Thank god for Barney!

A very kind friend sent me a stack of English video tapes before we went to the UK in the summer. I have become increasingly concerned about the lack of English in Joey`s life so I was really grateful to her for the videos. I know there are many arguments for and against allowing kids to watch TV and I don`t really want to get into them here. I think it is the kind of thing that all Mums have to decide for themselves and I personally am in favour of TV as it opens up a whole new world of English vocabulary for my son that wouldn`t be available otherwise. Joey LOVES Barney. If I put Barney on I am guaranteed at least 10 minutes of peace so I take what I can get!! (This post comes to you thanks to Barney enabled internet time!!!) We had a crazy weekend. I had to teach on saturday morning. One was a new class I have taken on and the class after lunch was one I had moved from Tuesday when I was sick. Daisuke took Joey to the zoo and they had a wonderful time by the sounds of things. Joey loves animals and the zoo is really cheap (200 yen/ about 2 dollars) for adults and Joey was free so I will probably take him again in the future. I hadn`t realised it was so cheap! I am not a big fan of Japanese zoos because it makes me sad to see the animals in such small cages but apparently Hirakawa Zoo is one of the better ones and they have a Koala sanctuary (Perth in Australia is Kagoshima`s Sister city) which I would like to see. Joey was worn out and fell asleep around 5pm and stayed asleep!!! Yesterday we both woke up very early and D was being cranky and complaining about lack of sleep so I decided to take Joey to Kokubu to see my friend Jenn and her husband Ryu. There was also supposed to be some kind of Samurai parade but we never actually managed to work out where it was taking place!! We did go to Kagoshima shrine and they had some guys dressed up like Samurai so as you can see below, Joey and I had our picture taken with one of them! It was a really fun morning and as Jenn and Ryu are expecting a baby boy in February, it gave Ryu a chance to practise being a Daddy as Jenn and I left him in charge of Joey as we chatted!!! I am getting very excited about their baby! In the afternoon I came back and dropped by to see my friend Cynthia who owns the English language bookstore in Kagoshima. I had some forms to drop off with her and it was good to catch up as we don`t manage to touch base very often. Joey fell asleep in the car on the way back and I was worried it would mean he would be up late yesterday evening but he ended up sleeping ALL afternoon and ALL night until 6.30 this morning. I am wondering when this blissful sleeping phase will come to an end, I guess it will finish when he is finally recovered from all the bugs that have been bothering him but I am kind of wishing it would continue for a while as I am liking having all this time to myself in the evenings!!! Joey still isn`t eating properly which is a bit of a worry but he is taking in fluids and enjoying the occasional boob fix so I am not too worried. ok, time to take Joey to daycare. I might post more later but I really should clean instead as our apartment is a real state at the moment!!!