kai took his first bubble bath ever! he wasn't sure what they were, so he cried for the first few minutes but after that, he enjoyed himself playing with bubbles :)

the stuff on the background is his shape bath toy from boon. we really love their cute and modern products, we also have frog pod, flo (which i used to do the bubble bath tonight), water bugs, flair, and most of feeding accessories, i recommend them all!

when i first starting the bubble bath...kai's expression is silly, i think...like "what???"

this is when he was calming down on crying...looks so pathetic.

we were back on working on our backyard today again. mainly we glued all the pvc pipes and assembled some sprinkler stuff. we will be back again next weekend to finish up installing the sprinkler controller, wiring, and some finishing touches! keep you posted!

first thing first! we fixed that drainage pipe that we busted when trenching. good thing that it only costed about $9 to fix, yay!

this is the special pvc glue we had to use to connect them all (it was like pretty much a hard core rubber cement). very pretty color but very very toxic!

daniel and his dad glued them all one by one.

and looks like that. i guess this glue drys in 30 sec. so they had to work fast!

here is our little helper...he was "working" very hard again ;)

re-digging the drainage pipe we just covered after fixing...

thought i'll document what he does to the house everyday (by trashing the house, that is) and what he plays with lately. he is into putting books on the couch side way to make them "stand." very interesting...or he would throw them across the room, so i prefer him doing this quietly ;)

he loves his little cart! everyday, he puts different things in there to cart around downstairs and today's pick were...a book, yo gabba gabba characters (muno and plex to be exact), yoshi, and some cups. ha ha ha.

he drags and rides this orange magis puppy around the house...and the puppy's been mostly in a "dead" position lately. poor thing :P kai is also have been trying to ride tricycle as well, definitely gets the idea but can't quiet get it going 'cuz he is still a bit too short to reach.

where was kai? well, he was napping in his bed cuddling snoopy today ;)

i think i'm getting sick! ugh!!! i'm just really tired, sleepy, minor headache, and one really dry spot in my throat (hate that!). i'm trying to get better by making myself to take it easy (trust me, it sounds crazy but i'm not good at just sit still and watch tv!?!) and catching up on my recorded tv shows as i drink my favorite ice cold oolong tea (it's 94 F/34 C outside) and take some cold remedy. i want this cold to go away!

stuff happens...yes i know. but this wasn't anything we expected! i was cleaning out the dirt on the trenches so it'll be more level when we put the pvc pipes. well, when i was i digging, i felt something weird then found our backyard drainage!?!?! see, where the trencher went through the pipe? i thought this was already a long project but now it just got longer to finish...greeeeeaaattttt!

this was when we discovered the disaster... :P

we started shoveling and digging.

after about 1 hour of doing that, we were done and cut the pipe so we can replace it with the new one.

here was our little helper (to say the least...), thought that count...right? ;)

we rented this trencher today with our neighbor mike and worked on trenching both of our backyards. i think we trenched about 12 to 14 inches (30 to 35 cm) deep in the ground. it seems easy but it took us all day to do it and at the end of day, they all have lots of blisters on their hands :(

i guess our next step is to clean and even out the trenches and go buy pvc pipes to put in there with sprinkler heads on the end of them. hopefully we can finish doing that on monday and be done with it!

i got this new wii game called ea active and it's so awesome! (so far anyways) i desperately need to lose weight and want to get in shape this summer, so i was excited to buy this game, not to mention it's getting awesome reviews. well, so far, i think this game is a lot better than wii fit because...

1. there's variety of exercises to choose from, not just like 20 moves on each sections
2. everyday is different combination of exercises (upper and lower body) so doesn't get repetitive and boring
3. i really sweat and "feel" that's working...yes, i wake up with sore muscles
4. it's designed to increase the intensity of exercises over time (like 30-day challenge) so you can really "work out" your body and hopefully get in shape!
5. i like how it constantly have "calorie burned" and "total time of exercise" on screen to see my progress

well, i 'll report how this work out in a month or so. i hope combination of doing this game and go on a walk almost everyday will do something to my body... i just have to be good and actually keep doing it rather than staring at the game ;) wish me luck!

see! this is what i'm talking about, such a trouble maker!!! he discovered how to get on top of the master bath sink a day before yesterday and loves going thru my make-up, play with the water, and voluntarily brushes his teeth (such an odd kid!). now i need to put a gate up so that he can't go in there anymore!

