Taiyo's samurai helmet

Taiyo's grandparents sent him a samurai helmet! May 5th (also known as Cinco de Mayo) is "Tango no sekku" or Boy's festival in Japan, which has been celebrated since 8th century. "The day was originally called I like Farting," according to Wikipedia (I'm serious, but it's gotta be a bad joke). Every Japanese boy has a samurai helmet like this, and we put it on display a few weeks before the celebration each year to celebrate his strength and health, which is so appropriate for Taiyo because he is so damn strong and healthy! He mastered his art of standing up, and now he would hold my hands and make a few steps forward- he's walking! I bet he'll be off to college tomorrow.
on april 25, 2010 @ 12:30 am [link]

more development

I thought he just began to crawl yesterday, but today he stood up by himself holding onto my leg. He was so excited with this discovery of his ability and couldn't sleep until almost midnight. I bet he's going to walk tomorrow. Cherry trees are in full bloom; pink petals were blown by spring wind, creating 'flower puddles' on sidewalks. Gloomy, but still a beautiful day.
on april 18, 2010 @ 12:50 am [link]

just a little drama

Last night I spent three hours in emergency room, since Taiyo couldn't pee for six hours. He was crying hysterically on and off for hours. This, of course, happened in the week with so much drama after his third vaccinations, by a nurse who beautifully sang for him, followed by fever in the evening, then my root canal treatment. In the emergency room we had a company of another lively 8-month old baby who may have swallowed a battery, and they babbled with each other in teletabbish that made us worried parents laugh at least for a while. After hours of waiting, he was simply diagnosed with yeast infection. Today he seemed just fine. He was again the happiest baby. I was all achey today, probably carrying my 20-pound son for hours last night, but it just makes me the luckiest mom to see him all right. I was so tired tonight and I was going to pour myself a glass of sake, but when I opened the refrigerator and turned around to a glass, I realized I had a bottle of formula in my hand.
on april 16, 2010 @ 12:44 am [link]

It's official

Trees around the neighborhood suddenly began to blossom this week. Callery pears are already in full bloom, while cherry trees still have tight buds. Taiyo and I enjoy walking around day and nigght, finally without the stroller cover. Certain development is not as obvious as appearance of first teeth, but it's official; in clumsy movements, Taiyo is crawling! For a few weeks, he seemed to be moving around by just rolling around. But a few nights ago, I said to myself, wait a minute, is he crawling? Then I realized that he is moving his arms and legs to maneuver around the bed. Yesterday we stopped in to see my landlord Micheal and Taiyo 'kind of' waved at him. Of course this made his a very happy man.
on april 3, 2010 @ 02:09 am [link]

motivation for spring cleaning

I've forgotten many things I used to do and enjoy since Taiyo came into my life. Writing an entry here is one. Before I normally kept up at least one little piece a week, which wasn't much, but now it's been down to one every month or so in the last six month, although here I am trying to get back to my regular schedule. Being a mother of a healthy baby, my primary concern has been his bowel movement. Frequency, consistency, amount, color and such. Was it sticky or hard and pebbly rabbit poo? When he has a nice big soft poo in the morning, I feel that I've done something right. He assures me with the sweetest cutest smile. Related to this, making of his baby food has been another thing that's always on my mind, which makes me forget about the specials on menu. This has also been quite a new challenge, stepping into the unknown territory. Well, par his doctor's advice, we started on 'cereal' with oatmeal, which made him cry. I switched to rice and added a little bit ot ground oatmeal and barley. He tolerated about two spoonfuls. After almost two weeks, he began to eat just a little more. I was supposed to add some vegetables, but jumped to adding fruit to encourage his eating. Then he began to gobble up a whole bowl. It must be in his genes; now he loves eating. In short two months he already covered quite a bit. Sweet potatoes, carrots, squash, cucumber, tomato, broccoli, avocado, lentil, peas, chickpeas, edamame, apple, pear, banana, mango, strawberry, peach, and of course tofu and even stinky slimy fermented natto beans! He seemed to really like it, to my surprise. It made my day to enjoy eating natto with him. He's getting bigger and stronger; now slowly beginning to crawl forward. I have to get my act together to clean up years of clutter in my apartment. Last weekend I finally killed my old desktop computer, and let it go for recycling.
on april 1, 2010 @ 01:38 am [link]