The Mythos of Santa (and having to decide to believe or not)

Santa never came to our house when we were little.
It's not because I was a misbehaving kid, or being punished for pulling my sister's arm out of the socket when she was a little over one.

I don't think the idea of Santa was wide-spread in Japan yet (he was a mascot character for winter events, but not someone who actually gave you gifts), and I checked w/ Ichigo and she confirmed that we never got presents from Santa.

So I never believed in Santa.
And the concept of Santa is foreign to me.

It never hampered my life as an average citizen... until now.

When you have kids, all of a sudden you're forced to decide...Do we believe in Santa or not?

Okay, some people don't need to decide. It's a given. Santa exists for kids, and you keep the idea going until they start questioning it, no longer believe or something.

But for me, I have to learn this Santa business.

How do kids find out about Santa?
What age do you start talking about Santa? How do you make him believable? What's his back story!?

F*ck.
I don't have memories of the Santa fantasy (or the disappointment of finding out the truth), so it's really hard to comprehend.

I didn't know Santa gives you the gift you most want (or the expensive toy).
Man, you get the gift your kid wants the most, and you don't get credit for it? That kinda sucks. (Yeah, yeah. The joy in your kid's face is rewarding enough. Bah!)

So is that the joy of Santa? He knows the gift you want most? And you try to stay out of trouble, listen to your parents, don't pull your sister's arm out of the socket...so he'll bring you your favorite-ist toy ever?

What is magical about Santa?
He comes in the middle of the night to drop off gifts? Hmm. How do you know Santa dropped off a gift when there are other gifts under the tree? Doesn't it get lost in the pile? Or is the box so big, it's hard to miss?

And I knew about leaving cookies & milk (TV commercials tell you so), but I assumed you just buy cookies. Our friends are posting on FB about baking cookies w/ their kids. What!? Do you know how much mess I make when I bake cookies? The thought of baking w/ a 3-4 year old is making me dizzy.

I'm sure it's cute when kids believe in Santa.
But the cynical part of me would be twitching at the face if I had to play along with the Santa mythos.

Which brings me to the really important part.
I don't want to be the adult, nor do I want to have the kid, that ruins the Santa fantasy for other kids.

I've already come pretty close.
I openly talked about "not doing Santa as a kid" in Popo's music class. There are kids 2-4 years old who fully understand what adults are talking about, and some of the parents looked uncomfortable. I only realized later on that the parents were nervous their kids heard me.

Ugh.
If I'm not making any friends in the parent/tot classes, this is why.

So we haven't decided whether or not we'll believe in Santa yet. Popo is still scared of people in costume (Santa included), so we haven't even tried introducing her to Santa. I think she might know what he looks like from cards, books, TV and iPad apps, but not sure what he is.

But we'll definitely need to decide by next year, since she'll understand more and some of her friends will believe.

Is there a good book to read, so it'll help a first-generation Santa-ican understand this childhood magic?

The Pad

じゅるる had their company holiday party yesterday.

Last year, he was on some committee to help decide what prizes would be good. I whispered "iPad"... and they did give away a few. We just didn't win any.

In fact, じゅるる didn't win anything for 2 years in a row. The odds are pretty good to win SOMETHING. He just doesn't have that luck, maybe.

So this year, I sent him some luck vibes (curse?).
I bend my knees, legs at shoulder width, extend my arms, wiggle my fingers, and send him some chi (curse?).

Looks ridiculous.
But I have the luck. At least for little things, like gift cards and B*rney concert tickets.

And I get a text around lunch.

"Guess who won an iPad? Whoo!"

No. Way!

But for some reason, I couldn't tell people because I felt that the luck would go away if I said it before really confirming. Strange, isn't it? He already won it. It's not gonna get taken away.

(He could have dropped it on the way home. The car catches on fire and iPad burns up in flames. Asteroid comes shooting down the 405 and his car gets crushed. Earthquake comes and iPad gets swallowed up in a huge crack in the road.)

After a while, I message Sat. Message Ards.
Ards sends a nice list of free apps to get for Popo.

After charging overnight.
And downloading a few apps.
We show it to Popo the next morning.

Happy early Xmas!

Shiz Can't Cook Series: Persimmon Cookies

Somehow Ichigo thought I like to bake cookies or something.
Must be all the cranberry & w choco cookies I've been making.

