roam regatta

the big brother is watching

2012-01-25T22:13:00.003+08:00

dearest mei mei,

today, you finally said those words "kor -- kor" (big brother)

your big brother is so proud of you!

xo,
momma

p.s. papa was wondering when his turn will come.

p.p.s it started with mama, mumm mumm (to eat), nenek (grandma), and now kor-kor!

Alexandra is 9 months and 3 days old.
Christian is 2 years, 10 months and 6 days old.

christian's first day of school - Jan 9, 2012

2012-01-12T17:36:00.003+08:00

i'm exhausted... for now, pictures will suffice...

we heart taipei

2012-01-03T13:25:00.007+08:00

eric and i had never planned it. we never said, "we should travel". it just happens. we both think it's important to get out. we both like it, regardless of its inconvenience. and even with kids, we don't really think too much about it. in fact, i don't think we thought of travelling with kids as a "hassle" - we just change our expectations a little. we were never one of those who have to see all the sights in one visit. lasseiz-faire describes our attitude and approach aptly. we like to just "live" in the city we are visiting. so when our friends asked us what we did in our trips, our answers, almost always, sounded mundane.

i think it's becoming a ritual - at the end of the year, we crave cold weather. what we can't get, we travel by plane to. so, we bundled our brood and off we went to taipei, taiwan. we stayed at this fantabulous hotel - far eastern hotel - and received 5-star treatment. all this, despite the fact that guests came and went in haute fashion, while eric and i were pushing the stroller laden with takeouts from a nearby foodcourt, clad in our H&M/Forever21/Gap/no-brand outfits.

the kids were like celebrities in taipei. people stopped to say "hi" to them. Once, someone even asked to take a picture and posed next to Alex. “好可爱哦!" (so cute!) we hear this a lot and my heart will swell up like a helium balloon with no strings unattached. yeah, we got a lot of love from the very pleasant taiwanese. civility rules the day and we just love the city.

as for the cold weather - it was superb. but heck, we forgot what a hassle it is to dress up to go out. just dressing the kids in layers took us one hour to get ready. yep, i've said it. hassle.

she loved her mini-spa. because....

there was a tv next to her bathtub!

"don't mess with me" at eslite bookshop near taipei 101

at ximending... street food= potato croquettes

thrilled to be so near a whatisthis?digger?crane?

all bundled up with mommy = excited bebe

a rare family shot

someone's obsessed with mommy

to eric, Harlem Yu is probably the most famous taiwanese.

loving his mcqueen sweater

Merry and Happy

2011-12-27T17:23:00.003+08:00

a little late...
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, folks!

Christian is 2 years, 9 months old
Alexandra is 8 months and 5 days old

the past

2011-12-22T13:10:00.002+08:00

met up with Lifen - I haven't seen her since Christian was born. It was good to see her - we've known each other since high school but had "spottily" caught up with each other over the years. when i had to move away to go to grad school, i had lost touch with most of my friends. it's sort of like the "meant-to-be" thing - those people that are mere aquaintances just dropped out of your circle, or you of theirs. and there were friendships that just didn't make it. in some ways, people do change and evolve so the preferences are not as aligned anymore. but with Lifen, there was always something to talk about. these early friendships (we were 13 when we met) are like signposts of who you are deep in your core. they just last.

i was really glad that she looked radiant and seemed to be doing well. i had been concerned for her. i brought alex with me since Lifen's not seen her before. and then she asked the all important question: do you want another baby?

i do. i love babies. i love that i could produce babies who are so cute (which baby isn't cute, by the way?) i love being pregnant. but i seriously doubt i could hold down a job and have another kid. the marginal cost is catching up with the marginal benefit. i hate to think about it in such mercenery terms that's so close to being "crass", but i know deep down i do have a ledger and i'm slowly ascending the hill of happiness and if i'm not careful, i might start on the descending route (in short, my objective function is concave).

how do people come up with the right number of kids? for us, it's between 2 or 3. 4 is a stretch. i grew up in a family where emotions were tumultous and when there was a peaceful day, i wondered when the next storm would start up. there were 4 kids and i found comfort in that number. i felt safer because there were 4 of us. but i also wondered, and sometimes still do, if the 4 kids contributed in any way to the acceleration of the breakdown of my parent's marriage.

the past does color the future. the past does affect how i view as important in building a strong marriage and a family. could i finish internalizing everyone's hill of happiness? well, eric could figure out his own quite well (he always has a strong sense of what he wants), but alex's and christian's? and, mine?

a secret

2011-12-07T00:21:00.004+08:00

going through our cold weather clothes today.

actually i only picked through the kids' clothes. i'm so flabby that i hate to dig through my old clothes.

thanks to my sweet friend Marnie, Alex has tons of clothes to choose from. hoodies, leggings, you name it, her daughter Nadine wears through the seasons (!)

alas, with Christian, zilch. He has this long-sleeved top that I bought from Espirit a year ago. I bought a size larger back then, but he grew so much (height-wise, that little imp melts all his fat away instantaneously) and the sleeves were a tad too short. And I dug out three very sad-looking dungarees (Editor: overalls). Eric didn't like them. Said one of them (it was from gap, mind you) looked girlish????!!! i think he has a thing or two against dungarees. so does Christian - every since he was a baby he hated them.

i guess, i'm writing a blog post to justify a shopping trip. i've been dying to go to H&M. i'm planning all this, laced with the slightest tinge of guilt. i'm supposed to be working hard tomorrow.

eric doesn't know my intentions yet.

he will, once he reads this. ha(!)

about a boy

2011-12-06T20:25:00.005+08:00

dunno when he started doing this, probably a month ago.

he started with

"one, two, three, four, two, three, seven, ten!!!!"

but now, he goes

"okay, let's count."
"one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten!"

ten always gets an exclamation mark and a lilt.

and he can recognize the numbers (thanks to Thomas & friends... "thomas is number one, gordon is number 4, percy is number 6, toby is number 7" <-- i only know 4 of them, he knows them ALL.

i'm full of pride. he really counts - frogs, little people in books, cars and airplanes, trains, clouds, fish, apples.

teaching him lower case letters now. dang, must "b" look so much like "d" and "p" so much like "q"?

oh, he's learning to spell now. favorite word? "p-i-e, pie"

we don't eat pie (that much)

Alexandra is 7 months and 2 weeks old.
Christian is 2 years, 8 months and 2 weeks old.

thanksgiving

2011-12-05T11:42:00.004+08:00

we celebrated thanksgiving last weekend. a week plus 3 days late.
whatever. as in whatever it takes to keep our stress level low. work had been crazy so we postponed it.

and it was good dinner.
i managed to make dinner in under 3 hours. i surprised myself.
given that i decided to try out new recipes.

we ate
(a) rosemary-lemon turkey (b) muffin-cups potato gratin (c) lemony roasted brussel sprouts and parsnips (d)sage, mushroom and sausage stuffing.

it feels good to be able to walk out to the balcony and snip off my own herbs to make dinner. must. grow. more. herbs. next. year.

wine's a little too sweet for our liking. then in the evening, christian and i headed out to get 3 slices of velvety pumpkin pie and ben and jerry's vanilla ice-cream. so yummy.

i noticed that christian has a very sophisticated palate.

it's nice that it's been rainy all weekend. feels very much like fall.

holiday season: christmas! chinese new year! lots of exclamation points. but this is the best: vacation in taiwan *exclamation point*

first words

2011-11-29T17:49:00.004+08:00

dearest alexandra,

hello my little darling. you know, sometimes i wonder if this space is too flimsy to share all my thoughts. i mean, i don't even know what the internet is. and for some reason, it could also be a repository. back to why i was writing (besides it being a shoot-from-the-hip, quick and easy way to record my thought du jour!)

you are growing waaay too fast. so fast that i've not been able to jot down your progress with much precision in your baby journal. so fast that i could only manage blogger-minutes to type as fast as i can here and then return to exam grading and depressing oh-god-please-let-this-latest-idea-be-publishable research (note to you - please write legibly and concisely when taking exams. also, i happen to love my job, despite its judgmental nature. and at times when i don't love it, i'm doing it so i could enjoy the quality of life its income brings...i earnestly hope you'll find a job you'll love and if you don't it's okay, as long as you don't give up looking).

you can tell that my mind is all over the place. that's an occupational hazard of being a mom. but i see you. i see you are learning a lot. that little brain of yours must be in some kind of an overdrive. when ever you grow by leaps and bounds, that's when your sleep becomes really crappy and my state of mental alertness goes way down low. and two nights ago, you enunciated your words so clearly i had to do a double take to make sure it was you. you said, "ma - ma", with the gentlest little pause that sounded so deliberate. you have a really amazing full and deep voice - i swear, you really sounded like dionne warwick. i read somewhere that "papa" was easier and so it was the typical words from the mouths of babes. if that were true, then you must have worked extra hard to call me. and for this, i'm really touched.

you've grown really clingy recently. when i put you down to sleep in your own bed, you looked desperate and reached for the only words you know.. "ma...ma.." man, how could i let you sleep alone???? and when i did sneakily put you down in your own bed, once you wake up, you'll be searching for me. "ma..."

God made babies this cute, for a reason. to be loved.

But who can resist you? And this new thing that you mastered, plopping your head down on my shoulder when i carry you - that's waaaayyyy too sweet, babilicious.

