Halloween, a little early

Maybe zoom in . This is called the `boy mountain.' It is beautiful, but is thought to have many spirits!

We drove to Morioka again for a party at Oasis language school. The entire street had a festival too. The guy with the hammer is making sticky rice. This is a very old custom in Japan. You can see baby with daddy, and mommy with Noah and Jas! Thank you Elvis and Mariko!

The Zoo

Here we see the Morioka Zoo. This place is about 1 .5 hours from us. It rained of course, but we had a fun day!

Marathon

Jas is running, in the 2 pictures; and boy does she look tall! Cross is wondering what is going on, and I was wondering who that kid was running with that long hair. It was my own Noah!

Ninohe Catholic Church

This is it! Our church is very and I mean very tiny!

Our favorite priest is now gone, but we do have a replacement as you can see.

Shimp San, we miss you!

Polo

Jasmine is getting a workout! Or maybe the horse is getting one! Jas was happy because she is finally big enough to go alone, and get a regular lesson by the pro.

The Tanaka House

On Saturday we drove to a place called Fukuchi. This house is 120 years old and is in the Tanaka family. I guess years ago this family owned a huge business. They possibly owned most of the town. We were interested in a display that they had on this particular weekend that included rugs from all over the world. All items could be purchased too. Notice the great gardens of the place. We could smell incense as we walked toward the front entry. Moss grew on the table top too.

It's ball time

Here it is! Daddy had the yard blacktopped so Noah could play Basketball. We have a huge area that some of the neighborhood highschool boys think is available to them too. We caught guys out there more than 3 times already. You can see Jasmines backpack in the background.

Ouch!

This was cross's first knee injury. It was the size of a large quarter! He was running on the new blacktop while Daddy and Noah played basketball.

Canoe Trip!

I had a very fun time going on the canoe trip! But I had to get wet at the end, It was so cold, but once I got the hang of it it wasn't so cold! I got a little wet when I was paddling the boat, but it felt good because it was so hot out. We took a small rest when we were half way their. The food was pretty good, it was fun!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Takko Garlic Festival

Takko is a nearby area .We went to the yearly garlic and beef festival as you can see from the large garlic thing behind us! Great burgers, unlike Japan!

Also, we had a chance to grill out on these large yakiniku grills. You will notice some people who are not Japanese (no, not me!) She is the Washington garlic queen. The queen next to her is from Takko. There were maybe 100 foreigners there. I felt at home!

NO. 11

Another party for Noah! We had one in the U.S. before returning to Japan 3 days ago too! Yes, we are back in Japan after quite a long 6 mos. in Appleton. Noah boy is 11. I made a pumpkin cream cheese as requested.