New Year's Eve

We bought a tatami bed today. We searched all over town yesterday, but failed to find a board bed for me. Biajee was on line this morning searching for a tatami bed. There is actually a local store in Boulder that sells tatami beds and futons. We drove there after Arnold woke up from his nap this afternoon. We ordered the biggest size - California King with the head pillow. It'll be shipped in 2 to 3 weeks and then Biajee will pick it up with our van and put it together. It's so beautiful and comfortable that I was almost in tears.

I found another Chinese doctor who has been practicing for over 30 years. He has some Wudang Kungfu as well. I've seen him twice already and my backache has improved dramtically. He said the sphine was hurt and the disc had moved slightly. It'll probably take 5 to 6 times treatment for it to heal completely. Biajee and Arnold went with me to his clinic yesterday. He talked to us about Chinese methodology of curing diseases. He advised us to boil some vinegar every day in the house so that Arnold can smell it and will not catch a cold. He also tested both my pulses and found out that there was still leftover heat in my stomache from the child birth. I need to eat very light dinner - only fruits and vegetables, preferably watermelon every night to let it go. After I stop breast feeding, he'll give me some prescription of Chinese medicine to totally get rid of it. If I don't listen to him, I'll probably die by the age of 58, like my mother and grandmother. He thinks they both had the same problem but didn't get treated. The heat in the body accumulates over years after childbirth, resulting in the thickening blood and finally heart attack.

Biajee went out shopping for watermelons for me. There is no such thing in the grocery stores at this time of the year. I can only wish him luck. We had sushi, sashimi and tuna neck at Tora, our favorite Japanese restaurant, to celebrate the new year.

Arnold is laughing, smiling and cooing every day. This is so unfair. Every time he does these things I feel being taken advantage of. There is so much love and pain and wonder in my chest that it's almost unbearable. He refused to sleep last night though, because we went to a friend's house and people were singing KaraOK till midnight. It was so loud and terrrible that poor Arnold was annoyed. Worst of all, all the Chinese kids there take turns performing their piano and violin after dinner. I cannot imagine Arnold being one of them in 5 years. I will not force him to learn anything if he doesn't like it.

Baby Sit

We were going to hire Alba, a teacher in Montessori, to watch Arnold this week. She didn't show up yesterday and didn't call us. Biajee had to take Arnold to work. A friend's parents are watching Arnold today and will be watching him till Friday.

My back is still hurting and I've been seeing different doctors every day. Apparently I cannot sleep on mattress any more. We've been sleeping on the floor this whole week. Nancy finally advised me that we can buy board bed in this country. Biajee and I are going shopping this weekend for a board bed and a hard couch.

I've never purchased a new bed in my whole life. This will be an exciting and expensive experience, but it'll sure worth every penny of the investment. I cannot wait till I'm handicapped to get a comfortable bed. Life is so short that we all need to enjoy every minute of it when we can.

We start to take hot bath every day like Japanese people. It helps relax the muscle tremendously.

Christmas Day

Arnold woke us up at 5 am precisely. He kept biting my fingers after being nursed. I suddenly found that he had grown one tooth! It was so exciting for all of us. Biajee looked closely on his lower jaw and we could see that little white bone pinching up. Amazingly he was never fussy or upset like other babies during this whole process.

My back is still hurting, but at least I can move slowly now. My spine is not straight yet and it looks quite frighteningly in mirror. I had to adjust my body to a certain position because of the pain. Biajee took all the work of taking care of Arnold. He finally understood why I had always been so tired in the past half year. I had never been able to sleep when I wanted to and had always been working on the baby or the house while Biajee slept until noon. Our only hope is that I can be better to go to Maui in 10 days. Under current situation, there is no way that I could take a 9 hour flight.

Both Biajee and Arnold went to sleep again. We haven't even opened our Christmas presents yet. It's such a beautiful day and we have been indoors since yesterday because my back requires that I lie down as much as possible. There won't be any luxury when I resume working tomorrow. I need to see a chiropractor to make sure that my spine or disc is not mislocated. Hopefully they'll take an X-ray for me and hopefully insurance will pay for it.

Merry Christmas!

Back

I sprained my back yesterday trying to pick up Arnold. I can hardly move now. I cannot cough or do anything. It hurts like hell. Going to the restroom becomes the biggest challenge in my lilfe at the moment.

I don't know whether Biajee ever believed me or not. I've been telling him about my backache ever since Arnold was born. Yet I still do most part of the baby care. And I'm working full time, full time means 12 hours. And I'm getting up every night at 2:30 am to pump for my son. Men don't understand at all. They think we are super women who can endure anything.

I hardly complain until I am close to dying. Now I feel I'd rather die than staying here like a dead person. I'd rather give up anything for my health. If only I could walk and run freely as before! I feel like a $2 watch falling apart. Worse thing is that I have this tremendous guilty feeling of not being able to hold Arnold, change Arnold, feed Arnold and bathe Arnold for a while.

