NOV 3

November 3 in Japan is a holiday. Yay! More family time. Here are more details about the holiday (from Wikipedia):

Culture Day (文化の日, Bunka-no-hi) is a national holiday held annually in Japan on November 3 for the purpose of promoting culture, the arts, and academic endeavour. Festivities typically include art exhibitions, parades, and award ceremonies for distinguished artists and scholars.
Culture Day was first held in 1948, to commemorate the announcement of the post-war Japanese constitution on November 3, 1946.
November 3 was first celebrated as a national holiday in 1868, when it was called Tenchō-setsu (天長節, Tenchō-setsu), a holiday held in honor of the birthday of the reigning emperor—at that time, the Meiji Emperor. (See also The Emperor's Birthday.) With the death of the Meiji Emperor in 1912, November 3 ceased to be a holiday until 1927, when his birthday was given its own specific holiday, known as Meiji-setsu (明治節, Meiji-setsu). As Meiji-setsu was discontinued with the announcement of Culture Day in 1948, some see Culture Day as a continuation of this tradition as well—a mere renaming of Meiji-setsu—although they are ostensibly unrelated.
As Culture Day exists to promote the arts and various fields of academic endeavor, local and prefectural governments typically choose this day to hold art exhibits, culture festivals, and parades. For example, Hakone in Kanagawa Prefecture holds the annual Federal Lord's Parade (箱根大名行列, Hakone Daimyo Gyoretsu) to exhibit Edo Period clothing and costumes. It is common for universities to present new research and projects on Culture Day.
Since 1937, the award ceremony for the prestigious Order of Culture has been held on this day. Given by the Emperor himself to those who have significantly advanced science, the arts or culture, it is one of the highest honors bestowed by the Imperial Family. The prize is not restricted to Japanese citizens, and for instance was awarded to the Apollo 11
astronauts upon their successful return from the moon.
Culture Day is statistically one of the clearest days of the year. Between 1965 and 1996, there have only been three years with rain occurring in Tokyo on Culture Day.

We still don't know what we're planning to do tomorrow but for sure we'll all be together on this holiday. :)

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Ruther is feeling under the weather. Which is another reason why we cannot make final plans about tomorrow. I really don't want him to get sicker than he already is. Today he sported a mild fever after we came home from church. I think the cold air and the exercise he did yesterday just wore his body down. He already took some medicine today and I urged him to drink lots of juice. Hopefully he'll be all better in a few days.

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Tomorrow is Mama's birthday. That's Ruther's mom. We're planning to call her to greet her. We already sent her a birthday card and Nikki made her a small poster for her birthday so we hope she got it days ago just so she'll know we remembered her. I'm sure she'll be glad to hear from us because with Russell (Ruther's younger brother) in Dubai and Ron (the youngest) in Laguna for work, it can get quite lonely at home with just Papa as her companion. So hopefully we'll be able to cheer her up and make it a nice day for her.

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It's getting to be quite cold these days. We've had 12-degree nights and now the boys are usually in pajamas (at their request). I have to dress them up in the bathroom after their bath because it's just too cold to dress outside the warmth of the bathroom. After their bath, the boys' legs are like chalkboards where you could draw and write on them using your fignernail because of the dryness but it's nothing a good dollop of lotion can't remedy. I'm having some rashes/allergy from the cold as well but thank goodness my sister sent me some ointment so that's well under control. It's been wonderful going out because we don't sweat in the sun anymore and the boys are comfy running around but it's just a bit of a hassle bringing jackets in the bag just in case the day gets a little bit too cold. But then again, we are adjusting quite well and despite the little setbacks, we are still really happy to be here.