Sakura & Natsuki's room

Two years ago I posted about my ideas for redecorating Sakura and Natsuki's room. Earlier last year I took the wallpaper off, fixed the dents and holes and painted the walls. I chose a soft yellow to go with all of the things I bought at Ikea. When my mom came to visit last June we made curtains together and chose the last details to go in the room. Just like when we put together Emi and Misaki's room, we took the girls to a friend's house and while they were gone we put everything together. Sakura and Natsuki were so excited when they came home. They love every part of the room and they've spent a lot of time playing up there. But I realized that I never posted pictures of the finished product. Enjoy!

For the window behind the bed I covered a large piece of styrofoam with the same material as the curtains for the other window. Our bedrooms are on the third floor and I had a vision of the girls fooling around near an open window, falling through the screen and sliding down in the 2 ft space between our house and our neighbor's house. It freaked me out so I did this in both of the rooms!



They love to organize their princess shoes like this!




The boxes hold all of their toys. The bottom two are full of dolls!







I think I've only bought two stuffed animals since Emi was born but as you can see there are enough to fill a whole basket! Where do they come from?



These wall lamps are so adorable.

It's hard to get a good picture of the whole room but I think you can get an idea of what the room looks like. Last week I finally put up the rack for their bags but for some reason I've been hesitant to put up the rest of the things I bought to go on the walls. Maybe because I worked to hard to fix the walls, I don't to "wreck" them again. But mostly I'm not sure I still like what I bought. I was able to get the froggy prince wall pocket which I like but the only place to put it is beside Sakura & Natsuki's bed and I know they won't be able to resist touching it when they're supposed to go to sleep so I'll wait on that.

I can't decide what to put above the shelves that hold the toys.

This wall is especially bare. I have a signed poster from the author of a book we love (Suki's Kimono) to frame for the other wall so I was thinking of doing a poster from another book for this wall but I can't find anything that would suit the room. Any ideas? I can buy through Amazon or Posters.com so there is a pretty wide selection but I've lost steam for this room! Any help would be appreciated.

bullet points now and then

I found this post from October 2009 that I had saved as a draft for some reason. It's so funny to look back and remember what we were going through and how far we've come.

• Misaki slipped (on nothing) at school and fell backwards, smacked her head (on nothing) and got a small cut on her head. The school nurse called to inform me that they were taking her to the hospital to have the doctor check it and then called me a few hours later to say that they had put one staple (!) in her head. Fortunately there were no other problems (dizziness, etc.) and a week later we had the staple pulled out and everything's OK. Now the paperwork begins. Our health insurance covers 70% and the school will cover the other 30% but I have to get the hospital to fill out one form (which will take two weeks), then we have to fill out another one to accompany it, turn it in and then wait 3 months to get reimbursed. All this for about 20 bucks. But she was cute with the bandage around her head.

Update from 2010! I never did the paperwork. It was too complicated (typical) for too little return.

• Emi and Misaki had their sports day last Sunday. The weather was perfect and we had great seats with friends. The girls were awesome in their events and performances. Usually I don't praise one child over another but Emi did so amazing in her 80m race that I actually think it would be unfair not to mention it. There are about 90 kids in the 3rd grade at her school and the teachers painstakingly decide which six kids will run against each other so that each race is still competitive. Emi ran against five other girls and boys and halfway through the race she was already pulling ahead and before the finish line there was no one even close to her! She was so proud of herself and so were we. Another interesting thing about this year was how easy it was to get everything ready. Usually I'm running around trying to find mats, making our lunch, getting the kids ready and stuff like that but this year we were out the door on time, we found a great place to put our mat down for lunch and it was really relaxing. I feel like I conquered another hurdle of life in Japan.

