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Monster
April 27, 2008
Monster followed Mia home from school the first day. Monster is pink and furry. Monster's favorite food is candy. Monster frequently likes to do things that Mia isn't supposed to do.
"Monster wants to climb up on the counter and see what you are cooking."
"Ok. Does he like what he sees?"
"Yes, he does. I want to climb up there with him."
I've learned that his name is Kato. Or Kado. It sounds like Kay-dough. But she rarely calls him by name. Usually she refers to him as Monster or My Monster. He usually comes with us wherever we are going, but often doesn't ride in the car with us. There's no room. So, he's outside the car. How he keeps up with us when we're flying down the road at a whopping 37 miles per hour I don't know, but he does. Somehow.
I think Monster is kind of cute, and he hasn't caused too much trouble around the house yet. Although he has taken the blame a few times for throwing some food on the ground or some other misbehavior. Mia seems to like him though, so I guess he's here to stay!
Posted by Kimberly at 09:53 PM | Comments (0)
School Days
April 23, 2008
Japanese preschool, not surprisingly, is full of routines. I think the two year old class is just to teach them HOW to go to school. We're greeted by everyone with a Japanese Good Morning -- Ohayo Gozaimasu! Mia started saying it back to them this morning so she's on her way to learning the language! When she first comes in, she is supposed to take off her outside shoes, put them on her very own shelf and put on her indoor shoes. She then hangs her thermos on it's very own hook. She goes into the classroom and puts a sticker in her attendance book on today's date.
She hangs her towel on her very own hook, and then places her backpack in the backpack bookcase on, you guessed it, her very own shelf! Everywhere her name is labeled somewhere, it is accompanied by a sticker of a little chick. So even if she can't recognize her name in Japanese yet, she knows she has the chick hook or chick shelf.
Once she's done all of her get-ready-for-school-tasks taken care of, she can go get a toy and take it to her very own seat.
She plays with that until she's bored of it, at which time she is supposed to put it back on the shelf where it belongs. Both the toy and the shelf are labeled with the same sticker so she knows where it should go. Genius!
After free play time, it is story time and/or singing time.
Everyone has a spot on the floor where they are supposed to sit, and it is labeled with their name and baby animal sticker. Mia's already learning the little Japanese songs, complete with hand gestures. Maybe she'll do it for the camera one of these days. Next is snacktime. This may be followed by a bathroom break, or it may just have been coincidence that a few of them all needed to go at the same time. Not sure yet. But Mia knows to say "Oshikko" if she needs to go to the bathroom with the tiny kid-sized toilet.
So far she's only had one accident at school, so she's doing great there! Now, if we could just cut down on all the puddles at home.
Outside time is next and it takes a bit of preparation. They have to find their sun hats and change back into their outdoor shoes. That's nothing compared to the task of getting 19 two year olds all outside and doing the right activity. It really was like herding cats. They wanted them to play in the sand. One teacher would stay in the sandbox and try to involve all the nearby children as the other one ran around the playground trying to corral the stragglers back to where they should be. I'm not sure if all the parents that are sticking around for the first few days helped or hindered this herding...
But eventually they all wound up in the same place.
They somehow herd them all back inside where they collect all their belongings and get ready to go. They sit with their backpack and wait to be picked up. When it's time to go, they bow goodbye to their sensei and say Sayanora. Quite a lot to pick up, but she's getting the hang of it.
Posted by Kimberly at 10:29 PM | Comments (0)
First Day of School
April 17, 2008
After months of begging me to go to school, today Mia woke up in a mood and announced she didn't want to go. Since I told her she had to go, she decided she wouldn't do anything else. No shower, no hair, no teeth, no getting dressed, no breakfast... you get the picture. I fought the battles that had to be fought-- the child couldn't leave the house naked-- and then I tried to fight one more. I wanted to get some pictures. I begged, I pleaded, I bribed. None of it worked. Seriously. The child turned down chocolate to spite me. I still snapped whatever I could, most of them a blurry blob running away from the camera. The video makes it look like she had a really fun first day. Appearances can be deceiving!
Posted by Kimberly at 09:32 PM | Comments (1)
She's a thinker, that one!
April 15, 2008
I have a bit of a runny nose right now, and Mia noticed me blowing it for the 847th time today.
Mia: What's wrong with your nose?
Me: I have a cold.
Mia: Oh. Yeah, you have ice in your nose!
Posted by Kimberly at 08:40 PM | Comments (0)
School is hard!