I miss you at work. Work is crazy. But because I'm crazy about you (and your brother, and of course, your Papa), I got to keep my sanity and keep chugging along.

xoxo,
Momma

Alexandra is 7 months and 1 week old.
Christian is 2 years, 8 months and 1 week old.

my marvelous kiddo

2011-11-24T22:36:00.005+08:00

i came home late from work tonight.

kicked off my shoes, rushed the expressed milk to the fridge and proceeded to kiss my babies hello.

did you notice my bad habit? i forgot my kicked-off shoes.

as i was sitting at the dinner table munching on mini oreos, Christian wanted to join me and decided to push his Tripp Trapp to the table. But before doing that, he saw my shoes, and proceeded to put them away.

i'll now go hang my head in shame and stand in the naughty corner.

i was (still am) a shy little person

2011-11-22T17:49:00.013+08:00

i have childhood memories that go back all the way when i was 3. my mom will testify that this is true. i don't recall a whole lot, but i remember my emotions very clearly. there was this game that my father liked to play with me: we lived on the 12th floor, he would place me at the edge of the low wall along the common corridor and catch me "just in time" just as I was about to topple over. it was scary and i had recurring nightmares about falling over. however, whenever he played this game, i would laugh out of excitement. i'm sure this was enough reason for the social service to step in and send me to foster care - but that was in the early seventies. when we were playing this game, i got the chance to look at the people from 12 floors up, and i remember wondering to myself why would a seemingly tall adult appear like an ant from the 12-floors vantage point. i also remember telling myself that if there were two of me, one on the 12th floor and one below, then i would also observe that the "me" at the bottom of the 12 floors would be very small. i remember mulling over this idea for a long time. i also remember scheming up a plan to perform an experiment. we took the elevator up and down our apartment but my sister and i would play at the staircase all the time. i must have understood depth perception. i understood that the stairs take you one floor up and one floor down. i remember reasoning to myself that if the stairs could take me up and down, one step at a time, and looking at the stairwell, it seemed that the stairs went all the way down - i could go to the ground level on my own one step at a time, without taking the elevator - which was a "black box" and i could not reach to touch the buttons. i hatched a plan - to prove that the very same person that was originally 12 floors up was the exact same person 12 floors down below but only looked ant-like because that person was "far away". but what excited me about the plan was not so much depth perception, i was more intrigued by the curiosity that the stairs that seemed to go forever could actually take me down to the ground level. in my memory, i had observed people moving up the stairs a lot. and finally one day, while playing along the corridor, i took the plunge. i took one step at a time and i eventually found myself on the ground level. i was delirious! i remember jumping up and down. i remember seeing the same person that i saw when i was peering through a peep-hole like vent in the low corridor wall 12 floors up. that person was wearing a black scarf in her ponytail. i remember that black scarf because we had a similar scarf in our home. the success of this experiment was my favorite childhood memory. my mom remember this incident. what i don't remember was the panic that ensued after i "disappeared", and how i caused my grandmother (my primary caregiver) to burst into tears thinking that i had been kidnapped/abducted. my mom told me it happened when i was 3 and she remember i was really happy to have made it downstairs.

because i can remember some childhood incidents clearly, i sometimes feel that i can relate to how christian is feeling. whenever he throws a temper tantrum, there were flashbacks in my mind. i remember feeling this rage that i could not control. the emotions were too complex to understand; and even when i was angry and i wanted to stop crying, i couldn't. the emotions were a monstrosity to control. and i would cry about my failure to control them too. but because of these flashbacks, i sometimes feel i have to be careful too - that christian's emotions do not necessarily mirror mine at that age. we are, after all, two separate beings.

i've mentioned my friend Elizabeth here before. she runs this company called Embodied Movement which focuses on dance therapy. I don't have a good grasp of what dance therapy is and won't attempt to describe it here. Elizabeth wrote to me months ago about a possible dance therapy workshop here in singapore (she lives in rotterdam, the netherlands). my thought then was to support Elizabeth's endeavor and so i signed up without any hesitation. it was a session for little toddlers and their parent(s). and it happened this past Saturday at the Substation.

Christian and I headed out to a part of town that we hardly visit - it turned out to be a sunny Saturday morning and we sang to Yo Gabba Gabba! in the car. He seemed really happy to have all of my attention - on a typical weekend, I watch Alex all the time. It was a refreshing change to me too - I realized that I really miss these simple moments with Christian. But upon reaching the dance hall in Substation, Christian hesitated. He didn't want to take off his shoes, and didn't want to go in. He kept pleading and pushing me toward the door to leave. I instantly felt bad -- I was the one who made the choice to do this dance class with him, yet when he wanted to leave, he couldn't. Christian is always shy with strangers. He takes a long time to warm up. I wanted to encourage him to try different activities with people around him. But on that Saturday morning, he would have none of it. I stood my ground and tried to encourage him to participate. He wouldn't. He wanted to leave. He went to grab his little Miffy backpack and was adamant about leaving. I could tell it was the shyness.

I was a shy kid myself. It was painful to even say "hi" to strangers. My parents teased me and said they didn't like my reserved behavior. I remember not understanding what I was to do. And I remember very clearly that my parents would prep me before meeting their friends, it didn't encourage me to open up, i clammed up all the time, and the pep talk just added tons of stress way before meeting those strangers.

shyness is not a bad trait. but i don't want it to be a social handicap.

I understood Christian's shyness and his insistence on leaving the class. The guilt was starting to seep in. with Christian's protests and my coaxing, it was close to a battle of wills. But way before the class, I had anticipated Christian's behavior. I had convinced myself that the lesson I want Christian to have was that it was okay to be shy, that's who he is and what he feels, and that it will be okay to have these feelings and still be able mingle with people - either playing together or to play alongside. So I chose to stay. I chose to encourage Christian to dance just with me and that it was okay not to dance with the rest. He seemed pretty calm throughout the entire session but needed to have his bag with him all the time.

The session lasted for maybe an hour. Toward the last 10 minutes, Christian warmed up. He played with the scarfs in the class. He finally was having some fun. And I was really encouraged. Elizabeth had been fantastic - she was not pushy with Christian at all and just let us be. These are the pictures from the class. Elizabeth's husband Jeroen took these pictures of Christian and me. The pictures were very sweet. We were obviously oblivious to the rest of the class. My focus was entirely on Christian. I tried very hard not to be too self-conscious about Christian's protests. I know kids are sensitive. I didn't want to shame Christian into any action ("look, everyone is looking at you. you should dance.") and I know that if I were embarassed, Christian would pick that emotion up too.

I had thought the word "therapy" in this dance therapy session made it sound too clinical. but upon reflection, maybe it was therapy after all...it taught me a lesson or two on how to interact with a shy little person, who's not so different from me. i still have thoughts of Christian's shyness in my mind and i still have not ruled out the probability of calling a child psychologist to assess the situation. but for now, little baby dance steps will suffice.

{all pictures courtesy of Embodied Movement}

Christian is 2 years and 8 months old.
Alexandra is 7 months old.

port dickson

2011-11-10T13:42:00.003+08:00

we had a long weekend here and we decided to take a roadtrip to malaysia. we drove up to port dickson and stayed at the Avillion and before heading back, stopped at Melaka (and we daydreamed of buying a condo as our pied-à-terre - no, we are not rich, and yes, we were only daydreaming...) the weather was perfect and the kids were well-behaved (only in the car). we drove up with our friends... christian would not eat with them (wassup kid?) and threw a temper-tantrum at every.single.meal... i honestly feel bad for our travel companions and we are solely responsible for any and all heartburns in the restaurants. nonetheless, if you can believe it, we did have a good time.

(Re. the first picture, Alex refused to sit and watch me pack for the trip in her crib, so I moved her to the box seat and she was happy and contented.)

spooky bad mommie guilt

2011-11-01T23:10:00.005+08:00

this year's halloween was super fun, because we get to dress up another nugget. HOWEVER, work was crazy and it slipped my mind that I was the ONE who was to get the kids' costumes ready. i suffered from bad-mommie-guilt big time and luckily, Christian was able to still fit into an old tiger suit. I had bought Alex her monkey suit when she was in utero - that was back in January when Cyndi and I were shopping in Seattle's Costco. All in all, it means that next year, I'll have to plan for Halloween earlier...

you know, I didn't grow up celebrating Halloween...but I do love it.

Hmmm....

2011-10-27T22:17:00.004+08:00

Click on the picture for a bigger view.

christian reading alphabets

2011-10-27T12:44:00.001+08:00

grandma from florida made a pillow cover of alphabets.

listen to christian reading the alphabets here.

the video is too large to be embedded here...

好极了！

2011-10-07T17:40:00.002+08:00

and this one, papa said "好极了！" (that is, "great job!" or "it's great!")

"whoa, so smart"

2011-10-07T17:39:00.001+08:00

this one, he unabashedly said "whoa, so smart"...

reading part II

2011-10-07T17:38:00.001+08:00

a crack in the track

2011-10-06T14:01:00.008+08:00

christian has started reading before he was 2. This was taken when he was around 28 months old. he doesn't recognize the words, but he memorized the words in each page. it's quite amazing how much kids could absorb.

part I

fun time

2011-09-28T11:36:00.004+08:00

got up in the morning and got dressed, then fun timez with sophie the giraffe

head out to the bookstore, but i prefer my dog to books

did i mention the bookstore is by the water? nice sea breeze...but nothing beats papa's hairy, yummy hands

head home for a bath

competed with an alien - whose head is rounder?

first time in a sling - me likey!

tummy time!

Alexandra is 5 months and 5 days old
Christian is 2 years and 6 months old

Baldy

2011-09-22T16:08:00.004+08:00

Alex had her 4 month head shaving yesterday. She still looks cute to me, but my Mom seems traumatized by the whole thing.

a debt, the zoo, candy floss tragedy and a turtle

2011-09-19T11:38:00.006+08:00

washington d.c. that's where eric and i met. i was living in the district then. once, he asked me out to the zoo (i still had not caught on the excitement/significance of the pandas in the national zoo) and i sorta blew him off . fast forward 8 years, it's still a chip on his shoulder (okaaay, i'm telling the story here, so it's totally my side of the story. he'll most likely have a different version).

we are sorta at the cusp of late-morning-showers-season (actually, we are in the midst of a monsoon season but i can never tell when the monsoon season starts... without googling...) and that means that we should take advantage of the cloudy days to do some outdoorsy stuff. cloudy days are the best times to go outdoors in our humble opinion, other days, we just wither and get scorched. instant combustion not entirely impossible.

anyway, we finally made it to the zoo on saturday (the debt from 8 years ago finally paid off). i have no idea why i thought the animals will be in cages. they are not! and christian's best memory of the day? sitting on an alligator (statue) and we didn't even have to pay admission for him to do that.

