When I put my head down on my pillow each night, I ask myself what I accomplished that day. Sometimes I think that I only "wasted" my time and I didn't get anything productive done. Now that I have seen an "official" sign giving me permission to go ahead and waste time, I can sleep much better at night....AND you can too! I keep telling myself that as I continue to post this blog! Ha! Ha!

As I have continued on my adventures over this past while, I have to share something of most importance.......the little children of Japan. They are almost as adorable as my own grandchildren!

Here we have Brittney and her three adorable daughters, and Brooke with her two darling children.

Let me introduce you to Evie, Norah, Lilly,

and Lucas Bennett. These are Brittney and Mike's children whom I love and miss so much.

Next we have Carson and 

Lila Christensen. These are Brooke and Carl's children whom I also love and miss so much. These are the little ones that I personally love....

 and these are the little ones that I love to look at.

Let's start with the weeeee little ones going out for a walk with their day care tender. Are they just so cute? Check that stroller out! Four children in one stroller. Do we have these kinds of strollers in the US?

Here's a different kind of stroller. You could pack a dozen kids in this thing. I'm not quite sure what they would be like once you got to your destination,.....smashed, squished, fallen on, crying, screaming, etc. I can see it now! But hey, you sure could haul them all in one vehicle!!

We have a numerous strollers and babies! Notice the cute little hats they wear.

Now check out these cute little tykes!

What is down there little boy? (You don't want to know.)

Is that the cutest little face? She's just hanging out with her grandma and wondering why I am taking her picture.

This little guy all tuckered out! Check out those chunky legs. They remind me of my babies!

There is nothing funner than riding on a kid-train with your mom or dad.

These two are just sitting there eating their lunch. I wish I had the little girl's face to show you. She was so cute as she was being the big sister. Where are mom and dad???

When Japanese go on a picnic or to a park, they take a cute little tarp to sit on. When they sit on it, they take their shoes off and leave the shoes off the tarp. This little girl is missing her tarp....... but she has her food that you can't see!

It's a girl thing..... Once we girls are old enough to walk, we have to drag our purse around with us wherever we go. Notice how the boy is just fine with nothing in his hands. We learn young, people, young.......

Let's now check out the elementary age kids......

This cute boy is walking home from school in his uniform with two umbrellas. You never know when you will need two umbrellas in a storm....???? Always be prepared!

These kids are preparing to defend their country! Seriously, are they so cute???

We start our Japanese "high" fashion early. I love the kids clothing around here!

This isn't too much in fashion, but still cute!

This is what I'm talking about.....fashion!

These kids started to talk to me in a store so I asked them if I could take their picture and they were so happy to pose!

Notice how the girls do start early carrying their bags!! This is a water bottle/bag.

"Hello Kitty" is still popular with girls when they are young, but when they are older........

any type of stuffed animal hooked on to a book bag will do just fine. We don't ever grow out of carrying around cutsie stuff. I can't seem to determine what age they stop carrying around their stuffed animals and toys because I see them everywhere.

The other day, my grandson Carson went to the fire station for a field trip so I thought it would be appropriate to show a Japanese fire truck.....

Carson, Grandpa says "hi"! Check this truck out. Does it look like an American fire truck?

This truck was giving rides on the lift to little kids.

Notice how this truck is different from the other truck.

See the guy in the orange uniform? Do our firemen wear uniforms like that?

Check this preschool bus out. Do our buses look like this? 

Do our boats look like this?

Do our tow trucks look like this? This little boy loved being in the driver's seat.

If you can see down in the green space in this picture, you will find red and white awnings which were set up for the festival that I went to where I took these pictures. It was Minato City Days where they celebrate it's founding by having festivals throughout the city. So fun!

A WALK DOWN MEMORY LANE.....

Since we are talking about little kids, Kent and I decided to take an afternoon to go to an area in Tokyo called Denenchofu where we use to live when our kids were little. And this is what we found......

Brittney's elementary school where she went to first grade. This is the front door. Do you remember walking through that, Britt?

This is the gate leading to the front door. 

Kent and I then went to the back of the school to the playground where we found no grass, but we found immaculately clean dirt and a playground with a slide, basket ball hoops, monkey bars galore,

tires to play in,  and a wash basin. Smart, very smart to have a wash basin outside for the kids to use before they come in the classroom.

