The Yomitan Glass Man

On our first weekend on our own in Okinawa (meaning we finally had a car), we took a drive to explore, and we discovered the glass man's hut on the side of the road. I'm so glad we pulled over. This place is still one of my favorite little finds of the island. The glass man doesn't speak a word of English, so it was thanks to translator apps that we found out he blows all the glass himself, with recycled glass. His work is just so beautiful. 

Everytime we stop to get a little something from the glass man, he always throws in a "present" which include glasses and bowls, which are some of my favorite dishes in my cupboard. 

 

We took my mom there when she was here. I love bringing people here. 

Remember that time when I was pregnant?? This was the last picture we took while I was pregnant, I think. I went into labor a day later. 

This is kind of a random post, but I just wanted to share more of my love for this island and all of its special places with the people of the internet.

Hope you're having a swell day.
xoxo Annie

The time my dad "met" Justin Bieber

I've been meaning to post about this for a while, just because it's pretty hilarious and deserves documenting. 

One morning a few months ago, my mom and dad both tried waking me up at 6am, telling me to look up Justin Bieber's instagram. My mom called and insisted. So I obliged, begrudgingly, wondering what would be so important about Justin Bieber's instagram. 

I was in for a treat, because this is what we saw...

Umm what???? Talk about random, and hilarious! My dad was waiting for his sister at his NYC hotel and dozed off. After waking up and getting in a cab, he started getting texts within minutes from people in Utah who had seen the photo. Oh, the world of social media.

The photo ended up getting over a million likes, and me and my sisters got a kick out of sharing screen shots of the hilarious comments that came streaming in from crazy people all over the world throughout the day. 

This one was amusing....and the bottom one from some internet troll: excuse me lady?? He's not your dad!

Some other amusing ones:

These last two are my personal favorites:

Then the Daily Mail in the UK published this, and some of my friends in Europe showed it to me. 

So, apparently the Brits do not like Justin Bieber! They kept saying my dad should sue the Biebs. I think he should have too, if he would give me some of the money.

It's just such a crack up. It was fun seeing my dad's few days of fame. He even went on the local news in SLC! Just such a funny, totally random occurrence. Good times.

Cliche Mom Things I Shall Not Say

...not this month anyway.

"How is my baby one month old?? I can't believe it's been one month already!!"

--I can. It's been possibly the longest month of my life. A great month, but a loooong month.

"Where has the time gone? He's one month old already!"

--I know where the time has gone. Lots of sleep lost and lots and lots of feeding the baby. Sweet moments that I do cherish, don't get me wrong, but it is quite the adjustment.


Well... that's about it.
Because all the other cliche things about how they change so fast and how I want him to stay this little and cuddly forever are absolutely and completely true.
I never expected to enjoy the newborn stage as much as I have.
I love snuggling with him, and I love how easy he is to just cart around to stores, restaurants, etc.
I love how he knows who I am, and even if I am just a milkmaid to him right now,
I love that he stops crying for me when I scoop him up into my arms.

So put all those cliches in your pipe and smoke it. I love my little cuddly guy, and it's been quite the month.

Saying Goodbye to the Parents

Two weeks ago, we said goodbye to my mom and dad. That was hard. Yesterday we said goodbye to Victor's mom and step-dad. That was hard.

Hard is an understatement. Victor and I were completely spoiled by being able to spend such quality time with our parents. We hadn't seen mine for eight months and we hadn't seen his for over a year and a half. And not to mention the fact that they were here for us in our first moments of being parents to support us, guide us, and encourage us as we experienced a huge life change, one that sometimes we just felt so clueless about, and still do.

What's been the sweetest blessing is seeing how much love they immediately had for our son. It's true that the people that love you will love your children.

And that's why saying goodbye to them this time around was much harder than it's ever been. Victor and I have both lived abroad before and gone for long periods of time without seeing family. When we moved to Okinawa, even then the goodbyes weren't hard, because our parents were excited for us in this new adventure, and we didn't think much about leaving them.

But now that a little baby is involved, everything has changed. It was SO hard seeing the tears in Victor's parents eyes at the airport as they said goodbye to J. Babies change so incredibly fast, that for us to live so far from family who loves him is a harsh reality of our grand adventure of living abroad. It was something we never had thought about until now.

