Happy New Year Everyone!

On New Year's Eve, mommy and daddy had their friends Denise and Akio over to ring in the new year. We made sukiyaki, and they let me stay up for the ball drop, which was very exciting! I didn't get to sleep until almost 1am! Then, on New Year's morning, I helped mommy put the finishing touches on her 'osechi ryouri' and make ozoni (traditional Japanese New Year's food). This year, mommy made 'kyozoni', which basically means that she made the ozoni soup with saikyo miso, a type of miso that is popular in Kyoto, It is more sweet and lighter in color than the regular white or 'shiro miso'. I'm learning alot about cooking already, and now that I have a step stool, I can join mommy at the kitchen counter and watch her when she's cooking.

After we ate our New Year's food, I went to Barnes and Noble with mommy where we met one of my friends, Juliana. I haven't seen her in a while, and was happy to see that she is now walking! We then went to the playground but since there was too much snow, we could only go on the swings. It was Juliana's first time on the swings in a playground, and she really liked it! She was quite upset when we had to leave.

When we went home, daddy had a few of his friends over to play mahjong (Akio, Ito, Daisei). Every year on New Years Day, daddy likes to get together with his friends to play this game. They play for hours and daddy usually ends up winning since he's so clever! He said he's going to teach me how to play someday.

Akio's wife also came over, and while mommy was taking care of the laundry, Denise read me a couple of books. I also helped mommy down in the laundry room because she had so many clothes to wash. She would hand me some clothing, and then I would help her by putting it into the dryer. I thought that was so much fun! We also tried to talk to ba-chan and ji-chan in Japan over Skype, but our video camera wasn't working, so we could only see them. We decided that we would call again once our camera has been fixed. I did get to see my cousin Masamune for a few minutes though. I can't wait to go visit him in Japan again!