Beatrix was so excited for her sixth birthday. She asked us everyday after Christmas how many more days until her birthday.
I think she was mostly excited for presents, cake, and ice cream. She said her favorite present was candy. We also got her a blood pressure cuff, a stethoscope, and a yoga ball.
Beatrix is doing great in school. She has mastered what feels like 800 kindergarten sight words and has only had two calls home from the nurse for head injuries at recess.
Beatrix was also excited to take her birthday pictures. I think she really likes the ritual of having a birthday and everything being about her.
Beatrix just started swim lessons and she has learned to float and not be be scared of the water. She still has a long way to go to learn how to swim.
My baby is five years old! She was so excited for her birthday she was pretty much bursting at the seems.
If you ask her what she likes or wants her go to is usually cake and ice cream. She also likes to watch TV and will ask for Cocomelon, not that she gets to watch very much.
She is very much a youngest child and still gets mad if Calista every tries to sit on my lap. She is always trying to be silly and to get us to laugh and think she is funny.
Beatrix has been making friends at church and school and that is fun to watch.
Sometimes she has nightmares and will be screaming in the middle of the night. When we go in to help her she sometimes yells at us and tries to kick or hit us. It is not very often though. She doesn't like it if she wakes up and finds out the the older kids are up and didn't wake her up.
She is pretty messy and is learning to clean up after herself.
At the end of March Beatrix graduated from Chirrupu (Tulip) class at her yochien (kindergarten) called Sakuranoseibo. One parent was allowed to attend.
After an opening ceremony everyone broke up into classrooms. I was struck at the ceremony how different Beatrix looked form all the other kids. At the start of the year Calista was attending and so was another girl from base who had blonde hair like Beatrix. Calista left, and that girl moved. So Beatrix was the only child I saw without dark hair. Things are going to be so different for her when we move away from Japan
Beatrix does have friends in her class and school. I love seeing her play with the other kids.
Here she is with a friend and her teachers.
The two friends she always talks about are Annie-chung and Sabrina-chung. They both have one American parent and speak English and Japanese. I wonder how Beatrix found them and how long it took them to learn that B-chung can only understand them when they speak English. Do bilingual 3-year-olds even know they speak two different languages? Did Beatrix notice that she could understand them sometimes and gravitate toward them? Or did they hear her speaking English and then respond to her in English?
I do see other kids and her teachers speaking to her in Japanese, but I'm not sure she understands. Her teachers claim she does and I have noticed her saying a few Japanese phrases here and there at home. But I also know it would be easy for her to just copy the other kids and she might not really understand.
Now that she graduated, she is in the Lily class, which is Calista's old class. She was in the red hat class but now her class wears blue hats.
I am grateful that she gets to go to a Japanese school.
My baby is four years old! I can hardly believe it.
Beartrix is the silliest of my kids. It is like she spends her time trying to be silly and hoping we will laugh with her and tell her she is funny. Her main technique is to say things that couldn't possibly be true like "I'm going to eat the house," or "I think shoes are yummy." She also likes to reassign everyone's identity. So she will say things like "I'm mom and you are B." Then we need to now act like the other person. One of her favorites is to make herself a baby. When that happens I need to rock her and tell her not to cry.
Beatrix also loves to play games and to win. Her favorites are Spot It, Memory, and racing up the stairs. Sometimes she gets really upset when she doesn't win, but she is getting better at losing.
Like a typical four-year-old she gets worn out and grumpy in the afternoons. When that happens she can be unreasonable and cry and throw fits for things that really don't make sense at all.
Her favorite shows are Vamparina, Elana of Avelor, Minnie Mouse, and My little Pony.
Beatrix goes to all day preschool and it can be difficult to get her ready some mornings. Sometimes she doesn't want to go, but mostly she wants to play while I'm trying to get her ready. She will do things like put her socks on her hands or put her vest on backwards. She always wants to hide and then for me to tickle her when I find her. It takes us way longer than you would expect to get her dressed for school. Then when I go to pick her up she runs to me. It is really cute, but then we have to spend a few minutes finding her friends so she can wave bye to them.
On her birthday she requested puffed pancakes for dinner and a strawberry cake.
