Kintaikyo Matsuri

We walked on fire!

Today Melissa and I went to the Kintaikyo Bridge festival with her son Elijiah. It was a Japanese holiday today. We wanted to get there early so we could catch the fire walk ceremony at 9:10am. We watched the performance and was asked by one of the announcers if we wanted to do it, too. We decided we would try it! It was something we had never done before. I was a little nervous at first. I thought it would be very hot but it wasn't. Our feet were so black after walking over the ashes. We went to Kiko park and dipped our feet into the fountains to clean them. We had so much fun and we made a memory we will never forget!

During the fire walk ceremony, I called Eiko to join us. She met us at Kiko park, next to the Kintai bridge, to see the rest of the festival. Eiko and I stopped and did the tea ceremony together. It was 500 yen a person and they gave us a sweet and Macha and then we moved to the second area and had another type of tea and a sweet cracker. We had lunch at a restaurant near the bridge and then headed over to the Jyokamachi Flea Market.

Japanese Tea Ceremony

Melissa & Elijiah

The Fountains at Kiko Park

Kimono Costumed Parade

Taiko Drums

Maple City!

Maple City Restaurant!

Atsuko and the rest of the cooking class members took me out for lunch at Maple city. It was my first time going there. Wow! It was so good and the restaurant was beautiful!

Thank you ladies for letting me teach you American cooking and I will truly never forget you and this experience you gave to me. Everyone of you has a place in my heart! It is hard for me to leave you and Japan but I will definitely keep in touch. I will miss all of you! XOXOXOXO

Akari Restaurant

I met Kiriko at her house and she drove us to Hiroshima to Hondori street. Kayoko, Kazue, Mitsuki & Yoshie met us there, too! Thank you all for taking me to lunch! I will miss you sooooo much!!! XOXOXO

Kayoko & Kazue

Lemon-Spinach Chicken

I thought I would share this with you. I just made this yesterday and really liked it. I doubled the recipe to fit my family but you don't have to.

2 (10 oz.) packages fresh spinach

1 cup all-purpose flour

1 1/2 tsp. salt

1 tsp. freshly ground pepper

6 boneless, skinless chicken breasts

4 Tbsp. butter

1 cup chicken broth

1/2 cup dry white wine

2 tsp lemon zest

4 Tbsp. fresh lemon juice

4 garlic cloves, minced

Garnish: halved grape tomatoes

Cook spinach in a lightly greased large skillet over med-high heat, stirring often, 2 minutes or until wilted. Transfer spinach to a bowl. Combine flour, salt and pepper in a shallow dish; dredge chicken in flour mixture. Melt butter in skillet; add chicken, and cook 4-5 min. on each side or until golden and done. Remove chicken from skillet, reserving drippings in skillet. Add chicken broth and next 4 ingredients to skillet, and bring to a boil, stirring to loosen particles from bottom of skillet. Cook, stirring occasionally, 2 minutes or until reduced by half. Stir in spinach, and cook 1 minute or until thoroughly heated. Serve chicken over spinach mixture. Garnish, if desired.

Our house is so empty! This is what our living room looks like now. It is a big difference from what it looked like before! Our loaner furniture is so uncomfortable! The Japanese movers were moving our household goods out and bringing in our loaner furniture when one of them had a chair in his hands and said "where would you like your luxury lounge chair?" He was serious. My husband says when he is sitting in our living room he feels like he is sitting in the lobby of our medical center on base.

Love Book Class!

KumieAfter having our love book class I noticed I really didn't take photos of the actual book. I will try to borrow someone's and take page by page pictures. We used the Bo Bunny word Book "Love" and covered it in Infuse basic Grey paper. The papers have brown, olive green, warm pink, and ruby red in them. So beautiful! Everyone received a sheet of Infuse Die cut Shapes to use on their book.(they were flowers) I had many pages of sticky letters, that came with each set of Basic grey collection pack, that I never knew what to do with. We used them for the Amore page and also for the front of the book. The accessories were Rhinestone brads, large silver eyelets, silver rings to bind our books, Infuse buttons, and lots of ribbon! I chose the Baroque Motifs stamp set for this project.

Megumi

Eiko, Hideko & Kayoko

Melissa (she is new) & Me

2nd Love Book Class!

Our 2nd love Book class will be held this Wednesday the 9th. It will have to be my last stamping class in Japan as I am preparing to move soon. See you soon!

Otake paper!

To all our family and friends back home, we had our picture in the Otake newspaper! We had been invited by my friend Eiko to the Nagashi bina doll festival. In the picture we are getting ready to float our dolls on the river. What a special day and Eiko is such a special friend!

Here are some of the photographers other photos: