Dinner American style ... barbecue

Sunday the girls broke out the origami... they spent quite awhile after church folding butterflies, dogs, frogs, crickets, little purses and Alyssa even managed a swan using the book that Nao gave them. What a treat for them ... a gift of her culture that they can use long after she is gone.

What better way to welcome a visitor to the USA then barbecue with good old hamburgers and hot dogs? Since Jenny and Chris also had an exchange student, we invited them over for dinner on Sunday night ... after we watched the USA vs Japan Soccer game in the theater. The game was great despite the final results ... although Nao would say that was the best part. :)

So the Meeks came over and we taught Nao and Sakina how to barbecue.


After our barbecue, we decided to go for a walk to visit another family in our neighborhood who was also hosting an exchange student. But before we got far, Nao noticed our neighbors little dog... so we stopped to play for a minute.
We wanted Nao and Sakina to meet the Cardons since we would all be carpooling together. The Cardons weren't expecting us but were sitting on their back porch and invited us to join them. They have chickens which were roaming around the yard. The kids all enjoyed that.
It was fun to watch the kids all interact with the three exchange students. They played tag, basketball and on the swingset together.
Then they taught us another hand game that they play in Japan. The goal is to get your opponent to put 5 fingers up on each hand. To play, you add. You each start with one finger up on each hand. Player 1 taps the hand of player 2 which adds player 1's one finger to the one finger already up on player 2's hand. So, player 2 now has 2 fingers up on the hand that was tapped and just 1 on the other hand. Player 1 still has 1 finger up on each hand. Player 2 now uses one hand to tap the hand of one of player 1's hands. If they use their one finger, player 1 adds that one finger to their one finger already up. If player 2 used the hand with 2 fingers, player 1 adds that 2 fingers to their one, making 3. If a player has 3 fingers up and is tapped with 3 more, that makes six, so the player holds up one finger. The game continues until someone has five fingers up. That hand is then removed from the game. The game continues until one player loses both hands, leaving the other player a winner. Steve played several times and could never win...
When it was time to go, our kids took off on their scooters and bikes but we managed a picture with the Cardon kids, Nao, Mami and Sakina.
We headed back to our house, where we enjoyed some yummy brownies. The girls thought they were pretty rich. Another successful day...