A post just for P

I only heard of this phrase in recent years - “Daughters are Daddy’s lovers from past lives.” I think it’s so true! This post is specially dedicated to P, who works hard for the family and bears with all sorts of characters and situations, just for us. 

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An exchange between Calista and I just before she went to bathe today...

Ca: Mama, do you know, when people laugh at Daddy, I feel sad. 

Me: Awww.. why would anyone laugh at Daddy? Who?

Ca: Korkor.. when Korkor hit Daddy with the balls and went “Hahaha,” I felt saaaad..

Me: Aw, it’s ok, Korkor was just having fun with Daddy. Daddy was having fun too! You don’t have to feel sad for him. 

       Wait. Why did you suddenly tell me this? 

Ca: Because I think of Daddy all the time, cos he is not home.

💕

A recap - End 2014

So..what has happened in the past 3+ years? I think it would be best to do separate posts of various time periods, starting right from the start of when we arrived in HK.

Let’s make a little list now (I love lists..they help me gain a little control of my tumultous topsy-turvy life): 

IN END-2014: 

1) I left my job, friends and family in Singapore

2) The family moved to Hong Kong to be with P

3) The kids joined the International Montessori School, Calista at the “Casa” level and Christian at the Primary 1 level

4) I adjusted to being a stay-home mum with part-time help

Parts 1 & 2:  From Singapore to Hong Kong

Calista's birthday celebration during sports day practice at Pasir Ris Park.

  She was only 3!

Still chubby-cheeked..with her "bf" Tze Zin on the right...

 Christian showing off his first prize trophy from the school race - they apparently ran a total of 2.4km and he won due to his regular and steady speed:

 Some farewell presents from friends..

 

Teacher Dani thoughtfully helped the children create some going-away presents for the grandparents.

She bought the lamp and lantern from Ikea, and let them draw on it themselves..Christian's lamp had portraits of the family, and was so meaningful.

 Leaving Singapore 

 Arrival at HK - he was still so short then!

First look at our tiny apartment in Stanley

A revival

It’s been a while! 3 years, 4 months and 10 days. 

What has happened in that time? So much, that I barely know where to start. 

Perhaps let’s start with why I am blogging again. We are expecting the arrival of Baby No. 3! She is due to say hello to us on 9 November 2017 (or 5 November, based on my first scan), but perhaps we’ll see her a bit earlier than that. 

Not sure what prompted P to revisit this blog, but a few days ago, he sent me the link to Calista’s birth story on this blog. I was so grateful that I recorded all the details of her birth, for I have truly forgotten most of it 6 years on. This led me to realise that this blog serves such an important role in recording the little moments of my family life. Given P’s and my poor poor fish memory, we will not remember these years of raising young children, when we finally make it to the season of reminiscing. 

(I was going through the blog, looking at old pictures of the children when Calista joined me. It was so surreal when she started reading out loud my post on her first steps! I certainly did not imagine her reading the post when I first typed it. :))

And so, here is my valiant attempt at restarting this blog. Hopefully I will still have time after baby no. 3 pops out! 

For starters, here’s a look at what the children look like now, before I go back to being homework police: 

Cain and Seth

Here’s another story I’ve been recounting to my colleagues and friends:

About 2 weekends ago, Christian asked us “Why is there war? Why do we fight and kill each other?”

I was silent and waited for P to answer (he takes ‘weekend duty’ since I am responsible for answering all of Christian’s questions during the weekdays).

P started going on about Cain and Abel, and how one was jealous of the other cos the other won God’s favour. This triggered more questions of “what is jealousy?” and “How did Abel gain God’s favour?” We told him that God was pleased with Abel cos Abel offered God the best, whereas Abel kinda gave God his leftovers =7

P continued and said “So we are descendants of Cain…and that’s why we have sin in us..”

At that point, we had just parked at a multi-storey carpark near the Old Airport Road food centre, and were walking down the stairs. I asked P whether he wanted to take the lift instead, cos he had slipped and injured his knees just a week ago. He didn’t hear me, but a few seconds later, said “Let’s go take the lift.” We trekked across to the other side of the carpark and went into the lift, which was just about the point when P said “So Cain is our great great great great great great great greeaaaaat greeeaaaaat greeeeaaaaaat grandfather.”

I stared at P, willing him to keep quiet in a packed lift full of strangers. We reached the ground floor a few seconds later and were heading towards the food centre when a man chased us and said with a look of hesitation “Actually, we are not from Cain’s line. Adam had another son after Cain and Abel and we came from that line.. Sorry I don’t mean to embarrass you..but I know we came from that 3rd son’s line..and from that line came Noah.. you know Noah?”

