Yokosuka Navy Burger

Have you had a Yokosuka Navy Burger? Recently the Yokosuka City Government has worked to put our little Navy town on the map. The US Navy passed down a recipe to the city who has chosen several restaurants downtown to serve (as one article put it) this delicacy. I have never heard of a burger being described as a delicacy but whatever floats their boat! According to the pamphlet that I picked up at Yokohama Keikyu stop, there are 11 different restaurants in Yokosuka serving up their own style of the Yokosuka Navy Burger. Each establishment puts a little something different on top and a "secret" ingredient to make their burger different.

Other recent additions to the town have been a small Ferry boat tour over by the mall. It looks like the tour includes a cruise around the bay to see all of the Navy ships. (US Navy and the Japanese Defense force ships and subs.) For those wondering, 'Why on earth would I go out of the way to see Yokosuka?' The advertisment also mentions Spasso, Monkey Island (It's one of the few remaining natural islands left off the coast) and Mikasa Park. (Where there is a Japanese battle ship from the Russian war and a fantastic water fountain show). Oh yeah, and we just got a Burger King. (I may be the only one excited about this....)

Japanese Baby Food Update

Thanks Illahee for the input on Japanese jarred baby food! This weekend we all drove up to Gunma prefecture to visit friends and they have a baby as well. Supposedly their baby's daycare pushes not to bring jarred baby food whenever possible because of the preservatives. They suggest mashing it at home. They also say no fruit....here, it's a dessert. I haven't found other brands of baby food besides Kewpie so, I'm going to have to go on a little hunt. I used to mash it myself for Joshua but now, I am a bit lazy and just buy the American Gerber brand at the Commissary. In the states when companies first came out with baby food, they packed them with salt and sugar and preservatives. Customers stopped buying so they changed their recipes to only have water and veggies/fruit. However when it comes to meat jarred food, I'm not sure what the ingredients are. Gerber now has organic options but that can get boring after a while. There are only a few options for organic....again, it gets a little monotonous.

Samuel loves baby senbei. He especially likes the veggie flavor ones. However, anything that he can hold and feel more grownup with he absolutely adores. I will have to try white fish with milk. I gave him small bits of Salmon in mashed rice and he gobbled it up.

I usually feed Sam brown rice cereal mixed with mama milk. Mike's parents just sent Sam a package of Familia Baby Muesli that I used to feed Joshua. I had totally forgotten about feeding that to Joshua when he was little. When I opened the bag it was like a little flood of memories feeding my little blond curly haired Joshua in his highchair in San Diego. I can start giving him that at 9 months. I may see if I can suggest it at the Commissary.....

Korea

This last holiday weekend, Mike and I decided to take the family to Seoul, to visit our very close friends that we met here in Japan. They are mentioned a lot through the years in our blog. We went to Hida Takayama with them and to the Navy Ball. Nathalie was a very close mommy friend of mine. Always inspiring me to do more and see more all the time. They left Japan last year and moved to South Korea. We promised ourselves that we would go and see them. It took us a while to get up and go though. It feels like just recently we've come out of the baby haze. Plus, it's not really a great destination to go to during the winter unless one like to ski or snowboard or, just freeze! When spring hit we knew that it was the right time especially because during the Summer they go back to the States to visit family every year.

Our original trip was to just see our friends but we ended up doing so much more. DMZ, Lotte World and the SHOPPING!! The DMZ was definitely educational and it was really amazing to see how much of a tourist attraction it was. Strange. Despite the overall sadness of a divided country. There was a museum and even amusement rides located there. Lotte World is one of the largest indoor amusement parks in the world. There's an ice skating rink, roller coasters, kiddy rides, monorail to connect to another island, and shopping mall. Speaking of shopping, I have to conclude by saying the shopping was really a lot of fun. After being in Japan for so long, it's refreshing to go somewhere where I can spend about $100 and walk away with more than just one thing in my hand, especially now that the value of a dollar is in the toilet. The Korean people are very different from the Japanese... much more westernized. Needless to say it really was a fun trip. I recommend it to anyone living in Japan whose getting a little island fever! Pictures will follow soon and I'm sure that Mike's version of our trip will follow soon as well.

Japanese Baby Food

There are many types of foods in Japan to feed your baby. A plethora of options await once baby starts eating solids. In fact, the Japanese baby may start of different fluids much earlier than the American baby. Americans are advised to do strictly breast milk or formula for the first few months. While the Japanese mother may be advised to supplement a bottle a little water after a bath. Japanese Mothers may also bottle feed miso soup or other fluids much earlier. While there is no "right" way, I leaned more to the American way early on. Only mama's milk for the first few months. For me though, Samuel got teeth by his 5th month (Joshua was 4 months when his first popped). He wasn't taking a bottle either. When Joshua was born and he was bottle fed, I remember listening to breastfeeding moms venting about their babies who wouldn't take a bottle and thinking 'Yeah right, if their hungry enough, they'll take it!' Well Samuel changed my thinking about that in about 2 seconds. I started realizing as well how irritating it was to hear people say that same statement to me. Anyway, again I am getting off subject.

