Miyako Fest Has Officially Begun!

So, for those of you who know me well, you know I LOVE my birthday. I call it "Shari-fest" inspired by my friend Beki (who has "Beki-fest"), and I try to celebrate for a week or so. I do this by celebrating with different circles of friends. You know, dessert with my high school friends on this day, dinner with the fam, Keeneland with my gym friends...I can always find a reason to celebrate my birthday.

Today though, it is not about me! "Miyako-fest" has officially begun! Although considering Miyako was born in the US, I am not sure when exactly to celebrate her real birthday. When she wakes up tomorrow morning, 2 years ago we will have just checked into the hospital on November 2nd. :)

Miyako fest started with a fabulous afternoon at a local park with a photographer recommended to me by a friend. Unfortunately the photographer is moving to Thailand in the spring, but I am hoping we can vacation there in the next year and she can do new family photos with the newest Kawashima. Today she took pictures of Miyako for her 2 year old photos at Shiba Koen. She also got some family shots. I cannot wait to see them. She will post a few snapshots on her blog tonight!

The festivities continued into the evening as my kitchen smells of cupcakes, brownies, and p-nut butter cookies. Thankfully I had lots of mixes from the US! Tomorrow is Miyako's birthday and a national holiday. Her friend, Mr. N, turned two today! So we are doing a joint birthday party/picnic tomorrow at Hama-rikyu gardens in Shiodome. Everyone is bringing a bento lunch and we will have snacks and sweets to share. It should be fun. I imagine my post tomorrow will be all about the party, so I thought I would take the time tonight to remember Miyako's birthday.

I can remember it so clearly - it was a Sunday, November 2nd, and I woke up thinking "something feels different." I had some cramping and was wondering if this would be the day. We went to church, and I came home and cleaned the house thinking I would not get it cleaned for quite some time. I knew we were going to have the baby soon and that we would not make it to her due date which was November 7th. When I told this to Kan, he thought I was crazy. I kept wondering if my water had broke, but it was not this rush of a river so I figured I was just having weird pregnancy stuff. After going shopping for a bookshelf at Pier 1 (just typing this I realize I miss Pier 1, especially right now with all of their holiday stuff out) and stopping by Graeter's for some ice cream (oh no, I miss Graeter's too...maybe I should stop remembering), I called our Bradley coach and asked her if she thought I was in labor. She suggested calling my mid-wife. The pain was nothing but I kept questioning whether or not my water had broke.

My mid-wife suggested I come in and take a test as to whether or not the water had really broken. Kan and I took nothing with us - we thought this was just a test and they would tell us to go home...that we had plenty of time. Well, they did the test and the nurse said, "You are not leaving this hospital without a baby." Hello! Panic! Good Lord, what are we thinking having a child?!

Kan went home to get the bag and pick up some dinner. I was only dilated 2 cm. so they gave me some medicine to help me sleep a bit. The Colts were playing a Sunday night game so we watched that and I tried to get some rest. At midnight, I knew I was in labor. They say you forget the pain - no, I remember it. I remember getting sick, yelling at Kan about how badly it hurt, and wondering why it took the epidural guy so stinking long to get there once I finally decided I wanted one! I remember full well the pain - and I can say with all my heart it was all worth it.

Miyako is like her dad - always late - and took her sweet little time coming into the world. We checked in the hospital at 7:00PM on November 2nd and on 10:40AM November 3rd 2008 our sweet little Miyako entered the world. We did not know what we were having, so when Kan told me "It's a girl" my response was, "But we do not have a girl name picked out yet!" We really thought we were having a boy so we had our boy name (still have it in case baby #2 is a boy, and no I am not telling). However, we were clueless as to a girl name. We knew we wanted a traditional Japanese name and no middle name. We had two girl names we liked but wanted to include Kan's parents in Japan in on the discussion so they would feel a part of things. We had a slight problem though - it was 12:40AM for them so we could not call them at that time to discuss the name. About 8 hours later we finally called them and Kan's dad loved "Miyako." The character to represent her name means "old capitol" in reference to Kyoto, which is where Kan is from, so the name really was special for Kan and his family.

Miyako is such a sweet little girl. She is getting the typical 2 year old attitude, but I remind myself, "wow, she is acting just her age" to remind me not to have too high of expectations of her. She is developmentally on track. :) She loves to sing, and she has a sweet little voice. My heart melts when she tries to sing "Holy, Holy, Holy." Miyako is a deep thinker. You can see her little wheels spinning constantly. She observes everything and she does not forget anything! If I tell her, at 10AM, that she can watch Charlie Brown or "the dog" before she goes to bed, she goes to get the DVD before bedtime and puts it in. She remembers getting boo-boos from a month ago, and we will walk past the elevator she fell down at and say "ellie fall down." She is really into baby dolls right now - she loves to put diapers on Minnie Mouse, Pink baby, or any other stuffed animal or doll we have floating around. She even wipes them with baby wipes. She will be a great big sister! I am sure I will come in the room at some point with the new baby and see her trying to change his or her diaper. I could go on and on about all of the neat things she says and does. But for now, I will close with this...

Miyako-chan, your dada and mama love you very much. But more importantly our prayer is that you know how much Jesus loves you. You are His gift to us. You belong to Him and our heart's desire is that you know Him, love Him, serve Him, and cling to His word.

And now, "Miyako-fest" can officially begin!