So, I drove out of the Tri Cities today for the first time. It’s the first time I drove longer than half an hour, just me and my babies. Ball & Cross Books in Moscow is closing its store so I went there to use a couple hundred dollars of store credit a friend (who owed me money) left for me.

It took me about 3 hours to get there. The last hour, Rinah was screaming so hard I could hear her throwing up and choking on it but there was nowhere to pull over so I just had to listen and pray. She was crying like she was scared. When I finally pulled over, her lips were purply-blue and she was shaking all over. I held her and tried to comfort her a bit before getting back on the road.

While I was in Moscow, I got to meet some friends I hadn’t seen in way too long, Rinah’s lovely godmother, and the wonderful family I boarded with. It was great but I only got to spend a few minutes with each of them. Not enough time at all. I wanted to stay longer because there were so many more people I wanted to see, but I left so I could get home before dark.

My sweet little girl, who is usually so calm, cried for over 2 hours on the way home. Not just cried. Screamed. It didn’t help that she’s teething. All her molars, top and bottom, right and left, are cutting through her gums. So I was speeding and I got pulled over and got a HUGE ticket. It cost as much as my “free” books. At least the policeman was really nice. His last name was Smith. Ben just told me our car insurance is going up because of this.

Now I hate cars (and myself) more than ever. If we were in a train in Tokyo, I could have been holding her, playing with her, reading to her, nursing, walking around, pretty much whatever I wanted. I think this means I am not meant to get out of the the Tri Cities … especially with another one coming so soon. AUGH. One baby screaming is bad enough. I can’t imagine how horrible it is to listen to 2 babies screaming in the back seat.

Except for meeting some friends, today was just a really, really bad day … 6.5 hours of driving and almost 3.5 hours of screaming. I miss everyday life in Mitaka and Kichijoji so much. Here are some pictures of a really good day we had last summer in Mitaka, 40 pounds ago. She has her daddy’s wrinkly forehead and my nose-wrinkly smile.

We’re back home and she’s back to her happy self, running around, giggling, singing, babbling, dancing, and playing with daddy. She is going to be a really talkative little girl. Actually, she already is, I just have no idea what she’s saying most of the time.

The first couple days were an adjustment. She wouldn’t let anyone touch her and she screamed a lot which made me want to pull out all my hair. But she got to know everyone and was happy … for the most part, anyway. She took naps on Aunt Sally’s back and Matthew’s back (that’s her under the blanket on his back) in my brand new custom-made Babyhawk mei tai.

Tofu, Aunt Sally’s beautiful fluffy Maltese puppy, put up with a lot of enthusiastic petting and whacking from Rinah. The poor dog got so stressed out from her yelling and chasing, but first thing every morning, he would come looking for her anyway. She learned to feed him her Kix and he liked that a lot. By the end of the trip they were almost inseparable.

She learned a lot on this trip, put on underpants half-way by herself, walked to the bathroom and tried to put on the potty seat by herself.

She met her Great Uncle Leo and Great Aunt Sally and all my boy cousins who are her cousins once removed. We also got together with Great Aunt Kathy and my cousin Kristi and daughter Emily, who is her second cousin. It took us a while to figure it out but we finally did, thanks to Wikipedia, which is where we got this interesting tidbit about cousins.

George W. Bush and John Kerry shared a common ancestral couple in the 1500s … [they are] ninth cousins, two times removed. Also, in 2007, it was revealed that U.S. vice president Dick Cheney and senator Barack Obama are eighth cousins.

We went to Woodfield, a humonginormous mall with hundreds and hundreds of stores, where I found the cutest baby boy clothes I have ever seen at Janie and Jack. I was really excited to go to a real live Hanna Andersson store for the first time where I got some organic cotton training panties and matching outfits for my babies. Aunt Sally gave me a gift card to Lord and Taylor where there were some absolutely adorable Ralph Lauren baby clothes on clearance. The shopping out here is SO much better than the Tri Cities. *big sigh, mumble grumble*

Before we left, we went to the Coldstone Creamery and got some custom made ice cream. Mmmm. Yummy yummy.

We didn’t make it to the Illuminations store there, or the Apple store, or Godiva, but that’s OK. There’s always next time.

