Archive for the ‘Observations’ Category

Must pen these thoughts and observations down before my old and rusty memory fades.

Let’s start from the back of the pack.

Bradley finally turned himself sometime after he reached his 6 months mark. Now that he knows how to do that, it is more difficult to leave him alone in his cot. There was once when I left him and I could hear him fussing, but I chose to ignore him. When I checked on him 5mins later, poor fella was on his tummy and was clearly distressed as he didn’t know how to turn back! I felt so guilty for ignoring him. Now I make it a point to stay for a bit in his room in case he needs some “help”.

On solids-feeding, somehow he is not as keen as his brothers. Both Bryan and Brandon had happily opened their mouths when they see a spoon coming, right from the start. With Bradley, he will make a grab for the spoon and attempt to paint his face with a spoon-ful of cereal while an earnest mummy attempts to pry open his mouth with another spoon! Needless to say, feeding time is a messy affair!

Oh, have I ever mentioned that Bradley has the longest eye lashes? Not only are they long, they naturally curls up too! I think you can see it a little from this photo.

Little Brad was ill about 2 weeks ago – cough, runny nose & phlegm. He was running a slight temperature. Poor litle guy looked so lifeless and he didn’t smile nor kick his legs. Thankfully, he was back to his cheery lil’ self two days later.

Brandon, oh Brandon, what can I say?!!! He is definitely showing signs of turning “Terrible Two”. Unlike previously when he stuck to VT like a leech, he does that to me now! VT obviously ain’t too impressed and called him a “traitor”. I guess Brandon must be wanting more attention now as I’m either talking to Bryan or tending to Bradley. Brandon is still slow in the speech department hence adding on to his frustration. This boy knows what he wants and will go into full-blown Tamil drama-type of crying to get it. As he cries, he will say, “Mama, mama, mama……..” on-and-on-and-on. It’s quite cute, come to think of it!

Brandon immitates everything that Bryan does. If Bryan knocks his head and starts rubbing it, Brandon will do the same. When Bryan plays with Lego, he’ll want in too. If Bryan asks for milk, he’ll go “nen nen” relentlessly until you give a bottle to him, only for him to return it to you 2 seconds later with a “no no”. *slaps forehead*

Here they are, sitting at the newly-purchased Ikea table and chair, for dinner. Now that Bryan sits at the table for his meals, Brandon has abandoned the high-chair and insists on sitting there as well. (Note: see one more chair, behind Brandon? That’s for Bradley in the near future hehe)

His favourite things at the moment are cod liver oil, Vitamin C chewies, ice-cold water and washing his hands. Whenever I need to take leave to do other things, one of these will do the trick in distracting him.

Conversations with Bryan are getting more amusing by the day – I cannot remember the specifics now. **Mental note to self: must joy them down as soon as I hear them**. He has also picked up “May I…..?” from school as I usually use, “Can I………..” at home. It’s very sweet to hear him ask, “May I have a bedtime story please?” and obviously, he ALWAYS get one.

Bryan is the sort who enjoys not just a routine, but a ritual. Example: in preparation for bed, he must first have his customary bottle of milk in bed, followed by teeth-brushing, hands-washing, changing into PJs, bedtime story, a quick hide-and-seek in bed and a game called “Finding Things”, which involves him burying his head in the pillow and then declaring the things he has found. Usually, food iteams which he pretends to eat. Finally, the night light will be turned off. Do any one of these in the wrong order and you are dead! I suspect a career in a factory production line may suit him very well

For the past two weekends, I have been focussing on the boys 100%. No shopping malls, no trips to my parents’ – just at home chilling. I’d invented a few new indoor games using kitchen utensils (oh, Bryan loves to play pretend-cooking too, to VT’s dismay), we had indoor picnic and splashed around the pool in the porch. It was terribly exhausting so I don’t envisage that I can be a SAHM, but at the same time, extremely fulfilling. To be able to watch them play and learn every step of the way. Never mind the fact that I had to pour myself some Bacardi Limon on Saturday night LOL. But with 3 boys, I am pretty sure I’m going to miss them terribly once they are all grown and don’t want to be seen with their frumpy mother anymore. Hence in the meantime, I am maximising every opportunity I have to molly-cuddle them! MUAKS to all 3 of mummy’s boys!!!!

