Yoron Getaway

We celebrated Noa's birthday this past weekend by taking a trip to one of Okinawa's outer islands, Yoron Island. To get there, we had to drive north and then take a ferry ride to this tiny island. Yoron is the sister island to Mykonos Island in Greece and uses lots of white on their buildings, walls, and statues.

We stayed at a small resort called Pricia, which definitely had that Mediterranean feel with all the blue and white. For the first night, we stayed on the ground level in a modest, low-cost room in a building like this:

But, when we realized the weather was going to give us some problems and we wouldn't be spending most of our time on the beach, we upgraded to a nicer room. We later decided that this was a smart move, considering our new room had a hot tub, private yard, a little kitchen, and more space overall.

Here's the outside view from the back. We were on the ground floor and didn't have upstairs "neighbors."

Our hot tub. :)

The view of the ocean and our yard with lush, green grass. I'll admit it, I ran around the yard barefoot several times.

Here is the living room and kitchen (in the back).

Most of the Japanese-style hotels and resorts have separate beds and this place was no different. We're also not big fans of the Japanese pillows, which we've named "rice pillows." It feels like they are filled with cut up straws, which just isn't as comfy as our regular cotton pillows. Still the room was clean and bright.

Now, on to the resort grounds. This is the area where the resort held nightly outdoor barbecues. We didn't get to enjoy this due to the rain, but we did get to watch a lightening storm while we were drinking beer and cooking our raw meat on the table grill in a nearby covered area.

See how the buildings have that Mediterranean look to them. Cute, right?

The little pavilion is for weddings.

Pricia Beach

One thing that was a little bizarre were all the stray cats we encountered, both on the resort grounds and out in town. Although super cute and extremely friendly (especially for cats), most had some sort of disease or infestation. I started to name them after their "condition." We got to know Mange, Disease, the Twins, Momma, and a few others.

Can you find 5 cats in the picture below? Hint: there are 2 pairs that look alike.

This little one was my favorite. We named him Bandit.

These two boys met us at the beach.

Yoron seemed to be mostly farm land or beach with a little Mediterranean/Japanese-style town in the middle. We rented a scooter and spent 2 days exploring. One of our favorite places to visit was Umi Cafe. We ate some delicious lunch there and enjoyed sipping coffees and perusing Japanese magazines. I also loved taking pictures of the eclectic decor.

The entrance:

Some of the decor that I liked. It was beachy, eclectic, and artsy.

Mmm...iced lattes! Oh, and notice how Noa ended up with the beverage with a flower design on top!

Noa's omelet on bread with a small salad on the side.

Their take on a chicken gyros: chicken,veggies, oil, and a warm pita. Mmmmmm...

I couldn't resist it of course.

Nice view!

We explored a couple of beaches. They were lovely, as most beaches are on these outer islands.

Team Juloa on Udonosu Beach

Here's one of the scooters that we used to travel all over the island (it's only about 8 square miles in area).

Okaneku Beach (it was pretty cool and windy this day). We walked along the beach and collected shells and sea glass.

We even found one shaped like New Hampshire.

These two hermit crabs were duking it out on the coral.

And lastly, the obligatory self-portrait.

Happy Birthday, Noa!

Featured

I'm "famous." Okay, not really, but I was featured on Okinawa Hai today. You can see the article here.

Japanese Pancakes

Ever wonder what a Japanese pancake looks like? Last weekend, we went to Okonomi Yaki Osino in American village and got to experience okonomi yaki, or Japanese pancakes, for ourselves.

To create these, our server mixed a concoction of what looked like cabbage, egg, cheese, and some other mystery ingredients in a bowl and then poured half the mixture onto our table skillet. Then, he added our choice of fillers. Finally, he topped it with the other half of the mixture.

They cooked like this for a few minutes and then were flipped.

We also grilled up some herbed chicken and veggies on the side. Here, Noa adds sauce to the top of my okonomi yaki.

Smile! I liked it!

Turns out my "pork" okonomi yaki wasn't just pork, but pork kimchi-flavor. KimUchi = kimchi. Ohhhh, now, I see......

This was the sign on our way out.

Here are the lights of downtown American village at night.

We couldn't resist stopping at Yogurtland for some dessert. Here are our cups of yogurt goodness.

I had to sneak in the Koala Yummies. They are too cute!

Current Classroom Pics

Here's some shots from my fourth year in Kinder. Most of it is similar to last year, but with smaller, less noticeable changes. I gotta keep it fresh, you know?!

The lanterns are new. I love 'em. Plus, I can keep them up all year. No more climbing on that counter to hang up artwork. The counter serves as an art center with supplies on top and contained underneath in the open shelving.
Here's the front of the room where we have morning meeting, read alouds, and mini-lessons as a large group. The "overalls" on the back door has classroom jobs in each pocket. You can see the Listening Center in the corner.

Moving over to the right is our Book Nook area with a display wall. I'm trying to make the classroom all about the kiddos now, so they are displayed everywhere. Plus, it helps with name recognition. The tree will again be decorated with letters this year after we read Chicka Chicka Boom Boom. The next big project is to paint the coffee table white. I'll be using that for my reading groups.

Some self portraits hang on the windows. Cute, eh?

Here's a close up of the Listening Center. The students choose a book/cassette from the container on the right. Then, they plop down on a pillow, stick in the cassette tape and listen to the story.

Here's the Writing Center - by the windows as always. Lots of supplies live here - paper, notebooks, notepads, pens, pencils, markers, colored pencils, erasers, word books, stencils. It's a popular center. The computer center is behind it. We haven't "opened" that center to the students yet, since we have to teach them how to type a 9-digit password. Don't get me started on that one....