"i sit sit on an alligator?"

"snoozing for a cruzing"

Gorgeous white tigers

puffer fish!

elephant 大象！

“i sit sit on the elephant?"

Alex finally woke up from her nap in time to see the rhinos

Zebras - eh!

When the day was done - it was threatening to rain. we passed by a candy floss stand and i decided it was time for christian's first candy floss. But eric was stressed about getting to the car before we got rained on. So, can you imagine what followed? me holding onto a ridiculous candy floss that looked like a marie antoinette wig and pushing the stroller and ran-walked behind eric and christian. By the time we got to the car, the candy floss looked miserable, the humidity in the air caused that "wig" to disappear right before my eyes. Christian did get a bite - at this point, it actually tasted like cough syrup and he was happy i tossed it out - so much for first experience.

For eric and me, the highlight of the day was this... christian chasing after the turtle and asking "hey turtle, where are you going?"

One of the gang

2011-08-23T11:58:00.002+08:00

with

2011-08-19T16:57:00.001+08:00

when papa had to walk the dog last night, he walked up to his papa and said,

"take me with you?"

and papa did

being a wild child

2011-08-17T11:53:00.005+08:00

i've been thinking about child play and learning. it's true, parents evolve with their kids. ask me what a 2-year old needs a year ago, i would have drawn a blank and wondered "what do they need, they are 2-year olds, for crying out loud." but as I watch Christian absorbs his surroundings like a sponge, as I spend quiet time with him just watching the different shapes of the clouds and he being the rambuctious child he is could sit and watch the clouds and point to me the "mama clouds and baby clouds", as I listen carefully on how he uses new words he learned through osmosis, I realize that as fleeting as childhood goes, this period of time is a great opportunity to expand one's mind and taste for living. for me as well as for the children.

music, smells, tastes - the senses have a memory of their own and those early memories stem from childhood. ever since I have kids of my own, i'm frequently reminiscing what my grandmother did or said or taught.

call it the "kiasu" syndrome or whatever label you want to call it. but i know that if i don't seize the childhood days and fill them (to some extent) with pleasurable "lessons" and mommie/daddy-and-me times, they will be gone forever.

on that note, i'm obsessed with this site.

give me some chill

2011-08-16T11:42:00.003+08:00

it's always the heat that gets to me. i know it gets to eric but it's different -he grew up in a cold place. me, for some reason, i hate the heat here. and i think by some cosmic power, i was to go to grad school in wisconsin to enjoy the winters there since i missed out so much for the early part of my life (i.e. pre-grad school). i love love love the cold, dry air. summers are so uninteresting, save for beer by the lakeside and maybe a block party (so. not. a. fan)....

anyway, i put on a thin springy/fall-y sweater today and have started fantasizing about being able to take the kids out to play in the park and still be able to wear sweaters and jackets and maybe a hat. not forgetting sending emails harassing eric to think of a place cheap enough where we can pack the kids up and just chill. and enjoy the chill (haha)

*sigh*

happy birthday grandma!

2011-08-15T15:54:00.002+08:00

wish we were able to celebrate it with you in person...

p.s. christian was having a cranky tantrum - that's why he wasn't in the picture :/

Happy 16 weeks!

2011-08-12T21:40:00.004+08:00

My sweet little bunny Alexandra,

Happy 16 weeks. You've been such a sweet baby in so many ways. When you wake up in the morning, you'll quietly observe all that is around you while you wait for one of us to notice that you are up. Then you'll light up with the most sparkly twinkle in your eyes when you see us and give us your big toothless grin.

You've been trying to grasp stuff now. You love to lift up your skirt for some reason (your papa is starting to worry), lucky for you your jiejie Nadine has passed down some adorable bloomers so... modesty is assured (phew). Besides that, hair that's dangling over your chubby face delights you endlessly.

i enjoy holding you in my arms and slowly rocking you to sleep (or to a semi-groggy state), at that point, you'll reward me with a silent hearty laugh or a wide smile, while you drift off to dreamland. being the happy baby you are, you sleep well. actually, you slept well. ever since i went back to work ( 5 days ago), you've been missing naps and you've wailed yourself to sleep by the time i get home from work. this breaks my heart into so many pieces because i know it was not in your nature to cry and wail and you are doing this now because of so many parents-oriented decisions. i apologize but i do hope you'll learn to cope and i believe you are a clever little girl who will soon learn how to soothe yourself. meanwhile, i'm racking my brains out to find the best solution for such a predicament.

i have to admit that your mama has a more feisty personality than what i've observed of you so far. on that note, your bro is more like me. i also have to admit that your zen personality is starting to rub off on me. i'm a calmer person now because that's the way you communicate to me and i really like this new me.

i love you little sugar bunny. babyhood is so fleeting... i can't believe that it's already 16 weeks - the fact that you've been so agreeable with the world despite its sometimes depressing and difficult nature makes time fly by even faster - and you are learning so much within such a short span of time. i love your little shallow dimple on your right cheek, because you inherited that from me. although, no matter how many times i stare at your lovely face, i can't convince myself that you, the beautiful creature that you are, really are my baby and you come from me.

love you always,
mama

little big christian

2011-08-06T22:56:00.005+08:00

he's so cute - i don't know when he learned this - but he's been humming his songs nowadays. you'd think that humming comes before singing... but i think it's the other way around -- humming seems to be a more abstract art. he's also getting into adjectives now - angry, sad, funny, happy, cute.

i realize that i'm slowly forgetting how he was (his hairstyle, his smiles, his giggles, how he felt in my arms) when he was a baby.

we love papa

2011-08-01T12:42:00.007+08:00

a few months ago, eric turned 40. for his birthday, i made him a special birthday card. well, it was a pack of little cards, depicting the activities we'll do on his special day. Alex was a month old, and she hadn't really established any schedule yet. So we brought Alex along but had to leave Christian at my mom's. We went for burgers and coffee at 313 and then went to shop for an iPad. We only managed to get 2 shots of the cards. After strolling around, we were missing Christian, so we went to get him and since it was still pretty early in the day and by some crazy chance, Christian had an early morning nap (rare! he naps at around 3 pm), we decided to go to the Bird Park with the kids. The original plan was to get pizza for dinner at de paolo's, so says one of the cards. But we ended up getting take-out pizza the next day at Tomato's. that's life with 2 kids, you can never plan your day. but i think eric enjoyed himself.

p.s. alex wants to thank her papa for putting up the lovely mobile above her changing station. she enjoys it every day.

random stuff

2011-07-30T22:58:00.004+08:00

cinnamon's so nonchalant, she didn't care if she was squishing her pig, either that or that she's too old and needed the pig to prop up her chin...

my herbs are thriving and my son's enjoying the new balcony. mission accomplished.

eric's still suffering from jet lag.

restlessness

2011-07-26T00:38:00.003+08:00

eric's finally home after getting stuck at the newark airport for 16 (or was it 18???) hours. yikes. i wonder if the US airlines will ever, ever work out their debt and service problems.... hmmm.

anyhoo, we are all glad he made it home. life is just not the same without him. christian was delighted to have his papa back.

i went out with my girlfriends for dinner tonight and when i came home, alex and eric were both asleep. shows that the girl is agreeable to having daddy come home and putting her to bed. i managed to get some work done while the kids are in bed. alex has been sleeping better at night and i'm hoping this keeps up and gets better (how greedy we are of our precious sleep) - this will allow me to work a little every night, chipping away at the mountainous maternity-leave-haystack-of-work <--urgh!

i'm all hyped up after working for 3 hours straight. can't fall asleep even if i were to try... hence, my hanging around here... but i've got nothing to blog about. the balcony's finally done, my herb window box is thriving (thank goodness) and i'm officially bored. i told my girlfriends tonight i needed a new project and they both looked at me like i'm crazy. what next? i'm restless...

a nice break

2011-07-21T23:29:00.002+08:00

the kids at my mom's. alex has the "i've been harrassed, get this dude away from me" look.
which happens on a daily basis. christian LOVES his sister and tends to suffocate her with kisses and hugs. there weren't any internet access at my mom's. i spent days reading, going out with christian and sometimes alex and my mom and learning french (can you believe it?). it's kinda nice. no air-conditioning either... thank goodness it was super breezy and the kids slept well in the gentle caress of mother nature's refreshing breath.

blurry days

2011-07-21T23:16:00.004+08:00

my mom's long-time friend Auntie Ashia came to visit us today. I had known Auntie Ashia since I was a little girl. She was in Tasmania when Alex was born and she had not met little Alex. She brought a little dancing sunflower for Christian which Christian immediately takes to (anything that dances is a good gift for the little tod). Christian seems to have outgrown taking pictures, he refuses to stand still for a picture and tries to sabotage every single shot... that's terrible two's for you - he refuses to do anything you tell him because he darn well can.

p.s. have you noticed christian's new hair cut? i had to take a chill pill when i picked him up at my mom's and instead of my son, a toilet brush greeted me at the door...what happened to parent's consent when it comes to shaving your son's head????!!!!

nostalgia

2011-07-17T23:15:00.003+08:00

strangely, with eric being away, with my being at my mom's clearing out the boxes i've left behind when i first moved out to go to grad school...i sorta got in touch with who i was before i became a mom. being a mom could bring out something (good-something) in myself i've never known but in that process, i had lost touch with my old self. cliche but true. and i used to think that i'm still me.

not true. my 24-hour-day is different. my priorities are different. heck, even my body has been put to use i've never really experienced (being pregnant, giving birth, breastfeeding, being a cradle, a story-teller, and sometimes, a clown<-- eeeuww)

it's not anything bad, this new life of being a mom to two kids, but it's kinda nice to remember the times when it was just eric and me and i think, i ought to dig and drag that old self out a little more frequently. hello there, old me.

the final renovation

2011-07-17T18:30:00.006+08:00

Eric's now in the States or perhaps on his way to Montreal. We had deliberately scheduled the retiling of the balcony while he's gone. It's just easier and I like the idea that he'll come home to a transformed home, or part of a home. The plan was to leave the apartment to the maid and cinnamon while the kids and I stay at my mom's for a while... The plan worked except that my mom took advantage of it and now refused to come back to our apartment. So Christian stayed behind while Alex and I are now back.