I am backlogged in EVERYTHING:

- posting of Bryan’s 3 1/2 years old milestone

- household stuff eg supposed to have had people come to fix 3 leaky taps, service 3 aircons and clean 2 mattresses BEFORE CNY

- kids stuff eg supposed to have had created a little children’s nook in the living area by using Ikea solutions BEFORE CNY

- own stuff eg supposed to have had downloaded and sorted photos from our weekend away (yes, VT & I managed to squeeze in a weekend trip somewhere without the kids!), photos from CNY, sorted out my maternity clothes (they are still hung up in my wardrobe ha ha)

- parents’ stuff eg supposed to have had drop the cheque for maintenance fee for my folks’ house about 2 months ago

- car stuff eg supposed to have had brought the car in for servicing

NONE of the above was accomplished. Bogged down with work (new big boss!), day-to-day going ons with the kids & family, and with CNY. I have not been leaving comments at your blog but I’ve been trying to read them via the Google Reader, so please excuse me ok!

Never theless, it’s still not too late to wish everyone, “KONG HEI FATT CHOY!!”. May this Year of the Tiger bring you & your family health, wealth and happiness.

I get questions from many people about how I manage being a FTWM with 3 boys whose ages are close together. I dont’ have an answer. I suppose I don’t “manage”, I just get on with doing whatever that needs to be done. I think that’s what every parent do as well, regardless of the number of children. But what keeps me sane? That is quite a different story.

To start with, I don’t bother comparing my kids against other people eg. at what age they can read or write or speak, whether they attend Gymboree or Shichida. I wasn’t at least perturbed that Bryan couldn’t utter a word before he was 2 (of course, when he started, it was a point of no-return!) or that he cannot recognise his own name now. I am not discouraged by the fact that at 18mths, Brandon clings to me and throws tantrums ALL the time. He is afterall, learning how to express himself without having the vocabulary to do so. And then, Bradley is over 4 months and can’t flip either way because he is either strapped to the bouncer or confined on his bed, alone. I’d rather him flip later than to be trampled by his two kor kors!

When it comes to meal times which can be quite stressful periods, I have a simple philosophy – Let the child lead you. If he is hungry enough, he will eat anything. Because of that, if either Bryan or Brandon shuns their meal, it is perfectly fine with me. The only rule is that there is no snacking if they have not had their proper meal. Very soon after, they will realise that they ARE hungry and wolf down the blandest porridge as if it was the tastiest thing on Earth.

Then again, I am not one with the tidak-apa attitude. I do worry about my kids especially about their safety. As such, I almost never compromise when it comes being buckled in the car seat or running around/playing with sharp objects. They must also be polite and I’m beginning to teach them to be appreciative of what they have. Very soon, I foresee myself educating them about earning what they want.

I also do worry about their health especially after the recent spat of fever/cough/runny nose that were travelling amongst my 3 musketeers. I ensure that every meal is balanced as much as possible during the weekdays while on weekends, I let loose and also indulgences in fast food, icre-cream (great source of calcium) and chocolates (release endomorphins – the “happy” hormones”).

In conclusion, if I worry I make sure that I worry where and when it matters. Otherwise I would say to you, in a true Malaysian manner, “Relak-lah!”. Have a happy weekend!

I have 2 main group of friends. The first group are my colleagues whom I’m really close to. Most of them are mothers. They hand over most of the baby-related chores to their maids and/or nannies. They have time to put on make-up for work everyday and pain-stakingly pair their work clothes with accessories. For me, I’m always rushing to get out of the door on time hence I don’t wear ANY make-up (nope, not even lipstick – afterall, my job involves me sitting in front of the PC the whole day, staring at spreadsheets to no end) and the only accessories I wear are my wedding band and my precious “rock”, which I promptly remove when I get home less the “rock” scratches the kiddos. And then the look good because they go to the gym regularly after work while I rush home to take over the kiddos from my MIL. Yesterday evening, I went for a run around KLCC park and got back past 8pm. I was greeted with a, “You should wake up at 6am if you want to exercise” remark. Ok, I get the hint. Oh, did I also mention that this group owns houses ranging from RM1.5-RM3 million? Don’t get me wrong, this group of friends are extremely dear to me and probably the only reason why I stay sane at work.

The second group of friends are the mummy bloggers – yes, YOU! They are either SAHM or FTWM. They whip up fanstastic meals (as seen from the gorgeous photos posted on their blogs), sometimes throwing in bento-styled meals for their children, clean and re-organise the house, take their children to the park/zoo/malls/holidays, attend blogger gatherings, entertain the children with home-made activities, and still have enough time & energy to blog AND earn money from it. My first group of friends pale in comparison to the second group. Really. You guys are my hero.

Most breastfeeding mums will scoff upon looking at the photo and reading this post since this is nothing to them, but I am personally proud of my achievement.

 
In my freezer sits more than 20 bottles of frozen EBM, each filled with 4ozs. Never before in my life have I had so much EBM. Looking at it, now I know how some mothers get a little too obsessed about stocking up EBM for WW3 because somehow, it brings some amount of pleasure, satisfaction and smugness! But the EBM will run out soon as my milk factory is packing up soon for various reasons. I don’t feel too bad about stopping although I do feel that it’s a shame to stop but it’s a personal choice.