So she gives me a vague recipe for persimmon cookies saying, "I like them."

Make them yourself!!

But being a better daughter than the pre-kid me (no, not really), I decide to try making persimmon cookies.

First off... the batter came out awfully wet.
Probably too much pureed persimmons.

But not being familiar w/ how baking works, I didn't really want to add more flour or other dry stuff. So I decide to just freeze the dough. That'll make it easier to mold and bake, right?

So I made these long rectangular log.
One w/ walnuts, one w/o nuts.

Froze 'em long enough so I can cut them.
Aw, I don't have any roasting strings. Floss will have to do (bfft!)

And they came out like this:

They don't look so bad.

They're just kinda... chewy.
That's probably the soft batter talking.

I'll try it again w/ more flour.

PS. Ichigo's reaction: "Oh, I like them in mounds."

Make 'em yourself!!

Shiz Can't Cook Series: Cranberry & White Chocolate Cookies

Eek, long time no write.

Back in the beginning of October, I helped organize a charity event and one of the gals brought these delicious cranberry & white chocolate cookies.

But I never got around to asking for the recipe, so I did some searching online. And found a few recipes... and one of them was an egg-free version. Awesome!

Since we have tiny bowls here, I cut the recipe in half. And also decreased the sugar by half.

Ingredients:
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup cream cheese
1/2 cup sugar
1 cup flour
1/2 cup cranberries
1/3 cup white chocolate chips

It's easy b/c you pretty much mix it all together.

Then drop them onto a baking sheet.
I like them in little mounds, but they can go flat too.

And voila:

Delicious little mounds of cream cheese cookies!

They're so easy, I'm chucking the idea of making Russian tea cake cookies to pass out to Popo's teachers for the holidays. This is our go-to cookie recipe now!

Hello, New Expensive Advanced Phone

Ardee said, a slide out keyboard would be easier to text (S Intercept).

Sat said, LG OV got a lot of great reviews.

じゅるる said, I can get whatever phone I want.

But two of the three agreed on one thing.
No phone is a toy for Popo.

So I agreed to keep the phone out of reach from her. Change my habits instead of training her. Really? I thought our mantra was "train her to live in an adult world."

Oh, then she touches adults' things & destroys them.

Bah. I could keep the phone way up high.
So I went with the $150 LG Optimus V.
I've never ever ever spent so much on a phone. Oh, except the prepaid phones in Japan. And we bought 3 of those.

And you know what? It's an Android phone.
Woooooow.

It's like... I've advanced 10 years.
Okay, not that much. Like 5 years?

But I don't really know how it works, so I'll have to play around with it. But my mind is really foggy from the cold, so I won't be able to figure anything out for a while.

Now time to manually enter in all my contacts. Before my old phone uses up its last bit of juice.

The End

Hello, Temporary Phone

So my plan was this.
I'll buy a temporary cheap phone while I decide on what phone to get next.

Sat's phone (K TNT) was cheap, and although it doesn't have a qwerty keyboard, it's something I could use for this weekend.

So after a Mitsuwa crepe run w/ Ardee, we stopped by BB and bought a similar phone (K S2100).

Got home & tried to switch my account over to the new phone. Nice thing about V Mobile is that you can do this all online.

But after I typed in the serial number, it gave me an error message.

"You need to migrate your service."

Huh?

So I call the customer service line.
And the kind young woman on the other line explained that I bought the wrong type of phone. Apparently there are two "classes" of phones. Inexpensive to semi-expensive ones are non-internet ready phones. And you only get talk minutes and you have to buy "debit money" to text. Whaaaaat?

The plan we currently have (semi-expensive to expensive phones) can do the unlimited data & text, but limited talk minutes.

But, but, but... my phone & my sister's phone can do unlimited data/text! And the phones are still available... oh, they're newer models. And they've been downgraded to non-internet ready. Really!?

Well, having to pay for minutes and then pay for text would be... like AT*T or Veriz*n.

FIIIIIIIINE.
I'll hurry up and decide on which phone I want & go return this cheapy phone.

So I head back to BB to return the cheapy phone (and buy a more expensive phone).

(to be continued...)

Goodbye, Phone

Yesterday, I made a lazy mistake.
I let Popo play w/ her saline nose spray bottle & left my phone on the couch. It appears that she's learned to unscrew the bottle cap.

