Tuesday, March 18, 2008

The Last Few Weeks

I haven't written an update for a while! A lot has happened in the last few weeks. Brayden has been well for a while now, although he is getting some more teeth so his attitude has not been the best lately. A couple of weeks ago was my last day of going to language school full time. I am now seeing a tutor with a friend on Mon, Wed, and Fri. from 10am-12pm. This new schedule has been working out so much better for me. I am much less stressed and have more time to spend with Brayden. On Mon. and Wed. he stays at the daycare until 3pm because I like that he gets the exposure to Japanese. He can say a couple of Japanese words now! He says "Ato" for "Arigato" (Thank You)," "I-Oh" for "Ohio" (Good Morning), and "Wa" for "Konichiwa" (Hello). The cutest part is that he does a little head bow when he says these words, because thats what accompanies them! Below are some pictures of the last couple of weeks.
Brayden having fun climbing on Daddy.

Mike joined a Rugby team that plays on Sundays. He got a black eye this last time. It has yet to go away and this was 3 weeks ago!

A couple of weeks ago we went to the zoo with our whole team. Here are the boys looking at one of the animals. After we went to the zoo, our husbands took all the kids home and us girls took the train to Nagoya and had dinner and coffee. It was so much fun!

Here are all of us at the Zoo. It was cold that day!

I made chocolate chip cookes for Mike's birthday last week. Here are the kids eating their cookies. It was an accident, but they are lined up perfectly from oldest to youngest. Colette is 4, Owen is 2 and 1/2, Sterling turned 2 last month, and Brayden is 19 months.

Our teammate Caitlin, (here in Japan she is called Caito-San) had a St. Patricks Day party and made fried fish and chips. It was delicious, (Oishi!) and very fun. Here I am with some 3-leaf clover glasses. So about our names-My name here is Ereen-San, but the "r" sound is a mixture of an r and an l. Mike is "Mikeru-San." Brayden is hard for them to say, so they say "Buray" with the same funny "r" sound they use for my name. For children they add the suffix "khun" so he is "Buray-khun." Funny, huh?

The weather has been warming up and its been beautiful out. On Sunday we took Brayden to a park and went on a train ride around the pond. This was the first time Brayden looked at the camera on purpose so I could take his picture. He was giving me a silly smile.



Brayden recently started loving to "Wa," meaning "Draw." Here he is with his new found activity.