I had so much expectations for me and him. I want to do the best that I can in every aspect as a mom. I want to teach him morale, politeness, physics, finance and most of all, Chinese.

We went to a Chinese physical therapist today and I can move a bit now, although in great pain. We had acupuncture, glassy pots and massage. I hope I can recover after Christmas. We have a Maui trip scheduled after all.

Blizzard

It's hitting us now, today, from this morning and getting worse and worse. We'll probably get between 10 to 20 inches by this time tomorrow.

Montessori closed at noon so Biajee and I had to pick up Arnold. My boss agreed that I should work from home this afternoon. I logged on line and found our headquarters closed by 1:30pm due to the severe weather condition. It took me over an hour to drive home. Biajee tried to go to work after we left Montessori, but his car could not climb up the hill. He called his boss and they agreed that he should go home for the afternoon.

Finally he was close to home, but our Civic got stuck in the snow 2 blocks away from the house. We've already accumulated over a foot of snow here. Biajee took the Sienna out with a shovel trying to rescue our Civic. The garage door would not close because of snow. Fortunately I went to the gym at 1:36 am today and got that done. Otherwise I'd feel guilty for the rest of the day.

Chances are Arnold's day care will be closed tomorrow and our company will be closed as well. I don't think a lot of people can even get out of their house due to the snow. We only hope there will be continuous power and water supply. All the flights at DIA are canceled. I'm so glad Biajee was able to drive home before it gets worse. I don't want to stay at his company for the night. He didn't even bring any changes of clothes...

Puffy Baby

Arnold can eat 3 jars of baby food for one meal now. I watched him gain weight over the weekend. He likes the beef tomato soup Biajee cooks. We mix that up with oatmeal cereal for him. He made funny faces when the sourness of tomatoes hit his tongue, then he bent forward trying to grab the whole bowl. We don't think he was fed enough food at day care.

His face started to turn round again. He surely has lost some weight ever since he was sick 10 days ago. We all sat together on the couch learning about college fund 529 last night. Basically we put money in tax deferred and then take it out using for higher education without paying taxes. We need to open an account for him this weekend and start to take advantage of the tax benefit. The only drawback is that it's invested in mutual fund. We have to see whether we have any control over what kind of fund the money is invested in.

What a pity we have to consider all these things after we have a baby. I never remember having to make long term plans when I was single.

CROCS

It's a firm in Niwot, Colorado, between our house and Boulder. One of my friends even knows their boss. Their stock's ticker symbol is CROX. They went public 3 months ago and their stock price already double to when they initially IPOed.

We bought 2 pairs of their shoes on Saturday night as our equipment to Maui. These shoes are originally designed for people who work on boats. They are super comfortable and not slippery on water. Soon it boomed through the US market and became a trend. They even signed a contract in Disney to put Mickey Mouse's head on their shoes.

This is a great business. We strongly recommend people who would like to invest in fast growers to chip in. Biajee and I started counting down on our vacation to Maui. We both need a vacation pretty badly. We're going to celebrate Biajee's birthday with Luau dinner in paradise. It's baked whole pig underground with a lot of natives singing and dancing. There will be half-naked handsome lads in the performance. I'll really get a kick out of it...

Excel Training

We are in an Excel Training class today. You wouldn't believe it but we need some recharge for MS Excel 2003. I cannot say that everything we talked about is useful today in daily life, but I didn't work from 8:30 am till now. The trade off is that we might have to work this weekend to make up for projects.

Our EVP stepped in at lunch time looking at all of us and said, "What are you guys learning? How to sum? You already know Excel." I don't think he is happy that all his finance people are unavailable today. We surely get a kick out of not working on Friday though.

We cannot go to a hockey game tonight because we cannot find a babysitter for sick Arnold. Whatever the virus he got, he gave it to me already. I've been having a terrible week ever since Monday night. I have a running nose, a sore throat and a bad headache. My voice cracks up as well.

The only good thing is I already booked bike tour and Luau Dinner for Maui. We're even going to get some Crocs shoes for our vacation.

2nd Paps Test

I met Dr. A again. My paps test during pregnancy was abnormal so he offered to check me again today. I won't know the results till next week though.

I read about the possible cause of abnormal data on paps test: cancer, cervix problem, etc. Not very encouraging at all.

Dr. A was in a happy mood as ever. He told me my back pains were results of holding the baby too much and that I should work out on my abs and back muscle to relieve it. I suddenly understood the difference between involvement and commitment at that very moment. When you're having ham and eggs for breakfast, the hen who laid the eggs got involved, but the pig who got porked to ham totally committed. Biajee and I fully committed to the life of Arnold.

