Life at 247-1

A trip to 'Diamond City', a big shopping centre and cinema complex was our decision for today, agreed on by the fact that it was raining outside. While Baaba and Jamie watched 'Doraemon the movie 2006", the rest of us did some shopping. Little Markie soon to be 2 this month, got new Ampanman shoes and an Ampanman mini trampoline for his birthday and Jamie a new Dinosaur King cardholder.

This morning welcomed the arrival of Jiiji and Baaba from Chiba, an hour and a half plane ride from Fukuoka. An excited Jamie and Markie waited patiently at the arrivals terminal........ JII JIIIIIIII!!!! BAA BAAAAA!!!! screamed both of them at the sight of their grandparents. Lots to look forward to for Jamie and Markie as they spend the next week of their Spring hols. with their beloved Jiiji and Baaba!

Today was rather uneventful, most of it spent cleaning and washing - the same old boring routine of housework! The highlight of the day being the HUGE strawberries that I found in a small neighbourhood stall. Being well known for strawberries, Itoshima is definitely the place to be in the Spring! Normally considered a luxury and an expensive fruit in Japan, here in Itoshima strawberries can be bought for as cheap as 120yen a punnet when in season, other places you would pay around 398yen a punnet. One of the reasons why our fridge is never without strawberries at this time!

SUE, the biggest Tyrannosaurus in the world!! Yes, she was waiting for us at The Dinosaur Expo in Kitakyushu. Along with another family from Kindergarten, as requested by the dinosaur MANIAC of our family, Master Jamie, we made the 1 and a half hour drive from home all the way to Kitakyushu to see Sue.

After a snack and a game of hide and seek with friends, we decided to set off on an early evening stroll. With spring around the corner and cherry blossoms soon in full bloom we enjoyed the smell of ripe strawberries from the field and the company of neighbourhood dogs on their daily walk. A stop off at a small playground was the highlight for the boys where they delighted in jumping tyres!

Our fun for this morning was to make paper airplanes. We started off with the simple ones using small origami sheets and proceeded to a more advanced one which required cutting and pasting and putting together.

For a change from Jamie's favourite Japanese ninja animation, I decided to put on the movie 'Ice Age'. My excuse to Jamie for the change was, “this is going to help Markie learn English so he can go to Australia with us to see Goong Goong, Poh Poh and Coufu” (grandpa, grandma, and uncle in cantonese). “Ok” he nodded convinced, and they both sat down quietly on the sofa eager to watch. Somehow Markie was able to sit through the whole movie and at the end of it, Jamie said to him, “so can you speak English now? Repeat after me, A B C D......... X Y and Z ” and amazingly enough Markie repeated the whole alphabet after Jamie!

Being on Spring vacation and running out of toys to play with, Jamie decided to pull out his Thomas the Tank Engine railway set. For the first time since Jii jii bought him the set over a year ago, he was able to build and create his own railway track with bridges and crossings, of course Markie was around to get in his way but they managed to play nicely together and best of all for mummy, they were preoccupied for at least on hour or so. “Shu shu poh poh! Shu shu poh poh!” (Choo choo! chugga chugga choo choo!) went Markie repeatedly as he pushed his engines along the rails....