Pretty Random Post

Just thought I'd start out with a random cute picture of Kelsie. Her curls are pretty popular here in Japan. We can rarely walk on or off a train without hearing "kawaii" at least once. Kawaii means cute in Japanese. Some Filipino lady actually gave her a little yokult drink yesterday and kept touching her face telling her how cute she was. It was pretty funny.

 These past couple weekends have been rainy, which has been a real bummer...and this weekend is supposed to be more of the same.  So while we haven't done a lot of major site seeing, we've been checking out some of the bigger train stations closer to our house.

First up was the Kamata eki (train station).  We found a super yummy Japanese steakhouse.  They brought our food out on sizzling hot cast iron skillets.  I haven't had steak in 2 months, so it was especially yummy.

 Next up was the Jiyugaoka Eki.  We found a super yummy traditional Japanese restaurant to eat at for dinner and then we just wandered around to see what was there.  I'll definitely be heading back sometime soon.  There is TONS of shopping.  I found a great kids clothing store with decent prices. There is a huge Gap store. And we found an awesome baking store - Cuoca.  Liana from our branch recommended it to me when I was searching for baking cocoa.  They have just about anything you could ever want.  I loaded up on powdered sugar.  It was pricey, but a lot cheaper than the regular stores that may or not may even carry it in the first place.  It was the only place we were able to find Cream of Tarter (the local store owners didn't even know what it was).  Most Japanese don't have ovens in their homes, therefore don't bake.

Before we went home we needed ice cream...like usual. :)  Kurt found this cute Sweets Forest place.  They had tons of different desserts to choose from.

...Thought I'd close with a cute kid picture too.  :)  We've had to entertain ourselves inside on rainy days.  Kelsie sported the purple ballerina outfit for 3 days straight and both kids are getting really excited about their new baby sister.