pinku

Shoogie and Lorettie

If you've visited pinku before then you would know we have two guinea pigs - Sugar and Loretta.

Before Jake was born they were showered with affection, but now they certainly don't get as much direct love as before. We feel bad. Our apartment 'Before Jake' was also fine size-wise, but now with two adults, one crawling baby (who likes to pull up on their cage) and two guinea pigs, it's starting to feel small. Therefore we've come to a decision to find them a new home and I feel sad. We will also be leaving Japan this year and we won't be able to take them with us so we would like to find them a good home before it all becomes too crazy with the moving etc.

That's all for now. I'll be back with Jake's 9-month update soon. I'd like to keep them up because he is growing so quickly. It'll all be a blur before long and I LOVE looking back on my posts and remembering all of his little milestones. I'm also trying to organize an online mother's group (in the form of a forum board) - mainly because I have so many cool internet mama friends and I want to ask them so many questions all the time... so I thought a forum would be fun. When I say trying to organize...that means I'm thinking about it...actually a very basic board has been set up but I haven't posted anything. Maybe I'll get around to it in the summer when it is quieter at work and I actually have time to do something other than work....at work. Ha!

our sweet shoogie

On Wednesday Darin went to feed the pigs and found blood. He found an open and bleeding abcess on our sweet Sugar's leg and rushed her to the vet. How could we not have noticed?! I had only been cuddling her that morning and she had seemed completely normal. They have cleaned out half of the abcess but had to stop halfway because of excess bleeding. They are not sure why there is so much bleeding. If the infection goes internal I don't want to think about possible consequences. She is our first born pig daughter and has brought so much to our lives. I know she's only a guinea pig, but we have become very attached to this sweet and innocent creature.

So please send lots of healthy pigs vibes our way. Sugar is going back to the vet today. She's been at home the last couple of days but we've separated her from Loretta and both of them seem down. They are not eating and drinking with as much vigor as before and there's definitely been no popcorning. I was shopping at Ikea when I got the call about Sugar's abcess. My initial reaction (after tears that is) was 'what if this was a human child?' What have I gotten myself into?....

Whenever Darin and I are down something that always makes us feel better is 'double pig'. Holding two pigs at the same time. Darin wasn't down in the photo below - that was just a gratuitous double pig moment.

Ganbatte Shoogie!

My life in pigtures

This blog has been neglected for long enough. It's time to make some changes and be more attentive. I'm going to try real hard to post every day this week.

Last week was amazing. It was Golden Week in Japan, a cluster of national holidays, and we got Monday, Thursday and Friday off. Four day weekends rule. The weather was also amazing. Darin and I got up relatively early each day and went and got coffee and wandered around our neighbourhood. We rode the boats, visited the zoo, played with guinea pigs other than our own, cleaned, bbq'd, played frisbee and just relaxed.

Here's darin relaxing on our rowboat. sorry if that's a bit too much leg for you on a Monday, but daz was trying out his new short shorts look....

Darin is now visiting friends in SF, so I've been living it up as a bachelorette watching girly movies and shopping.....ha! Claire and I also have tentative plans to watch Dirty Dancing 2: Havana Nights, as we are both single ladies this week...well sort of. Did you know that it's the 20th anniversary of the original Dirty Dancing movie this year??!! That makes me feel old-ish. I remember going to see this movie with my sister and immediately after the movie she went and bought the soundtrack. DD has a special place in my heart as it was also playing on the tv here in Japan when Darin and I decided to get married. We tried to mimic that scene where Johnny lifts Baby above his head, but abandoned this silly idea when we realized that someone would most definitely get hurt.

Anyways, here are some cute keitai pigtures of our pigs. After Darin left I separately gave the girls a celery treat.

Lorettie went first

then shoogie

but when I put Lorettie back in their house to give Shoogie her treat, she got a little jealous. Here she is all feisty biting on the bars. She's not the sanest of pigs.

So that's all for today. I've been doing absolutely no knitting but maybe I can change that predicament this week. No promises though. In exciting news, I'm off to Australia in 11 days for a week. It's been over a year since I've seen my family so I can't wait - YAHOO!!!

Everything is peachy

Life is getting busy. With less than three weeks before we leave for the US, our schedule is packed in such a great way.

