Happy Holidays

This past Saturday, Beejay and I were invited at my friend/co-worker Mickey's house for the Christmas party.

This year is the first Christmas Mickey is spending at his house which he has purchased at the beginning of the year. Not only that he's done an amazing job decorating trees, his house was in immaculate condition! It was unbelievably well organized and clean just like houses you see in magazine....

Needless to say, Beejay and I was in the mood to clean like crazy that evening...
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土曜日に同僚のお家にクリスマスパーティにお呼ばれして行ってきました。

クリスマスの飾り付けはもちろん奇麗な上、絵や全部すっごく奇麗に片付いているだよね〜

唖然・・・　まるで雑誌の写真の様！！なんでここまでキレイにしたまま生活できるの？？言うまでもなくその夜、私たちはアパートの片付けに夢中に・・・

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Being a huge fan of Martha Stewart's Living magazine, Mickey has so many pretty dishes displayed nicely all over the house.

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Martha Stewartの雑誌Livingが大好きなミッキー。可愛いお皿が奇麗に飾られていたよー。

more photos>>>

Thanksgiving in VA

サンクスギビングの連休はBのお父さんの結婚式もあり、バージニアへ。ついでに２週間も留守にするのでコーディーをお姉さんに預かってもらうため、一緒に連れて行ったのだ。

食べ過ぎよう注意と思ってても、やっぱりサンクスギビング。何となく食べ過ぎちゃったよ〜ターキー美味しかった! コーディーはアパートとは違く広い台所の隅々を一生懸命クンクン食べ物が落ちてないか探しまわってたよ。

さあ年明けにつれに帰る際太ってるでしょうか？？　疑問です…


:: 写真 ::
食べ物が落ちてないか気になっているコーディー。
お姉さんが作ったCandied Yum。
Egg Nogのパッケージ。
ターキー。

Bonsai Killer

かなり遅いハローウィーンの写真。 同僚Randyの枯れ果てた盆栽をハローウィーンらしくお化けで飾り付け。 実はこの盆栽、彼が事務所に就職したお祝いとして彼女がプレゼントしたもの。 残念ながらRandyのデスクは日光が当たらないため、１年後にはゾンビ化してしまったのだ．．． ハローウィーンケーキはMickeyのお手製のもの。美味しかった！！ ************************************************************************
Really late Halloween photos. I decorated Randy's dried up bonsai tree with a ghost for Halloween. Actually this tree was a gift from his girlfriend when he started working at the office. However, because the sun light won't reach his desk at all, the tree turned into a zombie after a year... The Halloween cake was made by Mickey. It was yummy!!

Still Working on Them

10.14.2007 /// More wedding related photos are up.

Also I've uploaded some of the photos from the trip to Chicago back in August.

Hay Hay Hay

実りの秋ですが、数年前からりんご、なし、サクランボ、プラム、桃などがたべられなくなりました…　アレルギー反応出ちゃって、喉や唇がかゆくなっちゃう!

ケンタッキー自然豊かすぎ＆牧場だらけで、どうやら草によるアレルギー性鼻炎になってしまい、そのため春に限らず秋もテッシュが欠かせません泣き顔　

この草アレルギー性鼻炎(hay fever)になると、りんごなどに含まれるタンパク質を花粉と勘違いしちゃって喉や唇がかゆくなるらしいんだよねー。

食べるの大好きな私にとってはかなり辛いです　
どこか花粉のない土地はないかねー。どうやらとうとうビージェイまで花粉症になってしまったみたいー　．．．ツラっ

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Now it's October, the weather is nice, not too hot, not too cold. But I haven't been able to go anywhere without tissues and allergy medicines!

Yup. It's that time of year for me who still lives in KY—hay fever. Since there are tons of horse parks and farms everywhere, it seems like that I have developed the hay fever. Not only that now I cannot eat certain fruits such apples, plums, cherries, peaches and pears. This sucks so bad since I love these fruits! Whenever I eat them, my throat and lips itch and and swallow.

According to Wiki, the condition I got is called "Oral allergy syndrome" and it's not exactly an allergic reaction to these fruits. What happens is that my "immune system mistakes the food proteins for the pollen proteins and causes an allergic reaction."

YIKES!!!

Unfortunately this year, Beejay finally got allergy. It's most likely the hay fever too... His sinus has been bothering him, but the symptom got much better after taking an allergy medicine.

We need to move somewhere that there is no allergen if there is a such place!!

It's Finally Over!!!!

::PHOTOS updated 10.15.2007::
//photos take by my family and Erika Lutz

This is going to take some time. Too many photos to go through! Sorry...

写真は徐々に更新しますので、時々チェックしてください☆
下のリンクは友達とフォトグラファーによる写真です↓

But meanwhile, here are some photos from the wedding taken by friends and the wedding photographer. I will be posting photos and links a little by little while I go through ones I have....