I laughed out loud at how ignorant he must think we were, to not even know Noah. P immediately accepted being corrected and I thanked the man for telling us.

After the man left us, I told P that God must have had enough of his nonsense, and thought we should not propagate falsehood to our children. =7 A quick check of my electronic bible revealed that Adam’s 3rd son was Seth and yes there was a long lineage down from Seth to Noah..

I took the opportunity to talk to Christian – “You know how you always ask me where God is, why can’t you see him? We may not be able to see Him, but we can feel Him.. just like we cannot see the wind, but we can feel the wind right? And we can see the leaves moving because of the wind..”

Christian caught on and said “Yes! Just like I cannot see God, but God sent a man to talk to us and tell us what is right.”

I beamed and P could not resist taking a dig at me “Wow that is the most profound thing I’ve heard you say since I dated you.” (This coming from a man who got his facts wrong in the first place! =7)

This was a pretty long story, but this showed me how God is in control of everything. What were the chances of us meeting a man who knows this story, a man who was present at the precise time when we were at the lift? I was SOOO comforted the whole day, knowing that He cares, about every little thing, and is present at every moment of our lives. This gives me courage and strength to do what is right by Him, instead of what is conventionally done in this world.

One Sentence, for our children

If, in some cataclysm, all of scientific knowledge were to be destroyed, and only one sentence passed on to the next generation of creatures, what statement would contain the most information in the fewest words? I believe it is the atomic hypothesis that all things are made of atoms — little particles that move around in perpetual motion, attracting each other when they are a little distance apart, but repelling upon being squeezed into one another. In that one sentence, you will see, there is an enormous amount of information about the world, if just a little imagination and thinking are applied. ~ Richard Feynman

If, in some cataclysm, all of my knowledge were to be destroyed, and only one sentence passed on to my children, what statement would contain the most information in the fewest words? I believe it is the simple truth that all of us begin as an ego — heeding our parents’ voices gives us knowledge that gets us to reason — heeding our inner voice gives us clarity that gets us to intuition — heeding our creator’s voice gives us wisdom that gets us to holiness. In that one sentence, you will see, there is an enormous amount of information about the world, if just a little humility and introspection are applied. Remember too, the pareto principle that 80% of us will vacillate between ego and reason for most of our lives, and that the only true bridge (or shortcut if you will) between ego and holiness, is Christ. ~ Daddy O

(This was a guest post contributed by P, which was inspired by us witnessing Calista vying with her brother for the skate scooter and promptly losing interest once he gave in to her. =/)

A special question

This is a backpost…Christian asked me about 3 months’ ago (24 Jan):

“Mama, I have a very special question for you.”

I braced myself and replied “Yes…?”

Christian: “What if….the grasscutter doesn’t want to cut grass anymore and the grass grows to outer space then when the grasscutter finally cuts it down and it falls onto Earth, will the Earth explode?”

*Mama laughs heartily*

Oh, the things that preoccupy the mind of a 5 year old. (This was when he was interested in outer space and the various levels from atmosphere to space.)

Candour

I’ve been telling this story to anyone who would listen..

Was putting Calista to bed one night, and sang her “I Wish You Love”..I was feeling quite pleased with myself after completing the song, and was debating whether to sing “Dream a little Dream” or “Fly Me to the Moon” when she went:

“Mama I can’t sleep…”

I tenderly stroked her hair and told her not to worry, “just close your eyes and i’ll sing you another song until you sleep”.

At that point, she interjected and said:

“Mama stop singing. I can’t sleep.”

My bubble immediately burst and I started fuming –_-“

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Another night, it was Christian’s turn to be utterly frank with me. I was thinking of my boss going to his mother’s house for dinner, and thought to ask Christian “Darling, will you still come and have dinner with me when you are 50 and I 75?”

He hemmed and hawed and I expressed surprise at his hesitation, so he blurted “But what if you die already? So old…how about earlier? When you are not so old?

I burst out laughing at how he was perfectly comfortable expressing that thought to me without realising that it’s taboo amongst adults to talk of death.

Christian’s Art

The only art lessons he goes for are holiday programs at Little Artists..think there’s improvement from before though he’s not a Picasso yet.

This is my early Mother’s day present -

I could guess the figure in purple was meant to be me and the figure in blue is him, cos those are our favourite colours. He tells me we were eating brown rice by a stream, surrounded by a road and mountains. Can you tell?

The many faces of Calista

Calista seldom shows her multi-faceted personality to strangers. Perhaps it is still early days yet, but it is certainly a pity that others do not see the many expressions she is capable of, but only see a sullen, silent Calista staring at them.