We wanted to add grilles to the balcony because we live on the 10th floor and we KNOW how our toddler is capable of the scariest mischief that includes scaling the wall in the balcony. BUT that toddler doesn't have depth perception yet, I think, and he doesn't know the consequences (man, just typing this out is enough to send shivers down my spine.)

Anyhoo, up went the cage-like structure (not a design I fancy but was part of the condo's code) we replaced the crooked and humongous doors and a little retiling and paint, our balcony is looking pretty swanky. I had second-guessed my choice of a faux bois tile but now that all's done I'm glad I didn't get real decking - wood decking could split and i'm not ready to be picking splinters out of Christian's soles yet.

I bought herbs to indulge in my whim to have a herb window box...deep down, I know that I'll probably kill them in a matter of days, but a girl can always dream she has a green thumb, yes?

I didn't have any before pictures, but I thought these of Christian hanging out in his favorite space are pretty cool(he has this i'm-too-sexy-for-my-slippers look, lol!)...

2 peas in a pod

2011-07-03T18:41:00.005+08:00

having a 2nd child taught me something i never knew before - that it's possible to love more. love is not a zero sum game. you can love more; there's always room for more. christian is an amazing brother - he loves alex. and this is probably not something we consciously taught him. it's in him. he comforts her when she cries by giving her his favorite trains and trucks. if he doesn't have a toy with him, he'll hold her hand and tell her "不要哭，不要哭。”("don't cry, don't cry.") magnanimity could perhaps be taught, but i believe one is predisposed to have an abundance of it. he's a lovable boy in this aspect. he gives his hugs and kisses freely and i can't imagine a better gift for alex and christian than to have each other as their sibling.

Christian is 27 months and 2 weeks old
Alexandra is 10 weeks and 2 days old

it's hard to be deliberate

2011-06-28T20:04:00.003+08:00

Alex had her first shot today - well, technically, she had her first shot at the hospital the day she was born. anyway, i've been dreading this day and "sorta" pleaded with eric to go with me. it was a half-hearted plea with eric because i know he would be in a bad mood having to skip work and having to wait at the clinic and our stress levels will, without a shadow of doubt, be elevated by the time the shot was done.

so, i sucked it up and drove Alex to the clinic. and dragging my feet, i hugged my little bundle of snuggle bunny to the doc. and true to form, i was tearing up. and as i patted my little girl to distract her from the needle, her huge eyes dilated as the needle when into her marshmallow thigh, and i swear i saw a sense of betrayal in her eyes and she cried and cried. she has never cried like this since we brought her home...and shamelessly, i cried and frantically looked for a tissue in the doc's office.

i thought i'd be stronger having gone through the same with christian. i guess some things just don't go away. i'll always be a wussy momma with a heart made of silken tofu.

happy rainbow child

2011-06-21T22:44:00.001+08:00

at aunt serene's

2011-06-21T00:35:00.002+08:00

my brother-in-law's parents were in town so we stopped by for a visit. meme thinks that alex has a lovely smiley face :)

later, we spent some time in Alex's cousin, Ian's room which was pretty graphic.

fessin' up

2011-06-18T23:29:00.002+08:00

dear alex,

your momma has never had a manicure done before the age of late 20-ish. So i have absolutely no idea how to file nails. The other day I did a horrible job that made your nails look like the white cliffs of dover. I have a secret to tell you - before you were born I was a little freaked out I was having a little girl - I'm pretty bad at the standard girlish affairs of the heart (but i tell ya, i'm taking a crash course and hopefully i'll catch up before your prom night. fyi, i didn't go to my prom.) Anyhoo, I'm going to take a stab at trimming and filing your nails again. Pray that all will go well.

Love you little sweet puppy bunny.

Your crazy momma.

P.S. I did a horrible job with your brother's nails too and Nenek had to take over the task when he was 3 months old. I'm glad he didn't disfigure himself to a pulp or a character from a Wes Craven movie.

rag quilt from grandma

2011-06-17T17:18:00.001+08:00

{snoozing with bella the daschund}

{alexandra-lized}

Grandma made a rag quilt for Alex - it's one of the softest things Alex slept in. I've never seen a rag quilt and this is truly exquisite! Thanks Grandma!

Alex is 8 weeks old

Christian is 26 months, 4 weeks and 1 day old

dali time

2011-06-14T23:36:00.002+08:00

dear alex,

we spent some mommie-and-me time at the artscience museum. it was the siren song of the salvador dali exhibit that lured us. you were sleeping and obviously didn't want to miss out on the ahmmazing-ness, you woke up with a wail ... you really enjoyed the butterfly lithographs (momma loved the alice in wonderland paintings - they gave me the goosebumps)... well, you only started cooing at the butterflies after we had an emergency feeding session in the nursing room that was curiously lacking a comfy chair. thankfully, you were cute enough to warrant a lot of attention and a chair was promptly brought in for yours truly.

Alex is 1 month, 3 weeks and 2 days old.
Christian is 26 months, 3 weeks and 6 days old.

package from grandma

2011-05-25T14:12:00.004+08:00

grandma in florida sends us lots of stuff. plus she's an amazing sewer!

can you beat that? changing pads for every corner of our home :) the bigger one is a super fancy-pants one.

cutesy bodysuits for alex

and a special gift package from grandma's friend Gerry. love love love the card!

Imp Update! Christian is soooo manipulative. While playing with the phone (and trying to place a long distance call to Siberia), he saw Eric walking toward him threatening to take it away from him. Guess what Christian did - he immediately put on a smiley face and said into the receiver, "hello grandma". that stalled his dad right in his tracks.

stardust in your eyes

2011-05-21T23:50:00.009+08:00

dear christian,

while mama wants to teach you the value of being thrifty (one of the celebrated virtues of being one-fourth hakka) and to be responsible to the planet earth we live on, you beat me to the game. how so? u see, when mama was pregnant with your little sister, papa decided to give up our home office to make room for your Auntie Bernadeth to come live with us and help us out a little. together with that decision, we got rid of our work table but couldn't find a buyer on craigslist for this lamp... (see exhibit a below)...

... fast forward 5 months, it so happens that the lamp in your room broke and we decided it's time for you to use a grown-up looking lamp (well, not entirely. the reason papa and mama bought this lamp was because it reminded us of this robot)...(see exhibit b below)...

but you show us big time what "upcycle" means... you turn that lamp into an instrument that only a true star could think of. you share your limelight with that little lamp and sprinkle stardust all over it...

we are so in awe of you and that little brain of yours that harbors imagination that's pure genius... are you sure you are our baby? i assure you your parents are mere pedestrian folks...

and now... to translate your little tune:

小老鼠上灯台
little mouse, climbed up the table lamp

偷吃油下不来
to steal a bit of oil and couldn't get down

喵喵喵猫来了
miao miao miao, came the cat

基哩咕噜滚下来
"Jiligulu" (*tumbling sound*) the little mouse came tumbling down

Alex is 1 month old
Christian is 26 months and 2 days old

monkey hugs and kisses

2011-05-20T12:39:00.001+08:00

part two!

monkeying around

2011-05-17T20:39:00.004+08:00

grandma sent another package from florida, among all the goodies (which I will write about in another post) is a golden monkey that christian immediately fell in love with...

it's strange, now that with a new baby at home, christian seems to have grown up all of a sudden... is it me, or has he really grown???

random smiles

2011-05-16T23:11:00.002+08:00

dear alex,

your momma is a tad superstitious when it comes to babies, etc. so i hope i'm not jinxing myself, but i can't help shouting out to the world that you are possibly the cutest baby girl i ever laid eyes on (okay, your jiejie Nadine is very cute too :) ) and now you are flashing me with those random smiles. oh baby baby, it a wild world... i just hope i'm a good enough momma to keep you smiling.

xo,
your crazy momma

p.s. thanks for not making me as sleep-deprived as did your brother. i so love you for it.

a rose is a rose is a rose

2011-05-14T17:20:00.003+08:00

one of the outtakes - she's sooooo cute!

Alex is 3 weeks and 1 day old

Christian is 2 years, 1 month, 3 weeks and 5 days old

My grandmother

2011-05-14T16:19:00.003+08:00

This is my grandmother, my Mom's mom, from whom Alex received her middle name, Rose. That's me she's holding in 1971. Forty years later it could be Alex in that photo if I didn't know better.

her little lamb

2011-05-07T00:38:00.003+08:00

Alex basking in the sun and almost touching her little lamb.
Her favorite outfit is this vintage petit bateau kimono bodysuit.

Alex is 2 weeks old.
Christian is 2 years, 1 month, 2 weeks and 4 days old.

gifts from grandma

2011-05-03T14:06:00.004+08:00

a package came from grandma. lots of wonderful books and handmade gifts for christian.
christian is delighted! he loves his "i'm the big brother" t-shirt grandma made.

at the end of the video you can hear him say "thank you, grandma" :)

thanks, mom!

Alex is 1 week and 4 days old.
Christian is 2 years, 1 month, 2 weeks and 1 day old.

alexandra's little corner

2011-04-30T23:35:00.003+08:00

a little bunny friend, a lacy alpaca-wool blanket that's good for warm weather and nani iro crib sheet

alex really digs her little lamb

jonah and the whale - a tale of obedience, a reminder to mommie

a postcard from centre pompidou, paris

Hello World!

2011-04-23T18:08:00.005+08:00

Sky relaxing before it's time to work.

Alexandra all bundled up right after delivery.

A little while later.

Sky looking pretty good afterwards!

Nenek and Alex.

The whole family. Wow, there're four of us now!

