Craft Day at Kobayashi Tenjin

Today, I was able to attend Anna's kindergarten to participate in the parent/student craft day. My wife had done many of these before but, since I was able to get the day off work, I was able to see this one too.

Today they made a decoration for the Hina Matsuri. Hina Matsuri is the girls festival held during the month of February. Homes typically display traditional Japanese dolls showing the prince and princess and thier court. We have a couple of small ones that we display in our home. Some of the other displays you see are huge and very expensive. You can see my blog entry from last year talking more about the Hina Matsuri.

In her craft today she made a little prince and princess out of a half of a toilet paper rolls and hung them in the middle of a ring decorated with flowers. After the glue dries, she will bring it home to display with her other Hina Matsuri dolls.

My Hero; Neil Armstrong

I just wanted to share this article and video I found from last year's 60 minute interview with Neil Armstrong. As a little boy I idolized this man and took many trips to Wapakoneta to visit the Armstrong Air and Space Museum.

Click here to see the video and read the article.

The video must be seen. I have never seen an interview with Neil Armstrong being that he doesn't like being the celebrity. In the ultimate understatement he actually wonders why people still think of him as the spaceman. For God sakes, the man was the first human to walk on the surface of the moon. I get goosebumps just watching the interview. Sitting in front of the computer I am wisked back to when I was 8 and visiting the museum with my Dad, seeing the lander and his space suit. Actually hearing him talk for the first time is really special for me (Am I weird for this?).

Snow in Inzai Video

Here is a short video of the wet, clumpy, cold and wet snow that I used to make our little snowmen here in Inzai.

Snow in Inzai! Punxatauny Phil Confirmed!

This weekend we have been taking it easy at home. On Friday Anna came down with a fever and Hiroko took her to the doctor. Since it was too early then to say she had the flu I took her back again on Saturday.

After taking a sample of her snot, the doctor tested it and came back to say that she had type A influenza. We got her some medicine and a couple of Pretty Cure videos and headed home. One of the medicines that the doctor perscribed was Tamiflu. Although there has been some incedents here in Japan that people say are connected to the drug, I decided that, in order for Anna to get a good night's sleep and recover, it was worth the slight risk.
After spending most of the day at home Saturday we woke up to see that we had had a some snow overnight. In this region the snow seems to be big, wet, clumped flakes. This made for some nice little snowmen in our yard.

Anna watched from inside as I built up the two little ones and directed how they should look. She also provided the hats. I think they came out pretty nice.