I SCORED one yesterday!

Remember how Vic feels uncomfortable about Daddy or Mummy walking her into class now? Well, yesterday I got the privilege to send her to school in the morning and I quickly took the opportunity to ask her in the car, whether Mummy could walk her in. As expected, her first answer is no.

Not giving up, I went into a speech about how much we love her, how sad we will be when we can't walk her in next time when she goes to Primary School, and how we used to walk her into class when she was 3 years old, and that it's OK still and teacher will not scold, etc... then she agreed! Yippeeee!!

Me being me, I don't want to be overjoyed too soon, coz Vic can change her mind the last minute. So when we entered her school gates, I asked her again, and she confirmed OK, so I happily found parking near her school entrance. I saw some parents walking their kids in too (the younger ones mostly) and made sure I commented about that to Vic, hehe.

Entering the main door, all kids queued up to have their temperature taken, and I saw Vic put her bag down at her Green Table, got a chair, and then helped her joined a "train" of other kids heading to the next block where her class and teacher is already (she was a few minutes late).

Hugged her, whispered to her that I will see her later, Mummy miss her... etc and then off I left with a very very happy heart... and waiting to gloat to hubby ; )

Btw, hubby negotiated a deal with Vic to walk her in one day in a week so it's considered a win-win situation. We better enjoy this before she enters Primary School.

Is it school holiday today?

Today my Victoria will sit for her FIRST exam / test / written assessment (whatever you call it!) in her life, and she's only 5 years old! I don't remember having any tests when I was in kindergarten, and I can't even recall my Standard One exams. Haha.

Anyway, her teachers have been doing revision with the kids for the past one week leading up to today, and I've also try as much as possible to run through some spellings with her. Today's paper is Numbers and I think Vic's quite strong in this area.

We put her to bed at 830pm last night but I think she only shut eye nearing 10pm. This morning when Daddy stirred her, she groggily answered, "Daddy today got no school. Today is school holiday."

Nice try, Vic... nice try.

My independent girl

My Victoria has grown up so much especially in the past one year. They say also that when a child becomes a kor kor or jie jie, they automatically take on responsibilities.

Eversince William came into our lives two years ago, Victoria has mimic us by cuddling and carrying her Heh Heh doll to sleep, wrapping her up in sarong, wearing diapers, pants, shirt and even complete with mittens and socks for her. Then she would help us bring his diapers, choose and lay his clothes before bath time, fetch items we need, push stroller, hold his milk bottle, etc

Truly this is a big jie jie in the making.

Then as William became more mobile and expressive, they have their first, and now, almost daily conflicts. Their relationship today is very much a love-hate relationship, which I really don't know how to resolve. Probably just let them be, intervene only when I see WW3 about to break, or if it involves serious disciplinary action. But easier said than done, being a mom is nothing like "washing hands" and choosing your jobscope.

After one month of not having a maid (we are waiting for the new maid to arrive end of next month), Victoria has became more independent - somethings not by our choice, but due to circumstances that I cannot be everywhere at the same time.

She has learnt to bath on her own (still need to "brush up" on the rinsing hair and rubbing whole body with soap part), wipe herself dry and dress up, have her meals by herself (so poor thing, because she always want someone to sit by her side), comb her own hair, cut her own fingernails (learnt this quite a long time ago), help fold clothes, wash her shoes, wipe the dining table, tidy up the toys (even though it was William who played with them), watch over her brother whilst I complete some chores, do her homework by herself, practice her piano by herself, switch on/off lights/fan/air con, brush her own teeth, etc.

She is indeed what my gynae told me... my little helper.

What other responsibilities can a 5 yo take? Frannkly, I told her I'd want to spend more time with her, ahh, if only I can.

The new maid will not be the light at the end of the tunnel, but I pray Victoria will hang in there - don't grow up too fast girl, before she becomes too independent to want me around her.

(She keeps pestering me to let her join her After-School-Programme so she can have lunch and play with her friends. When I probed, she told me she didn't want to have William around her...)

