I used some things which are alomst expired.

As you know, I try keeping discarding 10 things every week.
I don't only discard things but also try using effectively.

I always check some foods whether they are almost expired or not.
This time some things are almost expired.

This is the custard cream mix powder.

I made pie, cookies and of course served them for our breakfast.

Cookies are frozen in the freezer.

And some free coupons are also almost expired.

I put them in my wallet, and are going to use this weekend shopping. 

a season word 0928 traffic safety campaign

 

Here in Japan Traffic Safety Campaign is carried out twice a year. The word "Safety Campaign " sounds good, but anyway we see lots of policemen and undercover police cars hear and there. And during this season a strict crackdown on speed, seatbelts, and so on. Yes, we have to follow the rule, but sometimes ----,

 

And in this season some volunteers  (or some people are asked or ordered from the residential community or school ) stand at  crossing and watch children (and adults) walking cross them.

It is good for kids, because after the summer vacation they tend to become to relaxed and carelessly, so they should brace up.

 

Get on the ball, Traffic Safety Campaign, comes again.

What a surprise, grow taller, kids with yellow backpack  (here in Japan new students who are in the first grade have a backpack which is covered by yellow sheet.)

Thanks for your volunteering, elderly people,  now your turn, I hope you enjoy it.

 

 

Yuki's birthday --- -2-

If you read yesterday's diary , you might say "just a cake, Oh, poor Yuki!".

I'm a "good" wife, so the weekend  we bought this beef at a butcher shop nearby.

Not a supermarket, not a department store, at "butcher shop".

For you, it might be a natural thing to buy meat at butcher shops.

However, here in Utsunomiya, there are not so many butcher shops. Usually we buy meat at supermarkets, or department stores.

Coincidently we found a butcher shop nearby.

They don't show any meat in their food showcase, just some labels are put, like pork loin 100g/240yen,  pork shoulder,100g/170yen etc.

So probably if you are not familiar with the butcher , it might be difficult to buy some meat.

An acquaintance introduced me to the shop, so I told her name when I entered into the shop.

Anyway we could buy a good meat in reasonable price.

Stake is the best treat for Yuki.

Yuki's birthday

 

Last week my husband Yuki got 58 years old, just two years are left before he retires.

It was a usual day, so I served these pieces of cake for our breakfast and celebrate his birthday simply.

These are cakes, but  -- I bothered to go out to buy them to "the" cake shop, or I wanted to go to "the" cake shop to buy them.

The former sentence might sound negative, and the later sentence might sound positive. In Japanese we use "WAZAWAZA" for both meaning. --- It's a another story.

 

What is "the " cake shop?

Since we came to Tochigi, or since he started to work at this office, 34 years passed. And the cake shop was as old as our history. When Yuki came here at first, he lived in an small apartment. And the cake shop opened near the apartment. It is a cake shop and also a café, so we often used to have a coffee time there with cake.

So the master or chef of the cake shop is almost as the same age for ours. Now his son manages the shop mainly, but our familiar chef is also fine. Of course he remembers us.

Though I seldom buy cakes these days, when I want to buy cakes, I usually go there. And this time the familiar chef "bothered" to meet me from going out of the back.

 

Well, well, I don't know whether Yuki will work for another company or "stay" home. Anyway in two years our situation will dramatically changed.

 

season word 0921 red spider lily

Today's word is spider lily, and according to this article it is also called hurricane lily.
Now it's the season of spider lilies. Though in a big city it might be difficult to see them, we see them in the suburbs of Utsumoniya. For people who are into taking photos it is one of busy seasons. Because my friend who are into taking photos says that spider lilies are photogenic. Additionally I 've learned a new word instagenic .

Being photogenic, dark red, spider lilies

Spider lilies broom around the day of Ohigan when we respectfully worship the soul of  deceased like visiting our family graves or having a small party with "eating" OHAGI") .Ohagi used to be a wonderful sweet for kids, nowadays cake seems to be better.

with sweets, make our eyes more enlightened,  decorating spider lilies

from the windows of  a local train, in a row of spider lilies, bring a cool breeze

Though I didn't take any photos of spider lilies  I'll show a photo which was taken 2 years ago.



