Reina's Commercial

Reina was in a commercial last year. It has finally come out. You can view it on youtube here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b3XbWmz6sgI

I've also posted some stills from the commercial:

Happy New Year!

On 12/31 we went to Reuben and Mari's, friends who host a mochi party every new year. Mochi (pounded sticky rice cakes) is traditional New Years food in Japan, and Mari makes it fresh every new year. It's delicious.



After eating mochi, we did fireworks outside in the afternoon. On Hawaii, fireworks are the traditional way to celebrate the New Year, probably adopted from the Chinese custom of fireworks on New Years.





It was a full moon and this is what it looked like from our apartment rising over the mountains. We also did a bunch of fireworks at night to celebrate the new year. Our friends who live next door came over too.






The next day, we watched the sun rise and had traditional Japanese New Years food called osechi ryori. Our bento box here has rolled Japanese omelet, sweet black beans, white beans with konbu seaweed, tied bundles of konbu, white fish cake, carrot and radish vinegar salad, and special glazed chestnuts. We ate this with ozoni, a special New Years soup that has mochi in it. Chiharu's a great cook, so everything was fantastic!

Christmas 2009

Hey all! We had a fine Christmas, and we hope you all did too!

Okay, this first pic is a few days before Christmas. Me and Noa in a tree:

For dinner, Chi made this potato salad and broccoli Christmas tree. Little Santas sit at the bottom:

Reina and Noa make cookies for Santa:

Reina wrote a note to Santa. Here are the cookies and milk and some carrots for the reindeer:

Santa came!!!

Noa's favorite present: a guitar and mic:

It's starting to feel a lot like Christmas...

Well, it is! It's getting cooler (for Hawaii) and it gets dark early (at 6:00). The kids have colds and the streets and malls are jammed with people. And we sent out our Christmas cards. Here are a couple of ones we didn't use from our so-called photo shoots (you can click for larger images):

Sometimes, it was hard to get everyone on the same page:

Chiharu made these stockings in anticipation of Santa's visit:

I hope you all have a happy holiday. Peace on Earth!

Dancing Elves

See us as dancing holiday elves.

Click here to watch the video!

North Shore Surf

Chiharu and Noa went up to the North Shore to see the waves. The forecast was for big waves. Here are some photos she took. Click to view larger image, then use the browser back button to return to the post.

Garden Party and Christmas Tree

We had a busy weekend. On Saturday we attended the Manoa Community Garden holiday party. I was vice president of the board this year, although I didn't do much. As vice president I was much more of a Joe Biden than a Dick Cheney, only filling in when the president could not for various reasons. I did get the organization out of the stone age by setting up all the docs on Google Docs, setting up emailing lists, setting up downloadable document site, and setting up and maintaining the blog. I also gave up my garden plot, as I have been too busy to work it and will be for the foreseeable future.

Here's Reina and Noa with garden member Na'oe. She really adored the children, gave us lots of veggies, and sometimes weeded our garden when I didn't get up there. We'll miss her and lots of other people too. It was a potluck, and there was lots of good food as well.

Also, we bought a Christmas tree.

Reina and Noa on their way down to get the tree. Noa's comment: "My reindeer horns have a Santa hat and Reina's don't."

Here Reina cuts the tree from the roof.

And here's our tree!