Bedtime Trivia with Little L

I was relaxing all throughout the school hols. By relaxing,  I meant me being lax with the kids' bedtime.
Make that very lax.

While I was a stickler with no. 1 making sure S went to bed by 9.30pm when he was younger, the bedtime somehow just stretched well beyond 10.30pm for L. (I guess most no.2s and beyond would enjoy that 'privilege' as parents get lazier and lazier along the years.)

And now, in prepping them for the re-start of school in just a few days time, I'm working towards inching their bed time back towards 9.30pm.

While S more or less sleeps without much fuss on his own, I am not having much luck with L.

Forty five minutes later into bed, she is still wide-eyed and fidgety, and very much chatting away. It seems that she is doing it all on purpose during bedtime just so she doesn't need to sleep.

It is always in the dark that she launches into her out-of-the-blue trivia questions. And boy, do they often get me stumped. 

"Mommy, what do giraffes like to eat?"
"Are you taller?"
"Do snakes have teeth?"
"Are you happy or sad?"
"I have three bottles! Here's one for you!" (And proceeds to hand me an imaginary one.)

Every bedtime, I'm half part exasperated, half part amused, and mostly exhausted.

Given any normal daytime situation, it would certainly be enjoyable and funny having these chats with her. But not during bedtime. I mean, I'm sure all mothers (and some fathers) can relate to that golden moment between them sleeping and our bedtime, where we can have that precious block of time all to ourselves.

This girl however, seems intent on depriving me that block of time. She will go on and on like little ms chatty on an energizer battery. Often needing many 'shush-es' and explainations that bedtimes are for keeping quiet and resting instead of talking, she'll lull awhile and just when you think she's almost falling asleep, she suddenly starts her trivia chats again.

"Mommy, are you angry?"
"What's that sound?"
*yawn* "I'm so tired, mommy."
"What colours do you like?"

And so goes the questions.

I've tried answering her questions,  ignoring her, threatening her (yes, with me stepping out of the room since she isn't sleeping), shush-ing her, hugging her to sleep, patting her while singing (aiyoh, sing until throat dry with no sign of her sleepiness anywhere around the corner), and whatever ways my mind can come up with.

And just when I don't think she is going to nod off anytime soon, she suprises me.

Suddenly and quietly, she closes her eyes and dozes away into dreamland...

Pffftt....
So, I guess the battery has gone flat.

Goodnight everyone. Shhh....

Hong Kong 2013, once again

So, we went Hong Kong TWICE. 

Within the same year.

Some people might think us crazy. And in a way, maybe it wasn't the most logical of choices (story behind btw) in choosing our holiday destination. Nevertheless, a holiday is a holiday. And no matter where we choose to go, a holiday is a time of togetherness, happiness and enjoyment. Join us on our trip as we journey through Hong Kong streets last week.

That's the kids posing at a huge christmas tree at the airport right after we checked in. 

And here's L. Posing with (or rather, behind) her Spongebob Squarepants character.

Changi was having a 'promotion' - spend more than $100 to get these 'cute' characters at $3/-. We're not fans of Spongebob Squarepants, but somehow it was so easy to spend over a hundred in DFS. So the kiasu-ness in me thought "Aiya, why not?", and asked L to choose the one she liked. 

Of all the funny and weird characters on display, I don't know why she chose this round (read: very 'zhor deng' & bulky to carry around) crab. We couldn't even use this as a pillow for the kids on the plane. I wondered why she couldn't choose something flatter and less bulky, like Spongebob instead? 

Approximately 5hrs later, we were relaxing in our hotel room @ 279 Chi Residence.

Evidence here as you can see, L having her milk like a boss on the very comfy bed.

This has been our third stay here, (big thank you to my cousin V for introducing this place to us) and the reason why we keep coming back is because this apartment has a great location. Within a 5 minute radius, there are shops, a convenience store, cinemas, MTR (YMT stop), nice coffeehouses (茶餐厅), temple street with all its variety of food stalls (so far we only tried the famous claypot rice and stewed beef - DELICIOUS) and a police station! How safe can we get while walking around late at night? 

