birthday

Jolon has enjoyed all of his birthday celebrations so much. We've been talking parties, presents and cakes for weeks. At school as well, they celebrated with him on the actual day and then today was the school-wide November birthday party, so lots more attention directed at him. Still, I think it's pretty confusing to go from 3 to 4 in one day. Tonight he looked up and asked, "Am I still 4?"

Jolon's 4th birthday party

Jolon had a great birthday party with Auntie Erin and Peter, Suzie and Vince, and Craig. He got some amazing presents: a glow in the dark skeleton and book about the human body from Grandma Jude, a pillowcase he can color on from Grammy and Grandpa, play-dough toys from Suzie, a snake and pirate towel from Vince, an art book from Craig and Lisa, swords and various ninja goods from Peter and Erin, puzzles and books from us. The pirate cake was a big success. We think Kellan may have actually enjoyed eating it more than anyone else.

Kellan playing with his sushi

2 cute things Jolon says:

"That's mines", instead of mine.

He uses the expression "all the day," to mean "too much." As in, "I don't want to wear that shirt all the day," if I ask him to wear a shirt that I like, which he doesn't. Or if I ask him to eat some fruit: "I don't want to eat fruit all the day."

Both of these expressions could easily corrected if I bothered to teach him the correct way, but I think they're so cute, I can't bear to correct him. In fact, I use them the same way he does! Bad Mom...

Kellan

The other day I brought home some English scones from a food festival. I put butter and jam on them and served them for the boys' snack. I was cleaning in the kitchen while they were eating and when I looked up, Kellan, who usually dumps things into his milk and/or dumps his milk onto his food, was very carefully dunking bites of his scone into his milk and then eating them. I was pretty impressed as the traditional way to eat scones is with cream. Going back to his English roots I guess!

Walk down the aisle

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This is Jolon walking the down aisle with little Sarah. Sorry, the color is weird... the camera accidentally got switched to night vision. See how he tries to give the ring box to the priest, who gently refuses and points in my direction where he is supposed to go next.

Ring bearer

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Jolon did a fab job of walking up the stairs, giving the ring to the priest (going the wrong way, but got back on track with the help of an attendant), accepting lollypop and kiss, managing to not fall coming down the steep stairs. Notice just before he gets to me, he wipes his eyes with his arm. So nervous he was almost in tears!

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Kellan latest 10/15

Tonight Kellan actually managed to sit through two books with me while Jan was reading to Jolon. They say he does ok at school when they read books to the group, but I haven't had much luck reading to him at night.

Last night just before he fell asleep, he started saying, "Jyozu, ne," which means, "That's good." It's what you say to praise someone for doing something well and he hears it a lot at school and home. After saying that a few dozen times, he got quiet and then started saying, "ba-na-na" over and over. This is his mark at school...so funny that he says it with a Japanese accent. One of his first words was, "ball," but lately we and his teachers have noticed that he's changed the way he pronounces the word to the Japanese pronunciation, "bo-ru."

He's getting pretty good at pulling up his pants by himself. He still needs help getting his feet through but then he can get them up, although quite often they get stuck and he just cries for help.

Speaking of crying......WHEW. He is still not speaking enough to tell us what's wrong when he's upset, so he's just continually letting out these ear piercing cries.

He'll often say he's sorry when he does something wrong such as drops something he shouldn't be carrying. Instead of "sorry," though it sounds like "soy."

The other day I got up and was washing my face at the bathroom sink. I went to do something else and when I came back, he'd found a stool, pulled it up to the sink, turned on the water and was washing his face too.

A couple of times the other day he got slightly annoyed with things Jolon had done, and both times as he leaned in to bite Jolon, I yelled, "no bitey." He quickly changed from a bite to a little kiss. It was really funny. He looked up with a smile and had completely forgotten why he was angry or annoyed in the first place.

Summer villa-be warned about a 5 min. slide show and over 100 pics....

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Go left, no go right, right?

Jan has been teasing Jolon with this play on words for awhile recently and he said that Jolon looked up the other day with a big smile. He got it. This morning as we were walking to school all I heard was: "You said turn left, right?" "No right." "Right?" "Right. Turn left." "Ok, left, right?" etc. etc.

I went out to dinner with my friend, John, last night while Jan kept the boys. He fed and bathed them and then they starting watching the original Peter Pan movie. About halfway through, Kellan got tired and as Jan got up to put him to bed, Jolon got scared. It was a scene with the bad pirates and he was starting to cry. Jan leaned down and whispered, "Don't worry, Peter Pan is going to win. He'll beat the pirates and he's going to win." Jolon calmed down and waved goodbye to them with a big smile on his face.