And flipped the bottle upside down to pour the saline onto my phone.

I screamed.
Quickly dried off the phone.
And relieved that it was still working.

Or so I thought...

I didn't think to check all the nooks and crannies, and charged my phone overnight.

But it wasn't charged.
Hmmm...
Maybe the charger came loose on the extension cable.
Nope.

So I look at the charger port, and it's a little green-ish. Oh. My. Gosh. It's that time she poured saline on the phone. It's corroded!!

The phone works fine. But without any way to re-charge the phone, my phone is dying a slow death.

With one bar left on the battery life, I didn't know how much longer I had the phone.

(to be continued...)

We are All Officially Sick

It always starts w/ Popo.
She catches colds from various places. But I have a few location suspicions. Like Westside P's food court play area. And WBC's ballpit.

Anyhoo, even if Popo gets sick, it doesn't necessarily hit the rest of the household. Sometimes (like 50%) it hits じゅるる. And I get hit about 10% of the time.

But this time... we all got it.
Popo got it first. じゅるる started getting a stuffy nose by her 2nd week. And by the time her 3rd week was starting, I was sick.

So now we are all on antibiotics. Popo for her ear, じゅるる for his bronchitis-like thing, me for... something.

Isn't it too hot to be the cold season?
It makes it hard to get better when you end up kicking off all the blankets too.

We Joined the Y

We learned that the Y offers free childcare as long as you're in the building, so we took tours of the two local facilities with the intent of enrolling in one.

I'm not a workout type of person, but there are days where I would love to get away from a certain critter. Maybe I'll walk on the treadmill. Maybe I'll do water exercise w/ the old folks. Maybe I'll sit on the bench and watch other people working out.

First we went to our usual Y.
That's the one where Popo takes her swim class (= water play time).

CP's rates are $125 joining fee & $60 per month for the family membership. They just got brand new gym equipment (じゅるる said it had a "new car" smell). Childcare is only in the mornings to noon, and in the afternoons. But tot classes are all free w/ membership.

The next day, we went to the next closest Y.
WS is a bigger, nicer facility. But the rates are $169 joining fee & $90 per month for families. Ack! But they have a hot tub, sauna & steam room in both the men & women's locker rooms. Childcare is longer hours, and the room was much bigger and had more windows. But tot classes still cost money, altho it's half the price of non-member class fees.

Even though I was attracted to WS, we ended up going w/ CP. Cuz we didn't know if we would be able to make a full use of the facilities in either places, so why not start low? Plus we're able to go to the other Ys four times per month. Ha! Time to use the hot tub & sauna!

Then when we went to sign up, CP said they're waiving the joining fee ($125) if we've taken classes before. What!? I love you!!

So now we've been members for 2 weeks. Used childcare two times. Took two water aerobics class. Tried family swim once. So far so good. The only problem is Popo's been sick, so we can't really use childcare now. Or go to family swim. And I haven't gone to the other Y for the hot tub, but we did join their tot gym class (at the cheaper rate).

Next might be yoga. Or tai chi at the other Y. Or if I'm adventurous, maybe zumba.

Shiz Can't Cook Series: Egg-less Cupcakes

So now that we know Popo is allergic to eggs, I looked up some egg free cupcake recipes online. Most of them are chocolate... but I don't think I'm ready to give a 13 month old some chocolate yet.

Then! I found a vegan website that had these strawberry cupcakes. Could be muffins. What is the difference between cupcakes & muffins anyway? With or without the frosting?

Anyhoo, I decided to give it a try.

The dry:
1 3/4 cup flour
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp baking soda

The wet:
1/2 cup canola oil
1 Tbsp vinegar
1 tsp vanilla
8 oz strawberry puree

I don't really care for strawberries, nor do I have frozen strawberries on hand, so I substituted w/ cranberry-raspberry apple sauce. Each snack cup was 3.9 oz, so 2 snack cups will do.

Oh, the original recipe asked for 3/4 cup to 1 cup sugar, but since this is for a toddler, I went w/ 1/3 cup sugar. Drastically less, but it should be sweet enough.

The site said to mix the dry, then mix the wet separately, but I just dumped them all in the same bowl. Started out w/ the dry, then added the wet.

