Day 4 - Nara and Fushimi-Inari Shrine

Kyoto has some nice side trips - Nara is a good for Todaiji and the deer. Fushimi-Inari Shrine has impressive shrine gate paths. Both are south of Kyoto.

Friendly deer, usually

Giant Buddha statue at Todaiji

Tying away bad fortunes

Five storied pagoda

Shrine gates at Fushimi-Inari

Day 3 - Kyoto and cherry blossoms

Today's theme was cherry blossoms. That and an actual full day of exploring until my feet died

Japanese style breakfast

Cherry blossoms in full bloom

Kiyomizu-dera

Chioin gate

Okazaki canal

Philosopher's path

Day 2 - Kyoto

Travel to Kyoto via Shinkansen, went to Kinkaku-ji (Golden Pavilion), walked around Arashiyama area namely the path of bamboo, and enjoyed a Japanese style ryokan inn stay

My fortune is excellent!

Yukata

I could get used to a Japanese style room...

Day 1 - Tokyo

Tokyo Tower and surrounding Imperial Palace

Weekly baking - (deflated) grapefruit macarons

This week's baking - failed and deflated grapefruit macarons

Recipes: almond macaron with grapefruit zest and grapefruit buttercream
I call them deflated because I messed up the step where the egg whites should peak. Apparently, any trace of oil (including zest) makes egg whites impossible to stiffen up. Flavors were all there despite the cookies being chewy. Good lesson learned!

Highlights from UW campus

Cherry blossoms are blooming at the UW Quad

UW Quad

Line of cherry blossom trees

Closeup

Subtle beauty...

Also finally visited the Suzzallo Library building

Suzzallo Library exterior

The Suzzallo Reading Room

Weekly baking - gluten free muffins

This week's baking - Gluten free muffins

Recipe here - I used maple syrup instead of honey and made a bigger batch due to the portion sizes of my apple sauce cups. The right side is topped with pecans, the left side is filled with chocolate chips.

These are lightly cake-ey and mildly sweet. Very nice for those who are gluten-intolerant. Highly recommend using paper liners.

Weekly baking

So far this year, I have baked something each week. It's become sorta a weekly mission. And it's time I start posting the yummy results.

This week's fun - Orange curd shortbread bars

Recipes used: shortbread bars plus clementine curd

I needed to use up leftover curd from making clementine macarons last week. Tasty, sticky, and quite a bit thinner than I expected. Not bad though.

forgotten random links

awesome lego photographer collection
this star trek watching guide is pretty on target

nerdy me doesn't love big bang theory, though i don't hate it

grid of real disney character faces is really cool

give the world a 100,000,000,000,000,000,000 years...

a revealing story about the phrase boys will be boys

wolves are enough to change ecosystem. wow, neat

asian american quarter life crisis, tis true for many ppl i know

how to pick your life partner - yes... my qualms exactly

my favorite meal, hot pot buddies!

and, as a big B5 fan, i totally geeked out watching their reunion at phoenix comicon. here is part 1 (awkward until they took over), part 2 (fun!), JMS panel (very revealing), and claudia christian (aka ivanova - she is hilarious)

random 10

1. the colder it gets, the more naps i take...
2. i am growing increasingly aware of how people react to my "single asian female nerd" persona
3. my internal deadline to booking japan lodging is march
4. snowshoeing is fun! cold, but fun
5. my recent knee bruise has made it very apparent that i kneel a lot
6. buying cleaning supplies is not motivation enough to clean
7. if you want something to happen, you gotta organize it yourself
8. so far this year i have baked something each week
9. must not let bitterness get in the way
10. 2013 photos! fall, fall outings, vancouver in oct, thanksgiving, winter, dec fun times, and christmas. whew. that's it for 2013, now just the 2014 pics!