Wednesday, July 11, 2012

Big Adventure Ahead

I don't think it is an exaggeration to call getting on a 10 hour flight with a 5-month old an adventure. Yet, that is only the tip of the iceberg!

We leave tonight to head to Denver via San Fransisco. We have some luck in our favor to make our flights (if all goes as planned) nicer. We are flying out of the new international wing of Tokyo-Haneda Airport. This probably means very little to people not in Japan, but I'll try to explain. Haneda is about 30 minutes from home and the flight leaves at night. Narita (the other international airport) is nearly 2 hours away and the flights leave mid-afternoon. It's hard enough traveling with a baby, but starting the trip by throwing a wrench in Touma's normal routine didn't sound like much fun.

We are also lucky to be meeting my mom in San Fransisco, so if things are going badly at that time I have an extra pair of hands to help.

The last bonus is the carrier. We are flying Japan Airlines. That translates to "we're flying an airline where the flight attendants are friendly and helpful and will most likely not balk at the idea of watching Touma for 5 minutes if I have to use the toilet."

The rest of our adventure is of course seeing friends and family that I haven't seen in awhile. Particularly friends! I get to see some of my former teammates from college who I haven't seen in 10 years!! It hardly seems possible that it's been that long.

I will attempt to keep posting while we're on the road, but can't promise anything as I have no idea what kind of internet access we'll have. Either way... wish us luck!

Thursday, July 05, 2012

5 months old

I know I haven't posted many pictures lately, but there's just so much going on that half the time I forget to take pictures. I have to get better at that.

Touma is 5 months old! I can't believe it!?!? When did my tiny little baby get so big. He's nearly 17 pounds! (Holy cow!!) Our main mode of transportation (for him) is still babywearing. I'm trying to improve my core strength, but it's not going all that well. Luckily I have good carriers that last several hours before my back starts to get tired.

The big adventure we're working towards is going out on the train using the stroller. Our stroller is not that small (it's a jogging stroller), but it does fold nicely to store at home. We have to go on the train tomorrow using the stroller. Our station has an elevator, but I've been searching everywhere to see if the station where we are getting off has one. Very stressful and haven't found anything yet. (Boo!) I guess we'll just least early and figure it out when we get there. (Why are we using the stroller? Because my hair salon is baby friendly and I can take Touma, have him sit in the stroller AND get my hair done! Otherwise it would be carrier all the way.)

So, what does 5 months mean for our little man? It means he is rockin' and rollin' - literally! He can get up on his little knees and rock back and forth. He can also roll back to front and front to back easily. He also tries to get in a plank-like position and see how strong he is. It doesn't last long, but it's pretty funny. He's also a huge fan of his Johnny Jump Up! We listen to music and he bounces around. :-)

He went through a rough time with his night time sleep pattern, but he's starting to get back in the swing of things (and so is mommy!). I think we may start being early risers because he seems to really like getting up at 7, but then goes down for a nap around 9ish. That is something I can deal with.

Next week we leave for Denver to visit family and friends. I'm a little worried about flying alone with Touma, but we're flying on Japan Airlines and they are meant to be quite good. We are also leaving in the evening, which I'm hoping allows for both of us to be nice and tired that we can get some sleep on the way over.

And now, I'll leave you with one picture.

Playing with hats the other day.... doesn't quite fit!