Sports day at the Yochien, Japanese preschool/kindergarten, is a big deal. I didn't really know what to expect. I knew the kids had been practicing and the school was sending out papers about it for about a month. They even had a half day the day prior to set up. When the day came I was excited to go to school with Beatrix. Parents were invited to come int he morning with their child and stay for the entire thing, about three hours long. Then school was dismissed for the day. When I got there I saw that most kids seemed to have at least two parents there watching them and everyone had video camera's and tripods set up and ready to go. It was like a combination of elementary school end of year music performance mixed with field day.
I was amazed at how they had 150 preschoolers standing quietly and in their positions. Before this I've never seen anything like it. It is difficult to get my six to stand still and in a certain spot. But they all ran out to their spots and stood quietly just like they were supposed to.
Beatrix was not very into it at first. But she was having a rough morning. She skinned her knee the day before and was refusing to walk ever since. I had to work hard all morning to convince her that she could stand and walk. Once she got out with her class she seemed to forget about her knee and was walking normally.
I've noticed before that she doesn't really understand anything the teachers are telling her. At one point everyone sat down and she just stayed up. Even the other parents were noticing and pointing it out. I only got a video of the tail end of it because I had put my phone away. I feel a little bad for her that she goes to a school all day where she doesn't understand anything.
Aside from singing the kids did races and then each age group seemed to have their own events. The race was really cute and organized. The older kids did a relay race and a few other things. They even played instruments.
Below you can see Beatrix having a water break. Notice how all the other kids have words on their shirt fronts and backs? I read something about it in one of the flyers they sent home, but I thought the school was going to put the words on. Or send the material for me to write on it. But nope, now I know we were supposed to buy a 20x20 cm cloth somehow write or print or buy stick on/iron on letters to write their name. Then sew it onto their shirts. Beatrix was the only one without it. She didn't say anything to me though, so hopefully she didn't mind.
We also made banners to support our kids. I wasn't sure what to put on it so I drew a picture of Beatrix. I don't think they kids looked at these at all.
The hat stealing event looked so fun. The kids got on their parents backs and then the parents ran around and the kids had to steal each other's hats.
I wish I got more video's of this next event. The kids were making these crazy formations with each other. It was pretty interesting.
I'm glad we got to participate in sports day here in Japan. It was such an interesting day. I love it when I get a glimpse into a different culture.
I got an email with what will probably be the last of my kids modeling photos. Since we no longer live by Tokyo it isn't really something we can do anymore. Yes, it would be possible, but it would take much more effort than it is worth. It was fun to see these pictures of Beatrix. I'm glad we had the opportunity to do it while we could.
She totally rocked this shoot by the way. It was probably the first and only shoot she did where she wasn't scared.
My babies are officially gone for a good part of the day. Calista and Beatrix started Yochien which is Japanese preschool/kindergarten. The bus picks them up right in front of our house at 8:10 and drops them back off around 2:30 five days a week. It is so weird being in the house alone. I can't not even think of a time I've been home alone since Tucker was born! It is so crazy. I miss the kids a lot. All of them actually, not just these two.
They are super cute in their uniforms though.
They have tons of stuff they need to bring to school. I'll take a picture of what is in the bags someday. But it is mostly their gym clothes, back up clothes, indoor shoes and a ton of lunch supplies including a water bottle, dishes, a placemat and two hand towels.
These are their winter uniforms, in July they start wearing their summer ones. They are almost exactly the same but short sleeved and the skirt has a faux button on the front. Oh, and the hat is different.
The uniforms cost about $470 per child!!!! Not to mention the $100 in supplies we had to buy. Luckily the school got the idea I did not want to pay that much and found some preowned uniforms I could buy from them for $70 per child.
This next picture is of them in their gym clothes, they have a short sleeve version of these as well. They have been wearing these to school everyday this week. But I think later they go in their fancy uniform and then change into the gym clothes at school. I actually have no idea. I sent them in their fancy uniform the first day and then saw the bus pull up and all the kids had their gym uniforms on. So not only do my girls get to go to a school that is %100 in a language they do not understand they have a mother who doesn't understand either and keeps doing things wrong. I get so many papers and flyers all completely in Japanese it is really hard to figure everything out. Then on the first day the bus came early so I wasn't waiting at the road and their teacher had to walk them all the way to our door.
They have gone a couple days already and seem to really love it. They both were happy to go and came home happy. They say they really like it. Today and yesterday morning though before getting dressed Beatrix keeps saying she doesn't want to go. She has some Easter eggs that she wants to play with instead of getting ready for school. I think she likes school but she doesn't love her reduced play time at home, especially in the mornings.