This month we met Ah-chan in Tokyo, so she doesn't come here., this month. It means probably we won't go out to the suburbs of Utsumomiya to see spider lilies.

discarding 10 things 0918

Little by little the rooms are being organized. So I tend to discard tiny gadgets every week. They are too tiny to refresh my feeling. It means "we" started to organize the garden. I made some trees lower.
So there are three bags of 90l.

Next I started to search tiny gadgets as usual

Done.
I did this job three days ago. I was going to Tokyo, but since the typhoon came, the plan was postponed to next Monday. So I had enough time  in the evening after the typhoon has gone.
And now --- my left wrist hurts. The jog was too much for me.

cooking 0918

Though I always keep rice, sometimes I really want to eat bread. Whenever I have such a feeling, usualy I don't keep bread. As you know I have HB, it takes more than 3 hours for HB to complete to bake bread. On the other hand I always keep pancake mix which is useful
to make something .When I want to eat bread, it means I don't want to something sweet.
I made two pieces of dough, and put lots of cheese one of them.

 

Finished. It took about 40 minutes.

While the oven was working, I started to make usual pre-cooked dishes for this week.

I could my bread and potato salad for my lunch.







Karaku in September

This lady who is reading is Ms.Ukai.
Coincidently I met her about -- three or four years ago. She used to belong to a professional theater company in Tokyo, and now she lives in Utsumoiya. She is still an actress in a theater company in Utsunomiya, and also works as MC of lots of events.
I'm a really lucky person to do perform with this professional player, even though I'm an armature.

 After this performance we had  usual sweets sweets.  The performance is not a job, considering this  sweets, our voluntary performance is a very high quality leasure. (Of course, the audience doesn't need to pay charge, just pay for their coffee and something. 

season word 0914 see fire

I don't know the phenomenon "sea fire" occurs in your country.

To tell the truth, I've heard the word SHIRANUI (sea fire), but I haven't see it, I didn't know about it.

This time I learned it occurs in Kyusyu area.

Though I'm not sure you can see the Japanese video, anyway I'll show a youtube site.

This is SHIRANUI festival.

What is shiranui?  Travle to Kyusyu,  during our retirement life,
What is shiranui?, lots of unknown words are left, keep studying

Cleaning

Nowadays in Japan an old-fashioned way, or you can say, a natural way to clean is reconsidered.

It means to clean with baking soda, citric acid, or sodium per-carbonate instead of synthetic detergent.  I think the reason is that there are many kids and adults suffering from skin allergy.

 

The two of things such as baking soda, and citric acid "was" familiar when I was a child. They were in my house, and my grandmother's house.

 

Now, I try doing them sometimes.  I sometimes boil lids and pots with baking soda.

 

 

and I usually citric acid (with some aroma)  to soften clothes while the  washing machine is running.

 

Yuki some times show interest  in the old-fashioned way, because it sometimes works better than synthetic detergent, though he is not a naturalist.(I'm not sure the word of naturalist is an English word, anyway the word naturalist exists as a Japanese word.)

To remove hard water stain of  our bath sink (why hard? because it is very old) is usually Yuki's job, because we have to scrape it hardly, even though we use synthetic detergent, or baking soda paste.

 

And finally the between detergent  has appeared.

It consists of 5% citric acid and surface acting agent.

Cooking

These are pre-cooked dishes for this week.
This summer the price of summer vegetables were higher than usual because of that strange weather.
And-- while September comes, we see sunshine, and I get cucumbers from here and there.
How do you cook lots of cucumbers?
I fried them with sesame oil and ginger, and add some soy sauce to them to preserve them for a while
When I eat them, it's all right to eat them directly, or fry again with eggs, tomatoes, or anything else.

And I found a can of condensed milk which is almost expired.

So I simmered it with full of  hot water which always covers the whole can, for about 4 hours.

I made fresh caramel cream.

Of course we used them as a jam, but it seems too high calory to get it straight.

So I baked caramel & nuts cake.

Of course we had some for our breakfast, and served the rest of them the day before yesterday when some friends came to my house..

Lots of chores

Yesterday, I had lots of chores, why? Just I went out all the day the day before yesterday, but I had lots of things.

This Sunday Yuki and I attend the 27th anniversary of Yuki's father.

So I had to organize photos, budgets, my bags.

However the first job was to go to the bank.

Additionally suddenly a friend would come to talk with me about the event of the end of September in the afternoon.