10 days to go

2011-04-19T14:58:00.002+08:00

according to the pregnancy counter, i've 10 days to go! wow!

a restful weekend proved to be such a salve to my very sore muscles... part of the fatigue is due to the fact that i've been giving non-stop presentations last wed. i've seen a physiotherapist in the beginning of my second trimester and it had been money well spent. it enables me to deal with the soreness i get now and then through simple exercises and observance of my posture. i can't wait to go back and start strengthening my core postpartum.

i'm still in the office - trying to get as much done as possible. the funny thing is that i'm seeing my documents in "dot-matrix"... something's gone wrong with my eyesight and i'm pretty sure it has to do with the pregnancy.

i'm also amazed that i got my to-do list done (i can't bring myself to delete this list on the right hand side - it's too much of a testament to a labor of love). last night, i started the preliminaries of sewing a crib sheet - hopefully, i'll get to finish it tonight :)

eric's been super wonderful this entire pregnancy - despite his heavy workload, he was able to run errands to get things done for little babe and christian. and that's the best gift we could ever give our children - a strong marriage and a commitment to keep it strong.

crave list

2011-04-18T20:06:00.004+08:00

freshly shucked oysters

bubbly pink champagne

fruit tarts from here

chocolate cake from here

godiva truffles

smoked salmon benedict

prosciutto e melon

burrata with a fruity riesling

macarons from ET Artisans Sweets

a go-to list for eric if he runs out of ideas of comfort food - heh!

the countdown begins

2011-04-15T11:46:00.003+08:00

we've reached 37w + 6d yesterday for our doc visit.... which makes today 38w! christian sent my water bag bursting at the ripe ol' age of 38w. let's see how little babe does.

doc measured her very round tummy and her head, estimated weight of around 3.2-3.3kg. seeing my horrific expression, he assured me it's the head size that mattered not the weight. phew, and her head measured 93mm (can't remember what it was, diameter or circumference)... and so, it ain't too big. double phew!

and it seems that she has pretty big feet, 72mm from the big toe to the heel... like her bro. why do our babies seem to have big feet, neither eric nor i have the peggy-hill genes.

most of the baby stuff is done - somewhat. it's time to focus on moi... and i really really love this epoch in the pregnancy when i'm so tuned up to my surroundings, and so in love with everything around me (tsk tsk - sappy hormones in overdrive). the hope is that baby stays in her cocoon for a little while, so daddy and mommy can have some time alone and do "couple-ly" stuff. today is the last day of school, aka daddy's stress level will plummet starting at around 6-ish pm.

p.s. mommy is 38w and weighs in at 60kg (no weight gain over the last doc visit).

35 weeks and 2 days visit

2011-04-11T14:06:00.005+08:00

a belated post. we went to the doc and yay(!) baby is in the right position with her face looking at my right (left occiput transverse) . this is WAY better than the lateral position, which got me concerned because it was quite late in the pregnancy for her to be doing acrobatics to get the position right. as a desperate measure, i'd been trying out the breech tilt twice a day to hopefully tilt her in the right position.

i'm now obsessed with the weight gain because of the gestational diabetes and my worry that she'll get too big. my goal has been to keep the pregnancy weight to as close as my weight when i had christian. but well, each child is different... i just want to avoid fetal macrosomia. as of the last visit, she measured 2.8 kg (how how how???) and i weighed in at 60 kg. a lot of my weight gain has to do with fluid retention because i've been seeing it yo-yo-ing for a while. the doc realized that my ankles were swollen and my legs were extremely shiny (another sign of fluid retention). swimming helps with the retention but i could feel my pelvis was getting unstable and wanted to stay on the safe side.

rocker chick is still very active and we got to see more spiky hair - so impossibly cute.

she's ready to pop out of her oven anytime soon, since we've officially reached 37 weeks 2 days ago. she's been hiccupping a lot these days and practice contractions have slowed down. i panicked yesterday because the feeling that she's coming anytime now overwhelmed the heck of me all of her sudden. uh-oh, please don't come so soon, i have 1 presentation and 1 consulting job coming up on wed, and that consulting gig is easy $ that i don't wish to forego.

friend

2011-03-30T23:28:00.004+08:00

met up with an online friend, elizabeth, for lunch yesterday. it's still quite intriguing to me how genuine friendships could be formed over the internet. elizabeth and i "met" 6 years ago, she lives in the netherlands and yesterday we finally met each other in person. we had an amazing time, our conversations include career, life, parenting, education, and stuff like creativity through destruction. it turned out to be 2-hour lunch, a refreshing change from my daily grind. elizabeth gave little babe a softie - it's of the softest material and it's such a lovely present :) thank you elizabeth.

Latest pic of mei mei

2011-03-17T13:04:00.007+08:00

She's very cheeky, like her brother, though in a different way.

postscript by sky: little babe grew (yet some more) she gained 1 kilogram (2.2 pounds) and is estimated to be 2.5 kg (5.5lbs). she's huge! We know these are just estimates and plenty of times, these measurements are reportedly off - but her little round tummy and her head circumference have definitely grown. meanwhile, momma gained 200g within 1 month and weighs at 58.6 kg at 34 weeks... so how little babe put on the pounds was a little confounding... the bad news is that she's lateral, in a horizontal position, plus the fact that i'm sometimes having regular contractions (15 mins interval that lasts 1 minute each) was a little unsettling for the doc. to prevent pre-term labor (would have to be by caesarean if she remained in this position), i was prescribed ventolin (eeks) that gives me the jitters... i'm typing this with trembling fingers because of the drug. doc also prescribed rest. eh...doesn't go too well with my personality. in spite of feeling a little "uh-oh", it's always a joy to see her at the doc's. little babe looked really cute and had spiky hair. rocker chick, oh yeah!

giving

2011-03-16T15:02:00.005+08:00

this is a shameful post...eric and i decided, perhaps 3 years ago, that we will skip giving each other christmas presents and make a gift to charity instead. we get to pick the charity we wanted in turn. he picked the smile train the first year and then, me, i took my own sweet time and procrastinated... what's happening in japan jolted me to act... we love japan, the country and its culture... it's so surreal seeing all these news footage...

the organizations we picked:
doctors without borders
the smile train

single-minded

2011-03-10T21:39:00.001+08:00

one thought.

man, i could really go for a mug of asahi beer.

hello ...

2011-03-04T15:09:00.003+08:00

"Like all new mothers, I couldn't believe at first he was really for me, and I could really keep him...I'm still filled with the wonder of his being, to be able to go out and come back and find that he's still there..." ~Audrey Hepburn in Barry Paris's "Audrey Hepburn", 1996.

I remember when I held Christian in my arms the second time (I got to nurse Christian immediately after he was born, then I was wheeled to a maternity ward while he went off somewhere else to get a smorgasboard of baby tests). I stared and stared and smiled myself silly. I looked and touched his perfect little face, eyes, nose, mouth, fingers, hair and toes and felt him still kicking a little while he was sleeping and thought to myself "is this really my baby?" i remember feeling that he was too perfect for me, and felt this big emotion of wanting to introduce myself gently into his very new life... afterall, he was very new to the world...

thinking about pain

2011-02-24T13:06:00.003+08:00

when it was time to give birth to christian, i was virtually pain-free. i didn't have contractions (i had odd little balls in my belly like charley horses once in a while), and the nurse didn't do the IV because for some reason, rubbing alcohol on the back of my hand hurt that i yelped and she left the job to the anasthesiologist who was a God's gift to pregnant-women-who-needed-drugs. Having the IV and the epidural needles inserted was painless. I'm not sure if I've lucked out the last time. This time round, I actually felt Braxton Hicks contractions, just last week. It was going on and off one particular day and woke me up several times at night. It actually hurt. Owwww. My belly was all balled up like one big melon and little babe would "freeze" her movements (quite comically) and then start to move when it was over. This brought back memories of postpartum recovery (that was when I felt the pain) and I shudder to think that I have to go through it again... i'm a wuss when it comes to pain and my doc is well aware of that - i had the strongest dose of paracetamol he could prescribe to ward off postpartum pain (which worked) I'm hoping to have the same experience as with the birth of Christian, but no one can really tell. Here's to wishing and hoping and praying and stretching.

time-tested beauty tips

2011-02-18T15:26:00.004+08:00

for christian and little babe,
my two precious friends in the world.

For attractive lips, speak words of kindness.

For lovely eyes, seek out the good in people.

For a slim figure, share your food with the hungry.

For beautiful hair, let a child run his fingers through it once a day.

For poise, walk with the knowledge you'll never walk alone...

People, even more than things, have to be restored, renewed, revived,
reclaimed and redeemed and redeemed ...

Never throw out anybody.

Remember, if you ever need a helping hand, you'll find one at the end of your arm.

As you grow older you will discover that you have two hands. One for helping yourself, the other for helping others.

