Mobile Mayhem

Now that both kids are mobile, we find ourselves running back and forth, making sure Mirei's not putting something dangerous in her mouth, and appeasing Taisei as he calls for us every 2 minutes.

Here's the first day Mirei discovered that her legs are useful propellants.  June 8, 2010

And this is what she does when she's in the crib and she doesn't want to sleep.  It makes it so hard for us to leave her alone in there!

We ended up having a party instead of putting her back to sleep.  :|

Taisei just started swimming lessons.  We were so afraid that he would hate them, since he's not a water baby like I was.  He never craved the swimming pool before, but to our surprise, he loves the lessons.  We just drop him off and off he goes.  (For Taisei, that's a big deal.)  It probably doesn't hurt that the water's like 85 degrees and it's basically a private lesson since there's only one other boy in the class.  We recommend Saturday mornings.  Apparently, no one wants to be there at that time.

As the kids get older, I keep waiting for Taisei to turn jealous and resentful.  We're pleased to see that it hasn't happened yet, even as Mirei has demanded more and more attention.  Taisei did go through a phase where he had to realize that Mirei's not a baby anymore and has her own opinions about stuff.  And boy does she have opinions.  She has never been shy about letting us know what she wants.  So as the two have gotten older, I'm convinced that their bond has only gotten stronger.  Taisei tells us now that he's not scared to go have over nighters with his buddies (the Jones) as long as Mirei comes along.  Mirei, on the other hand, is a friendly baby and will smile for anybody as long as they make an effort to coo and pay attention to her.  But when Taisei walks into the room, she beams and giggles almost without fail.  She sure seems to love her older brother.  Taisei loves to show off "his baby" whenever others gather around to pay attention to her.  So far, it's perfect.  I hope they can be best buds and take care of each other for a long long time to come.

By the way, Happy Father's Day to me and all my Daddy friends.  ;)

Welcome

Today, Taisei's four years old and Mirei's almost 7 months old.  Taisei's about to finish his first year of official preschool at the U of U.  He's loved it and we'll send him back there again next year.  He's been in the Wanpaku Japanese Preschool for several years now and may be finishing up his last year this summer.  Mirei just started officially crawling on Monday, two days ago.  Until now, she has been doing the army crawl to get at things she wants.  And, boy, when she wants something, she really wants something.  She wears her emotions on her sleeves, completely the opposite of her brother, who has to be pried, prodded, and bribed for any extra information.  They seem to be very different already, yet they are the best of buds.  Often, they'll sleep together in a bed at night now.  When Mirei sees Taisei, her eyes light up and she squeals with joy.  It's a happy sight for their parents.  Seeing our kids happy makes everything we do worth it.  We'll do our best to post pictures and anecdotes for posterity and for any of our interested friends.

About 3 months ago.