Here’s a few shots taken in December by some unknown person (not me..perhaps the helper?) which I found in my memory card..

Am I biased mum or do you think these are worthy of making it to the cover of a magazine as well?

Christan’s Year End Concert 2013

Christian’s year end school concert took place on the 22nd of November..the theme that year was on Rainbow Fish and Teacher D picked him to be the narrator of the play! She said he usually talks so loudly in school, but I was appreciative of her giving him a chance to build confidence.

I must admit that I was worried he would have stage fright, but worked hard not to show my worry and infect him with my fear. He did well, memorising most of the script, and performed beyond my expectations!

The play was held at a room at LaSalle, and it was definitely not as ideal as the stage at the Eurasian Association the previous year. There was no mic, and all the parents kept chattering away as my little boy walked up to the front and started his introduction to the story. I felt bad for him, but he bravely went on and enunciated with emotion, just the way we had rehearsed. I was so proud of him my heart felt like it would burst. ^_^

He has certainly come a long way since those days when he would freeze in fear..

P took half day’s leave and an earlier flight to fly back for the concert.. he made it just in time and I knew Christian was happy to see him before the play started..the little things matter so much to children..

Here’s a picture of us milling around while waiting for the play to start..

And a picture of him in costume. Teacher D spent days making the costumes by herself. I was impressed by how professional the costumes were, and how much blood and sweat she poured into making those costumes.. there were so many ‘sea creatures’ which she painstakingly stitched…mermaids, starfish, crabs, jellyfish..I kowtow to her true dedication.a

Back!

I had been on a hiatus from this blog for many many months..mainly because P went to Hong Kong and took the old laptop, leaving me with a new shiny tablet which i hated. Haha..he had good intentions, thinking that the tablet was more portable and I could let the children use it too, but it only had one USB port and it was a pain to transfer photos / backup stuff with. Given my limited time for blogging (10minutes after the children sleep and before the helper sleeps) grappling with all those technical issues was too much of a waste of my time and so I gave up.

P has brought the old laptop back on his own initiative..he says he wanted to “put me out of my misery”. I’m sure he’ll enjoy reading the posts from the tablet, instead.

So here’s the 1st back-post..Pictures from our outdoor photoshoot last year!

We went to the Fort Canning Park and it was rather fun, posing, running around, chasing bubbles..

Calista didn’t smile very much as usual, but we weren’t too bothered by that (especially since i still have some hazy memory of how ‘dao’ i would be in front of strangers, as a child). We did manage to catch a few rare smiles of hers when she was thrown in the air by P or when her brother teased her, so those are precious shots..

It was definitely a good bonding experience and gives us some concrete memories to keep, and act as triggers when we are old and senile, of how life was when we were a young family.

The pictures also made good Christmas presents for P and the MIL, who probably want nothing other than to see the children everyday..

Mandarin

So, I've been trying to speak Mandarin to the children as much as I can, whenever I remember. Christian has reached the stage where he is reading English books really well, but his Mandarin ability lags far behind.

Berries helps somewhat, but I usually do not have much time to revise with him the characters he learns..given that we have less than an hour together each day. One day, I found a rare opportunity to bring out the cards and make a game out of it. I told him the aim of the game is to cover the entire bed with the cards, but he can have the cards only if he reads them out accurately. That silly boy actually bought into the game (I wonder how long this gullibility will last).

I shall try to be more creative and come up with more games like that, seeing how he enjoys the challenge and thrill..

Let's go to the beach

One of the children's favourite song to dance and bounce around to is "Let's go to the beach".

It's a repetitive ditty (as most kids songs are), and it goes like that:

Let's go to the beach
It's a sunny, sunny day today..
Let's go to the beach
It's a sunny sunny day today.

Christian hadn't been to his favourite beach in a while, so we decided to take the opportunity one day when it was sunny and we didn't have swim class to go to. The kids were so delighted! Christian dug around in the sand and played with the sand machines at Siloso beach, while Calista mostly watched. I took shelter in the shade, while feeling grateful that P was so hands-on. =P

Christian the Protector

Yesterday, I brought the children down to the playground cos I was home early (took time off to be at the doc's with Christian to discuss allergy testing, but that's a topic for another post).

They ran around and I hung around watching them. Suddenly, I saw Christian running right in front of his sister, standing there with his arms wide open, before noticing that there was a little toddler who was being chided by his mum. I figured out that the toddler must have tried to hit Calista. I smiled at how protective he was of her, and told him how proud I was. He was ever vigilant, and when the toddler didn't give up and tried hitting her again, there Christian went again, putting himself between her and the toddler, shielding her with his body.