We had a wonderful summer with family here. They shared with us one of the most special times of our lives. But the time sure did fly by. We love them. And we miss them.

So now it's just our little family of three. Wish us luck!

Married (with children) Conversations

^^more pics, because I love them so.^^

A week or so ago, about to go to bed:

Victor: It's your turn to say the prayer.

Me: Ok. ........[long silence].........

Victor: Annie.

Me: What?

Victor: You're supposed to be saying the prayer.

Me: Oh, right.

I amaze myself these days at how quickly I can pass out. Ha.

****

After our two week checkup for baby J:

Victor: Well, tonight should be nice, since the doctor said that we don't have to wake J up to eat anymore.

Me: Just because the doctor said he can sleep longer, doesn't mean he actually will, Victor.

Victor: [...]

Yeah, so babies don't really care about doctor's orders. It was a rough night two nights ago, but then last night he only woke up once. No consistency! Newborns.

One Week Old Deliciousness

Introducing Joseph Ramón Castro

I hadn't thought much about taking newborn photos. My good friend Anna had mentioned it before giving birth but it wasn't until after that I realized that capturing the perfect goodness of a delicious one week old was absolutely necessary. Anna did such a good job with the pictures, and these photos are treasures to me. 

Baby J, you are perfect and you have captured our hearts. 

The Agony and the Ecstacy (AKA Giving Birth)

I gave birth just five days ago. And it sure is amazing how those extremely painful parts are starting to become foggy and I think, "oh yeah, I could do this again." But if you had asked me on Tuesday, the day I spent entirely in labor, I would have said, nope, no more babies ha ha.

I started having regular contraction, five minutes apart like clockwork at midnight on Tuesday. I went into labor and delivery at 3am and they told me to go home. I also had a doctors appointment that morning with my dr to possibly discuss induction. At that appointment, she got the ball rolling (in other words stripped my membranes) and then the contractions that started made all the other ones look like chump change. I labored at home for about five hours. I was so scared to go to the hospital and get turned away again, after being in so much pain and feeling like I just HAD to have made progress.

But we went in, and I was 4cm, and I had a leak in my water. My golden ticket! I got admitted, and the anesthesiologist soon was on the scene giving me an epidural.

Epidural, sweet epidural! When it kicked in, my husband said, "it's so nice to be able to talk to my wife again!"

^^not too shabby view. smiles from the epidural!^

I spent the rest of the evening making progress. My dad's flight got in, and our dear friends picked him up and brought him straight to the hospital. Finally, at 2am, my midwife that delivered me said it was time to start pushing! But at this point, with the way I was sitting for pushing, I started feeling so much pain from the contractions. I was exhausted, and I hadn't eaten a thing all day so my energy was dwindling.

That hour of pushing was definitely the hardest thing I have done physically. I know I couldn't have done it without prayer. I just kept praying to find the energy I needed to do it. And soon enough, the head was starting to come out: I reached down to touch it in my midwife's effort to get me motivated. It was pretty weird, but still pretty cool.

Soon I could feel the whole baby coming down the birth canal. That was so surreal! And then he was out. And everyone immediately exclaimed "he's so big!" They immediately put him up on my skin, and he really was a chubby little guy. That moment was surreal. It wasn't like how some people say that they felt they knew their babies all their lives. It was more like, "wow, you've been in my belly for 9 months: it's nice to finally meet you!" To finally have a face to all those kicks and movements you come to know for so long.

They let me do skin to skin for as long as I wanted. I felt like I was hogging him from Victor ha ha. I knew he was so excited and so ready to hold his son. So, I gave him to Victor and then he had him weighed. Nine pounds four ounces! Where was he hiding in that belly of mine?? The belly they said was always measuring small, and the belly that my doctor had estimated would maybe be around 7.5 pounds. It was crazy. But I love my little baby with chubby cheeks and cute little leg rolls.

And I am amazed and frankly, proud of my body, for growing that baby, for being able to get it out, and for now being able to create food to keep him alive. It's all so amazing. And witnessing live birth, whether it's being the laborer o being able to be a witness, is by far the most spiritual and sacred thing I have ever been apart of.