Winter Fireworks

I went to the last fireworks show this year held at Nagano city with my cousin and his wife from Singapore. Shun stayed at home with daddy as I was concerned about the cold and crowd after reading that more than 32,000 people attended the show last year.

The fireworks show started at 6pm and lasted for more than an hour. It was freezing cold (3-4 degrees) but we were burning with excitement..I think you can catch some of our excited voices in this video.

Meddling with meat

Shun didn`t like his minced meat meals until my neighbour taught me her siew mai recipe. The trick is to mix the minced meat with cornflour in order to create a smoother texture.

My baby siew mai recipe is simple. Just mix chopped onions and mushrooms, minced pork meat, cornflour and a little soya sauce. Then, wrap in siew mai skin and steam for about 10 mins. If time allows, I will add some toppings (eg grated carrots in the photo)to make it look more appetizing. By the way, daddy likes it too with some chilli sauce.

Autumn walk in park

I wanted to take some quick photos of Shun at the park but we ended strolling about an hour there. Shun was totally engrossed in his little world, exploring and walking on the yellow blanket of fallen leaves. I think he liked the crunchy sound that the leaves made when he walked on them.

Boy had so much fun till he didn`t want to leave. As it was getting chilly, I had to grab him to the car despite his strong protests of screams and struggles.

Let me share his little autumn walk with you.


Do I look good in this cap?


Playing peek a boo with daddy.


I found daddy!


Definitely enjoying himself. Look at his satisfied grin.

Apple Ring Bread

1 apple down. 26 more to go.

We Love Autumn

Embracing the colors and wonders of nature.

My first apple pie

This is my first apple pie! Its hassle free because I used ready made pie dough.

Filling
3 apples, peeled, cored and sliced
10g butter
3tsp sugar
80ml water
1tsp ground cinnamon

Pastry
2 sheets of ready made pie dough(to be thawed)

My pie was embarrassing easy. I just stir fried the apples in butter and added sugar water. Stew for about 15 mins till the apples are tender and leave this mixture to cool down completely. Then I rolled the pie dough big enough to fit into my pie pan. Poured the apple mixture onto the pie pan and laid dough strips on top.

Glaze the pie with egg before placing in the oven. Bake for about 3o minutes at 200 degrees or until golden brown all over.


Voila! My sweet pie.

Dinner tonight

Nothing beats having hot soup on a cold day. I cooked veggies and beef soup today using my reliable slow cooker. I love my slow cooker because I can set the timer and go take care of other things. It allows me to mutli task and the the ingrediants get soft enough for Shun to eat too.

Here are my ingrediants:
500g cube beef
1 onion
2 carrots
1 can of diced tomatoes
2 pcs of laurel leaves
salt or 1 beef cube

I didn`t do anything much. Just toss everything into the cooker and added hot water. We had a simple but delicious hot soup after 4 hours of cooking time.



Shun had some of the beef soup with his rice which I made with my new moulds. The bear`s eyes looked awful because Shun interrupted while I was cutting the seaweed.

Little boy digged into the bear`s ugly eyes first and ate them up. Then, he happily finished all his dinner.

Apple Picking

Takashi`s colleague bought an apple tree for S$300 last year. He was kind to invite us to harvest the apples together today.

The weather was a bit chilly but luckily there was no cold wind blowing.

Farm was packed with families and kiddos, busy harvesting their red goodies in cartons.

I had visions of making apple pie or apple jam, but never got around to it. Good reason to experiment this year because we received 30 apples. Need to search for a good recipe. Let me know if you have any....



Basket is full.


Don`t touch my apples.

To the castle

Hey ,that`s the castle!


I took Shun to the Matsumoto castle last week on a fine morning. He had just recovered from his cough and I thought that some fresh air will do him good. The castle trip was a little adventure as it was the first time I brought him out alone to the town.

My little boy enjoyed his morning watching the swans and the ducks. I had a good time enjoying the beautiful celebration of autumn with red and yellow colours everywhere around the castle.

Though the taxi trip costed S$30(two way ride), we had a happy day which made the money spent worthwhile.


Shun watching the swans and ducks.


Matsumoto Castle

Top of the mountain

The hills are alive in Matsumoto~~~

Imagine staying on top of the mountain surrounded by clouds and a panoramic view of the city below. This was what the hotel that we stayed in last week promised to offer.

Too bad that we didn`t get to see the sea of clouds due to the foggy weather but we did enjoy the stay with my mother in law visiting from Osaka.