Walking her into class

For many mornings when hubby wanted to walk Victoria into class, like how he used to in the old kindy, Victoria would bluntly tell her daddy, "Don't want" or "No need" or something along the line that she's a big girl now or she wants to be like her friends or teacher would scold.

Obviously hubby's heart sank everytime she rejects his offer.

I thought I would get a break when I sent her to kindy one morning last week, but she told me the same thing, "No need, mommy." Sigh.

Two days ago (Thursday) however, Victoria asked daddy to walk her into class.

You bet one man on that day went to work with his heart on Cloud 9 :)

Of hair and shoes

My William boy has this fetish over my hair eversince baby. He'd hold my hair when sleeping on the bed, when drinking milk, when being carried or simply just for comfort. Why? I don't know. I don't see him holding another woman's hair eventhough it's long. And for this simple reason, Hubby is not able to do the night shift because William would know it's not me, just by feeling the back of his neck to look for my hair (without opening his eyes).

On the same note, I am losing my hair. I say it's not entirely William's fault as he holds and doesn't pulls, only occassionally he does that playfully. But it's the stress and I'm rather embarrassed now to see my usual hairstylist. The last time he commented that my hair was thinning on the front, and recommended me a hair nutrition spray. Now I feel my hair is thinning all over, yikes!! Is William and Victoria going to get a bald mummy in no time????

Besides hair, William is very particular over what shoes he wears when going out. He has a choice of 5 pairs - one blue slipper, one CROCS Mickey mouse, one yellow CROCS immitation, a yellow/brown sandals and a sports shoes. Of all these, his favourite is the rather large blue CROCS Mickey mouse, which was handed down by his sister after he kept wearing it when it was still hers. (To pacify them, I bought Vic a Hello Kitty CROCS from the night market and easily convinced her to hand down her Mickey Mouse CROCS to William)

Ideally I don't want William to be wearing the Mickey Mouse shoes when we go out because it's rather large and he might slip on it. However, this strong-minded toddler would insist to wear the Mickey Mouse shoes all the time, and rarely do we succeed in convincing him to wear the other pairs.

Yesterday as we were rushing out, I quickly took the Mickey Mouse shoes for him (since he'd just be sitting in the car and not much walking). To my surprise, he changed it to the yellow CROCS immitation and I wondered why. Probably he is starting to show some "fashion sense" as he was wearing a yellow bermudas, which would definitely match the yellow shoes. :) Maybe the next Jimmy Choo?

Photos taken during Family Day

After many pictureless blog posts, here is one of the kids taken during Daddy's company Family Day this year, at Sunway Lagoon Resort. Lotsa sun, (and tan, eventhough we lathered on sun block) and fun!

Popo bbbuuuyyy!!!

William is sooo particular over what diaper he wears. Does all toddler go through this? A few months back, Popo bought Huggies Comfort (red pack) diapers for us as it was on offer. We normally used Mamy Poko and Huggies Dry (blue pack).

From then on, he kept saying he wants, "Popo buuuyyyy!!" I think Popo got so touched, she went to buy another 3 more packs! And refused to accept money back from us, so she's officially sponsored his one quarter diapers.

And why is the boy so "yim jim" over his diapers? We discovered the truth. He'd study the diaper before we wear it for him, and sometimes ask for two... one to wear for him, whilst the other is for him to hold and look at the pictures on the diaper... which has all his fav items ie car, star, bear, ball. He counts the star like this, "Star (pointing)... star star star... (point point point)"

A few times when I tried to reuse his diaper because it's soiled only abit, he will insist on a new diaper! Haiyaaa, have to convince, have to pacify, have to pujuk.

That's William and his diapers!! I hope when the new maid comes and settles, I can start potty training him.

Victoria's reading and other subjects

To add to the stress of juggling kids and chores and food and everything else, I now have another stress of teaching Vic to read.

