Our House

This is a picture of our house in Hikone, Japan.

Come on in and get a tour of our house!  You can see our mailbox is on the right side of the door, it's the rectangle on the bottom.  The kids love to check for the mail from the inside of the house.  Above that is our doorbell that also has a video camera attached.  When the doorbell rings, the video comes on and from a screen inside the house you can see who is at the door and talk to them.  Pretty cool!

You don't wear shoes in the house in Japan, they all stay on the gray floor or the closet (see below).  There is a small step which is nice for the kids to sit on to put their shoes on or off.  It's also nice to keep the dirt by the shoes so it doesn't get tracked into the house.

When you come in, there is a very large closet to the left.  There is no basement, but there are several spacious closets in the house to make up for that. 

Coming up the step you enter into a hallway of doors as I call it.  To the right is the one and only small bathroom in the house.

It can get pretty toasty in here!  There is no air conditioner in the room and it faces west so in the afternoon it gets hot!  On top of that, there is a heated seat on the toilet, which I just figured out how to kinda turn off.  If you leave the lid down like in the picture above, the heated seat feature isn't on.  However, after you lift the lid it starts to heat up.  I know I will love this feature in the winter!

The heated seat is just one of many features of the toilets over here!  This is the control for it, but I have no idea what it says!  There maybe a way to change the heated seat temperature, but I don't know how.  I haven't been brave enough yet to have a seat and start hitting buttons.  I may be pleasantly surprised or scarred for life!

There are also two buttons on the very top right hand side that flush the toilet.  I don't know if one button is specifically for number one and the other is for number two. They both work just fine and I haven't noticed a difference between the two.  Perhaps I will never know! 

Above the door in the bathroom there is another neat storage area.  After leaving the bathroom, there are stairs on the left to go up, a little further down on the left there is a sliding door to the computer room, straight ahead there is a sliding door to the toy/laundry drying room, and to the right there are two sliding doors to the dining room.

Let's continue on to the computer room.

Do you see the darker square lines in the floor above, we will come back to that when we get to the laundry area.  There is another storage shelf in the computer room that has a curtain over it, so you can hide what's up there.

This is where we will dry the laundry on rainy days or in the winter time.  It is also the kids play area.  The door walls over here can open from either side.  The screen door slides from side to side too, so you can move the screen along with the door and not worry about bugs coming in.  All of the windows and door walls here are textured.  It's not a clear smooth glass that you can see through, it's more like a shower door.  It lets the light in, but I can't see out.  It doesn't bother me too much now because we keep the curtains shut during the day to keep the house cooler.  It is also nice because the neighbors can't see in, but I miss being able to look outside.  I have no idea what the weather is out, unless I go outside or open up one of the windows.  

There is a large closet in the playroom for all of their toys. I love how deep the closets are, you can fit a ton of stuff in them!

Except for the bathroom and bedroom doors, all of the rest of the doors are sliding doors.  It's possible to change what room is open to another room just by sliding the doors.  It's hard to explain and show in pictures, but I will give it a try.

In this picture, I am standing in front of the door wall in the play room.  I slid the three doors mostly shut, so you can see a bit of the computer room.  I can slide all the doors to the right and this is what you see then...

The kids enjoy sliding the doors open and closed and we've only had a few fingers pinched when we first moved in.  They are pretty good about it now.  We keep the doors to the hallway closed usually.  Only certain rooms have an air conditioner/heater unit in them.  There isn't one in the hallway or the bathroom, so we keep the doors closed to keep the main rooms cooler.  Each bedroom has an air conditioner/heater, thank goodness!

To continue the tour, we will next go to the family room.

The sliding doors by the couch lead to the playroom.  Here's another view of the family room.

The family room is open to the dining room and the kitchen.

There is not much counter space for cooking, but we are getting by.  There is no oven, but we do have a gas cook top and a microwave oven/toaster.  We also have a rice cooker that plays "Twinkle twinkle little star" when you turn it on.  The top section of the refrigerator can open from either side.  The middle compartment is the freezer and the bottom is more refrigerator. 

There is also a side door in the kitchen which is nice for bringing in groceries, especially since the car is parked on that side of the house.  There are not many attached garages on the houses in Japan.  Most people just park on the side or in front of their house. 

Do you see the plastic bags hanging by the sink?  Those are for our garbage.  The Japanese are big on recycling and we have to separate our garbage before throwing it out.  The bag on the left is for metal, the bag on the right is for plastic and the regular garbage container is for combustible garbage.  There is a drop off location down the street.  We have a calendar with the schedule of what is picked up on what day.  For example, combustible garbage is collected on Tuesdays and Fridays and plastic is on Wednesdays.  We have to put the garbage in special bags when taking them out.

From the kitchen you can go to the laundry room.  That's our washing machine, not very big, but it does the job.  Also, there is only a cold water line, so everything is washed in cold water.  Do you remember the darker square line in the floor of the computer room?  It's actually a storage area in the floor.  There is one in the laundry room as well.  As you can see in the picture above, we keep our laundry soap in it.  It's a really nice feature, good storage without taking up any space!

