A Perfect Day

When L called yesterday to decide what time we should meet today, she suggested 9 o'clock. Not my favorite time, but getting an early start is better than starting too late, like Akinori and I usually do, hence spending only 45 minutes at the zoo yesterday before it closed. I set my alarm for 8 and ending up sleeping in until 8:30 and Sara showed no signs of waking at all. I have to say that waking up with her next to me is really the nicest possible way to wake up. She'll usually wake up at 6 or 7 for a bottle, then go back down for another 2 hours or so. She kind of starts out half asleep and half awake and rolls all over me with lots of hugs, then she gets all smiley and giggly and lots more rolling and hugging. I used to hate mornings, but now I actuallyook forward to those few minutes every morning. Amazing what kids will do for you.

Back to the point here, L was running late and called to ask if we couldn't meet at 10 instead. Perfectly fine with me! So we met up and she told me all about her time with Mrs. X. I had to laugh at a lot of what she said. I was able to guess at a lot of the stuff they talked about since Mrs. X tells the same stories over and over and OVER again, not hard to imagine what their conversation was like, well not really a conversation really is it when only 1 person does the talking.

Anyway, L and I went to a flea market that was happening about a 2 minute walk from our house first, where she picked up a few really super cute items. I just walked around showing off my super cute baby. When we left the flea market, we didn't really have any plans for what we were going to do next, but I was really up for a bit of an adventure. So we got in the car and went to Hakuba. I hadn't been to Hakuba since I went snowboarding about 8 years ago, but I had really been wanting to go since I heard there was a large foreign population there and lots of stores and restaurants that cater to them. The drive took a lot less time than I expected, and when Hakuba came into sight, this is what it looked like...


It was soooooo breathtakingly beautiful. Forget the fact that I HATE snow, it was just too beautiful to be concerned about the cold.

Now that we were in Hakuba, we were hungry and I tried to find somewhere to eat using the GPS. A place came up that I knew I had heard of, so we tried to go there, but it was closed. It was along a mountain road that was lined with pensions, so I guess maybe it's only open during the ski season. It looked cute though so it's too bad it wasn't open. The area was beautiful so we drove around for a little while, then turned around and decided that we really needed to find a place to eat. So we just went into the first place we found that was open, which also happened to be quite cute, and yummy! Here's Sara and mommy getting ready to eat. (Mommy looking a little bit like a witch I think, maybe that would explain the lack of a smile on Sara's face.)



After lunch there wasn't much to do since it's not ski season yet, so we decided to drive closer to the ski slopes and check them out and then head home. Not one phone call or text from Mrs. X all day. Peace.

We came back to our house and hung out for a bit before L had to go and meet someone else. Akinori came home early and got to meet her briefly, then he took a quick shower and we went to the annual Ebisuko fireworks display. Wow! Japanese fireworks displays are amazing. I haven't been to one in the States in years and years, but I don't remember them being nearly as long. This fireworks display went on for nearly TWO HOURS!! It was cold, but worth it. Here's just a sample...

Apparently it's one of the largest displays in the country, especially nowadays considering the bad economy. No one's wasting their money on fireworks anymore, except for the good people of Nagano. One more good reason to live here I guess!