Last night before turning 4....a typical scene at 7 o'clock in the evening. Either Pappa or myself with Josephine. Evie already fast asleep (put to bed at 6pm)

last day of being 3

I've just told Josephine that this is the last day that she will be three.
Of course, I know she's mega excited to have her birthday and turn a year older. Everything is about being bigger, being faster, being taller, etc, so there's no holding her back. Mamma, on the other hand, is reminiscing that "small girl days" are flying....and I so love these days! (I am the soppy sort)
So, knowing that she was very excited, I did ask her if there was any inch of sadness about getting older.
"No. No, Mamma, no." And then, with big eyes "And even when I'm four, I can still wear my ballerina dwess. Hmmmm.(nodding strongly)"

But 3 minutes later she added: "Actually, it's no fun being an adult."
Me a bit surprised: "Why?"
Josephine: "Us little kids, we can sleep a lot and we can play a lot and just do our little fings."

Another 3 minutes later:
"Mamma, dat super dupey loop thing (rollercoaster) is too scawy for little ones. It's only for big people like you and me."



:-)

Holidays

It's been a holiday week! And I love having both my girls around me all day long. It's so nice to just be us and do things in our time. It just feels wholesome. :-)
Anyway, we've had different days this week ranging from playing at home or cycling to Noge Park or going to Josephine's school grounds and meeting with special people. The busiest and nicest day was on Thursday. We went swimming in the morning and then we met with a new Japanese friend (from Josephine's KG) and because it was raining we went to an indoor play centre. (a great new tip for me!). The kids had a total ball on the trampolines and ball pools etc. I was a lot with Evie who had different interests to the "older" ones ;-)
But other good days just involved going for a bike ride here around our place and then coming home to play all sorts of games (doctor doctor or whatever!)

At the same time, Michael had a very busy week with hosting a conference for IT Asia. So all the big boytjies came along from Germany and Asia. We missed him as he had to take them out in the evenings ;-( But now that is over and we're enjoying family time together this weekend! Yay! It's so nice being a little family.

Handful of cute things from today

I made a vegetable curry with rice for lunch today...and this is what she said:

"Pappa. You fink dis spicey food is driving your tongue nuts too??"  :-)



Evie's new words for this week are:

"Mamma's gewl" (mamma's girl)

"hank you"  (thank you)
"purple"
"lellow" (yellow)
"fire. Twuck" (A second's pause between the words to regather her tongue-energy for the next word!)
She also knows a few letters, so if I say "a for...?" she says "apple". "b for..." "boat", she says. So, she knows (a,b,p,m,j,E,f)
She also loves to sing "LaLaLaLa" and says "Alleluya" for the song called "Hallelujah" that I sing to her each night (you know the one that Alexandra Burke sang ... that one. But way worsely sung. ;-) Evie sings "Lalalala" for the verse and then sings "Alleluya" for the chorus. Too cute. With her little head on my shoulder. I wish she'd stay small forever!

Kamakura

We have found a hit place: Kamakura.
It's steeped in history, got lots of Japanese style buildings, beaches, beautiful views and lots of fresh air. Perfect!
We planned to go and see some of the temples and shrines this time, but never got to it. The kids just loved the beach and we hung out there a long time! Again, we all got soaked, but it was so much fun!
The tide had brought in heaps of kelp and the Japanese were wading in the shallow waters and searching the beaches for some "snacks". Very healthy stuff! Apparently what gives them such good hair and skin. ;-)

4th ballet lesson

These girls look too cute: like marshmellows you just want to bite into! EDIBLE!!!

They're currently doing a little "Pirate Dance" where they pretend to be sailing the winds, then fighting the storm, then looking for treasure, then finding it! Almost a piece of drama.

Evie was allowed to join in for about 10 minutes. It was a total treat for her. She loved it and really tried hard to do the curtsey at the end! Too cute!

Indoor play center in Futakatamagawa (Tokyo suburb near us)

This is where Josephine, Evie and I headed the other weekend when Pappa had a headache and needed to lie down, poor man.
We had a good time. :-)

Verbal evolution

12 months old:
pointing at desired object and bopping "Uh! Uh! Uh!"

18 months old:
"Juice!!!! Juice!!!! Juice!!!! MY Juice!!!"

2 years old:
amazing vocab growth, efforts of politeness on occassion, when reminded.

3 years old:
"I want to do it by myself!! I can do it alone!"

nearly 4 years old:
"I want to do it! I can do it better dan you!"  (a quote from tonight....)

Valentine's Day

I had the best start to Valentine's Day....

Josephine still comes into our bed sometime in the middle of the night. In the wee hours of the 14th, I couldn't sleep. I went to bed at midnight after baking stacks of little cupcakes with hearts for KG. Somewhere around 1am she slipped into our bed and fell asleep immediately. A while later I heard her talking in her sleep:
"I love my Mummy"  (she now sometimes calls me mUummy)....just made me all warm and fuzzy inside! And soon afterwards she was chuckling to herself in her sleep. :-)

Reunion!

Considering 3 countries different time zones and an unplanned, but FAB surprise, we managed to co-incide to all be on Skype at the same time today!! Had a fab FAB time just connecting with THE WHOLE FAMILY!!! Everyone was there!!! :-) Despite the fact that I was still in my pj's, it was awesome to see everyone! I loved it and so did Michael. We've been talking about it all day!
x

Doubly beautiful

Today was Josephine's ballet class. Again, Evie joined in fully and did twirls, tried to copy everything the bigger girls were doing. Evie's photos were all a bit blurred unfortunately, but here are some of Josephine which came out quite nicely.