Yu Have Come to the Right Place.

Ok, all the kids have had lots of firsts lately, so let me get right to it.  We'll go oldest to youngest.
(Excuse to crappiness of all the cell-phone pictures.)

Taisei started T-ball this season and I volunteered to be an assistant coach.  Wow, the local Avenues Baseball organization is serious.  I even get my own coach's UnderArmour long sleeve shirt imprinted with my team name that they're charging parents $50 for.  On weekends, they have professionals come coach the older boys, and at various times, they have coaching clinics to coach us coaches how to coach.  Insane.

Anyway, Taisei's turning out to be a so-so hitter so far, but a pretty good fielder.  In the off time, we play games to get him to move to the ball and stop it between his legs.  It's been effective.  I can't even get some of his teammates to turn the gloves the right direction yet.  Some of them can't even keep the gloves on their hands at this age.  haha.

Here he is, in all his Mets glory.
They don't score the games, so the kids just have a fun time hitting the balls and running around the bases.  If we did score though, our team actually is trained well enough to get kids out at first base.  It's fun to be involved, although I now have to go to a practice on Mondays and a game on Tuesdays or Thursdays.  It's a lot of time I have to get out of work early.  :-|

Taisei (#2) at short stop.
 Taisei hitting his first ball in a game ever.
Running for 1st base.


Taisei's kindergarten class spent tons of time preparing for their first musical, "Stone Soup, A Rock Opera."  The music was fun and all the kids did great.  They all memorized lines, all the songs, and had song motions.  I had a hard time following the story, but I did have Mirei climbing up and down the chairs, bugging all the people around her.
 Taisei delivering his line.

Taisei earned his Green Belt in Karate!  He's moving along, although it's slower now since T-ball is on the same day as Karate.

We attended the Provo Japanese Ward's "undoukai", a common Japanese tradition - an olympic games type of day.  It was great fun.  Our team, the white team, won the whole thing.  Dad (me) won a first place sprint where fathers had to carry our 2 year olds.  If you've ever seen Mirei and I, you would know that she clings to my back without me even having to hold her up, so this was an easy one for us.  She hung on and I sprinted.  No problem against all the youngster dads out there.  ;)  Taisei had a hard time with the events because he didn't know a lot of the others and didn't know what was going on.  He did like the ball toss games though.

Mirei's still a crack-up.  There are other words to describe her:  fiercely independent,  carefree and oblivious to consequences, rebellious, and outgoing - a few that come to mind.  She copies EVERYTHING Taisei does.  Today, Taisei was reading his book before bedtime and decided to stop after chapter one.  It was kind of sudden, so we were kind of surprised.  He got up, ripped a piece of paper, and stuck it in as a bookmark.  Then, I was reading Mirei's book to her next, "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" (you might have heard of it).  After the caterpillar ate the 5 strawberries, she suddenly walks away and says "I'm done."  Huh?  What's going on?  She rips a piece of paper, comes back, and sticks it in the book.  She says "Bookmark."  Was she planning to do that, or did something trigger her memory and she remembered that she'd better quit before we finished the book?  Either way, it caught me off guard.  Taisei rolls his eyes of course cuz he's tired of having everything copied.

She just figured out how to pedal her tricycle.  This is great.  The next thing will be the balance bike so she can learn to coast.  Then hopefully, she'll be able to ride a bike by next summer.


Another thing.  We're not sure where she picked it up, but she randomly calls people "Buddy."  We think probably primary at church.  The other day, there was a contractor at our house fixing up trim in the shower and she asked him "What are you doing, buddy?"  She says it to anyone whose name she doesn't know.  It's pretty hilarious and gives other people a chuckle.

Lately she's been saying "Mirei, now happy!"  Always with a big smile on her face.  She often says it when I get home and pick her up.  Awwww!  She also says it when she gets dessert.  Sometimes it's just random.  It brings a smile to our face whenever she does it.

On Sunday, Leina rolled over on her own.
Leina's definitely starting to show us what she wants.  When she wants to eat/sleep, she gets super mad if it's not mom holding her.  Other than that though, she's super mellow.  She'll just chill, and suck her thumb or play with her blanket.  The blanket is definitely a security thing for her.  And sucking her thumb seems to soothe her as well.  Both of these are new to us.  The older two never did either of those things. 
So far, she's a super easy baby - definitely more like Taisei than Mirei, I think.  From the day Mirei was born, you could always tell if she was mad.  Taisei never got mad in his life until he was 2 or 3.  Leina's gotten mad maybe 3 or 4 times when she wanted to sleep or eat and couldn't get her hands on mama.  On the other hand, she's smiling a lot now, especially at strangers.  It's nice to get a smile out of stranger when we're out and about - either from Leina's smiles or Mirei's goofy behavior.

Everyone's happy.  The two older kids love the baby, although we get real worried when Mirei's trying to handle Leina.  We are a happy family.