Girls' drink?

I really hope Oliver doesn't turn into a girl. You don't need to pretend to be one honey, we have a real girl in the family now :)

Miss Spiky

Hi everyone, I am 5 weeks old now. I am growing fast. I can focus on things now, and look at my hair -  it's still growing against gravity!

Giggle giggle giggle

Our happy kids :)

This is also the last time

The apartment my parents lived in was called "Swallows". I am not sure how the birds knew where to come and nest but they get swallows every year for nesting and bringing new chicks up.

Ever since I can remember we always had them above our apartment front door.



Can you see the wee ones? They are so cute:



I hope they can find some other safe place. This is certainly one of the many things we will miss from shifting...

Last time harvesting

My parents lived in the same company apartment for the last 40 years. We grew up there and our kids played there each time we visited Japan. It is very sad they have to move out as the building is no longer earthquake safe.  What makes it more difficult to leave the place for my mum is to let go of her biwa/loquat trees. They have been in the backyard of their apartment since I was 8 or so - I planted the seeds and now they fruit every year.

They are very juicy and sweet and each year they get better. Mum looked forward to this season every year but no more... This is the last year :( She talked more about the trees than the actual moving.

She had to make sure she picked as many as possible before they shift.

Here is my mother (60years old!) climbing and picking for the last time:



Oliver and Luca helped too:







This may be the last time they will watch the train from this property... Very sad :(



I don't want my parents to be squashed but wish they could have stayed there for a little bit longer...

Gift rush

Our boys are so spoiled. Since Ashley was born they got lots of presents being big brothers and of course for their birthdays. These are some of their many cool presents.



The t-shirts make them fly!!!





We now have to find a matching top in Pink for Ashley :)

Bless you!

Aaaaaa....



Choooo!!

Where is the rain?

Yumiko brought this beautiful hydrangea the other day for Ashley - lovely soft pink/purple flowers.

They are the most common flowers in June in Japan as June is usually the rainy season. But NOT this year tho... I think we had only 2 days of rain since they officially announced Osaka being in the rainy season in late May.

We are having this perfect blue sky pretty much everyday. It is nice to have some sunshine but having 34-36 degrees in June is just crazy!



I hope we get some rain soon - the plants in my garden are very thirsty...

More visitors

My dearest friends from my old work came over to meet Ashley this afternoon. Chisa has a son and Chie has two boys so Ashley was really treated like a princess!

I just love having these girls at my house, they arrive and start working in the kitchen as if it is their own house and help themselves to drinks etc. Extremely stress free guests!

Oliver was very very excited to have Keito over, he has been asking weeks when he would come and play with him again. Last time he was here Oliver was speaking in English and Keito in Japanese and they were sort of communicating but this time - amazing! Oliver was non stop speaking in Japanese to him!! I am very proud of my son.

Keito and Oliver:



Our boys are pretty comfortable around them.  Such an easy afternoon for us!



Chisa with Ashley:



Yumiko and Oliver:





While we were busy playing with the boys Chie (as usual...) finished her bottle of wine and had a nice afternoon nap on the sofa.

Hopefully they will come back once more before we head back to Singapore :) Thank you girls for the lovely presents for Ashley and spending the afternoon with us!

Visitors from Singapore

We had some more visitors! Shem and Naz came from Singapore to meet Ashley (Shem was on duty to KIX for two days).





Even though they don't have their own (yet), they are very very experienced with babies, looking after their friends or family's. Ashley was quite relaxed around them.



Nice to catch up with great friends :)



Matthew arrived the next morning so we all went to meet them again in Rinkutown for lunch before they had to return to Singapore.





I am just loving this special time with my friends in my own country! Who else would like to come and see us here in Osaka!? We are here for another month if you are keen :)