Livin' the McDream

Saturday, November 9, 2013

Hirosaki Castle Autumn Festival 2013

Spent today with a couple friends driving through the Hakkoda Mountains to Hirosaki to the Autumn Festival/Chrysanthemum Festival. Gorgeous views and saw the first snows up on the mountains.

Driving route, took the southern route through the mountains on the way there and the faster north route with tolls (~1600¥) on the way home. Each way was about 100km (62mi) but going through the mountains took about 2.5 hours, with the toll roads it took 1.5 hours.

Quick stop at Suriennuma Pond, no more leaves, but now there's snow!

A little solo Saturday drive

After working all week crocheting I was ready to get out of the house. I didn't really have a plan so I just headed west and ended up stopping a few places that we had just been to recently. Fall colors were beautiful (still)!

Tsuta River

Here's what I've been up to...Twisting Fate Designs

So Keenan left for a month of training so I'll be hanging out and keeping myself entertained until he returns. I haven't really mentioned it yet, but since a nursing job hasn't really been an option I have started my own "Home Based Business" crocheting. I taught myself how to crochet over Labor Day weekend and then applied for the business permit which got approved toward the end of September. I've actually been really busy taking orders and making custom hats (as in busy enough I'd be getting overtime pay if it was a real job). I'm pretty much booked solid through Christmas and will soon have to start pushing completion estimates to January. It's not a lot of money but at least it's a little extra spending money for us AND it keeps me entertained. My business is called Twisting Fate Designs and the link to my page is www.facebook.com/twistingfatedesigns I don't think you have to have Facebook to view the page, but I could be wrong on that. You can "like" the page if you want as well!

Besides crocheting, I volunteer in the Education and Training department of the hospital on base and I've applied to be a substitute school nurse and para at the schools on base. That application process takes a while so hopefully sometime soon I will also have that as something to do as well. One thing is for sure, I don't have a problem being bored.

Here's a few examples of hats that I've made so far (yes, it's a little difficult to make some of them that represent "other" teams, haha)...you can see lots more of my work at the link above :)

We said "I DO" a year ago?!? Anniversary #1

Wow...where did the last year go? Oh, I know...we got married in October...Keenan left for a couple weeks of training...we went on a honeymoon to Costa Rica the end of November...there were a couple holidays...February 1st we found out we were moving to Misawa...begin whirlwind move preparation and moving...June we got to Japan and the rest has been quite the adventure (and is documented on this blog!). And that's how we got here to our 1st Anniversary.

Here's a quick look back and then on to our day of celebration!

We started off the day by exchanging a couple gifts...we decided that we could either do the "traditional" gift of paper or the "modern" gift of time...I got Keenan a watch, not that creative, I know, but his old one was old. He was very creative with my gift and even when I think about it now I'm still kinda surprised he was able to come up with it by himself (sorry honey, but you know that's true). I got an origami bouquet of flowers and framed Japanese calligraphy! Love it!

When you open the back of the frame this is inside.

Here's how we spent our day. We drove around Lake Towada, passing through the Oriase Gorge on the way there. It was a beautiful day and the leaves were really starting to change! Many of the places will look familiar if you've seen previous posts about Lake Towada or the Oriase Gorge, hopefully you'll enjoy seeing them again in autumn.

Shimokita Peninsula adventure (again)...this time with a logging road

Happy Columbus Day! We celebrated by exploring a couple new places and revisiting a couple places we'd been to previously. Not sure this was Keenan's idea of a great way to spend a day off, but we didn't really go anywhere over the weekend so I convinced him to do this.