Motherhood is not for wimps

Baby vs Puppy

2010-07-12T06:25:00.000-07:00

Terelle is besotted with this little Shih Tzu from a pet shop in Marine Parade.

Every chance she gets, she will rush headlong into the shop and stand in front of her little glass cage, making funny faces, jumping around and going "Awwwww...Coochie coochie coo".

She has christened the dog Leelo, tells me she wants to take her home and implores me to buy her. I tell her i have no money, and that she should go ask Daddy.

This is the conversation that ensued tonight.

T: Daddeeeee, i love Leelo...can u puhleaze buy her for me?

D: How much does Leelo cost?

T: Err one thousand...errrr five hundred and sixty...no eighty

(Im behind hubby, silently mouthing the words for her, she definitely doesnt know the concept of how much money this is)

D: Do you know how much money that is?

T: Not alot! You have money right?

D: Haha...how about we sell Baby away, then we can use that money to buy Leelo? What do you think?

*Terelle is stumped for words. You can literally see the cogs in her brain whirring furiously*

D: Yup if we sell baby away, he will go live with someone else, but they will give us money so that you can buy Leelo. You want that?

*More silence as she ponders the consequences of that option*

And then the clincher...

T: How bout you sell him away when he is grown up!

Hubby and I almost rolled off our chairs laughing...her loyalty to her brother only extends after he is all grown and has exhausted his usefulness of entertaining her!

Great insight on a kids' thoughts...hahaha...

Seeing red

2010-06-03T21:30:00.000-07:00

My posts have all along been of the happy schmapy, la-di-da kind.

Well, this post aint gonna be so.

Have you ever been so angry that a red mist literally clouds your vision?

Your hands are shaking, your skin is burning and you just feel like screaming, throwing something, beating the daylights out of somebody? (not necesssarily in that particular order but maybe simultaneously)

Maybe its the culmination of too many "I dont like you, Mummy!" s from Terelle.
She rejects my good intentions and frequently peppers her sentences with declarations of not loving me anymore.
She shoots dagger stares at me when i get her to do things she doesnt like and is frequently rude and defiant.

Or maybe it's Thane's constant screamy demands, incessant whining which can last the entire duration of a car ride from home to destination and ridiculous fights with his sister that's doing my head in.

Or perhaps its hubby losing his temper one too many times, or him making snide remarks on trival matters or... i just dont know.

But i simply feel as though im losing it.

My tolerance level is almost zero and i feel myself losing control.

I can no longer sit there deflecting anger from everyone with patience and humor.
I cannot find a single ounce of energy left to do so.

A good friend who is also a stay-at-home-mum recently told me she got so angry with her son, she beat him with a hanger till it broke. It left marks all over his body and she felt so guilty over it she cried herself to sleep.
He's fine now, with nary a memory of why he got beaten in the first place, but my friend is appalled at the seemingly monstrous mum that she has become.

I am not capable of such release of my frustrations, and maybe that's why im going crazy inside. Maybe i should simply scream at them all, throw something around and basically let fly vitriol. Perhaps that will scare them a little and make them shape up.

I revolve my entire schedule around them, trying to make their lives as enriching as possible, scheduling my work only when it doesnt incovenience them.
And this is the thanks i get.

Admittedly, I have long accepted this job to be thankless and i do not harbor any lofty desires to be thanked for it.
Oh its supposed to be a selfless job you say?
But why do i feel no personal gratification from it?

Maybe im taking it all too personally. Im supposed to be raising happy, well mannered and adorable kids and not surly, ungrateful brats. They are my responsibility and however bad they turn out is all my fault cos I AM the one at home supposedly GROOMING them.

And so tonight, i have stormed out of the house for some peace and solitude because i just cant stand the pouting, whining and finger pointing one second longer.

I need help, God.
Help me find my composure once again.

Love letter

2010-04-26T22:24:00.000-07:00

In case you cant read this, it says:

Dear Wei Pyn

My number 67570794

Love Terelle

I. Am. Floored

My daughter, who is all of 5, has just given her phone number to a boy.

She is kinda besotted with this boy from her class. A skinny little ball of energy named Wei Pyn.

Im not sure if she truly understands the meaning of love or perhaps she simply enjoys his company very much, because Wei Pyn, from what i can tell from my sneaky observations in school, is a spontaneous, fun loving and mischevious little boy.

He has many characteristics that are similar to my mafia queen and they are inseparable in class, always playing and chatting happily and even poking fun at their classmates together.

And so for the past few weeks, its been 'Wei Pyn this, Wei Pyn that". She tells me she wants to marry Wei Pyn when she grows up. When i say she's too young to be thinking about marriage, she retorts, "No not now Mummy, when Im big like you, I will marry Wei Pyn."

*Smacks forhead in disbelief*

He loves anything to do with Transformers and she brings Transformers stickers to school for him. Heck she even smuggles Thane's Transformers figurines into her schoolbag when he's not looking, to give them to Wei Pyn!

What disloyalty to her brother! haha!

And sometimes i catch her smiling to herself and when i ask her why, she tells me with a shy smile and a twinkle in her eye that she dreamt Wei Pyn got down on his knees and asked her to marry him.

Oh myGod.

The best part is, Wei Pyn actually called her that night, after she gave him the note in school.

The conversation went as follows:

Terelle: Hello? *giggle giggle* Hello? You want to talk to my brother?

*passes phone to Thane*

Thane: HAR-LOW??!! HAR-LOW!!?? WHO ARE YOU?

*snatches the phone back*

Terelle: My brother is very funny right? *giggle giggle* OK... ok... see you tomorrow! Bye!

And she comes up to me and says,"Mummy how come Wei Pyn sounds so squeaky on the phone? He sounds like a mouse!"

That's cos his voice hasnt broken yet!? That's cos both of you are 5 years old!!?

That's him, that's my supposed future son-in-law.

Sigh...should i start fretting now?

My baby's Five

2010-04-05T08:08:00.000-07:00

My precious firstborn turns 5 today.

We spent the morning having a leisurely macD's breakfast while Thane was in class.

Trying to glam it up with my sunnies

My little rock chick!

And after school, Hubby left work early to join us for an ice cream treat

Terelle is growing up to be a real little lady, and i am so proud of her for achieving many milestones so far.

Physically she can:

1) Swim a short distance now!

She has made such great progress in swimming and i am very impressed with her coach.

I would never have been able to achieve what her coach has managed to get her to do in just 2 short months.

She started as a whimpering scardey cat, sitting and crying at the side of the pool, refusing to put her head into the water. Something the coach said then made sense to her. (and me too! I thought it was a great quote to coax kids!)

He said that it was ok to be scared but its not ok to cry. Surprisingly she started to trust him after that, and tried her darndest to follow his instructions, even if it meant coming way out of her comfort zone.

Here she is at one of her 1st few lessons, still a little fearful of the water

And then, Coach managed to get her to dunk her head in to blow bubbles

Her confidence bolstered, she began to clown around in the water

And recently, she has managed to swim a short distance, unassisted!!

Well done babe! Mummy hopes you will continue to perfect your strokes and have total confidence in the water!

2) She can run about 1km without stopping for a break.

All my training sessions on wednesdays while Thane is in school have paid off!

Mummy secretly hopes you will follow in my footsteps and take up running. You can do it anytime, anywhere, it keeps you fit and in shape and best of all its free!

Here she is outrunning Shukai, the son of one of my good friends - He is so pooped he gives up and flops to the ground without managing to catch her!

I think you can keep your shotgun Daddy, our girl will be able to outrun any boy chasing her in the future! Haha...

Intellectually she can:

1) Read simple books now!

Thanks to Alice who introduced this method used by mothers who homeschool their kids, Terelle's confidence grew and before i knew it, she could recognize a lot more new words.

I dont know exactly how it happened, but suddenly she was able to read complete sentences and whenever she encountered new words, she would at least attempt to try to sound it out. Previously she would just give up whenever she was stuck.

To further encourage her to read more, I came up with this reading chart. For every book that she reads, she will earn a sticker. Every 5 stickers can be exchanged for a treat - ice cream, kinder bueno, gummies, chocolates...she names it, she gets it!

Close friends know that im such a stickler when it comes to the "No Junk" policy for my kids, so all these treats are like Christmas coming early to her and she totally relishes them.

And it works! She gets a real kick out of actually being able to read an entire book by herself and then sticking each sticker in its respective box. Of course, the books that i choose are simple readers as ive realised that the more difficult ones tend to discourage her and put her off.

No matter, babe! We'll get there together soon!

My cheeky gal would still sometimes play the fool and say something ridiculous whenever she didnt know a word, collapsing in fits of giggles at my admonishings. But generally her reading has improved by leaps and bounds and i am glad.

For a period of time i considered sending her for extra classes to teach her how to read!
Phew! Money saved!

Her current favourite books are those by Dr Seuss as his wacky humor totally appeals to her goofball character. She will read them over and over again and keep laughing at the bizzare and silly parts in the book, and then repeat those parts to her brother and insist that he laugh too.

2) Write simple words all by herself!

Everyday i find a jumble of unrelated words written in a myraid of colors on the easel

It is pretty fun reading new "quotes of the day" on the easel everyday

And for mothers' day, she made this card for me all by herself!

She didnt ask for any help to spell out the words

It's a simple card, with simple words, but im proud, so proud!

3) Play simple tunes on the piano

We are blessed with an awesome teacher who has a knack for getting her to practise her pieces.

On those "off" weeks when no amount of cajoling, threatening, begging or scolding on my part can get her to even go near the piano, one lesson at Aunty P's and she's so motivated, she will practise on her own everyday for the following week.

I have no idea what P does or says to her but it works! And Terelle simply loves her piano lessons now.

And I am so glad i dont have to scream like a banshee at her everyday and pull my hair out over her practising the piano!

Playing one of her latest pieces

Socially she:

1) Empathizes and read feelings very well

When im teaching or upset or busy and flustered, she knows how to stay out of my way until ive calmed down. And then she will give me a hug and tell me that she loves me. Or she will draw something funny or write me a card to cheer me up.

I can never stay angry with her for long!

And if i scold or scream at her, i always feel terrible straight after, cos she is generally so well behaved (albeit a little mischievious and cheeky) and easy to manage, it doesnt seem fair to her to be yelled at by Mummy.

I thank God for her understanding, if not for her, I wouldnt be able to achieve half of the things I do everyday!

2) Obeys orders and is pretty easy to discipline

She knows her daily routine very well and will usually do as she is told without any complaints. The tricky part is not to let her get too tired. When she's tired, all protocol is thrown out of the window and she starts to whine, cry and basically melt down.

If things really get out of hand, all i have to do is look at her sternly and tell her firmly that i want the hysterics stopped at the count of three. She will usually stop right after she hears me start on "one".

Other than that, if she is well rested, she is a joy to have around and i love hanging out with her as she is interactive and fun to be with!

3) Is still a little shy among adults

I am training her to greet her elders loudly and clearly whenever she meets them, but so far she manages only feeble little squeaks of acknowledgement.

Well, we're still working on it. Some days she greets people that we meet loudly and cheerfully while other days she still hides shyly behind me and squeaks incoherantly.

Sigh...no matter! Im sure we'll get there too!

So Happy Birthday babe! May you always stay my happy, healthy and spunky little girl!

Couple Time!

2010-03-23T05:36:00.000-07:00

It has become de rigueur that we have some couple time every Friday cos Terelle has a long day in school, ending class only at 4pm. So she doesnt nap when she comes home and will be knackered and in bed by 8pm. Baby will follow his sister to bed at whatever time she chooses.

Which leaves us with a good 4 hours to head out for some shopping or a movie, to catch up with friends and of course supper!

Food at Glutton's Bay is good but overpriced

Checking out River Hongbao during CNY

Dont like to jostle around in crowds with the kids in tow

Posing in front of the Kent Ridge Hall float

Scouring Nite Markets

And at our latest run - the Live Earth Run for Water!

This time we brought the kids over to my in laws' the night before the run, so that we could have a good rest before the race, and the whole day to ourselves after that!

At the finish line

Unfettered by kids, we went shopping after the race, went home and grabbed our gear before heading out for badminton and swimming with good friends, and ended off the day with a nice dinner by the seaside

What bliss!

Im so mentally recharged to handle the kids again!

Before this short break i was dragging my heels and losing my temper at the kids at the slightest provocation. What wonders a 24hr break can do to my psyche!

More "staycations" yah, hubby? ;)

Discpline and Reward

2010-03-01T03:19:00.000-08:00

We came up with this chart to motivate Terelle to behave.

She gets a tick for good behavior and a cross whenever she misbehaves. Moreover there was a period of time when she began to cry whenever we dropped her off at school and would cling to me like a limpet, all the while wailing pitifully.

No idea what brought on that period of regression, we put it down to Thane starting to become more endearing with his antics and captivating everyone's attention, so she had no choice but to come up with something to attract our attention as well.

Thank God she didnt regress in other ways like bed wetting or fighting sleep though! That would have been major headache for me!

So for each day that she did not cry, she would get a tick, and for the days that she did, she would get a cross.

If she reached the end of the chart of crosses, she would be "rewarded" with a lollipop.

And if she completed the chart of ticks, she would get this neat contraption called the Ezy Roller.

We found this in an obscure sports shop and all of us were fascinated by it. The Ezy-Roller is a three-wheel cart without pedals, a chain, or batteries. Instead it glides forward by moving your feet and knowing our daredevil daughter, she would definitely be game to try anything that involves high speed action outdoors.

So it was obvious what she was gunning for, and whenever she slipped up and started crying in school, she was genuinely appalled at her behaviour and kept vowing not to repeat her hysterics the next day.

The chart was also good in controlling errant behaviour. I would simply have to go, "Do u want a tick or a cross?" and any attempt at a misdemeanour would be quelled immediately. Haha!

And so, after a couple of months, Terelle finally earned her Ezy Roller, adding this to the sporting activities that we do together during our special time on Wednesdays!

She is a speed demon, just like her mama! haha...

Patience

2010-02-17T07:13:00.000-08:00

This is what we got up to, on one of those nites when the small one went to bed early.

Terelle honing her patience by lining the dominos up one by one

half an hour later....all done!

And down they fall...a few minor glitches though...

This would NEVER have been possible if the small guy was awake, he is so eager (or rather destructive) he will topple short rows of only 3 dominos!

Updates

2010-02-15T06:53:00.000-08:00

Terelle and I have 2 special days in the week, when we do stuff together during a precious 2 hr window when Thane is in school.

Since his school is at East Coast, we will go for a morning run together, starting from the old Big Splash...

looping around the Lighthouse...

and then turning back!

We will then treat ourselves to a hearty breakfast at one of the eateries near Thane's school, all the while taking goofy pics and/or read some books and do some activity books.

Other days we will take either her scooter or car along with us and have some giddy, giggly fun rolling down slopes and racing along the jogging tracks.

Here she is, hurtling down the slopes at breakneck speed!

And then she has to carry the car back up - its a good workout for her arms and legs too!

Some days we venture further, over to Parkway Parade for a nice breakfast and our favourite longan/pineapple drink at the hawker centre.

And then its off to the playground near the library for some fun, while we wait for the library to open its doors.

We will then spend the next hour in the library, reading together and choosing new books to be savoured at home.

Baby i just want you to know that Mummy really treasures these times spent with you, and i hope that you enjoy yourself as much as i do!

A Prayer

2010-02-11T06:23:00.000-08:00

While most of us are reveling in the festive spirit and worrying over inconsequential things like whether the home looks impressive enough for guests, like how to churn out the dishes for reunion dinner or even what to wear to make a fashion statement while visiting; i want to stop my very own trivial quibbling for a moment and say a prayer for someone.

Many of us know Charmaine, the feisty girl battling neuroblastoma. The girl and her long suffering mother whose story touched us all.

I do not particularly enjoy reading the blog chronicling her battle with her cancer, because it makes me so utterly sad and i cant stop thinking about her for the next couple of days.

However, i was reading someone else' blog today and that person wrote an update about her. Feeling curious and hopeful that perhaps there might be a chance of a happy ending for her, i started to read about her latest developments.

And the prognosis doesnt sound optimistic, the cancer's back.
I come away with feelings of misery, despair, unfairness, indignance and overall hopelessness again.
The pain i feel for this little girl is so real that she might have been a close friend or relative's daughter.

As Charmaine's mum puts it, all she really wants is to lead a normal life.
All she wants is to "go to work like everyone else, fret about the stressful life in Singapore, stress over my kids' education and complain that money is never enough."
Issues that all of us go on and on about every single day, moaning about our lives like its the end of the world.

I want to hang my head with shame for whenever my own kids are sick, i whinge and whine and think that im suffering just because i dont get a couple of nights' proper sleep. And here is this brave mummy who stays by her daughter's side day after day, night after night taking each setback and triumph with strength and grace.

I dont know if ill have her strength if i was in her situation. Looking at my kids playing together happily without a care in this world brings a lump to my throat and tears to my eyes.
They have been given this simple gift of health and it has suddenly become so precious to me because here is this little girl, denied the same gift and the experience of the pure, unadulterated joy of enjoying the world through innocent and pain free eyes.

Tonight, i thank you dear Lord, for my children's health and vow that i will not sweat the small stuff anymore.

Whenever im going to yell at Terelle for not learning to read properly, ill think of the fact that all Charmaine wants is to go to school.

When i find myself losing my temper when they dont behave, ill think of how much Cynthia wants Charmaine to simply be cheeky and have the energy to goof around.

And whenever i get upset with my kids not eating properly/watching too much tv/being tardy at bedtime/making a mess/fighting and basically just being kids, ill remember that all Cynthia wants is for Charmaine to be able to do all of that.

And i hope i will be able to find it in me to stop for a minute, calm down and just hug them both a little tighter and thank you again Lord, for giving them to me as they are, above everything else.

And so, i say a prayer for this little family tonight, that perhaps, just perhaps, the night is really the darkest just before dawn.

Dear Heavenly Father, i would truly give up all my creature comforts, just so that this little girl can have a decent shot at life, a life of health and happiness that all of us take for granted.

Please hear my prayer tonight, Lord.

Amen.

Wheee!

2010-02-05T07:29:00.000-08:00

Hubby insisted i take this video, so that 10 years down the road when the kids are grown, he can remember that he once used his head for purposes not quite that conventional.

We Heart Bangkok

2009-12-22T06:06:00.000-08:00

Long overdue post detailing our by now infamous (at least among our circle of friends with young children but who have yet to dare scoot off on a holiday WITHOUT them) Bangkok trip.

4 days 3 nights in a swanky Marriott suite in the heart of Bangkok.

4 days 3 nights of non stop shopping and eating.

4 days 3 nights of doing absolutely whatever we want, whenever we want with no schedules to adhere to.

4 days 3 nights of absolute freedom from the incessant demands of 2 precocious kids.

What complete, unmitigated bliss...

And yet, the night before we were supposed to leave, i was having 2nd thoughts. (See post on breastfeeding Thane for the last time)

How were the kids going to cope without me?

Who will police them in drinking their daily copious amounts of water?

Who will make sure that every inch of every tooth is brushed every night?

Who will make sure that they dont stuff their faces with junk?

And who will be there for them if they miss us badly?

I know hubby was all ready to berate me for wasting his time and money should i pull out from our couple trip at the last minute, so i bit my tongue and quelled all my fears about leaving the kids behind.

I could hardly sleep that night, disturbed by nightmares about the kids injuring themselves/falling very sick/choking/getting lost/getting run over by traffic cos no one was watching them...yeah i was that paranoid.

You couldnt blame me right? This was the 1st time in almost 5 years that we have actually left their sides for more than a couple of hours!

Of course i was apprehensive!

To make matters worse, my baby started to develop a runny nose the very night before we were supposed to depart.

Talk about the kids always succeeding in sabotaging our plans huh...

Here he is, a little sick but still cheeky as usual

And so, the very next morning, we carted everyone off to my mother in law's house , 2 hours before we were even due to check in.

Hubby called for a cab to the airport and with nary a backward glance, plopped himself in the backseat.

Me, my heart broke when Terelle started crying. I wanted to cry myself and almost wanted to ask hubby not to go after all.

Callously, hubby dragged me into the cab (a move which i would thank him for later) and demanded that i get a grip and that they would be fine without us.

We did eventually make it up the plane, but not before me insisting to call home like twenty times (all in the space of 3 hours before takeoff)

As soon as we landed in Bangkok, the shopaholic in me could not resist the lure of the intoxicating city and my worries over the kids began to fade.

OK i was determined to make the most out of my 4 days of freedom!!

And so, all we really did was eat, shop, rest, swim, have massages, read, watch tv...in no particular order and then eat and shop some more. By the end of the trip we were thoroughly sick of shopping...and i NEVER get sick of shopping...ha...

Waiting for the train to take us to Chatuchak

Oh yes, we totally heart Bangkok!

Hubby totally satiated and outside the public toilets at the weekend market

He said that the toilets were so clean that they put to shame any one of our public toilets back home. Says so much about our society huh?

Shopping in the sweltering heat

The Bangkok traffic - i love the colorful taxis!

Carting home the spoils from the market

Having dinner at the Suna Lom Night Market

Our sumptious and authentic Thai food

Lunch at a hip joint in the heart of the city where we caught up with an old friend

Silly me was too fascinated with these noodles (aptly named Complicated Noodles) that i forgot to take pics of our little lunch party. Gah!!

And what's a trip to Bangkok without risking life and limb on a Tuk Tuk?

Look at our loot! 80% were stuff for the kids - shows how much we missed them! Haha!

The beautiful infinity pool surrounded by the tall buildings dotting the city

Lazing around by the pool

When the time came for us to leave, i was eager to return home, for the first time! Usually i will be very reluctant to end a holiday and will glumly drag myself back to the airport. This time, i was looking forward to seeing the kids cos we really missed them over the 4 days.

Thanks to pragmatic hubby who had the faith that the kids would be fine without us, who actually dragged me onto the plane and who limited my calls home to only twice a day (think without him, i would have called home every hour), i truly enjoyed our very first trip away from our 2 monkeys.

More to come? Hell, yeah!!

This time ill have utterly no qualms about leaving the kids behind!!

Thane talks

2009-12-21T05:58:00.001-08:00

We are at the airport fetching hubby home from a work trip.

Thane is dressed in long sleeves and wearing his striped pants with a huge owl on his bum.

Passers by find him irresistibly cute and cannot resist but ruffle his hair and pinch his cheeks.

Helper comments," Wah baby, everybody likes you huh?"

Thane swiftly replies, "Because baby handsome."

* I have absoultely no idea who taught him that! *

-----------------

I have stopped breastfeeding him for close to a month now.

Just yesterday i offered him the breast for fun.

M: Baby wanna drink nen nen?

T: *looks at me incredulously* Dunwan!

M: Why? Why dont you want nen nen?

T: Because baby big boy already.

And no matter what i say and how i cajole him to drink nen nen, he keeps rejecting me with a cheeky smile on his face.

He really is a big boy through and through!

---------------

Helper plonks him down on the playmat and goes to the kitchen.

Barely a minute later, we hear his plaintive wail.

" Aunt-eeeeeeee! Come here! Play with baby! Im SO BORED, baby ALL ALONE!"

This is said with the exact same intonation and in the exact same manner as Terelle, who laments this way ever so often, especially during the long holidays.

He is picking up EVERYTHING from Jie Jie, good and bad.

Weaning - the aftermath

2009-12-01T06:05:00.000-08:00

Weaning Thane from breastfeeding was easier than i thought.

Now, whenever its nap or bedtime, all i have to do is to lie on the mattress next to his bed and do my own thing, while he wriggles and squirms round and round the bed, trying to find a sweet spot to lay his little head.
(You know, just like when a dog needs to poo, he goes round and round and round until he finds a nice spot and then he goes?)

After about 15min of burrowing around his bed, he finally falls asleep with nary a fuss.

Heaven!

But the catch is that i HAVE to be beside him. If suddenly during his squirming he happens to look up and im not there, he'll scream the house down till i come back and sit beside him.

It doesnt work if hubby is sitting there. It has to be me.

But im not complaining...its a far far cry from having to nurse him left, right, left, right.....on and on and on for at least 45min!

His appetite has increased much more too. Now he takes 3 bottles of milk a day, 300ml in the morning, 150ml in the afternoon and 120 ml at night, on top of 3 full meals.

No more eating like a mouse! Hallelujah!

However, even without breastfeeding, he's still quite the mama's boy.

Ever so often during the course of the day, he will come and lay his head on my chest and just lie there for a good 10min. He will want me to hug and cuddle and carry him like a baby, smiling contentedly when i do.

And when he's upset, all i have to do is pick him up, cradle him and soothe the raw nerves with some quiet words and he's fine and dandy again.

And i was so worried that only breastfeeding could calm him down!

So overall, i would rate this weaning episode a 10/10. And we got to go for a holiday on our own on top of that!

Happiness...

So long, and thanks for all the fish

2009-11-27T05:17:00.000-08:00

It is 10pm and Thane is comfortably cocooned in my arms, blissfully suckling to sleep.

Little does he know that it will be the last time he gets to suckle and that a thousand and one feelings are swirling through me right now.

Tomorrow hubby and i leave for Bangkok for a 4 day getaway and we are going to use this chance to wean him.

I am sad.
We've been through so much, my babe and me. From the early days of mastitis, to finally achieving a constant supply, to his abrupt and emotionally wrenching milk strike, to him becoming kinda addicted to the breast...this last breastfeeding session just seems so sudden and so final.