It wasn't just so sudden. She was read to by her Popo when she was a baby and when she moved back with us, I read to her almost every night with her seated beside me. I would point to the words and read and she will initially look at the words, then the pictures, and then the pictures and finally the pictures.

Well, the habit kinda died when William came along and I had to nurse him at night, put him to sleep, and then off and on we still read a book at night. Then when we changed her to her new (current) school that starts at 8am and is pretty strict on children arriving on time, many night activities have been cancelled including this.

I didn't think much of this until lately. All these while I thought her school teachers will be able to pick up from where I left off.

Oh, how wrong was I!! A few days ago, her Mandarin tutor commented to me that Vic may not be having a good focus and attention span because she cannot read. She suggested that we start her on very basic books, and not the story books that we have because Vic may not be reading because of frustration when she sees difficult words. So her Mandarin tutor has offered to bring in some Q-Dees english story books to guide Vic. Wow, that's nice! So I naturally agreed (but I hope no extra charges).

The past few afternoons, I picked up where I left off a year ago. To teach her to read. I don't know if there's any impact on her, if she's even grasped pronounciation, or how a collection of phonic sounds from alphabets joined together will create a word. Look, I'm not a teacher, never was and I think I make a lousy one even if I was. I have no patience, I have no creativity (that's why I did accountancy, haha) and time is really not on my side.

Reading should be a joy. Reading should be done when one is relaxed, and a child should not be stressed or pressured to read when not ready. But when is ready ready? She is 5yo and I'm told kids her age can at least read some words. Yea, she can read simple common, short words.

Vic can go into her freeze mode when she reads. That frustrates you. She can even say words that sound totally out of line from the word she is reading, eg the word "said", she simply tembak "go". Haiyoo, I tell her, at least look at the alphabets and guess the sound of the word. And what Vic does is to memorise the stories so you actually think she can read the whole page.

On another note, a couple of months back when Vic came home one day with her Chinese homework, and neither hubby nor I could guide her on it because we are total "bananas" (cannot read chinese), we became frantic. So the decision to get external help was made. I researched chinese enrichment centres like Bao Bei and Skylace, and also called a couple of private tutors. Then we were introduced to a chinese teacher in her school who teaches the 6yo class, and who could come to our house to guide Vic on Mandarin.

These days, Vic looks forward to her Mandarin classes, and is doing well in this subject. Her other strong subject is Numbers. She reminisce doing Arts & Craft in school though, and she tells me that her class is very naughty and that's why they are not allowed to do any A&C. Hhmm...

What being a mother means to me

Over the weekend I got to wake a little later than usual. When William woke at 7am as usual and he wanted to play with me, my tired hubby took him out of the room to let me rest. For two days hubby bought breakfast for me and ensured that I ate. Despite his work commitments and fatigue, he made a special efford to help with the house chores (we are temporarily maidless for those who do not know) and reminded the kids to behave.

On Saturday evening after church service, we ate out as usual, and decided to have a Japanese dinner. I thought Nagomi shabu shabu would be nice, as the kids can enjoy the steamboat soup. Then hubs said if it's Jap that I want, he will bring me to Rakuzen at Plaza Damas as a surprise. Unfortunately the place was full house as we did not make any booking last minute, but we ended up at La Yosh Jap cum Western instead.

Half way through the dinner, William got restless. He played with his food, and then when he was full, he wanted to walk around in that small cozy restaurant, much to our frustration. When food was served nearing 8pm, hubby and I busied ourselves cutting up the food for William and helped Vic with hers. Oh for that one moment (ok honestly, many others), how I wished hubs and I could have just one quiet dinner, to ourselves, by ourselves.

That's parenthood. Part of.

On Sunday morning, I was served my favourite McD breakfast in bed by the two boys. I'm thinking now, can Mother's Day be everyday? ; )

But I quickly gobbled down my breakfast, then helped Vic to clean up and then went downstairs to settle the morning chores whilst the kids and hubs have their breakfast. As I was washing William's milk bottles, I heard my darling Vic's voice behind me, "Mommy, why don't you join us for breakfast?"