With Rinah spending so much time eating, playing, sleeping, and running around with my uncle, aunt, and cousins, I’ve had a lot of time to read. It’s been wonderful. Years ago, I started reading Schmemann but life got in the way and I never finished it. My cousin Christopher had a copy sitting on his shelf and I’m trying to finish it before I leave. I don’t know if I can because it’s slow going. One reason is because I keep rereading what I’ve read already. This book been an answer to prayer, showing me the way out of some of the struggles I’ve had in my life.

(The italics are Schmemann’s. The underlining is mine.)

Weltschmerz, hunger, desire, pain.
Created in the image of a perfect Triune God, three Persons in eternal fellowship and friendship and trust, I am filled with a yearning and longing for that same fellowship and friendship and trust. The imperfect human fellowship I have found does not satisfy my hunger, but merely whets my appetite to the point of starvation. Trusting and desiring Man leads to pain and betrayal. There is no true love, no joy, no faithfulness, no peace with Man. But Christ invites us to His table, gives us Himself, His blood and His flesh.

Man is a hungry being. But he is hungry for God. Behind all the hunger of our life is God. All desire is finally a desire for Him. (p. 14)

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For some reason, my daughter loves her big toes. When she’s barefooted, she gets all excited and repeats, “Big toe, big toe,” over and over again while touching them with her forefingers. She likes to walk around holding her ear and saying “ear.”

She’ll say “down” when I’m holding her and she wants to get down. But she can’t say “up” and says “ba” instead.

Potty training has come along really well the last few days and when she needs to pee, she’ll say “pee pee” or “diaper” which has been really helpful. When her diaper is dirty, she’ll say, “Ooooh, myyyy.” I have no idea where she picked that up.

In the mornings or when we are getting ready to go somewhere, she’ll smile a huge smile and squeal, “shoes!” and “pretty!”

She loves to point and say “baby” whenever she sees a stuffed animal or a baby who is smaller than she is. She likes babies and I’m hoping it means she will be a doting older sister and not a jealous one.

Of course, there is her favourite toy, the phone. She sort of says “phone” but it sounds more like “ba.” She says “ball” which also comes out as “ba.”

We take a bath together almost every day and play with her foam alphabet and numbers in the water. She tries to repeat all the letters. She likes “A” and “I” and “H” the best.

Her overall favourite and the word she says more than anything else is “eat” and next is “please.” Sometimes she tries to say, “thank you” but it doesn’t quite sound like how it’s supposed to yet. She usually nods her head instead. She can say “bread,” too, and “banana.”

She can say “bye bye” when it’s time to leave or when I flush the toilet. It’s funny to see her waving to the toilet boil as, uhh, stuff goes down the drain.

First thing in the morning, she sits up and says, “Eat! Bread! Downstairs!” and repeats until I get going. Sometimes I lie there trying to wake up till she suddenly sits very still, gets a weird look on her face, and says, “Pee pee.” Then I jump out of bed, grab her, and rush her to her potty while stripping her sleeper off, because she can hold it for about 4 or 5 seconds and it’s all over.

Every day, I recite the Ten Commandments (Deuteronomy 5:6-21) to her and chant the Lord’s Prayer, Psalm 95, the Te Deum, Psalm 100, the Apostles Creed, Gloria in Excelsis, Psalm 51, and the Nunc Dimittis. She usually gets very quiet during the Ten Commandments and recently has been trying to sing along with the chanting. It’s really cute.

I wouldn’t trade this for any job or anything else in the world. I am so happy with her every day and it’s always so exciting to see her learn and discover everything around her.

Every day, I discover more and more how girly my little girl is. She loves shoes, bags, and necklaces. She watches intently when I wash my face and slap on some lotion. And she doesn’t know very many words, but she does know the word “pretty” and tries to say it when she puts on a necklace. I marvel at how God made women to be beautiful and adorned and she seems to know it already!

