Well, I succesfully ignored the internet for the weekend. But now back to the story of Aaron's winter vacation/the invasion of many many American girls to Japan.

Here we are at a ramen shop in Osaka, and I'm teaching baby Shmoo how to use chopsticks. She didn't quite get the hang of it, but it was an adorable bonding moment nonetheless. This would be one of the Shmoo being 5 years old moments that I mentioned in an earlier post.
Here she is again, still 5 years old. This is at a park in Osaka, which we treked to in order to see a interesting sounding museum that turned out to be closed. I'm behind the tree, pushing her up.
Here's Jaime riding a baby octopus at a massive playground in that same park in Osaka. There was a big momma octopus next to the big one, but I don't think I have a picture of that.
Not a great quality picture but still one of my favorites. It's Jaime pouting angrily at the small child who kept cutting her in line for a zip line swing at the playground. Thise reminds me of the moment when not just shana (though especially shana) turned into a 5 year old and i turned into the daddy. When we arrived at this rather large and impressive playground, the girls either quickly or eventually all started running around and going down slides, swings, and rope bars with the many very very small Japanese children. In turn they gave me their bags to hold, and I stood just to the side holding their stuff, watching them, smiling, and taking pictures. Alex came up to me and said "you ARE the dad" and at that point shmoo turned around on a colorful little bridge and started waving. With her puffy white jacket, little white hat, fuzzy colorful mittens, and big stupid smile on a little kids playground, she was 5 years old again. aww.
here is a shiny and quite large ferris wheel in osaka. We did a fair amount of walking around in this city. It's big, shiny, and really really crowded. Still more manageable than Tokyo though.

I of course have lots more, but it's bed time and my internet is being funny. I'll finish up osaka and start Kyoto next time.