Next to the washing machine is a sink with a medicine cabinet over it.  All three mirrors open and once again, another nice storage space.  The faucet on the sink can be pulled out and you can change the water flow.  You can have it on the spray mode or push a button and change it to a normal bathroom sink flow (the kitchen one can too).  You can see to the left of the sink is the bathing room.

 

Traditionally the Japanese will shower off in the white area of the bathroom, then once clean, they will soak in the bathtub.  There is a cover for the bathtub, so that the dirty water from your shower won't get into the bathtub.

There is a control panel on the right side over the tub.  You can change the water temperature and have the tub fill up by itself.  When soaking, you can push a button and it will fill the tub with warmer water too.  There is also an intercom system in the control panel to talk to people in the kitchen.  I am sure there are more things the buttons do, we just haven't figured it out yet.

That's everything downstairs, so let's head upstairs.

The stairs here are not as wide as they are in the US.  Perhaps the Japanese have smaller feet, or just different building codes.  It took some getting used to, going up and especially going down.  Thank goodness for that railing!

Upstairs there are two bedrooms, one for the kids and one for Jeff and I.  The kids all share one big room.  Their beds are on the floor, which is perfect for them, if they roll of the bed, they won't get hurt!

There are two doors to their room, a door wall to the balcony (you can see it in the first picture), and in the back corner a little storage area. 

Speaking of doors, there is a strip of a fuzzy fabric that's on the side trim of the door.  It's very quiet when you close the door, if you were to slam it, you wouldn't hear it.  It's nice but sometimes the kids can sneak up on you!  I am waiting for them to get up in the morning or up from their naps and surprise there they are!  I never heard them close the door, but they did.  We keep the bedroom doors closed because there are no air conditioners in the hallways and we want the rooms to stay cool.

 

Our bedroom is just across the hall. It too has a door wall to the balcony.



I absolutely love the view from the bedrooms! There is a rice field behind our house and you can see the mountains off in the distance. I don't think I will ever get tired of the view! It's so beautiful here! In the early evening you can see the bats come out and fly around the rice field. 

If you noticed, there wasn't a clothes dryer in the laundry room, it's because it's up here on the balcony!

Here's another picture of the master bedroom.

You can see Killian hiding in the closet.  The doors slide from side to side along the track which is pretty cool too.  The closets are very deep and have nice shelves for more storage.  There is storage over our dresser too!

That's the tour of the inside of our house. 

This is a picture of the street we live on.  There are no yards with grass, everything is gravel or cement.  There are just a few small trees in front of a few houses.  The houses don't have backyards either.  The house is on the lot and that's it. 

Across the street and one house down is the neighborhood play area.  There are two swings and a slide to play on.

The kids have a great time playing with all of the other kids!

That wraps up the tour of our house in Japan.  If you have any questions or comments, let me know! 

Our Welcome Party!

Our Welcome Party

Our neighbors threw us a welcome party this past Sunday.  In the morning we heard our mailbox make noise, so we knew to check it.  Inside were two envelopes from the kids (Rinne and Sena) down the street. 

I love how they spelled Chloe's name "Crawley".  On the envelope to the left, there is a quote "Midnight Parade, Here is the world that you know.  And, here is the world that you don't know."  I thought that was an appropriate quote given our situation.  They also included a map of the houses on the street along with the family last name, so I know who lives where.  How sweet!

Around noon some of them came to take us to the party, which was really nice, since I wasn't too sure what house the party was at.  When we entered the house, we had to take off our shoes.  Everyone's shoes were pointed towards the door, so when it was time to leave, it's easy just to slip your shoes on and go.  Crocs are really popular over here by the way.  Katherine has the same shoes as some of the other girls in the neighborhood!

We went upstairs to the party.  There were low tables set up on the floor and mats for us to sit on.  On the table there was a ton of food and two portable burners that the women were making soup in.  I am not sure of all the ingredients, but I saw them put in chicken, beef, cabbage, acorn squash, flour balls, octopus, and pork.  We told them about Killian's food allergies and it turned out he couldn't have the soup because there was something with egg in it.  A few minutes later, Killian had his own special pot of soup, with no eggs!  It was so thoughtful of them!  We didn't ask them to make him some, but they did!

The women and children sat at these tables and the men sat at a table higher up.  When the food was done, the women served the food to the men.

Everyone (adults and kids) is so interested in the kids.  They like to feel their hair and like touching Chloe's cheeks!  They also like to pick Chloe up, she's not a big fan of that and usually starts crying until they put her down or give her to me. 

After we were done eating, one of the girls used her cell phone and a translation app to ask Katherine if she wanted to go play.  So off we went outside to play!  I am amazed at how well the kids play without being able to speak the same language!  They had fun playing catch, finding a tiny frog (she's holding it in her hand in the picture below), and playing on the playground. 