Erin's Wedding

Jolon did great. He was a super star. I still can't believe he pulled it off. Poor thing, he was so nervous by the time it all started.....people said he looked terrified walking down the aisle. Suzie said his eyes were bugging out of his head. He walked all the way down holding Sarah's hand and they both came and sat with me and Keiko, Sarah's Mom. Actually he tried to give the ring box to the Priest when he got to the end of the aisle, but the priest pointed to me, so he came and sat down with me. Then Jolon had to wait until the priest called for the rings and go up a big set of stairs. He almost wouldn't let go of my hand, but I gave him a gentle push and he somehow managed to go. He went right to the priest and then KK, Erin's sister, gave him a lollypop and Erin gave him a kiss, and he came right back to me. It was so sweet, but he was so nervous that by the time he got back to me, I thought he was going to burst into tears. The lollypop helped.

I managed to get Kellan to sleep that morning from 10:45 until 12:15, woke him up and fed him quickly, got us all dressed and into a taxi at 12:50. Because of the nap, Kellan was able to really enjoy the party. He danced and ate tons of good food. (During the ceremony, Mrs. Fujimoto and her youngest daughter, Mako, watched him at the back of the church and he never cried for me.) Erin had set up a kid's table at the party, complete with crayons, puzzles, and LOADS of candy. Jolon was in heaven. People were so nice to help us keep an eye on Jolon, as he walked around freely between the two party rooms with some of the older flower girls. Setsuko (good friend) would occasionally give me hand signals that Jolon was doing ok on the other side of the room. Jan and I took them home around 7:00, had them asleep by 8:30 and then Hiromi watched them while we went back to the party until nearly 12. They didn't wake up once while we were gone. Beautiful wedding, fun day out with the kids, great night out with Jan.

The first two pictures are of Jolon wearing his new Carp shirt signed by the mascot, Slyly. The second is a close up of a little stuffed Slyly that waves a fan when you pull a string out of his back. Both presents from Erin and Peter to Jolon for being in the wedding. Jolon sleeps with the doll every night and would sleep in the shirt too if we let him.

Cute baby

Erin's wedding rehearsal

Well, the practice went great. Jolon listened carefully to the instructions, walked properly, even smiled as he walked down the LONG aisle with Sarah. Fingers crossed for next Sat.

Kellan latest 9/26/08

Kellan has recently started changed from saying, "Jo Jo," to "Jolon."

He is saying things in Japanese such as "Mommy no," which means "This is Mommy's." In other words, he can show possession. "Kellan no." It's mine. "Jolon no." It's Jolon's.

He's also showing that he understands when we are asking him a question by our tone of voice. So he'll often nod or shake his head when we ask him a question if even if he doesn't understand it.

If Jan and I are talking and we happen to mention shoes, Kellan will sometimes go to the door to find his. Or if I say something about getting in the bath, he'll start taking his clothes off.

He knows not to come into the house with his shoes on and has been really working at and getting better at getting his shoes off and on by himself.

His teachers told us that he said, "Joji, wake up," (in Japanese) the other day after nap time when it was time to get up. They seem very impressed that he's making two word sentences.

One of his favorite words is "oishii," (delicious). So funny to watch him take a sip of tea and then nod and say, "oishii."

Nose in Eye and The fall

Jolon saw some sleep in Kellan's eye this morning and said, "Kellan has some nose in his eye." Guess he thought thought the sleep looked like snot or other nose gunk.

The other night Nobu and Sachi dropped Yui and Mei chan off so they could go to dinner and a concert. Keeping 4 kids was quite a handful but by 8:00 Jan and I were doing fine and feeling pretty proud of ourselves. Dinner went well and the kids were playing happily while we kept switching between washing up and playing with them. Recently Kellan has been pulling his diaper off at random times, occasionally sitting on his pottie and doing something, but more often than not just pulling it off because he can. In the midst of the chaos, neither Jan nor I noticed that he'd managed to get it off. All of a sudden we heard Jolon yell, "UNCHI GA DETA" which means "He pooed." Jan ran to the kitchen to get a cloth to clean it up before any one of them decided to grab it or try and clean it up themselves. On his way back to their room, I heard an extremely loud crash. Apparently Kellan had also peed on the floor (unbeknownst to us), and Jan slipped on the pee, tripped over the pottie (useless though it had been) which was in the middle of the floor and landed flat on his face. He did really bang his toe, but I could offer no sympathy as I was doubled over on the floor myself laughing hysterically.

Happy Birthday, Allie!

Dear Allie,

I wish I could have been at your party and sung, HAPPY BIRTHDAY to you and helped you eat the cake. I miss you lots.

love, Jolon

Insults

Jan was taking the boys to school the other day and when they got close to the building, Jolon saw his good friend, Yura. Yura was walking with his Mom and carrying a piece of wood. It's important to understand that when Nakayoshi (school) boys, Jolon's age, meet each other, the accepted greeting is to affectionately punch/bearhug the other boy or fling insults. Jolon, eyeing the piece of wood, and trying to come up with a funny/insulting line.....yelled (in Japanese), "Hey Yura. You're a..........BAKER."