Ahh.. this reminds me of that time when he shielded me at the playground too. He has the makings of a gentleman :)

Din Tai Fung

One of our favourite restaurants is Din Tai Fung. I really wish they had a loyalty program because we would definitely chalk up many points and redeem that for lots of free meals if they had one.

One would not anticipate that a Taiwanese dumpling restaurant would be family friendly, but they certainly are, offering cute children cutlery which never fail to excite my children, and child-friendly options. We can specify that we do not want MSG in the food, and request to have less oil and salt in our food, and the servers wouldn't bat an eyelid. I think it's mainly cos they cook individual portions after orders are placed, unlike some other places where food is cooked in large batches.

Our children lurrrve the xiao long bao, which is also very child-friendly in that it is mainly minced meat and easy to chew. Calista can eat 6 on her own. She eats it the proper way too, scooping one dumpling carefully onto her spoon, bringing it close to her lips, piercing a hole in the dumpling skin, sucking the soup out before eating the rest of it.
P and I are pleased whenever we eat there, cos they eat so heartily and we know that none of the usual nasties that accompany outside food (MSG, excessive salt) is getting into them.. ^_^

They certainly deserve their Michelin star for the consistently good food they serve up!

Christian's 5th Birthday

This post is long overdue.. we celebrated Christian's 5th birthday at an indoor playground this year. He had asked for a party, and was careful to specify "I don't mean just bring a cake to school...I mean a party like Andrew had, at SAFRA, remember?"

I considered this request carefully because I do not want him to cave in to peer pressure, and did not want to give in all the time. After some consideration, I realised that we did not have a proper party for him since he was born, and we informed him that if we had a party, the next one he will be having will be in another 5 years' time. I also set 2 conditions for him to fulfill. He had to I) start showering himself and II) stop using diapers at night.

Yes. He is still using diapers at night. I was initially quite ashamed of that fact, and blamed it on lack of effort on my part to train him, but after reading some articles online, learnt that boys are usually slower than girls in this aspect and that night toilet training really depends on the individual being physiologically ready - the bladder must trigger a signal to the brain and wake the child up.. So I stopped putting pressure on him, and thought he'll be ready when his diaper finally stops being wet in the morning.

As for party venues, I had considered having a sports party organised by Shaws, a pirate ship party at Sentosa, and a simple indoor party. I settled for the last cos not all kids might enjoy the sports party (especially the girls in his class?) and also cos my friend pointed out "How are you going to top it if you go for the pirate ship party straightaway?"

So we settled on Fidgets, which looks pretty awesome to me, but was a little inconvenient in its location. It's at Bukit Timah, Turf City which I discovered to be a rather family-friendly place, but not so friendly to those without cars.

Christian had also asked for an Elmo cake and so I looked hard for one. It was tough to find a baker who would do a fresh cream Elmo cake, but I eventually managed to find one who would customise it for me at a very reasonable price.

Here's a few pictures of the big day.. (P and I kept thinking (much like typical parents) "we've never had such a party for ourselves..kids these days are so fortunate..")

Christian certainly looked like he enjoyed himself, playing with his classmates in a different environment, and being the star of the day. We are so happy that he has reached this milestone! Half a decade.. only 3 more of these to go, before he is a full-grown adult.. sigh.

Thank you darling for being such a wonderful son..you are so beautiful and precious to us and we love you more than you can imagine.

Photoshoot 2013 (Part I)

P had a sudden impulse to have a family photoshoot.. I think he was just staring at the kids one day, thought to himself "they are growing so fast", and suggested we go have some photos taken because "that's all we will have to look back on when we grow old and they leave us.." Haha.

So the Chairman comes up with the proposal and the Family CEO (i.e. ME) executes the plan. I looked around some websites, got a few quotes and found that the professionals look really good, but charge exorbitant (in my opinion) prices for the return of all images. And so we looked out for deal coupons. What a lifesaver. We bought 2 coupons, one for an indoor shoot and one for outdoors. I timed the shoots a month apart, to hedge against bad hair days / bad skin week / illness etc.

The indoor shoot was not great.. the photographer had no initiative, no novel suggestions, and kept harping on the fact that Calista refused to smile, even though we told him we were fine with her being her usual moody self in the pictures. We managed to get a few decent photos though, and P thought that it was time well spent. We had fun bonding during the 1 hour, and still had photos to show for it!

More photos from the outdoor shoot coming up in 4 weeks!

Updates (Calista)

 

It’s been a while since I last blogged..it’s hard to find the time and energy to do so these days, but the kids are growing up so quickly I feel wistful, and think I need to capture some of this down somehow.

For mothers, making time usually means forsaking sleep, and that is why I am up an hour earlier than usual.