::Jenny's Flickr::
::Mel's Shutterfly::
::Wedding Photographer::(warning: some of them are badly PhotoShopped!)

Everyone thanks for all of your help and support to make it happen!!

treats

Beejay has been into baking scones lately. Lucky me!

The last time he baked yummy cranberry scones around 11pm on Sunday night just because he almost forgot to make them even though he promised me of them. (I didn't make him to bake at 11pm though!) How nice of him!!

It's going to be chocolate chip scones next time. yay! Who knows... Maybe in the future we might open a scone store... and I guess I will be overweight eating them too much. arghhhhh〜

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ビージェイが最近スコーン作りにハマっていて、前回はクランベリースコーンを日曜日の夜11時に！私に約束してたの忘れてて悪い気がしたらしい。なんてやさしい〜

次回はチョコチップスコーンだって。やったね。将来、スコーン屋さんなんて開いてたりして。そしたらスコーン食べ過ぎで私でぶってそう…　ああぁ〜〜！！

first time

二ヶ月ほど遅れてのポストですが、生まれて初めて参加した地元Lexinton Ad Clubのデザインコンペ（ADDY）で賞をもらいました〜。嬉　

提出した３作品ともなんらかの賞をもらい驚き！そのうちの1作品は「審査員賞」を！（写真）
地元のコンペとはいえ、初めて自分の作品を認めてもらえなんかほっとしたかも。普段自信なさすぎだからね・・・

で、先週更に良い知らせが。地域のADDY（ケンタッキー、ウエスト・バージニア、オハイオー）で銀賞を貰ったとか？？

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This news is about 2 months late: for the first time ever, my work has received awards at the local-level ADDY, an annual advertising competition, held by the Lexington Ad Club.

All three entries got something (2 Golds and 1 Silver), and one of them got the Judges' Choice Award. Even though it was just a local competition, I was relived to earn some kind of recognition for my design since I'm not so confident.

Then I got better news last week. Supposedly the work for UVa C.A.R.E received the Silver at the district-level ADDY (KY, WV, and OH)!?

wow.

scrubs

看護士に転職しました。

…自分の血を見ただけで気分が悪くなる私には絶対むりな職業だわ。冗談はおいといて、イラストの土台として看護士のユニフォーム(scrubs)をきての撮影です。UVAの看護士紹介プログラム用のもの。

パジャマみたいに着心地があまりにも良いので、写真取った後もしばらくきてた。面白いことに、scrubs着るだけで誰もが（同僚でさえ）看護士に変身してしまうから不思議。

今年のハローウィーンに使おうかな？

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I have become a nurse.

...well, it is definitely not a job for me who gets sick by looking at my own blood. Besides the joke, the photo was taken as a base for an illustration for a project, UVa's nurse referral program.

It was as comfortable as a set of PJs. So I was wearing it for a while even after the photos were taken. It's interesting that anybody in scrubs instantly turns into a nurse, including my co-worker.

Maybe I should use scrubs for this year's Halloween?

March 3rd

Because Saturday, March 3rd was the Girl's/Doll's Day (Hinamatsuri) in Japan, I've cooked chirashizushi (a type of sushi) to celebrate it. It made me a little sad to realize that lately it's been hard to remember these kinds of Japanese seasonal events and holidays. There are few things to remind me of them in the everyday life. I guess this is one of processes of turning into a weird Japanese...

Snowy Saturday

It has been snowing a lot this winter, and I cannot wait for Spring to come around! Although, it's a different story if I would get "snow day" off like school kids...

今冬は雪がかなり降ってるよー。春が待ち遠しい・・・　学生の頃の様に雪降って会社が休みになるのなら、雪いっぱい降ってもかまわないんだけど〜

Here Comes a Moster!

Well, at least to say, it was a very tasty monster!!!

不運？？

またまた（！）結婚式／披露宴、壁にブチあたったかも。

これは何かのサイン？？　かなり落ち込んできた。

決めようと思っていたレストランのオーナーから全く連絡なし。
数回だした催促のメールにもかかわらず、頼んだリストや新しい値段のプロポーザル未だにこない。一方的に連絡して、必要な情報もらって前金払えばどうにかなるんじゃないかなと思えるけど、ここまでいい加減だと決めた後にもいろいろグズられて後で後悔するんじゃないかという懸念も…

なんかぁ、誰も協力的じゃないんじゃん！大金払わなくちゃいけないから、よけいに頭にくる！

ど〜しよ〜。お手上げ状態。＞＿＜；

こたつで…

先週からずぅーっと氷点下で寒いよー。雪結構降ってる。

♪ゆーきやコンコン　降っても降ってもまだ降り続く…
♪いーぬは…　こたつで（ベッドで）丸くなる…


．．．馬鹿犬は朝８時に家を出るときいつも毛布の下に丸くなり寝たまんまで起きてこないし…

またまた…/once again

今冬に入って、３回目の風邪だよー。今回のはちょっと長かった〜。

水曜日に喉がちょっと痛くなって、翌日は更にヒドくなり午後にはダルくなり、３０分早引け。
家帰って市販の薬のんでさっさと寝ればなおるだろうと思っていたんだけれども、翌日更に悪化。
でも、休むものなんだから雪の中だるいーと思いつつ通勤したんだけど、無理でした…