Though I was touched, I explained to her that I needed to get some things down first, then I will be out to join them.

Vic wasn't about to give up. She said, "Let Daddy do the work. It's Mother's Day."

: ) She can be so sweet at times, but I told her Daddy's work very hard, and we should have take some share of responsibility, not just Daddy.

And well, a mother's job is never ending, not even on Mother's Day.

That evening, we had a sumptuous dinner at Klang together with Ma Ma Yeh Yeh, Yee Sok Yee Sam and Theodore.

So is being a mother all roses and candy sweetness?

No. I want to say this... to both Vic and Will. Straight from my heart.


My darling kids,

I have been guilty of wanting to quit. Wanting to breakaway and run away. There were difficult days, challenging days, days I could only wish will end. There were days when I questioned my own decision of being a SAHM, and why I had not been like most other woman out there who pass their kids to the grandmothers, or pay a babysitter to care for their offsprings? That, and how I gave up my decent pay, my working clothes and heels, my social life, my freedom.

And then there were days when I am so tired from juggling the chores, settling your meals and keeping the house relatively cleaned and tidy. It is not, by the way. Because I am a self-confessed perfectionist mom. I gave up having a spotless dustless squeeky clean house, but then I am constantly reminded of your allergies to dust, Vic, and now the doctor tells us that William may develop childhood asthma so best to avoid dust.

What else can a mother ask for but the best for the kids. For good health of the family. Is all my sacrifice down the drain if you disobey me, if you are sick, if you can't spell, if you refuse the crappy food I put on the table.

A mother's job is never ending, right? I love the cheekiness and laughters when the two of you play and when you hug me. I love to see you grow and mature, I want to be there for you and do so much more, I wish I can be the fun mommy to you all the time instead of the result oriented mom, but I'm not superhuman, my darling children.

I am privilege and blessed to be mommy to two beautiful children.

Motherhood is bittersweet. I cannot ask for anything more, but thank God for two of you everyday, for you are the drive in my life, the two twinkling stars in my heart.

But this doesn't excuse you for not picking up your toys.

Fooling around in IKEA

To be honest, eversince we got back from UK and Vic's kindy changed it's schooling hours to begin half an hour earlier, ie 8am, we have eliminated all night outings to the mall on weekdays. It's really quite sad, I think, as I always prefer to break the boredom and tension of the weekdays with an outing at night. Also, there's less crowd on weekdays and our weekends are already filled with activities.

You may say there's no need to go to the malls, and this consumerism encourages wastage in goods and finances. You may also say kids should sleep early on weekdays and learn to appreciate other outings besides shopping malls, such as parks and playgrounds. Well, yea, but there's no escaping the malls. : )

So anyway, sometime back we went to IKEA (after a really REALLY long and my alibi is that checking out prices here is part of my workscope). Although the kids didn't get to push the small children trolleys (because, well, it was on a weekend and all the trolleys were taken), they had some good time.

Here are a couple of pics of the little red indians:

This is Wolfhead

And here is Happy Liontail

Cut my hair shorter, mummy!

William goes to the barber, and Vic... well, she's a girl, so it's easier to cut a girl's hair at this age. Saves a lot of money too (in anticipation of her teenage years when she will want to go to a proper hairsaloon, maybe of some big name).

So this afternoon I told her I will trim her fringe which was touching her eyebrows. We waited till William slept, then I sat her down in the toilet, where I started snipping away. Now that's she's older, it's easier to get her to sit still. Those days, I had to hurry to get the job done before she fidgets and decides enough is enough.

But today, she told me, "mummy I want to cut the back of my hair, too" and when I asked her why, she said "coz I feel hot!"

So I took off about an inch at first, which later ended up around 2 inches I think (mistakes corrected mah). After all done, she told me, "not short enough".

And this is how short she wants her hair to be... girl, you gotta be kidding!