I'm sure all post more pics throughout the year, but I thought I'd share a little of the part of my life that keeps me so busy all the time!

Roller Coaster Life

Ah, the ups and downs of life. We Hammers have been busy these last few weeks (hence the lack of blogging). Lately there seem to be a lot of ups and downs, but truly I am feeling happy and blessed with life in spite of some of the downs right now. Here's a little glimpse of some of these ups and downs:

UP: Just had a great time with friends at Okinapa, the annual wine festival, on Friday night. We are so fortunate to have such great friends here - I'm glad we extended after all.

DOWN: Sadly, it is our last time going to Okinapa. I will miss events like this when we leave next summer.

UP: School "starts" this week for me. The past week was filled with home visits and parent meetings. This week the real work begins with the kids coming to school!

DOWN: I am so not ready! I'll spend my Labor Day laboring away in the classroom.

DOWN: We're down to one car. The Turtle (my car) died on us late Saturday night and we ended up having to walk home. Looks like the alternator needs replacing.

UP: Having the car towed was easy and headache-free. MCCS came through for us in a big way. Also, I'm glad the car died when Noa was around and I didn't have to take care of it alone.

No, that's technically not my car pictured below. My camera battery had run out of juice when it was time to get the car towed. So, hopefully, my car will be running like this one from the web in no time:

UP: We recently hired a dog walker for the weekdays. The dogs are getting some much-needed attention in the afternoons.

DOWN: It's that time of year again when I'm working a lot. I'm still working on keeping balance in my life.

UP: There was a rainbow outside our building the other day. There's nothing down about that! Sometimes, you gotta just count your blessings!

Illustrated by God

The clouds tonight were incredible. The rich blues, purples, and oranges reminded me of some of the colorful illustrations in my children's book collection.

Just beautiful!

Ahhhh.....More Staycation Fun

The staycation has proved to be a wonderful way to vacation. We celebrated the end of it tonight with beer and pizza. We've swore off fast food for the next 6 weeks, so it was extremely tasty in light of knowing it was our last (for a little while).

I don't know why we haven't visited there before, but we went to Tropical Beach yesterday, which is about 5 - 10 minutes from our house. It was a great visit and very HOT!

You'd think we'd be used to the ridiculously ovenlike conditions here, but we still can't believe how warm it gets, especially at the beach. But, look how beautiful it is! During low tide, you can walk out farther and catch little ocean critters.

We decided against that, opting instead to lay out and go for a periodic dip in the ocean.

I loved looking out at the sail boats.

The beach had little lifeguard "huts." Makes me think of the Beach Boys for some reason.

And a great view of this monument on the convention center grounds.

That night, we enjoyed dinner (yummy curry!) with our friends, Kenny and Amanda. They hadn't had Yogurtland yet, so we were more than happy to introduce it to them for a yummy dessert.

While enjoying it outside, we were entertained with some local fireworks nearby. Good stuff all around!

Staycation!

With school around the corner, Noa decided to take some time off of work in order for us to have some time together before the work craziness begins. We live on a beautiful tropical island, so we decided that instead of traveling somewhere else, we'd simply use the time together to spend enjoying our home here. Plus, we'll save some money and not have to worry about where to put the dogs for several days.

Anyway, the "staycation" is great. We've been doing all the things we enjoy doing around town, like going to coffee shops, getting massages, sleeping in, going out, and spending time with the dogs.

We had lunch at a new place, Cafe Unizon, which is now my favorite "hang out" place. It is basically a large loft, with a view of the ocean and inviting mid-century and 70s-era furniture. I plan on going back soon.

This was my homemade ginger ale. There were actual pieces of ginger root on the bottom!

The view from where I sat. The tables have magazines that you can browse through. I found a dog photography book that amused me for awhile.

The weather here has been weird the last few days. One minute it will be bright and sunny and the next it will be dark and stormy. I tried to capture this dichotomy of light and dark from the balcony.

Goofing off at the Honda dealership (we were buying touch-up paint, not a car).

We decided to explore the south of the island by visiting a new restaurant that had received some positive raves from our friends. Cafe Caracuma or "Thai in the Sky" as our friends call it, was fun and we didn't get lost getting there (a big feat for anyone trying to follow a map in Oki). The grounds are lovely. Here's the view (hence the nickname, "Thai in the Sky" which reminded me of Pizza in the Sky up north):

Gorgeous, right? There were all these little trails you could explore. Could is the operative word here since I saw this sign about poisonous habu snakes and decided not to try my luck in meeting one. Yikes!

We did however, have fun playing with the timer on the camera and learning to balance it on coral.

But, here's the real treat of the place: the food. Check out how delicious it looks!

Pad thai

Asian spring rolls

Malaysian Chicken Curry with Naan

Oh, the other interesting thing we found was a "museum" on the grounds of this restaurant. So, before eating all the above deliciousness, we walked through the random dinosaur and fossil displays.

Fossilized fish prints

I have no idea what these deer are called, but they are cute. Noa mentioned that he thinks these deer can be found on one of the local islands.

And, check out the special display there: Terracotta Warrior replicas! If you look closely, you can see Noa in the reflection. Sorry to say, but the real thing was MUCH better.

More staycation pics to come! It's not over yet!

Why We Don't Own A Couch Yet

With a year left on our time here, we realize that's it's time for us to start gathering any furniture pieces we'd like to bring back to the states next year. It seems that we may not be bringing as many furniture items as we originally thought. Can you imagine this Japanese couch in an American living room? It would be like doll furniture!