On A Mission

Reina has been making leaps and bounds in so many departments, that I don't really know where to start - and she's been doing so over the whole summer, I just keep forgetting to mention some of them.  Most recently she has dedicated a lot of time to learning how to pour.  She was outside after dinner today playing in her "pool." I added several containers and she was content for quite a while (tonight we had to stop her) pouring water from one container to another or simply out of a container.  Its really cute when she tries to fill up one container, while holding another, and she pours out water from one while trying to fill the other. She has also mastered walking and finally started to pick up speed; I would say she is running.  I can still beat her in a foot race though, so she has still got some practicing to do.  Her vocabulary increases daily and she is pretty consistently putting two words together, "more please," or "help please," or "more water," etc.  Of course sometimes I have to remind her to say please.

We went by the house today to see what progress has been made.  We haven't heard from the housing people in a week or so, so we were curious to see what the house looked like.  I took a picture through the window, as we don't have keys and they are really good about locking the house.  They have finished most of the interior - the floors, kitchen and light fixtures most recently and look like they are slowly making progress on the lawn.  I am still wondering about some of the changes they have made, and plan to bring up a few at our next meeting.  Some of the light fixtures are not what we spoke about and also, the kitchen isn't exactly like we wanted either.  It was supposed to have white top cabinets and black on the bottom.  It is all black and it doesn't look bad....  Also, the cabinets in the back are really high - like I'm going to have to have a stool to get them.  This is so Japanese; something that Chris and I have even joked about, since many older Japanese houses have kitchen cabinets that are high and out of reach to a population who is notoriously short.  I added three pictures of the house as of today to the yomitan slideshow (which can be reached by clicking on the slideshow link here and navigating to "Jillian's Photos" in picasa.

School officially starts tomorrow.  I think prior to having Reina is was excited about school starting. Now the summer is over, which means we don't get to spend as much time with each other.  She is growing up so quickly and neither of us want to miss it.  :(