A Halloween Post...on Thanksgiving..

I have once again been informed by Laurel an anonymous reader that I need to update the blog! It's not that I don't want to, it's just that...we're lazy! And then we get more and more pictures and it just backs up! So here we are, November 25th, blogging about Halloween! Oops!

First, there was pumpkin carving (of course!). This was Yoshi's first time, and I hadn't done it in a few years! I forgot how much work it is, and our pumpkins were absolutely FREEZING on the inside, despite how nice the weather was outside. Here are some pictures of the fun we had!

Carving is F-U-N!

Uh-oh! Someone let the carving go to their head...

It must be all the power...

The finished products! (3 guesses which is which...)

Making delicious pumpkin seeds! There were SO many!!!

My mom's little pumpkin display--they're all so cute :)

spooky view :)

This year, since Halloween fell on a Sunday, we had plenty of time to get up to MSU to go to a Halloween party on Saturday. Yoshi and I made our matching costumes all ourselves - Mario and Luigi! Let's just say every time Yoshi introduced himself people tended to say something like, "Well, that doesn't make sense..."

The Supermario Brothers!

Best friends on Halloween! Rosie the Riveter, Pam from the Office, and Mario!

Yoshi with his new best friends :)

We had a ton of fun, and headed back to Tecumseh to hand out candy on Halloween. We even dressed up again, which was pretty amusing! It was Yoshi's first time with all of this, and he had a blast!

Our pumpkins along with my mom's!

Well everyone, there's our Halloween this year! We hope you had a great Thanksgiving, we are very thankful for these experiences we are having, and for all of you who read this!

ღ

Kate and Yoshi

From Seattle with Love!

We are currently sitting on the couch of our lovely friends, Katy and Josh! This is our last full day in Seattle :(, but we are having a great time! We have some spare time so we thought we would update the blog a bit!

Our trip to Chicago! This was Yoshi's first time on an American train (and it wasn't even that late!)

This photo was taken near Broadway on our way to dinner at my old professor's house! There are two really cool giraffe statues on a side street we walked through!

The Bean! Although it was raining that day, it was still a lot of fun! And less people :)

The first night we arrived we were able to spend with Jess and Ben before they left for Ohio, and left us to our house/dog sitting duties! No pictures, unfortunately :( BUT we did eat some delicious Ian's pizza, with Macaroni and Cheese on top! (None for Jess, though, she got a covered chicken pesto pizza with no cheese.)

Friday we stayed on the Northside and scoped out Hipsters (Yoshi is still learning what this term means, and therefore our trip to Belmont was full of the question "Is that a hipster? Is THAT a hipster?"). We hit the army surplus store which was really fun, had some food at an old college favorite (Pick Me Up), then headed over to a Professor from college's house for dinner! Dinner at Miho's was great, it was so nice to meet her family and it was also EXTRA nice for Yoshi because not only is Miho Japanese, but her wife and daughter speak it as well! It was such a great night (and also great yummy pizza!) Wish I had some pictures from our reading session! :)

Saturday we ventured downtown, tried and failed to get rush tickets to the Lion King, saw the bean, attempted the Art Institute (too crowded!), and ended up at the Cultural Center, which was really nice AND we stumbled upon a free Jazz concert for the 15th Annual Asian American Chicago Jazz Festival! It was great!!

This bull is outside the Cultural Center, and it has what I believe is a skyscraper or something for an eye!

One of MANY beautiful ceilings in the Chicago Cultural Center, which used to be the Chicago Public Library.

Sunday we went back for a second chance at the Art Institute, right when it opened! SUCCESS! It was great, even though I expected the new Modern Wing to be more...something. I guess all the hype had built it up too much in my mind! It was still a great visit though. We both really liked this installation at the front:

I finally realized that you have to read this from the bottom stair to the top, after a while of trying to figure out what it said!

After the Art Institute, we headed down to Chinatown. It was really fun to go to Chinatown again after such a long time, but unfortunately our food wasn't very delicious :(. We couldn't get into my favorite place because it was Sunday (aka Dim Sum time!), so it was crazy busy and we had to go to another place. Maybe next time!

