753

Kana had a 753 festival which is a traditional Japanese event to celebrate children's growth and pray for their future health and well-being, when they are 3-year-old girls, 5-year-old boys and 7-year-old girls.  This time is for 7 year old.  She was in Kimono, and we visited to a shrine to pray with her grandparents.  When she was 3, she was too small to wear Kimono and she cried a lot those days.  This time there was no cry of course.  In that respect, I felt she has grown up.  To see her in Kimono next time will be, when she is 20 year old.

Test at swimming school

The last week in every month is the examination day of swimming school called Itoman to move up to the next grade.  Kana failed grade 21 again which she has tried same test last month.  To pass it, her body must be kept straight floating on the water, but she can't.  Her legs goes down. The comment on her report card was written that she needs to relax her legs. So how can I tell her how to do it?  That's not easy, I think...  Floating is the first step for swimming as you know.  It would take time for her and I must wait until then.
I hope she will success the third test next month.

Long summer school holiday

Kana is in a long summer school holiday over 1 month.  This is the first long vacation for her because I had job last year and then she was in a nursery that has no holiday except for weekends.
How can she spend such a long time at home?
I planed she goes to the kids club which is placed at school, to play with friends every morning as long as we don't have any plan to go. They provide various programs such as playing with water, craft and visiting elder people.
Besides, I arranged 1 dollar concert for pipe organ at Minatomirai hall, musical of "Lion King"  produced by Shiki theatre company and a film to go out with her. 

In a middle of August,  our family will travel to Hokkaido where it is the northernmost of island in Japan.  I hope it will be cooler than here.  We love travel a lot, so when we would like to go, we could go anywhere anytime at lower price until last year.  This year is not.  Ken's holiday affected by the great east japan earthquake has been fixed by his company.  School holiday is fixed.  There is no choice to have a travel during a peak season.

Swimming school

Yesterday was the first day for Kana to go to the swimming school and she enjoyed it very much.  There were first time trial lessons for free last month and Kana did them with joy. Since then, somehow she didn't say she would like to join it.  I convinced her that how it's important to be able to swim and she must swim at her school.  The other day, suddenly she answered "Yes".  I hurried to sign up for it before changing her mind.

Panda

We visited Ueno zoo during golden week to see pandas called Riri and Shinshin because Kana loves pandas very much.  There was a very long queue to see them and it took almost an hour although we enter the zoo around 4 o'clock.  When we were in front of them, we couldn't stop to see them and take photos of them.  I glanced at them and clicked the shutter quickly.  I hope to see them a little bit longer next time.

After-school lesson

Many kids in the nursery where Kana goes tend to go after-school lessons like swimming, piano, dance.  I suggested her if she would like to do it like other her friends, but the answer was asways "No" with the reason "Is mammy close to me...?".
She likes to learn addition and Chinese character (Kanji) at home by workbooks published by Kumon company for long time.  But the other day, it was so difficult for her that it confused her brain.  The level of the workbooks had reached high level for her to study by herself without any support.  Then I suggested her to go to Kumon that when I was young, I experienced for almost 7 years and Ken as well for some years. Unexpectedly the great answer returned and she said she wanted to study not only arithmetic but also Japanese.
I was not supposed she would go Kumon such early point, but it is good time to start the after-school lesson as she interested in learning.
Yesterday was the day to go to Kumon for the first time.  She was a little nervous but kept concentrating and the teacher praised her good work.  On the way home she seemed to be satisfied with the work and enjoy it!!

School bag

Ken's company gave Kana a school bag last week which is a traditional school bag called "Randoseru" and carried on the back.  She is looking forward to going to school from April and feels like to carry the bag on her back again and again at home.  When I was younger, the colours of the bags were only red and black.  Nowadays, there are wide range of colours like brown, blue and strawberry pink she has.  They are very sturdy so his company will correct them for reuse in developing countries 6 years later.

Snowing

 

It's snowing!!  All houses are covered with snow slightly and Kana is excited to have play with snow.  Unfortunately that's not much enough to construct snow mans for Kana.

We are relived that there is no snow on paving and we don't need to clear up it.  It's ready to go out by my car today, but we still need full attention.