Burning last years luck...

For the second year, the Guthries (minus Rodney this year, as he had to work late Momday evening) headed to the Kintai Bridge area in mid-January for the Tondo festival, which is basically a huge bonfire made from bamboo where you bring your shimekazari (Japanese wreaths) and other good luck ornaments from the new year festivities to burn them with ceremony to start the new year off right. We also ate mochi, a sticky rice cake in a sweet red bean soup, which Will and I love, but Xan does not care for. You can see why he's not a big fan in last year's blog post. Basically, he wore more of the soup than he ate.

Will threw the shimekazari we made in December in to the fire - fortunately he has quite an arm because we arrived a little late and the fire had already been started by the time we finished our mochi.

Of course, the kids had to stage Will throwing Xan in to the fire. Fortunately, Will loves his brother... and isn't that strong.