{Time-tested beauty tips by Sam Levenson}

failure

2011-02-16T21:25:00.007+08:00

i failed the test. the glucose tolerance test, that is. i had expected to fail it, like my sister before me, like when i was pregnant with christian. but still i was pretty crabby when i realized my body had failed me, yet again. a draw from a random distribution, a crapshoot. however i cut it, i had a glimmer of hope. so my body is ridden with gestational diabetes. and the little baby will have to go through additional tests when she's born. i'm wrecked with guilt. but i know it'll be okay. christian was on the small side by anecdotal evidence (he was 2.965 grams, i.e. 6 pounds 8 oz) and avoided the curse of being too big at birth. watching my diet wasn't that hard, so i do welcome this vigilance for the next few weeks. it's just that once the pregnancy is over, there'll be a shadow of doubt of whether the diabetes will go away and i'll have to take the test again. it went away the last time. but still, a small exasperated voice in me did yell "why me?" anyhoo, i'll probably get over this self-pitying stage quick. the good news was that i gained only 500g over the past one month and all of that went to little babe. so when the scale read 58.4 kg (128 pounds 12 oz) it was a consolation prize to me. little babe's estimated weight is at 1.45 kg (3 pounds 3 oz), and just as i had guessed, she's already topsy turvy with her head at my pelvis, looking impossibly cute with chubby cheeks and big eyes.

buddy

2011-02-14T14:50:00.005+08:00

at 29 weeks. i can begin to feel little babe getting big, i can feel a limb jabbing at my ribcage all the time. the position of the placenta could explain a lot of this, but while she's just as active as christian, her movements were more "graceful", with christian, there were a lot of impatient kicks especially when i tried to sleep on my left (which supposedly helps my overworked lungs to supply more oxygen to the rest of my body). i'm feeling breathless so easily these days - and tire more easily because sometimes i have to schlep a kicking tantrum-throwing toddler.

the good thing about a second pregnancy is that you already have a motherlode of stuff and don't need to "security-buy" too much (i.e. buying stuff that you read/heard that you need but these things ended up being totally useless). i'm feeling the sense of inwardness all over again, it happened the last pregnancy too, where i yearn to spend more time alone to prepare for the birth. i had doubts about whether having another baby is a good thing for christian... until eric sent a link to this blog entry... but as the days progress, as i still continue to spend time with christian, i'm beginning to appreciate this as a journey for the 3 of us: eric, christian and me. we are all in this together, in varying degrees of awareness, to welcome little babe into the world. christian kisses my tummy and says "hello, mei mei" perhaps not literally understanding what he's doing, but the closeness we feel as mother and son is one of the best aspect of being pregnant with a second child. we'd shopped for a crib for the baby and possibly a bed for christian together as a family. so 10 months of gestation is probably a God-intended time for everyone to get involved. it feels like a partnership, like any project... christian and i braved the home improvement stores when we were renovating our home, spending endless weekends looking at tiles, lights and bathroom fixtures. he was able to get us good deals and freebie snacks. and he's always been a trooper and good buddy, just like his dad.

time for spring

2011-02-11T13:03:00.004+08:00

corners of our home. christian approves of the new seat covers i made for the henriksdal stools. the laura ashley's lori fabric was on sale and had the right spring-lunar-new-year vibe. its cotton-linen blend has a great sheen and is low maintenance.

waxing

2011-02-09T14:57:00.005+08:00

i've told you before that christian loves hanging out in the balcony. he had learned the word "moon" about a year ago but now he actively looks for the moon at night.

his infectious enthusiasm for the cosmic lune often caused us to flock to the balcony to see the object that captures his intense interest. sometimes, in his trace of the waxing moon, he'll be surprised to find how big and bright it was and he would run to one of us and tell us to go see " moon! moon!". the other day it was "papa, moon! papa, papaaaa!"

this is the aspect of parenting that i so deeply fall in love with. i am rediscovering nature through the eyes of the innocent. i hold this being in my arms and feel sincere and genuine love for me. and i for him. and it rejuvenates me and my marriage. i know that this little kid of mine is so dependent on me that i start to evaluate my life choices a little more carefully, consciously. life is love. but a child reminds me that every single day.

weird dreams

2011-02-09T12:02:00.003+08:00

i've been having weird dreams (nightmares) for 3 consecutive nights. please click away if you are squirmish... i got the creeps myself...

first dream: i dreamed i gave birth to a bunch of chicks (one died) and there was a little chick who was very sad that one died and i tried to comfort it. later, the chicks grew up to become cocker spaniel puppies and the home was invested with big fat ants because of the puppies.

second dream: i dreamed i was in so much pain and was bleeding.

third dream: i dreamed i passed out giving birth and when i woke up, my baby was so huge, but was a premie. she had teeth (!) and acne and i wasn't sure how to react to it. to top it off, she could walk... (manifestation of fitzgerald's benjamin button???? i shouldn't have read that story).

eric thinks it's stress... but, i don't feel stressed out at all !?! the only thing that changed for the past 3 nights is that i've been crocheting before i go to bed...

i'm officially spooked.

sunny day sweepin' the clouds away

2011-02-07T22:57:00.005+08:00

it was a chilly night and my mom dressed him in "winter" pj's. elmo is perhaps his first sesame street character. he loved it so much he refused to take it off even though he was sweating buckets in the morning.

later in the week, he saw the maid doing his laundry and demanded to have his elmo back.

a present for kor-kor

2011-01-31T13:35:00.003+08:00

a little suitcase to bring to the hospital, on behalf of little babe. her first present to her big brother... now, what shall we put inside? we shall gauge by how hard you kick or elbow me, shall we?

p.s mommie is 27 weeks and 2 days pregnant. for the past 2 weeks, i could feel a little knee or a little elbow running across my belly. also, daddy felt your hiccups one morning. so cute! what are you doing in there?

a growing list

2011-01-28T14:25:00.010+08:00

I'm starting to knit again. I had problems with the casting on as the baby knits I had done were curling at the bottom. I had given up on my projects. A few months ago, I got an old copy of vogue knitting at a library sale and it seems that i had used a wrong technique. going to give it another go with this project (via here).

as Christian grows taller, there are more things to child-proof around the house...

The balcony is a great concern, and we will have to think about that soon.
Next, we have to get rid of the curtain tie-backs which are potential hazards: even though I had decided against cords when we installed the drapes, I didn't know the drapes people would include tie-backs. I had assumed they would let me do the installation for the curtain holdbacks.
Christian's also reaching into drawers and climbing up stools to access the countertop. ~~The knives have to go to another drawer but I'd need something to store the knives in ... I think this might do the trick, but I'd have to ask our carpenter to trim it so it fits.~~ got the rationell knife tray, it's of solid construction. and now i can hide the knives and even have a slot for the carving knife!
I also want to make this hooded blanket.

Mei mei

2011-01-22T16:58:00.003+08:00

The latest picture of mei mei. She seems to have a lot of the same features that Christian had in utero: chubby cheeks, pointed chin, a round nose.

postscript by sky: the little girl grew! she was a mere 369 grams (13 oz) to a whopping 940 g (2 pounds and 1 oz) within a month. a month ago, the doc said she was tiny and had revised her due date to a week later... i bet she secretly said "watch me"...

subtle

2011-01-17T13:57:00.003+08:00

came home. eric was waiting for me at the airport. why an extra bag? oops, shopped too much. went to bed at around 2.30 am. woke up at 8 am. i could hear christian saying "bus". why does his voice sound different? his pronounciation is much clearer. was finally able to lift my heavy lids. christian! mommy bought you a little train and a little book (besides a mountain of clothes which you are not interested in anyways). went out. he was in the balcony. looking at trucks, cars, motorcycles and the occasional, infrequent public bus. i went up to him. he didn't look at me. continued pointing out the imaginary bus, the cars, the motorcycles, the trucks. i went to give him a hug. felt skinnier. gave him a kiss. he ignored me. but he knew i was there. went to get him his train and book. he adored them. then, a flash of a meaningful look. he wanted to sit on my lap. eyes still averted. he wanted me to read to him while he played with his train. and he leaned back. so his back was against my body. and then... lots of hugs. my boy, he expresses his feelings in such subtle ways.

loot

2011-01-09T23:18:00.003+08:00

one last video, actually plenty more on our flickr account. but i think i'm oversaturating the blog with the same theme. it's still funny, especially when i'm able to watch it here in faraway land.

went shopping…

i couldn't resist buying frozen packs of white castle burgers.

it's snowing. lucky me.

music innate

2011-01-09T23:15:00.001+08:00

He loves the music player but took a little time to warm up to the slippers…

thanks grandma

2011-01-09T14:29:00.003+08:00

we opened the presents on boxing day (lost track of time, but technically, it's christmas day in the US). christian was saying "Elmo" and then "mao" which is cat in chinese, but he said it slowly because he was trying make a bubble with his drool... and of course, he said "cat". I love his expression when he heard the music - priceless.

randomness

2011-01-08T17:42:00.003+08:00

cold weather has to be the best remedy for fatigue. the two nights i was here, i was blessed with temperatures in the 40s (degree F not C). there must be some inherent buoyancy about the cool winter night air. i actually felt weightless. i'd forgotten that the sun sets early this time of the year. in fact, i had forgotten about so many things in the US. it's strange that it feels like coming home to an old blankey. For some reason, I feel more "discriminated" against in Singapore, which at its very heart, despite its cosmopolitan outlook, is still a rather homogeneous society. Not that I have anything against the country, but it does feel a tad liberating to be here. I can't explain this elusive and very very subtle feeling at all. it's like julia child, when she first experienced france and then felt that all along she's been french and not knowing it. i don't necessarily feel like an american (don't even know what that should feel like), but i do feel understood, feel less than a misfit, perhaps that's why eric became my husband. he simply gets it.

on the other hand, the question of where home is pops into my head again and again. is home singapore? is home in the US? we are so rootless in a way, sometimes it feels like a cruel joke. christian has dual citizenship until he turns 18 by which he needs to decide which citizenship to take up, which means that someday, very soon, we'll have to make a decision as to where home is. our jobs may look nice and cushy to some, but it's essentially full of uncertainty until one of us gets tenure. with the human capital invested through years of grad school, at least, we'll find a job somewhere without having to live in cardboard boxes, but still... it's about doing what you love isn't it? but isn't everyone's facing the same kind of dilemma about work?

anyway, it's 3 am in the morning, i was up because of jetlag (i seem to get this as i grow older). i feel sleepy again. time for bed.

p.s. was googling for the tax rates in denver versus those in seattle to decide if i should get flossers (not sold in singapore) here instead of seattle - haha. sales tax is lower here in denver - uh oh, more shopping?

holiday

2011-01-08T11:40:00.003+08:00

the dog and the kid love the balcony. christian helped to put up the amy ruppel's christmas decals on the window. he loved the birds. the tree was bare, we decided to collect ornaments slowly. that way, every year, there'll be something new. turkey was good but the legs were a little dry this time - still trying to figure out the new oven's temperament. had a sip of wine and dessert trifle was spiked with cognac. why do i always feel like drinking when i'm pregnant? christian was excited about all his presents - he had so many this year (!) the videos were too large to be embedded here (more to come, mom - they take a long time to upload.) so here are the links. this and this.

i am in my hotel room, presentation's done, tomorrow it's all schmoozing. jetlag has set in. it's almost 9 pm. time for bed. for some reason, walking in the cold doesn't make me feel pregnant. all that winter bundling hides the bump so well no one gave up their seat for me on the bus. my feet are killing me.