Calista is now 2 years, almost-4 months. She surprises me with how long she has grown, how she speaks in complete (albeit slightly ungrammatical) sentences.

I called home from work yesterday, cos I called earlier to ask my mum something and heard her voice in the background asking “Is it DADdy???” (Typical daughter-father bias.)

When I called to speak with her, she told me “Mama I want you to read storybook to me…! This one..”

1) She thinks I can see the book she is holding, even though I am not there. Everything is still magical and possible to her.

2) Her mandarin active vocabulary is almost non-existent, other than “baobao” (carry). She speaks almost exclusively in English despite me trying my best to speak Mandarin to her.

My brother is so amused by Calista…her cries often disturb his sleep, and when he asked “Who cried earlier?” she would unashamedly do a “mock-cry” for him.

She is ending playgroup soon, and just attended orientation at her brother’s school, in preparation of going Nursery 1 next year. To think that when I first checked out Christian’s school, she was still comfortably ensconced in my tummy! Sigh.

She enjoyed school, and didn’t shed a tear…it appears that boys are usually the more clingy, crying sort when it comes to separation from familiar surroundings / caretakers.

Not much else has changed, except that her appetite increased, she’s grown taller, has longer hair, has larger eyes, and thus a less-prominent nose. Everybody says she looks like a female version of Christian, but I am not quite able to see it which is ironic given that I stare at them everyday, but maybe precisely cos that is the case.

She is exceedingly vain and has a healthy self-esteem. Loves to dress up and preen in front of the mirror, or show off to us. Made me laugh the other day when she pinched her nose, and moved her fingers to the sofa, saying “I put pretty there ok, you take care”.

Has a soft spot for soft toys and little animals. All I need to do to get her to be quiet is to pretend some soft toy is sleeping. She can usually be tricked into long cuddles by a whine or two from me :)

Her favourite song used to be “Happy Birthday” and I would love at how she valiantly tries to sing the third sentence “Happy BIRTH-day” which goes hiigh up, as if her voice was cracking. The song of the month seems to be the ABC song though. She can remember every bit although she mumbles her way through “LMNOP”.

She’s also into numbers now and can count properly (ie. point to one object at a time as she goes 1 – 2 – 3 –4 ). Can’t recognise the digits yet, but i am in no hurry to try since I know she’ll get there and there’s no point duplicating what the teachers will be teaching her anyway.

Sigh. She is the sweetest darling, who increasingly reminds me of myself when I was young, every day. We are so so glad she chose us to be her parents and decided to come into our lives.

  

Kluang, Part II

I decided to take 3 days off work and bring the kids back to Kluang during the September holidays again.

Considering the options, it worked out best for our situation cos I was not willing to spend on an air ticket for the helper, and air tickets for everyone just to Penang would cost almost a thousand.

We had promised Christian that we would take the train to Malaysia one day, and I took the opportunity to fulfil that promise. Taking the train in was definitely more of a hassle compared to getting my uncle to fetch us, especially since the station had moved from Tanjong Pagar to Woodlands (2 cab rides in the morning to catch the outbound train cost us $60 already). It was definitely a memorable experience for the kids though, who were so excited to be on a railroad train.

It was such a pleasure to get away from the everyday distractions at home and work, and to enjoy the beautiful moments which seem to last just a bit longer in the slower pace of Kluang. I saw Calista as the 2 year old she is now, I witnessed what a true toddler she looks like now, and her cheeky endearing personality that warms strangers towards her.

 

My colleagues probably thought I was wasting my leave in Malaysia, but the trip brought me back to my childhood, when I could laze around and not worry about what I needed to do next. The main activity of each day were – go hiking, go to the hair salon, go for a massage. The time in between those and meals would be spent with the children horsing around in the bedroom, reading or motivating Christian to work on his writing exercises.

Hiking - I enjoyed the cool walk as we ascended the Kluang hill..

We had to leave Calista behind at the foot of the hill with my dad and the helper cos she kept wanting to be carried..Christian, my cousin, my aunt, mum and I proceeded to ascend up till the mid-point of the hill. It was wonderful inhaling the fresh air of the forest, and having the cool air brush against our skin. Christian was also thrilled when my aunt, a regular trekker, showed us the tap from which spring water flowed. The taste of that spring water was so cool and we could feel the energy of the mountain in that gulp.

Christian also loved the job of watering the plants in the garden with a spray can,

climbing up and down the steps with his sister hot on his tails

and horsing around with his granduncles who were so indulgent.

He asked if we could go back next holidays, to climb the stairs in Granduncle’s house and to drink milo.. Gosh. It is sometimes so easy to make children happy.