Yura's Mom burst out laughing.

Jan guesses that the piece of wood looked like a piece of bread to Jolon, and that was the best he could come up with at that moment.

Everyone does things that are bad sometimes

Jan went in to put Jolon to bed the other night and told him that he was the best big brother in the world. Jolon protested that he was sometimes mean to Kellan.
Jan: "But everyone does things that are bad sometimes."
Jolon: "Like when you cook really badly?"
Jan: ummmm. yeah, I guess so.....
Jolon: "and when you don't sing very well?"

The best part of course is that Jolon wasn't trying to be funny or make a joke. He was really trying to make sense of the idea that everyone does bad things.

Kellan

When Kellan does something he's really proud of, he'll look up at you and swing his arms back and forth, pleased as he can be with himself.

Kellan

Kellan's teachers said that he and all of the boys in his class love trains. In fact at home, he can say "shinkansen," ("dindansen") and distinguish a picture of one from a regular train, "densha" ("dinsa"). They sing a song at school about a train and each child will grab onto the shoulders of the child in front of him until everyone is attached, forming a long train. It seems to be the favorite song at the moment in the little pigs class. Because trains are so popular at the moment, yesterday Mari Sensei made a little train out of a big cardboard box. 3 children can get in it, hold it up around their bodies and by walking together they can go around the room in the train. Fumiko Sensei wrote that when it was Boushi han's (Hat group, which is Kellan's small group) turn to do it in front of everyone, he became very shy and embarrassed and kept putting his face down on the ground.

Some of the words Kellan can say at the moment: Sensei, boushi, apple, banana, streetcar, car or "bu bu," which is the Japanese baby word for car, ball ("bebow"---that's not Japanese, just what Kellan is calling ball at the moment, pants, "ku ku," for shoes.

Some of his favorite things: balls, hats, shoes, trains, and streetcars

Favorite foods: fish, rice.....not much else, although he'll tolerate pumpkin, corn and broccoli. Unfortunately he likes little hotdogs which are quite popular in Japan. He also loves Japanese curry, which is something that all Japanese kids love.

Foods he doesn't like: fruit, potatoes, avocado

Nicknames: Kel Kel, Baby doll, Doll Bird, Doll Prince. (poor Kellan!)

Sleep: still not nightweaned. but most nights goes to sleep around 8:00, quite often with Jan who will sometimes give him a bottle of milk, but usually not and then he wakes up about 10 or 11 and cries the house down until I go in and nurse him. Then most nights he sleeps until 5ish and I'll nurse him again. Usually he'll then sleep until 6 or 7. I am intending to at least night wean him, but I must not be ready because I can't bring myself to do it. The other night he nursed for a long time on one side and I was nearly asleep again, assuming he was. Finally he popped himself off (rare) and said, "achi," which means "that one." In other words, he popped off to tell me he wanted the other nipple! I nearly laughed out loud.

Jolon-Ensoku (Field trip)

Jolon is going with his class to the famous island, Miyajima, today on a field trip. Luckily Hiromi and Toshi came over last night with tons of food so I was able to save some of the rice and tempura she made and put it into their bentos. (Kellan is also going on a field trip to a nearby park). I boiled some corn this morning, stewed a little pumpkin and included a baked chicken dish I made yesterday. Jolon had to be at school by 8:20 so I was up early getting the bento together and packing his bag. According to the newsletter yesterday he needed a water canteen, a bento, a plastic sheet to sit on, a plastic bag with a wet cloth, a plastic bag with a change of pants and underwear, a hat, and socks for his tennis shoes. These are all of the things that he's needed for field trips so far in Spring Wind class, and I usually make a big deal out of asking him to make sure everything is in the bag. We usually look at the newsletter the night before and pack the bag together. But last night with Toshi and Hiromi went late and this morning I did all of the packing myself without mentioning any of it to Jolon. So I was so surprised this morning when just as we were walking out the door, he stopped and asked me if I'd packed the plastic sheet he sits on while eating. I thought that was so mature of him to be thinking about what he needed for his trip before we left the house.

parks

Kellan can be a little possessive......

When Kellan gets really interested in something, Jolon is apt to try and take it off him, just to see how upset Kellan will get and what he'll do. Kellan is likely to do any (sometimes all) of the following: throw the item away (if I can't have it, he can't either), burst into tears and fall to the floor, try to bite or hit Jolon. And actually it can be pretty funny to see how quickly Kellan go from happy to furious. He can put on quite a show.

Making furniture

We got a new side table and chest which Jolon took great pleasure in helping Jan put together. Of course Jolon thought of Grandpa and so we decided to take some pictures just for him.

Jolon's new trick

Happy Birthday

My friend, Jackie, made these delicious cookies for my birthday and gave them to me in the cute wooden box.