AJATT SilverSpoon Blogger Tanoshimini

Well I have been looking at this blog Tanoshimini by Matt. He has been posting about the things he is doing with AJATT SilverSpoon which I am so jealous that he is participating in. He has been posting about two specific techniques - Copycat and Shadowing which he did in the very beginning while setting up his Japanese environment as well as starting kanji. I have been going a little crazy thinking what to do while I get enough kanji to start reading to be able to sentence mine. Now I have an idea. I am still trying to get caught up with my reviews, but with my new 5 minute session limit on Anki I am able to stay motivated to do some everyday. I don't know when I am going to get caught up, but I will eventually.

災

Ok, so thanks to Heisig "災" is one of the few kanji  I recognize easily. Unfortunately Japan has had a huge 災. There is fire and water just like the kanji. I am seeing it over and over again on the blogs and many tweets on twitter. I have been watching NHK on Ustream http://www.ustream.tv/channel/nhk-gtv. I am lucky and grateful that I was able to hear from my "little sis" Yuki in Tokyo and know that she and her family and her husbands family are all safe. Also there are 4 of Miss S's classmates at preschool who have family in Japan and all are safe. I have 4 "siblings" in Japan I haven't heard from. They are probably fine since they live in Tokyo, but I wish I I knew for sure. I have so few of my Japanese posts to read these past 2 days I hope that all of the bloggers and their families are safe as well. Positive vibes for Japan.

I have no idea what day this is.

ok. So being a mom and doing kanji are not that great of a match. I am not having any trouble doing my reps, I can do those while the baby is napping and while the older one is playing at the park. I am having trouble with the finding 5 minutes to sit down, get out my RTK and learning any new Kanji. That book is just too big to carry around everywhere I go. My diaper bag already weighs a ton. Anyway I did 100 cards on Anki today and I am still a bit behind, but I am sure I will get caught up again by tomorrow.

Day 7:

I have some kanji to review and some to study. I visited a mandarin school though for my Miss S who will be starting kindergarten next fall so I did get to "read" some kanji on signs and posters and such today. I have been keeping up with my reviews and am on frame 270. I have not added in the supplement yet. I am really hopin to be finished with RTK I by my birthday, or the end of March at the latest. That means that I need to do more new frames then the 10 I have been managing to do so far.


I am also getting really excited about the idea of cooking some Japanese food. Making vegan versions of things is kind of tricky though. I really want oumrice though. Also my friend made her son a super cute bento lunch today and I was jealous that I don't have sweet bento skills like that.

Day 3!

I did manage to get all caught up on my smart.fm reps and still have only 2 katakana left to complete. Yay! Katakana are sort of hard because there are several that look alike, some look like hiragana, and many look like kanji.

I thought I got caught up on my RTK reps, but I was fooled because I forgot to sync my app. Today is my deadline for getting caught up though so I had better get back to it so I can start unsuspending cards again tomorrow. I downloaded the supplement to RTK with the new Kanji so I am going to go back and add any that fit in among the 1st 250 that I have done already.

I also watched a bit of Tokyo Dogs and listened to a bit of a podcast.

OK, Kanji Time! Day 1 Take 2.

I have been continuing on with my lameness for too long. The newest member of our family is now 5 months old. I am running out of excuses. Also the eldest is going to be starting kindy next year hopefully in the Japanese program. She would then be in class with Japanese kids with Japanese mom's for me to hang around with. However having Japanese friends will be more likely if I can speak at least some Japanese. My goal is to get caught up on my RTK reviews and get back to adding new Kanji and catch up on my smart.fm reviews. Gotta do it. I also need to do a write up of all the Doramas I have watched. I am curious how many hours I have logged of listening and watching doing that. I have watched a ton and my tastes have really changed. I also want to post about the podcasts and blogs that I follow even though I don't understand them beyond random Kanji, katakana and single word phrases. Oh I also started a Tumblr inspired by Kanji & Tea.

So Lame

I have been completely lame. I have not been practicing any Japanese. I have not done any new Kanji or reviews nor have I done any hiragana or katakana review. I have no excuse really, but I doubt I am going to make my goal of having Heisig finished by August. I have been listening and watching tons of Japanese Dramas and PVs on youtube. Yesterday the hubby was watching Ponyo in Japanese with English subs on because he loves me and I was blogging on my other blog and I kind of knew what was going on just by listening here and there. I am not sure if all Japanese dramas use the same phrases over and over again on purpose or if the language is just like that. I love it though, Yay Panda! I am just sitting down to do some Kanji now though. Something is better than nothing right.

Seriously Bad Handwriting

I have been going through my kanji only writing each character a few times like Heisig suggests, but I cannot read anything I write. I don't feel like I am getting the stroke order correct on some of the more complicated ones like Dr. and Measuring box. Also I am fairly sure that the proportion of all of the characters I am writing are incorrect. How on earth is the best way to get good Japanese handwriting. Do I need to go out and buy the lovely grid paper I always see at Kinokuniya or can I practice on my computer with my lovely wacom tablet? I would love that because then I could save a lot of paper. Maybe I should look for some kanji work sheets or something. I must figure out something quickly before I learn to read 1000 kanji and then have to start over with being able to write them.

It's Here! It's Here!

My Heisig Remebering the Kanji is here! Hooray! It arrived with All About Particles by Naoko Chino and the Oxford Beginners Dictionary which are 2 books that are sort of recommended over on AJATT for sentences. Which means it is on. I have a goal of finishing the book by the 31st of August. That is 2042 Kanji by the end of summer. I am not sure that it is a reasonable goal being that I am a mom and have lots of other things I probably should be doing instead of studying japanese flashcards on Anki. However if I don't finish by the end of this summer I am going to get way behind with all that fall brings. I have 130 Days. That is about 17 Kanji a day. I believe I can do it. When I was attempting 25 a day and that was a little hard some days. Maybe if I round up to 20 a day that will be a good number for me to achieve my goal. Well we shall see. The first 200 or so should be pretty quick since I have done them already.

I have learned all 104 of the Hiragana Goal on smart.fm. I am now reviewing. I am still irritated by the typing part of the program. I always spell them wrong even though I know how they are supposed to sound. I have still not "completed" any. I am not sure if I should start the Katakana Goal or wait until after I finish the Kanji. Will I kill my brain doing both at the same time?

On another note I have finished watching Ohitorisama. It was cute. I liked Real Clothes the best so far though. I just need to get them without subs. I am deciding if I should pay the hundreds of dollars to get them from YesAsia.com or not. What to do? I started watching My Girl which is not bad but a little sad.