As i watch his little angelic face slowly soften as he starts to doze off, my heart breaks and my resolve is weakened. I am so tempted to call off my trip tomorrow, just so that i can continue nursing my little one.

If i had my way, ill probably let him self wean slowly. But so many factors are pushing me towards this harsher decision of weaning him myself, now.

I think of the sleepless nights. Ive not had unbroken sleep for the past 2 years cos he still wakes up to 4 times a nite to nurse!! For FUN!! He's not really suckling!!

The screaming fits when i deny him the breast. The absolute worst case is when im driving and he's strapped in his car seat and howling incessantly for nen nen. He will wail and holler and scream and sob all the way home, and all the while im trying my darndest not to get into an accident amidst the racket he's making.

I think about his lack of appetite and disinterest in food cos he loves to suckle at all times of the day and he fills up before he gets a chance to have his proper meals. He eats like a mouse and i am afraid he is not getting enough nutrients, for breastmilk isnt supposed to be that nourishing to a 2 year old as it is to a 6 month old!

His reluctance to drink from the bottle cos the breast is always so much more comforting. And so i am chained to him, for i always have to be present to comfort him whenever he's upset and also to put him down to sleep. I remember him waiting for me way past his naptime, cos i was having tuition and couldnt nurse him. He ended up real cranky and screamed the whole house down cos he was extremely tired, but still he waited and waited till i was done.

I think about the embarassment when he tries to pull up my top in public as and when he fancies. The image of Emperor Pu Yi comes to mind and i am terrified if i dont wean him soon, he will continue to breastfeed all the way till he's 6!!
Horrors of horror!

And so i harden my heart and commit this image of his contented little sleeping face to memory before putting him down to sleep. I have to move on and close this chapter of my life.

That's it, its over...My milk producing days are done.

Ive breastfed Thane for 1 year 11months and 22 days, just 8 days shy of his 2nd birthday.
I deserve a huge pat on the back.

Oh and i forgot to mention, bye bye cleavage, hello runway again...sigh...

Mourning Jack

2009-11-23T06:03:00.000-08:00

It was the day when torrential rains poured over our little island. And there was widespread flooding, the most well known one being in the Bukit Timah area.

I was in Bedok, far far away from Bukit Timah. I was supposed to be safe.

And yet...
Let's just say i was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

I had just finished my workout at Tampines and was going to pick Terelle up from school. One of her classmate's mum called to say that her car couldnt start and asked if i could pick her gal up as well.
Sure, not a problem, i cheerfully answered, as i slowly negotiated the car through the blinding rain towards the school.

I picked the girls up, dropped Terelle's friend back home and headed off towards our own home.

Almost every car had their hazard lights on and everyone was going at a snail's pace. I had never seen such heavy rainfall before, much less drive through one, so i was exceptionally careful.

I saw some flooding ahead of me and estimated that the water would come up to about half tyre. But smaller cars than mine were cruising easily through the pool of water so i figured it was alright.

Never in my wildest dreams did i expect to stall right smack in the middle of the flashflood!

You always see other drivers standing forlornly by the side of the road, beside their vehicle that had just broken down, and u go "tsk tsk so cham!"
But you never ever expect it to happen to you.
When it does you are just flabbergasted and lost.

The next few minutes were pretty surreal.

I tried to restart the car but it sputtered and died, with all its indicator lights flashing.
Other motorists started to horn at us from the back.
Terelle jumped up and down excitedly, asking me loads of questions and yelling at me to "Quickly start the car and MOVE, mummy! We are blocking the road!"

At that moment my mind was a blank. I didnt know what to do but to call hubby, who was thousands of miles away in Beijing.
Sudden call at 3pm on a Thursday afternoon from wife, i wouldnt hazard a guess over the million and one bleak thoughts that could have flashed through his mind at that time.

After calling for the tow truck, i ushered Terelle out of the car and into the pouring rain cos i was afraid the cars behind wouldnt be able to see us and plough into us. I had to carry her through the flood, cos i didnt want her to get wet, and my shoes and pants were soaked through.

As we stood by the road side, huddled together under the umbrella, and waited for the tow truck (and the liews to come save terelle and bring her home 1st), i saw the floodwaters slowly receed.

10minutes later and the road was back to normal.

Sigh...if only i had stayed a little longer at the gym, if only i had driven a little slower, if only i had parked at Terelle's school and waited for the rain to abate, then i wouldnt have been caught in the flashflood.

See? Normal road conditions by the time the tow truck arrived

Poor Jack being towed after his watery death

I'd never thought ill feel so strongly over the car.

Poor poor Jack (Our family's affectionate name for the car) with his flashy rims, sporty exterior and customized racing stripe, is now lifeless with his lungs (engine) full of water in a dirty workshop. Jack who has accompanied us on many a happy family outing, who has drawn countless appreciative glances on the roads and who is a luxury to maneuver is dead, dead, dead.

And he is barely 2 years old!

As im writing this, im not even sure if we'll ever see Jack again, the initial prognosis from the mechanic is grim.

I feel like im mourning the loss of a dear friend. *sob*

Running

2009-11-14T06:31:00.000-08:00

Amongst many other common interests, i am thankful that hubby and i share a passion for sports, especially running.
Due to our inherent competitive streak, we have always taken great pride in trying to outrun each other, ever since our school days.

I havent been running very regularly since ive had the 2 monkeys, but this year, ive finally hauled my lazy ass off the sofa and restarted my fitness regime. Also because hubby sponsored an unlimited membership with the gym, and penny pinching me abhors wastage, so i go almost everyday to maximize the membership! Haha...

It really is a case of mind over matter. When i wasnt exercising i always felt lethargic and listless, and yet couldnt sleep well at night. Once i started hitting the gym regularly, i had renewed energy to push myself to do so much more during the day and at night i slept like a baby (until awoken BY the baby)

Here we are at some of our runs this year.

At the starting line of the nike human race

I struggled to complete the 10k last year but im proud to say i did it quite effortlessly with a respectable timing this year! Yeah!

Just before flag off in a sea of red

A little crazy with euphoria at the end

At Run Singapore

I also took part in the Great Eastern Women's 10k but alas, no pics as my friend was holding on to my fone when i went for a loo break at the start and we got separated when the run started.

And i have made it my personal challenge to keep beating my timing and to push myself to see how much i can improve.

It feels good to have an agenda for myself for once, and to indulge in something that i am passionate about, and not have my world revolve entirely around the kids.

And this is also the reason why i am dead set against having a 3rd child. My life has just started to get back on track and i dont want to be derailed again and start right at the beginning with another baby.

A couple of good friends are expecting their 3rd child and i am really happy for them, (sidenote: YL you may not be the best mother in the world but i know you are the best mother that k, s and the akan datang little one can ever have. And i admire you for your bravery and steadfastness in following God's plan!)

But i know that i will be extremely upset if i were to fall pregnant with a 3rd child. There is just not enough of me to go round if i were to have another baby.

(Which reminds me that i did mention when i recounted about my pregnant pauses, about how i was going to permanantly guarantee that that doesnt happen.)

We have set our sights on the Great Wall Marathon in Beijing and the Phuket Marathon next year and maybe also the Great Ocean Road marathon in Melbourne, and take a holiday at the same time after completing the race. It would be a good chance for us to have some couple time too without the kids.

Anyone keen to join us? :)

Simple pleasures

2009-11-13T02:27:00.000-08:00

We really do not need to spend money to buy any more toys for the kids.

Here they are keeping themselves occupied with things found around the house! Best of all, most of these things came free of charge!

Drawing on a balloon

This is a box that came with a lounge chair that we bought.

They doodled on it, played hide and seek in it, played pretend house, slept in it, hid their little treasures in it and basically spent many happy hours with it.

Hiding and squealing non stop

Terelle peeking out of the little window that she cut out herself

Thane in his shanty town house

Alas, hubby has thrown the box out as it has been almost torn to shreds.

Its ok, it had lived a good life!

And here they are, dragging each other along in the old car seat.

I am seriously thinking of doing away with xmas pressies this year

Shall i get them some cardboard, a few pieces of plastic and maybe some tin cans?

HAI-YAK!

2009-11-12T21:01:00.000-08:00

This is the result of watching too much Kung Fu Panda.

In the video, Terelle is very amused by Thane's antics and held on to his head while he pummelled the air. Of cos that didnt go down too well with him.

And when he couldnt hai-yak Jie Jie, he turned and started to rain blows on me...haha...

The story of the rejected milk powder

2009-11-10T20:04:00.000-08:00

I bought a tin of Nan Pro 3 for Thane to try a couple of months back and he took to it, finishing the entire tin within a month.

Gleefully i bought another tin but this time, it was a pain just trying to get him to finish up a bottle every day. Thinking that i bought the wrong tin (cos Nan Pro3 and Nan HA look similar) i rushed out to get a tin of Nan HA just so that he would drink more milk everyday.

To my utter dismay, he rejected the Nan HA completely! Actually i dont blame him, it smells and tastes like puke.

And so i have almost a full tin of Nan HA and a quarter tin of Nan pro 3 sitting in my kitchen untouched.

I was determined not to let them go to waste, but i couldnt possibly sell them away now that they have been opened.

Brainwave moment - I decided to use the milk powder to bake cookies! I used a conventional recipe for cookies and made some trial and error changes, the cookies turned out to be crunchy on the outside and a little soft on the inside, just like the consistency of Sugi cookies.

The kids loved them so much that they walloped almost half the entire batch the moment they came out of the oven. In fact they were already eating the dough even before i could bake them. Wahahaha...

And so here is my recipe, for any mummy who wants to get their kid to drink more milk without them actually drinking it!

Ingredients
180g butter (softened at room temperature)
80g Horlicks
50g milk powder
200g cake flour
10 tsp sugar
chocolate chips or colorful sprinkles

Method

1. Preheat oven to 140deg. Line baking tray with baking paper

2. Sieve cake flour and milk powder.

3. Cream butter and Horlicks at low speed for about 3 minutes, gradually adding in the sugar.

4. Add cake flour and milk powder and beat until dough is formed.

5. Roll into balls or use cookie cutters to cut into shapes.

(I let Terelle decorate them, she made faces with the choc chips and silver sugar balls.)

6. Bake at 140deg for 25-30minutes, depending on your oven.

7. Cool completely before storing. Makes about 50 cookies.

Enjoy! :)

Thane is writing!

2009-11-08T21:13:00.000-08:00

Ive been practising with him using this reusable ABC booklet. And one fine day, he surprised us by actually being able to write out a couple of letters on his own on the easel!

He can write the letters "H, I, L and O" proficiently. And most of the letters with the straight lines with a bit of help. Letters with curves are still a little difficult for him.

But its no mean feat! Terelle only started writing letters when she was around 2 years and 8 months!

Working too hard?

2009-09-19T06:48:00.000-07:00

Ive been giving tuition for years but for the longest time this year, ive had no luck in getting assignments.
However, recently God has been good to me and all of a sudden im bombarded with so many referrals for tuition that i have to turn down many assignments.

Im very thankful for the work coming my way and the financial independence it proffers, not to mention the immense satisfaction from knowing that i actually count again.
I can earn my own keep!
Im no longer just a yellow-faced, thumb twiddling housewife whose entire world revolves around the 4 walls of her home!
The rusty cogs of my brain are turning once more!

It feels good to be able to buy stuff for the kids with my own money or to pay for their enrichment classes or workshops without having to consult hubby.

I can also treat myself to an indulgent snack if i fancy it. (it used to be "What? $3.90 for fried taiwanese chicken pieces? sigh...ill pass")

Hell, I can even buy little surprise gifts for hubby!
In the past a gift for him didnt feel like it was a real gift cos i was using his money to buy it!

But i wonder if im working too hard and spending too much time away from the kids.
After all i did quit my job to be a stay at home mum in order to spend time with the kids.

My typical day goes as follows:

Morning

Chauffeur the kids to enrichment classes/school. Thane attends classes at 9am so if Terelle is awake by the time we need to leave the house, I will get her changed and ready for school and take her along for a spot of breakfast as our helper accompanies Thane in class.
After he is done with class, i will send Terelle off to school.

(On a sidenote, I lament the fact that i seldom am able to accompany Thane in his classes because if Terelle is around, she always demands my attention and refuses to have breakfast with our helper and let me go to class with Thane.

Yes we do have a good time bonding over breakfast, as we read storybooks, do a couple of activity books and draw funny pictures together.

But i get this niggling sense of guilt that Thane seldom has mummy's undivided attention, unlike Jie Jie in the past, who had mummy all to herself.

Terelle went everywhere with me, literally. Even when i had to give tuition, i would bring her along and she would play with my student's siblings with nary a complaint.

Sigh the pitfalls of being the 2nd child...)

Midday

After Terelle is off at school, ill take Thane home, put him to sleep and rush to the gym for an hour's workout, ending just in time for me to go pick her up from school.
Sometimes if any of my students are home early from school, ill schedule tuition during this time so that i can be home for a longer stretch in the afternoon.

Afternoon
After showering Terelle and giving her a snack, ill put her down to nap, wolf down my lunch and rush out for tuition. Usually ill have at least 2 sessions a day and ill only return at evening time. This means that after their nap, Terelle would have spent about 2 hrs playing with our helper while Thane would have spent at least 4 hrs.

Evening
Ill have dinner with the kids and after playing with them for about an hour, its time to start the bedtime routines.

Im concerned because lately, Thane has been clinging to me like a limpet each time i return home. If im occupied and cannot tend to him immediately, he cries inconsolably and keeps saying "I want mummy!"

Terelle has also commented that she seldom sees me at home anymore. And sometimes whenever she is excited about something and wants me to share her excitement, she calls me "Aunty!" and then "Mummy!" *horrors*

Is my working 4 hours a day too much for my kids? Cant i have my cake and eat it too?

Sigh...

I still want my stay at home mum status to be a badge of honor and not become a subject of contention.
And so i shall cringe and turn away yet more lucarative assignments because after all, my kids are still my top priority.

Who? What? Why? When? How?

2009-09-10T09:01:00.000-07:00

Thane is getting prolific at questioning us. His line of questioning is spot on in context and he always leaves us flabbergasted at his creativity.

Scenario: His diaper has burst and his shorts are all wet. Our helper tells him that he has to take a bath right now. However, they are not at home but at my mum in law's house.

Helper: Baby you need to bom bom now. Your diaper burst.

Thane: *Looks at her incredulously* Here?

Helper: *Amused* Yes!

Thane: How?

(As in this is not our house, where in the world can I bom bom?)

Scenario: Passerby couple quarrelling. We overhear guy telling girl to keep quiet and that he doesnt care about her anymore.

Thane turns to his Gong Gong and with a puzzled look on his face, asks, " Why?"

Gong Gong: I dont know...I have no idea...

Thane: Then how?

*Gong Gong is gobsmacked*

Scenario: Thane is singing at the top of his voice and totally massacring the song. Terelle is trying to sing the same song properly but cant because she is distracted by him.

Terelle: Keep quiet baby!! KEEP QUIET! You must SING PROPERLY!!!!

Thane: *with a mocking smirk* Why?

Toilet Humor

2009-09-05T06:32:00.000-07:00

For reasons unbeknownst to me, children absolutely love words associated with waste material. Toilet humor cracks them up to the point that tears stream from their eyes and they are almost rolling on the floor shrieking with laughter.

Terelle bombards me with a barrage of toilet humor every single day.

She changes the words of the nursery rhymes that i try to sing to thane.

"Old Macdonald had a POOT POOT, E-I-E-I-O

And on his farm he had some SHEE SHEE, E-I-E-I-O! Wahahahhahah!"

When we play make believe with her soft toys, she names them POOT POOT, SHEE SHEE or UNDERPANTS, all the while howling with laughter.

If any of the above words so happen to feature in our conversations, she latches onto them immediately and says them over and over again, giggling non stop.

And whenever i fetch her from school, i always find her holding court with her subjects in rapt attention as she spews words such as "CHICKEN UNDERPANTS!", "POO POO POOEY!", SHEE SHEEEEEEEEEE!"
And everyone will burst out laughing hysterically.

Charming...

Mafia antics again

2009-09-03T06:10:00.000-07:00

I drove up to the pick up point where all the kids would be waiting for their parents to fetch them.

She was nowhere to be found.

Two other mummies couldnt locate their kids too so the teachers freed up an area for us to park our cars.

I found Terelle in the playground, together with the two missing girls, She was holding court with a rapt audience, commanding everyone to watch as she gleefully dripped water from her wet hanky over her head.

Her uniform was drenched with sweat, her cheeks were flushed from mischief and exertion and her hair was soaking wet.
Her friends were in stitches. She was encouraged by their boisterous cheers.

I caught hold of her just as she was about to scoot off to the basin to get more water to pour over her head.

I let fly vitriol, she was unfazed.
I demanded to know who did she follow to the playground, she looked guilty.

So she was the one who instigated everyone to run off to the playground instead of waiting at the pick up point!
They must have snuck off when the teachers in charge at the pick up point weren't looking, cos it can get pretty chaotic during dismissal time.

Just at that moment, 2 teachers came down and started to ask the children to identify who ran off to the playground first.
Fortunately for her, one of her friends pointed the finger at another girl who was totally indignant at the accusation.
The teacher was really furious and gave all the perpetrators a good tongue lashing.

The ring leader was still totally unrepentant until i sat her down in the car and told her in all seriousness that if she were to do that again, Mummy would not be able to find her and take her home. Then she would have to spend the night ALL ALONE in the dark dark school.

Her eyes watered, she looked genuinely petrified.
"I promise i will wait for you at the pick up point, Mummy. I wont run away again."

Score!

However, just barely a minute later,
"But can i ask my friends to play catching with me at the pick up point?"

Ugh...a leopard can never change its spots...

If tomorrow never comes

2009-08-20T04:02:00.000-07:00

Sometimes late at night

I lie awake and watch her sleeping

She's lost in peaceful dreams and i turn out the lights and lay there in the dark

And a thought crosses my mind

If i never wake in the morning

Would she ever doubt the way i feel about her in my heart

If tomorrow never comes

Would she know how much i love her

Did i try in every way to show her everyday

She's my only one

And if my time on earth were through

And she must face this world without me

Is the love i gave her in the past gonna be enough to last

If tomorrow never comes

My best friend made me watch a youtube video of a talented singer crooning this ballad today. This song never fails to leave me with a lump in my throat.

And even though you have made me so incensed yet again throughout the day, with your constant whining, refusal to obey instructions and general mischief, tonight i will hug you a little tighter, give you a few more kisses and vow to be more tolerant, patient and indulgent towards your antics tomorrow.

To my special firstborn, i hope you know that no matter what, Mummy loves you, more than you can ever imagine.

Toxicity

2009-08-10T20:25:00.000-07:00

These feelings are usually easy to write it off but today not so much.

I just HAVE to write about what happened today cos im just sooooo pissed, and i need to get it off my chest.

Are you a happy, optimistic, positive person by nature but when you're around a certain individual, you feel depressed, pessimistic and negative?

Or maybe you're an idealistic person who sees the world through rose tinted glasses, but some people just make you feel silly and delusional?

Has someone consistenly thrashed all your well intentions, not spared a thought for your feelings and yet leave you feeling guilty that somehow you hadnt tried hard enough?

These people ooze toxicity.
These people have 'issues' that are toxic.
They are toxic to our happiness.
They are toxic to our mental health.
They are toxic to our self-esteem.
And they are toxic to our lives.
They can suck the life out of us and even shorten our lifespan.

I know this is happening to me because of a certain someone and yet i am powerless to defend myself.

My certain someone has an extreme sense of self-importance and believes that the world revolves around him/her.
(I shant be so overt about this. Lets just call the person X for ease of writing.)
Many a time the people around X want to shout "It isn't always about you!" , yet we always bite our tongues and get on with it to avoid conflict.

X is so utterly focused on his/her needs, our needs are totally ignored.
If you do not do just as X wishes, you are in for a big guilt trip, and are often left feeling upset, disappointed and unfulfilled.
And so to avoid feeling like crap, you abide by X's commands even when you have to expend so much energy on him/her, you have nothing left for yourself.

X is never encouraging, affirmative or upbeat.
When you say you've tried your best, he/she doubts your efforts and belittles any struggles you had to go through for him/her.
His/her negativity is infectious. It consumes you and you find yourself feeling melancholic and depressed just cos he/she is feeling that way.

I can never give enough to make X happy.
He/she takes me for granted, always has unrealistic expectations of me, finds ways to continually fault me and never takes responsibility for anything.
Everything is always someone else's fault and never his/hers.

All of us spend so much time and effort trying to please him/her .
Why do we even bother when none of our efforts are ever appreciated?
All of us are worn out, our own needs are always sacrificed and yet we keep making the same mistake and going back for more "torture".

This person is so self absorbed, he/she doesnt see that what he/she is doing is wrong.
Talking and explaining my actions to him/her falls on deaf ears, and sometimes i wonder if i am the crazy one.

Hubby is at his wits' end seeing me get all worked up by X all the time. He stresses that the more these people get away with their behavior, the more they will continue.
I know that but yet i cant bring myself to take a confrontation to cataclysmic levels because i am afraid of the consequences.

I know life is too short to be dealing with such toxicity all the time.
I must learn to turn a deaf ear and blind eye to this peson's rants and demands.
I must learn that ive tried my best and it is not my fault.
And i must learn to hide my chocolates properly.

The big 20

2009-08-07T08:21:00.000-07:00

Thane turns 20 months old today.

Physically he can:

Chew chunky food! Yay finally! He has almost his entire set of baby teeth, save for his 2 lower incisors.

Hold his own in the water. He is fearless in the water which is sooooo unlike Terelle who used to scream murder whenever her face got wet.

Throw and catch a ball effortlessly.

Play catching with his sister.

Climb the stairs by himself, holding onto the railings at the side.
(But he never dares go up or down the stairs by himself. He used to attempt to, but each time he does, he would meet with a barrage of loud, sharp words. So i think he's learnt that the stairs are dangerous.)

Blow out through his mouth. A nifty developmental skill that Terelle only picked up later.

Copy a couple of dance moves. The kids are especially adept at dancing along to Michael Jackson MTVS. They have been well and truly exposed to the late King of Pop.

When they are not fighting, he loves imitating his sister. Here he is trailing along in her wake, whistling, marching and saluting just like her.

Intellectually he can:

Recognize all the uppercase letters of the alphabets. Lower case letters still need a little prompting.

Knows the sounds of all the letters of the alphabet.
(Thanks to Leapfrog's Talking Letter Factory DVD)

Can count items from 1-10, any more his counting goes wonky.

Can segregate different sections of a picture, i.e. for example the beach scene below, he has colored the sun yellow, the crab and starfish red, the trees green, the sea blue, but all of cos not inside the lines.
But i think its a great effort!

Verbally he can:

Indicate what he wants by saying "I want!" whenever we have something in hand that he likes.

Right now gastronomically, he is starting to be very adventurous and will go "I want!" and insist on trying whatever we are having at mealtimes.
He has even managed small nibbles of mee rebus and rendang without flinching.

Tell our helper whenever he wants to drink milk - "Drink Milk!".
(Oh ive started him on formula - NanPro3 cos its supposedly most similar to breastmilk)
However he hates sucking from the teat, preferring to drink from his water bottle, from a straw.

Repeat after us quite accurately. I remember just a little over 2mths ago, i was asking hubby how come he hasnt started to say any coherent words yet and now here he is, talking fast and furious!

Say "Go Gai Gai!", grab his shoes and go stand by the gate at least once a day. He simply loves to go out!

Sing along to all of Jie Jie's favourite songs. Rhythm is there but words not so clear. For those songs he's not so sure of, he can sing the last word of each verse.

Emotionally:

He's still very much mama's little baby. Loves to be cuddled and hugged and will hug, kiss, sayang any of us when asked.
Much more "manja" than Terelle ever was!
I think its all because im still breastfeeding him.

Clings to us, or more specifically me, like superglue whenever in a new place and faced with strangers. Will warm up and start to explore his surroundings after awhile. The period of time taken to warm up significantly shortens when i am not in sight.
Did i mention he's mama's little boy?

He is adding new antics to his ever expanding repertoir everyday and i am eager to see what he can achieve next!
Im so proud of you baby!

Sibling Interaction at its best

2009-08-05T08:51:00.000-07:00

Scenario: They are both watching starfall. The letter L, which is Terelle's choice, is currently being played but Thane wants to watch the letter N.

Thane: N!

Terelle: Later

Thane: Nnn!

Terelle: Later!

Thane: Nnnnn!

Terelle: LATER!!

Thane: Nnnnn!! (He is so getting a kick out of riling his sister up)

Terelle: LATER!!! Can you hurry up! (Referring to the website loading very slowly)

Thane: Nnnnnn!

Terelle: Can you hurry up and see!!! (Telling Thane to finish watching L 1st) WAIT PATIENTLY!!

* Thane smacks her lightly in retaliation to her pinching his cheeks*

Terelle: (Looking at me and expecting a response)

*Resigned and feeling unjustified* He beat me!

*Reproachful* Naughty boy! Dont play with you!

No matter how many times i watch this video, it still leaves me in stitches.

Gong Gong is...

2009-08-03T08:44:00.000-07:00

We were in the car and Terelle was commenting that Baby was a good boy cos he didnt want to nurse for once and sat quietly in his car seat.

T: Baby is a good boy!

Me: And what about you?

T: Me? Im a good girl

M: And mummy?

T: Mummy is a good girl

M: Daddy?

T: Daddy is a good boy

M: What about YiYi?

T: Yiyi is a good girl

M: And Gong Gong?