you can see "trouble!!!" in his eyes, right? he is definitely crazy these days...i really think that "trouble" should've been his middle name... kai has been really active and getting into things like there's no tomorrow!!! makes me wanna scream like crazy in the house too ;)

deedee gets this look when she is asking me for "help," poor thing, she gets beaten by kai on a regular basis but i swear they have a love + hate relationship! she hates getting beaten up by kai (of course!) but when kai is taking a nap, she's usually laying next to him and when he cries, she runs next to kai right a way! it's very cute to see that and i guess that's her way of "baby sitting" kai...

i finally made kai's door sign, i've been wanting to but i just couldn't find the right typography (that's when graphic designer's picky-ness really comes out, right?) to put on the chocolate brown bear sign (bought it at daiso- in japan). i painted the letters with same blue paint to match his wall color, can you tell? ;)

i went to different craft stores to find the "right" type but no luck...you know, i don't want curly girly type or serifs!...so i finally ordered them online. i should've ordered them a bit smaller cuz now they bug me a little that his name is not centered within the sign... (yes, i'm getting picky again!). oh well, i also ordered few more stuff, i'll post the pics soon.

it has been exactly a year yesterday that we've been living in our house for a year. we did lots of painting and personalizing the interior the past year but we have not touched our backyard at all. it's just dirt field :P definitely not very attractive picture!

since kai is getting bigger and a lot more active these days, we decided to start working on the backyard now so that it'll be done...hmmm i dunno when but maybe in a year??? we've been planning how we want our backyard to be and with a help of mike + michelle yesterday, we roughly marked the areas. we are planning on trenching the yard this coming up weekend so that we can put the sprinkler/irrigation pipes in the ground. wish us luck!

this is our rough backyard plan how we want it to be.

cont. reading for our backyard inspirations.

probably you can tell by now, we want modern, clean line, and simple architecture stuff for our backyard. i wanna make deedee a cool modern dog house (this one is very fancy tho) cuz she gets really hot from being black!

omg! this weekend was super hot! look at this bright sun!!! today, it went up to 104 F (40 C) during the day so we turned the air conditioning on and tried to stay cool. we noticed that the fountain at near by park is finally on from yesterday so we decided to take kai there for the first time this year.

there were lots of people/kids there...of course, we all think about the same thing, right? hot day, fountain at the park (free, of course), on the weekend... kai was having lots of fun today.

it's amazing to see how kai was enjoying himself so much today...last year this time, he was totally afraid of the water and wasn't walking yet... kai is growing up!! ;)

found this water squirt gun (pretty much everybody had it and had no idea who it was!) so he was tying to copy what big kids were doing and playing with it.

i have a feeling that you gonna be seeing lots of fountain pictures this year since it's like 5 min. walk from our house and kai's loving it ;)

2 different colors of lilies are planted in this neighborhood, red and yellow ones. in our front yard, we have this red one (but ours are not blooming yet...actually not even close :P). like the richness of the red, very pretty!

happen to see a lady bug hanging out on this yellow one so i had to take a picture! this lady bug don't have any black spots on the back!?! interesting...don't they usually have some kind of spots? i think in japan, they always have 7(?) spots on the back...i think...

finally got one of those bike trailer yesterday so we can go on a family bike ride! i didn't really think how much heavier it is to tow like extra 30lbs... my thighs are feeling it already ;0 i'm out of shape anyways, need to build some good lean muscles!!

he is such an escape artist lately! i tried to hold his hand but he doesn't want to and just takes off on his own...

so off to the park by himself.

today is kai's 17 months old b-day so i had to take his usual snoopy pictures. i took his 16 mo. pics but didn't post them 'cuz he was in a bad mood and crying the whole time :P but today, he was in a such a good mood and took some good pictures :)

he was "kissing" snoopy. awww, how nice of him!

big smile with lots of teeth!

this is my favorite pic of the day, he looks so innocent and cute =)

but maybe not so innocent after all, grabbing snoopy by his ears...

cont. reading for old pics.

this is his sad 16 months pic.

