Earlier this month, we got some hinamatsuri/early shichi-go-san photos taken by Atelier Kanawa at The Japan-America Society of Washington DC.
From Wikipedia: Shichi-Go-San is a Japanese celebration of the passage of children into the older years of childhood. The ages 3, 5 and 7 are considered lucky numbers in East Asian numerology, as they are odd numbers. In the tradition, boys who are aged three or five and girls who are aged three or seven are dressed in kimono — many for the first time — for visits to shrines. Three-year-old girls usually wear hifu (a type of padded vest) with their kimono. A more modern practice is photography, and this day is well known as a day to take pictures of children.
Shichi-Go-San is held in mid-November (usually on the 15th and observed on the nearest weekend), but I figured that I’d kill two birds with one stone by getting some early (or late, if you go by the traditional kazoedoshi or age reckoning) Shichi-Go-San pictures taken during this Hinamatsuri (Girls’ Day) photo session opportunity, since the kimono garb is exactly the same for both occasions.
With hina-ningyo for Hinamatsuri
Posing with a Chitose-Ame bag as is the tradition with Shichi-Go-San.
As you can see from a lot of these photos, the photographer had a hard time getting Mio to smile. She asked for Dan and I to help get a smile out of her, so we asked her what flavor of ice cream she wanted, and that did the trick:
Mio’s answer: “CHOCOLATE!” Unfortunately, she broke out of her pose…
Love our little Japanese doll!
Some behind-the-scenes snapshots I took with my phone:
The original photos we received from the photoshoot came back very yellow due to the lighting, so Dan had to do some color correcting to return them to a more accurate color (which is what you see above), but we’re pretty pleased with the end result. I myself never had the opportunity to wear a kimono as a child, let alone have photos taken in one, so I’m really happy that we could do this for Mio. I can’t wait to send these over to Mio’s great-grandparents and other relatives in Japan! 🙂
Our long-awaited baby girl is finally here! We’d like to officially introduce the latest addition to our family, Mirei Mirabelle Allen. She was born on Saturday, January 25, 2014 at exactly 9:00am, weighing a healthy 7 lbs 14 oz and measuring 20.5 inches long. We’re already in love!
We’ve been home from the hospital since Sunday afternoon, but have been taking some time to recover and adjust to our new family of four. It’s been difficult to find any time to update the blog (or have any free personal time for that matter) between taking care of a newborn, almost-3-year-old toddler, and my postpartum self, but I did want to pen down Mirei’s birth story details before they got too foggy in my ever-worsening mommy-brain, as well as share about the meaning behind her name since many have asked. As with Mio’s birth story, I can be quite wordy, so I commend you if you get through reading this entire post! These are really more for my own personal documentation, so that I can look back and remember my birth experiences for each of children.
Mirei’s Birth Story
Though Mirei was born on last Saturday morning, I’m going to backtrack to a few nights prior to that to give a full account of my labor experience with her. As I’d mentioned in my last blog post, I was stuck in prodromal labor mode since the previous Friday, when I’d started experiencing contractions on and off for a few days, but Friday had been the most consistent and they had gotten very irregular and scattered the following days. It was not until late Wednesday night (the 22nd) that the contractions came back in what seemed like full force. They kept me up into the early morning hours of Thursday, at which point they were between 3 to 5 minutes apart for three hours and were getting stronger in intensity. I called my OB and she told me to come into the hospital to get checked out. Dan drove me over at around 6am, and we waited in triage as my contractions were now consistently 3 minutes apart. When the nurse checked my cervix, however, I was only 1 cm dilated and 80% effaced. My OB came in and told me that she suspected that I was in early labor, but that it would probably take a while longer as I was only 1 cm and I was still able to talk through my contractions, which showed that they weren’t painful enough to be considered active labor. She said that I had the option to walk around the hospital, but that if we were hoping for a natural birth, she advised that we go home and labor at home until I made more progress because there was no way of knowing how long it would take. She did tell me that she was fairly sure I’d be back later in the day, but that it would just take several more hours for me to go into active labor. Needless to say, I was pretty disappointed, but I didn’t feel as crushed as when I had been sent home from the hospital while in labor with Mio. I knew in the back of my head that being sent home was very much a possibility after having had it happen with Mio, as well as from my experience on Friday night when my contractions seemed very real and consistent but only ended up fizzling out after five hours. Sure enough, after we returned home, my contractions eventually grew further and further apart and then completely stopped around noon on Thursday. I was frustrated but I just tried to get as much rest as I could the rest of the day, because there was no telling when the contractions could start up again.
