The rest of Letter H for Heart Activities

Sorry about the long delay in posting this, since we finished H for Heart two weeks ago. Here are some pictures of the activities that I did with the little ones:

I printed the activities from the following websites, makinglearningfun and filefolderfun. I then cut them out and laminated them. I separated the games into ziploc bags and put them all into this plastic brief case like container I found at the 100 yen shop:



Matching lower case and upper case letters:



Puzzle to match colored hearts:



Lacing heart:



For the first grader, matching contractions with the words that they are made up of:



Sorting hearts by color and size:



Using heart shaped letters to assemble the alphabet:



We also at the beginning of the week drew a giant H on paper and filled it in with lots of words that began with H:



There is also a stuffed H, but I failed to take a photo of it, maybe it'll show up at the end of this week with my R for Rainbow post.

Sakana ga oishii desu ka?

Do you think fish tastes good? This post is triggered by the memory of Natalie, Lily, and Aiden's visit one year ago. Ho hum, I can't believe it's already been a year. The nice thing about the anniversary of their visit is that it reminds me exactly when the strange syrupy fish sale is and when to avoid the crazy long lines at the grocery store while people wait for scoops of these fish into their plastic bags. The fish market by our train station always has long lines of people waiting at this time of year, I think it's only 1 or 2 weeks you can get this special kind of fish, some type of Japanese delicacy if you will. I sent Nathaniel over to the shop with my camera, this is his close up shot, your first shot of these gooey delights:



A fresh batch being scooped into a bag, I think I may have annoyed the people by taking this photo, but hey, this is something worth sharing:



I don't know what all of these are, but hey pictures are worth 1000 words, right?

Do you like eyes on your fish?






Some tentacled delights:





These were still alive, ewww!



Authentic sushi:



Crab au la fish flakes:



These are mini fish that they boil, or reduce in soysauce or sprinkle on salad to make you think it's just shredded lettuce or sprouts, oh no, IT'S FISH!!! Oh, and one day in a fresh fish market, Addison ATE a handful of these and at the grocery store this week asked me to buy some. Now I know I've lived in Japan too long!



For those of you who prefer no eyes:



Shell fish with the shell anyone?




Mmm mmm mmm fresh seaweed:



Yes, a trip to the grocery store in Japan can be very quick when you avoid the seafood sections since they are the LARGEST sections in any grocery store.

Tomica cars why we love them.

The first time I bought my kids a Tomica car (Japan version of matchbox), this is the one Owen got.



I thought it was cute with the panda on the side. I really thought it was just a cute Japanese cartoon decoration. Then, one day, we were in the car and the kids were driving me nuts, I told them to look for their toy cars, the next thing you know, Owen's panda truck drove by. Yes, we refer to it as Owen's panda truck. We have since found out it is a moving company, we have seen the parking building where they keep them once while on the train, we have even seen a TV commercial during the Olympics. Finally, we saw one stopped long enough to get a photo. I think it was the happiest day of Owen's life.



And mine, I had my new gorilla pod with me that Dave gave me for my bday (so I can be in my own photos now). Look, it's me:



So, why wouldn't you love a Tomica car when they are modeled after REAL cars and your kids can spend hours while you're out looking for their own toy cars driving on the road. We've made a game with photos from the Tomica car magazine, see my February We HEART cars post. Check back next week for my Tomica car activity pack I've made for Owen.

Oreo cookie balls

Once you pop, you can't stop! I got the idea again from Bakerella. I sort of modified the recipe and made it a bit more work than hers, but well worth it. What I did was after I made the filled cupcakes (see Yummy filled cupcakes- back in january) for our neighborhood international night, I had about half left and didn't want it to go to waste.

Here's what I did, I crushed a pack of Oreos (US sized) in my food processor. Then I mixed in the rest of the filling and about 4 oz cream cheese. Here's what it looked like:



Then, I formed it into balls and set them on waxed paper. I melted white chocolate and dipped the balls in, let them harden on the wax paper for a few minutes, then transferred them to a plate.





These were so simple to make and I got TONS of compliments on them.

For the filling, I used 1/6 c confectioner's sugar, 3 oz marshmallow fluff, 1/2 TBSP water, pinch salt, mixed with my hand mixer for a minute until fluffy. So simple, so GOOD!

Chigiri-e and other art

This is what Nathaniel came home with last Friday from his first Chigiri-e class. Chigiri-e is a japanese paper tearing art class. You tear paper and glue it to make a picture. I am impressed by this artwork from a 6 year old first timer and the fact that his teacher didn't really need to help him. In fact, if I didn't know any better, I'd think this was store bought. This post was supposed to be solely about Nathaniel's surprisingly amazing chigiri-e creation, until I saw this other amazing artwork:





This artwork was done with dot to dot markers. Yes, I know the difference between boys and girls, girls like wearing lipstick! She must have overheard me talking on the phone about her tendency to dot her lips because the next thing I knew, they were dotted many times over!

Owl apparel February (#4)

A day late, but that's because I thought my sewing machine bit the dust. Turns out, it just doesn't like sewing through felt with a sticky backing. This skirt was made using Little Sassy Skirts pattern by Cindy Taylor Oates. It was VERY easy to make, in fact, I cut it and sewed it in less than 2 hours, that included putting kids to bed and cleaning up after dinner.

I chose this fabric for this month's apparel because the rainbow colors and green were very St. Patrick's day-ish.

MEOW a cape poncho

I have been DYING to make this ever since I saw the idea at this blog, Filth Wizardry. It took about 10 days for the fleece to get to my mom and another 7 days to get to Japan and then another 7 for me to find the time to make one, so you can imagine how excited I am to be almost done with one! The other three are cut out, but I wasn't sure about the neck sizing so I went with the tiniest neck first. I still have to put the button on the collar, but I am sooo excited- look how much she loves it!



I downloaded a clipart, stretched it to fit an 8 x 10, printed it, cut it on felt, and stitched it onto the back. Up until now, she was carrying around the paper cut out face.

Oh, check out the back, this is why she loves it so much:



Photos of boys' to follow in a few days.