Ok, here she is:

What is she up to now?

• Crawling lots, cruising lots, able to stand up on her own for a couple of seconds
• Clinging on to Mama every opportunity she gets
• Screaming when someone takes anything away from her
• Loves playing with her kor kors’ toys
• Saying “nen nen”, “Mama” and “mum-mum”, and other incomprehensible words. Chatty girl, she is.
• Pointing at things with her forefinger
• Self-feeding snacks
• Co-sleeping with me (yikes!)

I’m looking forward to her reaching the 1yr mark next month!

Where do I even start? If you’re wondering if I have abandoned my blog, the answer is NO. If you’re wondering if I’m busy, then the answer is a definite YES YES YES.

Just wanted to jot down a couple of milestones here.

Kayley started solids at 6 months to the dot. Started with baby rice cereal and now on pork, chicken and beef with a huge variety of fruits and vegetables. Still intolerant to fish (loose stools) so shall wait another month or two before trying again. She loves Cherios and makes helluva noise when she sees something eating. She sits un-supported from 7 months and started crawling and pulling herself up to a standing position (supported by holding on to a piece of furniture) at 8+months. Still no tooth in sight, which is not surprising because none of her siblings had any tooth before 1 year old.

Bradley has developed the need to speak VERY LOUDLY in his super high-pitched voice. I suppose he is trying to get as much attention as he possibly can. Of late, he is quite a carnivour. Eats any cooked meat in sight. Yet he remains the smallest of the lot.

Brandon remains the life of the party. He is picking up Mandarin in kindy so it’s really cute to hear him try to speak Mandarin with Bryan.

Bryan is putting on a lot of weight from eating 5 meals a day, mainly from buying stuff from teh school canteen before, during and after school. But he is enjoying school so that is important. Trying to make him more physically active during the weekends.

All 3 kor kors still adore their little sister to bits. I will say it again – TO BITS! They can be fighting each other violently but the moment they see Kayley, all 3 will turn very soft and gentle.Very very sweet.

Sorry, still no photos. No time to download and sort them out. Sorting out photos is currently at priority #173.

I need to jot these down less I forget. Memory is going to shreds….blame it on aging in addition to the need to think of/remember 20 million other things.

• The 3 boys have started sleeping on their own in our new abode. Finally, I can tell a story, turn off the lights and retreat to my own bed to do some work or light reading before retiring. And also no more kung-fu kicks in the head/face/stomach/back in the middle of the night from a “helicopter-ing” toddler.
• Kayley is now in her own room and still happy in the cot the whole night. Let’s see how long that lasts……..
• Before I leave the boys’ room, I always have this conversation with Brandon. Only him. Don’t know how it started. He will say exactly the same thing in the same sequence every night, and I have to give the exact responses.

Brandon: Good night, mummy

Me: Good night, Brandon

Brandon: Sweet dreams

Me: Sweet dreams

Brandon: I love you

Mummy: I love you too

• Bryan has found a new sense of independence and freedom from having money to buy food from the school canteen. It seems like his highlight of going to school. RM1 seemed like a small price to pay to get him to enjoy school.
• Bryan requested to go for extra-curricular activities offered by his school – Robotics and basketball. Of course we obliged even though it meant a lot of ferrying around on Saturdays. As it is, he already has swimming at 8-in-the-freaking-morning on a Sunday!
• Kayley loves my accessories – she can fiddle with them for half a day, under my watchful eye obviously. What can I say? She’s a girl!
• Bradley is loving nursery. But each time I ask him what he did in school, it would be “nothing!”. That’s a heck a lot of money I’m paying to do “nothing”!
• Brandon remains an angel in school and gets many positive comments from teachers and other parents alike. Typical Mr Hyde and Dr Jekyl, this boy of mine.

These little things keep me going every day. Ain’t being a parent great?

Like any other anxious parents, I took 2 days off work to watch over Bryan the first 2 schooling days of the year. In hindsight, it was unnecessary because Bryan fitted in well and seemed comfortable. However, I still wanted to be there to ensure that everything went well. I was definitely more anxious than Bryan was! Afterall, the school compound is massive and there are many Std 1 classes. Good thing I’d made friends with fellow parents and we share our concerns and questions.

Bryan, we just want you to know that you did us very proud by the way you handle yourself in a new and strange environment. You did not even have friends from your kindy in your class yet you are confident and compossed. You are truly a big brother who is showing a great example to your younger siblings. Well done, Bryan! We pray that you will enjoy schooling and take all the challenges that come with it. It is the journey that matters, not the destination – remember that.