Things kick off this Saturday with Clover's annual Knit Out - the event was held at Roppongi Hills last year and it has been planned a little differently this year with lots of mini knit outs in cafes around Harajuku/Omotesando/Aoyama. The main session of the knit out will be happening this Saturday October 28 (12:30pm - 8pm) and Sunday October 29 (11am - 8pm) in the basement of Omotesando Hills. Come and knit!!! As a side note, both Taeko and myself will be participating in a talk show on Saturday, where we'll talk about the Tokyo SNB and Taeko's other crafty group - Shibuya Shugeibu. It's a little bit nervewracking.

Then that night we are heading to see Peaches at Unit in Ebisu.

On Sunday to celebrate the visit of my friend Amanda, who's on her way back to Australia from Copenhagen, we are going to search for an outdoor onsen with views of pretty red leaves.

At the beginning of November there is even more excitement with more visitors - I'm finally getting to meet Mariko and Kelly who will be visiting on official Superbuzzy business.

In Jaywalker sock news, I decided to take Stephanie's advice and finished the second sock in um....a totally different sock yarn. It is certainly now a mutant sock. Photos to come!

OOH and Jen of Moving Hands, one of the original founders of the Tokyo SNB and mother of two has started blogging again, as has Joy of Dynamite Knits who now lives in beautiful Hawaii (so jealous...) - YAHOO! Nice to have you back ladies.

Oh and in piggie news, we've decided that Loretta is our teen pig. She's rambunctious and rebellious and just a little bit crazy. She talks constantly, picks fights with Sugar and headbutts her dish in the morning...sometimes at night too. Darin created this photo just for her. You get the idea.

Loretta Bendall Mok

Say hi to Loretta - the newest additiion to our family. We have her living separately from Sugar for now, but it's been fun to watch them react to each other's squeaks since Loretta arrived yesterday. I think they are going to get along famously. She is SO tiny compared with Sugar and I want to cuddle her so badly, but we are holding off for a couple of days so she can get used to her new surroundings. I wish that was love in her eyes in the photo but to be honest it's pure fear. She is eating, drinking and pooing though, so they are all good signs that she is adjusting. Hopefully in a couple of days we'll be able to pick her up and start introducing her to Sugar. Sisters are the best!! Hey neen!

And since it is Friday here are some pink photos sent to me by my friend Shirl who lives in London. She visited Paris recently and went to the Grand Palais art exhibit - lucky her and lucky me that I can visit all of these awesome places vicariously through her.

New baby piggie..and unrelated comment about dresses

It looks like we'll be getting a brand new baby piggie next week - well she'll be about a month old when we get her. The cute baby piggies I posted last month all turned out to be boys, so we couldn't take one. We were heartbroken. But of course there is a lot of piggie love for everyone.

Say hello!

We'll quarantine the new baby for a couple of weeks (keep her separate from Sugar) and start introducing them slowly in a neutral location (anywhere but Sugar's habitat). I hope they get along. Also during Golden Week we managed to set up a new habitat for Sugar and we've continually been making improvements. We'll also extend the habitat and make it longer when Shoogie's new friend arrives. All materials for the habitat were found at Daiso (100 yen shop) in Tachikawa and it all cost less than 3000 yen. A bargain considering much smaller cages are about 8000 yen.

The skateboard has since been removed and replaced with a flat wooden board as we were a bit worried that it might hurt Sugar's feet. She can easily jump up on the skateboard and at night she does very fast laps around her house. It's quite hilarious. We might have to try and film her one of these days.

UNRELATED COMMENT ABOUT DRESSES

In a completely unrelated note, I have been thinking about creating a Flickr Group where people can share photos of their dresses - vintage, new, formal, etc. I love dresses and would love to see what dresses you have in your closet, why you like/hate them, the history behind the dress, etc. Maybe we could swap dresses or something fun like that. What do you think? If I have time on the weekend I'll set it up and take photos of my dresses.

Piggy Love

There's a chance that we may get another guinea pig. Sugar needs a friend. It could be one of these three baby guinea pigs that were born in Japan earlier this month. BEWARE - you might have a heart attack from the cuteness!

These photos were taken the day after they were born - here they are snuggling with mum!

Have a great weekend!!!