• I am so worried about Sakura's sports day. As of today it looks like the weather might cooperate but if it doesn't Chikara and I are going to miss her first sports day and that seriously sucks. Due to poor planning on my part and the stupid Silver Week vacation pushing back the date for her sports day I will be in Portland for the "rescheduled sports day" and Chikara will have to work. I've asked our closest friends to go in our place and they're really excited about it but I'm just sick over the fact that this has ended up happening to Sakura. So I've got my fingers crossed that everything works out fine, the typhoon passes quickly and there is good weather for Friday so I can go and be the good mother that I want to be. Grrr.

Update from 2010! The weather turned out fabulous and I was able to go and cheer Sakura on and then hop on the plane the next day for a shopping trip with my mom and sister!

• Chikara needs to change his diet. He's got this and although at this point it's reversible it means he's got to give up most of his favorite foods and make a permanent change to his lifestyle. He's really upbeat about it and honestly the timing couldn't be better but it's just one more thing on top of everything else. Recently I've started to enjoy cooking or maybe it's that I finally have time to think about cooking but it was fun to look around the internet for new recipes and browse the supermarket for new options. My plan is to slowly work new meals in to what I make now and phase out the meals that have a high carbohydrate content (bye-bye yakisoba). I guess we'll all be getting healthier together.

Update from 2010! Chikara is amazing. He has lost 12kg over the last year mostly by being more careful about what he's eating. At his last yearly health check all of his levels were back to normal!

• Natsuki's potty training is not going well which is mostly because of my busy schedule. I can remember when my youngest brother (also the fourth child) was being potty trained that while mom had him sitting on the toilet we would walk back and forth in the doorway making crazy faces to entertain him while mom waited for him to pee. I guess it took all of us to keep him on track and it seems like it's going to be like that for Natsuki, too. After I get back from my trip then Natsuki will be my only priority until we're done with diapers.

Update from 2010! Natsuki is potty-trained and I am enjoying a diaper-free life!

• Then there's just regular busyness like Chikara being at work more, me and my English classes and parenting groups. Even without trying our days just fill up. Last weekend we had a good-bye dinner for friends that are moving back to the States, a trip to the hospital to take Misaki's staple out of her head, met a friend at the mall to catch up, Emi and Misaki's sports day and a party to welcome a friend to Osaka. Phew!

Update from 2010! Still busy... I guess some things never change!

what a cute daddy

I was going through the pictures on our computer today and found a collection that I had put together for Chikara to celebrate Father's Day a few years ago.

A few are so cute that I have to share.



Asleep with Emi (1 month old)




Asleep with Misaki (2 months old)




Asleep with Natsuki (3 months old)




No pictures asleep with Sakura but this is cute!




An extra bonus pic asleep with Misaki (2 years old)



Chikara has definitely always been available to assist with naptimes!

pics from July 2009

Emi and Natsuki smiling at our favorite sushi restaurant.



Daddy and Misaki like sushi!




Natsuki *begged* me to do her hair like this!




After Sakura's haircut. She looks like a model!




How can Natsuki possibly be sleeping in this position?




On July 25th was our neighborhood's festival so we got all dressed up (except for Emi who grew out of her yukata) and off we went.

Emi (It was a fight just to let me braid her hair!)


Misaki




Sakura



Natsuki



Eating Shaved Ice


The park where we have our neighborhood festival.





Only August left and I'm caught up. Yeah!

pics from June 2009

I'm trying to catch up with blogging a bit so here are a few highlights from June. My mom came to visit us and we had Sakura's 5th birthday!

Natsuki doing her buttons!



The girls being silly at Sakura's b-day party. Notice the torn up shoji on the window behind them. Throughout the summer the shoji went from bad to worse.



Making Father's Day cards!



The dress mom made for Sakura. It's a little big so it'll fit her next year, too.



The quilt my mom made for Natsuki. It's Noah's Ark.



next up July...

ack!

I had to get Sakura new inside shoes (uwagutsu) for when she went back to school on Tuesday and over the summer (only six weeks) she grew from a size 17cm to a size 18.5cm! That's three whole sizes. And Misaki's only in a size 19cm

Yikes

Also, her mizuibo (some kind of wart) suddenly cleared up last week so her teacher let her go in the pool for the last day.