T: *slight pause* Gong Gong is a good old man!

Current fav pics

2009-07-30T05:35:00.000-07:00

These are my current favourite pics of the sibs.

Taken at Ikea, he was trying out a kiddy rattan chair. When asked to smile, he gave a wonky little smirk. He looks so grown up now!

Terelle is now fixated on using chopsticks. Here she is having noodles and using her training pair. I know im biased, but with her coy smile, she looks oh so sweet!

Our "romantic" getaway

2009-07-27T05:50:00.000-07:00

We are jinxed - by our kids.

What was supposed to be a romantic hotel stay to celebrate our 7th wedding anniversary in June got postphoned 3 times cos all of us took turns to fall sick.

Finally the room was booked over the past weekend and hubby and i were looking forward to spending some quality time together - at last...

And then....

The morning we were supposed to leave for our staycation, Terelle woke up with red, itchy and watery eyes.

Alarm bells rang in my head.

That's it, I thought, there goes our weekend plans. AGAIN!

As she had no other symptoms, Hubby dropped her off at school as usual, only to have her form teacher call me an hour later ordering us to take her home, cos her itchy eyes were bothering her.

We quickly brought her to the gp who diagnosed conjunctivitis and prescribed eye drops.

Time check 1145am.

We still had time to get her sorted out before we set off to check in at 2pm.

Optimistic, we brought her home, administered the eye drops, put her down for her nap and waited for Sis to arrive so we could scram.

To our dismay, she woke up screaming half an hour later, complaining that both her ears were painful. I figured it might be an ear infection so we rushed to the pd immediately cos the gp was by now closed.

Sure enough, pd diagnosed it to be an ear and eye nfection and we were sent home with one eye drop, one eye lotion, ear drops and an anti viral medicine.

By now, our friend was getting increasingly whiny and clingy, it was as if she knew we were going to sneak off!

We were only able to extricate ourselves at 6pm, and checked in at the hotel downtown at 645pm. The idyllic afternoon of shopping, movie and eating that i envisioned just went up in smoke.

We felt uneasy leaving the poor sick gal at home so after a hurried dinner, we drove home again to check on her. Went through the bedtime routines, administered the truckload of meds, gave instructions to helper, sis and dad to call us if her condition worsens in the middle of the night; we finally went back to our supposed "sanctuary" at close to midnight.

Luckily there was a 24 hr TCC nearby to offer some grub and comfort to 2 weary souls.

Comfort food at 2am

It was pretty fun sitting by the sidewalk and gawking at the trannies doing their rounds near Shaw Towers - some of these man chicks were really hot!

The next day, we were determined to enjoy ourselves for a bit.

After repeated phonecalls home, we were satisfied that the kids were still alive without us, so we headed out for a nice dimsum brunch and a leisurely look see at the new ION orchard.

It was EXTREMELY liberating traipsing around town without having to negotiate escalators, staircases and throngs of people with 2 strollers and 2 demanding kids!

That night we had a nice peaceful dinner with the Liews and caught up with old friends over supper.

It was bliss - no schedules to follow, no whiny, demanding kids, no frazzled nerves. It was just us back to pre-kids days, having fun and hanging out with our friends.

Us as we were in the past, not us as parents, as we have inadvertently become.

And although the kids were fine without us at home,

(Thane actually slept through the night without waking up to nurse!

He went without breastmilk for 1.5 days!

Terelle's condition didnt worsen!

Both ate well, slept well and didnt miss us one bit!)

we came back the next morning to fetch them back to the hotel.

Having dinner on the toilet while keeping an eye on the kids in the bath

Can parenthood be more diligent than this?

So there you are, our so called romantic getaway.

We firmly believe we are jinxed. Cos everytime we set up something fun for ourselves or just go out for a couple of hours' break, we'll come back to some calamity involving the kids. Or are we such bad parents that we do not deserve breaks at all?

Hubby thinks this is what transpires between the kids whenever they sense we are going off somewhere without them.

Terelle: Hey pipsqueak! Mummy and Daddy are sneaking off tomorrow.

Thane: Har...does it mean we have to make ourselves sick again?

Terelle: Ya lah, of cos! So isit ur turn or my turn this time?

Thane: Your turn lah! The last time u made me lick the raw meat and i had gastroenteritis for a week!

Terelle: OK OK...so what shall i come down withthis time? Flu? Fever? Baluku on head?

*Out comes a spinner on which is written a myriad of illnesses and injuries. They spin it*

Terelle: Awww man! Conjunctivitis?? Damn its uncomfortable you know!

*Proceeds to touch the toilet and rub her eyes*

Thane: *sniggering* And u think having diarrhea for a week is comfortable??

Plausible, dont you think?

As i write this, im so missing my lazy, hazy saturday already. I really wonder when we can have another break...a proper, guilt free, incident free one...

Sigh...

Kids if you are able to read this now, its payback time!!

Mafia Boss

2009-07-19T06:14:00.000-07:00

My daughter is a mafia boss.

Her form teacher took me aside today and commented that she has incited her friends, on many occasions, to create mischief.

She will come up will silly antics when everyone is doing serious work and divert her classmates' attention from their tasks at hand.

She will entice her friends to join her in a splashing good time at the sinks in the toilet, only running back to class in fits of giggles when the teacher detects their absence and comes to look for them 10min later.

She will say silly things and contort her face and leave everyone in hysterics every opportunity she gets.

As a result, her teacher tells me that many a time, she has been made to stay back to complete her work. She would grudgingly sit at her desk and do her coloring/phonics/chinese strokes/craft while her friends play with toys or troop off to the playground.

Her teacher says she is beginning to disregard her authority and I am concerned.

I have noticed that my daughter has a natural ability to influence the kids around her.

Whenever she is playing with a toy or doing something, the other kids invariably end up being drawn towards her and they will all crowd around to see what she is doing.

She will say something ridiculous and all her cronies will repeat it after her and all of them will collapse in fits of laughter.

She takes a sticker and places it on her forehead and everyone else does the same. She proclaims that she's an "Ah-neh!" and everyone else chants it after her.

She entices her friends in games of police and thief, with her invariably being the flight footed thief that no one ever manages to catch.

And yet, despite all the tomfoolery she creates, she is amazingly protective of her friends.

She makes it her responsibility to watch over her quieter and meeker classmates, making sure they have their snack, that their water bottle is in the right place, that their name tag is pinned properly.

When they report to school everyday, all the kids' temperature are taken and their mouths and hands are checked for spots before they are allowed into class. A teacher is always on hand to record their temperatures beside their names on the class register.
And mafia boss is always there telling the teacher exactly who's who in the queue of kids waiting to get their temperature recorded.

After everyone is checked, she will wait at the staircase and round everyone up before holding the meeker kids' hands and ushering them up to class.

Anyone and everyone seems to know Terelle.
Hubby has witnessed her giving permission to some kids (not from her class!) to go to the playground after school.

I have seen her playing with the older K1 and K2 kids while waiting for me to arrive to fetch her home.

And the clincher:
I didnt send and fetch her to school for the whole week that i was sick. When hubby went to fetch her, he overheard a kid running up to her and asking her if her mummy was still sick.
It was akin to you showing concern over the wellbeing of your boss' family and scoring points at the same time.

To which came her flippant reply," Yes yes she is ok now" before dismissing the minion with a wave of her hand.

*gasp* The entire school seems to know i was sick, through her...

Surreal...totally surreal...

We had better steer her in the right direction before she leads everyone astray. I dont want to be responsible for other kids' errant behavior.

Ugh.

The stubborn bug saga

2009-07-17T05:58:00.000-07:00

As i write this post, i really hope im seeing the end of this particularly feisty bug that has been plaguing my family for the past month and a half.

It all started with Thane.

He came down with a fever on the day of our wedding anniversary, which was 15th June, a Monday.

Having a nice buffet lunch, oblivious to the "battle" we had to fight soon

After a nice day out together, we came home to my mum in law's house to find him burning up. We gave him paracetamol and a cool bath and thought nothing much of it, cos her house is a furnace and we concluded he was probably suffering from mild heat stroke and dehydration.

We started to get worried when his fever yo-yoed up and down, registering highs of 38.5degrees over the next 2 days. To make matters worse, he had 6 teeth erupting at the same time and his appetite was almost zilch.

As there were no other symptoms, i was beginning to worry it could be a urinary tract infection so I brought him to the pd on Wednesday just to get him checked out.

Turned out it was a throat infection and after 3 doses of her prescribed antibiotic, his fever subsided.

Here they are, full of energy, despite being sick

By the way, the toddler bed will always be put in the living room for us to nurse whichever kid that is sick. One, for isolation purposes and two, temperature taking and sponging throughout the nite is less disruptive to those who are sleeping, if it were to be done downstairs.

So the toddler bed was a permanent fixture in our living room for close to 2 weeks when the kids took turns to use it.

Thinking that the worst was over, we went for Thane's weekly LNT class on Friday and even met up with the entire family on Saturday to celebrate Fathers' Day.

To our dismay, his fever came back on Sunday and by evening, it even reached a high of 39.5 degrees. He also had 4 bouts of diarrhea that day.

By then hubby was starting to get frantic cos he was so afraid of witnessing a replay of Terelle's fit when she had high fever 2 years ago. So we inserted a suppository and quickly rushed to kkh to get him checked out.

At the hospital, his fever began to subside and the doctor diagnosed him to be having viral gastroenteritis. She said it was a different bug from the one in his throat and all we had to do was manage the fever and watch for dehydration from the diarrhea.

Thankfully, everything cleared after another 2 days.

But then Terelle was next.

She started to develop a fever of 38degrees on Tuesday and similarly, it yo-yoed up and down over the next 2 days.

Having an ice popsicle treat to bring down her fever

Surprisingly that was about it.

She had no other symptoms and was hale and hearty again in just 2 days. And through it all she was her usual self, bouncing off the walls and inciting Baby Bone to mischief even though she was burning up.

Here she is, teaching him to do something cheeky as usual

He hero worships her and will copy whatever she does

So it was time to celebrate!

The kids were happy and healthy once more!

Time to head out again cos they had been stuck at home the past 2 weeks!

Modelling Yiyi's sunglasses at a dessert shop just before heading to the indoor playground

And here we are enjoying a nice steamboat dinner sans kids, to replenish all the lost energy during those sleepless nights taking care of the kids

How wrong we were!

That night, it was my turn to succumb to the bug. I started to feel lousy right after the steamboat and woke up in the middle of the night with a fever and chills. My throat also felt as though there were bits of glass in it and swallowing was pure torture.

That was Sunday.

My fever only hovered around 38degrees but i felt like i had been hit by a truck. I marvelled at how the kids could still prance around the house when they registered higher temperatures than I did.

Went to the doc the next day but could only take mild med cos i am still breastfeeding Thane. By Wednesday, my fever still had not subsided, my throat was killing me and i had frequent bouts of diarrhea too. I felt so nauseous and bloated and could hardly sleep, i was feeling that uncomfortable. I couldnt take it any more and went back to the doc to beg for stronger med and some antibiotics.

Thursday came and went and i wasnt any better. Thankfully, the mum of one of Terelle's classmates volunteered to help me send and fetch her to school. I was so weak i could hardly stand. All i could manage to do was drag myself from the bed to the toilet and back again.

Hubby had to leave for a business trip on Friday and i was still burning. I was also getting frustrated and helpless that i couldnt shake the darn bug. This was one of the rare times i was so sick!

My fever only finally subsided on Saturday and by Sunday, i was 80% back to normal. 7 feverish, comatosa days! Well i lost some weight in the process...only good thing that came out of it. *grin*

But that wasnt the end.
Hubby left for his business trip already nursing a sore throat. He came back on Sunday and by Monday, it was his turn to burn up. The doc only gave him a 3 day course of antibiotics but after the 3rd day, all his symptoms abated so he thought he had fully recovered.

Alas the nasty bug fought back with a vengeance and by that sunday, he had chills and a fever again, in addition to a chesty cough which left him breathless.

A 2nd visit to a different doc, some new med and 3 days later, still no improvement. In fact he seemed to have deteriorated, with his phlegm showing streaks of blood.*gasp*

A 3rd visit to the original doc returned a dire prognosis - bronchitis, the bug was now ravaging his lungs. She prescribed a stronger antibiotic and warned him that if he got any worse, he would have to go to the hospital to be treated for pneumonia.

And so, as i write this, he has already been on the new course of antibiotics for a week and is due for a review tomorrow. Hopefully he is finally on the mend.

Conclusion: Same bug, different manifestation...and Terelle is the strongest of us all?

One day in Your Life

2009-07-08T06:35:00.000-07:00

Yes this is gonna be another eulogy and no prizes for guessing who is it about.

Just finished watching the encore telecast of Michael Jackson's Memorial. I must say that it evoked a myriad of emotions in me.

Happiness.

Im happy that he is finally free of all the people who constantly found fault with him, who sniggered at him as he underwent his dramatic facial reconstructions, who watched and waited for a chance to hurl abuse at him if and when he slipped up.

These same detractors pinned child molestation charges on him and gloated when he fell from grace in the pubic's eyes.

I chose to ignore those reports that he allegedly molested kids. In my eyes, MJ was a soft spoken and kind guy, a symbol of love and peace who loved children above everything else. When he settled those lawsuits out of court, i wanted to believe it was because he'd rather an amicable resolution than a lengthy public court case, and not an admission of his guit.

As MJ's brother so aptly put when he gave his eulogy,"Just how much pain can one take?"

The tabloids were splashed with all the sensational reports on how frail and sickly he looked and the immense pain he was in both physically and mentally just before he died.

Im glad that he is finally in a place where nothing and no one can hurt him anymore.
God must have been pained that he had to endure so much suffering in his life and so called him back home early.

Sadness.

I grew up listening to MJ's songs.

I vividly remember rewinding and playing the song "Ben" over and over again on my little cassette tape recorder, to try and figure out the chords so i could sing and play it on the guitar at the same time.

I remember valiantly trying to do the moonwalk with my cousins, but failing miserably yet having a good laugh in the process.

MJ is the ONLY pop star whom EVERYONE knows. Ask any coffeeshop uncle who MJ is and chances are, he might start singing in a falsetto, do the moonwalk and grab his crotch. But ask him again who is Justin Timberlake and he'll go "Har? Justin Si Siang?"

No other pop star will EVER be immortalised the way MJ has become.

Gratitude and Pride

When i watched the choir sing "We are the World" and "Heal the World", it dawned on me that these 2 songs have become anthems which the whole world sings. For the duration of the songs, just a couple of minutes, the whole world is truly united as everyone sings along to the all familiar lyrics.

You dont need a lyric sheet to sing these songs, unless you've been living under a rock the past 20 years. MJ's influence on you was just so strong that these lyrics have been ingrained in your mind. He has truly found a way to unite the world, if only for awhile, through his music, for only his music transcends all races and all religions.

And i am grateful to have been in this era when he was alive, where i had a chance to be touched by his music.

Hubby and I have been playing a couple of his earlier hits from youtube, for the kids to watch. We have been showing them Michael Jackson as we know him, in his earlier days, when he was untouched by garish makeup and plastic surgery, when he was untainted by scandals.
We want to expose them to the King of Pop, whom sadly they will not get a chance to know as intimately as us.

I could write so much more on MJ but so many tributes have already been written to him. So i shall be laconic for once.
In the words of his eerily prophetic song which is coincidently one of my favourites

"One day in your life

You'll remember the love you found here

You'll remember me somehow, though you dont need me now

I will stay in your heart

And when things fall apart

You'll remember one day"

Enjoy the King of Pop at his best.

What now, What next?

2009-06-18T19:47:00.000-07:00

I am going through a phase in which im constantly questioning my role as a stay-at-home-mum. Day after day passes, some in meaningless drudgery, some with satisfying results.

I find myself dwelling too long and too often on whether it is all worthwhile.

What would i have become if i had chosen a different path with my life?

What could i have achieved?

A doctor? Perhaps.
I have the constitution of an ox; i fall sick only like once every 2 years, am good with kids and think i have much better bedside manner than alot of other doctors ive seen.
I would have been a great paediatrician, i know it.

A principal? Most of my ex colleagues in school have gone on with their careers and have achieved success climbing up the education hierarchy. I could have been among their circles right now, but would it be something i enjoy doing?

A journalist? A business woman? A hot shot in some big company?

Well, all these are just wishful thinking on my part right now. I cannot turn back time nor can i ever hope to become any of these for the rest of my life.

And all because i chose this path - to become a sahm.

Yet I realise that im starting to take my children's lives too personally.

When they get injured under my watch, i beat myself up to no end cos i was responsible for their pain.

They cant read while their peers can; i berate myself for not having read to them more often.

They utter something hurting; i wonder why and get very upset cos i dont understand why they hate me so when ive tried so hard for them.

My children's every failure has made me bombard myself with countless thoughts of "I should have done that instead".

I care too much about everything and when things dont go as i have planned or envisioned them to be, i get frustrated and upset.

I would imagine this being akin to going for a performance review at work and having your boss tell you that you suck in many areas. It can sometimes be depressing and debilitating.

True, the rewards come in other forms.

My daughter proudly telling her friends that store bought snacks are no match to my home baked cookies.

Her eyes wide with joy when i present a pair of hand painted shoes of her favourite little mermaid (which i spent an entire night working on), to her.

A paper bracelet painstakingly strung together by little fingers, which now sits proudly on my nightstand.

A picture of me messily colored in by the both of them, but which i treasure greatly cos it was their 1st joint effort at drawing my portrait.

A tower of blocks carefully constructed and proudly declared to be "Mummy's castle", and that ill get a real one when she grows up and builds a real one for me.

Everyday occurences and snippets of conversation about everything and anything, all etched vividly in my mind.

But the children are starting to become my life's entire purpose.

After all ive poured out blood, sweat and tears just for them and they are supposed to be living proof that im not wasting my time at home.

My son's precociousness, his milestones...my daughter's excellent memory, powers of observation and speech. I take pride in them and it is through them that i find self validation.

And that scares me.

For in just a few years time, when they are all packed off to school, what's going to happen to me then? How will i find alternative forms of self validation?

Mine is a 24/7 job that pays no salary, makes no cpf contributions, let alone hand out performance bonuses. Ive left the job market for so long now, i dont think i can ever go back and accept starting right from the bottom again.

And so right now, i have to look for some pittance of an alternative income - its my way to self validate and to safeguard my mind for when the kids are grown.

Im not the kind to sit around and do nothing for the rest of my days. But when the time comes and ive all the time in the world again, will my few tuition and writing assigments be sufficient to keep me occupied, and most importantly keep my mind challenged?

Im seriously afraid.

At 18 months

2009-06-15T08:17:00.000-07:00

Thane has finally progressed beyond unintelligible babbling!

He can call us all by name:
Pa Pa
Mare Mee (Mummy)
Che Che (Jie Jie, it used to be "chee chee" but now he has gotten the hang of it)
Ko Ko (Gong Gong)
Per Per (Por Por, it sounds like "per" as in the sound the letter P makes, but we know what he means)
Yee Yee (He does this best, with lots of glee and a great deal of panache. Arent you proud, sis?)
Yeh Yeh
Ma Ma
Ah Tee (Aunty, our helper)
Bay Bee (baby-himself)

He can indicate his intentions:
Go (when he wants go out)
There (when we ask where does he wanna go)
Hey Oh (Hello)

Ball (His favourite toy right now is a yellow soccer ball)
Bear Bear
Egg Bird (Big Bird from Sesame Street)
Eh Mo (Elmo)
Car

He has a distinct preference for the color yellow.
When in the ball pit of any indoor playground, he will seek out all the yellow balls and try to hoard them all, screaming murder if anyone tries to take them away.
At dinner time, he will always choose the yellow plastic spoon over all the others.
He has 3 pairs of shoes, one yellow and 2 blue. Whenever we go out, he will always go for the yellow pair.
Similarly for toys, stickers, markers, crayons, you name it...he will always zoom in on the yellow colored one and not let go.

Loves the song "C is for Cookie" by Cookie Monster
He will clap and bob along to the rhythm of the song whenever any of us sings it. Terelle will usually trash the lyrics by purposely singing some rubbish to the same tune but he seems to find this even more amusing and will laugh hysterically at her version.

Loves books
He will come running to anyone who has a book in hand, sit down quietly and listen while we tell him the story. And i am glad to notice that because of this, Terelle has begun to want to read more, cos she sees her baby brother always totally absorbed in their books.

He can sing the alphabet song!
Well not exactly...but he can make almost the right sound for each particular letter, and follow exactly in tune and rhythm!
He can also pick out several letters correctly when we ask him to.

When asked "What's your name?"
He will answer "Teen!"

When we point to pictures of him and ask who is that, he will go "Me Me Me!"

Can make correct animal sounds...
Dog: Woof Woof
Cat: Meeeeiow
Cow: Mooooooo
...and point out all the different animals whenever we ask where they are, even atypical ones like dinosaur, ostrich, koala, mole and lemur!

Although Terelle was way more advanced in speech at the same age (she could string together short sentences by 18mths), im proud that he has made such progress so far!

Keep it up baby!

On an entirely different note, at 18mths we brought Terelle to France. When Thane turned 18mths, we brought him to Sentosa.
Talk about sidelining no2? hahahah...

Ear Wax!

2009-06-14T03:31:00.000-07:00

The answer to my previous post is EAR WAX!

But it aint mine, its Terelle's!

Ive been trying my darndest to get rid of this huge chunk of the icky stuff from her ears for the longest time. And since we saw these ear candles on sale at the car boot sale, we decided to give them a try.

Im still amazed that they actually work!
Think she must be hearing us loud and clear now. Hahaha...

Mandy and Sharon, u girls share the prize? haha...

Its a...?

2009-06-04T09:23:00.000-07:00

Im offering a $10 prize for anyone who can guess what this is.

Family members who know exactly what it is, you are not eligible. Pls refrain from commenting.

Anyone? Contest open for a week!

Hahaha...

Appalling!!

2009-06-03T20:12:00.000-07:00

Saw this kids' tee in Tampines 1 today. Check out the print!

It reads:

MAGIC MUSHROOM

Magic mushroom takes you to heaven

TO BE STUPEFIED ITS SO FUN

I am appalled. Promoting the use of drugs on the tee shirt of a 4 year old?

Shocking.

But yet its so absurd its funny.

Clingy babe

2009-06-02T18:25:00.000-07:00

This is how Thane behaves outside nowadays.

Nestling in either our helper's or my arms

Clinging to our legs

Err being a lazy beach bum...

...but nestling in my arms, u get the point

He will lie in the safe cacoon of our embrace and eyeball any strangers warily, refusing to proffer a little hand for a high five or even give a tiny smile. Lips pursed, he will shyly look down or away when any person tries to engage him.

What a big contrast from a couple of months ago when he would happily wave and smile at any friendly stranger!

Hubby attributes it to me still breastfeeding him, that's why he's so clingy. But i think its just a phase they all go through.

When she was about Thane's age, Terelle was extremely attached to me for a period of time too, refusing to allow anyone else to even touch her. Now nothing will keep her still by my side for long!

So ill just treasure my little koala while this phase lasts.

Sibling Dynamics

2009-05-31T10:04:00.000-07:00

Ive been observing the siblings interacting with each other and im greatly amused by their antics.

Scenario 1:

Im about to leave the house with Terelle, we are going to watch a play. She gleefully skips over to where her brother is playing quietly and taunts him.

Terelle: Oei Baby! Mummy is bringing me out! We are going to a PLAY. A PLAY, you know what that is? Its for MUMMIES AND BIG KIDS, babies are not allowed! Whahahaha!

Thane: (Realises that he wont be going out with us)

*Starts howling and clings to my leg*

Terelle: Stop crying baby, u cant go out! CANT GO OUT! hahahhaha!

Thane: *Yells louder*

Me, i have to pacify him by telling him that i promise to bring him out the next day, ALONE, without his sister.

He seems to understand and allows himself to be carried away by our helper, back into the house, but not without protest.

Terelle continues her ribbing all the way down the corridor.

My poor son lingering forlornly by the gate

I tell her that when i bring Baby out the next day, it will be her turn to stay home.

She is unfazed.

Scenario 2:

They are playing with their 'Monster vs Aliens' toys from MacDonalds.

Thane wants The Missing Link but Terelle refuses to give it to him, cos she is using him to stage an epic battle with Galaxxar.

He yells, they fight, i manage to break it up.

Awhile later, Thane somehow manages to get his hands on The Missing Link. However, he wants to watch a repeat of the battle so he offers him to Terelle and indicates that he wants to watch Galaxxar pummel the fish-man.

She, by now, is bored and doesnt want that toy.

He insists that she take it.

She yells, they fight.

I laugh.

Scenario 3:

Naptime. They climb into the cot beside the window and look out at the park below and the opposite block.

They are both clutching their beloved blankies and Terelle is pointing out nothing much in particular to her brother.

But he is enthralled and they both go "ooh" and "aah" at everything and anything.

I sit by the side, watching and feeling glad that they have one another for company.

Scenario 4:

Dinnertime. They sit side by side at the table.

Terelle puts her elbows on the table very near to Thane.

He decides that she is invading his personal space and tries to push her arms off the table.

She finds is hilarious that he is geting riled up and refuses to budge.

He yells and starts hitting her.

She screams for me and starts complaining.

I dont know if i should laugh or scold them.

Scenario 5:

We are in the taxi. Thane suddenly decides that he would like to attempt to call his sister.

Thane: *Softly with a shy smile* Jie Jie

Terelle is overjoyed that her brother can call her at last.