This is the back of the school. See the other wash basin? We not only have one wash basin, but we have two!

I'm thinking that they could use a paint job? Well, why spend money on the outside when you can have technology and every other form of learning equipment inside?

Once we saw the school, we walked over to our old home.....

the way that Brittney use to walk to school. She would have to cross this busy street by going over the blue walkway, walk a half of a block, turn left on a small road and walk another half of a block to her school. It was rather far in the eyes of a child and a young mother, but as Kent and I walked it, it really wasn't far at all. Brittney mentioned that every time she left our neighborhood to cross the busy street, she would say a prayer asking that she not get kidnapped even though she always had a friend to walk with. Since she was never kidnapped, you could say that a child's prayers were answered. I love seeing the faith of a young child in action. We came upon our home and this is what we found.....

That it still looks the same. We couldn't take a picture of the entire home because the street is so narrow, so we took a series of shots......

The two windows on the second floor is the master bedroom and the room right here behind the wall without the window is a tatami room which you will see in a following picture.

This new gate from when we lived there is next to the side of the home which leads into the yard. The red brick wall in the upper picture extended to the edge of the wall on the right side of this picture. You can see how large our yard was. Yep, the width of a car. They made a car port where grass and plants use to be.

This is another view of the side of the home. Let me share a funny story about this home. Notice the balcony on the second floor. Hanging from the eves above the balcony is one of two white attachments that holds a bar to hang clothes to dry on. I use to hang the girls clothes out to dry on it because my dryer was a Japanese dryer that didn't work very well and I found that hanging things outside dried much more quickly. After a while of living there we were informed that we were in the national tabloid magazine. The article stated (which was suppose to be a scandal!) that I would always hang my red lace panties outside but then stopped because the neighbors were talking about them. Yes, I did stop hanging "my" red lace panties outside because Brooke grew out of them! Ha! They (whoever "they" were) were noticing baby Brooke's diaper cover panties. Who ever had the idea that they were mine was way off in determining sizes! Ha! Ha!

We then walked down the street about 20 yards to a park that was across the street from our home. We loved it because it was so close. I could see the kids playing from my home when they were over there. This park is called "Pudding Park" because the cement shape thing in the middle is shaped like Japanese pudding that you buy at the supermarket, thus the name.

Kent face-timed Britt and we had a little "reminiscing" moment together.

This pudding/slide has various ways to get up to the top. Rock climbing, two kinds of stairs, and 

a rope/chain. The kids loved playing on this, and the swing in the background is the "infamous" swing that Brittney loved.

These bars were great "twirly" bars.

The drinking fountain that is at least a hundred years old..... Someone lost their shoe!

We then went to our next door neighbor's house where she insisted that we come in to show us her remodeled home. She was a sweet neighbor who loved the kids.

She has a "tatami" room where they use for special occasions including a.....

shrine for their parents. She was very proud to show it to us and wondered if Brittney remembers it....???

We finished visiting with Mrs. Shimbo and walked on to the train station exploring the town as we walked. We caught a taxi to take us to our 2nd home in Denenchofu. You may ask...."Why did they move?" Well, each time we had a child, we moved because of the cost of extra space. Since the cost difference is in the thousands between a home to live in or a home to grow into, we would always be conservative and find a home to live in until the time we needed to "grow". So our next home was because of another child being added to the family.....Robby!

Remember this home girls? This is the last home we lived in 22 years ago. 

The shrubs are of course bigger now which is hiding most of the home, but the homes are still nicely kept. It was fun to find it which brought back wonderful memories.

We then walked to Brittney's second elementary school to find.......

 the paint job a little better than the other one.

This is the front gate/door.

and this is a view of the other side of the school building. Most public elementary schools look similar to the two that I have shown here on the blog.

Observing the little Japanese children has brought back many fond memories of when we lived here with our young children. I seem to wonder where the time went and wish that I could somehow turn the clock back to the sleepless, backbreaking, nauseated, body stretching days of the child bearing years when I could snuggle, cuddle, love, and nurture my children. However, time leaves us, but the sweet  memories will always stay and be close to my heart and to my mind. Thank you kids for those cherished memories. I love you!

Mom

Dad

Grandma, Grandpa

Uncle Kent & Grandma Barb

Kent and Barb