Toguchi Beach

We went to Toguchi Beach tonight to drop off some hermit crabs that Mike had collected for his class on our last group field trip. I love this beach! It's not too big but it is full of wildlife. Some more adorable than others...

Adorable:

So tiny!!!

Kawaii!!

Found this on a car on the way out to leave

Not so adorable...okay nasty!

I have no clue what these are but they are so gross

Afterwards we went to Obligato's because it's just been way too long since we ate there. Jude seemed to be excited to eat because he was super wiggly! When we got home Mike found this right next to our door:

I don't know if it is a baby or if it was just puffed up because it was sleepy. We let it rest there...it was pretty cute :)  I've really got to remember to keep my camera charged up and in my purse because there are so many things to take pictures of here!

Adventures at the second hand store

We have a little thrift shop that is near by that we have found a few treasures at (although I think the only thing we've bought from there is our tatami table). We decided to visit it today because we've been looking for a rice cabinet. This may need some explaining....well rice cabinet may not even be the actual name for what this piece of furniture is. It is basically a cabinet that has an electrical cord to plug in. It also has a few outlets inside the cabinet to plug in your appliances (like rice cooker and microwave). I guess a better name would be microwave stand except for the key feature. Towards the bottom it has a storage space to keep your rice. There are buttons on the front and a drawer on the bottom. You press the button that has the amount of rice you need and the rice falls into the tray at the bottom.

Anyways...Mike and I had searched the rows of "treasures" and couldn't find anything that was close to what we wanted. Mike did find a collapsable papasan chair that looked like it hadn't been used so he went to go ask how much it was as I continued to look around. I stopped at the end of an aisle and what do I find...a rice cabinet! It has 2 outlets - one for a microwave that will fit on the top and one for a rice cooker that goes on the 2nd shelf. The rice storage part isn't usable because there is a metal bar with rust in it (and not exactly bug proof) but we can still put containers in that part to store rice. I was more excited about the fact that it had the storage that we needed (as our counter space is VERY limited) and the plugs so we don't have to use a power strip. Mike tested the plugs and they work :) When we went to check out the older woman who works there gave us a 200 yen discount too so it only cost us 2,500 yen (about $25).

Now my next apartment wish is to get some plastic drawers for our closet and get rid of the dresser we have in our room. I don't know if that will happen anytime soon though because there is no place for the dresser to go! Living in a small apartment gets quite crowded and it's about to get even more crowded in a few months with Jude coming :)