Terelle: Baby call Jie Jie, baby call Jie Jie!

Thane: *louder* Jie Jie!

Terelle is really chuffed now. She yells at the top of her lungs.

Terelle: BABY CALL JIE JIE! CALL JIE JIE!

However, by now Thane has lost interest and plays with his toy.

Terelle: BABY CALL JIE JIE!!! CALL JIE JIE!!!!

He looks at her as if she's a raving lunatic.

Ive to calm her down lest the taxi uncle throws us out.

When night falls...

2009-05-26T01:42:00.000-07:00

I hate bedtime. Absolutely detest, abhor, dread...even fear it.
Why so, u may ask?

1. The kids love to fight sleep. After the routine bedtime stories, teeth brushing and washing up, they will go to their room and laugh, squeal, bounce around, do somersaults and basically egg each other on to see who can create a greater ruckus.

No amount of yelling, threatening or scolding on my part will make them stop. Only until their last ounce of energy is spent will they lie down , exhausted but satisfied.

I cant leave them alone because they love to play rough and i have to keep an eye on the baby, lest his sister breaks his bones in her over zealous enthusiasm.

And so there i sit, in semi darkness, while they run riot beside me. And i am helpless until all their energy is exhausted.

2. Once they're pooped, I have to breastfeed Thane to sleep and keep Terelle company at the same time. If im lucky, breastfeeding him will take a mere 15min. If im not, it can drag up to 2 hours.

Left side, right side, left, right, left, right... the fussy boy just cant seem to settle.

If he's down fast enough, ill have to play dead beside Terelle till she falls asleep. Some nights she takes a long time to go down, and ill invariably end up falling asleep in a weird position, waking up with a bad crick in my neck/shoulder, totally numb arms and a pounding headache.

Again, i cant up and leave cos Terelle insists i stay. If not she will launch into her hysterics and follow me around the house, simply refusing to stay put in her room.
She claims that Baby Bone is too small to protect her from the monster in her room.

Tsk tsk, you may go. Bad sleep habits, i know, especially the breastfeeding Thane to sleep part.

Trust me, ive tried letting him fall asleep on his own. But he'll either cry himself hoarse or wait up and continue playing till i come and nurse him to sleep.

Many a time have i come home from tuition to find him still wide awake at 1030pm cos he's waiting for me. He is obviously tired, but the stubborn boy just wont rest till he's got the breasts.

3. Once they are asleep, im torn between going to bed early and catching up on my forever insufficient sleep or spending some precious quality time with hubby. Cos it is only after the kids sleep do we get to chat, watch some tv or have a bite of supper together.

I always wind up choosing hubby over sleep, resulting in an even bigger sleep debt which i dont think i can ever dream of repaying.

4. When i finally get to bed, i am thoroughly beat. I dread to think that any moment, the baby will wake and ive to go tend to him, leaving me with another night of broken sleep.

If he doesnt nurse, he will want to sleep on my chest for comfort. Imagine a 11kg weight crushing your ribcage. Sleep? What sleep?

If i ignore him, he will stuff his little fingers in my nostrils and yank my face towards him.

If i still resolutely pay no attention to him, he will start to howl. And ill surrender. Cos if he snaps out of his half asleep daze, that's it for me. He'll be bouncing off the walls for the next 2 hours.

And so ill end up spending the next half hour nursing him, me wide eyed in the dark, the rest of my family snoring contentedly around me.

We've tried letting him cry it out when he wakes but ultimately, one of us will give in, usually hubby, cos he has to work the next day.
"Just give him the breast and shut him up!", he would fume.

I would yield when his cries turn into wracking sobs that leave him shuddering for breath.

We've tried giving him water when he wakes to nurse but he takes a few sips and starts to howl again.

We've tried giving him a bottle of milk. Same thing.

We've tried singing, rocking, bouncing, talking...nothing works.
He just wants the mammaries.
Worst of all, he doesnt even drink properly. He just sucks for comfort.

Terelle, god bless her little soul, never had such sleep issues. As soon as her energy is all used up, she sleeps like a dream. No amount of screaming on her brother's part can wake her and she will sleep her requisite 10hours straight at night.
And this is on top of her standard 2 hour nap in the afternoon.

I know its bad to compare, but why is it so damn hard to put Thane to sleep?
Have i really done wrong by not inculcating good sleep habits from young?
Ill give anything if he can sleep independently without nursing and sleep throughout the night just like his sister.

As a stay at home mum, ive had to deal with many challenges regarding raising the kids; tantrums, whining, illnesses, discipline...But NOTHING, nothing comes close to dealing with Thane's sleep issues.

Because of him, im constantly tired, crabby and snapping at everyone all the time. Ive no energy for my beloved sports and can hardly engage the kids in meaningful activities in the day.

I dont know how long more of this i can take. Already my days go by in a woozy daze because i only get 5 hours (max) of broken sleep every night.

If anyone has any ideas, please give me some new insights to resolve this nightmare, if not i think ill seriously go cuckoo from lack of sleep.

My happy Mothers' Day

2009-05-12T07:04:00.000-07:00

I received this beautiful hand made card from my brood on Mothers' Day!

Hubby spent many gruelling hours at the scrapbooking shop, painstakingly learning techniques from the pros just so he could come up with this masterpiece.

It is a feat for him and i am particularly touched because he is not one for art and intricate detailing, his fingers are too huge! haha...and also because much thought has gone into making this card unique and symbolic.

The background is an array of numbers of varyg sizes. Hubby highlighted the numbers '5' and '7' with glittering red sequins, representing Terelle and Thane (To fully appreciate these 2 numbers, read my post on "Uncanny coincidence")
The '5' just so happened to be bigger in size than the number '7'!
Hubby chose fabric flowers with a snazzy retro print on them cos i love all things vintage. He tells me Terelle carefully stuck them on the card

And the message reads "Not by chance but by the grace of God". How apt!

And i was treated to a Mothers' Day crab and prawn feast, ironically sans kids. Haha cos if they were around, the meal wouldnt have been half as enjoyable!

As Collin Raye would croon," For all the wrong ive done in my life, i must have done something right", similarly i think im doing ok in God's eyes to deserve my 3 greatest blessings!

I love all of you! Thanks for making this Mothers' Day the most special one yet!

On a side note, "she" didnt throw her usual histrionics this year. There was no launching into her annual tirade about how insincere we are and how "everyday could be Mother's Day and not specially today", and even despite us not planning anything fanciful in her honor.

It was a special Mothers' Day indeed.

Foolishly fashionable or fashionably foolish?

2009-05-11T05:31:00.000-07:00

God is awesome. He uses the most unexpected scenarios to teach us the most humbling of lessons. And i was taught an important life's lesson this mothers' day.

The contest form in the Sunday Times heralded the search for Singapore's Most Fashionistic Mum. The contest rules were simple: Mums were to be given a time limit and a budget to shop for themselves and their hubbies and the most fashionable one would walk away with a truckload of prizes.
I was intrigued. Should i sign up?

Im a self proclaimed shopping queen.

I pride myself on being able to grab the best bargains in the shortest period of time, a skill honed from countless jaunts in flea markets overseas on a shoestring budget.

I can pull together a decent look, so that even when i go to the coffee shop, i dont look like a train wreck.

Im a mum and can modestly say i didnt let it all go after 2 kids.

And I love a good challenge in the name of fun.
Hell, why not?

But as usual, the procrastinator in me hemmed and hawed over sending in the application, finally only doing it on the very last day and sending in two rather mediocre pics of myself. Thinking that i wouldnt get chosen since i sent in the form so late, i didnt think too much of it.

To my surprise, a call came one week later asking me to go down for an audition as i had been shortlisted for the contest.

.......

During the audition, as soon as i walked into the room to face the 2 interviewers, they asked me why did i send in such pics which didnt show my features clearly. "Why, are u disappointed with what you see in real life?" i asked. Ha ha...

They then commented on my height and asked if i had any modelling experience and then the interview was over.

So short? Ahhh, that's it for me, I thought.

That night, another call came informing me that i had been shortlisted as one of the 8 finalists for the competition. Whoa now this i didnt expect!

.......

And so, the day of the competition came. I didnt expect that it was to be similar to a beauty contest! In addition to the shopping with a budget segment, we had to catwalk in our denims, and then go through a q n a in our sportswear. Gawd...if i had known it was so pagent-like, I would have thought twice or three times before i signed up!

I always thought pagents were flesh parades for bimbos and was thoroughly mortified to actually be a contestant on one myself.

.........

And so on the day itself, my brood trooped down to Plaza Sing to lend support.

First round: We had to appear on stage in a white top and denim bottom sans makeup, and do a brief intro about ourselves.

No problem for me, Im always running around without a scrap of makeup anyway. (Not to be catty but during the briefing, there was an audible gasp from some of the other girls when they heard they had to appear in public without any makeup on...heehee...)

That's all of us fashionable mums...haha

The eventual winner was the 1st lady

Then we had 2 hours to shop for an outfit adhering to the theme of "Going on a holiday" and get my hair and make up done. And here's where we screwed up...big time...

Hubby and I have always talked about going sailing when we retire. So we thought, why dont we dress as if we were going for a little chi-chi soiree with some close friends, aboard a yatch?
It would definitely be different from the get up of the other contestants, cos everyone would go for beachy, resort wear for a short getaway, and we may just score well for standing out.

But have we EVER gone sailing on a yatch?
Nope.

Do we even know how do people dress at these so called "canape and champagne" events?
Nope.

Wouldnt we be dressing in a way that is way off from what we usually wear?
Oh god, yes.

We made our purchases and had loads of time to spare. Feeling smug and gleefully thinking we had outsmarted everyone, we got changed. Me into my sports attire, hubby into this shirt and preppy, argyle printed vest combo. (He did look smart, but it just wasnt HIM...)

Second round: Q & A in our sports attire. I chose a simple black tube and fitting track pants with stripes down the side, and swung my "look at me" retro purple jacket over my shoulder.

I thought i cut a pretty good picture, and i answered ok for the q & a segment too. I was very encouraged by the nods of approval from the judges and was delighted to see many people casting their votes in my favor. (There was this box for the crowd to vote for any particular mum whom they thought would win the contest)

And then it was down to the last segment. This time, we had to appear onstage with our hubbies and explain the reasons behind choosing each item of clothing. Sounds easy rite?

But hubby and I were so self conscious from being decked out in threads we were unaccustomed to, that we kinda bumbled on stage, shuffled uncomfortably towards the emcee and then stood so far apart from each other it looked as though we were mere acquaintances instead of husband and wife.

Then the emcee ripped our entire getup to shreds.

Why did u choose heels for a sailing trip?
Why is he wearing sneakers?
Shouldnt you be wearing a gown and tux for a high society event?
Why are you guys even thinking about a retirement holiday when u are still so young?

Dats me in my sailing booboo getup

Yet we could still fend off his line of questioning and foolishly thought we still stood a good chance. (I didnt think i would win, cos one of the mums - the eventual winner, was really good looking and she was tall and slim and had great fashion sense, but i really thought we could at least be placed)

When the results were announced, I had the highest number of votes from the public and was presented with a swarovski crystal necklace.

That was a nice surprise and spirits buoyed, i waited to hear my name being called for at least 3rd place.
Such big headedness, such overconfidence!

Posing with Fong Fan, the celebrity stylist after winning Most Popular

Of cos, God does not favor such arrogant thoughts. When my name was called as one of the consolation prize winners, I was stumped. I could see hubby was stupefied too. The same thought flashed between us: What went wrong?

After thinking long and hard, it then dawned upon us that we were just not ourselves. Why did we bother to choose such outlandish outfits? Our simple tank top, tees, bermudas and sporty walking shoes would have sufficed.

Why did we say we were going sailing when the thing we missed most after having kids was going on our backpacking trips? A short getaway could see us going off the beaten track to nearby Cambodia, Vietnam or Laos and our usual getup would be perfect for such a holiday. (Come to think of it, i really should have just bought a new pair of walking shoes with the budget money, mine are so worn out! I wanna kick myself!)

And being in those alien clothes just made us so awkward. Zero marks for chemistry. Zero marks for confidence. Zero marks for relevance to theme.

Sigh...we've realised that we are highly competitive people. Every contest we join, we hope to win and that aggressive spirit of ours costs us dearly cos we never stop to think carefully and plan our course of actions.

And so God has taught us a humbling lesson. Always be yourself and never let things get to your head, cos when you fall, it will be a pretty hard wake up tumble.

But it was fun and we'll definitely still sign up for more contests! Just no more pageants for me. *Cringe*

Bento Binge

2009-05-08T21:29:00.000-07:00

Went to Daiso a couple of days ago and chanced upon these adorable little containers that could be used to hold different kinds of food to be packed in a bento. They came in all sorts of shapes and sizes - penguins, hearts, butterflies, flowers...and had lovely pastel hues.

I gleefully bought a couple back home, thinking i could pack a little bento set for Terelle on the days she has to stay back in school for enrichment classes.

On the said day, out came the cute little silicon cups and in went a cheese sandwich (cut into 3 bite sized pieces to fit 3 little cups), some raisins, some colorful cornflakes and a marshmellow.

Terelle was bug eyed with anticipation when she saw what I had packed that day. She was profuse with her "i love you Mummy"s and "Thank you so much mummy"s and lavished me with hugs and kisses and kept declaring that I was the "best mummy in the whole world".

Here she is, not able to take her eyes off the bento box, all the way to the car

Thank you baby, for reminding me that it doesnt take alot to make you happy and that simple things can earn me the stripes of a pretty awesome mum in your eyes.

Flu bug

2009-05-07T03:08:00.000-07:00

She has succumbed. After 7 long months of being in the pink of health, she has finally succumbed to a flu bug. In fact Im surprised that she hasnt fallen sick in such a long time! *touch wood!!!*

It all started with a little, intermittent cough that slowly developed into a runny nose and watery eyes. But that was as bad as it got. She skipped school for a day and i knocked her out with medicine from the GP. After an extremely long nap of 4.5hrs, she was 80% back to normal.

I am so relieved and thank God that her health is so much better now. Never again would i want a repeat of how sick she was when Baby Bone was just a month old. (Read my post on "Things will only get better")

This is a cinch. This doesnt make me a wreck. This I can handle.

Speechless

2009-05-06T08:38:00.000-07:00

Terelle has no qualms about voicing her displeasure and will unabashedly comment on something that offends her sensibilities or for my following case in point, her senses.

We get into the lift which is jam packed with people. Someone in there has a serious case of body odour. Terelle clamps her hand over her nose and mouth and blatantly declares, "Mummy it stinks! Someone STIIIIIINNNKS!"

Some guy turns beet red and shifts uncomfortably. The others either stifle muffled giggles or look horrified.

And me? Im mortified. I keep trying to silence her with "shhhhhs ok that's enough" but nothing will stop her.

"Mummy its very smelly, very smelly! I cant stand it!"

She makes a big show of pinching her nose and breathing through her mouth.

I wish the ground would open up and swallow me.

As soon as we reach our floor, i bolt. She follows me nonchalantly, all the while continuing her tirade.

"Wah that was really stinky. Right mummy? so stinky...tsk tsk..."

I try to tell her that its not nice to say things like that in front of strangers and that she should exercise restraint and not make known her comments until later. To which came her swift reply.

"But why Mummy? When Daddy farts at home, we all say its smelly rite?"

.......

Blessed

2009-05-04T00:31:00.000-07:00

When i look at these 3, i feel like ive been given the world

Beautifully Imperfect

2009-04-27T08:32:00.000-07:00

While the furor over the latest MCYS commercial about the Indian lady giving an eulogy at her Chinese husband's funeral is still getting everyone all emotional, let me add my two cents worth to this interesting debate.

Yes it may be cliche and yes it probably was a rip off of the scene from Good Will Hunting, but it sure did leave me with a lump in my throat. (And did i detect a sniffle from the whereabouts of my man too?)

I guess it strikes a chord with couples who have been together for a long time, such that they know each other inside and out, and all their idiosyncrasies right down to a fault.

We know exactly what makes the other happy and what exactly gets the others' goat. And yet it isnt easy to always do the things that makes the other party happy.
Call it character differences, complacency, or simply Im-in-a-foul-mood-so-I-just-wanna-be-a-pain-in-your-a**, we get fuming mad with each other, have a cold war for half a day, yell, scream, cry, but ultimately forgive and forget.

That's what its all about right? People have written into the papers condemning the commercial, saying that it advocates settling for 2nd best in a life partner. I dont think they have grasped the essence of the clip. Nobody's perfect - so its really just up to you whether you want to celebrate the differences between you and your partner and work hard at your marriage or just take the coward's way out and not even try.

Hubby and I have known each other for 16 years and we have been together for 15 of them, so you can be sure we know each other like the back of our hands.

Ive seen pictures of him snogging other girls. He's seen my granny underpants. I know all about the oily, birds' nest, walking fashion disaster hairstyle he sported all those years ago. He knew how i looked like with my thick as a magnifying glass spectacles.

We thought we really knew each other. We thought we were safe. Yet many things have surfaced to surprise us once we were married. Let me list a few:

- He has an extremely short fuse. Yet i always find ways, both inadvertently and deliberately, to light it.

- He abhors ants in the house and takes it upon himself to eradicate every single one of them, to the extent of following their trails with a torch into the deepest, darkest and tiniest crack.

Me - I leave tiny food scraps on the counter, I bring food upstairs to eat in the room, I do a sloppy job cleaning up, I leave junk food packs unfastened properly.

He thinks I must have been an ant in my past life so Im encouraging their existence in our house now.

Its not that I dont care...its just...I dont know...Whats wrong with a few teeny weeny ants? They're harmless right?

- He is a neat freak, im fine with chaos. i can leave my clothes, books, knick knacks, accessories, in fact anything and everything in disarray and i think its alright. So....He usually picks up after me.

- When we got married, I suddenly became Wife: Finder of all Things. Whenever he cant locate a certain item, a string of frenetic "Where??"s escalating in volume and exasperation will come my way until i locate the blasted thing.
I hate it! How would I know where he put the measuring tape/screwdriver/cufflinks/ear digger/whatever! Im not psychic!

Even Terelle is following in her Daddy's footsteps, yelling a staccato succession of "Where"s whenever she cant find her toys.

My reply to both of them - "Use your eyes not your mouth!!"

- He falls asleep in seconds, so much so that I could still be running circles around the kids and he wouldnt (or couldnt) open half an eyelid, much less help.

Worse, sometimes i cant get to sleep and i so resent the serene, contented little snores emanating from his direction.

Yes we're both imperfect but we're still hanging on tight on this roller coaster ride called marriage. And that's what makes it fun right?

(Though i dont think he finds it very fun when he's up following an ant trail at 4am just cos i left the cornflake box half open yet again...haha)

I sing, she sings

2009-04-24T08:25:00.000-07:00

Since she was a wee babe, ive been singing a special song to her. "Jesus Loves Me" will never fail to calm her down when she's tired and cranky, and is most certainly the lullaby of choice at bedtime.

Even now, most nights as she is lying in bed smelling her beloved blankie, she will implore either of us to sing it. And if Daddy doesnt do a good job of singing, because he is in the midst of falling asleep himself, she will order me to redo it, properly.

And yes, Baby Bone has come to adopt it as his calming song too. Whenever he is irritable n restless, ill cradle and nurse him and sing this song, and he will stop fidgeting and slowly drift off to sleep.

Lately, Terelle is very taken by a particular song she heard on a childrens' cd. She keeps singing it over and over again, never seeming to get sick of it. It goes like this:

I picked the reddest apple from the tree
It was the finest one that I could see
I saved it all except a bite or two
Just for you

I carried home the groceries from the store
I wanted to be helpful with the chores
I put them all away except a few
Just for you

Someday ill be grownup too
And if i can ill grow up just like you

I ate up all my lunch just like you said
But i think there was a little too much bread
And so i left the crust when i was through
Just for you

Someday ill be grown up too
And if i can ill grow up just like you

Just one more thing before i go to bed
When everything i have to say is said
There's something special that i wanna do
Here's a kiss
Just for you

The first time she managed to memorise all the verses, she said,"Mummy, this song is for you." And some nights as we are lying in the dark, she will sing it to me, in her sweet little soprano voice.

I dont think she fully understands the emotional nuances of this song but i'd like to think she means every single word of it, and it warms my heart.

Baby, when im old and grey and my memory is failing me, sing this song again to mummy and let me remember how we used to sing each other to sleep ok?

The good man I married

2009-04-22T01:21:00.000-07:00

Chanced upon this questionnaire so thought i'd put my hubby under the spotlight for once!

1. What is something your husband always says to you?

"Oei make sure there are no ants in my study/kitchen/living room ah!"

2. What makes your husband happy?

Sorry; this blog is public!

Hahaha...just kidding...he is happiest when the kids and I are happy, and he does his best to keep us that way (he plays silly games with them, brings us all out on lengthy family outings even though he was up the whole night watching soccer, bites his tongue in front of my mum.... )

Or when there are no ants in the house. Hahaha...

3. What makes your husband sad?

I have yet to really see him sad, even when I asked him this question, he couldnt answer. Perhaps he feels sad when his dad doesnt understand him. Right, mops?

4. How old is your husband?

He is young at heart and that's good enough for me!

5. What was your husband like in high school?

Irritating boy always trying to act cool, with a cap perpetually faced backwards and a backpack that was slung so low it reached his butt. Dont know what I saw in him then...haha...
He was deeply tanned, had a flat top cut and a much much smaller waistline...hmmm...maybe that caught my eye...

6. How tall is your husband?

173cm

7. What is your husband's favorite thing to do?

Channel surf all the sports channels

8. What does your hubby do when you're not around?

Channel surf all the sports channels while keeping half an eye on the kids

9. If your husband becomes famous, what will it be for?

Standing up for someone/saving someone's life/taking down a terrorist - he's brave and righteous like that
OR beating someone up cos he got on his nerves/poking his nose where it shouldnt be/being a road bully - he's got a real short fuse and is a gossipy aunty at heart.

Wait...did you say famous or infamous?

10. What is your husband really good at?

Making me laugh and being a dad.

11. What is your husband not really good at?

Being patient. Read point 9 - extremely short fuse

12. What does your husband do for a job?

He sells ultrasound machine parts.

13. What is your husband's favorite food?

Durians and Dai Look Mee (from KL). He can eat truckloads!

14. What makes you proud of your husband?

He is good at his job. I am always appreciative and thank God that because of him, I am able to stay home with my kids. And he is also the best hands-on dad that my kids could ever ask for.

15. If your husband were a cartoon character, who would he be?

Errrr...Kung Fu Panda? Cos I overheard Terelle telling her grandpa, "Kung Fu Panda is so fat, just like my Daddy!"
Hahaha...

New Look

2009-04-21T06:20:00.000-07:00

In line with the revamp over at the kids' blog, I decided to give my blog a makeover too. And since I lurrrve all things retro, it was a cinch choosing the look and feel of my new space.

So there you are, my faithful readers, the all new "Motherhood is not for Wimps"! Enjoy!

Memories

2009-04-13T06:57:00.000-07:00

It just occured to me that when she is older, Terelle will probably not remember much of the past 4 years of her life and neither will Thane. And I havent been really conscientious about keeping all these memories for them.

So...ive decided to be more meticulous in storing all these memories. Memories that meant something to me, and hopefully did mean something to them.

There we were, taking a rare bus ride to school. Why rare u ask? Because it has become the norm that hubby leaves the car with me and i ferry Terelle to school every day. Just so happened that he sent the car in for a thorough wash today and we had to find our own way to school.

But boy was it a treat for her!

Look we're so high up Mummy! Look at this tree Mummy! Wah i can see a doggie! Eek why are there so many dirty black things on the bus stop's roof? Wah that man has so little hair! Mummy look at that bright blue motorcycle! Mummy this is so fun!

Funny how a simple bus ride can transform everyday objects into fascinating subjects of conversation. She is totally blase when she is sitting in the car everyday, either silently staring out of the window or when she is in a more upbeat mood, singing along to her favourite songs.

I want to remember this particular day, because i know i will forget, she will forget. I want to remember how we made up silly stories about the people going on about their everyday lives, how we sang funny made up songs and how we posed for goofy photos. I want to remember how a 30min bus ride became magical through a 4yo's eyes.

As a SAHM, there are days when i really wish i could throw in the towel and leave them behind to go to work, cos work will offer definite respite from the mindless "admininstrative" things i have to go through everyday - bathing, feeding, changing, dealing with whines and tantrums, discipline, putting them to sleep, ferrying them around...the list goes on.

But today, just today, i want to remember the precious, happy moments that i got to spend with my Terelle, cos i was looking after her full time.

My CV

2009-04-11T02:42:00.000-07:00

Hubby was updating his CV recently and that got me thinking. If I were to have a CV, perhaps this is what it would look like.

Personal skills and qualities

- Efficient multitasker

(I can change a diaper while feeding another child, all the while keeping an eye on lunch on the stove, draw up a lesson plan for tuition and a grocery list and draft out a new writing assignment in my head)

- Excellent time management

(I can have lunch, feed the baby and pat him to sleep, rush off for tuition, buy a week's worth of groceries, go to the library to return and borrow books, then come home and edit an article all within the span of 3 hours)

- Exceptional driving skills

(Honed from ferrying the kids all over the island for school, outings, enrichment classes, having to negotiate the tightest spaces in ancient shopping centres and jostling for parking space with other frenzied mums. Hubby says i can drive like a man, and coming from him, that is the highest praise indeedm cos he is a fervent lady driver hater.)

