Will Miss #6: Bounty candy

I'm not big into sweets, but there is one candy that holds my heart. I actually grew up with Bounty back in Ukriane, but when I moved to US, I found out that it wasn't sold there except in stores like World Market. It is everywhere in the UK, so when I crave some junk food, I can just walk into the first convenience store and pick up Bounty. 

I will miss Bounty being sold everywhere and being readily available when I'm back in the US.

Just Arrived #20

Today I've received two more packages with three kimono and one juban. This kimono is a gorgeous wine color and the one I'm most excited about! See, it's actually long enough to be worn traditionally. I can almost hear everyone saying, but Lyuba, you don't wear kimono traditionally! Well... sometimes I want to go back to my roots and do something different to what I'm doing now. It's awase too, so it will probably we worn sometimes soon.

This komon is another summer hitoe. After my very first one, I can't get enough of them!

 I simply fell in love with the olive green stripes on this komon, and in person they are even brighter.  I can see some great color combo possibilities with my hair color... ;P

Finally, I've wanted another ro juban with longer sleeves for a very long time because the one I have has shorter sleeves than most of my kimono. When I saw this one come up on sale, it knew it had to be mine. And look, it has the oh-so-coveted chidori too! I'm actually pretty indifferent to chidori, but I love every other design on this juban!

Have you gotten anything good in the mail lately? :)

~ Lyuba

Won't Miss #5: narrow, winding roads

I've been slacking on these post, mostly because I like to have a picture to go with each post, but sometimes I just can't get one. Well, I can't be slacking anymore, so I'll continue posts even if I don't have any photos.

I really hate the roads here in England. The highways (motorways) are ok, because they are just as big and straight as in the US, but the roads I'm referring to are all the other ones. In the picture above you can see a street right next to my house, and when all these cars are parked on one side of the road, it literally creates a one car only road. Yes, it can happen in the US too, but at least in the US there are large driveways which help avoid the situation. In UK, driveways are tiny, if there is even one, so everyone is forced to park on the side of the road.

In addition, most of the roads where I live are extremely narrow and winding, to the point that I never know what's going to come around the corner. I think the main reason for that is because these roads were used to separate different farmer's fields, so they pretty much ended up following the shape of the fields. I could be completely wrong about that, but this is the only explanation I can come up considering I do live in the middle of nowhere with lots and lots of various fields. Driving at night is especially scary, because usually these roads have no street lights, so it's hard to see where you're going. Throw in some fog, extra bright lights, sharp corners and it's an accident waiting to happen.

I will not miss driving on these roads, and will be so happy when we're back in the US.