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Shitteta?

Why didn't anyone tell me this sooner? This rates almost as high as "it is not entirely your fault that you will be in a bad mood before your period" as things I should have been told sooner (like sometime during the 20th century).

 I thought it was really bad genes and poor eating/ exercise habits that kept me from finding pants that fit. Well, maybe that's part of what's going on, but I love not being held responsible way too much to acknowledge this :) It's not my genes' fault, it's my jeans' fault!

So for starters, I'd bought a jacket that looked good on a fashion blogger I liked for about 8000 yen (never mind that said blogger is about 1 cm taller but 6 dress sizes smaller than I am). I knew the sleeves were way too long, so I spent a couple hours shortening them. Then, I decided the shoulders looked wrong, so I took my trusty 100 yen-shop seam ripper and took out a few stitches in the lining and removed the shoulder pads. Then I hand-stitched the hole in the lining closed. The jacket fits much more nicely around the shoulders now, to say nothing of the sleeves looking right post alteration.

In a delusion of grandeur, I bought a sewing machine. So far I have only used it to hem the Pumpkin Princess's new curtains, but when I get the hang of things, I would like to use it for DIY alterations. Because it's not my fault my clothes don't fit! And I need to justify spending the money on a new sewing machine (when I could have just winged it with my mom's machine)!

It's this easy??

Konnani kantan nano?? The Pumpkin Daddy has found a new job. He starts on January 7th. I am an evil spouse because a part of me wishes he had been unemployed longer, because I liked how he was getting stuff around the house done (like taking down our green curtain and sweeping the genkan and working on the Pumpkin Princess's bedroom). Everyone is talking about how we're in a chronic recession and how the 99% is suffering and (cut for brevity because, seriously, do you want me to go on for another 2000 words?) ...so I was bracing myself for being the sole breadwinner for an extended period of time. The man was unemployed for 77 days. That's shorter than the paternity leave he took when the Pumpkin Prince was born! Granted, he is a very responsible, dependable, hardworking, and charismatic. If you were hiring, you would want to hire him too. If you were hiring. In this economy. It all seems too good to be true. I've seen his workplace-to-be. It's a good-sized factory that I pass by on my daily commute. Yes, for the first time ever, his work is now closer to mine. Say, do you think he'd take over day care drop off duty once or twice a week?

A little disappointed, a little relieved

Chotto gakkari, chotto anshin

For a while there, I thought someone was going to pay me to go to Thailand. For a while. Sour grapes make me say that I would have hated the mosquitos.

Santa Claus is coming to town

Santa ga machi ni yatte kuru The Pumpkin Prince and Princess trimming the tree

Lego Santas

November whizzed by with not so much as a single post.

Snail's Pace English School has finished all 26 letters of the alphabet! Now for vowel combinations (like "seal" and "coat").

I didn't say anything about this until now, but the Pumpkin Daddy is currently unemployed. His work announced they would cut jobs and people who raised their hands would get retirement benefits and full career counseling. We discussed what might happen if he stayed (potential transfer to Fukushima or, perhaps, China, and increased workload) and decided that for the Pumpkin Clan, taking what he could get and leaving was the best option. He's thrown himself into running (right now, he's at 10 km about four times a week) and doing stuff around the house (like re-organizing the closets and cleaning the kitchen sink) but not cooking (boo hoo). Seriously, the Pumpkin Clan could live like this forever (if the Pumpkin Daddy were o.k. with it). The Pumpkin Princess loves coming home to Daddy (as opposed to making the 15-minute walk to after-school child care), the house is clean, and I make enough money us to live comfortably (sans overnight trips to Disneyland or Guam, but um, I think we'll live). The career consultation companies have scored him several job interviews, and most have ended on a positive note, so we're still waiting, but I think things will be quite all right whatever happens as long as the Pumpkin Daddy is happy and healthy.

If you don't give me candy, I'll play a trick on you!

Okashi wo kurenai to itazura suru yo!

(updated in response to a request for pictures)

Some English conversation schools for kids have full-on Halloween parties, large affairs with the participants in elaborate costumes. Me, I run a fake English school in which half the student population of two shares a good deal of DNA sequence with me. So it seemed fitting to have a half-assed Halloween party (but not until we went through the 18 alphabet flashcards and 30 vocabulary flashcards first). I bought some individually wrapped candy and cookies at the local supermarket, and witches' hats and Halloween decorations at the 100 yen store.

Then the Pumpkin Mommy, Daddy, Princess, Prince, and the neighbor girl took turns being the trick-or-treaters and the neighbor.

The Pumpkin Daddy was assigned the role of the neighbor who didn't celebrate Halloween, and got TP'd. When planning this "party," I'd considered having them TP the house for about 0.02 seconds before deciding against it. I mean, how are you supposed to explain the concept of TPing to a neighborhood of Japanese folks in their 60's and 70's?

When the Pumpkin Princess and the neighbor girl started turning Daddy into a Mummy, the Pumpkin Prince started crying "don't hurt Daddy!" so we had to stop.

I want a Power Rangers Samurai lunch!

Boku, Shinkenjaa bentou ga ii!

Ask and you shall receive...

Rice flavored with ketchup (Red Samurai Ranger) or curry powder, salt and sugar (Gold Samurai Ranger) and decorated with sliced cheese (the kind that's wrapped in plastic that you have to remember to take off when making grilled cheese sandwiches) and nori. I used a craft knife that I bought at the 100 yen-shop to cut the nori this time. The empty spaces were filled with leftover chicken nuggets, leftover broccoli, baby tomatoes, and frozen chicken patties. It's interesting that the Pumpkin Prince asked for this lunch because "Shinkenger" was something like three seasons ago and he probably has no memory of watching the show. But he does like to check YouTube videos on my iPad, and apparently there are a lot of Shinkenger clips because "Power Rangers Samurai" ("Shinkenger" action sequences spliced into original material filmed with English speaking actors) is being aired in the US right now. What I want to know is if they're going with the original Shinkenger ending because Power Rangers Samurai has gone far away from the original story to make that kind of hard to do.

Summer has past...

Natsu ha sugi... So we survived the first summer vacation with a shogakusei (elementary school student) with only minor trauma. Gakudoh (after school day care) was open every weekday, and they had a system where a local company took orders for boxed lunches. The Pumpkin Princess said she wanted me to make her lunch every so often, and I think I ended up sending her with lunch something like 6 or seven times, but I only took one picture.

Cousins came to visit Grandma, so we met them there. Brother-in-law brought his nagashi-somen kit.

As the name implies, what you're supposed to do is run water and somen over the bamboo and catch the some as it comes in front of you, and we did this, but then things got wild and b-i-l stared letting candy through it, and then...

grape juice.

Snail's Pace English School is still open for class. I think we're about halfway through the alphabet. It's too soon to tell if we're going anywhere at this, well, snail's pace.