country road, take me home

2011-01-07T10:22:00.004+08:00

finally got in. Denver, hmmm, will we ever visit as a family?
i still feel as if i'm on the plane. feeling extremely lonely to be travelling alone. yet, little babe has been very active, as if she's trying to comfort and remind me that i'm not really all alone. she's better travelled than christian - christian has only been to shanghai in utero. this girl, she's been to malacca on a road trip, macau and now, denver (with seattle to come next).

kids do that to you all the time. you think you'll have a better time not worrying about them running off somewhere or breaking their noses when they sprint to the airport's picture windows and then you miss them when they are not around you. need to sleep before my presentation tomorrow... good thing hotel provides free food so i don't have to venture out in the cold.

usurper

2011-01-02T23:10:00.003+08:00

that cinnamon's really precious. i made her a rug pillow and she loves it but when christian pushes her out, she just lets him have it.

lost and found

2010-12-30T21:04:00.006+08:00

dear bébé,

you were with me when momma made the mistake of leaving customs at the hong kong airport instead of going to the transfer area to take the ferry to macau where papa and nek nek were anxiously waiting for me to join them. they had gone to macau the day earlier and momma had to travel alone with you. i faked panic hoping that the airport personnel would be able to let me back into the transit area. no such luck. your momma might have superb acting skills at times, but not enough to sway the wary hong kong officials. the only choice was to take the airport express to tsim sha tsui ferry terminal and try to make it to macau on our own. it was a very misty day, lots of rain, making for a nostalgic scenery - much like the scenes in eternal sunshine of the spotless mind. i finally was able to make a phone call to papa, he tried to sound cool but i knew he was worried. anyway, we reached macau safe and sound, the ferry ride was smooth and momma was happy to spend some quiet time alone with you - okay i did try to work a little on the boatride. when you greet us in april, we'll travel with you to see the world.

love you always,
momma

{all the little kids were bundled up in winter clothes but your big brother loved the cold weather and ran around skimpily clad in his t-shirt.}

{nek nek and grand aunt}

{momma swung so high on the swing that nek nek forbade momma to play... so papa took big brother on the swing instead}

{nek nek adores big brother, i'm sure she'll adore you too}

{you can't see yourself here but you were there}

{big brother has the most beautiful eyes}

{and the most adorable belly button}

{... and the funniest expressions... i'm sure you'll be just as cute}

flower baby

2010-12-27T22:01:00.002+08:00

christmas eve, the best i've ever had. i cooked while christian had fun with the flowers eric bought. he wanted flowers in his hair, and so we obliged.

it was a memorable christmas. we have our first tree, and we celebrated it first time alone as a family. the evening ended peacefully, we made it to family mass and then slept in really late and woke up to the aroma of pine needles. the babe in my belly was obviously delighted, she was vigourous both on christmas eve and christmas day. hope you had fun too.

Latest picture of mei mei

2010-12-22T11:47:00.004+08:00

The latest picture of mei mei taken yesterday during her detailed scan. (Essentially, a regular scan with the doc carefully looks at the heart, lungs, brain, etc. He said everything looks fine).

jinxed

2010-12-13T14:30:00.008+08:00

postscript: my lunch date eventually turned up for the date - but she was 1.15 hours late and had just missed me. the reason? she had texted me earlier asking me to pick her up because it was raining cats and dogs. but my phone zonked out. so she actually waited in her home for me to call her. i only got the message later... much later... i spent 0.5 hour driving to Sony Ericsson's service center in Orchard Road, waited 1 hour in line, the guy helping me was nice but not quite smart, i ended up diagnosing the problem myself (otherwise, I'd have to leave the phone with him and it would cost me SGD75-250 depending on the extent of the problem). Turned out my phone was fine, my SIM card wasn't. Drove to Raffles Place to get a replacement SIM card, blew another hour trying to make sure everything is okay. That was when I started receiving all my messages - one of them, my lunch date's. Came home, ate leftover pasta, did laundry, the day didn't turn out too badly, at least i got my phone fixed and i was looking forward to Macao and my family!

xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

i know i said that i felt i was in a "zen" state just hours before. but get this, i actually jinxed myself...

(a) first, attended a meeting that totally undermined me through some arbitrary "rules". can't go into the specifics, but i asked whether the rules were a policy and the answer was "no". gave up trying to understand "fluidity" - i must have come across as snotty and not realized it.

(b) because of (a), i had to follow up with some paperwork and hence, late for a lunch appointment.

(c) rushed to the lunch place, relish at cluny court, and my lunch date was no where to be seen. guess she could have called or left me a message, right? wrong. why not? well, my phone had to totally die on me last night so i'm now completely uncontactable. and i have no blooming clue what her phone number is.

(d) when i was at relish, waiting for my lunch date to appear, i decided she wasn't coming at all after 45 mins and ordered myself a burger, while trying to call the phone service center to see if i could get it fixed today (using eric's cellphone). then, lo and behold, i realized that i have my pencil case, moleskine, and a bunch of notes for a paper i'm writing, but no wallet. searched the bottom of my purse and found a 2-dollar note. how am i going to pay for that burger. just then, the waiter brought my burger to the table. i was sandwiched between two tables, and i could hear every single conversation - naturally, i would never, in a snowball's chance in hell, tell the waiter that i forgot my wallet there and then. so i mustered as much grace and dignity as i can and walked up the the counter to explain it all - with a promise that i will try to search for loose change in my car and i needed my burger for to-go.

(e) good thing we had lots of change in the car (hunny, if you think you've been robbed when you get in to the car... you've been robbed by me). walked back to the burger place and paid for the burger. the host was nice to tell me that actually, i could just cancel my order. err, thanks, could have told me earlier???

(f) smiled and got my burger and walked back to my car. drove back to my office to retrieve my wallet. desperately needed to get away from my office and just have lunch in the peace and quiet of our home. parked the car, and waited for the elevator. drats, why are there 3 notices up on the elevator wall? 3 renovations are on-going, one across from the hallway, one directly on top of me, and one 3 floors below. so now all i'm hearing is "grrrrrrrrrrrr" - the drilling and my anger brewing are what economists called: unidentified.

(g) i'm getting out of here to hopefully get my phone fixed. please, let today be a good day...overall.

caught up

2010-12-13T07:46:00.003+08:00

my mom, my aunt, my husband and my son have boarded the plane to macau. me? i'm stuck here in my office because i had forgotten i had a meeting to attend, and i had to stay behind for a day before i could join them.

we sent the dog to the pet hotel... it's amazing how we seem to outsource everything nowadays. we didn't even drop the dog off - there's a shuttle "white glove" service, they pick up the dog and they drop off the dog. cinnamon gets a tick-bath & front line. being lousy parents, we forgot to take her to the vet for a kennel-cough shot - i hope she doesn't catch it. of course, there's no guarantee for that borderella shot, she got the kennel cough once in charlottesville even after the shot. still, it would have been nice to remember our first child's welfare :(

the maid's room is all set-up, new swanky bed, new fluffy towels, new lampshade. we spent quite a bit notwithstanding some blood, sweat and tears. but when you read up on the bio of these maids, you feel that there's always more that you could do. so eric and i decided to go out a little more for her. i've been cleaning like mad - and eric naturally thinks i'm mental. part of it has to do with the trip - i don't know when i acquired this habit of wanting everything spotlessly clean before i leave for a vacation. but part of it is because i still see the maid as a houseguest and frankly, i can't stand the thought that my home looks like a tornado has passed through it to an expected guest...

i'm now feeling quite zen about the holidays now that most of the packing and organizing is done. we are left with bedroom black-out curtains (for the baby), and roman blinds for the maid's room. and at some point, we'll think about redoing the tiles and doors in the balcony. but the packing has done a great deal of good, i finally got off my ass and sent a couple of art prints to the framers and has committed to accent colors of the home (finally! sheesh)... our walk-in closet is done and eric even bought two sheepskin rugs to adorn the floor. it's so luxurious: being able to shower and then walk into an air-conditioned closet - haha, eric's paradise in such a clammy climate. eric says he can simply eat, live and work in that closet.

how is it that december can be really stressful?

2010-12-11T06:10:00.004+08:00

when i was young, december was a peaceful month. i loved hearing christmas carols on the radio and in the shops, i'd buy little ornaments after my weekly trip to the library (Queenstown Library still holds so many memories for me that I don't dare to step into the current one, which I believe has been renovated over the years, I don't want to risk blowing my precious memories of that place to pieces...), i curled up on my favorite cushy chair to catch up on the novels i'd reluctantly set aside during the school term, i'd hand paint and handmake all my christmas cards, sent them on time and received a lot from friends too. and when i was even younger, i fantasized about having snow for christmas - just once (i believe i prayed for it too).

i can't remember when december becomes a stressful month. i'm now up since 5.35 am (thanks to Christian wanting his daybreak milk) and i've been crossing out to-do items, checking my old list, and backing up picture files on my computer. i have a moleskine filled with to-do lists, and when i'm done crossing them out, i realize i have another moleskine filled with to-do lists (i live with two, if you can believe it). i feel myself morphing into a scrooge (and empathizing with him - he's probably quite a misunderstood character) when i drive into Orchard Road, when the stores ads and merchandise are always in my face, when i feel pressured to just get the christmas shopping done. i sorely want to reclaim that peace back - at least, get that magical feeling of snuggling in a comfy bed, with rain pelting on my window that's covered with paper snowflakes.

back home

2010-12-11T00:01:00.004+08:00

he's back! and he misses his toys... now he's deep in slumberland.
christian is a strange bird sometimes, he likes to line his stuff up. he came home and decided to line up all his trucks on the dining table. he lines up his softies on the couch and sometimes he just sits and chill with them... in this case, eric lined up the softies when christian wasn't home all week. daddy missed him apparently...

eric and i are tired from packing all week, and it culminates to this:
"no, don't throw the ball at the tv!"
"no, don't do that to the dog!!"
"no, get out from that box!!!!!!!!!!"