… I anointed thee with oil. I clothed thee also with broidered work, and shod thee with badgers’ skin, and I girded thee about with fine linen, and I covered thee with silk. I decked thee also with ornaments, and I put bracelets upon thy hands, and a chain on thy neck. And I put a jewel on thy forehead, and earrings in thine ears, and a beautiful crown upon thine head. Thus wast thou decked with gold and silver; and thy raiment was of fine linen, and silk, and broidered work; thou didst eat fine flour, and honey, and oil: and thou wast exceeding beautiful … and thy renown went forth among the heathen for thy beauty: for it was perfect through my comeliness, which I had put upon thee, saith the Lord GOD. (Ezekiel 16:9-14)

The necklace she is wearing is an amber teething necklace, by the way, a present from my friend. (For more info about amber and teething, see this article or Google.)

When my mother was pregnant with me (her first), her mother bought her a sarashi to wear. It’s a strip of cotton about 15 feet long which you tie on in to support your back and lift your belly a bit. Basically, you mummify your midsection. It works SO well. I don’t know how I would have gotten through my pregnancy without it, especially around the end.

I’ve seen some really scary stretch marks on some mommies but I didn’t get any (not around my stomach anyway … LOL, nm, TMI) and the other mothers I know who used it didn’t get any either.

I can’t find anything about it except a book called Shiatsu for Midwives which I found on Google Book Search. It’s probably the next book I’m going to buy as soon as I get some extra spending money. (Ooooooh, how I miss single money. There’s so much more single money than married money somehow. LOL.) I posted a screenshot of the excerpt about sarashi on the left. Click on the thumbnail to see it in full size.

If any of you are interested, I’m going to Tokyo this March and will pick some up for you if you want, ’cause I haven’t been able to find it for sale in America, online or offline. Just e-mail me or leave a comment below.

EDIT: Dawn asks, “If it’s just a strip of cotton couldn’t it be made? Is there anything special about an official Japanese one, besides sounding cool when you tell everyone it’s from Japan? :)”

Well, I think you can see from the videos I made that it’s not “just” a strip of cotton. I don’t know enough about fabric to explain it properly, but it’s different. LOL. Sarashi is the name of a particular type of Japanese fabric (see Google). Of course, you can try making one yourself from American stuff if you want to….

A couple of the very, very rare pictures I have of me and Rinah … thank you, Peter.

I have wanted to do this for so many years … anyone have an extra $10,000 for me? It’s a 19-day tour across Turkey and the tour guide is an archeologist/historian. *sigh*

Ben suddenly took it upon himself to start yoga. It was his idea, not mine, and he started last week. I’m SO excited. He’s doing Bikram yoga at a brand new yoga studio down the street. As far as I know, it’s the only yoga studio in the area. I used to do Ashtanga, but they don’t have it here in boony-town where we live. He has gone five times now and he is starting to show signs of trading his growing beer barrel for a six-pack. It’s more like a two-pack now, but I have hope. Coolness.

With the crazy gas prices, it costs us $45 to fill up the car. It is driving me insane. It’s not like we’re really going anywhere in the car. I miss public transportation more and more every day. It costs next to nothing. No need to constantly worry about the car breaking down. No need to worry about drunk drivers … or even driving.

And we finally night-weaned Rinah and for the first time in over a year, I have had more than 3 or 4 hours of sleep at a time. Oh, sweet sleep. A good friend of mine with a bajillion kids explained to me and Ben that if he would take her out of the room when she woke up to nurse, she’d fall back asleep again. It never occurred to us to try that. Amazingly enough, it worked. She almost sleeps through the night now. He has to get up once or twice and pat her a few times, but she gives up right away and it doesn’t take very long.

A guy at Ben’s work rides my dream motorcycle to work every day. Apparently they got to talking about it. Believe it or not, motorcycles can be safe if you’re careful. One thing led to another and now we have a shiny, sleek, dark, beautiful motorcycle. It’s black and silver. I love it.

Click to see larger pics.

Before we got married, when Ben and I were chatting and I’d ask him what he was doing, he’d often tell me he was hacking something for his homework. So even though he’s a programmer, I like to say he’s a hacker. A night-weaning daddy hacker who rides to yoga classes on a motorcycle. Now, if the carpets in our house quit growing his socks and shoes and underwear all over the place, and if we could actually get our butts in gear to read the Bible together every day, our marriage would be perfect … right? :D