We celebrated our 14th Wedding Anniversary last week.

Flowery Gift

My little sister is sixteen today.  Happy birthday Sarah!

Birthday Girl

I’m cooking Irish Stew for dinner tonight.  Marty loves this though he has annoyed me before by suggesting that it’s an easy option for dinner.  The problem lies with the word “easy”.  It’s true that there are no advanced cooking techniques required but it just took me an hour and half to get it to the stage where everything is in the stew pot.  In about another hour and a half it will be ready to eat.  That’s not my idea of an easy dinner.

Yesterday evening I got out one of my new knitting books, Victorian Lace Today, as I was keen to try out some of the beautiful patterns it contains.  I decided to start with something marked as an “intermediate” pattern.  After about two hours I decided that it was too difficult and I would start with something marked “easy”.  I have knit expert patterns before and I have also knit lace before so I was surprised that I was having such difficultly.  But then the word easy doesn’t really tell me very much.

The lace I’m knitting, just like the food, doesn’t contain advanced techniques.  It does, however, involve concentration and precision.  If every stitch needs to be perfect is the pattern really easy?  And when I say it doesn’t contain advanced techniques I suppose that depends on who you ask.  I know quite a few knitters who wouldn’t have a clue how to knit the lace as it involves stitches that are not taught to beginners and you have to know how to read a lace chart.

There is a cliche that says that says, “it’s easy when you know how”, but I’m not convinced.  Even a task that is easy can become difficult if you have to repeat many times.  As for the stew maybe it is an easy option for Marty.  All he needs to do is eat it once it’s finished and given how good it smells at the minute that shouldn’t be too difficult.

As always I got some lovely gifts for Christmas.  But this year I also received a gift that really made me laugh.  As part of her Christmas present my sister bought me some novelty wool and a knitting pattern to go with it.   Can you imagine how funny I would look wearing one of these?

Knitting Pattern

Of course, it may be a hint to knit one for someone else…

I arrived in Holland to be greeted by snow.  Christmassy wonderland fluffy beautiful snow.  It’s a pity that the same amazing snow turned into the nightmare before Christmas when I actually had to go somewhere.  Planes, buses, and trains don’t seem to like snow at all.  But I have made it to my Christmas destination and, even better, my husband managed to join me.

Dad Building a Snowman

Hard to believe that we have been married 13 years.

Wedding Day, April 2nd, 1996

My little sister turns 15 today.

Birthday Girl

One of the highlights of my recent trip to the U.K. was the food.  I love living in Tokyo and enjoy eating Japanese food but there are lots of things I miss eating.  Some of these are things I can’t cook for myself, because I don’t have an oven, and some others have ingredients that are difficult or impossible to get in Japan.

I have been surprised by the food that I miss.  I really miss roast turkey and roast potatoes. I never ate potatoes that often but for some reason once I got to Tokyo I started to miss them.  I’ve always loved turkey.

My family know that I crave turkey and I ended up having two fantastic turkey dinners in January.  The first one was in Belfast with Marty’s family.  This turned into a traditional Christmas dinner and was so much fun that I’m starting to think we should create our own tradition.  The second one was with my Dad and Step-Mum in Aalsmeer.  They cooked a really succulent turkey that I don’t want to think about too much now as I’m starting to miss turkey again!

To combat my food cravings I have been learning to cook new things that don’t require an oven.  And that can be made with ingredients found in the local supermarket.  This week I made spicy Italian meatballs.  I knew it was something that Marty would really like and thankfully I ended up liking it too.  In January I made Coq au Vin but I didn’t like this.  I think it’s one of those things that really needs to be made with a good red wine and I know nothing about red wine. Trying to pick a good one in a Japanese supermarket is beyond me.

I had meant to take pictures of my new cooking acomplishments for my blog but the food got eaten much too quickly for that to happen.  Marty will eat anything that doesn’t have teeth!

I spent a very enjoyable weekend at the Slieve Donard hotel with Marty’s family.  The hotel was beautiful but it’s the setting that makes it special.  It’s both on the coast and at the foot of the Mourne Moutains.  It really is the place where,  “the Mountains of Mourne sweep down to the sea”.

View from the grounds of the Slieve Donard Hotel

After checking out we went for a drive towards Silent Valley and Spelga Dam.  I wanted to see if I could find a good place to take pictures of the choppy sea.  I didn’t manage that but we did find a couple of places to stop in the mountains.

Slieve Commedagh

Marty and I spent five days in November relaxing in Okinawa at the Renaissance Resort.  Marty really likes water sports and I love to look at the sea.  The sea at Okinawa can be emerald green and various shades of light blue when the sun shines deepening to a dark blue.

When I was a small child we used to go to the beach at places like Millisle and Tyrella in County Down, Northern Ireland.  I remember the sea as being gray.   It was also usually quite cold, unlike Okinawa, but I loved to go anyway.  It’s hard to remember those days but I think my sister and I would sometimes go to the beach with my Grandparents on a Sunday afternoon.  Tyrella always seemed more of an adventure as it used to have a rickety road to the beach and I can remember my Granda driving down it at one point with a flat tire causing the car to lurch from side to side.  (I think my Granda Bailie’s driving was always a bit of a family joke and any car he ever owned was always on its last legs.)  My sister and I used to hide in the sand dunes and then try to find creatures in the rock pools.  I’m not quite sure exactly what we were looking for and I have strange memories of my Granda wanting us to find something he called “winkles” and “willicks”.

I think I will always love the sea.

Okinawa, South China Sea