Cherry Blossom Adventures

On Saturday night my friend Dani celebrated her 24th birthday in style with a 80s themed party complete with blue eyeshadow, Wizz Fizz, Care Bears cakes, bad hair and fashion, Culture Club & MacGayver (Remember him?)- you can not get much more 80`s than that!

Oh and by the way my no drinking for January went out the window however I am now alcohol free til my birthday I would say which is mid Feb (and hey I lasted til 24th!!)  I may have gone a bit overboard and I am really really really hoping it hasn`t jeopardized my chance of a weight loss this week.

It was such a fun night with me wearing my mum`s wedding dress (She married my dad in 83), coral eye shadow and taking my hoops (more 50`s and then 90`s but hey!). Shun was not much into the dress-up idea however he claimed his new haircut to be 80s (very true with his curls!) and donned a red eye mask to go as Raphael from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. We through about having him go as The Karate Kid but I could not find any plain white material to make his head peice from- so red it was!!!

Dani played the perfect host as Rainbow Brite. Dani and a Cyndi Lauper look alike (Alana) below.

There was of course plenty of bad 80s fashion

And a Michael Jackson look alike as well as a pacman couple!

We got into the hooping groove later on in the night. Spreading the hoop love is a must at any party!

And lets not forget some MacGayver love!

We had a great night!!! I was a little worse for wear on Sunday though…

More photos from the night can be found here

In other news the hairdresser got a bit of a shock when he cut Shun`s hair despite me telling him it was naturally curly. The more he cut off the more he realized what I was saying was true. He had never cut curly asian hair he said- I think he got a kick out of it. I like Shun`s hair short (he usually has it chemically straightened!) and curly (okay more fuzzy now than anything but still) but he hates it. He is counting the days til he can get it straightened again in Japan- I swear he spends more time and money on his hair than me!!!

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January 7 2009, Lota/Manly border, Olympus E-520.

I took this on one of my walks with Shun, Dad & Abbey- Abbey is loving the water recently and will now run in by herself as we near the little beach where she swims. This was taken along the grassed area leading to the beach earlier in the month.

It is a holiday here today for Australia Day. We live near the water and a big park that has plenty of bbq`s and playground equipment and already the street up the road is filling up with parked cars while families and friends set up for the day trying to find the shadiest part of the park. We have no plans today although there is a lot of cleaning & washing and replying to emails that I need to get through!!!

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It is pretty much decided that I will not be wearing a traditional veil at my wedding. I even read about itt (thanks to google, wikipedia and a number of other sources) and it is not for me. The religious connotations I guess do not really apply to Shun & I either (as we are certainly not virgins and he will not be taking “ownership” of me as they say by lifting up a veil).  Also the idea of something covering my face does not appeal to me so I have decided to forgo the whole thing.

That said, I do want something small to adorn my hair with I suppose you could say. I would also like to incorporate the cherry blossom theme perhaps into a hair piece, comb or birdcage veil. So after a visit to the milliner and a walk around the shops for some inspiration I came home and started the search for what I want. The most likely option is that I will get something made that appeals to my tastes and coloring. I need to go back to my dressmaker and get a swatch of fabric (I know, I know, I don`t have one- bad bride!) and  go from there. In the meantime I have been scouring the internet for inspiration and below are some images I have found that I like. I have also pulled out some handmade cherry blossom hair things (mainly from etsy- I am terribly sorry that I might not credit you if it is you that made them, i basically dragged the images to my desktop and moved onto the next page however if you ever come here, see your image and want me to link to you the please let me know!) to also take with me when I go to perhaps get something made.

So far I am liking the look of this last one the most- Except I am thinking instead of a big flower, three little cherry blossom flowers made from material & lace with pearls in the middle of them?

Thoughts?

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March 3 2008, Haruka`s house near Kichijoji, Olympus u830.

Another oldie but I must admit I love this photo. It would of been one of my last private lessons with Haruka, a student I saw on Monday`s for almost 18 months. The previous owner of my old school had recommended me to Haruka`s mum who she worked with and i became Haruka`s private English teacher. I would ride there after work (or walk once we moved to Nakano) each Monday and spend an hour to two hours with her.

On this day Haruka`s mother brought out a cake for Hinamatsuri also known as  girl`s day & doll`s festival which is held on March 3 every year. Each week after our lessons I would sit with Haruka & her mother (and sometimes her older sister Miki) and talk with them while eating a sweet and enjoying freshly brewed coffee or tea. With Haruka`s mother I always spoke Japanese and it was good for me to have the opportunity to speak with someone older as I had to be a bit more careful about the way I spoke and chuck in some “masu/desu” form every now and then.