but we are still thrilled to have him back in our arms :)

diminishing marginal utility of packing

2010-12-10T00:10:00.004+08:00

for the 4th consecutive night, eric and i have been "pupping". it was take-out night of sushi no less but man, the marginal utility of packing is wearing off... we are now more impatient with our junk, snippy at each other, and tire more easily... still, we got a lot done... stuff that should have been done when we moved in but we hadn't had the time nor the peace. cinnamon's been enjoying the christian-free days it seems, she gets the attention of the first-born all over again. she gets to nap without anyone shoving a wooden truck in her nose, without anyone trying to give her a "hug hug" that nearly strangles her every single time.

these pictures were taken in early May... when i decided to embark on some serious cooking research and made a delightful cobb salad. this lofty ambition was then disrupted with the trip to Europe and then the first trimester... i'm cooking again :) and just bought myself a le creuset cast iron casserole, the goal is to conquer julia's bœuf bourguignon. the pot's a happy lime-green, looks pretty but ummm, not quite my color (i like the traditional flame-colored ones), still it was the color on sale (and that will make it my color of choice)... although, now that i'm looking at these pictures, citrusy green seems quite sublime...

onboard

2010-12-08T20:24:00.003+08:00

our closet came on monday (it's wednesday night now), and we have lots of packing, unpacking and then packing to do. christian has been at my mom's since monday. according to my mom, he hasn't missed us YET. It's good that the kid is so portable. My neighbor's renovating, which means that afternoon naps are near impossible at mi casa. So we decided to pack christian up and a camping he would go. i suspect my mom's secretly delirious that she gets to live in her own home for a full week.

so, the latest news is that we got a maid. i was kinda against it but eric wanted to save his sanity (what with a baby coming and the "terrible twos" looming large, he's trying not to freak out). so i relented - and i suppose it's a good 5th year anniversary gift (my "consent", not the maid, sicko). i've been stressing about this impending change in our lives. i mean, c'mon, a stranger is coming to live with us. and me being the ever-private me, i like my cocoon/shell/well/cave private. anyway, to make room for the maid, we had to rearrange stuff, which explains the packing/unpacking/packing ("pup").

in a way, it was cathartic - the "pup", the nesting hormones that accompanied my previous pregnancy are rearing their heads and nodding them in unison. it's good to have eric onboard with the house stuff. so it's just the two of us, and cinnamon and it feels like what it had been like when we were expecting christian. me with my stretched-out belly, nesting, worrywort eric and whiny cinnamon.

i've also been bugging eric to get a live christmas tree (live because how on earth are we going to pack away a fake tree in this tiny apartment?). i want a charlie-brown tree and i bet christian will enjoy it when he returns. eric's eye is on the ball however, and the opportunist in him says that we'll get the tree when I and he finish the "pup". the carrot worked of course - i've been busting my ass trying to pack/unpack/pack.

speaking of being onboard, my colleague Joseph has recently sent over some pictures he took in Rotterdam. It was a dinner cruise, onboard De Majesteit . It was my mom's first trip to Europe and i'm glad the pictures turned out really nice - again, i had forgotten my camera that day.

furry canvas

2010-12-06T13:29:00.007+08:00

i had to post this series of pictures because the actions were laugh-out-loud hilarious.

my mom decided to take a vacation and wanted a long weekend off, so on friday i took leave to watch christian. i decided to try out the art class at gymboree since the first class we went to seemed to help christian overcome some of his shyness. the little imp enjoyed his class tremendously (for some reason, the class was full of girls and christian was the only boy artist). the theme of the day was "circle", the kids did everything to do with circles including making a circle collage. back at home, i thought he had wanted to show his daddy his artwork, but no, he grabbed his finished masterpiece, tore off each little sequin and circle he had previously pasted and repeated to himself "circle", "circle" as he tore them apart one by one.

then the funny thing happened. he placed the circles on the dog. cinnamon, being the good-natured canine, allowed herself to be a furry canvas for christian to exercise his full creativity.

here are the videos - he's pronounciation is soooo good!

In the second video, he walked to a spot and said 烧烧哦 (shao shao o) which means "it's hot here". there's a hotspot in the living room, possibly from the ceiling lamp of the neighbor's downstairs.

miffy my friend

2010-12-04T21:36:00.003+08:00

christian with a giant miffy in a rotterdam bookstore
i know, i wish i had taken my digital camera with me
i did my best with this picture using picnik

it was a fabulous bookstore, the children books were illustrated in vintagey colors by dutch authors/illustrators... they were a tad pricey, otherwise, i would have bought a whole bunch of them. they were that pretty!

disposable

2010-12-01T22:17:00.004+08:00

in rotterdam, i kept forgetting to bring my camera so we ended up with a disposable that we bought from this target-like store HEMA (quite amazing that we can still get these). the quality came out pretty good although out of the 24 only 7 survived... (the 17 were taken in a bookstore where there was a gigantic miffy *sniff*)

the first pic was taken in a pedastrian mall in rotterdam (where pictures weren't allowed - we only found out later) and the second picture was outside 10 corso como, milan <-- a store i absolutely love and would love it even more if i have wads of euros to spend...

p.s. in 2 hours, eric would have been in Singapore for 1000 days!

the ox or the cow

2010-11-29T23:02:00.006+08:00

i really like it when christian's pictures turn out blurry - he's in motion all the time... but the little chap knows a photo op, and he poses (!) and smiles (!) who taught him that? these are pictures of him in his halloween costume - a little cow...he's really funny when he says a gutteral "hmmmmmmmmm" instead of "mooooo".

now that i'm in my 18th week, i've been trying to remember how christian was like when he was this old in gestation. at 16.5 weeks, he gave a very distinct kick although i felt fluttering at 14 weeks. i remember lying down on our bed and eric and i watched my belly and we saw this little elbow/foot go "nudge"/"kick". it was like an alien movie.

not one to be outwitted by his brother, his little sister gave us little kicks/movements at 16.5 weeks too. Since I already know what's it like to be on maternity leave and out of commission, how baby-brain-inflicted i could be when my zombied state of mind was always in a fog, i'm now cramming in as much work as i can during the work-week and trying desperately to spend as much time with christian as i possibly can. The result of which is how little attention I'm giving to the little one until late at night... when it's just my tolomeo lamp, my book, my lower ab exercises and my little bundle of joy-in-utero.

as with the engagement, gestation brings about a certain air of inspiration. as is with trying to eat well and stay as fit as possible, my brain is constantly looking for ways to be inspired. my guess is that all this is the hormones doing and i play a very minute role: with christian i was obsessed with audrey hepburn, her movies and her biographies, the music i listened to? abba, and this ponyo theme song. with my little girl, it was julia child, re-reading her autobiography, poring over cookbooks and re-reading harry potter and the deathly hallows. uh-oh, not too dainty-reading, is it? hmmm...

p.s. before i forget, a little video on the little cow (a little too big in size to be embedded in this post).

about a girl

2010-11-23T16:51:00.005+08:00

most of you, by now, would have known that we are expecting a little teensy girl into our family. it's fun to imagine Christian being a 哥哥 (ge ge, chinese for a big brother) and he has taken to calling the sonogram/ultrasound pictures as 妹妹 (mei mei). the little boy has grown so much, and has matured a lot... he's very expressive for a youngster and he could, most of the time, translate words from chinese to english and vice versa (and does that instinctively). when he sees a tragic scene on tv (typically because my mom watches way too many taiwanese soap operas), he cries or get overly emotional. and to tell you the truth, when eric and i were expecting our first kid, we had imagined him to be a boy. so, it did come as a surprise when the doc said we have a high chance of having a girl. for me, personally, i had never thought, until now, that i would be a parent to a girl. and i think it stems from the way i had grown up. girls, particularly girls in a girls' school which i attended, were very complicated.

i went to an all-girls primary school, man, those were tough years socially - toward the later half when we were evolving into teenagers. i could never quite understand why someone would deem me as the enemy out of nowhere, find me "vain" when i didn't even understand what that was supposed to mean until they meant that i always wore "ribbons" or "special hair clips" (hey, my older sister liked to dress me up, okay?) the petty "wars" were never my thing, as were the vicious gossips... so i pretty much stayed out of girly cliques my entire life and always kept to a few close friends only. going to a co-ed high school provided a sense of balance and i continued to be clique-averse until adulthood.

so, can you understand why i worry i might be a bad mom to a little girl? i mean, i don't think i understand girls very well. for boys, i feel slightly more at ease, less complicated.... then, when i think about all the fabulous girls i have as friends, i feel that probably all is not lost. maybe i'm thinking too much, maybe i ought to give girlhood a second chance. maybe, just maybe, cliques are like a facade for loneliness, and i can raise my girl to be confident and intellectual and just not be one of those 'mean girls'....

and then i imagine the strength of bond between the two siblings, how they could slowly learn the bridges of communication with each other, how they have the chance to do both girly things (baking, cooking, shopping, crafting) and boy-sy things (soccer, wrestling, car-racing) together and how much fun I would have with them both, i sort of feel blessed to have a little girl and a little boy in my life. So, save for cinnamon (who's a little girl), our family is quite balanced in a yin-yang way.

p.s. i still owe my mom-in-law halloween pictures. next post, i promise...

{picture from stella mccartney kids}

Hi everybody!

2010-11-15T17:35:00.002+08:00

portrait

2010-11-11T16:42:00.002+08:00

feeling bored...so i decided to update the family portrait.

Working from home

2010-11-01T22:24:00.001+08:00

why does he always make me laugh?

2010-10-18T15:15:00.002+08:00

christian has comedic timing - like his dad. we were at the annual library sales (looking for cheap books - this year, i got a rather beat-up copy of David Hicks at SGD5) and someone came up to us, asked a few questions (it was a mini interview) and snapped a picture of us. i had forgotten about this until a recent email with this image attached appeared in my inbox. if you see closely, you'll notice the box in the background: christian had his first happy meal - and his first taste of undiluted apple juice, that kid is now hooked. "juice, drink, juuuuuuice!" - that's what he'll ask for whenever he sees me drinking some.