Japanese Hanami Picnic and Party

Hanami (flower viewing) is a gorgeous Japanese tradition of picnicking under the cherry blossoms in Spring. Whether you want to take a straightforward picnic to the park, have a Hanami orchad party or barbecue at home, or take it indoors if the weather isn't so good, Hanami makes for a colourful setting and some fun cooking and preparation!

Hanami Food & Drink
The Japanese pack their picnic food in bento boxes - lunch boxes with compartments for dissimilar types of food. The food for Hanami should be colourful, especially pink, white and green to reflect the colours of the bloom laden trees. Here are some ideas to get you started...

Yakitori Chicken (wonderful done on the barbecue, but just as great cold), Salmon Teryaki, Sushi Maki (you could get adventurous and try the cherry bloom version wrapped in salmon and made into a flower!), Tamagoyaki (Japanese rolled omlette) - a bento box staple, Hanami Salad - a pretty cherry bloom inspired rice noodle salad, Dango rice dumplings (traditionally pink, white and green for Hanami) - a bit of an acquired taste for the Western palette so you could use pink and white marshmallows threaded on a bamboo skewer instead. Drink Sake! (preferably served warm).

Hanami Decoration
If you hanami in the park, you'll have the real cherry bloom to sit under. If you conclude to Hanami at home (outside or in) you can decorate with paper lanterns and sprigs of cherry blossom, and fold some cherry bloom napkins. You can find beneficial videos on how fold cherry bloom napkins on YouTube.

Eating Japanese Style
In Japan, food is often eaten off low tables and cushions on the floor, rather than Western style chairs and tables. If you are having a Hanami party at home and have a low table this might be nice to try.

You can't have a Japanese party without chopsticks! There are quite a few rules surrounding the use of chopsticks, the main ones being; don't spear your food with them or leave them sticking up in a bowl of rice and don't point with them or wave them nearby in the air.

You say "itadakimasu" ("I gratefully receive") before eating, and "gochisosama (deshita)" ("Thank you for the meal") afterwards.

When drinking alcohol, it is traditional to serve each other, rather than pouring your own drink so keep an eye on your friend's glasses!

And finally, in Japan its not unusual to see barbecues, karaoke machines and boom boxes, and even night time picnics in parks strung with lanterns. So go to town and have your own Hanami party... At home or in the park!

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Adjustable Picnic Table Plans - Good For Kids and voyage

After all the time and exertion I spent building a children's picnic table, one of my friends commented, "You know, they're just going to grow out of it in a few years."

Needless to say, I didn't talk to him for a wee bit. But as I was talking it over with my wife, she told me, "What you should have done is made an adjustable table."

That idea never occurred to me before I started development the table. If it had, I probably would have looked straight through my woodworking plans for adjustable picnic table plans. As it was, I wanted to see what sort of extra exertion it would take.

It turns out there are two types of adjustable tables. For one type, you can build a table top like a normal table. The legs take a wee more exertion to make, but they adjust to make the table higher as the children grow. The benches stay the same size, but I could see how you could adapt the plans to make the legs get taller on those as well. The one thing I didn't like about the benches: they were detached. For kids, I prefer the attached benches.

The other type of adjustable picnic table is one that folds flat. It has many height settings, depending on where you place the legs at the bottom. What it most reminds me of is an oversized Tv tray. However, I could see that it would work well as an extra table or if you don't have a lot of room. And since it folds flat, it would be easy to converyance for picnics at the park or camping trips.

I decided I might just make a folding adjustable picnic table. It would without fail come in handy for the backyard birthday parties, and we could use it while camping. I'll without fail be using my plans for this project though. I don't want it to turn out like my first children's table project!

picnic table frame

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