Maybe I should have waited to put the vinegar last, since the chemical reaction of the baking soda + vinegar is supposed to do something for baking, right? But I don't know the science of it, so I just dumped them in random order.

The batter looked rather purple, even though the cranberry-raspberry apple sauce was dark pink. I might get purple cupcakes *laugh*

Also the batter isn't very liquid-y. Kinda lumpy, like oatmeal. But I poured/dumped them into the cupcake molds.

Oven: 350F for 22 mins

Ta dah!
(wait, it's still baking... photo & description coming shortly)

Shiz Can't Cook Series: Chicken Bao

Lately I've been using the bread machine for making dough.

Last time I baked individual round white bread (and some w/ jam & cream cheese on top), which came out pretty good.

This time I decided we'll use the dough to make chicken bao.
I used this recipe as the base, but omitted the dark sauces & most of the sugar since we're not making a BBQ pork bao.

Chicken bao filling:
1) Cook chicken
1 Tbs oil
1/2 lbs chicken, diced
salt & pepper to flavor

2) Cook onion, green onion separately until soft
1 Tbs oil
3/4 cup onion, chopped
4 Tbs green onion, chopped
1 cube of mashed garlic
1 cube of mashed ginger

3) Mix in chicken
1 tsp sesame oil

4) Add the stuff to make the "goo"
4 Tbs cooking sake
1 Tbs sugar
1 Tbs corn starch

We didn't have regular sugar, so added brown sugar. The recipe called for 3 Tbs of sugar, and I wasn't planning of putting it in, but I forgot & added 1 Tbs. It was a little too sweet. Next time we'll cut it in half.

Good thing Sat was there to work on the flavoring. I'm not very good at determining how food should taste. That's why Shiz can't cook, yo!

As for wrapping the gooey chicken in the dough... I thought it'd be the same as gyoza. Hm, these things need to be stretched out. My first one ripped at the bottom... but I stuck the bao on wax paper & it covered it up.

So they key is to don't stretch out (=thin out) the bottom, but the edges.

Okay.
The next few looked pretty good.

After 10 mins of steaming... voila!

It was actually really good :)

Now I did mess up on the last batch. I forgot to check the water level of the steamer... and it ran out of water for the last minute or two. So the bottoms got a bit burnt. Oops.


But Dee said it still tasted okay. Whew.

Next we'll try BBQ pork or red bean. Yum!
My goal is to make 'em nice and pretty looking, so I can take them to potlucks... but that may not be happening anytime soon.

Shiz Can't Cook Series: Baked Cheese Cake

Last week, Ards offered to help make cupcakes for Popo's birthday.

It was a red velvet cake recipe, so it said to get 2 cups of cream cheese ready for the frosting. So Ards got a tub of cream cheese from Costco. Only to realize that 2 cups was 1/4 of the tub (to her credit, she was calculating for two batches... but we didn't need that much frosting & only made one batch for the two batches of cupcakes).

Since I was left w/ a good amount of cream cheese, Sat told me to make cheesecake.

Okay, I heard it was pretty easy... but I never made cheesecake before. And with no one around to oversee my baking? This can't end up good.

I bought a cheesecake book at BookOff ($1).
Also looked at CookPad.
And found a "just mix everything in a bowl" recipe for baked cheese cake.

Recipe conversion from Japanese measurements to US measurements is tough, but that's where Google/Bing comes in handy. They're just estimates, but good enough for me!

First, I tried to whisk the ingredients all together.
But lots of little clumps of cream cheese remained.

Time to whip 'em all up in the Magic Bullet!
Argh! The recipe is too much for one MB cup. Split the mixing into two batches...

Ta-dah!
Looks very foamy, but let's pour away in silicone cups (lined w/ cupcake sheets).

It was barely enough for 12 cups.
(The original recipe was for a 15cm round. That's like... 6 inches?)

Baked the cheesecake for 40 mins.
When they came out, they were nice and puffy. But I knew it was going to shrink when it cools down... and shrink it did.


The middle seems a little undercooked, but it has the sour-ish taste of Japanese cheesecakes.

I heard you can make this in the rice cooker too.

Aches & Pains

Recently, I've been having some aches and pains all over.