The apartment is spacious (kitchenette, living room & a bedroom), modernly furnished and with very friendly and helpful staff! Our stays to date were always pleasant. And so we always came back because lazy me was lazy to look for another place.

After a short rest and recharge, we spent the day wandering around our hotel, enjoying the cool weather and basically getting a feel of Hong Kong sights and sounds. I forgot to mention that the weather was FANTASTIC during this period! Cool and dry. The kind that was aircon-comfortably-nice kind of cool. Coming from sunny hot Singapore, just walking around the lovely weather was already such a joy. ^^ 

And then, come dinner, trust the adventurous hubby to go looking for ulu places to eat. He wanted seafood, but didn't want to go back Sai Kung. So we went to another fishing village called Po Tai-O (布袋噢) instead. (Somewhere that I didn't know existed before this.)

Some trivia about Po Tai-O village:
● Tomb Raider (Cradle of Life) shot some scenes here with Angelina Jolie.
● Everyone in the village supposedly shares the same surname - 'Po'.

Thinking we'd take our leisurely time to get there, then enjoy the seaside sights while dinner, we took a mtr at about 5-ish to Po Lam where we would change to the green bus no. 16. When we reached the bus terminal however, we didn't know where to go. The bus terminal was big, but somehow devoid of people. We didn't know where to board the bus as there weren't any big signages around to indicate. After asking one of the rare passerby who directed us to a spot further up, we made our way towards that direction.

And ended up waiting here.

At this point, although it was only 6pm, the sky was already as dark as if it were 9pm. Our hopes for a lovely seaside scenery dinner were dashed. A green minibus arrived after quite a wait and we boarded quickly. As the night progressed, the air was also starting to get chillier. 

I forgot to take pictures but the bus looked just the same as those you'd see in HK dramas. What the dramas didn't depict however, were the reckless speed the drivers were going about. The bus that we were on, accelerated and stopped abruptly. If it was the same scenario back home, I'm sure SBS or Transit would have received multiple complaints along the way. But not here. Everone in the bus was quiet. No complaints or grumbles were heard so I took it as the norm for the minibus drivers to drive so. 

So I sat there trying to enjoy the exciting bus ride. Except that it was pretty hard trying to balance with L lounging lazily on me and while the bus was swerving and stopping so abruptly, I was slip sliding all over the seat. After about 20 exhilarating mins later, we finally reach the quaint little village of Po Tai-o.

Small clusters of people were smoking here and there, and we walked down narrow village and road paths, passing little stalls selling dried fish and squid.

And then we arrived here. 

Hub did the choosing while I looked after the kids. Again, no pictures were taken of the inside of the restaurant because at this point, it was already starting to get real chilly. And I guess my brains kind of froze. We had tai-tais with their hair all coifed neatly, wearing leather jackets with fur lining. 

And then we had us. 

Garbed in our thin pathetic Addidas jackets, and hubby with Just. One. T-Shirt. How underdressed we were! Such a dead giveaway that we werent locals. Haha.

Anyway, our meal was as such:

Clam soup that was hot and delicious with generous amounts of clams.

盐稣赖尿虾 (literal translation), big bamboo clams (which were huge! About 30cm long each!) & fried rice. 

And here was Hub's highlight of the day - Squid sashimi in all its gross glory. 

Needless to say, it wasn't my cup of tea. I don't even like sashimi! But I was duped into trying one because even my mom said it was good! So I put one into my mouth and started chewing as fast as I could, hoping to quickly swallow it down. But I simply couldn't take the slimy and flaccid texture and promptly spit it out much to Hub's dismay. "Walao eh, very wasteful leh" he said. But I will take credit for even trying. 

After dinner, it was already really, REALLY cold. So much that my fingers became numb. Lucky for us, we managed to catch a waiting bus and thus saved us half an hour of waiting out in frosty winds. It took awhile for me to be able to feel my fingertips again. 

*******************************

This was what we had for breakfast the next morning.