Haruka`s mother can be credited with teaching me to make miso soup and kinpira gobo!!!

Once I moved to Nakano her mother would usually drive me back to Kichijoji station so that I could catch the train home. I miss Haruka and I have been a very bad English penpal to her- I must write to her soon! I am sure I will visit her again once I return to Japan even though I will live too far away to be her English teacher again.

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I had a written a to do list for the weekend (and had some other mental notes made for more to do) and yet it is nearing the end of the weekend and I have not done any of them really.

The list consisted of things like

- Decide on a costume for Dani`s 80`s birthday party next weekend and come up with something for Shun

- Tidy my room and start sorting through stuff that needs to be sent back to Japan

- Go see a movie with Shun

- Email/facebook message about seven different people (so if you are reading and waiting for a return message from me I am sorry!)

-Complete the wording for invitations and inputting all the names and addresses into an excelt spreadsheet to give to the invitation lady (Thankfully this one is almost done, just need 4 more addresses)

- Walk twice and do some hooping (I did a bit of hooping yesterday- but no walks for the weekend)

- Add more to my recipe book so that I could return the books I borrowed from mum.

- Do two loads of washing including sheets and towels (okay I did these, except the sheets are still waiting to be hunt out and it is after 7pm)

- Sit down with Shun and figure out what documents we will need from Japan to register our marriage and apply for a spouse visa for myself. Also start filling in the forms for a new passport for me.

- Do a food shop.

Instead I did the following

- Go shopping with mum and meet with a milliner (in case I decide to get  birdcage veil or facinator made for the wedding) and to get some ideas

- Bought bridesmaid shoes for the bridesmaids (and they are cute!)

- Bought some cherry blossoms to incorporate into the decorations at the wedding reception.

- Surfed the net for birdcage veils, cherry blossom flowers, facinators and other inspirational wedding type things.

- Blew my diet- okay this is not true, I stuck to points except for the choclate today perhaps, but I barely did any exercise. I did walk just under 10,000 steps though yesterday because of the shopping and I did some hooping last night.

- Watched some soccer on TV and then some My Name is Earl with Shun.

- Bought 25 books or so at the lifeline bookfest for just over $100 (more stuff to ship to Japan- GAH!)

And now it is after  7pm and I really do not feel like doing anything much. In fact,  I will probably spend the rest of the night on the net and/or watching TV. Hopefully next weekend will be more productive. Or perhaps I could try and get some of the stuff on this list done during the week (food shopping is a must- I did manage to get some fruit, bread and yogurt though for lunches!)

Next weekend is a long weekend in Australia for Australia Day. Apart from Dani`s party on the Saturday night we have no plans but I guess what I don`t get done during the week on my to-do-list will then become next weekends to-do list. I just feel that sometimes the to-do lists are never ending though…(as much as I love a good list!)

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I wrote this last night- but I fell asleep while blogging as I was so exhausted from the busy day. Shun woke me up when he came to bed and I had my fingers on the computer keys and had literally stopped writing mid-sentence.

Shun and I met four years ago today. We always take our anniversary from the day we met (which may have been on the 14th just before midnight but we take it from the 15th)….

It is hard to believe sometimes that we have been together that long and other times it seems like we have been together forever. I can not imagine not having Shun in my life, nor can I imagine never having lived in Japan. It just seems like it is part of me now, part of my history.

So when we get married we will have been together for four years and almost six months.                                                                                                                                                                                               
We did have a small tiff today though regarding the wedding invitations and the fact that the RSVP will probably not be til the beginning of April, six weeks before the wedding and about the fact I have booked four rooms at the reception (has hotels!) and that is it which won`t be enough if others decide to come. He said we should find out who from Japan is coming way before April. I totally agree and have been telling him for months to remind his friends to book tickets if they are coming so that we could arrange accom if neccessary, but so far nobody has. They were to let us know so we could book places. I assume they are not coming OR that if they do come they don`t mind where they stay. I told out other friends before we left Japan (and again when we sent save the dates) that I would book accom for them if they let me know if they were coming and the sooner they let me know the more likely I would be to get them good accom near the reception etc. Anyway we had a bit of a tiff but we kissed and made up and all is good again. If worst comes to worse and more friends from Japan are coming than I anticipated then I will  book more rooms at the hotel. If there are none available I will book a group somewhere else. It is no big deal & luckily we are all good now.