April 13, 2008
And she hasn't even started yet. And I'm not even the one going! I spent this weekend gathering up Mia's school supplies off of my list which was roughly translated off of their list which was written in Japanese of course. As if the translation didn't make things difficult, I have absolutely no frame of reference for understanding this list. "Bring indoor shoes, the white ones, in a shoe bag." What does that mean? Had I grown up here, I would have known that all little school children wear the same indoor shoes and some of them have red soles, or blue soles, or pink soles. They wanted her to have the white soles. I think. And a shoe bag is not labeled "shoe bag" at the store-- at least not in anything I can read. So you just have to know that certain sizes and styles of bags must be for carrying shoes. When I toured the school, they tried to show me the contents of another girl's backpack so I had some idea of what I was looking for. Except for the shoes-- she must have been wearing those! Luckily, I have a couple english speaking Japanese friends to answer all my silly questions and they pulled me through. So I think Mia's ready for school this week.
She needs a backpack, a spare set of clothes packed in it's own little bag which will go inside the backpack, a towel WITH A LOOP to hang on her own personal little hook so she can dry her hands after washing them, a thermos with a strap, indoor shoes and a shoe bag to carry them. She got a princess one of course. I didn't even try to tackle the lunch paraphernalia yet since she won't need it until June when she stays at school all day. So I have a few weeks to figure out which bento box and which set of utensils (which incidentally come in their very own carrying case) I should get. There's a separate bag for the cup and another bag for the bento box and possibly another even bigger bag to hold all of it together. I don't know. I'll try to figure it out later. I need a break after this round. The biggest challenge of it all was that all of her things are supposed to be labeled. Why is that so hard you ask? Because her name is supposed to be written in katakana. So I turned to my faithful old pal, Google, and tried to figure out how to write Mia. Luckily for me, it's only two characters. Behold:
I asked my friends and they could read it so apparently I'm literate now! Just don't ask me to write Ellerie. We're going to have to move before it's time for her to start school!
Posted by Kimberly at 04:42 PM | Comments (1)
Following in her footsteps
April 11, 2008
I'm sure you remember that Mia had a knack for falling asleep in unusual places. Anywhere besides her bed actually, she hated sleeping there! One of her favorite napping locations was her bumbo.
Wouldn't you know it:
Mia on the other hand, has had nearly three years to perfect her sleeping in strange places skills:
Posted by Kimberly at 09:22 AM | Comments (2)
New & Improved Woah Woah Kitty room
April 10, 2008
Mia's playroom was out of control. Toys were just piled up so that she couldn't even get inside and the only things she would play with were the ones that happened to be on the top of the heap. Last weekend, we decided to put an end to the madness and do some organizing and de-cluttering. Mia had a blast building her bookshelves and now it's like she has a whole room full of new toys to play with.
Posted by Kimberly at 03:49 PM | Comments (0)
One week left
April 09, 2008
I had planned to send Mia to an American preschool starting in September, but the Japanese school year starts in April and this week all of her friends are starting. Mia has been asking to go to school for MONTHS now and it's been even harder to explain to her these last few days why she doesn't get to go yet. In the past she has asked where one of her friends is and I say she's at her school. Mia will always say in a sad voice, "I wish I could go to school." Today, when I told her we were going to go look at her new school she was ecstatic. She said, "Yay let's find my new school! And then Tatum will ask where is Mia? And her Mommy will say Mia's at her school!"
I've also been having a lot more conversations with my friends whose kids have been in Japanese schools for a while now as well as a Japanese friend whose perspective includes her own experiences as a child growing up in Tokyo and as a mother of a three year girl who has been going for a year already. The idea has grown on me. Total immersion will likely help her learn Japanese quickly and being exposed to the cultural differences will be good for her. She'll be in the two year old class for another couple months where she'll get used to the routines of school. There is a list of things they should bring to school each day, like indoor shoes, a box containing a fork, spoon, and chopsticks, a placemat, thermos of water, towels with a loop to hang on their own personal little hooks... each child is expected to clean up after herself. That can't be a bad skill to cultivate! Being a montessori school, they let the kids choose the activity and try to find a lesson within their play. There seemed to be a good mix of structure with the very specific daily routines and flexibility in letting each child pursue their individual interests and move at their own pace.
Now for the big surprise:
Who would have thought that of all people, I would choose a catholic school? I didn't actually know it was affiliated with a church until I got there today. I really like everything I'd heard about it, so despite the fact that I am sending Mia to the nuns, I think it's a good fit. They did mention that she'll probably learn some Catholic Japanese prayers, so that should be interesting!
So there's one week left before the big girl starts school. I was excited about the idea of getting her into a school that she could start sooner. But now that it's (almost) a done deal, it's a little sad that this big step is coming up so quickly! I think I might miss her. They weren't kidding when they coined the phrase, "They grow up so fast."
Posted by Kimberly at 10:54 PM | Comments (2)
Twins
April 03, 2008
Can you tell who's who?
If we keep dressing them alike, we won't be able to tell them apart in a few years!
Posted by Kimberly at 10:45 AM | Comments (2)
Conversations with an 8 week old
April 02, 2008
Posted by Kimberly at 04:01 PM | Comments (0)