Kairakuen park and Senba lake in Mito

Plum blossoms at Kairakuen

Shogun house

Kairakuen

One of the meeting rooms on the upper level

Spring is definitely here! There are perfectly gorgeous days sprinkled in amongst days and days of rain. The humidity is high, and the flowers are blooming. We are lucky enough to have a fantastic friend who took us to see the plum blossoms in Mito on a mild day last month (thank you, Fumie Emory!). Along with the plum blossoms, there is also a shogun house that you can walk through for a small fee. The stairs to the upper floors are amazingly steep, narrow, and the treads are shallow. Small wonder that the structure boasted a dumb waiter to move things more efficiently!

It was wonderful to see the interior and the architectural details. The building has a wonderful flow to it. The bottom level is skirted by a walkway, and the interior is divided into rooms with paper walls that are painted in different themes. The upstairs has amazing views, and a separate building on the lower level contained a spacious hall with tall ceilings and more beautiful views.

View from the shogun house

Senba lake

Near Kairakuen park is Senba lake, which is ringed with cherry trees. They weren't in bloom when we visited, but the lake was still an interesting spot. There are boats in the shape of swans and cars that can be rented, and it was fun to watch joggers run their laps around the lake. It's a very popular spot for marathon training.

Our kids definitely enjoyed their time at the lake. Our son discovered an amazing playground hidden at the top of a hill behind the lake. There was a zip line, rope structures, an amazingly long slide, and play structures that were connected to make one long obstacle course. I would wager that we enjoyed the playground more than Disneyland! No waiting, no fee, no crowds, and "yes, you can climb on that," is a wonderful phrase for kids to hear :-) We ended the day feeling very tired, but really happy.

A super-long slide with rollers

Slides, balance structures, climbing structures, webbing structures, and more!

Free time!

First day is over!

Initially I hoped to post at least twice a month on this blog. Hopefully I can start to do that, because our daughter started preschool! She leaves at 8:00 in the morning and comes back around 1:00 in the afternoon. Every time she comes home she practically bounces off the bus (which has the cutest child-sized seats, by the way). She can't wait to show me the projects that she brought home, and her teachers told me that she spends most of her time there smiling. It's such a relief to hear that, let me tell you! She can be so shy at times, and then flick a switch and act like a social butterfly.

I don't know much about her day, thanks to the language barrier. I do know that she doesn't wear outdoor shoes inside the classroom, of course. She wears a little yellow smock every day, and must always bring a little towel, a cup, and her bento (lunch) on bento days. Everything fits inside her little backpack, given to us by a neighbor who didn't need it any more. For the first week the parents are the ones who provide lunches. We have a lot of cute bento ideas, but she's been so happy with the first lunch that we made that we just left it alone. So, every day she has two little rice balls, a cut-up little hot dog, a big handful of edemame, and a packet containing sesame seeds and nori flakes to put on top of the rice. After this week we had the choice of making her lunch two or three times a week, but we opted to have her eat school food every day. We're so lucky that she adores Japanese food!

Preschool swag

I am really excited for her to be immersed in the Japanese language and culture, especially in a place that makes her so happy. She's at that lucky age where she can focus on speaking and understanding. It's much more difficult for our son, since he has to learn to speak, read and write, all at the same time. With any luck, our daughter will soon be a language resource for him, and one for me, too!

I still struggle a lot with Japanese. We've been here for about 3/4 of a year, and there is still so much to learn! Three mothers in our neighborhood speak English very well, and are working together to make sure that I keep up with what's going on at my children's school. It's quite a time investment from their end, so I have motivation to learn enough that they won't have to help me every day.