At around 8am on Friday morning (the 24th), the contractions were back, but were manageable in terms of pain level and were about ten minutes apart for the entire day. They were just annoying in that they were persistent throughout the day, without much of a change in intensity nor spacing — they were uncomfortable enough to prevent me from taking naps, and just wore me out after continuing for the entirety of the day. At around 2pm in the afternoon, I noticed that I’d lost my mucus plug (or had my “bloody show”) so I knew things were in motion and that labor was probably close, but I wasn’t holding my breath. By late that night, I was already drained and in a lot of discomfort from the never-ending contractions — they had been going on for longer than any of my other pre-labor episodes, and I wondered how I was going to get any sleep. Around 11pm, the contractions seemed to bump up a notch and became longer, more intense, and harder to breathe through. They gradually started getting closer together, and Dan had to rub my back and distract me with random conversation to help me through each one. By that time, the contractions were definitely too strong for me to be able to talk through. By around 4 in the morning (now Saturday the 25th), I was close to tears and told Dan that whether the contractions were real or not, I was in too much pain to stay home and that I wanted to go to the hospital so that they could at least give me something to take the edge off. So once again, we headed over to the hospital at dark o’clock on the snowy roads. When they checked my cervix, they found that the baby’s head was very low, but that I was only 2cm dilated. I was in disbelief that I had endured so many tiring hours of contractions and yet had managed to make so little progress in dilating. I thought that dilation would for sure happen a lot faster given that it was my second birth, but apparently not! My OB and nurses asked me what I wanted to do, and I told them that I was just extremely exhausted and in too much pain to sleep. My wishes for a drug-free natural birth were out the window at this point, and I desperately wanted something to help relieve the pain. My OB decided to keep me at the hospital, and she recommended that I get the epidural, which I agreed to. She also told me she was going to give me Pitocin to speed up the contractions and break my water in order to speed labor along. I was admitted to the labor & delivery room around 6am, and had my IV, epidural and Pitocin administered and my bag of waters broken all within the hour, while I continued to suffer through the contractions which were getting more and more difficult to bear with each passing one. The anesthesiologist had some difficulty with inserting the initial anesthetic needles into my back which made things slightly more unpleasant, but by the time the epidural kicked in, I was able to finally breathe and rest for a little while. I was so drained and sleepy, but for some reason still had trouble falling asleep because despite the fact that the epidural had numbed me from the waist down, I could feel the Pitocin doing its work and could feel the pressure from the force of the elevated contractions. When my OB came to check me an hour and a half later (around 8:30am), she looked at me with surprise and told me, “You’re all the way dilated. That was fast!” I had gone from 2cm to 10cm in less than two hours. Dan and I were in disbelief because with Mio’s birth, it took almost 24 hours for me to naturally dilate to over 5cm, and then an additional nine hours from when I got my epidural and Pitocin for me to dilate from around 6cm to 10cm. We hadn’t expected that it would be time for me to push until at least a few hours later! My OB and nurses started scurrying around, getting all their instruments ready to clean and care for the baby, and by 8:50am they started having me push. I was still really exhausted and was worried that I was too drained of energy to push the baby out, but the nurses told me that I was doing well and the OB assured me that she could already see the baby’s head. After ten short minutes of about four rounds of pushing, I saw Mirei’s head emerge, followed by her shoulders, and then the rest of her body just slid out as the doctor pulled her out at exactly 9 o’clock in the morning.
I had forgotten how tiny newborns are at birth, and I just couldn’t get over how small Mirei looked as they cleaned her up to be placed against my chest. I kept repeating, “She’s so tiny!” while my OB and nurses countered, “Actually, she looks to be a pretty solid size for a newborn… of course she will look little compared to your toddler at home!” Her skin had a more purple tone than I remember Mio having at delivery (I just remember Mio being very red, with some extra pigmented blotches from her exit), and her little hands and limbs seemed so delicate and fragile! Dan cut the umbilical cord and we took turns holding our new baby girl. Her facial features were distinctly different from Mio’s — her eyes were wide but not quite as round as Mio’s, her eyebrows had more of an arch, the bridge of her nose seemed taller and her lips more thin and delicate. (A lot of people who have seen Mirei in person and in photos since have mentioned that she looks more like Dan, whereas Mio resembles me more.) Like her sister, her fingernails were already quite long at birth, growing over her fingertips so we immediately put mittens on her so that she wouldn’t scratch herself the way Mio did on her first day of life (she still has a very faint scar from it). When the nurses took her from us to measure her, they confirmed that she was a “solid” baby at 7 lbs 14 oz and 20.5 inches tall (which is an ounce heavier and half an inch shorter than her older sister). I got to nurse her in the delivery room, and she proved herself a natural! We got to spend a little over an hour after delivery in privacy, and Dan ordered a large breakfast for us which we enjoyed with little Mirei sleeping in our arms.