15 months

14 months

12 months + 1 day

11 months

10 months

9 months

8 months

7 months

6 months

5 months

4 months

3 months

2 months

1 month

today is a national kite day! so to celebrate, we had a picnic and kite flying event at the park with the mother's club. obviously, kai is little too young to get what's going on but he wanted to watch and hold the kite (that we borrowed from his friend).

his attention span on flying kite was super short, he was only interested in for about 5 min. and he was playing with other kids. and of course time like this, our windy town wasn't so windy at the time! so the kite was coming down constantly!

other kids flying the kite.

kai trying to keep up with the "bigger" kids. he happens to be one of the younger toddler in the group except less than 1 year old babies. i think he is doing good and learning a lot of good things and bad things from them ;)

i've been trying to take kai to the park everyday so that maybe he can make new friends and get him really tired to crash as soon as we get home ;) this park has lots of these giant palm trees and they are nice since they give us shady area to sit while watching kai :) today was really nice weather at the park, about 80F (26C), kinda hot in the sun but it's nice and cool in the shade because humidity is about 25% here and pretty windy.

he is getting a hang on riding this thing pretty well.

this is like his new thing to do, put the sand in his hair and all over himself, greeeeaaaaat!
(i wish i caught the top part of the sand too, would've been a much better picture!)

i like his brown hair color...where did he get that? we both have dark hair! lol

full of expressions again today! he is getting good at doing the peek-a-boo (or いない いない ばー) by himself. sometimes he surprises and cracks me up by doing that out of nowhere!?!? he is definitely a silly one!

when ka is in a good mood and wants to play, deedee is his easy target and she gets attacked (or probably "tortured" is more appropriate) by kai very often. this is right before that was about to happen...see how he is "eyeing" on her!

...and attacked! i'm just glad she is good with kai and being a good sport about it!

this is his typical "trouble maker" face. i still love his crinkles on his nose ;)

decided to bake amish friendship bread this afternoon. since it's one of the rule that i'm not supposed to use metal bowl while mixing ingredients so i had to do it manually (rather than using the mixer). in a process, i made a lot of mess on the counter!

this time it turned out pretty well...actually i made some few weeks ago and that turned out bad 'cuz i messed up measuring on some ingredients :( anyways, just in case you are wondering, this "amish friendship bread" taste like cinnamon + sugar pound cake. yum!

quick update on the trader joe's dessert that i talked about last week. this apple blossoms were pretty good, not too sweet, and only $1.99 for two in the frozen section. i baked them for about 15 min. in the toaster oven and were delicious and i totally recommend them!

on the other hand, the other dessert i bought, 'canneles de bordeaux' was okay. it wasn't bad but i'll just say that it wasn't worth getting fat for ;)

kai's grandma got him a pair shoes from see kai run. what a great brand name ;) these shoes are super soft and flexible (i guess they are handcrafted from soft sheepskin leather) but very well made at the same time. i like the "K" design on the side and chocolate brown + light grey colors are always plus! i bet they would look good with jeans! thanks grandma!

even the shoe box is cute too, or am i just so biased by the brand name?!?! ;)

i went shopping with trisha last weekend and one of our destination was to go to the urban outfitters. vanessa told me that she got some pillows (happen to be one i want too) on sale, so i knew i had to go! 'cuz i've been waiting for this boo pillow to go on sale for like the last 3 months. luckily, when we went, there were 2 of them left for $9.99 each, score! i just like the colors and fun illustrations by chris bettig, thought it would go perfectly in kai's room on his rocking chair. =) i just hope kai won't destroy the pillows for a while!

daniel and i worked on a logo project for the last few days for my dad's company in japan. this is to encourage individuals like his company employees and clients to do some farming on the weekend (be a "weekend farmer" kinda thing, i know, might be a funny english...) especially around yatsugatake area in nagano/yamanashi prefectures 'cuz that's the area his company actually have a field to do farming and also where 2nd house is located.

if you like go here to see some pics around the 2nd house when we visited japan last october.

guess what that is? well, this was our little weekend project to install the ceiling fan in our bedroom (this was the mid way, right before wiring). we had this crazy hot weather about few weeks ago and reminded us to get it and install it before it gets much worse for the summer time! we decided to go with the same ball fan that is in our living room to match it ;)

cont. reading for our ceiling fan journey.

this was the beginning...i was like "oh man, there's so many pieces to deal with!" ;)

from pieces to this point was about 30 min., looks like it's only 3:45 pm.

after 2 accidental trips of the breaker, figuring out like 10 different wire connections (we had to go look in the down stairs one after a while :P) and last but not least, putting the top "cup" in the ceiling took as long 'cuz we had to shove the wires and remote control pad all in there. when we were finally done installing the blades, it was 5:35 pm. it took us almost 2 hours to do that!

i'm so happy that we got it done (even with daniel's "tender" knee) and are prepared for hot nights during the summer. i totally felt like i was a electrician today, ha ha ha. ;)