Something I Want to Share with You

Ichigo Ichie*

In this whole wide world
There's only one "you"
There's only one "me"

Irreplaceable
Precious
Precious
Only one

There's no other one



*"Ichigo Ichie" means 'You should treat people (well) like you'll never see them again.'


P.S. Mom, thank you for picking up this art piece for us! We love it :)

Songs

Everyone has songs that remind them of certain people or time
All the memories come back and become vivid when we listen to them

Every time I listen to those songs, I'm taken back to the past
There were days when listening to them made me cry

However, it stopped one day
I started feeling something new instead
It's like just looking back and thinking,
"Yeah, this and that happened.. Good times :)"
It even makes me smile

Finally, I felt I could move on

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誰にでもある思い出の曲
聞くたびに鮮明に思い出される記憶

聞くたびに過去に引き戻され
思い出すたび泣いた日もあった

それがあるとき消えた
変わりに新しい気持ちが芽生えた
「こんなときもあったなぁ」と
ただただ昔を懐かしむような
そんな穏やかな気持ち

前に進める、そう感じた日だった

Omoi

Don't be sad
It makes me sad when you are

Don't cry
It makes me cry when you do

I try to pull you out of a deep hole
But you wouldn't let me do so

No matter what I say
You wouldn't listen

It breaks my heart, my friend..
And that's the hardest thing

葛藤

自分に自信がない人間は始末が悪い

恋人が出来たって「なんで私なんか？」って思う
少しでも不安になると「まだ私のこと好き？」って確認したくなる

この先どうなるかなんて誰にも分からない
自分次第で悪いほうに行く可能性もあれば
いい方に進んでく可能性だってある
それなのに確認したい
「あなたはこの先ずっと私を好きでいてくれるの？」と

バカげてるってことは分かってる
そんなの今確認したってなんの意味もないってことも
その確認が相手を遠ざけるかもしれないってことも

だから私は確認はしない
したいけど、しない

その代わり、心の中でいつも恐怖と戦ってる

Confusion

I thought I got over him
I thought I could move on

But..
There were always "buts" in the end

I just kept coming back to him
My heart was aching to be his again
Or to make him mine

Did I still love him then?
Wasn't it to make myself feel better when things didn't work out with a new person?
To think "It's OK because I still love HIM. No Wonder it didn't go well"

To protect myself from the pain of rejection
To keep myself from thinking nobody loved me

I was weak
Crying by myself in the dark
Failing to recognize my own worth

Maybe I just needed something to hold on to

In Edmonds

Last weekend, me and my boyfriend went to Claire's Pantry in Edmonds for breakfast :) He's been there many times and told me that their food was good. So I was pretty excited about going there.

There was a car show going on in Downtown Edmonds that day, so it was crowded and hard to find a parking spot. The cars there were all classic cars (meaning old), yet the owners have been taking great care of them. You can tell by looking at them; they were shiny and looked really cool! I even saw a guy who dressed up like Elvis, which fitted right in the scene.

Anyway, back to Claire's Pantry. This place has been around for years! (I remember seeing "since 1968," but I might be wrong..) I read other people's reviews on this place, and a lot of people say that their service is slow and bad. However, when we went there, it wasn't slow. It was actually pretty good. Maybe it was simply because the place wasn't busy at all..

I ordered Denver Omelet, and my boyfriend had Eggs Benedict. The food was good as I expected! Especially their hash browns!! One of the best hash browns I've ever had, hands down :) Their Eggs Benedict was delicious too (This was actually my first time trying it).

So I'd say the whole experience at Claire's Pantry was pretty satisfying. I would definitely go back for their breakfast items!!

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ちなみにEggs Benedictとは、イングリッシュマフィン（半分に切られてる）の上にハムと卵（poached egg）がのってて、その上にソース（Hollandaise sauceと呼ばれるバター、黄身、レモン汁から作られるソース）がかかってるというもの。

コレが写真（かりものです）↓

ソースは見た目よりも全然あっさりしてて、イケます:)

Trip to Portland - Day 3

It's already the last day in Portland.. That morning, we checked out the hotel at 11 am and went to a bagel shop in Nob Hill (around 'Twenty-Third'). It's called "Kettleman Bagels & Bakery." They have quite a selection of bagels! I had a plain bagel with egg and ham, which was pretty tasty. But after seeing somebody's bagel with smoked salmon and cream cheese, I kinda wish I had it instead ;p

Now off to Japanese Garden! That was...just beautiful. Here are some pictures I took, so enjoy.







I hadn't seen anything that Japanese in a while, and it made me feel peaceful and really relaxed.

I wanted to take more pictures at the garden, but something unexpected happened. My camera's memory card became full, and my boyfriends camera's battery died! Well, I should've put all my pictures onto my boyfriend's laptop the night before.. We still got enough pictures, so it's ok :)

After seeing the garden, we had to went back to the hotel because...my boyfriend forgot his phone there!! It would've been really bad if we realized it after coming all the way back to Seattle, hehe ;p

Then, we finally left Portland. It was a really fun weekend trip! Thank you so much for everything, baby <3 br="br">
Hello again, Washington!


