I suffered a pretty severe writer’s block for the past several months (I think I’m still a bit blocked), and one suggestion was to write short fiction, which I hadn’t done in a long time. Someone on the r/writing subreddit mentioned that if you write a short story a week, it’s impossible to write 52 stories that are ALL bad, at least some of them will be decent. So I decided to give it a shot. I might post some mediocre stories, but hopefully this will help get my creativity juices flowing. My favorite writing prompts are pictures, so I went onto Reddit and found some really great ones on the r/learnjapanese subreddit. This one picture spoke to me: Sogenchi Garden, Tenryu-ji Temple, Arashiyama, Kyoto - October 2017 [OC] Sogenchi Garden, Tenryu-ji Temple, Arashiyama, Kyoto - October 2017 [1265x949] As soon as I saw this photo, I immediately had the idea to write this short fluffy piece. Feel inspired? Write something yourself and post a link in the comments! Pixies in a Garde...

おはようございます！ I’ve been offline lately because I’ve been: A) working on my book B) being stuck on my book C) praying a lot about my book D) switching to a new book to write to try to jumpstart my creativity again E) (re)learning Japanese in my spare time The Japanese part has been inconsistent because, well, it can be boring. But I found a way to make it more fun! My listening comprehension for my Japanese is not very good, so I watched Japanese anime with English subtitles. Crunchyroll has a ton you can watch with only their free membership. Lately, to take my listening practice to the next level, I started helping out with a coffee hour gathering put on by the Japanese language congregation at my church once a month. Okay, so Japanese ladies from Japan speak REALLY REALLY FAST! But it’s good practice to learn the actual speed people talk. I don’t understand most of what they say yet … Also, my vocabulary isn’t very large so many times I won’t understand because I don’t know ...

A couple months ago, Adagio.com gave me a gift certificate in exchange for some social media love about their teas. I already like their teas, but I took the opportunity to order some teas I hadn’t tried yet. TL;DR— Jasmine Silver Needle was the favorite, cold-brewed at 2 heaping tablespoons per 2 quarts of water, and my second favorite was White Peach (loose-leaf, not iced tea pouches), cold-brewed at 2 heaping tablespoons per 2 quarts of water. Adagio sells loose leaf teas as well as teabags, but I bought some of their Iced Tea pouches. Basically, it’s their loose leaf teas pre-measured in a pouch that you can use to cold- or hot-brew iced tea. I first tried their White Blueberry Iced Tea pouches . There’s approximately 3 tablespoons of tea in each pouch, and the instructions say that one pouch is for about 1 quart of iced tea. I cold-brewed the tea—I steeped a pouch in a quart of water in the fridge overnight. However, I found that the resulting tea was a bit strong for my t...

It’s been a couple months since then, but I did the worship music for our church’s Good Friday service. The service is a combination of people from both the English-speaking and Japanese-speaking services, so the worship leader has to sing at least a few songs in Japanese. I could do five songs, but I decided to sing all of them in Japanese while my other singer (in this case, Captain Caffeine) sang the lyrics in English at the same time. It’s a bit confusing, but I wanted the Japanese congregation to feel very included (which they don’t when the songs are in English). The service went smoothly—well, I didn’t make any mistakes, at least! I had been practicing the songs in Japanese for weeks before the service. One of the songs my pianist really likes is “10,000 Reasons”, and while it’s not really a Good Friday song, I thought it would be a good upbeat song to end the service with. So I had to search for the Japanese lyrics for the song and came across this version by Lauren Horii...

Lately I was really impacted by a song I happened to hear on Air1 Radio when we were driving to church. The song is “Hills and Valleys” by Tauren Wells. (Man that guy has an awesome voice!) I’m pretty sure I heard the song before Sunday, but this time the song was really catchy and stuck with me, so I bought it on iTunes right away. The lyrics are simple but so powerful, especially because the one thing I want all my readers to know is that no matter what happens to you, no matter where you’ve gone, Jesus loves you and you are not alone. I've walked among the shadows You wiped my tears away And I've felt the pain of heartbreak And I've seen the brighter days And I've prayed prayers to Heaven From my lowest place And I have held Your blessings God, You give and take away No matter what I have, Your grace is enough No matter where I am, I'm standing in Your love On the mountains, I will bow my life To the One who set me there In the valley, I wil...

At first I thought this was a stupid recipe to post, but then I thought I’d just post it in case someone hadn’t thought of this and was interested in it. Captain Caffeine has been known to remark that I’m very picky about my tea, although I don’t consider myself a real connoisseur. I don’t like tea that’s been made in a coffee carafe because I can taste the old coffee and it’s nasty, but I will not scoff at using a Lipton tea bag if there’s nothing else available. However, as the weather has gotten hotter I’ve been searching for the perfect fruit iced tea to drink. I love those fruit flavored black teas like mango or peach or strawberry. However, I notice that in restaurants, especially, many times the tea is bitter because they oversleep it. However, I’ve found that in order to get a strong fruit flavor, especially when steeping real dried fruit as opposed to just artificial fruit-flavored tea, I need to use hot water and a long steep time. It’s also generally recommended that y...

Photo credit: lalalime.blogspot.com I asked God to make me a prayer warrior, and I realized I was missing out on the chance to pray for all of you, my online friends! So how can I pray for you? I will try to remember to post this at least once a month so I can pray for you. Prayer requests can sometimes be private things, so to keep your privacy, I’ve made a form you can fill out that will keep your requests just between you and me. Also please be sure to fill out the form again to update me if you sent me a prayer request in the past. I’d love to hear how you’re doing. Loading...