So while in the morning I struggled with lots of things. What I could do is one thing at the same time  but my brain was thinking 3 things on the same time. It means yes, I seem to have enough power to lead some things.

Anyway the first event was done. Next event was to visit my father's grave with my mother.

And today, it is the day of Karaku, it means I play the piano for just 30 minutes at Karaku.
After the performing, I'm going to spend the rest of day loosely at Karaku.




discarding 10 things 0909

Anyway "suddenly" it got cold, though it sometimes hot.
Usually until middle of September, summer heat would linger, however this year it is completely different. So I had to change my clothes.

And, on the occasion I was going to discard 10 clothes, --- as you know I failed.

What I could discard are, some T-shirts, and a sock, the other of whose has gone somewhere.

Though I applied Konmari method to decide whether I should discard it or not, it means I put all clothes in my hands and check whether I feel something from them.

Most of them were necessary for me.

So I gave up organizing my drawers, and check another drawer of my computer desks.
From them, I took out these gadgets.

My task of discarding 10 things this week was finished.

However, Yuki found this electric outlet, and he put it in the drawer of his desk.
It's not my business.

Seasonal word 0907 katydid

 

Katydid ? What is it? And according to this article, "grasshopper" is said to be a old-fashioned word.

Is it true?

 

Katydid, why you know, it is what he wants to do.
 (Hi might play the violin on duty.)

 

Until your life comes to the end, keep nimble, katydid
  (so you never become a bedridden elderly person.)  

 

 

Well, I  have already seen mantises and crickets, but I haven't seen katydids yet. (Though I can't distinguish the sound of crickets from the one of katydid.)

 

Mieko's house workshop -2-

This diary carries from yesterday.
We learned about OTSUKIMI.

Why is the moon in mid-autumn so beautiful?
Because the crispy and bracing air comes along, and the heat of summer subsidies

Another name for chushu no meigets (the name of the moon we see on the day of Otsukimi) is imo meigetsu.
Because it is also the harvest season. So the night has a thanksgiving aspect and we tend to offer potatoes to the moon (not sweet potatoes, SATOIMO which is called yam, or taro.)

And, though nobody did know this custom.
You can "steal" some otsukimi dango ( we also offer rice dumplings to the moon).
Because kids are considered to be envoys from the moon and they are allowed to do so only on the night. Each home tries to display offerings that can be "stolen" easily.

Well, well, nowadays not so many people offer some things to the moon on the night, however, probably many people eat ODANGO on the day.


So we have to cook ODANGO.
We enjoyed cooking odango in not a usual way. I used a gadget, which is usually used to make TAKO-YAKI.

 

We made it.

Usually people decorate with silver grasses with the dumplings.

So instead of silver grasses, I picked up some lemon grasses in the garden.

 

 



 
 



 

Perfect. We had some there, and we shared the rest of them. It was a good souvenir.

 

 

 

Mieko's house workshop in September -1-

Yesterday two ladies came to my house and enjoy talking in Japanese and English, and cooking.

Before they come, I prepared my house more neatly than usual
I put some fresh herbs picked up from the garden on a usual artificial wreath.

 

And I also baked "moon cookies"

 

 

They look rough, because the moon has lots of craters.

 

Why "moon cookies"?

 

Because we talked about OTSUKIMI which is one of Japanese autumn custom. It means viewing the moon.

The day of Otsukimi this year is, to the truth, October 4th. Otsukimi is celebrated on the August 15 the on the Chinese calendar, so, on the Gregorian calendar it is changed every year.

And usually the moon on Otsukimi is mostly the full of moon. But the real day the moon becomes the full of moon this year is October 6th.

It is said, ancient people enjoyed the full moon in autumn, and named the nearest day of Autumnal Equinox day the 15 nights moon which is the day of Otsukimi.

 

 





How old is my black skrit?

This is the waist band of my skirt.
I mended it, or as you know I expanded it.

This weekend I'm going to attend the 33th anniversary of my father-in-law death.
And I'm going to wear this skirt.

This skirt used to be worn by my mother-in-law.
This is a black skirt, but it is not formal but semi-formal.


