first family hanami 2012; passing away of my uncle
the weather's been really nice lately and down right warm outside too. so earlier this week, we decided to do a "hanami" picnic this Sunday. hubs actually went to another hanami picnic on Saturday with some other volunteer Japanese teachers from our local community center. so he was lucky enough to get to do it twice :)
we originally wanted to get some bentos from Hotto Motto, a chain of bento stores, but since we still had a lot of stuff in the fridge, we decided to save the money and just make something simple. instead of buying some bentos, we bought some fried chicken from a little place we usually get our fried stuff from since i don't like to deep fry things at home, 'cause it stinks up the whole apt... :P
hubs actually wanted to go to a park that was farther away, but since we didn't want to spend too much time out today, we opted for the nearby playground/park instead since it's only a 5 min walk away. it was a really relaxing day even with the bento prep we did in the morning. i actually didn't sleep well last night, so i ended up sleeping in until 10:00, and then spent the next hour or so making a very simple bento lunch for the three of us. we left at around 12:30, so it took a while for us to find a nice spot to settle down for a picnic since almost everyone else in the neighborhood had the same idea as us ^_^; we even bumped into Kay's pediatrician enjoying a nice hanami with his family too! :) after a quick bite to eat, Kay was playing around with the rest of the kids at the playground and hubs and i just soaked in the nice weather and atmosphere. sure, there weren't as many sakura trees where we plopped down, but the few trees that there were made things still nice.
i especially liked it when a nice breeze would stir up the trees and the cherry blossom petals would just float down softly like little snowflakes! i tried getting a video of how pretty it looked, but dunno if our camera really captured how beautiful it was ^_^; now i understand why a lot of animes have sakura petals floating around in some scenes! :)
after a couple of hours in the sun, we decided to head on home. Kay was already starting to get tired and hubs, and i were a little overdressed for the weather, so the afternoon sun was getting a bit unbearable. on the way home, we stopped by a DVD rental store to get Kay an Anpanman movie for her to watch later while i did my chores. we had leftovers from lunch for dinner and that was pretty much our day. :)
here are the pics from today on my facebook and some vids that we took!
Saturday morning, my sister calls me on my cell to tell me that my uncle had passed away. i was a little surprised since it was so sudden! granted he was in his 80's, but my grandpa lived 'til he was in his mid 90's before he passed away. he was my mom's oldest brother (my grandparents had 9 children and mom was number 4, i think...) and looked and acted exactly like my grandpa. that's what my sister and i liked the most about him. :) i won't be able to make it to his funeral since i'm here in Japan, but he'll be sorely missed. i just hope that my mom and my other aunts and uncles will be able to cope with this ordeal. :( so far i haven't been able to get a hold of my mom or my dad yet since they haven't been picking up their cell phones. they're probably really busy with a lot of things right now :( oh well... all in all, my uncle will be sorely missed. ~_~
we originally wanted to get some bentos from Hotto Motto, a chain of bento stores, but since we still had a lot of stuff in the fridge, we decided to save the money and just make something simple. instead of buying some bentos, we bought some fried chicken from a little place we usually get our fried stuff from since i don't like to deep fry things at home, 'cause it stinks up the whole apt... :P
hubs actually wanted to go to a park that was farther away, but since we didn't want to spend too much time out today, we opted for the nearby playground/park instead since it's only a 5 min walk away. it was a really relaxing day even with the bento prep we did in the morning. i actually didn't sleep well last night, so i ended up sleeping in until 10:00, and then spent the next hour or so making a very simple bento lunch for the three of us. we left at around 12:30, so it took a while for us to find a nice spot to settle down for a picnic since almost everyone else in the neighborhood had the same idea as us ^_^; we even bumped into Kay's pediatrician enjoying a nice hanami with his family too! :) after a quick bite to eat, Kay was playing around with the rest of the kids at the playground and hubs and i just soaked in the nice weather and atmosphere. sure, there weren't as many sakura trees where we plopped down, but the few trees that there were made things still nice.
i especially liked it when a nice breeze would stir up the trees and the cherry blossom petals would just float down softly like little snowflakes! i tried getting a video of how pretty it looked, but dunno if our camera really captured how beautiful it was ^_^; now i understand why a lot of animes have sakura petals floating around in some scenes! :)
after a couple of hours in the sun, we decided to head on home. Kay was already starting to get tired and hubs, and i were a little overdressed for the weather, so the afternoon sun was getting a bit unbearable. on the way home, we stopped by a DVD rental store to get Kay an Anpanman movie for her to watch later while i did my chores. we had leftovers from lunch for dinner and that was pretty much our day. :)
here are the pics from today on my facebook and some vids that we took!
Saturday morning, my sister calls me on my cell to tell me that my uncle had passed away. i was a little surprised since it was so sudden! granted he was in his 80's, but my grandpa lived 'til he was in his mid 90's before he passed away. he was my mom's oldest brother (my grandparents had 9 children and mom was number 4, i think...) and looked and acted exactly like my grandpa. that's what my sister and i liked the most about him. :) i won't be able to make it to his funeral since i'm here in Japan, but he'll be sorely missed. i just hope that my mom and my other aunts and uncles will be able to cope with this ordeal. :( so far i haven't been able to get a hold of my mom or my dad yet since they haven't been picking up their cell phones. they're probably really busy with a lot of things right now :( oh well... all in all, my uncle will be sorely missed. ~_~