風邪薬飲んでがんばろーと思ったのもつかの間、何か食べる度に吐き気がしてトイレにダッシュ。結局３時に帰宅。　

熱はなかったんだけど、（多分）寒気、頭痛、だるさ等で金曜日の午後から、土曜日も一日中寝てたおかげで、どうにか日曜までには起きていられるほど元気になりましたー。．．．

な、長かったぁ〜。
前回は風邪薬飲むだけで、２日ほどで山場超えて回復したのに〜
がんばって免疫力もっとつけなければ。そうかんたんに会社休めないしねぇ。

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I got sick again for the third time this winter. This time, it took a little longer to get over it...

On Wednesday, my throat started to hurt. Then the next day, it got worse and I started feeling sick in the afternoon. I ended up leaving from work 30 minutes earlier.

Against my expectations that I'd feel better by taking some cold medicine and going to bed early, the condition got worse on Friday. Since I didn't want to take a day-off (a sick-day counts as a vacation day), I drove to the office in the snow...

Even though I was hoping to get by the day with cold medicine, I ended up leaving around 3. Every time I ate something my stomach got really upset and I threw up.

(...damn it. all yummy food I ate that day!!!!)



After sleeping all Friday afternoon and all day Saturday, now finally I feel much better. I assume if I didn't push myself on Thursday or Friday and took a day-off, I might have got over the cold earlier. But it's really hard to not to show up to work knowing the all things I was supposed to do that day...

I guess I need to take better care of myself so I won't get sick in the future...

fortune cookie／フォーチュンクッキー

For the first time in my life, a fortune cookie actually predicted my fortune!
I'm not kidding neither!!

Early last week, I had Chinese take-out as my dinner.
As always, there were fortune cookies...
Well, the one I opened said something like, "You will meet friends you haven't seen for a long time".

A few days later, I've discovered a contact information of an old friend who I lost contact about 8-9 years ago!! This was so random to the point it was freaky...
When I was flipping through a design book that my co-worker had just purchased night before, one business card caught my eyes. The name on the card was very familiar.

So I've checked out the website that was on the business card.
After I read her profile on website, I realized it was a girl that was my friend back in high school, but she went back to Japan with her family.
Eventually I lost contact with her...

I remember how she was always sewing/knitting something.
She was very creative. And as I expected, now she is working as a fashion designer in the States; although I wasn't surprised to learn she is back in the States. She seemed to fit in American culture so well. Also her English was excellent and sounded like a native speaker since she was born in the States. That was quite a memorable thing to me since I met her when I just moved to the States and hardly spoke any English.

Well, I've emailed to her, hoping to hear back from her soon.
We'll see how this goes...

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先週中華のお持ち帰りが夕食だったんで、フォーチュンクッキーがついてきた。

開けてみると「昔の友人に再会」と書いてあるんだよね。
フォーチュンクッキーと言いつつも一回も未来当たったことなかったんだけど、今回＊初めて＊当たった〜！！！



後日会社の同僚が持ってた名刺デザインの本をめくっていると…



あれっ？　なんか似たような名前だなぁ…　


えっ。ファッションデザイナー？　まさかねぇ。

もし彼女だったら偶然すぎて怖いかも…



で、半信半疑でウェブサイト覗いてみると………　
8年以上前に連絡の途絶えてた高校時代の友人でした！
しかも日本にいると思ってたら、アメリカに戻ってきてるし。

ミクシィでの再会は何度か経験してるけど、コレはあまりにも偶然すぎて怖い〜　＊＿＊；


彼女が同業で彼女がデザインしたものが載ってたんなら、少しは分かるんだけど、たまたま偶然見ていたデザインの本に偶然にもファッションデザイナーの彼女の名刺のデザインが載ってたんだもん！！　


偶然とは恐ろしいです。フォーチュンクッキー、甘く見ない方が良いかも…

プッ♪

夕食後、いつものようにソファーに座ってテレビを見ていると左隣から…



プッ！




慌てて振り返ると、思いがけず同様に驚いている彼の顔が？？
じゃあ、いったい誰が？！
って二人しかいないはずなのに…

目線を飼い犬がすました表情で寝そべっていた…



コーディーが引っ越してきて１年もたつのに生まれて初めてだよー。
犬のおならを聞くのは！！
犬もおならするのね。。。

大発見〜


彼によると、数回コーディー（犬）は自分のおならに驚いて飛び上がったことがあるとか…



あぁ、なんてバカな犬なんだろう…