Ok, so I’m really bad at updating this blog. I’m up to my neck over here – I’d moved home and moved office, and moved role over the past 1.5 months. No time to think, just do and do and do. Getting so disorganised, hence new year resolution would be to sleep less and organise more!

Bryan’s bottom 2 tooth dropped off and revealed 2 adult teeth in their places, and I didn’t even realise! We didn’t go through the whole fairy tooth thingy – why? No time! It happened when we were smack in the middle of house-moving. Then there was his Standard 1 orientation day on 28th Dec. I’m happy I made a couple of new friends, who are mummies with kids in Bryan’s class.

Brandon is on an ice-cream binge, no thanks to FIL who has been stocking their fridge with Cornettos. Got to control this boy as he already weights 29kg when he’s only 4.5 years old. Luckily he has his father’s height.

Bradley is still the baby of the family, refusing to walk at times and still cries and whines a lot. Did I say a lot? I will say it again – A LOT! But he has the most innocent and angelic face so cannot stay angry at him for long. He is more independent now so thumbs up, Bradley.

Kayley is the diva of the family. Very stingy with her smiles and totally despises new faces. Don’t feel offended when she sees you and cries LOUDLY. She does this to anyone who doesn’t live in my house or my inlaws, where she goes to every weekday, including my poor parents who are dying to carry her. She would have none of that. Kayley has started eating rice cereal and is quite lukewarm about solid-eating.

This school holidays have been uneventful for the kids as we did not go on any holidays. As mentioned, we’d just moved home and I’ve got a new role at work so it has been nothing short of a rollercoaster ride for all of us, physically and emotionally. VT has also been so tied up with work with some major changes coming on as well.

HOWEVER, I am confident that things will settle down and we will get back into our routines quickly enough. And more importantly, we are sitting in this rollercoaster ride together, AS A FAMILY. Nothing is more important, wouldn’t you agree?

So with this quick post/update, I am signing out for the year with only the happiest wishes for you and your family in the coming new year!!!

I totally believe in having consistent bedtime rituals. This is probably one of the few straight-out-of-textbook parenting techniques that I am convinced on. The rituals not only calms the children down prior to nitey-night, but also allows me to lie down first while they go about preparing themselves (yay to independence!).

For the boys, this is the ritual:

(1) Pees

(2) Brushes teeth

(3) Washes hands

(4) Wears own diaper (for Brandon & Bradley)

(5) Once everyone is in bed, I will countdown from five to one, followed by “Lights off!”

(6) Short story-telling by me. The topic will be decided by one of the boys and they take turns to decide.

(7) I will say, “Good night Bryan, Good night Brandon, Good night Bradley; Sweet dreams; Mummy loves you”. They will respond with the same.

And we are all off to dreamland….usually me first!

As for Kayley, it is still really easy for now and it’s done by VT while I put the boys to bed. Kayley is fed a full bottle of milk (4ozs), burped and tucked into covers. Lights are switched off and VT goes downstairs to watch soccer! She will then fall asleep on her own in the next 10-15 minutes.

My next step is to actually get the kids to sleep on their own without me, which means that I can leave the room after Step 7.

Do you have a bedtime ritual with your kids?

Where do I even start?

Now I understand why other mums of 4 do not update their blogs, simply because there is NO TIME! Activities that occupy my time and are of priority to updating this blog:

(1) Work – duh!

(2) Sleep – much as I like to cut back on the number of hours, I become a really grumpy mum if I do so.

(3) Cooking on weekends

(4) Playing and bonding with kids

(5) Exercise

And of course, I spend at least 2-3 hours on the road daily on weekdays, battling peak hour traffic. Cest le vie.

Between my last update and this, so much has happened. Of course there was a 3-day girly break to the land of “Tiger Shows” (actually, I’ve been told it is actually “Thai girls shows” but often mentioned otherwise if you said it quick enough), which was really a blast. And true to my style, I had managed to drag the girls to yet another hidden gem for the celebratory birthday dinner.

There are more challenges ahead next year, but as a friend often says – Baby Steps.

Anyway, I will try my utter best to update the recent milestones this weekend, complete with photos – woo hoo! Watch out for them.