And going to Muckleshoot Casino on the way home and losing some money is only between you and me ;)

Trip to Portland - Day 2

The second day started kinda early. The hotel was serving breakfast in the lobby until 10 am, so we got up around 9:30. It was a buffet style breakfast: Coffee, huge waffle makers, muffins, scones, bagels, cereal, some fruits, and yogurt. It was pretty impressive considering the fact that it was all free ;) After having nice breakfast, we went Chinatown, a little north of Downtown Portland.

The Chinatown Gate

We walked around the area and noticed that a lot of businesses have been closed down. It just felt empty and sad.. Anyway, we had Dim Sum for lunch at a Chinese restaurant in Chinatown. Sadly, I don't remember the name of the restaurant, but their food was pretty good. I still think Jade Garden (in Seattle) is better, though ;p Now we were headed Downtown to do some shopping!

Pioneer Place was really nice, and the good thing about shopping in Portland is there's no sales tax!! So I bought a few clothes and was really happy. However, the weather was really weird that day. It was raining pretty hard when we left our hotel, but the sun came out after the lunch. It was nice for a while, then it started pouring, like a storm! I'm serious!! And that's when we decided to go back to the hotel for a while (of course, it stopped raining by the time we got to the car..oh, well).

On the way to our car, we made a stop at a doughnut place called "Voodoo Doughnut."


Sounds interesting, huh? As you can guess by the name, their doughnuts are very unique. Here are some pictures of the ones we had.

Voodoo Doll

Neapolitan (top right), No Name Doughnut (top left), Blazin Blunt (bottom)

The store is very tiny; there's no space inside where we can sit down and eat. There was a line in front of the store, which indicates its popularity. Those doughnuts we got were very tasty, especially 'No Name Doughnut." If you're interested in seeing doughnuts in more weird shapes, visit their website!! (at your own risk, hehe) They do wedding services, too ;p

When we came back in Downtown later, we went to Powell's Books, the largest independent used and new bookstore in the world! Oh my gosh, it was huge, and I loved the atmosphere of it!! I love bookstores and libraries, and Powell's is now one of my most favorite ones. I wish we had it up here..

For dinner, my boyfriend told me that we could go wherever I wanted to go. I was looking at all the nice, romantic restaurants in Portland. But guess what we had for dinner?? Sushi at Sushiland! I know, I know. There is Sushiland in Seattle, too. It was just, for some reason, I didn't want anything American or Western. Sushi sounded really good, and I was also curious if the food and/or service was different from the ones in Washington State. So what did I think? Well, Sushiland in Seattle is better in my opinion..but maybe it's just because I'm so used to the ones in Seattle. Anyway, I was a cheap date that night ;p

We went to a bar afterwards and played some pool together. He beat me...well, actually I let him win, and he just doesn't know it!! ..Yes, it is called 'makeoshimi' ;p

Trip to Portland - Day 1

OK, so I'm back in Seattle now. This short trip to Portland was really refreshing, and I had a great time down there :)

We left Seattle on Saturday. It took us about 3 hours to get to Portland by car (without stopping for a break)!!

See you soon, Seattle



Passing Olympia, the capital of Washington State



Nothing but trees...



Finally entering Oregon State!
Can you see the sign says "Entering Oregon" in this picture? I know it's really far away.. My boyfriend should've been more specific!! Hehe ;p



Then, we went straight to the hotel, and the room was very cute just as I had imagined! I took so many pictures of the room, but I'm not going to put them on here (just because it's not that exciting and you can see how the hotel looks like on their website).
BUT I'll put one picture; the room key! Isn't it cute??



I knew each room had a kitchen, but I was surprised to find a built-in microwave, a dishwasher, an oven, a flat-top stove, a coffeemaker with ground coffee, a toaster, sets of plates and silverware in our room! Well, we didn't use the kitchen much while staying there, but it felt nice to have all the stuff ;p

After examining all the aspects of the room, we headed to NW 23rd Ave., so-called 'Twenty-Third.' It was only a few blocks away from the hotel, so we could just walk there. It reminded me of Wallingford, neighborhood in Seattle; a lot of the stores are actually houses (people remodeled the interior to make a house into a store).

On 23rd Ave., we entered a place called 'Moonstruck Chocolate Cafe.' I first thought it was a small local coffee shop, but this cafe actually has more than a couple locations in OR. Anyway, they have many kinds of chocolates, and some are even in animal shapes. Here's the picture of the ones we got.

Pyramid, Cat, and Ice Cream Cone (They are tasty, too)


Since Huskies (UW) were playing that evening, we were looking for a sports bar on 23rd Ave. The only sports bar there was closed down, so we went to the downtown area. It was somehow difficult to find one even in downtown.. maybe it's because we didn't know the area well. Finally, we found one and had dinner and beer while watching the game. I was a bit disappointed because I'm not really into college football and having dinner at a sports bar wasn't quite what I expected (I mean, not when we're on a trip, you know?). It turned out ok in the end, though; I was glad that my boyfriend had fun watching the game, and he got the message. He just understood how I was feeling without me showing it or telling him. That's what I think is great about him; he is just really considerate :)

And the first day in Portland ended with Huskies getting their ass kicked by Ducks.. (sorry, baby!)