Four Years?

Happy Anniversary to my wonderful husband. You are patient, kind and warm.  You're an amazing husband and father and I don't say it enough.  I can't believe it's been 4 years already.  We have accomplished so much in such a short period of time - we moved to Hawaii from Boston, bought a house, took over an ophthalmology clinic (and in the process, became bosses for the first time), and had 2 boys!  Yowser!

It makes me remember the write-up in the New York Times about our wedding.  I had submitted our wedding, more or less, as a lark.  I had some extra time between patients at Boston Children's one day and I figured - why not?  We have a cute story, met in NYC and I thought that might peak someone's interest. My college roommate had this amazing article about her wedding and I thought I'd give it a try.  So, I emailed off the one paragraph summary of our wedding and promptly forgot about it.  On the submission form, you have to list the names of your parents, priest and contact information.  Well, I completely forgot to tell anyone that I had submitted our wedding, mainly because I really didn't think we would make it in to the paper.  Then, a few weeks later, I was talking to my father and he mentions he got this strange phone call, from someone claiming to be from the New York Times, who was clearly trying to steal his identity - asking all of these personal questions.  Ooops!  So, I finally explained that he was a real reporter and here's the story below.

And, here are some pics from our multicultural wedding.  We had a Hindu ceremony in the morning (we had to fly a priest out from California since there are no Hindu priests in Hawaii), followed by an Indian vegetarian lunch.  Then we had a Presbyterian ceremony in the afternoon, followed by a dinner with a band, Chinese lion dance and interludes of Indian music! My colors were a deep red and pink (to echo the Royal Hawaiian hotel), with more gold in the morning to reflect the Indian ceremony.  Everything was DIY for the wedding - the programs, place cards, name cards, etc.  It was hard getting everything over to Hawaii from Boston, but I'm glad that we did.  Not only did it save money, but it added a personal touch.

If anyone wants help with ideas for creating an inter-faith, multi-cultural wedding, just let me know!  There are some things I would have done differently now in retrospect, but it was a beautiful day.

What Santa Brought Us

The best present Santa brought us was little Taj!  Even Nikhil loves this present.  (And, I did make these little tie shirts).

But, now on to material things.  In our family, we only buy presents for the kids (nieces, nephews, etc), which is a great tradition since they're the most important part of Christmas.  But Santa did bring me a little something I needed.  The backstory is that when I run, I always take Jeff's watch.  My watch (which he bought me for our first anniversary) is a dress watch and I don't want to run with that, so I take his surf watch.  He hates that I do that because I get sunscreen and sweat all over it and then sometimes I misplace it.  So, for Christmas, Santa bought me...

a Roxy surfwatch which I love.  I've started swimming at the Outrigger, which for some reason impresses my former swimmer/water polo husband.  The first time he saw me swim, he commented that  he was surprised, I think he thought I would be flailing around, since we always joke that I'm the land athlete and he's the water athlete.  Little did he know that I swam on the Springdale summer swim team until I was 10 years old - that's right, everyone should be impressed.  

For Jeff's present, I wanted to get him something meaningful.  It's a running joke that our only dates are to Hawaii Ophthalmology Society meetings.  We both have to attend, so we get a babysitter and the restaurants are nice, the meals are free and those have been our dates.  I am exaggerating only slightly, we do usually go out to dinner for our birthdays as well.  But, it occurred to me that discussing the latest Medicare cuts does not constitute a date.  And, some of you may be thinking, you two see each other all the time - at work, at home.  This is true, but not true.  We do obviously work together, but we each have our own patient load and we only see each other at lunch time, as we eat at our desk in front of our computer, so our main conversations revolve around payroll, administrative issues, bills.  And, at home, as parents, we are just trying to survive - get Nikhil his dinner, bathe him, get him to bed, which for some reason has now turned into a 2 hour affair.  So, it really leaves little time for real conversation.

I was browsing the blogosphere (why reinvent the wheel?) for husband gift ideas, when I came across this blog, find joy in the journey, with the best idea. It was perfect - 12 pre-planned dates, one each month, for the whole year.  Jeff and I always say we are going to do things and then the day comes around for our "date" and somehow, a trip to Costco ends up getting substituted.  But, no more.  I gave him a box with 12 envelopes.  On the inside cover of the box, I included a schedule of the dates after going through our work calendar and finding the Saturdays that we aren't working.  

I also gave him little hints and he's already trying to figure out each date.

January is the most extravagant, mainly because it's our anniversary and after having Taj, we have had very little time alone.  Each envelope has a printed card with the itinerary and other information.

Some dates are free, I don't want to give them away, in case Jeff's reading, but they are all things we have talked about doing over the past 3.5 years living here in Hawaii.  I'll post pics of the envelope and date as we do them in case other Hawaii couples are looking for fun things to do here!

My Henna Experience

Yesterday, I dyed my  hair with  henna for the first time.  I lucked into finding the fabulous Lisa of Megumi Salons (she's the owner).  I had been wanting to try it when I was pregnant with Taj since I didn't want to get my usual highlights when pregnant.  I know there's no real data out there on adverse effects of hair dye on pregnancy, but I figured it was better to be safe.  My girlfriend had tried henna and her hair was gorgeous.  Before, it was very blonde and a little dry, after, it was just lustrous and beautiful.  So, I thought I would give it a try.

Henna is a natural plant used to dye hair, skin and even other materials.  It has been used in India for thousands of years and brides-to-be get henna on their hands and feet in preparation for their wedding.  I actually was able to find someone to do henna for me before my wedding here in Hawaii.   The henna is mixed in a paste and then placed in tubes and squeezed as the artist draws the designs. 

 This is a close up of my husband's hand.  The groom will also get a very small design done as well.  The henna plant is kind of grayish-black and you're supposed to leave it on overnight to dry.  In the morning, it kind of flakes off, leaving with you a red/orange design.  As you can imagine, it's hard to eat or do anything if you have henna all over your hands and feet and this was supposed to be a time of pampering for the bride, so that others had to take care of her (feed her, etc).  The longer you leave it on your hands before removing it, the darker it gets. And, I think the saying is the darker your henna is, the more your husband (or is it your mother-in-law?) will love you.  I'm not too sure about that one, so if there are any Indians out there reading this, please correct me!
 

Since I had both a Hindu and Christian ceremony, I didn't want the super traditional, really intricate henna that most brides get.  I thought it would look odd with the white wedding dress.  Here's a pic of my henna.

And, here's one of the traditional henna that Indian brides get.



But this post is about my henna hair dyeing experience.  It was kind of similar.  This gray-black blobby mud like stuff is applied to your hair.  Then, it gets wrapped up with cotton and plastic wrap and you are told to leave it on as long as possible.  The hairdresser wrapped a scarf around it so it didn't look too odd.  I forgot to take a pic of that.  There is a smell to henna - but it's not the toxic, fumey smell of regular hair dye, which is nice.

I left it on for about 8 hours and just before I washed it out, this is what it looked like.

Jeff was scared, very scared...It took 2 shampoos and a lot of rinsing to get the henna out, but when it was out, I was pretty happy.  It's a subtle red sheen to my hair.  Nothing too artificial and you can't really tell unless I'm in certain light, which I like.  Plus, my hair feels really conditioned and is not stripped.

So, if you live in Honolulu, definitely check out henna if you want an alternative to regular hair dye/highlights.