First, I had trouble raising my right arm.
I was worried I had 四十肩, altho I'm not 40 yet.
But I realized it's probably due to carrying Popo on a sling recently. So I switched the shoulder I carry her on, hoping it would relieve some of the pain. It still hurts, but not like before.

I'm thinking of doing 準備体操 every morning, but haven't gotten around to it. I should bookmark the YouTube vid.

Then recently my right leg has a lot of pain.
I thought it was around my hip joint area, but now my knee hurts. It's the same knee I busted in a mini skiing tumble I had when I was 19. It's hard to walk up and down the stairs sometimes.

Well, I'm going in for my 35 year physical this Friday, so I guess I have more things to talk about.

I really want them to fix my middle finger. It's been cracked for 3 months now.

The Past 365 Days

At 10:49am this morning, we've been parents for exactly 1 year now.

Let's see how my life's been for the last 365 days.

I've been struggling with my identity as a semi-work-at-home, almost stay-at-home and non-income-generating parent. With my almost non-income, I've been quickly emptying out my savings account(s) for the condo. Thank goodness one of my savings account is a bit difficult to access, or that would have been long gone too.

I've been contemplating between looking for a minimum wage job (like cashiering at F*mima or M*tsuwa), looking at part-time accounting work on Craigslist, thinking about working full-time, wondering how much I'd be able to pay my mom to look after Popo, realizing she probably doesn't have the capacity to look after her full-time.

It's all hard to coordinate!
But I figure things will fall into place somehow, so I'm not too worried about it too much.

I started out thinking my kid will just grow up as a kid surrounded by adults. I don't know any kids, so we'll just hang w/ the adult friends. And she seems to enjoy them a lot.

But the cheapskate Asian woman in me had to look up free things to do... and boy, did I find them. And with my eagerness to share this newfound knowledge, I ended up joining a MOM'S GROUP. Yeah, mom's group. Crazy, eh!? (I still like to call them parent groups, tho)

I didn't just join one group too. I joined two online groups, made friends(?) in some classes... exchanged emails & cell numbers!? I NEVER answer my cellphone! And here I am, texting people I've only met once or twice.

We still go to sleep around 2am. Wake up at 8:30am. That's probably not enough sleep, but we got by before & it's not too bad right now. Some parents think we're crazy allowing Popo to be on a similar schedule (12am - 8am), but it works for us & I don't feel the need to change it yet. Maybe when she goes to daycare that'll change (or not, sinceじゅるる can take her in the morning).

I still have no interest in cooking. And Popo seems to like my mom's food over what I make. I'm glad she's okay nibbling on frozen veggie mix boiled w/ a bit of soy sauce & tiny amount of sugar.

My manga consumption is a lot less than before, but that's been the overall trend between me & Sat for the last 2 years. No access to cheaper manga, less series to follow after some ended, and the rising yen keeps us to 4-5 new manga per month. Sometimes we go through major withdrawals, then cry over the cost of a 400yen manga (and we don't even bother buying the 505yen ones anymore).

I still bite my nails when I'm bored/hungry.
I cut my hair twice.

And I didn't expect it, but I'm comfortable w/ this little creature attached to me all the time. Altho it's probably not that different than having Koge around. Just a little needier for now.

And we have at least another 17 years to go?
Oh boy. I didn't need to think that.

Ramen Celebration

Sat, じゅるる, Popo, me & Ards went to eat ramen at Mits*wa tonight.

It's a late celebration for Ards' advancement.

It would have been nice to go somewhere... nicer? But Ards wanted to eat ramen.

So we had ramen, bottled green tea & individually wrapped chocolate cake for the celebration.

Yay!

Japan Quake Fundraising

Steph wanted to do a fundraising event for the Japanese quake/tsunami victims, so she recruited a bunch of her friends.

Me?
Currently in hybernation from all this event planning... but joined their efforts.

So we spent three mad crazy days w/ very little sleep to throw an event together.

And I think it was pretty awesome.
There are rooms for improvement, but isn't that always the case?

Ards & Dee came to help too.
And we bumped into old friends too.

Time to think about a new event.

Missed Dr Appoint

じゅるる set up a dr appoint for me cuz I have a cut (crack) in my finger that hasn't healed in over 3 months.

But I got so caught up w/ screaming Popo & helping out w/ the We <3 Japan project that I completely forgot about it... and I missed it.

Oops.
Well, my finger will have to wait for the next appointment.

