Mae and Kate's Adventures

1/17/12

A day at Nogeyama Petting Zoo

The girls love petting the guinea pigs, chicks, mice and hens! little pleasures in life....

Phil and I celebrated 10 years married this December.

Life has been pretty good, let's hope for another great ten years.

Christmas morning this year was a low key, relatively quiet one. We spent the morning together. Open a few presents and just relaxed for the day. Santa didn't bring much this year, the girls told him to give it to the Tsunami victims since we are going home this year and didn't need much. They got a doll each, a few puzzles and a coloring book each, a few books and some clothes. Enough...it was a lovely Christmas. We missed our family and friends but we made the most of it.

11/7/11

Nanny's Visit

Mom and her sister Tee came last week for a few weeks. We have been enjoying having them around. We took them to Shibuya to the busy crossing. This weekend we will hopefully do a few things. Love having the company...

11/6/11

Mom visited Mae's classroom to be the Mystery Reader. Mae was so excited once she realized what was happening. She read a lovely book called: The Hello, Goodbye Window.

10/1/11

Video of Kate's Sports Day

Kate's Sports Day

This morning we went to Kate's daycare from 8-12 for her sport's day. She was very excited. Her class took part in a dance and an obstacle course and a 50m dash. She did well. It was a long morning but we enjoyed it. This was Kate's last sports day in Japan!

Waiting for her obstacle race to start.

Waiting again, patiently for her event.

Mae, Phil and I watched from the side.

Kate's self portrait.

Receiving homemade medals

Kate's "Sumire" class

Mae's first Ikebana

We have after school clubs, Mae chose to join flower arranging - Ikebana.

This was an interesting combination of flowers but she was very proud of herself.

9/21/11

Mae's latest song

More songs....

9/8/11

Kate is very interested recently in reading....or telling stories in Japanese. We aren't sure if what she says makes sense but we think she's awesome just to try it! She's a real risk taker that Kate!

9/6/11

Here are some photos of out three weeks in Bali this past summer. We had a blast. The girls swam almost everyday and Mae learned how to dive and swim, while Kate continued swimming underwater. Phil and I relaxed everyday and had some much needed R&R. I read four books and loved lying on the beach. Phil did a fair amount of bodyboarding and Mae even had a try. The food was good, we tried some nice places. My favorite was Balicosy, just below. The owners were a lovely family, I found their place on Craigslist. We loved it there. We moved around Bali a bit and ended up staying at some amazing places, five in total. We had a fantastic vacation and are so happy we finally had the opportunity to visit Bali.