When my father-in-law passed away, I needed to put on  a black skirt  while I was doing lot of chores for  preparing for the funeral. I didn't know it, so my mother "lent" it to me. At that time she used the expanded waist band, so I mended it to usual size.
Since then, I have kept it. Actually I put it on again, on the 7th  anniversary of his death.
And this time, I decided to  use it again, instead of buying new one.
And to be my surprised, I need to mend it again , it means  need to use the expanded waist band.
To tell the truth, everybody says I look to keep the same weight still now. Actually the weight is not so changed, but the sizes of my body parts are --- unfortunately, changed.


Well,  does my mother still remember of this skirt?

Utsunomiya Toast Masters' meeting

Yesterday I attended the Toast Master's meeting. This time my role was to evaluate how to organize the whole meeting. So I watched the meeting carefully while summarizing the flow.
I'll show the summarize.

First the meeting was started with table topics in English.
I was the first person to offer the theme of table topic. My theme was "haiku", and (thanks to Tim) I asked them two riddles. One is of course Mr. Toad and Mrs. Toad, the other is my Haiku .
Each speaker I appointed made a speech with solving the riddles.  This theme seemed to make the atmosphere fun.
The next person was Mr. T.  asked for the speech about "leaf," and "falling leaves". They were very seasonal topics.
Mr.H made a speech about Gingko trees. And I made a speech about picking up Gingko nuts.
Have you ever picked up Gingko nuts?
In my high school there were ( and now) many Gingko trees. So the students at that time  used to pick up premature Gingko nuts which fell on the ground, made them matured and sell them at the school festival.
premature Gingko nuts are covered with wet skin. They are very stink. We dag a hole and put them into it, and waited for a month. The skin melt into the ground, So we could get just hard Gingko nuts We washed and dried them, and soled them.

Oh, go back to the flow of Toast Masters' meeting.

Then Mrs.M asked for the speech about the recent J-alert.  It was a very timely topic.
Ms.E and Mr.T talked about their experiences at that time in turn.

Next it was the time for prepared speeches.
The first one was Data Science. the speaker was Mr. T.
He loves science, and I know he wanted to show the detail of the Data Science but he also knew it would be difficult for some listeners. So he introduced what was Data science, and how we were involved by it. The contents were very interesting and easy to listen to.
The next one was Toast Master's Organization.  The speaker was Mr. H. Mr.H is a Toast Master's area governor. On that day he just visited us. So it was a good opportunity for us to know Toast Masters more.

Oh, these two prepared speeches were done in Japanese.

And we also make short speeches in Japanese.
The first theme was just the word "TE N KI".
This word has lots of meanings depends on how to write it in Kanji.  (I didn't notice, What I imaged was just one meaning at that time.) The speaker was Mr.E, She quickly noticed two meanings, and made a speech about two words.
Additionally the two meanings were  weather and turning points.

And the other them was Mr.E asked for the area governor Mt.H. What brought you to become an area governor though the organization of Toast Masters is just a voluntary group, not a workplace.
It was very interesting.

The meeting was about two-hour meeting.

It was fun.


However fortunately there were four members this time, usually we don't have enough numbers of attendee. (And I hardly attend it) .  I hope this group activity will continue, on the other hand I keep thinking I should quick it.

HerbTincture

Suddenly it got cold yesterday, though today it is cool not so cold. According to the weather forecast this weekend it seems to be cold again. As soon as it got cold, I had runny nose.  I might have caught a cold, but I think my autumn allergy has started.

This summer I have tried drinking herb tea more than iced coffee. And nowadays I seldom drink something cold. I drink something hot which I added some drops of herb tincture .

 

 

I learnt the arrange of this herb tincture which seems to ease the symptom of autumn allergy from a lady in July. At that time I made the bottle of herb tincture using her dry herb leaves which she deals with as her business.

I need to make it more.

 

Well, well, usually dry herb leaves are not so inexpensive.

I noticed that some dry leaves in the arrange recipe are able to made by myself.

They are fennel, and pepper mint.

I picked them, and dried them.

Leaves of fennel are better, but probably it is all right to use the stalks. (My fennels don't have enough leaves.)

 

 

They dried enough.

So this morning I cut them and mix with other herbs I bought on the internet.

 

And I soaked them into vodka.

It is need to place at list for two weeks.

From today I've started to take medicine.  Anyway I try to do any things (except tough exercise, taking something expensive more) to ease my autumn allergy.