Saturday & Sunflowers

On Saturday I spent some time with my friend Annie since both our husbands were working. Well, Duke is actually deployed right now, but I'm sure he was working wherever he was. We went to brunch at Coffee Casa, walked to the seawall, then later that afternoon we went to the sunflower field where they usually have the sunflower festival (they moved it this year). But we got our pictures in! I don't know what I'm gonna do when Annie LEAVES ME this summer. We're kind of each other's personal photographers, since our husbands are always stuck at work. Love this little island! See sunflowers from last year here.

longboarding adventures

I have this cool, hip friend who just bought a longboard. So she brought it over to my place so we could give it a whirl. I think I've been on a longboard once before for about 5 minutes. It was so fun!!! I think I need one now. Maybe not super practical with a baby. But I'm sure I could figure out something ;)

Annie & J boy

Winston was also pretty enthralled with the longboard...until we tried to get him on it. There was a moment we got the longboard moving, but winston's hind legs were straddling the board and they were running to keep up with it. I was dying. Thanks for the laughs Winston.

Thoughts on Motherhood Part II

The past three months have been challenging. However, I can finally say I'm at the point where I'm loving being a mom. It took a while for me to get here though. I guess I'm just not a fan of the newborn phase. Someone told me the first 12 weeks are the hardest and I can now say "tell me about it".

When Lucy hit about a month or two I had a lot of people ask me "Do you just love being a mom?!". I honestly didn't know how to answer that question. I guess the real answer was no. My feelings were: I love HER. But I do not love sleep deprivation, the sound of her crying, my breastfeeding troubles, not being able to go places easily...and the list goes on. It surprised me and scared me a little when people asked me that question and I couldn't just answer "yes!". I felt like that's how I was "suppose" to feel. It's also how I expected to feel.

I also found myself getting frustrated on social media. I follow a lot of people on Instagram that have babies and young children. I kept seeing all these posts saying "oh my house is so messy and I have a million things to be doing, but there's NOTHING I would rather be doing than sitting here with my babies!" Even people with newborns raving about how they just LOVE it all! It made me a little upset and I just wanted to grab them and yell, "stop lying!!" I started to feel like I was on the inside of something and I knew the truth.  

It made me sad that I wasn't LOVING it. I always wanted to be a mom and kind of assumed I'd love it. 

Fast forward to 12 weeks. Something magical happened. I didn't notice until a couple weeks later, but I realized I was loving it. By 12 weeks she became more predictable. She wasn't so crazy gassy and screaming in pain, I was starting to understand what her different cries meant, and what she preferred. My breastfeeding problems resolved. I felt like Lucy was a happier baby. She was smiling at me and I was feeling a love between us I hadn't felt before. 

So I'm here to give people hope (and remind myself in the future) it gets better! I know it can only go up from here. I feel lucky to have this little chicken nugget. I know there are still gonna be lots of ups and downs, but the love is all worth it! Her sweet smiles and giggles make me smile everyday.

I love you Lucy Joy!

Shikinaen Royal Gardens

Over New Years weekend we went down to Naha and visited this peaceful garden. I went here a year ago, but I guess I didn't post about it on the blog. It's prettier in the summer...and when things aren't under construction. But we still enjoyed it!I love getting out and exploring this place.

Former Japanese Naval Underground Headquarters

Over our New Year break we played tourist for a few days and hit up some sights we hadn't seen yet. One of those being the Former Naval Underground Headquarters for the Japanese during WWII. I read that these tunnels were left untouched for many years after the war and when they decided to renovate and open to the public in 1970 the remains of about 2,400 people were found! So sad. Lots of Japanese committed suicide here towards the end of the war when things got hopeless.

All the side tunnels were pretty short! 

I don't know how they fit people in these tiny rooms.

The tunnels were built using only pick axes^ & hoes. Sounds like an awful job to have.

Some pictures of what Okinawa looked like at the end of the war^

Okinawa now!

Hedo Point & Dai Sekirinzan

Sunday was such a beauuuutiful day. It was 70 and sunny. So we packed ourselves up and headed 2 hours north to the tippy top of Okinawa. We first stopped at Hedo Point/Cape Hedo. The water was so calm and blue and absolutely gorgeous.

 I'm assuming this says something about Hedo Point being the most northern point of Okinawa. I also read that 9,000 military men were lost at sea here during WWII. So sad.

 We then headed a few minutes over to a place called Dai Sekirinzan park. It's a limestone plateau that has some cool rock formations and trails that weave through them.

 year of the sheep!

 That's Cape Hedo out there!

 I'm loving the warm weather right now! And love exploring this little beautiful island!