- Inexhaustible energy

( On worst case scenario days, i can function with just 2 hours of sleep, when the baby wakes 5 times a night, and i have to keep sponging an older child who's running a temperature. No help cos hubby's away. Most days i function with 5 hours of broken sleep)

- Dogged determination

(See post on nursing strike)

- Effective communicator

(I can talk down a wailing preschooler with the most creative promises in record time. I can convince hubby that i didnt scratch the front bumper of the car while it was in my possession.)

- Brilliant team player

(I have to manage the expectations of the kids, their teachers, my parents, my hubby, the helper, the inlaws, my students, their parents...the list goes on)

- Outstanding PR skills

( I am friends with almost everyone in the neighborhood, from the toilet aunty in my daughter's school, so that she will look after her when she visits the toilet cos she doesnt really do a good job wiping up after doing her big business, to the old Ah Lian hairdresser at the salon - so she can give me a cut and color in record time at a rock bottom price, to the bak chor mee uncle who will give me an xtra helping of mushrooms.

- Ability to speak multiple languages

( I speak a smattering of Cantonese, Hokkein, Teochew and even smaller bits of Malay together with English, Mandarin and French. But it is enough to endear me to most people. Maybe they find me amusing...haha)

So any potential employers who would like to hire me? I can start immediately!

Mummy Im Scared...

2009-04-02T07:37:00.000-07:00

Me: Good nite baby!
T: Good nite Mummy!
Me: See you tomorrow!
T: See you tomorrow Mummy!
Me: I Love you baby!
T: I love you Mummy!

(Silence for awhile)

T: Mummy im going to face the other side. If you're scared when you're sleeping, just call me then ill face you ok?

Me: (almost falling off the bed in laughter) ok!

Im amused because she is totally afraid of the dark. If she is half asleeep and i sneak off, 2 minutes later ill hear her plaintive bleating emanating down the stairs. If I hold off any longer going up to her, she will come running helter-skelter down the stairs as if there is a monster in her wake.

And yes, she is sleeping with us once again in our room. Her in the baby's cot (?!) and baby in between us. No amount of cajoling/promised treats/pretty princessy bedsheets/threats can make her go back to her own room. 3 rooms upstairs and all 4 of us squished in the master bedroom...sigh....

I used to get all worked up and angry with her whenever she started yelling for us and we have to lie beside her and play dead for a good half an hour till she falls asleep. Until hubby gently pointed out that maybe she has a good reason for being scared and that we should never doubt what goes on in her mind, did i then relent and willingly "sentence" myself to lying in the dark beside her every night, silently willing her to quickly fall asleep. (At least now its better, she lets me surf the net beside her so im not bored to tears..)

I guess ill just have to wait till Baby Bone is old enough to sleep in his own bed then ill shove them both out of our room and back to their own room across the landing!

Whatever...

2009-03-07T09:28:00.000-08:00

I was telling Terelle to make sure she washes her hands before she had her dinner. She was glued to the tv and turned me a deaf ear.

After repeatedly asking her to wash her hands and demanding if she heard me, she suddenly turned to face me, gave me a dismissive roll of her eyes and said in a "i-cant-be-bothered-with-you" voice, "Whatever..."

At that moment, i felt really hurt. Where did she learn how to use that word? And in that context and tone??? I expected that kind of rebuttal to come from an angsty, rebellious teenager and not an innocent 4 year old?! Oh my goodness, are we fast forwarding to 10 years later?

After some discussion with hubby, we concluded that maybe she picked it up from us, cos we did use the word "whatever" on each other before, especially during arguments or quarrels. Guess we better watch what we say from now on!

Luckily it was just a harmless word, ill be terribly embarassed and angry if she were to start spouting profanities when we are outside. But that, i know for sure, she would not have picked up from me....

Updates

2009-02-11T20:21:00.000-08:00

"This is the day, this is the day that the Lord has made, that the Lord has made. I will rejoice, I will rejoice and be glad in it, and be glad in it."

The entire afternoon session of kindergarten kids were singing this sweet refrain as Terelle and I entered the assembly hall. Wednesday is Assembly Day where all the kids gather at the hall for half an hour of praise and worship.

Hearing this just lifted my spirits immensely. Especially when Terelle bid me a cheery goodbye and raced into the hall, yelling out "Lao Shi Wo Lai Le!" excitedly. As i walked away, i saw her form teacher embrace her in a hug and lead her to join her friends.

I feel I have really made a good choice in sending her to this school, praise God!

Anyway updates on Terelle:

1) She is finally finally off diapers , day and night! I was trying to train her to get used to the feeling of not wearing diapers at night while we were staying at my mum in law's house. I felt it was a good time to train her since she was sleeping on a mattress on the floor, so in the event of any accidents, the cheapo mattress could just be thrown away at the end of our stay.

After MANY accidents, i was finally confident enough to let her go diaperless on her actual mattress in the new house. I set my alarm clock to get up and bring her to the toilet once in the middle of the night.

After yet many more hits and misses, we have finally got it. She will pee about 3 hours after she goes to bed, then the nxt one will be when she wakes up in the morning. We have also started a sticker system where she gets one sticker for every dry night and she can exchange 10 stickers for an ice cream treat. And im proud to say she has been diaperless for the past 3 weeks with only 1 accident!

2) She is into this "princess" phase. We put a mosquito net over her bed, our aim was actually to keep her safe from the mozzie infestation affecting out block now. She views it as a princess canopy and everynight she will tell us, in the haughtiest voice she can muster, to invite Her Royal Highness to please enter her bed.

Terelle: (Looking down her little nose at us) Quick tell princess to go inside her bed!

Hb and I: (Flippantly) Princess please go inside your bed.

Terelle: Again! Ask the princess properly!!

Hb and I: (Louder and more plaintive) Preeeeeeeencess...pleassse go inside your bed.

Terelle: ok...hehehe...

Wonder how long this princess phase will last?

3) She is getting increasingly whiny and angsty. When i say she cant have something, she will go on and on asking to have it.

"But I want Mummy I want...I want it Mummy I want I want I want I want!!"

If i continue to hold fast to my decision not to let her have it, her whines will become wails and tears will start to fall, especially if she is sleepy or tired.

Otherwise, she will start hitting me and yelling, "I dont like you! I dont like you!"

Fine fine...I can live with you not liking me for awhile!

4) She takes extreme pleasure from imitating hb and I while we are talking. And when we try to talk faster and she stumbles over trying to follow us, she will squeak and squeal and double over laughing.

And it doesnt faze her if we do the same and imitate her while she is talking. She will squeak and squeal and double over laughing too.

And as for Thane:

1) The maid tells me he is an extremely good boy whenever im not at home. He will sit in the high chair and allow her to feed him his entire lunch with nary a protest, play quietly with his toys and just be a little angel.

Its a different story when im home. He screams to be let out of the chair, bats away the spoon when i try to feed him, spewing food all over himself, me and the floor. He refuses to play on his own and always just wants to be carried by me.

2) He understands many things that we say and can carry out instructions very well, like "Come here!", "Take this to Daddy", "Go wash your hands!" (at the toy kitchenette), "Cook somthing for Mummy!" (he will hold a pot over the tiny kitchenette stove).

He does a very good impression of Terelle crying, by scrunching up his face and going "Waaaaaaah!" , whenever we ask him "How does Jie Jie cry?"

He also loves to peek at our helper while she is busy in the kitchen and go "Waaaaaatssssss" , laugh cheekily and then walk away. I think he's trying to say "Whatsup", cos hb has been teaching that inane word to Terelle as a form of greeting.

3) Terelle needs a blanket whenever she goes to sleep and seeing Jie Jie with a blanket day in and day out, he's taken to wanting one for himself too. Whenever its bedtime, he will lie on it and chew the corners, making little contented noises.

Im glad they do not have a preference for a particular blanket! Any piece of cloth seems to do the job!

4) Stands up for himself whenever Jie Jie snatches things from him. Will either smack her, all the while making admonishing noises, pinch her or if she tries to run away, grab her tee shirt and pull her towards him to continue his assault and verbal "lashing". If she manages to get away, he has no choice but to scream loudly and frantically fail his arms cos he cant run fast enough as yet.

5) And last but not least. he has 7 teeth and loves eating anything that is not his own food, and that includes unedible stuff like rubber bands.

Transitions

2008-12-30T07:15:00.000-08:00

What was originally meant as a 2 week stay at my in laws while the reno at our house was completed has dragged to become a month long stay, the reason being we added a couple more things to our list of to-dos for the new house and that has delayed the completion of the reno.

I am thankful for some aspects of our extended stay here:
- The kids have become so much closer to their grandparents. Previously Thane would turn away and cry whenever hubby's dad attempted to even touch him. Now he would rather Yeye carry him and take him out on a car ride than stay home with me.

- The after dinner playtime with their cousins. I think they will miss this most of all once we've moved out. Every night, dinner is hurriedly shovelled down in anticipation of dancing, singing, painting, playing make believe...u name it, they do it...up in the computer room on the 3rd floor. Thane doesnt do much of the above but he is content to watch his sister and older cousins at play and will always laugh or clap enthusiastically at their antics.

- The 24 hr free babysitting service that lets hubby and i have some precious couple time together, be it going to the nearby coffeeshop for supper or busying ourselves cleaning up at the new place, we are always reassured that the kids will be well taken care of at home.

- The super duper efficiency of the 2 maids in the house. Because they help each other out, our laundry is done within 24hrs, the toilet is always glistening, our room is always spick and span, the kids are always well fed and well entertained.

But i will definitely not miss:

- My mum in law's outrageous superstitious beliefs. I am particularly miffed by the fact that she thinks all women's clothes are "dirty" and have to be washed separately from the rest of the family's.

- The suffocating heat of the house. My mum in law keeps ALL the windows perpetually closed for fear of dust entering the house. Granted, the house is spotless, but the sticky, cloying HEAT is just unbearable.

- Terelle's obvious disregard of my authority cos she knows she has the constant backing of her grandparents, who will indulge in her every whim and fancy. Just this evening, after dinner (she had a HUGE bowl of rice), she saw her cousins stuffing their faces with cashew nuts and junk food and promptly declared that she was hungry. A soon as Yeye heard her pitiful mantra, he immediately gave her a bowlful of nuts, and Terelle simply ignored my fervent protests. Hungry?? Like real!! What a total con job that only grandparents will fall for!

- Hubby and I are constantly at each other's throats; i cannot pinpoint exactly why...perhaps its because of the lack of personal space here, perhaps its because of the heat, perhaps its because im constantly frustrated over the kids and am subconsciously taking it out on him.

So there you have it, as im writing this, we are still waiting for our new place to be completed. And for all the good there is from our stay here, I know that when we really move, I for one would be most happy and relieved.

Almost a year now...

2008-11-28T06:47:00.000-08:00

At 11 mths and 3 weeks, Thane can

- say "go" if he wants to be carried somewhere. He can even indicate the direction by flinging out his little fist.

- say "dog" whenever he sees a dog, his current favourite animal. That's why Mummy is going to have a doggy theme for you for your birthday!

- say "eye" when we point to our eyes.

- kiss on command. Very cute, especially when he is kissing little stuffed toys!

- clap and dance on command. Current favourite song - I like to move it! from Madagasca. This skill was honed by Terelle, cos she is hooked on the cartoon. She can watch it twice a day and not get sick of it!

- put a handphone to his ear whenever we say "hello?"

- make a monkey face on command. It involves scrunching up his nose and squinting his eyes.

- question authority. For example, he would be on the verge of reaching for a forbidden object like a fork. Upon hearing a stern "no!" from either of us, he would continue to surreptitiously reach for the fork by s..l..o..w..ly reaching out his little hand towards it, all the while cheekily looking at us from the corner of his eye.

- say "dee" when i point to hubby in our wedding picture. Though im not sure if this was a fluke, cos he hasnt been able to repeat this feat.

- walk unsupported for 4 steps before deciding that crawling will get him to his destination faster.

Its going to be your birthday party tomorrow baby! Mummy is getting excited! ;)

An ode to my friend

2008-11-16T13:31:00.000-08:00

To my dearest neighbor (ex-neighbor as of today) and friend,

I will always remember...

- the Games Nites we used to have b.c (before children), where we played board games/cards and snacked/chatted till late into the nite

- the yummy steamboat dinners together, leisurely ones b.c, not quite so leisurely after children but equally enjoyable

- the look on your face the 1st time you told me you were pregnant with Kirsten. I still remember it was in my living room and 1 mth old Terelle was fast asleep on the floor

- the holiday we had together to Langkawi. (Despite the not so ideal accomodation, we still managed to have fun! Remember the yummy Dai Look Mee dinner and seafood lunch n cheering on the guys during their go kart race?)

- our traditional xmas gift exchanges and little xmas dinner parties together

- how you managed to capture the bird that flew into my room with the wastepaper basket. You with your blooming tummy, with Kirsten inside and me with a 3 mth old Terelle fast asleep on my bed. Remember we were wondering how on earth we could let it free without it flying back into the house? Finally we threw it out into the corridor and quickly slammed my front door...haha...makes me laugh to think about it again...

- our New Year countdowns and "party" in the corridor, where we drank sparkling grape juice and ate "kwa chee"

- our endless chats about everything under the sun, especially the kids and our forever errant hubbies :)

- your support when Ryan was away and Terelle was very ill and had to go to the hospital. Will also always be grateful to Ray for sending us there even though it was late at night.

- having to borrow your thermometer whenever my kids were having a fever cos my lousy, screwed up thermometer always gave me wonky readings

- our dinners together whenever any of our hubbys were away on biz trips

- our shopping/makan sessions when the girls were in school and later, our shopping/makan sessions with the boys in tow

- the joy our girls had whenever they played together, be it in either of our houses, in the corridor, at the playground or in the pool or anywhere else we took them. As long as they were together, they enjoyed each other's company

- how we satisfied our spicy food cravings together by eating mee sian and nasi briyani when we were having the boys

- our bak kut teh pig out session, pity we didnt have more...

- your lovely homemade bread and the mouth watering smell that always came from your flat when you were baking it

- your generiosity, warmth and kindness and that you guys were the best neighbors we could ever ask for.

So its goodbye for now, my dear friend. 5 years have gone by in a flash, its the end of an era for us. As i write this, my heart is heavy and im feeling sniffy as i watch the movers at your place and the corridor being filled with your stuff. It just makes everything so final.

I wish you all the best as you move on to your new home, forge new friendships and make new memories. I will always hold what we shared close to my heart. I will definitely miss your reassuring presence just next door and the knowledge that i can always count on you.

Just promise me to meet up often ok? I still hope our kids can grow up together and become fast friends just like us.

Bye for now and God bless all of you where ever you may go.

Public holiday

2008-10-27T09:44:00.000-07:00

Its a public holiday and im having tuition in the morning. Mornings usually involve me trying to get Terelle ready for school. Today im of course, in no hurry to get anything done.

Im blithely teaching my student at the dining table. Terelle senses something is different about today. She saunters over and asks, "Why am i not going to school today, Mummy?"

"Cos its a public holiday."

"What's a public holiday?"

"Its a day when everyone does not work."

"But daddy is working." (Hubby's big boss is in town so he has to be at an important meeting)

"Daddy is special, he has to go to the office. Ok be good, go watch your cartoon, after Mummy has finished tuition, ill bring you out okie?"

"Yay! We're going out! I love you Mummy!"

She quietly settles down to watch tv for the next 45min. After my lesson, i decide that since its a cloudy and cool day, we could head down to the Botanic Gardens to have a picnic and feed the fishes. So I start packing some picnic things to take along.

"Are we going now Mummy? Are we??"

"Yes, after you finish your lunch."

"Oh man!" (Accompanied by a dramatic hanging of her head and exasperated shaking of her hands - This girl deserves an Oscar for her theatrics)

I call my parents and tell them of my plans for the day, to which they reply that its too hot to go to the gardens now and that i should make the kids take their nap 1st and then head down in the evening.

I agree (against my better judgement) and feed my by now extremely bored girl her lunch.

After lunch she dejectedly lies on the playmat in the living room and declares in a forlorn voice, "Its so boring at home, i want to go out Mummy, im so bored"

"ok ok we'll go out after your nap ok? Gong Gong and Por Por says its too hot to go out now. All the fishes are hiding deep in the pond, they will not come to the surface cos the sun will fry them"

"oh fry them? Then they will die? ok then ill sleep now, we go later when the sun is not so hot right?"

"yes i promise we will go later"

And so she happily skips off to bed. An hour and a half later, she jumps out of bed with a broad grin and chirps,"Are we going out now? Are we are we??"

By then it has started to rain cats and dogs and i was silently cursing myself for not following my instinct just now and just gone when the weather was fine.

"We have to wait for the rain to stop. Anyway Baby Bone is still sleeping. We will go when he wakes up ok?"

"oh its raining so the fishes will get wet then they wont come to the surface?"

"Hahahha the fishes are already wet cos they are living in the water. We will get wet if we go out in the rain. Then we will get sick."

"oh ok we go later"

Seemingly appeased for the time being, she skips off to play with her toys for a whole of 5 min before announcing again,"Im bored mummy! BORED! I dont want to stay at home. I know! Lets go to the children's playground!! The one that is nearby?"

"Aunty Yiling says its closed for renovation."

"Oh man!" (Dramatic hanging of head and wringing of hands again)

Her head suddenly jerks up and she implores longingly

"What about the other indoor children's playgrounds? You can drive there!"

"Its a public holiday baby, they will be very crowded"

"Oh man!" (This time she throws herself onto the mat and lies there with a woebegone look on her face)

"We will still go to the botanic gardens to feed the fish, just wait for the rain to stop ok?"

She doesnt answer me. I think she is angry with me. Haha...

After half an hour, the rain slows to a drizzle so i decide to take a risk and venture out. Terelle can hardly contain her excitement as i bundle both the kids into the car.

"Are we going to feed the fish now Mummy? Are we?"

"yes, yes. Pray hard its not raining at the botanic gardens ok?"

"Ok....god please dont rain at the botanic gardens please please" After which she settles back in her seat and happily starts singing her songs.

It was raining throughout our entire journey to the gardens and i was half expecting to have to deal with her disappointment at not being able to feed the fish after all. Miraculously, right after i parked the car, the rain stopped and we all headed straight for the Symphony lake.

As she was standing there gleefully throwing bread into the pond (bread sponsored by Gong Gong and Por Por who trooped all the way to Katong to buy scraps from a bakery), she turned to me and gave me a disdainful look.

"At last im finally having fun Mummy!"

"...?? ...??!!"

Since when did it become my fault??? Hahahah...

My second child

2008-10-23T02:35:00.000-07:00

Then
Terelle used to follow me EVERYWHERE, and i really mean everywhere. Even when i had to go to students' houses for tuition, i would cart her along, and she would play with my students' siblings or watch her dvds right beside me

Now
I hardly bring Thane out cos with 2 kids of different ages, its kinda difficult to plan activities that they can both participate in. And it doesnt help that he doesnt cooperate when i try to bring him out.

1) If i take him along to tuition, i wont be able to teach for 5min before he starts howling for attention and demanding to be picked up. If not he will be crawling around/pulling on everything in sight/putting everything into his mouth. No way would he be able to sit quietly beside me for 1.5hours.

2) He hates being confined in the car seat, choosing to cry and squirm all the way to our destination. Outside, he refuses to sit/sleep in the stroller, and usually ends up irritable and cranky.

It is a vicious cycle, because of this, he seldom gets to go out. And perhaps because he seldom gets to go out, he is not used to being taken out and gets upset by the sights and sounds, and tends to get frightened by the many different kinds of people he sees. He will stare intently and scrutinize any new face, only to break into a howl when they start to smile/wave/play/do a hi5 with him.

Sigh...i am trying to bring him out more often now. Dont want him to end up being a frog in a well cos he's always left behind at home.

Then
Hubby and I would bring Terelle out with us all the time, and show her off to anyone and everyone.

Now
We try to sneak out as often as we can sans kids and we really relish our precious couple time together. Without the kids we dont have to take turns to have dinner/feed them/change diapers/appease their tantrums/carry them till our backs ache/worry about them touching dirty surfaces and contracting hfmd...the list goes on...

What about showing off the kids? Errr...just go to our blog and see their pics.

Then
Terelle used to sleep with us every single night.

Now
Thane sleeps in his cot every single night.

Then
I experimented with all kinds of foods with Terelle, unwittingly ignorant that they might have weakened her body. (according to the sinseh - he who believes that children should not be given any fruits from A-Z, no biscuits, no seafood, no cold stuff, no fruit juices until they have built up their constitution)

Now
Poor Thane only eats porridge/mee sua/organic pasta cooked in meat broth with vegetables and plain bread as his snack. He has yet to eat a single piece of fruit nor try a bite of a biscuit. His food repertoire is so pathetic that i feel so sorry for him.
On the flipside, he does seem stronger than his sister. He seldom falls sick, even when she coughs and sneezes right in his face when she is ill. Even when he is sick, his symptoms are mild and usually abate within a couple of days. We shall see...

Then
We had no helper and Terelle only had me 24/7. I was also fiercely protective of her and abhorred the thought of a helper, lest she vie for the affections of my precious baby.

Now
I leave Thane in the capable (so far) hands of my helper while i go out to teach/exercise/shop/eat/attend workshops/catch up with friends/have a life. I do not feel a smidgen of guilt...ok maybe just a teeny weeny bit sometimes when Thane tries to reach out for me as the lift door closes in his face.

Then
I remember when Terelle fell off the bed for the first time. We panicked and hubby carried her and literally ran all the way to the paediatrician to get her checked out.

Now
When Thane fell off the bed for the first time, i was quite unperturbed cos he only cried for like 30s, had no baluku and was pretty much his normal self after that. No need to go haring off to the pd...saved me $40 too.

Then
Splurged on pretty new clothes for Terelle ever so often.

Now
Im happy with my friends' hand me downs for Thane.

Then
Flashcards! Music during naptime and bedtime! Books! Gym!

Now
Err...i do some of the above whenever im not too tired or when i feel like it.

My poor second child...please dont grow up thinking that you've been sidelined. I still love you to bits.

Best Baby in the Whole World!!!

2008-10-22T07:39:00.000-07:00

Thane is a very serious baby, i mean it.

Coaxing a smile out of him is like coaxing blood out of a rock. And that leaves most of our friends feeling extremely stupid cos no matter what silly antics they try, he will simply stare at them with an impassive face and a furrowed brow, as if to say "Hey just quit it, dont you know you look really silly and its not funny?"

Yet only Terelle can make him squeal and double over with laughter. We can say the exact same things, do the exact same actions as her, only to be met with that deprecating, pokerfaced stare.

Tonight, she was monkey-ing around as usual and singing "Ke Ren Lai" at the top of her lungs, peeking out at Thane from behind the dining chair from time to time. He seemed to find that hilarious and started laughing hysterically. That fuelled more clowning around from my dear girl and he was laughing so hard that he was spewing bread all over the place. (He was eating bread at that time)

This "Ke Ren Lai" episode went on for a good 15min, after which both kids were totally tired out so we started our bedtime routines. (hahah what a good way to get them to go to sleep!!)

As hubby was putting on a pair of long pants for Terelle and i was nursing Thane, she suddenly exclaimed "Baby is the best baby in the whole wide world!!"

Our hearts melted. I guess the best thing that we did for her was to give her a sibling.

But once he gets a little older, that's when the real mayhem will start.

Strike Day 6

2008-09-14T21:34:00.000-07:00

Thane slept through the nite before, somehow or rather i kinda expected him to. Guess once i changed my mindset, everything seemed easier to bear.

Helper took over to keep an eye on him so i could get some extra shut eye in the morning. However i couldnt really sleep cos i could hear him squealing non stop outside. Finally got out of bed and found, to my surprise, that my happy little baby was back. Perhaps our misery rubbed off on each other the past few days and once i started to lighten up, his mood changed for the better too. When i saw that he was no longer moping around, my spirits were further lifted, and i felt that maybe the worst was really over.

In the afternoon, after Terelle went off to school, i shut ourselves inside my room again, turned on the worship cd and spent the next 3 hours skin to skin. Thane fell fast asleep on my chest and although i was wide awake, i didnt dare move until it was time to fetch Terelle. He continued to sleep for another half an hour after that, that made it a total of 3.5 hrs! He had never before napped for such a long time.

The afternoon and evening passed by quickly enough, with us feeding him milk by spoon as per normal.

After dinner, as i settled down to watch some tv (Dont forget the Lyrics, my current favourite reality show), i thought no harm trying to latch him. I expected him to push me away again as usual, but to my utmost surprise and delight, he began to nurse as if he never stopped.

I didnt dare to move an inch lest he unlatched himself. I think I didnt even dare to breathe deeply. I watched in amusement as he went through his usual routine of scratching his head with his free hand and slowly drifted off to sleep. And i just sat there holding his hand and stroking his head for the next 1.5 hrs, with him asleep at my breast, only finally getting up and putting him down when my bladder was about to burst.

I don't know if he will go on strike again. But I am thankful that we had this particular nursing experience so I could savor every second of it. At least if that was the last nursing session, it will stay in my heart and soul forever.

Thanks to all my friends (you know who you are), and even other mums who just chanced on my blog, for being so supportive and comforting to me during this confusing, emotional time. What you did for me just confirms that mother-to-mother support is so very important to a nursing mother. I will always remember this episode for the rest of my life.

