Learning to Ski

With all of the snow around I decided that I would teach the kids to ski this year. The first time I took just Jonathan. They had about 6 inches of new, wet snow. Jonathan liked the bunny hill, but was no fan of the regular hill as it was much steeper and he couldn't turn because the snow was so deep.

The next time we went I took both Jonathan and Aubrey. We actually went on both Friday and Saturday that time. The great thing about Shichinohe is that it is close and cheap. I can be there in 45 minutes and a two hour pass for the rope tow on the bunny hill is only 200 yen ($2.00) for the kids and 400 yen ($4.00) for me. This time the snow was better. Jonathan started to get the hang of making turns and Aubrey could get up the rope tow by herself and got her balance. She fell on her turns, but was able to go across the hill without falling.

Sock Monkey Love

It has been a while since I took this picture, but I am just now getting around to posting it, or anything else for that matter.

For Christmas, my mother gave Ashley a sock monkey because I had one when I was a baby. We put it in the crib for Ashley to sleep with. One night I we went in to check on her and this is what we saw.

Ashley Meets Isaac...Newton

As you can see from the last post Ashley is now mobile. She does not like to be left alone, but if it is her idea then it's OK. While we were "celebrating" the holiday by cleaning upstairs Di was in the bedroom and I had taken something downstairs. Ashley decided to explore the hallway and found the stairs--and gravity, and thus she became acquainted with Sir Isaac Newton. Fortunately for Ashley there are only three steps to the landing, so nothing was seriously injured, except for maybe her pride.

Interesting factoids for the day. Did you know that Sir Isaac Newton was the Master of the Mint and established the gold standard in England from where is spread through the rest of the world? The United States was the last country to abandon the gold standard in 1971.

Mobility 2.1

I shot a shorter video of Ashley to see if that would work and it looks like it did. As you can see she is getting much more proficient with the locomotion--which is not without its down side.

We celebrated Martin Luther King Jr. Day exactly the way my father taught us to celebrate all holidays--we worked around the house. I promised the kids that if they helped us clean really well that I would take them out to dinner at their favorite restaurant. They did a great job, so we went out to eat. After we got home I put Ashley on the floor while Jonathan and Aubrey were getting ready for bed. She proceeded to open the coffee table drawer and scatter the coasters on the newly cleaned floor. I should have known it wouldn't last, but I didn't expect the first mess to be made by one so young.

Mobility 2.0

Ashley has been getting around by rolling and squirming for a little while now, but we are entering a new phase. She has started the army crawl and is making tentative steps toward regular crawling. She gets up on all fours and rocks back and forth. Sometimes she even lifts up a hand and puts it down in front of the other and then drags both feet behind her. Full speed can't be too far behind.

I had a video to post, but it won't upload. I will have to try again later.

Ashley--A Six Month Retrospective

I called my parents on Christmas so the children could thank them for the gifts and share a little Christmas cheer and was berated by my mother for not posting enough pictures of Ashley. The fact that there were no picture of me, her own flesh and blood, did not seem to concern her at all, but the grandchild--that was a problem, so here are a few photos of her cuteness. Last week she went in for her six month appointment and weighed in at 14lbs 11oz. She has fallen to the 25% for weight and maintained her height, but I can't remember what that was because I wasn't there. I was sledding in the new fallen snow with Jonathan and Aubrey.



JUNE

Ashley at 4 days old and getting pictures taken for her passport.











JULY

Ashley at 1 month old. The laundry basket kept her from getting trampled in the very close quarters at the Misawa Inn until we got our house.














AUGUST

Ashley at 2 months old. Aubrey can't imagine why anyone would want to take picture without her cheesy grin in it.










SEPTEMBER

Three months old. Is there any reason not to chew on both fists at the same time?










OCTOBER

Diane and Ashley at a family trip to the Oirase Gorge to see the leaves. We were about a week too early, but it was beautiful anyway.











The kids at Halloween. You should have seen the lines. The Japanese are invited to come on base and go trick-or-treating. We bought 12 bags of candy and after the kids came home they went through their candy and we gave out anything they didn't want to eat. When all of that was given out we just had to quit answering the door.







NOVEMBER

Ashely is 5 months old and had become a force to be reckoned with. She can roll where she wants to go and can shred a newspaper in 14 seconds flat. Of course Mom is not a fan of the newsprint on the maw and paws.









DECEMBER

With her increased mobility she has already started to unload the drawers. Maybe the new coffee table wasn't such a good idea.













She is also sitting...

and eating her squash, but her favorite thing to do is...

bounce in the jumper Santa brought her for Chritsmas.

Where's the Snow?

When we got to Misawa everyone told us how much snow they get and how cold it is here. As December came I have to admit we were a little dissappointed. We had one light snowfall, but nothing to write home about and then it melted right away. As for cold, it's not. I have been wearing a jacket to work in the mornings, but most of the time it isn't even below freezing.

Sunday it started to snow. We had friends coming for dinner and the roads were getting slick. After they left I went out and shoveled three inches of snow. It was that very wet sticky snow that is perfect for snowmen, snowballs, and forts, and miserable for shoveling.

Monday morning we had our answer. Jonathan woke us at 0600 as is his custom. He promptly informed us that it had snowed and the branches had fallen from the trees. He went out to shovel the walks while Mom and Dad slept in.

When we got out of bed this is what we saw:

No, those are not shrubs at the base of all of the trees. They are the branches that fell off in the night. I had always wondered why the pine trees here didn't have branches except at the top. Now I know.

When I went out to shovel the snow that the plows had piled behind our cars I measured a places in the middle of the yard--12 1/2 inches. I guess it really does snow in Misawa.