While this was not my first go-around with childbirth, the wonder of seeing a living, breathing baby emerge from your own body is so breathtaking and incredible, and it’s something that I imagine you never get used to, even if you’ve witnessed and experienced it before. I was in awe all over again, to see my baby girl who I had waited so long to meet. After a particularly challenging pregnancy and the drawn out pre-labor that I had gone through this time around, it made our first meeting all the sweeter. All my fatigue and pain just seemed to melt away in those first moments of seeing and holding Mirei, and I temporarily forgot all about the misery of my drawn-out on-and-off labor from the past week. I may not have had the “I am woman, hear me roar!” drug/intervention-free natural birth experience that I had been hoping to have this time around, but I still felt such an overwhelming pride and joy for this new life that I brought into this world despite all the hurdles that had been thrown our way — I was proud of myself and of baby Mirei for reaching what I feel is the most important goal of achieving a safe delivery that produced a healthy life, and was so thankful for Dan for being such a constant and unwavering support the entire time.
Here’s a video that Dan put together out of the footage he took of Mirei at the hospital and of her homecoming during the first two days of her life:
Behind the Name
Mirei’s name is Japanese, using the kanji (or Chinese characters) 美玲. The first character 美 (mi) means “beauty” and is the same character as the “mi” in the first part of Mio’s name. The second character is 玲 (rei) is a little more complex in the multiple meanings and associations it can have — it can mean the clarity or brilliance of a jewel or gemstone, and it can also mean clarity in sound such as the tinkling of bells ringing through the air. In simpler terms, the letter’s meaning can be summarized to mean “bright and clear,” both in appearance and sound — very much like the meaning of the name “Claire.” The name Mirei had actually been one of our top five choices when naming our firstborn Mio, and I guess we never really forgot about it because it came back again as a strong contender when we were thinking of possible names for our second baby girl. As the name implies, she is our beautiful gem and treasure, and it is our hope that she’ll have that same beauty and clarity in her heart and mind, in her thoughts and actions throughout her life and towards those around her. We also love the sound of the name “Mirei”, and the fact that it’s relatively easy for people to pronounce. There is actually a French name which has the same pronunciation, “Mireille” (think actress Mireille Enos of World War Z fame) meaning “to admire”, so hopefully it won’t be too difficult for the Western tongue… and I’ve heard from my Korean friends that the word/name “Mirae” (also similar/identical in pronunciation) means “future” in the Korean language. We liked that the name, or at least its pronunciation, has sort of a global presence and has different but positive meanings in other languages.
As for the middle name, we wanted to give Mirei a Western name as we did with Mio, and we chose “Mirabelle,” as it’s a girls’ name that I’ve always loved. Like Mio’s middle name “Elise,” it’s a classic, beautiful name that’s been in use for hundreds of years but isn’t super trendy as it’s outside the top 100 baby names. It’s derived from the Latin word “mirabilis” and means “wonderful” or “wondrous beauty.” The name sounds delicate, feminine, and sweet, and it was an easy choice as Dan and I both loved how it sounded and thought it went well with the rest of Mirei’s name.
Thank you for everyone who had been keeping us in your thoughts and prayers and sent positive labor vibes (as one of my close friends called it, “happy labor dust!”) while we were waiting for Mirei, as well as for all the heartfelt congratulatory messages that you sent us after her arrival. We can’t wait for everyone to meet Mirei, and we’re excited about this new chapter in our lives as a family of four.
Mio is exactly two and a half years old today! Every day, she grows more and more independent and adventurous. I find myself pausing once in a while to take mental snapshots of her, trying to indelibly burn these moments into my memory forever so that I can look back on them always. It’s been a while since I wrote an update on Mio, so I thought this was an appropriate time to document the things she’s been doing lately.
The Rundown at Two-and-a-Half Years Old…
Stats: I used to be so good about jotting down your exact weight, height, even head size… Now visits to the pediatrician are few and far between so my recordings aren’t as precise, and most days I’m too busy chasing you around to be able to pause and get any sort of accurate measurements. You’re definitely over 30 lbs now, and it’s been impossible to hold you for more than a couple minutes these days, especially due to my growing belly.
