2011 has gone, 2012 is here!

YEAR OF THE DRAGON 2012

really from January 23rd, since this is the Chinese calendar we're talking about

Since May, when we moved onto Porter Gulch, we have driven past this deer warning sign. I looked forward to Christmas to share this picture! I also posted this pic on Facebook and someone commented "Reindeer Crossing"! 

For my 50th
birthday

Zen and Taka really surprised me with flowers and a cake.
No, I didn't do anything big for myself. I would have partied at a party for me if others had started one, but...nah~ make it big and it would feel big. So many people don't want to really think about being 50 years old. I think about it a little...well, maybe a little more than a little!

For Christmas season I brought this toilet paper back from Japan!!!

Christmas morning Zen and I visited Grandmom and her doggies. Lynn was there cooking Christmas dinner too.

Ahhh, over  Zen's winter break he surprised me by agreeing to play Scrabble with me~ then he went and beat me!!! I'm impressed~ happy for him~ sad for me! He says he's regularly playing "words with friends" on his phone. It does appear to help.

With my birthday money, I splurged on the recently for sale again- Japanese Dot shirts! Taka and I had missed getting one of these a few years ago. They were sold out. Now they are being printed again!

AND a special treat~ see Taka and me in the little corner picture of a picture below? With Eiko and John in Hawaii, we got to skype-talk!!!

That was mostly what the "holy-day" season was about this year! Hoping for a wonderful 2012 to all!

From MPC~ some pics of Zen at their games...

      

An East Coast Antique shop visit

Janet and I had taken a break from moving from her place, and throwing things away...to this antique shop~ and there was: PINK FLOYD playing on the turntable!!! An "ANTIQUE"!


I loved seeing the SLED, and ice skates took me back to my youth~ and missing SNOW!

I don't know what was with the "phillies" cigars. Wondering if they were from Philadelphia?

This vending machine was so cool~

And then there had to be something from Japan~ This was found in a basket of other doll house furniture. Though it wasn't for a doll house when in Japan!

Pennsylvania~Sayonara "until next time"

Ten days in PA.

I got to drive by the home we grew up in.

"Grew up" in.

Well, guess we should say our "childhood home"

In Amber, Morris Rd., Montgomery county.

The yard doesn't look as large as when Janet and I had to mow it for three hours in summer.

When Dad left, the riding mower broke down, and...from then all we had was the push mower.

What's a trip was one house across the street from ours,

they still have this sick statue standing there.

The main reason I went to PA was to help Mom and Janet move Janet out of the apartment she's lived in for the past ten years or so.

Everyday except one, we took loads to the storage. (You can see those pics in the blog before this).

Janet's sweet neighbor~ above between Janet and her boyfriend Mike~ Reece, will be missed.

Yes, this was also the Thanksgiving holidays. Mom and Frank worked on a turkey the day Janet and I did the MOST trips delivering to storage. A day that is thankfully over!

I didn't get to watch the turkey preparations. I've never made a turkey, or stuffing~ these photos are about the only watching I did!Frank's son Taylor also came for dinner.

One afternoon, I got to catch up with Amie in Skippack Village.

Amie's one of the most awesome women (you single men out there take note!!!)

While looking in on some shops, this shop Floral and Hardy got this nice snap of us which they broadcast on their Facebook

https://www.facebook.com/floralandhardy

And then~ I got to see other childhood buddies~~

It was a Wissahickon low key reunion of about 15. True, I didn't get to graduate with these guys, but we have history. I'm loving getting to know these good people again. And realizing how much I miss everyone and Pennsylvania.

Finally one sweet meeting we got in was with my California Grandmom's last living friend. Her childhood friend from when she was 16. Babbi. Babbi was my father's Godmother. She was the epitome of the best godmother a godchild could have it sounds.

Stepmom Eleanor, and Janet and I went to visit with her.

As Babbi, who also is 92 like Grandmom, talked on and on with us...speaking of "lucidity" - or as Eleanor put it "having your marbles" which is how I would have called it- Babbi was also the epitome of having them TOO! She has SOME stories too! What an honor to have met her, though she remembers Janet and me from when we were little children. Perhaps from 45 years ago?! Half her lifetime- almost all of ours!

Babbi had broken her back not even 6 months earlier, but the way she cruised through the Assisted Living Home she's living in, you would never have know.

Fun after dirty work every day to move

Michelle~my Belle!!!And JILL!!! We each drove to meet at a restaurant half way the distance between our homes. (Michelle set it up- I didn't know JILL was going to be there! Gorgeous surprise!!!) I'm SO giving thanks (tomorrow's Thanksgiving!!) for friends like these. Making life ALL the better~

It's Wednesday now...since last Friday night I've been in Pennsylvania. And for the most part, to help move Janet, out of her home here~

There's still much to do, but...day by day~ we load up the car once or twice...

and drive 10 minutes away to this storage unit.

...here is where Janet's worldly possessions are- for the most part.
We still have some dressers, and other furniture to fit in. But it's getting close to done

Gone East

Well, not THE Far East...but I did find this plate which Sheon designed OF the Far East while we were packing (my sister Janet is moving). Janet, has had

a few of the kid's plates at her house. Sweet, I'd forgotten, these pictures.

Janet's moving out is still, slowly but surely, getting done.

No pics for this blog entry of Jan's place,  the only photos I've really thought to take have been of some BIRDS!

(Coincidentally, Janet, has been called "J-Bird" because of her bird-like legs)

I was waiting for Janet when I was here as a matter of fact.

I just love their colors!

And even tho sometimes these days are somewhat hard and tiring~ these guys were inspiring~ and made me feel~ happy.

And just a little bit later, when Jan and I were leaving the area, we had to stop to yield to these geese.

I don't think people here in Pennsylvania have seen many tourists taking photos out of their car windows like I did here. But it was so BEAUTIFUL!

First Game and Tournament for Zen's team MPC

Monterey Pennisula College~MPC

Being that Zen's a first year student (in a two year Junior College)~ that he gets playing time is really fantastic. Below are photos from the first game they played against Foothill College, in Los Altos Hills.

He's not on the starting team, but he subs for another point guard, Connor, who happens also to be one of his housemates~

This first game against Foothill College, was a loss for the team. But it wasn't a terrible game, being that the team was playing "for real" for the first time.