Scrapbook Day - April 12, 2012

Scrapbook day came and went for me. It fell on a Thursday this month and it was a jam packed day. We are in the process of changing our day with Nena so she did not come on Thursday. The reason we are changing it is because M has yochien, then sports class and straight from there we go to music class on Thursdays, not getting home until 5:30. I did not want to use Nena for just the K man, since M loves her, so we are hoping to switch our day with her to Tuesdays. M will still be in yochien, but I will arrange for Nena to babysit when she gets home and I can go out on the town for an afternoon. April 12th was our first day to start this new routine.

I dropped M off at yochien, and it was her second day. She cried on this day and was more scared. I think she gets scared when she sees the other children crying. After dropping her off, I went to a meeting for the yochien. My friend translated for me - well, we basically sat in the back and talked. The meeting was going over the rules of the yochien (like where to park your stroller when you drop off and pick up your child and that you need to stay seated, rather than moving to the side, during a ceremony if you want to take pictures or videos - and no, I am not making this up) and how they hope to develop fine and honorable citizens at age 3, but with all of the younger children crying and other mothers talking we hardly heard a thing. Afterwards you had to stay for a PTA meeting for your specific class. Thankfully nobody expected me to volunteer for two reasons - one, I have the K Man and two, I am American. So, yay! After the meeting I picked up M and we went home. The K Man took a nap, we ate lunch, the K Man woke up from a nap and he ate and then we were off.

Our extracurricular activities have changed days due to M moving on to an older class. Thankfully M's best friend is in both classes so it makes for a fun afternoon as we ride the train one stop and they get to walk and hold hands together. So cute. First we drop the girls off at sports class and have a cup of coffee while they play for a hour. Then we change the kids out of sweaty clothes and take the train one stop to music class where we sing, dance, and learn more music notes based on animals, people or fruit. M made huge progress this past week in music class as she went around the room by herself when they had to pick the music note and demonstrate the animal or person or fruit it represented. Usually she needs me to go with her. She also participated much more in the story telling part of the class where we act out a story. It really was night and day compared to the last class we did just three weeks ago. I loved seeing her engage in the class more.

I told my husband dinner on Thursdays will be either leftovers or bentos, and that is what it was on this past Thursday. The picture posted are ones I took at the end of the week. You can see yochien and all of this activity has worn M out. She was "resting" and watching a video after dinner and her eyes were very heavy. Below on the floor, the K Man, was crawling around and looking for any kind of trouble he can find. M is making a great transition in yochien. She really seems to enjoy it even though she is a bit unsure of herself in the morning at drop off. A little girl in sports class is in her yochien class and she has befriended her. They play together a little bit every day, which makes me very happy to know she is not so alone like she was in the beginning. This little girl speaks both Japanese and English to M. I can see M's Japanese taking off. She is not speaking to us in full sentences with it, but she seems to understand everything at school and with her Japanese teacher. Today I heard a bit of their lesson and she was speaking in Japanese. It is very neat to watch develop. The K Man, well, he is happy as ever and into EVERYTHING! He is trying to pull himself up on things but still has a hard time. He wants to, but cannot quite do it just yet. Plus, we do not have a lot of stuff he can practice on. He still does his army crawl and gets around pretty fast. He gets tired now of sitting in his stroller so I have to find parks with a baby swing so he does not get bored watching M run around. When he sees the swing he starts grunting and kicking his legs! He is a charmer - every old lady he sees, he smiles at and they LOVE it. M was so shy with people on the train from an early age, but the K Man eats it up. He also is sinful. There is a reason the Bible says we are sinful from birth...because we are. He will go for a drawer to pull open and I will look at him and say "K no touch." He looks up at me, looks at the drawer, looks back at me and then pulls it open. If I smack his hand a bit to tell him no, he just looks up, grins his sweet little grin and starts laughing. I told my husband that his troublesome is coming full circle as I think the K Man has his personality - a charmer with the ladies who is looking for trouble. :)