Things You’re Doing Now: You are growing into quite the little lady these days! Your vocabulary has really started to take off in the last couple months, and while you rarely speak full sentences, you’re definitely starting to string multiple words together to express yourself. The words you’ve learned to say are a pretty evenly balanced mix of English and Japanese words, and you can recognize and verbally identify a lot of things by both languages now. Some of the more random and interesting words/phrases that you’ve picked up and obsessively say these days are “kyuu-kyuu-sha” (Japanese for “ambulance”), “dinosaur”, and “How ya doin'” (said eerily similar to how Joey from “Friends” does…). Lately, you’ve been pretty interested in vehicles (firetrucks, ambulances) and dinosaurs, and it’s kind of refreshing to see that you’re still immune to gender stereotypes and haven’t become as interested in the whole princess business yet. We’ve found that you can recognize and identify a good 3/4 of the alphabet, and I can’t help but smile when I hear you trying to count with your own jumbled array of numbers. We’re thrilled to see that you’re already developing good manners, and that you usually remember to say “thank you” (which in truth sounds more like “ank you”) to people when they give you something or do something for you, without us having to remind you. You’re a people magnet when we’re out shopping or at grocery stores, as you’re always greeting people with a “hi!” and readily respond with a beaming smile and “ank you” to all their compliments. You seem to be doing pretty well with your first month of preschool, despite some instances of crying at drop-off and being a little overtired at pickup time. You like to hug my pregnant tummy and give it kisses, saying “Hi baby” and seem to be slowly opening up to the idea of your soon-to-be baby sister… though of course, we won’t know for sure how you’ll react until she’s actually born! You’re more active than ever and are always climbing onto high places and jumping, and frequently running into things, too, resulting in the occasional bruising — but you’re quite the tough cookie and rarely cry when you tumble or fall. Though there are some occasional tantrums and meltdowns characteristic of this age, you’re overall pretty cheery and happy most of the time, which makes things so much easier for us! You’re more affectionate than ever these days and are constantly peppering Daddy’s cheek with kisses and enthusiastically nuzzle your face against mine. We feel so incredibly lucky to call you our daughter, and count our lucky stars every night for how sweet, healthy, and bright you are.
The day after our routine ultrasound, we gathered a bunch of the family members and had a mini gender reveal party on Saturday afternoon, so that everyone could find out whether our second baby is a boy or a girl. (Some of my siblings had ongoing bets since the beginning of the pregnancy on what gender this baby would be, and they were eager to cash in!) We had some delicious cupcakes ordered from Georgetown Cupcake, filled with either blue or pink buttercream to show what the gender of the baby was! Mio was tasked with revealing the inside filling by biting into a cupcake.
Here’s a video of the gender reveal fun!
Delicious cupcakes from Georgetown Cupcake!
Topped with fondant ducks, they were filled with butterecream colored either blue or pink to reveal the gender of the baby.
Pink filling, which means… It’s a girl! ♥
So there it is! We’re thrilled to announce that we’re having a girl! Mio will have a little sister, who she will grow up to (hopefully) be best friends with. I cherish my own relationship with my younger sister, and so I’ve always hoped that Mio would get to experience the same joys of sisterhood. I’m sure they won’t be without their moments of competition and occasional jealousy, but it will be so beautiful to watch them grow up together. As for me, I’m elated to be a mother of two sweet daughters — I’ve always imagined myself a mother of daughters, and I look forward to the bond we’ll share as the ladies in the family. 🙂 Dan is very happy, too; Mio has been more attached to Dan lately and is growing into a total Daddy’s girl, which melts his heart! He’s very doting and protective over his little girl, and I know he’ll be like that with our second baby girl, too. ♥
On Friday, we went in for our routine ultrasound to see how baby’s growing, and to hopefully find out the gender! When I was pregnant with Mio, I had a few ultrasounds early on (I think at 11 weeks, 14 weeks, and then 20 weeks) for dating the due date and nuchal translucency testing, etc. This time around, they’ve only been checking the heartbeat at each appointment and told me they wouldn’t to do an ultrasound until we passed the 20 week mark, unless there were problems that arose (like not being able to detect a heartbeat, etc.). We’ve been waiting so long to actually see the baby, so it was so great to finally be able to “meet” our little one! Baby #2 measured how they should at this time, was moving around a lot, and is very healthy. There was so much movement that it was at first hard to get a good look at those telltale body parts, but we were able to get a very clear reading at the end!
Here are some of the pictures from the ultrasound…
The side profile of the baby.
Another view of the side profile.
Little feet!
Finding out the gender… can you tell whether it’s a boy or girl? 😉
Looking right at us!
The first half of the pregnancy has been pretty rough, and while the nausea is slightly better these days, it’s still very much there, and I find that I’m still constantly exhausted and needing to nap a lot. I’ve accepted that the remainder of the pregnancy probably won’t be much different. I guess pregnancy is just not meant to be a very enjoyable experience physically for me! At least we have the baby to look forward to at the end of all of this. We can’t wait to meet our precious little one. 🙂