She's becoming such a big girl except that...

She wouldn't dance at the festival at her preschool. She totally freaked out and we ended up going home and putting her right to bed. I did talk with her about what it means to be a "big girl" and that in order to get the fun of being a big girl (going outside, allowance, etc.) that you need to take responsibility and sometimes do stuff you don't want to do (say hello to neighborhood people, DANCE AT THE FESTIVAL). We'll see if she understood.

5 can be a trying age.

notes for next summer...

Is anyone else as happy as I am that school has started up again? Yeah for school!

I have to say that every year I get better at managing all the free time we have during summer vacation. The first few years I was totally discombobulated. When I was trying to manage a baby, a toddler, pool schedules (that are out of my control), lunches, dinners, baths, house cleaning (well, not really), potty training and whatever else came along, I was just glad that we made it through the day, but I think my older two kids were really bored.

This year was totally different since Natsuki turned 3. Yes, my baby is 3 years old! I can hardly believe it. She isn't potty trained yet. I've been working on it but she hasn't understood what she's supposed to do. I know everyone says that the summer is the easiest time to potty train but with everything else going on I didn't want to have to worry about accidents so I decided to put potty training on hold. Diapers are safer. But in spite of that Natsuki did pee on the potty for the first time two days after her birthday so go figure! Anyhoo, during Chikara's week off we took the girls to a water park (complete with waterslides, etc.) and an amusement park. Usually we only do one big outing because that's all the girls can handle but Natsuki being just a little bit older even than Golden Week made all the difference. She totally got the fun of what we were doing and she could adapt to a different schedule. Because of that Emi and Misaki had a lot more fun than they normally do and we did, too.

There are a few things I would do different for next year and I'm actually writing this post to help me remember (hopefully).

1. I would plan something for the last half of our vacation (after Chikara has gone back to work). The first four weeks were full of camps and fun activities plus Emi and Misaki had homework and art projects they needed to do so those weeks went flying by. But from August 17th we totally hit a slump. Sure it was hot outside but I totally lost momentum and looking back I wish I had a few more things planned.

2. One part of Emi and Misaki's homework is to write a daily diary. There's only room for one sentence but they also have check boxes for the weather, if they helped me, if they did their homework, etc. When I glanced at it it didn't seem all that complicated so I just left it to the end and we ended up having to take a few hours this last Monday to complete. A lot of the days have a blank because we could not remember what we did. Next year I want to remember to put it on the fridge the first day of summer vacation and then fill it out as we go along. All the rest of their homework went really smoothly which is an improvement over last year.

3. I want to spend one day alone with each of my daughters and do something they like together. Because Chikara is going to work more now it was really me and all four girls together all the time. Especially I feel Sakura got lost in the shuffle.

That's it. I'll probably have a new list of things that crop up next year but for now these are the improvements I'd make. What I wouldn't change for the world are these monkeys...

(Emi's not in a yukata because she outgrew hers!)

recent pics

April 2009




Emi's 8th Birthday




Misaki's 7th Birthday




Sakura's Preschool Entrance Ceremony




Natsuki being cute at home!

2009

Happy New Year!

I feel like 2009 is just finally beginning even though January is almost gone. We've been either busy or sick, but mostly sick. Emi and Misaki's classes were cancelled for two days (gakyuhesai) because too many kids in their classes stayed home sick (15 out of 30 in Emi's class and 11 out of 30 in Misaki's class). Fortunately it was not the dreaded influenza. So they were home for two days which meant that Sakura and Natsuki caught the cold. Natsuki's fever spike and she had a febrile seizure. She was having a hard time breathing near the end so we called the ambulance and they took us to the hospital. I knew as soon as we boarded the ambulance and Natsuki took one look around and started screaming that she was fine but I wanted to have her checked by a doctor anyways. The doctor that we saw was very concerned that she might have influenza and not concerned enough (for me) about her seizure. Turned out that she just had a regular cold (which I knew) so he gave us some medicine (two different types of suppositories!) and sent us home. The next day Natsuki got a little dizzy sometimes and while trying to walk straight would drift off to the side or actually fall down. I finally had to make her sit down so she wouldn't hurt herself. I cannot tell you how thrilled I am that we are all healthy again.

