today the kids and i had a lot of fun! yoshi had to work today, i guess he had to work at some point this (holiday) weekend so he just did it all today. so, i took the kids to costco (um...how is that a fun day??) i just barely got the kids in the car on time, because on weekends and holidays, costco is something of a nightmare. but we got there about ten minutes before it opens (although it had just opened when we got there. sometimes they open the doors early when there's a huge crowd.) i made a bee-line for the game software, i really wanted the new wii fit plus. i got it (for 1600 yen, if you're interested) and bought it. then we had to do a potty break (sasha is in underpants full-time during the day now!) and then it was time for pizza. of course, after two bites (from hiro) and eating all the pepperoni (that was tommy and sasha) they all declared they were full and wanted to see the bunnies! i waffled over going back through costco and in the end plowed through one more time (in a couple of weeks a le creuset set is going to be on sale and i wanted to check it out: frying pan, dutch oven and 2 (?) utensils. the frying pan is smaller than the one i already have. the downside: it's orange, not one of my favorite colors) and get a couple of other things. we survived our second time through, checked out fairly quickly and then got in our car.

the new petting zoo (but looks like a lot of the former animals are still there. i wonder what they did during their 'vacation'...) is on the other side of the toriasu shopping center and i waffled (again) about driving over there or taking the shuttle bus. the kids would have loved the bus, but i had all that pizza and didn't want to be too far from the car....so we drove over to the cinema side and yep! all the parking was full. i was driving up the aisle and this car was trying to park, but they were NOT good at it at all. finally they gave up and drove off. another car which had been there longer than us drove past the spot so i just took it! yay for me! we went to the petting zoo (i have to pay 300 yen for three of us now. *sigh* but the kids really enjoyed it.) there were a lot of people there, but that meant the animals weren't starving (when i went there last week with sasha and tommy we were nearly stampeded!!) so we could enjoy giving them some grub. (in the monkeys' case, that is literal! LOL)

next we did a whirlwind view of the animals in the pet store, and then we went to the onsen. did you know there is an onsen there? at the toriasu shopping center? well, there is. and there's quite a few baths, too. regular big pool, funny 'beppu' pool (smells like sulpher (gah! i think mozilla wants me to write 'sulfur' neener neener)), jacuzzi, cold bath (man, the kids love that one! weirdos!), super hot bath, electric bath, 'medicine' bath (which changes day to day, i think) and the outside rotenburo bath (totally redundant there, i know, but not everyone who reads my blog understands japanese!) there are also two saunas, one 'regular' and one 'medicine'. shoot, i forgot what today's medicine was. kinda evergreen-y. anyway, the kids loved it, and so did i. we went into every bath, i even got into the electric bath, except it didn't shock me. how weird.

after our bath we went back to the car. i called my mom and had a short chat, and the kids wanted their pizza! funny kids. then we went home, and everyone fell asleep. i got to try out the new wii fit (fun!) and update project pictures on ravelry. then the kids woke up, had a snack, then yoshi got home and then they all went out. i am here with dinner finished and waiting for them to come home. all in all, a fun day. i think sasha and tommy miss hiro so it was a great opportunity for us to spend time together again.

(p.s. i woke up at 4 am and couldn't go back to sleep, so i went downstairs and started up wii fit again. i don't think i'll be getting up at four every morning, but it was good to have some 'quiet time' to do my exercises!)