Seasons Greetings

Merry Christmas

Five Months Old

Tyler is exactly five months old since he was born on July 23rd. Here he is with some of his Christmas presents.

In his right hand you can see he is clinging to his cloth for dear life. It's his favourite thing to do - suck material. Anything will do - his sleeves, bibs, blankets, daddy's shoulder.

Santa arriving in Izumisano.

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas everyone!

Thank you for all our great presents. We have had a wonderful weekend. We celebrated a day early since Christmas is not a holiday here - Takeshi will be at work.



















Saturday - Noah, Tyler and I went to the airport to see Santa arriving. He flew in from somewhere ... and the kids from Noah's kindy put on a fantastic concert.

It was pretty exciting driving to the airport in our little car. We have to drive over a 3.7 km bridge that spans the sea. Noah had no idea where we were going and was a bit panic-stricken that I had taken a wrong turn because we were on the highway! It was a really fun adventure.

Before we left home I got Noah to write a letter and draw a map for Santa asking that he come early. Noah wrote " Dea Santa Pys come ae bit erly from Noah". His request was granted!

I spent the afternoon cooking. We had our usual fare - roast pork with vegetables, shrimp cocktails to start and trifle for pudding. We opened a couple of presents before we went to bed. Noah left Santa a glass of milk, a couple of packets of raisins and a muesli bar. This year he had to use a pillow case instead of his stocking as I got an email from Santa last week to say that his presents were quite large!

Sunday - both Noah and Tyler were very lucky. Santa left them some great gifts as well as all the presents from friends and family. Noah got lots of books about all his favourite things - space, pirates, dinosaurs, and the human body. He also got a jelly brain and a see-thru human body to make. Tak and I gave him a basketball set. His Japanese grandparents got him a CD/tape player and some book vouchers.

Tyler got tons of bath toys and cute bibs, books and food. There wasn't anything from Santa for him so I had to put in his baby rice that arrived yesterday from the Foreign Buyers Club! (for Noah's benefit).

We spent the afternoon at Cat and Masa's Christmas party which was really nice. I had several Christmas mince tarts there. I have been so busy these past few weeks I haven't had time to make mine. I just checked before and the mincemeat is good till 2008 so I will save it. There were devilled eggs, shortbread and lots of other festive goodies. It was lovely.

So we have had a really excellent Christmas. Thank you everyone!

Noah's kindergarten is putting on a Christmas concert next week. The kids have had three gruelling days of dress rehearsals this week.

Noah has done a picture of it here: these are the older children, dressed up in their nativity costumes, singing.

Noah's class is playing Jingle Bells with their instruments. Noah is playing the tree bell - a handle with several bells attached so it looks like a tree.

Tyler is so excited about Christmas. He's been shaking the presents trying to work out what's in them!
He's even wearing his festive green pyjamas (from Auntie Sally). ;)

Tyler twenty weeks

Tyler is twenty weeks I think.

He weighs 6.7 kg and is 65 cm tall. Quite average for a baby his age. But much smaller than his brother at the same age. Perhaps we overfed Noah!

Our tree

Noah the skinny refugee and our tree.

You can see it from the side road. Looks very pretty with the new LED lights.

Thank you everyone

Noah had a fabulous birthday. Can you believe he is five?

He got some great gifts so I want to say thank you. His letters are taking quite a long time to write since he insists on using a blunt pencil and a rubber that is not really a rubber.

From Nana - Hairy Mclary board game, DK Christmas Craft book, Lego racers Police car
From Grandad - Bonus Bonds
From Sally and Tore - a paint your own treasure chest
From Robert, Ayumi and Kai - Lego road boards, model glider
From Mummy, Daddy & Tyler - Lego City airport, key ring, books
From Babu & Jiji - silver bicycle

He's thrilled as you can see from the photos. Thank you everyone who made Noah's fifth birthday really memorable for him.

November

Lots going on this month. Noah's birthday of course - five years old now. Glasses for Noah. Kai's birthday. Noah's new bike. Tyler is exactly four months old.

Noah's Halloween Party

Hitting the blog a bit late as Noah has been sick.

Halloween 2006

Three and a half months old

Tyler giving a rare smile to the camera.

The boys playing together

A nice afternoon playing together. Noah is loving all the baby toys. He can't remember that most of them were his.

Looks like Tyler is going to need glasses

Ha ha ha ha - cracks me up everytime I look at this photo.

Look mum - no training wheels

Finally he's going like a little ripper! Now the chain keeps falling off so he's hoping for a new bike from Santa or perhaps his birthday.

Tyler can hold things and grab things

Tyler is just over three months, maybe 15 weeks? He is just starting to reach out and grasp things. If you open his fingers he can hold onto things for quite a while. He bats his toys quite purposefully. He seems to like the one that jingles when he hits it most. But he is also very fond of gazing at their faces. He loves his cat book, thanks Sally.

Bonfire Night

We had some garden rubbish to burn so Noah came up with a plan to host a bonfire night. We tried to toast marshmallows but the fire wasn't really hot enough. We were also unable to locate the fireworks we thought we had... It was a fun evening even so.

Joe our gardener

I advertised recently and half-heartedly for a person to come and weed our garden. I was so lucky to find Joe the Gardener. He came yesterday and today and has done an amazing job. The garden looks fabulous and is only going to get better over the years. We've got citrus trees, an apple tree and edible cherries. Lots of colour and rockery features now. We love it! Thanks Joe!

Noah's Trip

Last weekend Noah went on a trip with this dad, grandparents and cousins. I stayed home with Tyler. They had a fantastic time. The scenery was pretty spectacular. Noah made a snowman in the ice (see the black eyes?).

Wish baby

Tyler and his collection of Care Bears. Unfortunately Wish Bear the second wasn't looking at the camera. Wish Bear senior needs a bath according to Noah.

Twelve Weeks of Tyler

No Digging Please

Hi Nana, Grandad and Sally,
Do you like the look of this sign? When you come to my house please read my sign.
See ya
Noah xxxx

Going potty here

Noah, Tyler and I got some pot plants yesterday for our lounge. I think they are all bromeliads. Lets hope I don't kill them too soon.

Love this song

I love this song - Stacie Orrico, I'm Not Missing You. Click above to go to her site.

Chocoholic and Sister

Sally has a blog which so far seems to be devoted to food. Her new favourite is the Moro Gold. You can click on the title of this post to get to Sal's blog.
My favourite chocolate bar in Japan is Aero . I cannot walk past them in the supermarket. In New Zealand I always have to get some Jaffas. I just looked up Jaffas on Wikipedia and learnt that the name derives from the colour of oranges from Jaffa, Israel. You learn something new everyday!

Tyler is almost eleven weeks

Here he is just about to have a bath. That's why he's lying on a plastic mat. He's wearing one of the t-shirts that Bea sent him. His trackpants are from mum, they are so cute.

What a cute cardy!

Noah said Tyler looked like a doll. Didn't our doll Paul have a cardigan like that?

The house

Here are some pictures of the house - in family mode - as you can see it's impossible to keep tidy when I am blogging all day ...