I passed out suckers to all the kids, but they didn't know what any of the flavors were.  The only flavor they recognized me saying was mango, so they all had a mango sucker!  After the mango suckers, it was time to play some more at the party.  Everyone was sitting around talking when two of the kids started to arm wrestle.  Everyone started to watch and really got into it.  Katherine, Killian and Jeff all arm wrestled and did very well.  One of the girls (the one holding the frog above) let Killian win everytime!  It was so nice for everyone to get excited about it and pay attention, they weren't distracted by anything else.

They were very curious about what we like when it comes to entertainment.  One of the guys was so happy to hear we like Harry Potter.  He read all of the books and loved them, just like us.  He is also a huge fan of Johnny Depp, Spiderman, Superman and Batman.  He was asking the kids if they liked Spiderman, I think that one was his favorite.  At lunch the girls were asking us if we liked Lady Gaga and Avril Lavigne.  They had never heard of Taylor Swift though.  We had shown the kids some Japanese cartoon movies, "My Neighbor Totoro" and "Ponyo" directed by the famous Hayao Miyazaki, before we came, and the everyone was thrilled we had seen them!  

During the party Katherine asked if she could go out on the balcony.  I told her it was alright and somehow she got all of the other kids out there with her!  She's a natural born leader!!

They are also very interested in our ages.  The lady above is the same age as my mom and she was very excited about it! 

It was also quite toasty there.  They don't run the air conditioner like we do at home, that's for sure!  As you can see in the picture above, the lady has a towel wrapped around her head to catch the sweat!  In some of the other pictures above, you can see towels draped around their necks and they use them to wipe off their faces.

We had some ice cream for dessert while at the party.  The ladies knew Killian couldn't have ice cream (because of his milk allergy), so they sent some of the kids out to get popsicles for him!  Jeff has been looking for popsicles, but everything he found had milk in it, which is no good for Killian.  Now we know what store to go to!  It made Killian's day to have a popsicle and once again, it was so kind of them to go out of their way for us!

It was a lovely party and we are so lucky to be surrounded by such wonderful, thoughtful people!

Greetings from Japan!

My family has moved to Japan for my husband, Jeffrey's job.  Jeff works for a Japanese company and he was given the opportunity to relocate to Japan for a 2 year assignment.  We decided it would be a wonderful, once in a lifetime chance to explore and learn about another culture firsthand.  We also decided two years would be too long for the kids to be gone, so the kids and I are just going for one.  Jeff moved over the beginning of June to get everything settled before we came.  We have just arrived and I am starting this blog to keep all of our friends and family up to date with all of our new experiences!  

I hope you enjoy reading about our adventure abroad!  Here we go..... 


On Friday, July 27th, Katherine, Killian, Chloe, my Mom and I hopped on an airplane and flew to Japan. 

It was a long flight, 13 hours, and we had a slight delay due to storms.  The kids did well on the flight, especially considering it was the first time they flew.  They didn't sleep well until the end of the flight, of course, and I had to wake them up when we were landing. 

We made it through customs with no problem and went to collect our checked luggage.  We were the last ones from our flight to get our luggage, and the Japanese airport workers pulled it off the carousel and had it all grouped together for us.  As I walked up they said "Ms. Far-mer" and helped us load everything onto carts.  We walked out through the doors and see Jeffrey waiting for us!  It was so nice to see him, after being away from him for almost 2 months! 

We knew we couldn't fit all of our luggage in our car, so Jeff and I took it over to the airport delivery service.  Before they took our bags, the worker inspected all of our bags and informed us if something was ripped or anything was wrong.

Chloe made a little friend while Jeff and I were taking care of the luggage.  A little Japanese boy about her size was chasing her around and she turned and chased him!  I wish I had a picture of that, it was really cute!

We then went out to the car, installed the car seats and headed to our new home.  We were all so tired, I think we all fell asleep on the ride.

Jeff made us some hamburgers and then it was off to bed. 

We spent the next few days adjusting to the new time zone.  Most days we wake up around 5:30 am.  The sun is already up and bright in the sky, so it's not too bad.  On the flip side, it gets dark here at 7:30pm.  It makes it easy to put the kids to bed early because it's so dark.

When Jeff came home from work on Monday, a neighbor ran over and dropped off some watermelon for us!  Watermelon is very expensive over here.  The typical watermelon in the States costs a few dollars, whereas over here it's $30 and it's smaller.  It was a very nice gift and welcome present!

Jeff and I ran out to the store and a group of our neighbors were still outside.  As Jeff and I drove by, we rolled down the window and waved hi.  One of the teenage girls squealed and then jumped up and down and started clapping.  I just laughed, I suppose that's what some celebrities feel like when they see fans!  It was a very interesting feeling!

After dinner that night, the doorbell rang and it was the neighbors inviting us out to do sparklers and watch fireworks. 

Poor Katherine was just waking up and we couldn't get Killian to wake up because of the jet lag!  Katherine didn't want to do a sparkler and wasn't too sure about what was going on.  I suppose it would be very odd to just wake up and be surrounded by strangers speaking a different language and crowding around to see you better.  Thankfully she perked up the next day when we saw them again! 

Everyone was super nice and very happy to come over and meet us!  It was a great way to end the night and be welcomed by the neighborhood!