On a related topic, I’d finally concluded that the spat of migraines I’ve been having in the mornings were due to – COFFEE!! Yes, my favourite drink – something which I continued to gulp down during all my pregnancies! It is possible that my body is reacting to the caffeine having stayed off it for one month during confinement. Will I stop? I doubt it. Like alcohol, the more you drink, the better your body will adapt to it

P/S: Coffee may also explain why Bradley was up from 2am to 6:30am this morning!!

It started pouring cats and dogs at 5pm yesterday evening. By 6:30pm, I was ready to call it a day and prepared myself to brace standstill traffic for the next hour or two.

6:40pm – Leave office

6:50pm – In front of Westin hotel; hear on radio that SMART tunnel is closed to outbound traffic; no choice but to use Jalan Sultan Ismail

7:05pm – Stuck in front Regent Hotel on Jalan Bukit Bintang; yes, I’d moved about 20m in 15mins

7:20pm – Stuck in front of HSBC on Jalan Sultan Ismail; another 15mins for the next 20m

7:30pm – Back to square one: Stuck in front of Menara Standard Chartered; hear on radio that SMART tunnel is re-opened to traffic; made an illegal right turn (*bad girl*) onto Jalan Raja Chulan to head towards the Imbi entrance of the tunnel

7:45pm – Reached Eastin Hotel PJ; stuck in a crawl towards TTDI

8:05pm –  Home

The 1+ hours  being stuck in the car, alone, with the radio for company, I had a lot of time to reflect. It was extremely frustrating to be stuck in a jam when you are already so washed out from spending 9 hours at work. Looking beyond, I see many people by the sidewalk – holding umbrellas and waiting for their buses (which will most likely be late due to traffic) to arrive. And there I was, in the comfort of my car – aircon and music, protected from the rain.

Yes, I have another reason to be grateful.

I’m back from Japan! But sorry, no time to blog about the trip nor the family weekend trip to Singapore 2 weeks before. The title of this post says it all. I just want to capture a few personal thoughts and observations:

- Singapore is a great place to live and potentially a good place to bring the kids up

- Japanese people are, in my opinion, the most polite people in the world

- Tokyo is the cleanest developed city I’ve ever visited

- I’d missed the boys tremendously during the trip; even cried on the way to the airport!

- Never bring Bryan for a wedding function till he is older

- I missed my nasi lemaks and char kuay teows – yes, even for a week

Details of how I’d arrived at my observations to come soon!

I’d just returned from a scheduled visit to the ob-gyn – every 7-10 days now. Today’s visit was a particularly interesting one. My appointment was scheduled for 3pm but the ob-gyn was no where to be found when I arrived. His receptionist told me that he was called away for an emergency C-section. What to do? Wait lor…I’d noticed that there was only one lady ahead of me, ok so that wasn’t too bad. So I’d waited, and waited and waited.

The first hour and I was through reading all the magazines there were in his clinic. I popped out to buy The Star since I didn’t get a chance to read it yet. That kept me entertained for the next 45mins. The lady who was ahead of me was obviously not the reading sort as all this time, she was either talking to her husband or staring into space. Then there were 2 other ladies who had a girl (probably around 3yrs) and a boy (2yrs because I’d asked). They started playing with each other because they were obviously bored with the waiting. The more they played, the louder they got and then they started chasing each other. I watched with amusement as it reminded me of Bryan (and how thankful that I didn’t bring him along, else situation even more jia lat). Anyway, the kids then started playing near Lady #1 and suddenly, her husband pushed them away and said, “Stay away from her”. Lady #1 chirped in, “What’s wrong with you, children?” and gave them a glare.

GEEZ!! What’s wrong with them? Being expectant parents, I would have thought that they would have learnt that tolerance is the ONE virtue that need to be had. Plus you can’t really blame the kids for entertaining themselves. Sure, they were screaming in excitement at one point, but give them a break – they are only kids. Luckily, they are not my kids else this couple would have kena kau-kau from me.

Seriously, would you have responded that way?

P/S: By the way, I finally saw my ob-gyn after waiting for close to 2 hours, and all for a 2min visit. All is well with my Baby #2. Approx weight 2.8kg now, which was Bryan’s birth weight.

I did a fair bit of driving around the PJ area today – running errands and doing my own stuff. What really caught my attention was the number of “EYES” there were on the road. Usually in groups no more than 4 persons, to catch errant drivers (jumped the light, talking on the mobile phone without a handsfree kit, not buckling up). Then it loomed on me that CNY is close! Ah, every year is the same. So watch out folks!