And to any other mums who is as unfortunate as me to have to go through this, take heart. The strike will pass..all u need is alot of patience and determination. And if you feel like its the end of the world, just get in touch with me, ill lend you my shoulder to cry on.

Strike Day 5

2008-09-10T10:49:00.001-07:00

Hubby was at home again today, cos we need to go sign some documents for our new flat. The morning passed by as usual, with us spoon feeding Thane his milk and water. I have increased his meals to 3 times a day now, adding cereal for breakfast because in the past he used to latch in the morning.

When Terelle went off to school, we took Thane along with us to the document signing session. I still didnt want to leave him alone. In the car, i had almost succeeded in getting him near the breast when my fone rang. (It was my dad, he has an uncanny knack of calling me at the most inopportune time. Sigh...)

Thane got startled and started to cry and pull away. At the height of his hysterics, hubby suggested we turn back and leave him at home. I refused and tried my best to comfort him, all the while trying not to burst into tears again.

He finally slept on my shoulder. Thank God we didnt turn back! During lunch, i spoonfed him some milk again. He took it with minimal fuss. I put him in the sling and carried him around for the rest of the day. My shoulders ached from his weight but i was determined for him to spend as much time close to me as possible.

Thane had his porridge outside and was an angel throughout the signing and the meeting with the lawyer. He slept on my shoulder during the meeting and didnt wake until 3 hours later, by then we had already reached home.

I was worried that he was getting dehydrated as he seemed lethargic to me. Hubby cheerfully remarked that previously i worried when he didnt sleep, now that he was napping for a longer stretch why was i worrying again?

Fed him another bowl of milk when he awoke and gave him a new sippy cup to try. We had just bought that cup in the afternoon as i wanted to try everything in a bid for him to drink more milk.

I was dreading bedtime again but surprisingly, i neednt have worried. After turning on the cd, i sang "There is none like You" just once to him and he fell fast asleep on my shoulder with nary a fuss. I was elated. My spirits lifted and i felt so much more hopeful that i have felt in days. I think God is trying to tell me that we can get through this.

Hubby just came in and commented that it is funny how God works. We have been trying to get Thane to sleep on his own and complaining so much about how he wakes up countless times throughout the night. Whenever he cried and needed to nurse in the middle of the night, Hubby used to carry him to me and sleep at the foot of the bed while i nursed him. As soon as he fell asleep again, i would kick hubby awake and he would gingerly carry him back to his cot, hardly daring to breathe in case he woke up again. Before hubby left on his biz trip, we were actually saying that as soon as he came back, we were going to let him go cold turkey and cry himself to sleep.

We have realised that we should be careful about what we wish for, it really might just come true but not in the way that we expect. Yes he has gone cold turkey, but he has done it on his own terms. We didnt have any choice in the matter. And perhaps it is a good time that he is finally teaching himself to sleep on his own and not use me as a pacifier.

I am going to sleep now. As i am writing this, Thane is still fast asleep and i am convinced that he will sleep through the night agian.

We shall see. I live to fight another day tomorrow. I am encouraged and i have faith that i can get through this.

So help me God.

Strike Day 4

2008-09-10T10:13:00.000-07:00

730am: Thane was awake and wailing his lungs out. I hurriedly carried him outside as Terelle was stirring. I didnt want her to wake so early as she would be tired and cranky by the time she had to go to school.

Hubby had to rush off to work and i quickly warmed up some milk for my helper to feed Thane. At that moment, Terelle walked into the living room. My heart sank...i couldnt face the prospect of entertaining her till the time she had to go to school and deal with Thane at the same time.

I begged her to go back to the room and sleep some more. She refused. I started to cry and begged her again to go to the room. She started to cry too. Hubby saw the drama unfolding and let out a sigh of despair.

In the end, with tears streaming down my face, i carried Terelle back to the room and set her down on the bed. I asked her if she wanted some milk and she said yes. After she finished her milk, i laid beside her and she quietly told me "Mummy dont be sad, ill sleep some more ok?"

With that, she started to smell her beloved blankie and closed her eyes.

I started to cry again. I could hardly believe that my little girl was so matured about this. She could actually empatise with what i was going through and didnt want to add to my misery. I thanked God for my little blessing.

Just before Terelle left for school, Thane smacked an entire bowl of milk onto the floor in his rage at being spoon fed. I was devastated as i watched my precious milk spilt on the floor instead of ending up in his tummy and yet i was helpless to do anything about it.

It was comforting to have hubby home yesterday but i knew i had to get through the days myself from now on. When Terelle went off to school, i took Thane into the room, closed the door, turned on the worship cd again and spent the next hour skin to skin with him. It worked, and he lay contentedly on my chest, listening to the music with his eyes wide open and he didnt cry one bit.

Encouraged, i tried offering him the breast again when the entired cd finished playing. Sadly, he started to push me away again. Dejected and thoroughly discouraged, i started to cry again. Inwardly i was telling myself, perhaps i was being too impatient. Perhaps i should give him more time.

While Terelle was napping, I spent more skin to skin time with Thane with the same music playing in the background. He fell asleep on my chest and i put him down next to Terelle and fell asleep myself.

When i awoke, hubby was home with a dozen donuts to cheer me up. Only he understood me best and knew that i needed food, sweet ones at that, to keep my spirits up. I had already gone through 2 packets of chocolates that day. I thanked God again for my other blessing in my life.

After dinner, hubby took out his guitar and song book and we spent the next hour singing some of our favourite worship songs. Terelle even tried to mimic Daddy by strumming her toy guitar with one of his picks. Thane sat in my lap and quietly observed us. He seemed strangely calm and didnt move much as he listened to our singing.

When it came to bedtime, Thane fell asleep in hubby's arms again, all the while listening to the cd. However, Terelle was talking rather loudly and woke him up an hour later and he started bawling again. I quickly started to heat up some milk for him but when i returned to the room, hubby had already put him down on the bed and he was fast asleep.

My tears started to flow again as i clutched that precious bowl of undrunk milk. My supply had been greatly affected by the events of the past few days and my breasts were sore from being unaccustomed to the harsh pumping action of the pump, so every drop that i managed to squeeze out was so precious. And there was this entire bowl of milk that wasnt going to go into Thane's system! I just couldnt bear the thought of that.

Hubby sat on the floor beside me and told me to let go and let God. He said that maybe if i finally could stop blaming myself and let go, my supply would return and God would make things right. Deep down in my heart i knew he was right, it was really up to me to stop trying to control everything. I washed my face and went to bed.

To my utmost surprise, Thane slept through the night.

When i groggily reached for my clock in the morning, i half expected it to be 3am. It was actually already 730am and he was still fast alseep. I was so happy i couldnt go back to sleep myself.

Strike day 3

2008-09-10T09:52:00.001-07:00

Hubby took leave today to lend me support and help out at home. He helps me prepare Terelle for school as i struggle with trying to feed Thane via cup, bottle and spoon.
I realised that spoon is the best bet as most of the milk gets in that way. He simply detests the bottle and with the cup, most of the milk dribbles down his chin. I try to get him to latch intermittently without success; he continues to push me away, crying unhappily.

1230pm: Terelle goes off to school. Hubby suggests we go out for a nice lunch but i cant bear to leave Thane alone at home.

In the end, we bring him downstairs to the coffee shop for a walk and to get some groceries. I can hardly stomach any food. As i miserably pick at my hokkein mee, Thane stares ahead forlornly. He seems to have lost his spirit too. Is my misery rubbing off on him or vice versa? Either way we are both miserable.

Throughout the afternoon, I kept replaying in my mind what happened on Friday night. I kept wishing I had known Thane was going to go on strike. I would have treasured every moment of our last nursing session. I would have smelled his soft hair, kissed his forehead and nuzzled his little fist, and look on with amusement at how he liked to scratch his head with his free hand, until he fell fast asleep. I would have treasured every second of our special time together and not take it for granted by reading or watching tv.

That afternoon i cried each time he cried. At one point, he was just sitting quietly in my lap and staring sullenly in front of him. It seemed as if his spirit was broken. With tears streaming down my face, i told hubby i couldnt take any more of this.

Terelle was trying to nap when she saw me crying. She quietly gave me a hug and said "Dont cry Mummy, I love you." I could hardly believe my ears. Here was my 3 year old baby actually comforting me!
My little girl has really grown up. I picked her up and hugged her. I asked her why baby keeps refusing to drink mummy's milk. Her innocent reply was "Baby dont want to drink milk becos he wants to go to school with me."

Smiling through my tears, i marvelled at how matured she could be one moment and just a kid again the next.

We brought Thane to see the pd in the evening, just to get him checked out and make sure there was nothing physically wrong with him. The pd gave him a clean bill of health and told me that he has a strong character to be able to protest so vehemently at 9mths.

When i told her i was not ready to wean, she looked me in the eye and said that it was not up to me anymore. Now it was really up to Thane, if and when he decides to forgive and forget, and start to nurse again.

I was crestfallen at her declaration. I was all ready to nurse him well into his toddler years. I didnt want the hassle of bottles and spoonfeeding. If only he would return to nursing, i wouldnt even mind getting up 5 times a night to nurse him again. Why did i complain so much when he was nursing through the night? What i wouldnt give to go back to those days. But it wasnt about what i wanted anymore, was it?

At night, after all the bedtime rituals, the four of us trooped into our room. As i turned on the cd player, songs of worship started to fill the room. Hubby remarked that he suddenly felt like listening to this particular cd. Surprisingly Thane fell asleep in his arms with much less fuss compared to the previous few nights.

As the four of us lay on our bed listening to the cd, the song "There is none like You" begain to play. Hubby started singing and when he came to the line "suffering children are safe in Your arms", i felt peace for the first time in days. God was comforting me and i told myself to hold that line close to my heart.

Thane woke up again in the middle of the night and we went through the motion of feeding and comforting again, all the while with the cd playing in the background.

He woke up only once this time.

Strike Day 2

2008-09-10T09:01:00.000-07:00

11pm: True enough, when it came to bedtime and Thane needed to nurse to sleep again, he started his hysterical screaming. Tried to get him to latch again but he wailed even louder. After rocking, bouncing, cradling, singing, walking around he finally slept, shuddering every few minutes, the after effects of his frenzied crying session.

2am: He wakes up crying again. I warm up a small container of expressed breast milk and painstakingly feed it to him by spoon, all the while carrying him with the other hand. He laps a few spoonfuls up eagerly only to start crying and struggling again. I doggedly continue to feed him every single drop, despite his apparent misery every few minutes.

315am: He falls asleep after crying his heart out again. My dad actually suggests that i bring him to the pd tomorrow to ask if it is time to wean. I almost explode with fury and exasperation.

5am: Same thing happens. Cry, warm milk, feed with one hand with him protesting between spoonfuls. I keep sms-ing hubby for encouragement. He replies and tries to keep my spirits up, despite it being 5am too over in Shanghai.
Hubby says he has a phobia of travelling now, cos everytime he travels, something will go wrong at home. Its always the kids who suffer!! Once when he travelled, Terelle landed in hospital and now this?! How i wish it were me who was aflicted with all these suffering...why does it have to be the kids??

6am: Thane falls asleep and i gratefully sink into bed.

830am: I wake up and groggily stagger out of bed only to realise my parents have taken Thane out for breakfast. Thankful, i go back to sleep with Terelle who miraculously, has slept through the entire din the night before.

10am: Thane returns asleep in my helper's arms. She puts him down in his cot and he wakes barely 15min later crying miserably again. No luck with latching again, we try to feed him some milk in a bottle. He tries to bat it away in despair, crying and gagging at the same time. Takes almost 30min to finish just 100ml of milk.
I am worried as most of the time his diapers are barely filled when they used to be so full they would leak from time to time. Is he dehydrated??

12 noon: Supposed to bring Terelle to a good friend's son's party but am so tired i cant bring myself to dress up, drag myself out and handle her outside. i knew i would be worried about Thane at home too, so decided to skip the party.

Afternoon passes by in the same manner, the only thought that kept me going was that hubby would be returning that night. I needed him to be around, to tell me that it was not my fault and that everything would be alright again. And with him around, if i needed to cry i could cry in peace. I did not need to keep up with appearances as i did with my parents around.

Headed off to the airport to fetch hubby in the evening. Thane started fussing after dinner. Tried to nurse him in the car, but to no avail. He used to love nursing in the car, the rocking motion slowly easing him to sleep. My heart twisted at the memory.

1130pm: The entire household is asleep. Thane wakes and cries inconsolably. Hubby has his first taste of the mayhem. I break down and sob my heart out as he tries to carry Thane and calm him down. Finally succeeds after about an hour.

Hubby repeatedly tells me that i couldnt have forseen that Thane would have such a reaction after the flicking incident and that i should look ahead and not dwell on the past. But i cant..i just cant...everytime i see how miserable he is, i feel like beating myself up.

3am: Thane wakes and we both scramble to feed him a bowl of milk again. Same reaction, feed cry feed cry....cry until spent, fall asleep wimpering. By now my heart is in a million pieces.

Strike Day 1

2008-09-10T08:21:00.000-07:00

1130pm: Trying to nurse Thane to sleep as usual. Brought the kids out on a cable car ride to Sentosa and then to watch the "Song of the Sea" today so am particularly bushed. Hoping that he would fall asleep quickly so that i can crash too, and not looking forward to him getting up at least 3 times to nurse during the nite again.

1138pm: Thane bites me hard and i flick his mouth, chiding him at the same time. He furrows his brow, gives me a bewildered and hurt look, arches his back away from me and starts to howl. I quickly carry him out of the room for fear of waking Terelle up. (On hindsight, shouldnt have bothered...she can sleep through an earthquake)

1230am: He is still crying and screaming. My mum tries to pacify him and it works for a few minutes. I keep trying to offer the breast and he does turn his face towards it. Then he seems to remember that he was flicked and turns away yelling with renewed fervour.

145am: He is still crying and wimpering pitifully. I sms hubby who is away and tell him how desperate i am. Hubby is awoken from his sleep and dismisses me as he thinks it is not a serious issue. But i am scared and desperate cos deep down i know that something is not right. The worm has turned and i dont think that anything i do will make it turn back.

215am: He has finally cried himself to sleep. Exhausted i climb into bed beside him and fall into a fitful sleep.

330am: He is up and wailing again! I offer the breast again and the same thing happens. He turns towards it then remembers how i hurt him and turns away crying woefully. My heart breaks...

All this while my mum is grumbling that i am making her precious grandson suffer and that it is not good for babies to cry so much and that he will get a fever and fits the next day and keeps suggesting that i give him formula as she is convinced that he is hungry.
I tell her that i think he is on a nursing strike and she scoffs at my resolve to breastfeed, claiming that my sister and i are both fine and dandy now and we were both not breastfed.
I am utterly frustrated and try to shut out all her unwanted advice.

445am: He cried until he was exhausted and has fallen asleep. I am exhausted too and miserable. Why is he rejecting me? I feel that it is my fault for flicking him.

620am: He wakes and i jump at the chance to offer him the breast. He takes it!! I am overjoyed, thinking that everything has gone back to normal. I do not dare move and we both fall asleep, me upright and him cradled in my arms.

830am: Thane wakes as per normal and my mum and helper take him outside to play with him while i get some extra shut eye.

1030am: I wake and my helper tells me she thinks he's hungry and sleepy at the same time. I fumble with my bra's nursing clasp and try to undo it quickly. Alas it is not quick enough for my impatient boy and he starts to howl in anger and twists out of my arms again. When i finally get it undone he refuses to latch again. He screams and cries for a good hour before falling into an exhausted stupor again.

The next couple of hours are a blur of intermittent crying, offering the breast, his refusal and pushing me away, more crying, then falling asleep only to wake in a short while and repeating the whole process.

By nightfall i am totally spent and utterly miserable. I havent had a bite of lunch and have no appetite for dinner. However my parents are around and i make a half hearted attempt at dragging myself downstairs for some food. I bring Thane along as i cant bear to leave him at home with my helper.

745pm: My parents and Terelle are tucking into a sumptous bak kut teh dinner while i stare at my food with Thane sitting in my lap. He is looking around impassively, totally unlike my busybody little boy just a couple of days ago. Every few minutes he will cry out and bury his face into my neck. My dad quickly finishes his dinner and carries him away to look at some children racing cars nearby, in a bid to cheer him up. I half heartedly swallow a few morsels of food.

After all the bedtime routines for both kids, my heart sinks further. I knew that it was going to be another long night.
I was right, the night was longer that it has ever been.

Maternal instinct

2008-09-08T07:33:00.000-07:00

I am not maternal, never have been.

B.C (before children), i was never the kind to go ooh and aah over babies. Even when an impossibly cute specimen was hanging over my shoulder in the train, all i could manage was a smile or a polite pat on its hand, even while i knew that the mum was dying for me to ask some personal questions about her offspring just so that she could ply me with its latest anecdotes. No thanks, i would rather be listening to my music and escaping into my book.

Whenever i had to entertain a kid for more than a couple of minutes, my lame antics and silly noises would always be met with impassive, stony faces that conveyed the message that i was the greatest joke on earth. And i would be seriously wishing my friend/relative i.e the grimy kids' mum would quickly return or that the ground would swallow me up to save me from further embarassment.

And crying kids? They either gave me a headache or rendered me useless, and as such i avoided them like the plague.

While i was pregnant, i never felt that i was radiating femininity. While my friends waxed lyrical about how wonderful it felt and how miraculous it was to have a little being move inside you, all i felt were the longest 18months (2 pregnancies) of my life and i disliked the ungainly bump in front of me and the constraints it put on my active lifestyle.

6 years of marriage and 2 kids later, i am still learning how to be a mother. There are days i do give myself a pat on the back and there are days i wish i could kick myself. But through it all, there is one thing that i feel i have finally done well in - and that is breastfeeding Thane.

We battled countless problems together in the early days; latching issues, mastitis (3times), bleeding nipples, engorgement and yet we managed to overcome all of them. He has been a happy nurser for the past 9 months only to stop abruptly 4 nites ago cos i flicked his cheek in response to him biting hard.
This is not the first time ive done so as he has been biting pretty often enough, but this was the first time he looked at me with such hurt and betrayal in his eyes as he stopped nursing immediately, arched his back and pushed himself vehemently away from me.

Nursing strike - 2 cold clinical words that describe a baby's abrupt refusal to nurse.

Each time Thane draws away from me screaming his lungs out, I feel bereft; as if i am mourning the leaving of a loved one, as if im mourning my hold on mothering my baby. Mothering through breastfeeding is the only thing i know i am doing completely right and that nobody could fault, and if i cant nurse i feel useless, helpless, miserable and worst of all defeated.

I never thought i would finally come face to face with my maternal instincts in this manner. Yet through this nursing strike - these 2 simple, self explaining words have since shaken my entire life and soul and has made me feel like its the end of the world.

I have been trawling the net for information on how to deal with nursing strikes and have been trying to find success stories of mothers who have coaxed their babies back to the breast after a strike.

But all I have found are very factual advices about how to cope with nursing strikes (how do u spend skin to skin time when your baby keeps pushing himself away from you and crying himself hoarse??) but very few success stories about mothers who have actually survived a nursing strike and come out triumphant on the other side.

There is especially, a lack of stories about mums who reacted strongly when her child bit her, had the child gone on strike and emerged better off for it.

And so i shall chronicle Thane's nursing strike, firstly to remember these emotional days and also to provide hope and comfort to any other mum who would be as unfortunate as me to encounter this in her breastfeeding journey.

Maternal instinct? Guess i do have a smidgeon of it after all. But i wish i didnt have to realise it through this episode...

Complain Letter

2008-08-16T07:30:00.000-07:00

Terelle was bent over a blank sheet of paper, writing some letters and drawing some squiggles very intently. I asked her what was she doing.

"Im writing a complain letter,' came her swift reply.

Complain letter?? I dont recall ever teaching her the concept of a complaint, let alone a complain letter.

"What do you want to complain about?"

"I want to complain about the kor kor on the bus. I want to kill him for always scratching kirsten and me!!"

Should i be concerned about this display of violence? Hahahha but a complain letter? I cant get over it. My girl is a born and bred Singaporean alright.

First "fight'?

2008-05-29T07:16:00.000-07:00

We were coaxing Terelle to drink up her chinese medicine. As usual, she was doing all she can and coming up with all sorts of delay tactics to get out of it.

It had been a long day and both of us were tired, hot and bothered, and our patience was worn thin.

Hubby finally lost his cool and shouted at her to get on with it.

She grudgingly sat on the floor and indignantly downed the medicine.

Thane chose this precise moment to let out a gurgle of laughter, which sounded like he was mocking her.

The little chilli padi turned to him and grimly declared in a menacing voice that commanded no further comments
"IT'S NOT FUNNY!"

Hubby and I could hardly keep a straight face after that. We both had to run out of the room lest we burst out laughing in front of her and lose our authority.

Uncanny coincidence

2008-05-24T23:51:00.000-07:00

She was born on 050405
He was born on 071207
Similar date pattern

She has 7 letters in her name.
He has 5.

She turned 2 on 050407
He was made on 050407 *snigger*

She turned 3 on 050408
He started sleeping through the night on 050408

In the afternoon, both have to sleep at the same time and they will invariably wake up at the same time too!

We have an strange affinity with these 2 numbers in our daily life too. Rented wagons at the zoo, locker numbers, car park lots, receipt slips at special occasions; all bear the numbers '57'.
Sheer coincidence, you might scoff, but it has happened too many times for us to dismiss.

And the numbers 5 and 7 have an added significance, cos in the days when handphones were non existent and pagers were the hippest form of communication, i used the no 57 as my initials cos when viewed upside down, they form the letters LS.

Im so glad that sister and brother are close (so far), without me having to really try very hard. Whenever he cries, sometimes only his sister is able to make him smile with her silly antics. And whenever she cries, he invariably gets very upset too, as if he is sharing her distress.

Because of this uncanny coincidence, we have a sticker of the number 57 on our car, making us hard to miss on the roads.
So if u do see us, give us a toot and a wave! ;)

What did she say?!

2008-05-19T07:50:00.000-07:00

Scenario 1

Family eating at dinner table. Hubby talking to his mum and she replies with her mouth half full. Little smart aleck quips with a serious, admonishing look on her face,
"Mama dont talk with ur mouth full! Its very rude!!"

Everyone almost falls off their chairs in laughter.
Looks like my incessant nagging at her not to talk with her mouth full is working!

Scenario 2

We all head to the stables at Pasir Ris Park, hoping to let Terelle have a ride on the ponys. My dad complains non stop about the mosquitoes, the dark clouds and impending rain, the "ulu-ness" of the place and kept on dissuading us to let her have her fun with the ponys. This prompted me to tell him not to be a wet blanket.

Terelle, in all seriousness, asked as she cautiously tugged at and fingered his shirt," Why gong gong? Are you very wet??"

*Rolls eyes in disbelief*

Hope

2008-05-17T00:30:00.000-07:00

Ive finally realised the reason for my daughter's terrible moods - she's not feeling well.

Terelle has been on long term medication for her lung problems and allergies ever since January and recently her paediatrician decided to stop the meds. Consequently all the allergies started flaring up again - itchy, watery eyes, a sneeze a minute, leaky nose, breathlessness and a hacking cough with any slight exertion; and it drives her up the wall. And because of that, she takes her frustrations out on me, and who can blame her?

Coincidently a good friend brought her daughter to see a sinseh recently for her flu and it cleared up very quickly. She was very impressed and suggested i try tcm. I am not particularly a great fan of tcm, having heard horror stories of fly by night sinsehs who sneak weatern drugs into their "potions" and who use herbs from unknown sources. Moreover, i was brought up taking western medicine and coupled with my training as a biochemist armed with a plethora of proven scientific knowledge, i was skeptical and wary.

However, i have also heard that reputable sinsehs are able to treat the root cause of your problem and that treatment with tcm, although lengthy, aims for holistic wellbeing; versus western medicine which is quick acting but treats only symptoms. What the heck, i was desperate to try anything that can improve my poor girl's quality of life and also regain my sanity, so we quickly made an appointment to see this guy.

I wasnt too impressed when we reached the medical hall. It was old with flaky yellowed walls, non air conditioned and smelled very strongly of "koyok" (medicated plasters) A sour faced "nurse" told us in curt tones, without even looking at us, to wait until our number was called before going into the consultation room. After a 30min wait, we were finally face to face with the famed doctor.

He was a serious middle aged man who promptly ordered hubby out of the room so he could concentrate on sensing terelle's aura (or whatever he needed to do). Perhaps she was awed by him too, as she was uncharacteristically quiet and compliant. I started blubbering in my rusty mandarin but he totally ignored my ramblings. He took one look at her and grimly declared that she had weak lungs in surprisingly fluent English. ( Now why did i assume that just because he was a sinseh who practiced traditional chinese medicine that i HAD to speak in mandarin and make a fool of myself??)

He started to examine her and after a minute of silence (by then i was too cowed by his intimidating presence to utter a squeak), he looked up and with a voice that dripped contempt, asked me a barrage of questions.

"Do you give her yakult and juice?"

"Yes"

"Biscuits, chocolates, fruits?"

(more meekly) "Yes"

"She eats very slowly, has no appetite, sleeps poorly and tosses and turns?"

"Yes"

"She had an episode of lung infection in recent months?"

"Yes in January"

"Then she had high fever with fits too?"

"Yes during a 2nd infection in February"
(He can tell so much by just reading her pulse??)

"She is in very bad health, you shouldnt have waited so long to see me"

"....." (My heart sinks to the bottom of my shoes)

"Her upbringing is so bad, all those yakult, fruits, western stuff...they claim is good but it does more harm to our system. We are asians so we have a completely different constitution, we cannot eat the same way as the ang mohs."

