the best part of teaching tonight was that they were repeating
'slowly' over and over = and it sounded like 'srowry',
adding flour and sugar, but one of them, sumiyo,
was just dumping the ingredients in and naomi and miwa were going nuts
with the electric mixer, getting cake batter everywhere.
it was hilarious. and then we started talking about dislikes and sumiyo said
" i disrike my husband ".
i don't think japanese talk about things like that,
much less in public or with someone they meet for the first time,
but i appreciate their candidness and honesty, whichever,
which makes me feel like they're not afraid to show their opinions and not afraid of nonconformity.

i think i'm going to like this class alot =)

finally!

so finally i'm posting the pictures of mark's pillow covers and other stuff i've made in since then. sunday, i made a dash to the lilyan and went temporarily insane. i got pink and white stripe and pink and white polka dot fabric to make hats for my coworker, tameco's, daughter, taylor's birthday. i think i did alright, being that it's my first time making hats, this will be a
nice excursion into the world of millinery.

i got some weird bendy sticks that help you loop ribbon, rope,
whatever into stuff for drawstrings and more patterns.

mark's pillow cases

my first attempt at button-hole making

my record player

something i've been meaning to make and finally did as a
"see you in a few" present for our 1st shirt

temporary insanity purchases

the drawstring beanie/beret, that kid has one big noggin'

the pattern book i got it from, there's a good reason why eugenia kim banks...because she rocks!

domo-kun rockin' the floppy hat

he's hiding

pins i made for the hat using yo-yo patterns

it's domo-zilla!

so i think domo-kun has official become my model-slash-actor (and not actor-slash-model).
i think he's doing a good job, being that he's up in my header, i don't think anyone else would fill the position quite as well as he would. i put up an ad in the paper and noone else responded too.
except for him. and now he's taken over.

*peace out!*