Welcome to Chinatown! This was as close as Yoshi's ever gotten to China, ironically.

Monday was our last day, and Jess was kind enough to let us leave our luggage at her work downtown while we went over to the Sears Tower! (No, I will not now, or ever, refer to it as the "Willis Tower." It's too absurd.) We even got to experience the new glass walkout boxes which was really awesome! There were some people attempting to step out onto them but just couldn't do it! It was so cute.

Yoshi just chilling over Chicago. :)

This photo is a little trippy, but I like it. :)

Before I conclude, I have to give a shout out to our good friend/temporary roommate, Eddy! He always slept in his parents' room at night, but inevitably, someone would end up in OUR bed, and I believe from the progression of the photographs, Eddy may be in love with my boyfriend.

Kate, get out!

Back by Popular Moderate Demand!

Hello!

We are so happy to hear that people actually read our blog! Yoshi is going to start posting in Japanese as well (supposedly), but until then, it's just me! Yoshi is most concerned with photos, of course. Let's see what we have to show for ourselves...

This is Yoshi at Applebee's in Columbus. We were there for the MUSE concert! (Editor's Note: Those are MY (kate's) sunglasses!!)

This is the set before MUSE came on! GREAT GREAT AMAZING GREAT performance!

So as you can see, we made our way down to Columbus, OH, for a great concert by MUSE. All in all a great trip, but please don't ever stay at the Red Roof Inn Ohio State University unless you absolutely HAVE to. It was that bad (and expensive!).

This past weekend, we made our way over to everyone's favorite city, none other than the fabulous CHICAGO. We were lucky enough to be house/dog sitting for our best doggie pal Eddy (aka Jess and Ben), so we had free room and board for our 5 day stay (thanks again guys!!). We were lucky enough to see my good friends Goldy, Molly, and Steve along the way! I'm always surprised by how many of my college friends no longer live in Chicago :'(. But it was super fun (besides the weather) and we did a lot! This time was the Art Institute, Millennium Park, Chicago Pizza, Cultural Center, Downtown, DePaul, Northside, Chinatown, Michigan Ave. Next time we hope to see the Museum of Science and Industry, the Field Museum, Shedd Aquarium, Wrigley Field (properly), and hopefully a show! (We tried to get rush tickets for the Lion King, but to no avail.. :()

This is one of our many (obligatory) photos from the Bean!

We have more pictures and stories from Chicago, alas, we should wrap up this entry! Will post more Chicago, Halloween in East Lansing, and Seattle/San Fran trip when we return next Thursday!!

Much love to all,

Kate and Yoshi

First Entry!

Yoshi's not quite sure how to start our blog, so I guess I'll do it!

Here is a picture from our first week together in the US.



This was when Yoshi FINALLY came out from the gate because we were both interrogated by immigration! I thought if he were going to be detained it would be for his funny looks (haha) but actually they wanted to make sure he was going to leave at the end of 3 months, and if we were planning on getting (illegally) married while he was here. JEEZ it was an ordeal, but thankfully he came out without any further stops. phew!

One of the first things we did Yoshi's first week was go for a walk on a trail near my house. Yoshi decided it was a smart idea to go out of some fallen trees over the river...you can probably see where this is going...

Yoshi all fun and games

Yoshi after taking a spill!

After Yoshi dried off, we did all sorts of fun stuff! We did some fall stuff like looking at pumpkins, stopping for photo ops next to corn fields, and riding an incredibly fast (and probably unsafe!) ferris wheel at Tecumseh's Appleumpkin Festival!

At Whole Foods!

Trying to be taller than the corn

Ferris Wheel!

We also went to my good friend, Mitsu's wedding! It was a beautiful day, and an even more beautiful wedding! Congrats!

Mr. and Mrs. Jason and Mitsu Beck!!

Honestly the most legitimate photo of us from the wedding...and we weren't even drinking!!

Last Friday night we went to a Tecumseh football game...although we left at halftime! Haha!

Yoshi's first football game...ever!

I'll end this first post before it gets too long, with a very special picture--Yoshi's new haircut! You can kind of see it, he didn't want to show it off for the cameras unfortunately...more photos to come!!