(Bad upbringing?? what bad upbringing??) I felt abit indignant at that point.

"Your daughter has a very strong personality, she has very obvious leadership qualities. I can tell from her face. And being unwell hinders her learning potential. She gets very frustrated and irritable often right?"
(What is he now, a fortune teller too??)

"Yes"

He shakes his head and makes some notes. At this point i stupidly venture to ask a question, cos he made it sound as though she was beyond hope.
" So can she be cured?"

He looked at me over his glasses, arched an eyebrow and said curtly
"I know what im doing"

*But..but...i didnt mean to say you dont know what ure doing...i just need some assurance...* *sniff sniff*

ok no more talking from me, i decided to speak only when spoken to.

"ok she cannot eat nuts, all fruits from A to Z, fruit juices, yakult, green tea, chicken, eggs, all fried things, oily stuff, oven baked like cakes, cereals, biscuits..."
(i start to space out...so many things? What can she eat?)

"Ah i know u wont be able to remember all these. You yourself suffer from insomnia and hence cannot focus well, have a bad back here" (points to the exact spot where my back is aching) "pain here" (points to a stiff spot on my neck that i cant seem to shake off) "have constipation and heartburn"

Ahhhhh...he can see all that from my face too?? But he's spot on in his diagnosis

"Just give her small portions of soft foods now; oats, porridge. Boil it with meat but dont let her eat the meat. Fish ok"

"Can she eat sushi? Its her favourite"

"No, the rice is too hard for her to digest"

Terelle had been quiet and paying attention to our conversation so far. I noticed her face registering increasing alarm after hearing the entire list of forbidden food. To hear that she couldnt have her beloved sushi; it was the straw that broke her back. She couldnt help but blurt out pleadingly

"Noodles can? Doctor please say can?"

That elicited a smile from the doctor who told her with a laugh that noodles are fine.

"See your girl is so smart, we must make her feel better then she can really shine"
I heave an inaudible sigh of relief...he's human after all.

And i chose this moment to ask another dumb question.
"So do i have to be treated too?"

Another arch of his eyebrow. "Ill treat your girl first, part of your inability to sleep is because of her. Because u worry too much about her"
Whoa spot on again. I felt like a recalcitrant schoolgirl in front of a strict principal.

And so, that kinda concluded our virgin sinseh visit. Terelle was given a vile smelling concoction together with some powder to drink and ordered to come back in 5 days.

Miraculously, she took the medicine with minimal fuss and true enough, showed visible signs of improvement after 5 days.

We are now both seeing this sinseh for long term maintenance and well being and i feel much more lighthearted seeing terelle in better spirits and most importantly better health. She only has occasional sneezes when she wakes in the morning and can run like the wind without succumbing to a hacking cough.

And surprisingly, good ol serious doc has started to lighten up. He now laughs and jokes with us, probably cos we have been listening to his advice and have shown considerable improvement. Even sour faced puss at the recept now smiles and makes small talk with us. Or maybe our scintillating personalities are now shining through cos we are both feeling better? Haha...lame...

But there you have it, i now have hope, in the form of a no nonsense chinese sinseh.

My sweet girl

2008-05-16T03:46:00.000-07:00

I was lying in bed this morning trying to get an extra hour of sleep, having had to wake up 5 times the night before to nurse a sick baby with a stuffy nose. I could hear the baby wailing to be carried outside and Terelle's incessant pleas for someone to play with her but i stubbornly tried to shut out the din by burrowing deeper under the covers.

Suddenly i heard little footsteps approaching the bed. Terelle had crept up silently beside me. She planted a kiss on my cheek and whispered " Is your head bursting, mummy? You sleep well okie? Then when u wake up later you can play with me okie?"

For that i immediately got up and found the energy to start the day.

I guess i must be doing something right after all.

I am crap

2008-05-04T21:52:00.000-07:00

Lately ive been feeling extremely tired, both emotionally and physically, from taking care of the 2 kids. Im out of play ideas, i snap for no rhyme or reason, everything and everyone irks me to no end and when i wake up in the morning sometimes i wish they would just disappear.
In short, im simply at the end of my tether. I feel like a terrible, useless mum.

I have friends who breeze through being a stay at home mum to 2 kids, without any help whatsoever. And they are still cheerful and patient and can find loads to do with their kids. They can play with them the whole day, take them out to the malls (ALONE!!) and never scream like a deranged banshee.

Me? Most days terelle watches tv till her eyes glaze over while i sit on the couch with the baby stuck on my breast, repeatedly yelling at her to switch it off. And yet when she finally does switch it off, i have no energy left to think of yet another inane game to entertain her with. And i do have a helper to do all the household chores and cook for us.
I feel like a terrible, useless mum.

I used to have tons of patience to spare, i could counsel and advise even the most obstinate and rebellious student. Now i find myself getting irritated by petty and inconsequential things.

Terelle whines for more cereals. I grudgingly fetch the bowl for her and wish she would shut up.

She asks to be piggy backed to the toilet to brush her teeth and whines when i deny her cos my tired, aching body just cant take piggy backing her 14kg frame for that short trip to the loo. I forcefully haul her to the sink and brush her teeth whilst she is crying pitifully, saying that ive hurt her arm. And i start to regret...why couldnt i have just piggy backed her and saved myself from this emotional outburst?

The baby is cranky and refuses to sleep, and screams to be rocked and nursed at the same time. I stubbornly sit on the sofa, vehemently stuff my breast into his mouth and yell at him to cooperate, while he gags and chokes because he is fighting me off and crying at the same time.
And while i am fighting my epic battle with the baby, Terelle comes running to me and askes me to play with her cos my helper simply has no idea how to entertain her. I ask her to wait till the baby's asleep and she glues herself to the goggle box again. I think venomous thoughts along the lines of "why is my maid so darn inept that she cant entertain a 3year old for a couple of minutes?" and take my anger out on Terelle by continuing to yell at her to switch the damn tv off.

The baby is finally asleep but by now Terelle has watched a whole hour and a half of mindless cartoons and my wrist is aching badly. I force myself to inject some cheer in my voice as i ask her nicely if she would like to do some painting/coloring/puzzles/play with her playdoh/toys/read a book. She says no to all the above and screams non stop when i switch the tv off. I take my rising resentment and anger out on her by yelling at her yet again and ignoring her completely as she sulks on the sofa.

After awhile she comes over and asks me in a pathetically plaintive voice "Mummy make happy face, Mummy dont be angry" and my heart breaks. God, she must be thinking what a monster Mummy is! I must be doing some serious damage to her emotional health!

I remind myself for the umpteenth time that she is only a kid and that i really shouldnt shout at her for nothing. We do some activity for a whole of 20min before she loses interest in it and wants to go back to watching tv. I yell at her to switch the blasted thing off again and she goes and sulks again. The cycle continues.
Am i really such a failure at entertaining my own kid? Am i so boring compared to the damn tv??

I feel like a terrible, useless mum.

If she goes to school, at least i get some respite but its still not time for myself. The baby needs a bath, has to be fed and bounced to sleep again and i need some lunch and visit the toilet. If im lucky, the maid plays with him and he is happy while i can do my business in peace. On bad days, i have to rush through my business and cant do it properly cos i can hear him wailing himself hoarse outside. I am that pathetic.
And oh i forgot...i realise i didnt even have time to wash my face that morning.

If she doesnt go to school, i have an even harder time. After having barked at her non stop for the past hour to chew and swallow (Terelle hates eating, by the way), i am frustrated and sweltering (stupid muggy weather) and my patience is at its limit. And there she goes and sneezes, hurling chunks of food that she has been keeping in her mouth for the past 15min all over the dining table, floor and my face.
I literally lose it. Rage consumes me as i scream at her so malevolently i scare myself. She bawls and i send her to the room as i sit on the sofa and weep. I think to myself, how much more of this can i take?? After i compose myself i go to the room and find her a whimpering wreck and i start berating myself again as i try my best to soothe away the tears and raw feelings.

I feel like a terrible, useless mum.

If she doesnt go to school, i have to think of ways to entertain my gal, her with the attention span of a gnat. Somedays i take her out, but trying to manage 2 kids outside, albeit with a maid's help, leaves me exhausted and i wish i had stayed home instead.
Yet being exhausted outside still beats staying at home with a bored 3 year old who can take just that much of painting/coloring/puzzles/playdoh/toys/books. But hey, there are just that many places to go in Singapore and the blistering heat doesnt help one bit. Or am i just not creative enough?

When they are awake, im counting the hours till they take their nap. When they are napping, i pray fervently that they dont wake so soon. If there were a drug that would make my kids sleep the whole day without any bad side effects, ill rush out to buy it. Now what kind of mother am i to wish that her kids be asleep the whole day??
They have to sleep their requisite 2 hours so i can take the time to just cool myself down. If either of them wakes prematurely i find myself taking my frustration and despair out on them again. Its so unfair to them i know, but i cant help it.

I feel like a terrible, useless mum.

By 6pm im usually in such a state of misery that i start sms-ing hubby to ask what time he's coming home. Ive just checked the sent box on my handphone and realise that 4 out of 5 weekdays i ask him the same question. My messages sound especially anguished when Terelle is up from her nap earlier than usual and is in a foul mood.
Hubby has never complained about having to receive these messages day after day but i am depressed by the state i am now reduced to. I just live for the time he comes home and when he does im usually an exhausted, sweaty, crabby mess and I hate it.

Am i too idealistic in trying to raise my kids?

Perhaps a couple of hours of tv a day wouldnt do too much harm?
But i have friends who can keep their kids away from the idiot box and yet still keep them entertained by activity books, flashcards and books and here i am falling so far short of that benchmark.

Perhaps letting the baby cry it out for awhile wouldnt hurt him at all?
But ive read that happy, secure babies are the ones that have their needs met all the time and are stronger and healthier as a result; and I worry about letting him cry till he's out of breath while i am struggling with managing Terelle's emotions.

Perhaps letting Terelle play in the playground is a better idea than keeping her at home?
But what about the epidemic levels of hfmd now??

Perhaps letting Terelle go to a childcare for the whole day will do both her and me some good? But what about exposure to all those germy kids? What will that do to her fragile, allergy prone body??

Perhaps leaving them alone with the maid is alright while i go have some me time?
But i cant, i just cant bear the thought of leaving them alone with a complete stranger, someone whose entire background was only presented to me on a sheet of paper.

I look on enviously at friends whose parents help them to no end with their kids. And i start getting even more resentful because i know that i will never be able to have that luxury.

Perhaps im really being too hard on myself.
Perhaps i really should let go a little.
Perhaps i should just stop comparing myself with other supermums.
Perhaps i should go back to work so that when i come back ill miss them so much ill be a happier mum. (But that is out of the question cos i have no parental help and i cant bear to send them to a childcare)
Or perhaps im just not cut out for this job.
I feel like a terrible, useless mum.

Chemistry 101

2008-04-29T06:55:00.000-07:00

T: Mummy, what is this?
Me: A bottle for you to blow bubbles from

T: What is inside the bottle?
Me: Soap water

T: What is inside the soap water?
Me: Soap

T: What is inside the soap?
Me: Errr...alkali

T: What is inside the al-ka-li?
Me: Errr...chemicals

T: What is inside the chemicals?
Me: Molecules

T: (pondering) Moll-lee-qs. What is inside the molecules?
Me: Errr...nuclei and electrons

T: (pondering for a longer time) What is that mummy?
Me: Tiny things inside the molecules

T: Tiny things? What to they do?
Me: Errrrr i dunno...how about we blow some bubbles?

T: *Happily* OK! (All talk of molecules and what nots forgotten completely)
Me: (thinking) What do they do? What do they do? *Panic* Dun test my chemistry knowledge so soon alright??

Oh my god, and im embarassed to say im a chemistry teacher!! But how do you explain what do nuclei and electrons do to a 3 year old??

Because of you (two)

2008-04-17T01:58:00.000-07:00

Because of you, i have a chronic back ache.

Because of you, no amount of concealer can hide my eye bags.

Because of you, i have the rusty, cloying smell of breastmilk lingering around me all the time.

Because of you, i have become a neurotic hypochondriac, for fear of passersby spreading their germs to you. I deliberately make a huge detour if someone sneezes or coughs in our path, disregarding any dirty looks from the offender. To hell with social graces! I am not risking another episode of you being so sick.

And on the same note, because of you, every little sneeze or cough of yours sends me into a frenzy and i start keeping you under surveillence and worry incessantly that you might be falling sick.

Because of you, i find myself constantly counting the no of days it takes to incubate viruses after an encounter with a sick person, heaving a sigh of relief only after the theoretical requisite no of days has passed. Only to find myself starting on another cycle of waiting with bated breath as you come into contact with yet another sick person. I am crazy and paranoid, i know, but i simply cant help it.

Because of you, somedays when things get really crazy, i feel like giving up and throwing you both out the window. When you dont want to eat the nutritious food that i have painstakingly prepared for the umpteenth time, when you have been wailing non stop because you cant have your way, when you refuse to sleep and insist on me carrying your 8kg frame and bouncing up and down like a human "yao lan" WHILE your sister is screaming and kicking me in the shins because i refuse to give her sweets before bedtime; i wish i could turn back time and not have kids in the first place.

And yet because of you, every ache and every pain melts away when you lie beside me at night and tell me that you love me out of the blue.

Because of you, i am starting to see the world through your rose tinted eyes and marvel at how innocent and untainted a child can be.

Because of you, i am learning how to stretch my patience and have become more creative at parenting.

Because of you, im glad i made the choice to stay at home and witness every single one of your milestone. Every gummy smile, every new story that you tell me about your day in school is a priceless treasure to me.

Because of you, my heart is lifted whenever you are happy and i wish you could be happy all the time.

And because of you, i have come to see a different side of the man i married. The man helps me with you whenever he can and yes, although there are limits to his patience (he is a man after all...) but i am thankful for every bedtime story read, every bathtime sorted, every meal patiently fed when i am dead on my feet from exhaustion; when he could have been enjoying his sports channel after a hard day's work.
I am thankful for his thoughtfulness with little surprises like a spa treat when i feel like i cannot deal with you anymore and i am grateful for his willingness to labor on beside me in being a hands on parent.

And though because of you our bedroom has been usurped, our couple time has dwindled to almost zilch and our almost our entire day is being monopolised by a slew of relentless whinings, demands for attention, feeds, burps and diaper changes; it makes me miss our couple time and reminisce about the those lazy, hazy days when we had the whole weekend to ourselves and could jet off on a short holiday whenever we fancied.
But yes, because of you, i have grown to love your daddy more.

Having said all that, because of you, i am still glad i have kids.

Things will only get better

2008-04-08T03:36:00.000-07:00

How many times have i heard that phrase being repeated to me the past 2 months. i have heard it so often that ive started using it as a lifeline to keep me sane when the going gets tough. And boy has the going been really tough in the weeks following Thane's arrival.

Firstly, my breastfeeding woes revisited.

I never have luck with breastfeeding; having suffered almost every single problem in the book during Terelle's time - Difficulty latching. Check. Engorgement. Check. Sore nipples. Check. Cracked nipples. Check. MASTITIS (breast infection). Check check check.

In the end, i ended up expressing milk round the clock for Terelle and i actually managed to do this for an entire year. But it was a chore and i really found those pumping sessions a complete waste of time.

With Thane, i had no difficulty latching him on, (everyone says its a male instinct, haha) but i had all the rest of the problems again. He was such a proficient sucker that my nipples started to bleed even while i was still in the hospital. And then because they were bleeding, the nurse told me to feed from the other breast, which led to the affected breast getting engorged. What a vicious cycle! It is no wonder so many women refuse to suffer the pain of breastfeeding! It is indeed a torture.

As usual hubby couldnt stand the sight of me suffering so again he told me to give it up. No way! I did this before and im sure i can do this again. But i feel breastfeeding (or at least the early days) is really more torturous than labor itself.

And then things spiralled even further downhill.

During my confinement with Terelle, i fell sick with high fever and chills twice due to mastitis. Similarly, i was sick again during my confinement with Thane, with a racking cough that just wouldnt go away.

And worst of all, Terelle caught a nasty bug that landed her in hospital with a chest infection for 4 days. She literally could not stop coughing; it was so bad it interferred with her appetite and sleep. I had to express milk while in the hospital and rush home at night to deliver it to my confinement aunty who would help me feed the baby. Thank God she was still around to help!

To compound our problems, the baby caught the bug from his sister. It was heartbreaking to see a one month old baby coughing relentlessly and puking each time the phlegm got stuck in his throat. Luckily my little trooper could still chug down full feeds, so even if some milk came out with his phlegm, he did not miss much.

The nightmare really started when, less than a week after Terelle recovered, she was down again with a bad flu. This time she had a fever so high she suffered from febrile fits. I had never witnessed a fit in my life and when it is happening to your own child, it is simply horrifying. I have read about febrile fits before and know that they are not dangerous, but still to watch your child having one is just terrible.

Terelle was having a high fever that day but she was still able to eat some cheese and bread with hubby watching her so i went to express milk in the room where the baby was confined in (to prevent him from catching the germs again) Hubby suddenly rushed in saying that something was wrong with Terelle. I scrambled out to find her with her eyes rolled upwards and puking all over hubby's shoulder. Her face was ghastly pale and her limbs were jerking wildly. Frantic, we rushed her under the shower and i quickly inserted a suppository. Hubby was so afraid we were losing her that he was crying.
Everything was so surreal and i vaguely remembered giving our details to the paramedics in the ambulance and packing a bag for hubby to take along to the hospital. The image of Terelle having a fit was so traumatic for me that i had nightmares about it for quite a long while afterwards.

Thankfully she was alright and didnt have to be warded, but it was hell nursing her back to health. Both hubby and i caught her germs too and at the height of our illness, all 3 of us were just lying around wishing we were dead. It was terrible having to nurse a sick kid AND take care of a newborn while being sick yourself. We had to monitor her fever round the clock and feed her medicine at 4hour intervals. If her fever spiked again, we panicked cos we couldnt risk another fit and worried ourselves sick till it came down again. Every single racking cough sent us into a frenzy and her incessant whining and pleading with us to make her feel better just broke our hearts.

To make matters worse, it was during this time that i had mastitis on top of the flu. When you're having chills and your whole body is aching from a high fever, and you have an excruciating lump in your breast the entire day, you really wish you were dead.

Thanks to all my friends who kept encouraging me by plying me with anecdotes about their similar experiences. It was these messages that kept me sane through those 10 horrible days. They were the ones who told me that things will only get better and that i should have faith.

However till today, i still blame myself for not having managed her fever better initially. If i had brought her fever down quickly by sponging her more, perhaps she wouldnt have suffered the fit. Never again for the rest of my life, do i want to witness a repeat of that awful scene of watching any of my kids having a fit while i am helpless to do anything about it.

On hindsight, i thank god for small mercies like the baby remaining healthy despite all of us being so sick. Things could have been worse, if he caught the bug too and had to be admitted. Thank god for hubby too, who slept with Terelle the whole time and patiently took her temperature and administered her medication without a single complaint, while being very sick himself. Hubby was at home for such a long time and was such a great help to me that when he finally went back to the office, i felt bereft for some time and wondered how i would be able to cope alone.

Its been 2 months since and things have really gotten better. Terelle has been healthy so far, though her lungs have suffered from those 2 nasty infections. Her doctor tells me that she has to be on medication to help her suppress another flare up of that wheezing episode. The medication makes her drowsy and cranky sometimes but i can live with that, as long as she doesnt fall so sick again.

And as for Thane, just when i thought i would never have unbroken sleep for the rest of my life, he started sleeping through the night without me having to do anything about it. And yes, there is a price to pay; he hardly sleeps in the day and i have to constantly carry him or he'll scream himself hoarse, but he gives me peace from 8pm till 7am the next morning...and that is more than i can ask for.

And breastfeeding is a breeze right now. Apart from my little sumo sometimes insisting that i carry AND nurse him at the same time; feeding him is like second nature to me now, even though im suffering from a chronic back ache from his weight. And i am secretly proud that i am that 1% of mothers in Singapore who totally breastfeed beyond 6mths. Ive done it with Terelle and im sure i can do it again with Thane.

Terelle was acting up and kept demanding our attention in the early days immediately following Thane's birth but now she is taking to her role as the big sister marvelously. She absolutely adores her baby brother and is fiercely protective over him. She sings to him and pats him when he cant sleep, tells him stories and makes funny faces to make him laugh and showers him with incessant hugs and kisses. And when passers-by tease her saying that they want to take her baby home, she yells at them to back off and stands over him protectively.

Things could have been worse with her being jealous of her brother but she is not in the least perturbed when i have to deal with him the whole day. So despite her tantrums and demands and generally being a terrible 3 tot (that will deserve another post), every night i thank god for my tough girl and pray in my heart of hearts that my kids will grow up to be real close emotionally.

I am keeping my fingers crossed that things will continue on the uptrend. And to all mummies who find that you are struggling with whatever problems plauging your kids right now, take heart...things WILL only get better.

Thane has landed

2007-12-10T00:57:00.000-08:00

I have done it again, had an epidural-less labor not by choice (again), but because my doctor is pro all things natural. So how did it go this time?

7th december

Still 2 weeks to the expected delivery date. Was feeling tired and achey all over after yet another sleepless night, and wondering when he will actually pop.

12noon: Terelle went off to school with Yiling and Kirsten

1230pm: Had a meeting at home with my editor, promised him to do some work during my confinement month. On hindsight now, i was really thinking too highly of myself. I didnt even have time to sleep, let alone write!!

2pm: Drove to Woodlands to meet hubby for lunch and wait for Terelle to finish school

3pm: Tucking into my burger and msg laden shaker fries and joking with friends over sms that i hope today would be the day cos its a nice date - 071207! Coincidently Terelle was born on 050405

330pm: Picked Terelle up and headed over to gynae's clinic for a checkup

430pm: Gynae did an internal exam and commented in all seriousness that i was already 2 cm dilated and that he had just hastened my labor by bruising my cervix and hence triggering contractions; adding, in the same breath that he didnt mean to do so. Ahhhhhh!!! Its time!!!??

5pm: Strapped to the ctg machine to monitor contractions, continued sms-ing friends

530pm: Back in waiting room where a first time mum seated next to me commented on my apparent "cool" demeanor, when i was about to deliver anytime. Hell, i was freaking out inside! BUT to keep my pride intact, i continued to smile through her praises.

545pm: Doctor took one look at the ctg readings and proclaimed that i would be delivering by midnite tonight. Whoa...sweaty palms, clammy forehead...i feel faint already...

630pm: Headed home to do some last minute packing and take a shower, doctor told us to check into the hospital by 8pm

7pm: Hubby leisurely made a bowl of noodles to eat and kept offering me some. (Note: 2nd time round, not at all flustered)
I had absolutely no appetite, all i could think of was that a watermelon would be bursting out of me in less than 5 hours time.

730pm: Contractions started, as with Terelle, i labored with my back, feeling like i was being sliced into two each time the contractions hit

8pm: Had a CLASSIC BIRTH MOMENT in the car and as usual it had to do with hubby. I was groaning in pain in the backseat and urging him to drive faster to the hospital. "Im in pain!!" i yelled. The good man just had to choose that exact moment to ask "Errr what kind of pain ah?" DUH!!

Pain means pain!!! U mean there are different kinds??!!

2 years ago, hubby had an equally classic birth moment. While i was in the throes of pain at the height of my labor with Terelle, i requested that he massage my back to relieve some of the pain. After 5minutes of frantic rubbing, he plaintively bleated that his hand was painful. Hello? reality check? Who is the one in more pain???

But i digress...

830pm: Finally made it to the hospital without me killing him along the way. Handed Terelle over to my parents and sister and hobbled into the delivery wards

9pm: All prepped and waiting for the pain to intensify. At this moment the nurse came in, took my temperature and commented that i was running a fever. Shucks! Must be because of Terelle's flu bug! Had to have a plug inserted into my vein and antibiotics pumped into me to protect the baby. Ouch...i hate the plug! Whenever you forget and accidentally brush your hand against something, it yanks at your vein, causing pain in yet another part of my body which i really dont need right now.

Nurse did an internal exam: 4cm dilated

930pm: Nurse checked again, still 4cm. Made a call to the doctor who arrived in a couple of minutes. Doctor tried to distract me by talking to me while he did an internal check again. I didnt realise he was actually breaking my waterbag! To my surprise, there was a loud pop sound after which the clear fluid flowed steadily out. Ashen faced from the pain i turned to hubby for comfort. He was equally ashen faced and blabbering "He inserted a hook inside...a HOOK!!"

okay...no comfort from there...

945pm: Contractions fast and furious now. Sucked on the gas like there was no tomorrow, all the while trying to remember nors' advice at the back of my pain muddled brain. (Thanks dear!) I held on so tightly to the gas mask that at one point i actually yanked it off the wall, and was wondering why the gas wasnt working as well as it should. Why the hell wasnt i drifting off into that out-of-body trance?

10pm: Nurse came and did another check, just 5cm dilated. What??! Things dont seem to be moving along fast enough. She offered a pethidine jab to relieve more of the pain so that i would be more relaxed and hence make labor progress faster. Yes yes whatever! Just gimme something for the pain!!

1020pm: High on the gas, with each contraction i was mumbling "no more no more, this is the last one", to the amusement of the nurse assisting me. Coincidently, she was the same one who helped while i was laboring with Terelle!