Shiz Can't Cook Series: Tofu Salad

Hey, I can make a decent tofu salad.

But this is what happens when you're kinda tired to actually cook... and feeling a bit silly from the lack of sleep.


Heart of Romaine greens w/ a BLOCK of tofu on top. It's circular because I like using the soft Korean tofu for tofu salad. They crumble easy & act like dressing.

Drizzled w/ Kraft's Asian Sesame salad dressing.

Normally I wouldn't trust a non-Asian company's sesame dressing, but this one is pretty good! And much cheaper than the Japanese ones!

Oh, I thought it'd be funny to leave the tofu the way it came out of the container. I was giggling as I served it. じゅるる kinda gave a "I'm not impressed" look, but cracked a smile later. Cuz smiles are what's important in family life.

And here's the rest of the recovering-from-sickness-and-can't-cook dinner:

Beef skewers from Trader Joe's.
I think they're like $2.99 for the container. Has 12 mini skewers.

We bought these as back-up for the potluck where I took chicken & beef satay. Just in case I mess up. I would take these.

It was pretty good!
Maybe I shouldn't bother slaving over homemade satays anymore. At least until Popo is old enough to help skewer.

Violent Stomach Flu

So after spending a whole week as a virtual single parent & surviving Popo's first fever w/ the help of Ichigo... I caught the virus.

And I guess it was a stomach flu, because it caused me to puke very very violently. I think it scared じゅるる a bit & he was ready to drive me to the ER.

Saturday 3:00pm
It started out as an upset stomach.
Kinda like a heartburn. Where you feel like you ate too much oily food. I did have Carl's Jr for lunch (chicken burger & shared chili cheese fries w/ じゅるる).

Over the next three hours, I get progressively nauseous until...

6:00pm
First bout of puke. And then a few more times until midnight. Everything I ate or drank came right out.

Sunday midnight
It gets runny on the other end. But the nausea continues, so I'm holding onto a baby pail I got from the hospital in case I hurl as I sit in the restroom.

I think before all this, my stomach hurt a LOT. But you can't take painkillers on an empty stomach. What to do!? Heating pad helped... only a little.

During all the pain, I was thinking how if I never got an epidural, this pain would probably feel like nothing. I only reached the tip of the unbearable pain last March, so I don't know real pain... and so I think a pain from a stomach flu is pain level 8. Weak!

5:00am
Finally able to go to sleep. Before that, I would be able to take short naps of 20mins until it got too painful & I wake up running to the bathroom.

Oh, to keep my loved ones from having to stay up with me, I slept by myself downstairs. With the comfort of the heating pad. And Season 1 of Brothers & Sisters (thanks Netfl*x).

9:00am
Everything is drained out of me, but I have no apetite. じゅるる offers to go get popsicles. That made me really really happy.

And I spend the rest of the day sucking on popsicles. Hungry, but don't want to eat feeling. And secretly thinking, if the fever/flu lasts couple of days, I may lose a significant amount of weight. But even more back of my mind thinking how じゅるる can't take anymore days off b/c he took a whole week off last week.

12:00pm
Fever starts. Around 101 degrees. Ah, just like Popo.

So we missed Ards' Super Bowl party.
We didn't even bother watching it at home. We ended up watching the rest of Brothers & Sisters Season 1. Gosh, it's much more tense than Parenthood could ever be. My heart can only handle Parenthood level of tenseness, yo.

6:00pm
Fever starts going down, but now headache is starting. Still can't take painkiller b/c of empty stomach. Yikes.

I was able to eat a modest amount of food by the evening & by the time we went to bed, I was feeling good enough to let go of the heating pad & ice pack.

Lasted about 18 hours.
It was a violent and quick stomach flu.

Need to Learn Camera Settings

I don't know a single thing about photography.
While I appreciate the art, I'm not that interested in it. There are plenty of others around me who can take great pictures, so I don't have to be that good.

Then... I've been taking lots of photos at these parent meetup group events. And I post them to the site, but now I'm a bit embarrassed at my lack of skills.

One thing I really need to learn is how to adjust the settings on the camera. Since I don't have thousands to spend on better lenses, I should make the most out of camera settings. But I know NOTHING about 'em.

Is there a good site or book for beginners?
Something that can explain to a non-enthusiast?