Happy Halloween!

 

 Lola - Halloween 2011    (11 months)

 

Maximo - Halloween 2008      (14 months)

Another Tiny Concert

"I Love to Spell" brought to you by SuperWhy & Maximo Lemley

 - Flavius was tucked in first, then serenaded against his will, 
but he is not one to fight back when the Little Lemleys give him "tough love"

Photo Friday - Week 46

 I cheated this week.  The above picture is from Thursday, not today, Friday.  I took about 50 pictures this morning in the cute pink sweatsuit, but she was super boogery and her cheeks were really red and chapped.  Below you can see Flavius on the receiving end of a lot of Lola Love.  I take her off of him and he just continues to sit there and purr.  He never runs away or swats, no matter how many ear pulls he gets or if she straddles him and tries to ride him like a horse.

Here she is with her new "walker" toy.  She started standing up on her own this week - without holding on to anything.  She likes walking around with this, but gets stuck frequently and she hasn't figured out how to back up yet!

Maximo and Mommy Day... in Pictures

From Harborland, Kobe, Japan

Fall Break - Miyajima, Japan

We went to Miyajima (translation: Island of Shrines), Japan.  It is most known for it's famous Red Torii Gate:

We had a great time with friends and our kids did great.  Maximo did well on the travel days, except for "some" anxiety getting on and off transportation (read: screaming for the first 15 seconds on and off).

Miyajima is about four hours door to door via a bus, Shinkansen, local train and a ferry to the island.  So, in that aspect, Maximo was in hog heaven.

Peace & Milk on the Shinkansen

We really had a nice time.  The weather was perfect.  There was plenty to do for all of us - with more to try to do on another trip.

It was clean and safe, which is always nice, so the kids could run a bit, except the "wild" deer were sometimes a bit aggressive.

Maximo went on his first real hike up Mount Misen.  He did a fantastic job, he walked the whole way up and back and didn't complain once!

Lola was a trooper too - she spent a lot of time in the baby carrier and rarely complained.

There was an aquarium a block from where we stayed.  It had just been redone and was great!  Maximo volunteered to help in the sealion show.

Check out the photo slide show for the excessive amount of pictures!

Miyajima - Fall Break 2011

Photo Friday - Week 45

 

Lola - just shy of 11! Months

This took about 25 shots this morning - 

she would not stop moving!

"Get me out of here," crying the Loving Big Brother

Another Tiny Concert

Satu-Satu, an Indonesian song

Sung by Maximo in a loose English translation

Kind of Playing Together

Sports Day 2011

Monday was Sports Day in Japan.  I wrote about it a little bit here two years ago.  It really is a fantastic day at our school.  It's a half day of school where kids participate in sporting events and most of the students' parents attend.  It's a national holiday and most businesses are closed so parents (and grandparents) come, socialize and take a million pictures of their kids.

The morning starts off with stretching and the chicken dance with Freddie the Falcon (our mascot).  Maximo's class gets to lead the whole school with a couple of high school helpers in the chicken dance.  He loved it, and did not mind at all that he was in the middle of a huge field surrounded by about 1,000 people.

Afterwards, Maximo's class went back to the gym to participate in some activities, since the whole school activities would probably be a bit overwhelming and challenging for them.

I was a leader at the parachute activity and John lead the Hula hoop events.  It's really great to see the high school kids buddied up with the younger kids and everyone working together.  It's also really nice to see so many parents at the school.

After the morning activities, John and I shared a duty for the high school and middle school events, so we could flip-flop and go participate and share Sports Day with Maximo and his class.

 Maximo's class gets to meet Freddie the Falcon before heading to the field

 Maximo boogin' on down to the chicken dance - look at those arms!

 *Snack time*

 Playing sports in the gym with his classmates and all the parents looking on

 Race on!

 Scooter race

 Playing outside

 Posing with Freddie before we head off to the PTA BBQ!

We all had a great, great day!

Photo Friday - Week 44

 

 Miss Lola Caroline - 44 Weeks

 Lola is eating pretty much everything we are eating now.  It's nice to be able to just throw a bunch of food on her tray rather than feed her bite by bite.  Unfortunately, I learned that sticky rice was not a good food to let her feed herself. IT. WAS. EVERYWHERE!

As you can see, she is getting into everything.  She destroys this bookshelf daily.  She's been a bit under the weather this week, so she's been using her pacifier more, but really, we don't mind because we can actually turn our backs to wash dishes or put something away because we're not pulling stuff out of her mouth every two seconds!