As the urge to push intensified, i heard the nurse start to page for good ol doc. She kept telling me not to push and that, i felt was worse than the actual contractions. Imagine the feeling of trying to hold in a huge bowel?? one word - DISTRESSING!

Within minutes my savior was here, strapping on his boots and rubber suit with a flourish. He cheerfully declared, "ok you can push now!" what sweet words to my ears!

In the most unglamorous position yet again; feet propped up in stirrups, spread wide apart, i remember looking at my toenails and thinking irrelevantly: my pedicure looks nice! Good thing i had it done just a week ago!

But then the pain sweeps over me again, the gas mask is yanked from my lifeless hands and i am urged by 3 disembodied voices to PUSH!

i bear down hard, nothing happens.

Deep breath, bear down again. Was that a distinct snip i heard down south? i dun want to think about it.

Push! Hard. Why is it taking so long? This is even harder than Terelle's birth!!

By the 4th or 5th push i hazily remember screaming to the doctor to "just suck the baby out of me pleeeeeeeease!!"

Doctor obliges by setting up the vacuum and one push later, my son emerges in a wet rush.

I am exhausted and lay back against the pillows and refuse to move another muscle even as my squirming, piping hot baby is laid on my chest. Vagely i remember the doctor exclaiming," Whoa this little guy is big! Much bigger than what we scanned at the clinic!"

Of cos he is big, i bet it is a war zone down south.

Thankfully doc proclaimed that because he made a small snip, the wound was clean and i would heal marvelously.

Only after the effects of the gas had worn off was i able to admire my son. My son! My chubby little bub! Coolly messaging friends and relatives to inform them of his arrival, i was oblivious while doc stitched me up. While most would cringe at the thought of a needle pricking at your most sensitive regions, let me reassure you that absolutely no pain can compare to the pain of a drug free (well almost) labor.

And while doc was at his gory task, another classic birth moment happened. A moment which i will forever regale my frens with. Doc suddenly sneezed straight at me while he was doing his stitching. If that wasnt horrifyingly icky enough, he actually used his sleeve (bloody, mind you) to wipe his nose!

Gosh, can u ever be that blase about childbirth??!!

Me and my chubby bubby! Finally!

From only child to big sister...

2007-12-02T03:56:00.000-08:00

My poor baby is trying to cope with the arrival of her new baby brother soon. She has been displaying bizzare behavior which sometimes leave us really frustrated and at our wits' end.

1) Attention seeking

And how does she do it? By being really naughty what else?

She spits out her milk while drinking halfway and laughs when we scold her.

She runs away and lies face down on the bed when it is time to brush her teeth.

She insists on calling the maid by name instead of "aunty" and smacks her when she tries to pick her up.

She refuses to go to bed, insisting on watching cartoon after cartoon.

She is simply defiant and refuses to obey our orders and will deliberately turn on the waterworks when she doesnt get her way.

And she used to be my sweet and obedient little girl....boohoo....

2) Nightmares

She woke up crying a couple of nights ago and saying "Mummy dont want me anymore!" That really broke my heart...and it is not as though i havent been trying to reassure her that i will still love her v v much even with the arrival of the new baby.

3) Behaviour in school

Her teachers tell me that she used to be very chatty and outspoken in class but recently she has become quiet and withdrawn. Sometimes she will be very affectionate with them too, as if she needs their reassurance that at least they will still be there for her.

She has been toilet trained since she was 2 yrs old, but lately she has been wetting and even soiling herself in school. Her teachers reassure me that this is normal and that she will get past this phase soon after she gets used to the baby. But her forlorn and guilty look as she clutches her soiled clothes yet again when i pick her up from school makes my heart go out to her and wish i could do something to help ease her through this trying period.

I get upset when i see her like this, perhaps the arrival of her sibling is really a huge emotional obstacle that she is finding hard to deal with right now. I want to see my little girl happy and bubbly and normal in school again...

4) Being clingy and needy

I havent been carrying her at all since around the 4th or 5th month of this pregnancy and recently i just carried her for a short while from the dining table to her bed. She clung on to me for dear life and said "Mummy dun let me go okie? I want Mummy to carry me like last time." To which i had to reply "Mummy cant carry you now because Mummy's tummy will be painful. Just be patient, in a short while Mummy's tummy will become flat then Mummy can carry u everyday just like before ok?" And my perceptive daughter could actually say "okie then Daddy will carry Baby Bone and Mummy carry me all right?"

Heartwrenching.....arrrrgh....let's hope things will soon go back to the way they were

My pregnant pauses

2007-11-27T02:57:00.000-08:00

Not everyone loves being pregnant. Those who say they do are either sadists or liars.
I for one, am one of those who absolutely ABHOR being pregnant. Period.
I am almost at the finishing line with my 2nd (and last!!) pregnancy and i must say i am glad my ordeal is almost over. Here are some of the irritations, ranging from minor discomforts to excruciating pain, that i had to deal with for the whole 18 months of both pregnancies.

1) Morning sickness

Whoever coined the term "morning sickness" is a liar. He probably meant well, in a bid to encourage pregnant mothers that they would only have to bear with being green in the morning. I would have preferred if they gave me the hard facts and named it "whole day sickness". Thankfully for my 1st pregnancy i didnt suffer much, only retching occasionally at strong smells and it abated on the dot right after the 3rd month.
However, with my current pregnancy, every single thing made me feel sick as a dog; food, any smell, toothpaste, even plain water!! And it lasted all day right till the 5mth month! It is no wonder that i gained a whopping 18kg for my first and only 10kg for my 2nd.

2) Cravings

My daughter made me crave for sweet desserts and chocolates, so much so that i developed gestational diabetes towards the end of my 1st pregnancy and had to go on a low carbo salad diet for the last few weeks. My son made me crave hot and spicy foods that gave me terrible heartburn and a sore throat and flu that lasted for a month. And now towards the end, i feel like eating chocs again. But each time i satisfied my craving, i would feel like throwing up.

What an irony! I had to have these foods but yet my body rejects them. Oh these wretched pregnancy hormones!

3) Quickening or movement of the fetus

Quickening is supposed to be this magical moment when you actually feel your baby move for the 1st time. Its supposed to make u contemplate the meaning of life and appreciate the special gift that you have been blessed with.
Ok fair enough...we were ecstatic when we felt Terelle move for the 1st time, though at that time as 1st time parents, we weren't sure if it was actually her moving or just a bout of gas moving around in my intestines. With Thane, the first time i felt him move, i informed hubby and he did the perfunctory "hand-on-my-tummy" action all the while being glued to his Sports channel. Sorry little fella, for being so blase about it all...it's the been there done that mentality...

And as the babies grow bigger and stronger, each kick, twist and roll would either leave me wincing or running to the toilet to pee. Of course, I was reassured that my babies were healthy and moving around but it was disconcerting (and not to mention painful!!) sometimes when a little foot or elbow would pop out along my belly, making me feel as though I was an extra on the set of "Aliens".

My daughter did her fair share of jamming her heels up my ribs but as for my son, he seems to derive great pleasure from actually first jamming his heels against my ribs and THEN dragging his feet across them as if playing on a xylophone. It is especialy NOT FUNNY when it happens in the middle of the night, just as I am trying to chase my elusive sleep after going to the toilet yet again.

4) Insomnia

Read: Constant jabbing of ribs = Pain

Kicking of bladder = Pee

Punching of intestines = Discomfort

Rolling on spine = Sharp back pain

Bumping of stomach = Regurgitation of gastric juice or some of the contents from dinner

Need i say more?

5) Mobility...or rather Immobility

Towards the end of the pregnancies (especially this one), i find myself waddling around like a duck. And woe betide me when my son changes position as i move around and chooses to press his head or hand or whatever against my pelvic bone. Sharp, stinging pain radiates from my pelvic region in both directions; up my back and down my legs. Fortunately my daughter did not torture me with this particular womb acrobatic.

And at night, i have to practically roll myself out of bed to get to the toilet cos its just not possible to rely on my stomach muscles anymore, especially when there is a 3kg weight pressing down on them. Even changing sides while sleeping involves actually clutching my tummy and heaving it over to the other side.

I am a sporty person by nature and i used to exercise religiously pre baby. And it upsets me greatly when all i can manage now is to shuffle slowly from Point A to Point B wincing in pain with each step, while i watch dear hubby go for his regular gym workouts and runs. Arrrgh...just give me another half a year, ill be running circles around you like before!! *wink*

6) Labour

And finally the 9months of torment culminates in the most traumatic event of all - Labour. Many friends who go on to have their 2nd, 3rd or even 4th kid tell me that after awhile "mummy amnesia" sets in and they seem to forget the pain of childbirth. Its been 2 years and 8 months since Terelle was born and i still remember every single jolt of white hot pain that raced through my entire body during the contractions. I remember hanging on to the laughing gas mask for dear life and taking huge gasps when the pain hit so that i could become deliriously high and seemingly "watch" myself suffering from a distance. It was so bad that i vagely remember the nurse yelling to hubby to pry it out of my hands so that i would not be too woozy to push!

Well, the countdown has begun and Thane can decide to pop anytime from now on. On one hand i am so looking forward to sweet relief but on the other hand i am dreading having to go through the pain again. Someone once told me not to think of labour as an ordeal to be suffered but rather something only I can do for my baby. Yeah right...ill try to remember those wise words when the baby elephant is splitting my body apart.

Terelle is a blessing and im sure Thane will be a bundle of joy to us as well, but i am definitely not going to be 1st in line to experience the "joy" of pregnancy a third time. I know of friends who have had memorable and happy experiences throughout their pregnancies but I am definitely not one of them. In fact i more or less hate how i feel from the start right till the end of both pregnancies.

I am thankful for my children and i am also thankful that i wont have to go through this again. Now to convince hubby to choose a surgical form of birth control... =)

Kids say the darndest things!

2007-11-07T08:20:00.000-08:00

Terelle was playing with puzzles alongside Hubby's dad when she suddenly decided to check out his massage chair nearby. Here is the conversation that left us in stitches!

T: YeYe i use your massage chair ok?
Hb's dad: Sure! Go ahead!
( Burrows deep into the recesses of the huge massage chair)
T: YeYe i do my massage 1st, you make the puzzles ok? All the best!!

All of us looked at her incredulously and burst out laughing at the same time!!

I really wonder where in the world did she pick up the phrase "all the best!" And to be able to use it in the right context too!!

"Why?"

2007-10-01T07:39:00.000-07:00

The whys have started..in full force!! And how do i deal with them??

T: Why are the trees green Mummy?
Me: Cos they have something called chlorophyll in them
T: Why??
Me: so they can make food.
T: Make food? Why?
Me: Cos all green plants make food so they can provide other animals with food
T: why??
Me: So the other animals can survive
T: Why???
Me: Cos our world is made up of many different animals
T: Many animals! Oh yah i like animals!
(Tip 1: Deliberately miss the point, it throws her off course!!)

T: Why does Yi Yi's face have so many pimples?
Me: Cos YiYi is heaty
T: Heaty? why?
Me: Cos she didnt drink enough water
T: Why?
Me: Cos she was busy and forgot to drink
T: Why?
Me: Cos she's got alot of work to do
T: Why?
Me: Cos her boss gave her alot of work
T: Why?
Me: Cos he's a slave driver
T: Oh ok
( Tip 2: Use big words! Words that i am pretty sure she has never encountered. She will accept them all the same!)

T: Mummy where's Daddy?
Me: Daddy's outside watching football
T: Why?
Me: Cos Daddy likes football
T: Why?
Me: Cos football is exciting
T: Why?
Me: Cos i dunno
T: Why?
Me: Cos i dunno
T: Ok...i dunno too!
(Tip 3: Just say i dunno!! Muahahaha....doesnt always work though...)

And sometimes, her whys leave us simply stumped for any form of rebuttal!!

T: Where are u going Daddy?
Hubby: To the toilet
T: Why?
HB: Cos i need to go to the toilet
T: (Following Daddy to the toilet) Why?
HB: Cos i need to do something
(proceeds to cut nose hair with scissors)
T: Why?
HB: Cos i need to do something!
(Hubby's not very imaginative with his answers)
T: Why are u cutting ur nose Daddy??
HB: ......

Starting school!

2007-09-14T06:59:00.000-07:00

Terelle is starting playgroup this week! We decided to start her in school earlier, cos we dont want her to think that we are sending her away when Thane arrives! And since he's not due for another 3 mths, it gives her ample time to settle in nicely! Another plus point is for me; as im not so bulky and uncomfortable now, i can help her ease into school life sooner too!

Here is an account of her 1st week:

Day 1
Her teachers let me accompany her to class this week so that she wouldnt feel too traumatised. It was heartwarming to see how her new little classmates reacted to her. One tried to help her with her bag and lunchbox, another held her hand up during roll call to indicate that she was present. They were a really pleasant bunch with good manners and fine behavior and i was glad i made the choice to send her to this school.

She let me sneak off downstairs to grab a bite for about an hour, but when i returned i found her in tears in her teacher's arms. She soon stopped when she saw me and i counted my lucky stars she didnt cry violently. She also refused to let her teacher take her to the toilet today so i had to bring her myself. No sweat! i expected all these on the very 1st day so all in all it went by quite ok.

Day 2

She started crying as soon as we reached school, insisted on going to the toilet even though she just went, cos it gave her an excuse to delay going into class. Today her teacher told me to try to leave the class if not she may get too comfortable with me around. Hard hearted me was more than willing to give it a go so i scuttled off outside. Soon i heard screams of "i want mummy!!!" emanating non stop from the class, and the teacher had no choice but to call me back in.

Once inside, she insisted that i sit with her in class and follow her everywhere for fear that i would disappear again. She participated in all the activities happily and there were brief moments when she forgot about my presence and totally focussed on enjoying herself. But as soon as she remembered about me, she would quickly scan the room to ascertain my presence and then scoot over and hang onto my pants tightly. When i encouraged her to join in, she would do so hesitantly and kept looking over her shoulder to see that i was watching her.

Her teacher got her to demonstrate threading to the rest of the class and complimented her on her fine motor skills as she could follow exactly everything she did. I was pretty chuffed as my gal was the youngest in class and yet she could do things some of the older kids couldnt! haha..but then again, im biased!

Terelle allowed her teacher to take her to the toilet at the end of the class, and even waved goodbye to me but commanding me to stay put and telling me that she will be back soon in the same breath.

Day 3
Tried her usual trick of wanting to go to the toilet to escape class again and started crying as soon as we approached the school. I was rather tired today so didnt have the energy to entertain her theatrics. Got a bit fed up when she clung on to me during the Kindermusik session and refused to participate in the songs and dances.

She insisted that i sit right beside her at all times in class today and by the end of the school day i was totally whacked. One good thing though, she has started to let her teacher take her to the toilet without me.

Day 4
1st lesson of the day was Positive Focus and i found the lesson really interesting! The teacher was engaging and lively as she got the kids to go through different yoga poses while emphasizing that they were healthy and strong. Terelle took to yoga pretty well, perhaps it was because i did baby yoga with her when she was a wee tot. She could even hold the downward dog pose without wavering as the teacher slid under her!

She let me go off again today and i went to grab some lunch. I returned close to the time when school was about to end to find her crying hysterically and all because my dad peeked in at her unannounced and she got reminded that she was alone. Arrrrgh! Its really tough when u know your parents mean well but yet they screw up your plans sometimes. Had to drag a screaming and crying kid home that day, who kept insisting she didnt want to go to school anymore....

Day 5
My dad turned up unannounced at my house again at 1145am, the time when im rushing to get Terelle ready while cramming the last morsels of her lunch into her mouth. She got really upset at this unexpected event of seeing her grandfather and was crying and looking for me when she ran smack into the wall and bumped her head hard. As a result, she cried even louder, vomitted all her lunch over herself and made a complete mess. By the time i changed her and got her ready again, we were running late. I was beside myself with fury as i speeded all the way to school with her. I hate disruptions just as much as her and my level of tolerance is way low, what with being pregnant and all.

To make matters worse, my dad slammed his hand in the car door as we were getting off and bled all over Terelle's school bag. I told him to stay put and let me have a good look at the wound after i settled her into class but he being the matyr, sneaked off while i was occupied. Arrrrgh! What a terrible day! I was furious at my dad for ruining the day and making Terelle upset, worried that she got a whopper of a bruise on her head through no fault of her own and yet i was guilty as hell for yelling at him and upset that he injured his hand for nothing. Why oh why did he have to make the long trip up to my place today and indirectly cause all these ructions?? And being pregnant just makes everything worse as im so ungainly and uncomfortable and every movement is a pain.

It was a relatively subdued little girl who greeted me when i collected her today. I wonder isit because she has finally accepted that she will be going to school everyday or because her head was still throbbing from the nasty bruise??

At 28 months...

2007-07-29T01:36:00.000-07:00

Terelle is already 28months old and soon will no longer fit the description of a toddler, but rather a child. Some updates on her development, mainly for myself to reminisce about when she is older!

At 28 months...

* She is 89cm tall and weighs 12kg

* Has been fully toilet trained since she was 2 years old. Only has to wear a diaper to bed at night and when she naps in the afternoon (cos she takes marathon naps of 3-3.5hrs!)

* Loves all kinds of fruits, i never have to force her to eat them. It is much more tricky with foods though. She dislikes vegetables (courtesy of her Daddy) and will spit them out if they are not finely chopped up and camouflaged with the rest of her meal. Loves chicken wings, noodles, cheese and steamed fish (thankfully!) Everything else has to be finely cut up before she can be conned into swallowing them!

* She can recognize all the alphabets but has yet learnt how to read. I have realised that she thrives on experiential learning and that making her sit down to learn her phonics is an almost impossible task. She has a short attention span and gets bored easily. She requires constant stimulation by varied sights and sounds and rote learning simply bores her to death. Sigh, i need some inspiration to come up with new and exciting word games to make her learn how to read!

* She can count from 1-10 in 3 languages: English, Mandarin and French. In the process of teaching her to continue up to 20. She gets it sometimes in English and Mandarin but French is still abit wonky.

* Finally able to recognize colors proficiently in English. Was starting to worry that perhaps she was color blind when all objects were pronounced to be "Red!"
However, now all objects are "Hong se!" (mandarin for red) But this time i wont worry that she wont get it in the end!

* Loves to sing in all 3 languages, and can even make up silly songs on her own, complete with her very own made up lyrics. Very hilarious when she starts singing the words "Mummy mummy go away!" to the tune of Twinkle Twinkle Little Stars, when I try to get her to eat just that few more mouthfuls of rice.
Favourite songs: All english songs basically, for mandarin she loves "Xiao Ya - Duckling song" and "Yi shan yi shan liang jing jing - Twinkle twinkle", French "Joyeux Anniversaire - Happy Birthday" and "Tete epaule genoux et pieds - Head shoulders Knees and Toes"

* Adept at answering "Who, What, Why, When, How?" questions. Her carefully thought out hilarious answers sometimes leaves us in stitches. My favourite past time is "chatting" with her about anything in particular. Sample conversation:

Me: Terelle who is at the door?
T: Scary uncle
Me: What is the scary uncle doing there?
T: Waiting to catch me
Me: Why does he want to catch you?
T: Because...because im naughty
Me: How did he get there?
T: By aeroplane
Me: When is he going to go home?
T: When he wants to sleep

* Tries her utmost to get out of having her hair washed every night. Every single night without fail, she will look at you with expectant, shining eyes and ask imploringly "No wash hair?" To which i will reply cheerfully "Must wash hair!" Now she kinda accepts her nightly fate with a resigned "Ok my hair is stinko..."

* Behavior wise, I am happy to say that she responds well to negotiating. I do not have to resort to hitting or caning her as i believe that that should always be the last resort. She will usually abide by my requests and listen to my commands. For example, when i tell her that it is not nice to snatch toys and that she must share them or else no one will play with her in the future, she will usually give up the toy obligingly. That having been said, all negotiations will cease when she is in a foul mood, especially when she is sleepy, and amidst much screaming and crying, the desired toy will still not be relinquished.

* She is well and truly Daddy's girl - she can get away with just about anything with her Daddy! Cos as soon as she turns on the waterworks and adopts the damsel in distress persona, Daddy melts and will accede to all (well 90% of) her requests. And she knows how to play her cards very well! Switching from a cool, well behaved child who is eating all her vegetables in my presence to a whiny "manja" queen as soon as im say, off to the toilet and she is left alone with her Daddy, who just cannot bear to shovel another spoonful of the offending greens into his snivelling, theatrical daughter's mouth!!

Well, well...With her around, our life just gets more and more interesting everyday!

The grandparent gain? I wish...

2007-07-03T08:23:00.000-07:00

Magazines always extoll the virtues of having a grandparent's influence in a child's life.

"Never underestimate the influence of grandparents as they are universally recognised as great companions who constantly shower their grandchildren with lots of love and special treats"

"Grandparents have a truckload of life experiences, and they can privide your child with a rich sense of family history"

"Your child will then have a better sense of who he is, and where he has come from. He will have roots, a history, and a sense of belonging, continuity and perspective"

Oh yes ive heard all of this and i do believe in the importance of my child being with her grandparents. And i do know that whenever she spends time with my parents, she is happy and contented because they do dote on her and indulge her shamelessly.

But why oh why is it so hard for them to be a constant feature in her life instead of being manipulated by the petty issues in their own lives, and leaving her constantly wondering where is one or the other when both were supposed to be meeting her?

Why oh why when i am stressed and overwhelmed by work and the world outside, they are not my listeners and advisors? Havent they "been there and done that" and have the hindsight to help put my issues into perspective? Instead, they carry on and on about their own inability to get along with each other and how they wish for the millionth time that each other never existed so that their misery will end. A depressing whirlpool that relentlessly sucks me in, leaving me drained of energy and feeling immensely guilty for coming into this world and "forcing" them to stay together for my sake while growing up.

Why oh why are my parents not mental and tangible support for me when i truly need them? All i need is a place for me to leave my daughter, without any fear or worries, whenever i need to go to work for a couple of hours. Even this is denied of me, and all because a dog takes priority in my old home. A cranky, mad, sick, old mutt who has refused to be tamed since the beginning of time but whom they refuse to get rid of because of "ethical reasons". Because of this mutt, i cannot bring my daugher home for fear that it will chew her up, gouge her eyes out and infect her with a virus. As a result, my daughter is robbed of precious time with her grandparents, time which could be spent more constructively and which, i am sure will be much treasured by her when she grows up and reminisces about her childhood.

The solution is simple: Send the dog to an animal shelter where it can live out the rest of its days, with visitation rights of course. But no, the dog takes priority over my daughter. It stays and she has to stay away. Case closed.

And yet, they carry on a constant tirade about not being able to see her often, and missing her, and being all depressed and upset because they havent had a chance to see her in a long time. Why oh why torture themselves when my girl can actually spend 3 entire afternoons a week with them? I really wonder if the presence of the dog provides more happiness than 3 whole afternoons a week with your own grandchild.

I am particularly miffed and upset now, all because of a phone call telling me that time was wasted roaming the streets of Singapore in a bid to get away from each other today. Time that Terelle could have spent buliding a bond with her grandparents. To me that is utter waste. Period. And it makes me absolutely sick and tired of this charade of martydom, and to what cause?? And how much more time is there left to be wasted??

I remember growing up at my Granny's house; her warm presence, her yummy meals, her cantonese rhymes and stories and just being there for me and with me. I also remember violently refusing to go home at the end of the week simply because Granny was home to me. Sadly, my daughter will never experience the intensity of these feelings, and all because her grandparents are too bitter with life, too caught up with feeling sorry for themselves and too full of pride to look beyond their grievances to let her into their lives.

I pray for my children's sake, that my husband and i will never become so embittered and resentful of each other. For it will be a painful, draining and depressing legacy to pass on and i would never ever want them to carry this burden, the way my sister and i are carrying it now.

All i need is a miracle right now.

Daddy's fat

2007-07-02T00:51:00.000-07:00

Hubby goes for an evening workout at the gym most evenings if he comes home early. Feeling curious about her potential answer, i asked Terelle why does Daddy need to go to the gym.

I wasnt all that surprised (but totally amused by her candidness) when she answered solemnly, "Because Daddy is fat."

Once again she throws a gem of an answer in our faces. Bravo...

Fish bone, baby Bone?

2007-06-29T00:40:00.000-07:00

I was feeding Terelle dinner the other night and i accidentally fed her a large fish bone together with the chunk of meat. Thank god she is a proficient spitter, her skills having been honed by countless spitting episodes of food that she does not fancy.

Out came the chunk of meat and bone and i was admonished with an exasperated look and the words " Mummy!! Baby no eat bone! Only dogs love to eat bones!!"

I should have been shocked, fearful, relieved...but i could only manage to laugh hysterically...Haha...

She has also taken to calling the new baby "Bone". I wonder isit because she heard the doctor say that he could see the baby's nasal bone while we were at my checkup.

We intend to name the baby Thane, so questions of "where is baby Thane?" nowadays, will be met with insistent yells of "Baby Bone!! Baby Bone!!"

Hubby loves to tease her by saying "Thane Thane Thane!" To which she will reply vehemently "BONE BONE BONE!!"

She can be doing her own thing; playing with her toys or reading her storybooks, but if she hears us surreptitiously mentioning Baby Thane, she will simply declare loudly "BONE!!" without even looking up from whatever she is doing.

I guess we will let her call her brother (?) whatever pet name she fancies...Guess we have to be thankful it is a cute pet name instead of something unmentionable. Imagine if she had heard the doctor saying "penis", now wouldnt that be a disaster???