Hot Weekend Pix

Whew! It was a hot weekend. On Saturday, I took Maiya to the Nisei Week Baby Pageant. I know, I know. If you know me as a feminist/activist, you are probably surprised that I did this. Believe me, I agonized over it for days, and justified it in my mind, over and over. Tony left it up to me, but in the end I took her. It was what I thought it would be. I went as part social experiment just to see what it was like, and partly because in my mama's eyes, I know I have an adorable beautiful girl. Instead of a girly dress and hair ribbons (they said they werent judging on clothes), I put Maiya in her Nikkei onesie to represent as a Japanese American. I figured this is one of the ways as a 1 year old that she can participate in the Nisei Week activities. When it came time to the judging, I saw other parents urging their daughters to "perform" to wave, blow kisses, and smile at the judges, and I just couldn't do it. So we stood up there, with the other girls and I didn't ask her to do anything. But, I saw some old friends from college and community, so that was nice, and Maiya enjoyed her shaved ice and playing in the air of the fans.

On Sunday, we went with my dear friend Monica, who I used to work with at Great Leap, and her 3 1/2 year old son Dyami, and we went to the Urth Cafe, which is a healthy, organic cafe near the Santa Monica Farmer's Market. Lunch was good, but a little hectic. Afterwards, we walked down to the beach, and Dyami pushed Maiya in the stroller. We found a great play area at the beach with swings and slides. It was great to catch up with Monica, since we hadn't seen each other since Maiya was about 3 months old. Afterwards, we went to Ben & Jerry's and beautiful Dyami was wanting to wake up Maiya so she wouldn't miss out on the ice cream.

Also this weekend, we went to a playdate with 6, yes 6, 17-18 month old toddlers at our neighbor's house. There were 5 girls and 1 boy, and they all live within 2 blocks from our house. It's funny because we've lived in our neighborhood for over 9 years, and all of a sudden, we're meeting neighbors and the toddlers are taking over! So, that was about it for the weekend. Next weekend is the West LA and Higashi Obons.

P.S. How do you like the hot pink? It matches my phone!