I am selling my trusted and reliable Spectra 2 Breast Pump, which I’ve had with me since Brandon’s birth. This means the pump is 4 years old. It’s a hospital-grade pump, can be used for single or dual pump, and most importantly, it is QUIET. Sorry I don’t have a photo of it because I’m too busy to take one. If you google it, perhaps you can have a look. It isn’t particularly attractive nor handy to bring around due to its size, but it is the most effective pump I’ve ever used (I’ve owned both Avents and Madela previously). In addition, it is easy to assemble and also to wash – very few parts involved.

Recently, I’d even changed the tubing (worth RM15) and both the membranes (worth RM18). The pump was retailing for RM399. I’m going to let it go for RM200 and will also throw in these freebies:

- 6 Spectra breastmilk storage bottles (worth about RM60)

- at least 4 Avent breastmilk storage bottles (worth about RM120)

- a pair of adaptors (Avent brand) so that the pump fits both narrow and wide neck bottles (worth about RM80) 

- a cool insulated bag which can be used to transport the pump and breast milk (worth about RM60)

That’s RM320 worth of freebies!!

Kayley is 3 months old today. And mummy is horrible in putting updates about her. What can I say but it’s a tough job being a full-time working mum to 4 kids! Any available time is spent on sorting out household issues and finances.

Our little princess is still on a milk-play-crap-sleep schedule though not necessarily in those order. Some days, she drinks/ plays/ craps/ sleeps a little more than the usual but overall, she IS a good baby. At this age, she is occupying herself by checking out her fists – be it tasting them or opening/closing. It’s really cute to observe her even though she is our forth child. You would have thought it gets boring by now, by hell no, it amazes us each and every time. We thoroughly enjoy having her around.

Or so maybe not quite as much at three in the morning. We pretty much went through the first 3 months being her slave at night. Kayley would sleep the whole day away and as a result, be wide awake at night, until last weekend when I have had it. Even though it’s not I, but VT (bless my husband!!) who does the night shifts, I thought it was ridiculous to have a baby working off New York time. So I’d consciously woke her up every 2-3 hours by opening her diaper. Never fails to rouse her. After just 2 days of doing that, her internal body clock realised that she’s in Malaysia and bam, she was sleeping through from 6pm to 7am, with one feed at midnight. Gosh, I should have done that earlier and saved VT the grief! Of course some parties felt that I was cruel to wake her up during the day but heck, they were not the ones entertaining her at night. Again, it is not for my own sake but for my dear husband whom I happen to love VERY MUCH.

During our last visit to the paed about 2 weeks back, Kayley’s weight has doubled to 5.2kg from her birth weight. She is having 4ozs every 3 hours, but at times would be hungrier/less hungry. Her kor kors love her to bits, especially Brandon, although Bradley is can be clingy sometimes. She is indeed a diva, but more importantly, she is OUR diva.

Yes, another birthday/milestone post. If you haven’t realised already, all my kids are born between June to September – 1 in each month. Lots of parties and cake-eating over these 4 months. Not to mention, lots of fun too!

But I digress.

Bradley turned three on 2 September. He really is still a baby in my eyes. Everyone calls him “baby” including Bryan and Brandon but we are trying to move away from it since he is technically no longer the baby of the family and really, he’s 3 years old and I don’t want the nickname to stick as he grows up. Can you imagine just how embarassed he would be in 5 to 10 years time??!

Whilst he is the smallest-sized amongst the three boys (not the biggest fan of milk), he possibly has the largest and most variant personality. He is essentially Bryan and Brandon in one package. He is sweet and thoughtful (like Bryan) and yet playful and cheeky (like Brandon). Bradley also talks a mile more than any of his brothers did at the same age, thanks to influence from his older siblings. He won’t speak jibberish or nonsense, but very “adult-like” comments in sentences. It still amazes me today.

Up till now, he is still extremely attached to me. Ironically, when he was much younger, he wouldn’t give two hoots about me. Whenever I came home, I would call out to him but he never responds. But when VT walks throught the door, he will shout out to his papa and run to him. I reckon he got attached to me when VT went to Abu Dhabi for work for a period of 9 months last year. As a result, he clings to me like bee is to honey. Bradley can put on the most “manja” expression and you would not be able to resist but give in. Yeah, sucker!

Bradley, with his sweetest smile

Anyway, we had a family gathering at a japanese buffet restaurant and he got the Hi-5 cake that he asked for – home-baked and decorated by yours truly of course (which reminds me, we are going for the Hi-5 live show this weekend. Anyone going??). It was simple celebration but truly the most meaningful as everyone had a good time.

Happy birthday, Bradley. You will always be mummy’s baby. We all love you very much.