But I did not intend to start blogging in 2009 by complaining. I am very excited about this year and all it holds for us. As the year progresses I will share more about our plans (if I can ever get around to starting any of them!). In the meantime I will show you the girl's Christmas pictures.

Even though it's belated, I wish all of you a very Happy New Year! I look forward to reading (or hearing for the blog-less) about all the wonderful things that will happen this year.

Natsuki's latest phrase

I have so many things that I want to write about but I just can't seem to get to the computer long enough to actually post anything. Hopefully soon...

In other news, the other day when I got Sakura and Natsuki up in the morning, Natsuki was all genki-genki but Sakura still wasn't quite awake. We went in to wake up Daddy and Natsuki cuddled right up to him and was talking away in her own special language that no one understands. I was holding Sakura and she was whining at me and I was thinking that it was going to be a long day. After a minute of this I realized that Natsuki was saying something over and over but I couldn't figure it out so I asked her.

Natsuki: ah, ah, ehhhhh. ah, ah, ehhhh.

Me: Natsuki, what are you saying?

Sakura: (taking a break from the whining) She's saying "What The Heck". (resumes whining)

Natsuki: wa, ah, ehhhhck. wa, ah, ehhhhck.

Oh my goodness. I know she learned this from Misaki who picked it up when we went home this summer. Fortunately no one here knows what she's saying so I don't have to worry about offending anyone. Although later in the evening when I asked Natsuki to repeat it for Chikara, he was a little offended. It's pretty cute, though.

Apple!

Today I had to take Sakura for a "test" at the preschool she's going to go to in April. The test is really simple and is mostly to see if they can understand questions asked and then answer them and basic words. I was worried that she would be too shy or burst into tears but she was very calm and focused (unusual for her!).

I have to share one cute moment from her test.

referring to a page of fruit...
Teacher: ringo wa dore? (where are the apples?)
Sakura: ...
Teacher: ringo wa?
Sakura: ... apple!
Teacher: suteki (that's cool) said with a little awe in her voice

Yes, for the first part she kept answering the questions in English. The teachers (and other moms in the room) were totally impressed with her pronunciation. Eventually she realized the teacher was looking for her answers in Japanese so she switched over but it was pretty cute!

a Misaki flashback

This is Misaki on her first day of preschool. She had just turned 4 two months earlier and I was so nervous. I had no idea how she would do. Would she pay attention to the teacher? Would she follow instructions? Would she make friends? Would she enjoy herself? Would she be able to tell me what she did all day? Of course all my worrying was a complete waste of time. She did great all through those two years of preschool and she's turned into a spectacular first grader.



Basically this is how Misaki handles life: Nonchalantly with the occasional outburst of emotion.

PS Can you see Sakura to the left of Misaki? She was almost 2 at the time. What a cutie-pie!

my vacation is officially over

The cool weather has finally pushed me out of vacation mode. Actually I feel like for the last few months I've been on an "idea-search" trying to find answers to different changes we want to make in our lives. Kind of like being in a cocoon (mentally at least), preparing for what kind of butterfly I want to become. But a lot of these ideas have come together and Chikara and I have started talking through some of them so I feel like I'm starting to break out of that cocoon and will soon be able to take action.

As part of the "taking action", Sakura and I sat down today and made a few more videos for her blog. We posted the first one today and the other two are scheduled to appear over the next weeks. It's amazing how many hits her blog gets every week, even during the two months we didn't post anything new. I guess her fan base is pretty solid!!! Thank you!

one year ago and now

Emi today

Emi one year ago

Misaki today

Misaki one year ago

Sakura today

Sakura one year ago

Natsuki today

Natsuki one year ago