I'm sacrificing the lovely Arnold picture in my purse today. I just wrote Dr. A and Gail (the nurse) a Christmas card. I'm the most terrible mom - I've never worked on Arnold's baby announcement at all and Dr. A never got a Thank You card from me. Fortunately, there is a sacred holiday called Christmas for me to make up all I've missed.

Saturday

Biajee went to work today because he had to take Friday off to watch Arnold. Any time Arnold has a fever of over 100F, he gets thrown out of day care.

I bought a punch card at the gym that'll allow babysit for 20 times, each time for 2 hours. I took a Yoga class when Arnold was in the Kids' Club. Then there was a message from my boss informing that I need to be at work at 6 am tomorrow to meet with our EVP on 2007 plan. I need to write down a list of assumptions tonight.

The four tires on our Sienna worn out. We had to change them all on Monday. I'm at the Apple store in the mall now writing this blog. I'll be in Nordstrom in 4 minutes to do some shopping and get a free facial massage and a makeup at the Shiseido counter. They'll also give me a red gift box which is empty. However, the box itself is worth the trip.

Junior Achievement

I survived.

Nobody threw bad eggs or rotten tomatoes at me today. Nobody drooled or cried. I should thank my lucky stars for everything I went through and everything I learned.

Junior Achievement is a non-profit organization that uses hands-on experiences to help young people understand the economics of life. In partnership with business and educators, Junior Achievement brings the real world to students, opening their minds to their potential. Today I was a volunteer and I taught 17 kindergarten and preschool kids.

The class I taught was actually a Montessori kindergarten, although it is part of Mesa Elementary School. Every student had to say the Pledge of Allegiance before the day starts:“I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”Followed by that, they said something about the diversity of the school and how they should respect each other and treat each other as they want to be treated. I was totally impressed with all this. We never did that when we were kindergarteners in China.

They're all brilliant children from 3 to 5 years old. They already understand the difference between an oval and an ellipse, which most adults don't even know. They count, add things together and play with different geometric shapes. I'm so relieved to see that Arnold will be in one of the similar classes in 3 years.

It was a thrilling experience. I'm going to volunteer again next year, maybe for 5th graders to see how different that is or how easy it is to catch a kid's attention. One thing for sure: children today have a lot more to enjoy than when we were that age.

The Banquet Photo

We decided that Biajee's skill sets as a good photographer is far from Accepted standard. We had to scan the free picture taken by hired photography team at the Corporate Annual Christmas Banquet.

The key factor to a good photo is lights. I don't think Biajee has mastered that piece very well. All the pictures he shot were too dark to even figure out who were in there. He gets used to all my comments these days. I remember when I went to NYC years ago and criticized one of his masterpieces with a pole sticking out between the middle of a couple, he got fussy all night and would not let either of us sleep. It took a lot of work to get him to agree that my opinion is somewhat correct, although I didn't take a photography class in the world famous Beijing University. You can simply tell the difference by all the pictures I posted on the blog for Biajee and Arnold.

We bought a snowcoat and five onesies for Arnold over the weekend, the first clothes we ever bought for him since he was born.

Party Weekend

We went to the company party on Saturday. It was a black tie party. I dressed up as a Japanese girl while Biajee put on his penguin suit. Men are boring. They don't have a lot of varieties of clothing to wear to a formal occasion.

Arnold had a great time at the mall in the afternoon. He fancied his own image in the mirror and thought he'd play with that baby in the mirror. We dropped him off at Sylvia's before we headed to Omni Interlocken Hotel. There were 800 people at the party. We did cocktail, dinner and dessert. Biajee drank two glasses of Merlot, which caused him a severe headache the day after.

I booked our trip to Maui on Friday night. My boss almost tended to disapprove it because that's the busiest week of the year. But he did let me go in the end. I stayed at work till 8:30 pm to show him how I appreciate it. Everything has a payoff. I have to work really hard between now and January 5th. I'm hiring a new person to work for me though. I hope I can just dump everything onto his plate by then.

Vacation or No Vacation

I need a vacation. I've been sick 3 times ever since I came back to work from maternity leave. I hadn't been sick for at least five years prior to all this. We started checking the ticket and hotel in Maui since Monday, but we had to wait for Biajee's boss to come back into the office. Now he is back in the office, he needs to figure out his January schedule. In the mean time, the air fare and hotel fees have gone up signiificantly.

I don't know how we can afford it if we don't book today. I cannot live without taking a vacation between now and early January. I am suffering from amnesia because I have to get up at 3 am every morning to pump for Arnold. And I need to pump at least 3 times while I'm at work every day. Nobody understands the pain of being a loving and caring mom. I could have opted to quit breast feeding, but then Arnold will not be the smartest and healthiest baby. I'm caught between the rock and a hard place. I cannot imagine how much freedom and free time I am able to enjoy if I don't nurse at all.

And we need the answer today: Vacation or No Vacation?