Needless to say, I've been slowly muddling through the baby aisle at the local AVE or drug store. Most of the time, I stick with what I can get at the commissary which isn't too much. Because I am illiterate when it comes to reading Japanese, I don't know exactly what I am feeding Samuel when I feed him Japanese baby food. I mean, I can see from the picture and the English wording on the front that I'm feeding "Pumpkin Pudding" but, how much sugar, salt, additives, etc. are in it? I know from reading other blogs that there are organic options out there but where?! He absolutely loves some of the Japanese baby jar food that I've fed him. I tried it myself and it is very good. At the commissary on base there is organic baby food with just water and pureed fruit/vegetables. I used to make Joshua's baby food but really, I am a little burnt out on that. I suppose this post is partly question blog and partly report on what I've been experimenting on. There are some really neat little options in the baby food isle of the store but, what is it all? It looks like there is a rice cereal looking thing that I can plop in the rice cooker? Samuel also loves the Danon vegetable yogurt that I get for him out in town. I tried it myself and am not really a fan. It's like a veggie puree with gelatin atop yogurt but the yogurt tastes more like sour cream to me. I usually open it up and then mix it together (sort of like fruit on the bottom American yogurts) It's not super sweet, I'm pretty sure there isn't much sugar in it (Many Japanese mothers don't even feed their babies fruit the first year. Too sweet. They just stick to veggies). Like I stated earlier Samuel loves it and I'm not a fan but I don't really like gelatin type things. He likes it better than the organic fruit baby yogurt that I get on base and I love that stuff! He also really enjoys the baby rice crackers. There are several different types. He likes these better than the small Gerber Puffs and wagon wheels. They are also much cleaner than the tradition zwieback toast.

So here are the questions again. What are the general rules/standards in Japan that manufacturers have to adhere to for baby food? Are there organic options and where can I find them? Any mama's out there help! Thanks.

Just call me Martha

A ton of things have been happening around our household. Samuel has started crawling, he's got 7 teeth, Joshua is about to get out of kindergarten, and we just returned from a trip to Seoul to see some good friends of ours. This is just to name a few things. Our time here lately has just been wooshing by.

Today I just finished this great little stroller liner/pad for Samuel's stroller. Sam has migrated to using the Maclaren umbrella stroller that was once Joshua's. I have to stress over and over again what a great stroller this has been for us. Anyone out there new on the market of baby gear should consider a Maclaren. Yes, they are pricey but, a stroller is something that new parents should NEVER cheap out on. Trust me, I cheaped out on my first stroller and ended up buying 3 more cheap ones before caving and buying this one. They can also be found second hand and still in great condition. Children will use a stroller longer than their crib and we all know how much cribs cost. It will not only serve as a child transport but something to pile shopping bags in along with anything else one might need to push along while holding a baby. Maclaren's are light, compact, and have incredibly good construction. Because it takes up so little space and holds up well, I plan on keeping it just to have on hand in case we have little visitors. I bought this one used on Ebay and have been really happy with it. I have a little bit of a reputation for being a stroller junky. I bought a Combi travel system with the car seat that clicked into the stroller and didn't like it much. It was nice when i was using the car seat but after several months of pushing it around, the wheels started really sticking and it became difficult to turn with one hand. Needless to say my Combi is sitting here fairly new. I bought a Combi Japanese style car seat that swivels at Hard off Book Off several months ago and absolutely love it. They just came out with a model of car seat that swivels in the states by Combi. Aprica is an awesome brand as well bit very expensive if brand new. In Europe and here in Japan, Aprica is a well known brand. Sadly in the US, they aren't very popular. Most likely because of the price tag. Their car seats are pretty fantastic though. I love to buy things second hand if I can. I found a Quinny pram stroller at the second hand store on base for $5.00. I was told that in Europe it could go for $400.

Anyway, I totally went on a writers rant and got off the original subject. After web browsing I cam across a web page where a person was making stroller pads for Maclaren strollers. I was so excited over this. I decided to type her an email and ask a few questions. Alas, she was flaky and didn't get back to me. (Either that or I just never got her email for some reason). I still wanted one really bad. After visiting her site, I figured out that with some help, I could probably make one myself. I bribed my crafty girlfriend Dayna to help me map out/measure out how I to make it. After some help making the measurements, I was off! I was so inspired after sewing a little bit at Dayna's house I was determined on getting it done. Sure enough, it's done and soooo cute.

Total chick blog I know. Trust me, we'll have so more interesting ones coming up but for now our readers have to endure through my product props.