Her new look...

On the positive side, I think she will have no problems adapting to chinese school hairstyle codes ie short

Last weekend at Seremban: bumper cars and flying kite

One of the things that kept the kids occupied in the car... Heh Heh "the 3 year old baby"
... and William doesn't want to different... so he adopted a lion! His fav animal!
Learning to blow bubbles from Daddy at City Park

We forgot to bring Vic's kite back to Seremban. So this is the kids' new kite bought by Yeh Yeh. From the picture, obviously you can guess who chose the design... it's BEN 10, so it's got to be Vic's choice!

Victoria's style in flying a kite... ada gayaaaaa!!!
William with his 1-week old still super short haircut, checking out the babes... oops, I meant, the kites. Btw, see something sticking out from his pants? Haha... his diapers!!
The kids always enjoy this electric bumper car at MaMa Yeh Yeh's house
They each take turns to be the "petrol girl/boy"... here, Vic's counting the seconds
William eagerly waits to "pour petrol" into Jie Jie's car

Finger in 'pain'

William played with some cellotape this morning. When I took it away, he cried out "paaaiinnn" and I looked at him. He was showing me his index finger and crying pain. (such an actor!)

So I wrapped the cellotape around his "injured" finger to appease the Prince William.

Back dated post: William unwell on his birthday

Thursday, April 29th 2010

Today is my baby boy's birthday, well not so much a baby now that he's turning two today.

Last night William woke 3 times crying and was very fretful. The 2nd time the clock showed 145am and he finally accepted 7oz of milk. At 330am, he cried again with a worrying cough (everytime it sounded like that, I immediately think of those times when he was admitted to the hospital) and refused milk, water or even to be carried. He kicked and pushed me away.

I don't know if he was hungry or in pain but he finally slept, probably out of tiredness. I kissed him on the head and wished my son happy birthday. Mommy love you very much, more than you can ever imagine. It pains our hearts whenever our kids are sick, worse on their birthday. I remembered Vic had high fever on her 3rd birthday and flu on her 4th birthday.

William has been purging since last Sunday, and today is the 5th day. He had fever that came off and on and today he developed running nose and cough. The first visit to his paed on Monday, the doctor diagnosed his condition as stomach flu, and could be viral. Today, however, the doctor said it could not be virus but bacterial and ordered a sample of his stool to be sent in for lab test, prescribed more probiotics and started William on a 5 days antibiotic.

I thank God that William has always been cooperative (to the extent of being keen) when taking medicine, unlike his sister at his age. There would be no tears, no screaming or yelling, no chasing him with the medication, no hiding, no sulking, no bribery, and he would even be at the table eagerly waiting for his dosage.

It was like a normal day for William and myself throughout the whole day. We picked Victoria from school and whilst waiting, he dozed off in the car. In the afternoon, he watched his sister made jelly with cookie cutter for his birthday dinner later.

Late evening, Mama and Yeh Yeh dropped by to visit and joined us for dinner. I steamed his favourite taufu with fried shallots and garlic, and Daddy tapau-ed two other dishes. Mama Yeh Yeh brought Victoria's favourite BBQ pork and roast pork (charsiew siew yoke).

Yee Sok, Yee Sam and Theodore joined us at night as well. We cut his eggless chocolate walnut cake, specially negotiated and ordered from Tenji Japanese restaurant.

Then William opened his birthday present from us, which was a big Thomas & Friends Train casing which we thought consist of 17 small trains inside, but it was empty! There was a very short silence, as we stared at the empty case, and then checked and rechecked the label attached, and then realised it said, "trains sold separately". Haiyyaaa!! Why didn't we see that?! Felt so cheated. Should have used that budget to buy him another Tonka set then.

What a day! Even though we didn't go out to the shopping mall, or went to the park or playground, or had a big party like last year, but today was extra special because we thank God for this little charming, darling (also stubborn), William.

*pictures to be uploaded when I get to my desktop*