Moving

I have set up a new blog! Yay! I no longer have to look at these terrible orange and blue colors every time I publish something. You can now find me here:

http://creatingourownhappiness.wordpress.com/

Thanks for being patient with my long, long break from blogging.

Randoms

• We have had two massive failures in the kitchen within the course of a week. I attempted a crockpot curry and Ten concocted a healthy mayonnaise. They both were terrible. Lessons learned: Don't trust a recipe created by someone who has only eaten the food once and then made up their own version. Don't think you can make a healthy mayo that tastes like the original.
• We are now officially members of the Children's Museum of Manhattan. Mia gets to play with sand tables, kid sized trucks to crawl in and out of, and more. It will be our new playground once we have a second baby.
• I have 7 more 17p shots to go. It has not been a pleasant experience physically or financially. I think we should have a celebration after the last one.
• I am on my way to finishing reading a book. It isn't the most interesting book, but I'm actually making progress.
• We are once again trying to improve our living space. We have new bedding and a host of organizational things on their way to us. It is a never ending project but helps a lot.
• I recently read this blog about creating momentum in your day, and it has really been working for me. I'm also breaking projects down into set time slots (thanks Michelle Duggar) so I feel like and actually do get more done each day. For instance instead of trying to fold all of the laundry, I just try to fold as much as possible in 15 minutes. It keeps me sane and helps me get a variety of things done over the course of a week.
• I am finally watching the 5th season of Big Love. I'm glad it only lasted 5 seasons because I'm losing interest, but overall it was a good show.

Anyway, happy midweek everyone.

New Year's 2014

We are now in the second week of the New Year, so I hope everyone is still going strong with those resolutions. We had a really low key celebration at home. We decided to just eat a lot of the traditional Japanese foods and hang out inside. It was snowing and cold...story of our lives recently....and Ten only had one day off, so we just relaxed. 

Here are some of the pics of what we devoured over the holiday.

New Year's Eve Dinner: mikan, tomato and cucumber salad, fried ham cutlets (trying to get rid of Christmas leftovers), and soba (cold because easier for Mia).

On New Year's Day we had osechi, and you know what...it is not nearly as bad as what Ten said it was. Seriously 90% of it was quite enjoyable.

Ozoni that I made that morning. Mochi, naruto, carrots, spinach, and chicken in a nice broth. This is easily our favorite part of New Year food.

Yum.

Mia unwrapping the osechi.

Lots of really good food...and some that wasn't so good. Mia especially loved the fish eggs. She called them "snacks."

In other news, I've decided that this year I wouldn't be making any specific resolutions. Don't get me wrong. I have a big list of things that I would like to get done by the end of the year, but they aren't necessarily resolutions. They are things like finish Mia's baby book and register our second baby at the Japanese embassy. Things like that.

I have, however, decided to pick a theme word for my year. This seems like a pretty popular thing to do, and I like the idea that you can choose a word that you can use to improve all aspects of your year. 

Anyway, so I was thinking hard and kicking words around like "happiness," "focus," and "self-discipline." However, none of them felt right. They weren't what I exactly wanted to achieve this year. Then while I was up way too late last night, I finally came up with my word.

It is "simplicity." I love the simple life, and I think that that is something that we have gotten away from here. We are gaining clutter, we were eating quite unhealthy, and spending a little bit too much. I mean if I look at Mia's toys alone, she has toys that are basically the same thing but just different versions. If I look in my closet, we have DVDs that we don't watch. We own 5 cutting boards. All of these are symptoms of a life that needs to be simplified.

So, that is what I want to focus on this year. I hope to report back in a few days with the first part of my project to simplify things.

Anyway, Happy New Year!

Christmas Day 2013

This post has a lot of pictures. I just couldn't choose which ones I wanted to share from the huge amount I took, so I'm just throwing a whole lot of them together.

On Christmas Eve, Ten got home a little earlier than usual, so we spent the afternoon getting ready for Christmas. I think Ten and Mia watched "The Grinch" and "Frosty" while I got dinner ready. We also went to the park and quickly realized it was just way too cold and almost came straight home. Seriously, our coats weren't helping...and Ten was only wearing sandals and a hoodie...no idea why he thought that that would be a good idea.

Anyway, after our failed park attempt we came home and started getting our Santa cookies ready. We decided to go with the pre-made gingerbread men, so we could just enjoy getting to decorate them.

First cookie out of the bag...he didn't last very long.

Ten icing a cookie for Mia so that she could add her candy.

Going much better than the gingerbread house!

Our finished products...Mia's is on the top and by far the best. Ten's has two green gloves, and I'm not sure what is going on with mine. Sorry this picture didn't rotate properly.

After Mia went to bed, we tore down the train track and reorganized the apartment a little bit so that we could fit everything under the tree and still have space to move in the morning.

Like I mentioned before, everything was wrapped and ready to put under the tree. Saved us a bunch of time.

Ten did have to stay up pretty late putting together Mia's table and chairs along with this kitchen though. I don't think he got to bed until 2:00 a.m.

Mia's Minnie table and chairs.

Mia ran in first thing in the morning and went straight to Totoro. We knew this would be a big hit with her.

Followed by a rush over to her new kitchen. This things keeps her so busy, and she is picking up so many words from it. We all love this toy. Once again....sorry this didn't flip when I added it to Blogger.

Treats in her stocking from a good friend in Japan. Thank you so, so, so much.

The beginning of the unwrapping marathon.

Deciding to have a tea party with Totoro in her new socks....midway through unwrapping.

After we unwrapped a good amount of presents, we took a break for breakfast. We had this really good casserole, and you can find the recipe here. I decided to make something sweet because I thought we may have a better chance for Mia to eat some.

Of course, Mia wanted us to all eat at her new Minnie table.

Mia in her first outfit of the day. She seriously had to put on every article of new clothing that she opened.

It just isn't Christmas without a toy drum.

....Mia enjoying her afternoon tea with her new tea set.

After all of the unwrapping and cleaning, naps were much needed. We then got up and ate a really late Christmas lunch. I honestly didn't have the time to make everything that I wanted too, but it all turned out pretty good.

Tossed spinach salad, deviled eggs, rolls, spiral ham, green bean casserole, and an apple pie. Notice that we actually had serving dishes this year. Thanks Ten for the Christmas presents...and thanks mom for the matching dish set!!

My plate...so full we had to skip the pie. We also had baked potatoes, and I love putting salsa on mine. Not very traditional for Christmas, but very good.

So, that is a glimpse of our Christmas morning. I was so exhausted once the 26th rolled around. Anyway, now just to get the New Year's post up!