Kokochi

Simply pretty

Spotted while shopping in Hayes Valley.

Andy's face

Dav can explain this as it was his idea. What a prankster! But that's what I love about him; watching him work on this crazy mask, coordinating with Sean who provided the multiple masks for other partiers, and laughing from aside as the crowd took tons of pictures of each other wearing the masks.

What I liked most was the beautiful mural you saw when standing at the front door of Andy's apartment. Bet he'll miss that when he leaves for Amsterdam.

Breakfast at La Note

In Berkeley. Always a pleasure to pretend I'm in southern France. I love my morning cafe au lait in a giant round bowl. Kimi and I shared Brioche pain perdu (with cinnamon), and an omlette with ratatouille.

Art Project Notes

I'm 14 weeks now. I keep losing track, but a friend pointed out a nifty site that I signed up at, and it tells me where I am, and what is supposedly happening. Apparently, Gargle, our Little Bug, is about the size of a lemon from head to butt. Hands and feet moving about. And Gargle can gasp. Interesting.

Me? I feel fine.

I enjoy:

• food


• seeing the belly grow


• Dav's hand on my belly


• Dav's extra loving care


• wearing this secret BellaBand thingy that allows me to wear pants I no longer really fit in (pic). It covers my unzipped pants!


• having a friend tell me I get her crib that she's been keeping for me


• sharing all this with friends and family

What's a bummer:

• peeing frequently


• tight belly if I eat too much


• Kats or Waka deliberately walking on my belly, pausing to ponder about something while their weight digs in. Move!!


• a pinched nerve in my butt that electrocutes me ever so often

a new year

Random shots from NYE. Instead of our usual Sea of Dreams gathering with all our friends (we've done it 4 years in a row!), we opted to hop around from house party to house party, hanging out with different groups of friends, enjoying a mellow conversation (vs. dancing and partying hard), and wandering to the next place when felt like it. Most of our Campalicious friends did the same and we all enjoyed it.

Thanks to Toni though, we all first gathered at her house for dinner. I really treasured getting to feel our groupiness. It was like a grand reunion. I basked in the care and love everyone showed for our 'art project'.

When we finally headed home way past midnight, we ended up spending an hour or so at our neighbor's whose party was still in full swing. I was quite amused when someone came up and said, "my friend thinks you're cute but he's too shy to approach you." Telling him I was married and pregnant sure drove him away!

Once we got home, a few other friends had stopped by with a group of about 10 folks. So a party started anew! I was so surprised I stayed up! Later, after Dav was already in deep snooze, I got a call from dear Rachel and Cesar who wanted to stop by after their wild NYE party to "hug" me. I was so happy, and we snuggled in front of the fire place catching up on the night til about 6am. For a sober gal, I partied well, eh?

Happy Dog Year!

[update]

Toni posted our group picture from the dinner gathering. Man, I love our friends and am sooooooooooooooo lucky to have them!

scenes from our road trip

It's been a wonderful week+ off. We originally were planning to go to India, but things got hectic and we opted for a simple road trip down south with no particular plan. I loved driving around, and stopping along the way whenever we wanted. We first spent a few nights in L.A. meeting up with Dav's newly engaged cousin. Went to the beach area and rode a mini roller coaster (for Dav, it was a kiddy ride, but as you can see, I managed to get a shot of myself sorta freaking out). The last 3 pics are random from the Getty Museum.

This is from Ensenada, Baja, Mexico. We spent one night there, then drove down more south in hopes of finding a mellow small fishing village. Problem was, those tiny towns on the map were so small there wasn't a place to stay. So we ended up coming back to Ensenada for a second night. I was hoping for warmer weather, but it was quite chilly. We enjoyed the fish tacos cooked up by the port though.

We stopped by San Diego for quite a bit. Joined my high school friend and her family for Christmas Eve dinner. Stayed at Jessica's house for a total of 3 nights. Very comfortable and cozy. Visted the Wild Animal Park (Dav has much better photos that I'll link to later), and stopped by my old house when I lived in San Diego during gradutate school. Ah, the memories.

The rest are random shots from driving back up north: the elephants seals by San Luis Obisbo (gosh, they are huge and weird looking), and a few shots from the Hearst Castle (again, Dav has better pictures that will be up soon).

Overall, although we stayed so close to home (vs. going international), it was a fun and relaxing vacation!

early Christmas!

We're taking a road trip down to L.A., San Diego, and Mexico for Christmas...leaving like right now (we were supposed to leave an hour ago). Since we'll be away on the 25th, I made the sneaky decision to open all our presents last night!

We didn't decorate much holiday stuff, but placed received gifts around a succulent plant, and stuck an ornament on it (a tiny Christmas photo frame in which Dav stuck this picture). With the cards we've been receiving, it got holiday-ish enough :)

Received funky Santa hats (perfect for next year's Santacon), Japanese sox with individual toes (or the "tabi" kind with the big toe on its own), neato postcards that I fell in love with, a head-bobbing handmade cat, many yummy Japanese snacks, and...what I smiled much over...a gift for "our newcomer." It was a fluffy hippo. I called my parents, and my mom sheepishly confessed she couldn't help it. Made me very happy!

I loved the Christmas card we got from my parents...addressed to: Dav & Mie & Gargle. Yes, our Little Bug has a nickname from my dad already. So Gargle it is!

Happy Holidays to everyone! Enjoy the rest of 2005, and see ya in 2006!

Check out Mr. Dav Impossible Yaginuma

Interviewed on Biznik. Now, if I weren't married to Dav, and I read this interview and saw his picture, well, I'd start stalking him. Or showing up magically at PlaceSite meetings. I'd do my best to meet him, even though I'd be disappointed he was married.

Thank my lucky stars that I am married to him!

Here's a little back story to how this all happened. Small world all connected :)

how did we end up so traditional?

As you may know, Dav and I sorta enjoy and even relish being a bit different. We like to think that together, we can build a life thoroughly original, living to our standards and not too influenced by social rules or pressures. Our Burning Man wedding encapsulated perfectly what we feel for each other and our relationship.

But when Ele posted the warmest and most sweet blog post about our bun in the oven (I love her 1+1=3 title), I couldn't help but realize Dav and I actually fall into a traditional life sequence so well that we fit a well-known children's rhyme! Geez... No matter. Ele balances that realization out with our devil-horned Folsom Street Fair picture, and predicts we'll have "the world's grooviest baby."

Thank you, Ele!!

Dav and Mie's art project

I am horrible at keeping secrets, so I'm happy to finally get to spill the beans. It's about that art project I referred to a while ago, and it's why I haven't been going out much since I've been so freaking tired. In addition to being called our art project, we have called it Little Bug. Yep, I'm due July 2nd!

This picture here is when we got my parents on iSight and told them the good news. My mom teared up, and my dad said, "great work!"

I got to hear the heartbeat last week. That was wild. My tummy is definitely sticking out, but it's really hard to believe there is a life growing inside me. When I last went to the doctor's, I half expected her to say, "hmmm, seems to be gone," so hearing the heartbeat was reassuring, but also made me admire my body. The process is actually working! When Dav, Katsuo, Wakame and I are all snuggled up in bed, I now think we have 5 beating hearts on one bed.

When Dav and I babysat Tyler and Julia, Nicole left the kindest comment. Little did she know that we already had thought about it, and already had a bun in the oven!

Dav has started taking weekly photos which I hope we can turn into a sorta animated show of a belly growing. I must say, it's a pleasure sharing this with Dav, and I love having him hold and rub my belly. We've got a lot of adjustments to go through, but it's quite an exciting project, no?