Five Year Old Parents

My Cupcake in a Cup *see end note*

Five years ago we began our journey as parents.  Luckily these days it's a lot less stressful most of the time!

Today he had his fourth day of KA (Kindergarten A).  He is very happy with his teacher and new class.  He has most of the same kids from last year, two of his best friends left, but four next kids have joined the class.

We've said this a lot.  It's days like this, that it is great to work at the same place your kid goes to school.  John and I had planning periods at the same time this morning, which kind of coincided with Maximo's morning break, so we brought cupcakes and sang Happy Birthday with the class.

 And then we got home and opened family presents:

 We had dinner and more cake with ice cream.  His dinner was per Maximo's request (kind of).  We omitted some pork products and added some sushi to round out the meal.

Needless to say it was a hodge podge dinner.

And then, played in the nude:

** I've been seeing these Cupcakes in a Cone on the web and decided to try them.  I also tried a new frosting, with an interesting no powdered sugar/roux recipe, which I really like.  Note on the "cupcake in the cone", they don't do well overnight.  The cones were soft the next day - luckily the 4 year olds didn't complain!

The First Days of School - 2012

It's still about a billion degrees here, which is only truly felt in the hallways of our school or running errands on the weekends.  It's usually cool enough to and from school.

But, we have begun our tenth year of teaching...  Maximo has started KA (Kindergarten A - the four year old program) and Lola is still (LOVING) attending Yume Club (Japanese Daycare) across the street.

Day 1 (after three days of Teacher Days)
Morning Quote: "7:15 Family Photo, 7:30 Out-the-door".  And this was accomplished!
One of my favorites, but Max is now a clown during photos:

 Another one, with Lola playing coy.

 Our Funny Faces:

 Lola insisting on using a backpack - even though it is completely empty on her way to "school".

 Peeking at the bike barn.

 We had to tuck Mono into bed before we left for school.

Picking this little happy face up at the end of the day is one of my favorite things!  She's so happy to be dropped off and squeals and comes running when she sees us at the end of the day.

 Riding the train together for our annual check-ups today.

 Playing peek-a-boo with the pediatrician's rooster:

 Both of these kids took two shots each like champions!

Eating our Summer Away

Low Country Boil
Photo Credit: www.unclebubbas.com

As May comes every year, we start dreaming of all the things we can get in the US.  Things we miss from our childhood or just from the past few years.
Living in Japan is different than when we lived in Peru.  In Japan, we can get almost anything we want, at a price.  In Peru, there were things we just couldn't get and shipping was not reliable, even packages from our family.  Over the years, we have learned how to make many of our favorites from scratch - pork barbecue, Tex Mex, and many others.

Here are a few foods and dishes we crave from the US.  Most of them we've ate while we were home, some of them will have to wait another year.

In the South:

• Pork Barbecue at Johnny Harris, at Papas, Blowin' Smoke and anywhere else we could get our hands on it!
• Peaches!  Blueberries!  The kids ate their weight in fruit this summer.
• Boiled Peanuts
• Key Lime Pie
• Cuban Food at Rancho Alegre, specifically for me - Lechon Asada
• (Tex) Mexican - at Jalapeños and at Carlitos. 
• Shrimp - in a low country boil or peel and eat with hush puppies

In the North:

• Grinders (sub sandwiches, but somehow better)
• Sweet pizza from the Pizza Lady, although I miss it from Guilinos Bakery.
• Iced Coffees at Dunkin Donuts - I had at least one a day.  I miss Bess Eaton's crushed iced, but the iced coffee is still good.
• Soupy (local cured sausage - appropriately called Supri Soupressata)
• Portuguese Sweet Bread
• Lobster
• Fried Clam Strips
• Steamers
• Clam Chowder

Others:

• Mango salsa -spicy and sweet!
• Peanut Buster Parfait from Dairy Queen
• Rye toast

And a few of our new favorites...

We had a wonderful date night at the fairly (this means anything that opened in the past 7 years) Local restaurant near Forsyth Park, which was delicious! We then went to Lulu's Chocolate Bar for dessert and drinks.  Another night, we went to Sol which was a great treat too - we had a yummy dish of 4 different kinds of salsas and I had a great shrimp taco with Thai chili sauce. 

But, now we're back in Japan... luckily not too much heavier after eating all this food!  Soon enough we'll start dreaming about this food again, but for now, we're happy to be cooking more and eating great food here!

The Boy Can Swim!

 

Goodbye Water Wings!

Thanks to a couple of weeks of swim classes at the YMCA and being in the water, either the beach, lake or pool almost every day of the summer, Maximo can swim.  He struggles a bit swimming above water, but he can definitely swim underwater!  

Lola has gotten quite confident in her Puddle Hopper as well and tools around the pool without us right next to her too.