Located about 2000m above sea level, this hotel is only accessible by the hotel shuttle. Takashi parked our car in one of the allocated parking areas and we took the shuttle to the top of the mountain. The road to the top is rocky and narrow hence the hotel restricted all private cars entry.

No complains about this hotel. Good food, great view and attentive service to even little Shun. Shun seemd to like the hotel too because there was a play room filled with his favourite balls and anpanman toys. He even surprised us by sitting throughout dinner (1 hour) and breakfast the next day. This is a big big milestone for him and us! We can finally eat our meals together! Hope he will continue to be a good boy..

I am looking forward to staying again this winter to see the snow capped scenery. But then, the road up the mountain will be not easy. Let`s see how things turn out.


Delicious dinner


Us braving the cold wind in the early morning to watch sun rise.


Beautiful sunrise 530am-630am. Outdoor temperature was 2 degrees.


Shun entertaining himself with anpanman magazine during breakfast.


Shun enjoying his breakfast yogurt.


Blue skies and a hearty breakfast.


The hills are alive!

B is for Bear..

Oh...its a DOG.

Father and son

Strolling in the cosmos field.

A is for Apple

When I lived in Singapore, I thought nothing much about apples. I was surprised to know that there are actually so many varieties of apples with different names available.

Now living in the second largest prefecture that yields the most apples in Japan, I have dozens of choices when it comes to buying apples.

Last week, our market vendor friend gave us this big apple on the left named `World`s No 1`. Weighs about 500g - the weight which I hope Shun will put on after eating it..haha

Photofunia

Had some hilarious moments experimenting Photofunia with Takashi while Shun was sleeping early due to his runny nose. Visit here for some fun.

Mess

This is how our living room looks like at the end of the day. Argh!

Fun with food (1)

Shun finally sits in his high chair for meals after a 6 months long battle. Feeding him was such a chore then - chasing him around, spilling food on the play mat, getting him to swallow his food, me ending up like an evil witch. I literally jumped for joy when he first started to pull his high chair, attempting to climb inside during meal times.

To make his meal times a pleasure, I have decided to create more healthy and fun food. Let me start off with my mother in law`s mini salmon rice balls. The salmon pink brightened up the boring rice ball. Looks very appetizing.

Shun`s Verdict : 4/5

Taste of Autumn

Matsutake is one the most well known autumn delicacy in Japanese cuisine. Its earthy fragrance is much loved by the Japanese for many centuries.

Matsutake can only be found in the wild. The people who gather matsutake must brave steep mountains as well as occasional encounters with wild animals, which explains for the outrageous price and value.

Today, we decided to splurge on two small matsutakes (S$16) for dinner. We were totally `seduced` by the faintly pine aroma and exquisite taste of this expensive fungus but I guess its back to our usual budget shitakes for dinner next week.


Matsutake rice


Matsutake simmered in broth

Shun`s First Year Photo Book

The photo book that I have been working on for half a year has finally arrived! I was thinking of how to organize the over thousand photos of Shun till I chanced upon the photo book website.

There was no hassle of developing the photos and arranging in an album. Just upload the digital photos and arrange in whatever way you want it to be.

I even included photos taken while I was pregnant, and images from our ultrasound scans. It was fun as I could customize every page and personalise captions easily using the software available.

Check out this website if you are interested in making one for yourself. Only available in Japan though.

I'll definitely be doing the same thing again for his second year.






Beautiful photo memories.

Karuizawa Toys Kingdom

Last Saturday, Takashi had to attend his colleague`s evening wedding reception held in Karuizawa. I took the chance to follow him (2 hours car ride) and we brought Shun to the Toys Kingdom in the afternoon.

We were disappointed when we reached the entrance of the theme park. It looked rundown and smelled kind of weird. Those advertisements in the website were really deceiving!

To our surprise, the park was filled with happy children. Shun was absolutely thrilled when he entered the park. His mind was devoted totally to the wonders of toys and rides around him.


Look at his happy face when he took the Lucy train ride.


He didn`t want to get down even after the ride has ended.


It started to rain so we quickly went indoors to the train theme room filled with his favourite train tracks, train stations, cars, steam engines etc.

Shun was excited and started to chase after the bullet train. We just sat there watching him, glad that our boy was having more fun than us.




We only stayed about 2 hours in the park as Takashi had to prepare for the wedding reception. Since Shun enjoyed himself so much, we are thinking of visiting again in Winter. If he is happy, we are happy too.