Oh and by the way, it was weight watchers weigh in today and I have lost 1.6kg this week. I hope to lose another kilo by next Thurday.  Only 8kg or so to go until I reach goal! Yay!

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Yesterday I left work a little early to visit the Passport Office (The building next to my work luckily!) and then the Japanese Consulate. Earlier in the day I rang the registry of births, deaths & marriages office (and waited on hold for 35 minutes) to inquire about how to go about a speedy name change. I did ask if I could change my name before we were married to get my passport changed to my married name before the wedding (instead of running around like headless chickens afterwards) and apparently you can change you name before marriage to your married name (you can change it to whatever you want!) but then when a marriage certificate is issued it would state I had married someone with the same name as myself.

But luckily it turns out that if I book flights back to Japan in my “new” name and take them with me to the births, deaths & marriage office with my forms and certificate issued by the celebrant then they will our proper marriage certificate to us within 2 working days.

The passport office will then let me change the name on my passport and reissue it with the new name if they see they marriage certificate and because I will have flights booked they will also get my new passport back to me within 2 working days (and they will transfer the six remaining years on my current passport to my new one and only charge me $80 or so for a speedy return of it)

So far things were going well and I had time up my sleeve before I had to meet Shun (for the cricket) so I wandered down to the Japanese consulate, just making it in before the cut-off time (3:45pm) and asked exactly what I would need to apply for a Japanese spouse visa so that I can return to Japan. I explained that I would be getting a marriage certificate a couple days after the wedding, and then a new passport and that I wished to have my spouse visa put in my new passport.

Firstly they explained that we would need to register our marriage first (got explanations in Japanese for Shun to read through as he will have to get a few documents brought over from Japan when his parents come), and then I could apply for a spouse visa. They explained however that Shun could not be my guaranter since he hasn`t worked in Japan this year…even though he still has a job there and has been paying tax, pension and health insurance every month while we have been in Australia. So I will need to ask his brother if he will be my guarantor. I would ask Shun`s dad but he is retiring this year so Shun is not sure if his company would issue the documents I would need for him to be my guarantor.  They would be able to get my visa ready in 4 working days according to the consulate lady.

We were hoping to leave to go back to Japan on the 25th or 26th of May but I think it will need to be the 29th. Even if we went to the birth, deaths and marriages office on the Monday after we get married (unlikely since we will have Shun`s family in Oz and a lot of our friends visiting so we were thinking of going to Australia Zoo which would mean an early start), we leave for our honeymoon on the Thursday morning meaning the certificate might not be ready. So the plan is to go there the day after we get back from our honeymoon, pick it up, head to the passport office and put in my application (will need to make an appointment if you are doing an application- they don`t let you just rock up like they used to).  That would be Tuesday  19th of May…we could pick up my passport on Thursday at the earliest but more likely that Friday 22nd of May. Once that was back in my hot little hands we would walk to the consulate, register our marriage and apply for my visa. If it takes four working days then I am hoping I could get it back on Thursday 28th of May and then leave on the 29th. Will I be cutting it a bit fine? Probably!!!

May is going to be a crazy crazy busy month in the Lulu & Shun house!!! What with me finishing up work, friends and relatives arriving, getting married, a honeymoon and visiting all the fun places like the registry, passport office & consulate while trying desperatly to pack everything we want to send to Japan up in boxes and getting it sent off. I feel better having things sorted now though, at least I know what I will need and have a bit of a timeframe.

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We just got home from the 20/20 cricket game between Australia & South Africa. It was a close game but luckily Australia pulled ahead and won it. I think Shun enjoyed it & I am glad he got to see it. He definitely understands the rules a lot better now (except LBW- anyway of explaining this simply?). I left home just after 6am this morning and it is now almost midnight so it has been a long day.

It got me thinking though…I am getting very used to living on very little sleep. I am usually awake until about 11pm or 11:30pm (sometimes later) yet I get up just before 5:30am ( to leave just before 6am if I am catching the train) to get ready for work so that I can start early (7am). So an average that is about six hours or less a night. By the time I get to sleep tonight I will probably get about five hours. I seem to catch up on the weekend a bit though if I have no plans and will sleep for maybe 9 hours or so.

How much sleep do you get a day? Is it all in one go or in blocks (ie, do you have a nap?)? I must say that the five to six hours that I do get are usually interrupted (unless a storm hits and the dog goes nuts!) which I know will be a thing of the past once we have kids.

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January 4 2009, Mum`s place Brisbane, Olympus E 520

My first Macro Monday shot from my new camera!!! I kind of like the “boeki” in the background.

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