Hi. I know that students like to read things on the internet. My old page was here for a long time and I decided that it is time for me to give you some new information. I can't put up any pictures because Aichi Social Welfare asked me not to put pictures of Takumi on the internet.
Most of you know that the big news in my life is Takumi. About six years ago I applied to adopt a Japanese baby. I waited a long time and then I gave up. So I was very surprised in April when the Aichi Prefecture Social Welfare Office called me and asked me if I was interested in adopting a one year old boy. I met Takumi on April 19th. On April 22nd (his first birthday) I started visiting him every day at the orphanage. He came to my apartment several times to visit and on June 12th, he came to live with me.
Of course my life is very busy now. Takumi goes to DaiSan Public Daycare when I am at work. Our typical day goes like this.
6:00am - Takumi wakes me up. (sometimes he wakes up earlier at 5:00 or even 4:30). Takumi comes over to my futon and crawls and rolls around while I try to protect my face and head. He split my lip with his skull yesterday. His favorite position is to lie next to me with his head next to my stomach. He then likes to move his legs around a lot. Of course this makes it very easy for him to kick me in the head.
6:30am - I get up and make his bottle. While I feed him his bottle on his futon, I put away my futon (otherwise it's very difficult to put away as Takumi insists on being on top of it). I get the newspaper and start reading it. After Takumi finishes his bottle, he'll come and poke me or play for a bit. I can generally skim the whole paper in these 15-20 minutes.
6:50am - Takumi starts to fuss so I stop reading the paper. I start the laundry and then make breakfast. Sometimes Takumi will play by himself but usually I have to put on a video. Even then sometimes he'll just stand by the kitchen barrier (my kitchen is too small to childproof) and fuss. Today he stood on the rocking horse and pulled things out of the bookcase that he isn't supposed to be able to reach.
7:10am - We eat breakfast. Takumi is getting pickier. He used to get O-cha-zuke (rice soup) and tofu one day and scrambled eggs and rice the next, but he doesn't seem to like them as much as he used to. He always likes his yogurt and fruit and sometimes likes his vegetable soup (broccoli, spinach, squash or carrots cooked in chicken broth and then pureed.) He's very inconsistent about meals. Sometimes he wants to eat himself. Sometimes he only wants to use the fork (very hard with rice soup). Sometimes he wants to eat with his hands (ditto on the rice soup). Sometimes he just wants to play with a fork and a bowl and I can feed him. Usually he wants to put his fork in his ear, so much of the meal is spent saying no and blocking access to his ear. I'm having trouble making sure that each meal has some finger/fork food in case that's what he wants to do.
7:30am - I eat my breakfast. Yes, I now actually eat breakfast.
7:45am - I hang up the laundry. I put away Takumi's futon. I get the garbage ready to take out(three or four times a week). I take Takumi's temperature and try to think of something to write in his daycare book. Every morning I have to write his temperature, his health, how long he slept, how many times he pooped that morning, if he ate a normal breakfast and then something else. It is this last part that challenges me - whenever I have something that I really want to say or ask I don't have the grammar or vocabulary. For example this morning I wanted to ask if they know why he has scratch marks all along the back of his neck. When I try to use the dictionary, I don't have much luck - for example I will write that "he was nasty this morning" when I meant to say that "he was cranky." After I figure out his daycare book, I put on my school clothes. I change Takumi into his school clothes. And then somehow it's already 8:30.
8:30am - I rush out the door because I don't want to miss the garbage pick-up which is supposedly at 8:30. I think it's closer to 9am but I'm not sure.
8:40am - We arrive at daycare. I try to convince Takumi to walk across the yard (so far unsuccessfully). Takumi likes daycare. He holds his arms out to the teacher and happily waves good-bye to me. I put his diapers, plastic bags, clothes, book, hand towel, meal towels and bibs in their respective slots, hooks, pails and drawers. I then ask the teacher using pantomime and bad Japanese the questions that I tried (or didn't bother) to write in his book. Today she said that she hadn't seen him scratching his neck, so it was probably one of the other children who scratched him and she'd watch more carefully today.
9:00 - 5/6 - work. At some point during the day I ask Junko or Midori to translate Takumi's daycare book comments from his teacher for me. The daycare gave me two books so that I can alternate them and get them translated. They usually don't say anything important. For example, the book will say. "Today Takumi played outside. He played in the sand. He used the scoop a lot. There was a cat on the fence. Takumi pointed at it. He was happy to see it. His nose ran a little. He ate a lot of food at lunch and had seconds at snack time." They also tell me what he ate, when he slept, if he pooped and if he had a temperature.
5:00pm - I'm supposed to work from 10am-6pm but lately I've been leaving early since I've been coming in early. Evenings are really difficult if I don't pick Takumi up until 6:15 and he doesn't eat until 6:30. In fact usually he won't eat if I do this. I think that he is just too tired and he has a meltdown. The daycare gives the kids lunch at about 11:15 and then a snack at 3pm. Takumi really needs a bottle or another snack at 5:00 if he doesn't get dinner until 6:30pm. The daycare is unwilling to give him a bottle or snack. They say that the other kids don't get anything, so . . . Their refusal to give him a bottle has changed my opinion about the daycare. Before I had very mixed feelings. I really didn't like the way they dealt with me. (It seems that they are always telling me that I'm wrong or doing something badly.) But I thought that they were really doing what they thought was best for Takumi and that it was a very good place for Takumi to be. However, now I don't think that this is true anymore since they refuse to give him a bottle or milk when he very clearly needs it.
Anyway if I pick Takumi up at 5:00. I gather up all of his stuff at the daycare and we ride home. We usually stop and say hello to John (our neighbor's new puppy) and our closest neighbors' cats. When we get home, I try to unload the bike as quickly as possible so that Takumi can't try to go up the stairs to our second floor apartment by himself. Unfortunately, the place where the bicycles are kept has a low ceiling so I have to take Takumi out first.
5:15pm - I try to have a bottle in his hands by this time. While he is drinking his bottle, I start his dinner. After he finishes his bottle I play with him a bit and try to put off dinner until about 6pm.
6:00pm - dinner - pretty much the same as breakfast but never scrambled eggs or rice soup.
6:30pm - I eat my dinner. After that I take care of the laundry. I take care of Takumi's daycare stuff. I throw away the diapers, and put the clothes, bibs, and towels in the washing machine. I have to count the diapers and clothes and replace them. Takumi's name has to be written on the butt of all his diapers. Also he needs three bibs, three meal towels, a hand towel and three plastic bags (one for the meal stuff, one for dirty clothes and one for used diapers).
7:00pm - I run the bath and put out Takumi's futon. (I can't put out mine until he's asleep.)
7:25pm - We take a bath.
8:00pm - I give Takumi a bottle and put him on his futon (I know that giving him a bottle in bed is the cardinal sin of American motherhood but it works so well and I follow all the other teeth rules). He almost always goes to sleep immediately. I then do the dishes and clean a little. Usually I read, watch a video or knit until about 9:30 but for the last week or two I've been so tired that I've been going to bed at 8:30pm.
And that's our day.
This page last updated on September 12, 2002