Don't have much time-have to get ready for work. This is Hiroki's new summer do. He doesn't seem to mind it too much (even though he said he didn't want a haircut-he wanted to be able to put his hair back cause he likes people who put their hair back)

sleeping

Well, another week of sleeping problems-just getting to sleep on little Mr. H's part. At least that's one good thing-there have been times of problems getting to sleep and staying asleep. And that's when I think he's trying to kill me...
So I got the no cry sleep solution for toddlers and preschoolers earlier this week (I love amazon!) I like alot of what I've read so far (not much yet) but I'm still having a problem with the whole timing thing. The author says that he should be getting 11 hours of sleep a night. He is so not, which apparently goes a long way in explaining his temper tantrums and other similar behaviours. But according to the author, I should be getting him ready for bed an hour before the 11 hours of sleep. So I wake him up at 6:30, that means that I have to have him sleeping at 7:30. That means that I have to start putting him to bed at 6:30. Hmmmm. Not home yet/just getting home @ 6:30. There's also the bedtime snack before bed-so by my calculations-he gets home at about 5:00ish, eats dinner, takes a bath, eats a bedtime snack, I come home, put him to bed... it's too busy, I think. But I'm goingwh to read the book and see what else I can do.
Last week was busy, and a bit disturbing. One of the other ALTs was telling us horror stories of the grade 8 students at his school. They are doing things like hitting/fighting with each other and teachers! and it seems like there's nothin the school can do about it, which they have figured out. I'm pretty sure that if stuff like this happened in Canada, the police would be called. And then at my school, one of the grade 7 students went missing for a day and her teachere was concerned because there was a high chance that she was with her 18 yr old boyfriend(!). The next time I saw her at school, she had bruises all over her arms. where her father had punched her (mom is out of the picture). Now I know that the police would be called in Canada for child abuse. I also think that child services here wouldn't do much about beating-they have a good history of giving kids back to the people who beat them. Sad.
More murders in the news lately-kids killing their parents. More reason not watch tv (not that I watch that much)
Should go 4 now. xxoo

whoa, shock

I know, 2 posts within days of each other. I'd like to be able to start doing this on a regular basis but not sure if I can. Hiroki is at daycare now and I'll be leaving soon to go and get him. This is my schedule for the week-yesterday I went to the big city of Shizuoka (takes about an hour and half by local train) and picked up my PR, or permanent resident visa. I'm happy, I'm sad....Of course I ended up waiting for quite a while but ended up getting it done all on my own (they don't speak English, Chinese, Portugese, Spanish, or Korean) so was happy about that. Also was happy to come back to school at 2:00pm, missing all of my classes and with only 3 hours left of the work day. hee hee.
Today I went to a kindergarten and taught about 60 5 year olds. It was cool. I mostly enjoyed it. I pretty much get the star treatment when I go to kindergarten. I play with the kids, teach them a few things, then the supervisors say,"Come and rest, you must be so tired!" Then I play again, and eat lunch with the kids. After that, we go outside to play. The kids all try to grab me and pull me around (the part I don't like) and after that, the supervisor has me sit and relax and gives me treats to eat and take home. I finish early, so today I feeling pretty satisfied-finished cooking my part for dinner, (MIL cooked some nimono, stuff boiled in fish stock, soy sauce and sugar-today's stuff is yummy stuff like shiitake and fried tofu and some bamboo shoots), done the washing up, and ready to go teach at 5:30.
Tomorrow some more visitors to watch a class. Thursday, elementary school. I think Friday might be a regular day for a change.
Gotta run to get HRH. Love to everyone.

umm, ha ha, (shamefaced)

Well I am here. Not much time to use the computer lately. His royal highness is trying to kill me, I think. He's having sleeping problems and because of his not sleeping he is super cranky not to mention me! Then there's the whole sleep deprivation thing going on for me, too. He has been going to sleep really late at night, or going to sleep early-ish (meaning before 10:00) but waking up 2 or 3 times a night because of bad dreams? or something. Given that I finally fall asleep after 10, and wake up 2 or 3 times at night, get up at 5:00, I was a little out of it this week. So I did some research on the net (thankfully I have mostly free afternoons at work)about kids sleeping. I found a book on Amazon that I'm thinking about ordering about how to get kids to sleep with out crying and one more by the same author about how to get kids to do what you want them to without nagging or yelling etc. I'm interested in what she has to say. I'm not really into hitting for discipline and I would really like to know some other ways to 'manage' the little guy.(Although tonight I have to admit to giving him a little slap on his butt because the little bugger bit me while I was trying to get him into the bath-grrr!) When I read some of her advice, though, I liked what she had to say, but I don't know how possible it all is. Like she says that the optimal time to put kids to bed is between 6:00 and 7:30. I think that Hiroki is tired then, he is always lying down and playing around that time. (and extremely grumpy)Then it's like he wakes up and he's a happy boy again, but impossible to put to sleep. So I think that that probably is a good time frame for him BUT I don't even get hom from work until 6:30 on Mon & Tues, after 8:00 on Weds and home at 5:30 on Thurs and Fri but I go out to teach on Fri night until after 9:00. So I don't know about that. Especially since we have to eat and take a bath before he can go to bed. But I'm thinking of trying to move up his bedtime little by little. All I know is he is going to bed too late now!!
What else is going on here...I've been busy at school because of elementary school visits and kindergarten visits, which I like a lot, and people coming to watch classes which I don"t like but whatever.
And I'm reading a book (or skimming I guess) a book about food, named SuperFoods. There's a lot of food we need to eat every day in order to be healthy, holy crap! I eat school lunches when I'm at school because they are supposed to be nutritionally balanced, but some days I think they aren't really done well. I think there are some days when they need more vegetables. The worst part is that they all have to be high calorie because they are made for kids and they are all active and need to eat a lot. Then there's the milk , which I mostly don't drink, it's 3.6% fat. Most people in Japan drink this type of milk. My friend always says it's like drinking cream. The worst school lunch is agepan , which means fried bread. Yuck. Basically the bread is like doughnuts, only harder. We usually get 2 of these, along with something that doesn't suit it, (like stew or soup or stir fry) and always fruit cocktail with sweet grape jello and sweetened yogurt. The whole lunch makes me unhappy- my mouth usually hurts at the end of it. It would be a great snack, though.
Besides that, not much else. The news is full of people murdering children, some their own. One of the articles I read lately was about a couple in their 20s who left their 2 month old son in the car while they went to play pachinko , which I guess is equivalent to bingo in Canada. Assholes. They left him there for 5 hours and when one of them finally got off their ass to check on him, they found him dead from the heat. Poor little guy.
Anyway, it is getting late and I should probably sleep when I can!
xoxo to you all