豆浆油条 at one of the local coffeeshops downstairs our hotel. The hot soya bean came unsweetened and you need to add sugar in to taste. The rest of the fritters were quite oily but not too bad. Not much different from those we find back home. We also ordered porridge (not pictured, unfortunately) which was pretty good as well. 

After that we visited 花园街 where we bought these pretty shoes for the kids.

And here is my Mom with her spunky new pink shoes!

The next few days we visited Disneyland and the Big Buddha. 

Here was L doing her rendition of 'Do you hear something coming' while the train was approaching.

We hopped onto the signature cute train with Mickey shaped windows and stuffs, and compared to our previous trip here, spent a pretty fruitful day at Disneyland.

S posing with a gigantic toy soldier at Toy Story land.

And with Buzzlight year.

And here was us, enjoying the Small World ride, when in truth all Hub and me wanted was a 15 minutes rest on the boatride.

The kids somehow associate eating popcorns with Disneyland now. Every trip is never complete without devouring an overpriced box of popcorn. Here, they were having a conversation over who ate the bigger cluster.

And these are the pictures from our trip to 大佛. It was my first time there and although it was very commercialised and touristy, I thought the Ngong Ping village was a beautiful, scenic place with old village glamour.

Village + glazed donuts = commercialised

The streets with the Big Buddha far away on a hill.

We climbed the steps up! A total of 288 steps, and Hubby carried lazy L all the way up! He said his back felt like breaking after that.

So proud of this little guy who climbed all the way up without a word of complaint.

We ended the day with a trip to Tai Ping Koon restaurant for their fushion chinese/western food and this humongous souffle for dessert! The last time i tried these were a good 8 years ago!

Au revoir Hong Kong! Till the next time we meet again.

When we finally reached home at night, S suddenly blurted out that "it's good to be home!"

How astute, my son.

It has been a fun and tiring 5 days where I enjoyed all the together time we had. 

But nothing beats going back Home

Breakfast Dancing Joy

7th December 2013

It is such a simple joy to watch my animated girl watching tv while I sip on my cup of coffee over breakfast. She dances and sings along to the variety of cartoons, anticipating the next movements and songs with ease. (That would also include garbling along to the hokkien songs when she watches tv with her grandparents.) 

It was so different with kor kor the last time, who would just sit and watch quietly without as much as a peep. Thus to me, it is so very refreshing and entertaining to watch her going about acting like a train, a robot, singing like Princess Sophia and Doc Mcstuffins, or simply twirling around like a ballerina. 

I watch her with amusement on the sly as we've realised that if she catches any of us watching her intently while she's prancing or singing along, she'd immediately clam up. 

So I guess beneath all that animatedness and cheekiness, there's a shy and paiseh side of my girl afterall.

Happy dancing my baby girl.
Dance as if no one is watching you.♥

Shared smiles are the sweetest

25th November 2013

They quarrel, they fight
They play, they laugh.
Smiles that are shared
Are never halved.

Their shared smiles always warm my heart.♥

Little Ballet Girl

Backdate 15th August 2013

On my way home today, a little girl and her maid boarded the train during one of the stops. Judging from her dressing, the little girl must have had just finished ballet class and the helper was bringing her home. 

Little girl was about 5 years old and oh-so-pretty! The type that random passers-by would gush over. She had big round eyes and a ready cheeky smile. Garbed in the little ballet frock, her cheeks were still flushed red from the ballet class earlier on. Her bun was messed up in a cute unkempt way, the way that little girls who could never keep their hair neat would look. When I looked at her, I was wondering if Lauren would grow up to be like this little girl.

Then I looked at the helper. Judging from the length of her hair and dressing, she was the typical Filipino maid. The type that was quite 'lao chiau'. She had earphones plugged into her ears and although she wasn't talking on the phone, neither was she talking to the little girl.  She wasn't looking at her, smiling at her or engaging her. She was basically just doing her job - bringing the young ward home.  

Technically, she wasn't doing anything wrong.  But somehow I felt that she wasn't doing enough. Suddenly I realized that I may have been looking into the future of Lauren! With today's increase in the demands and expectations of our jobs and standards of living, it is very common for families to employ an additional helper. It is also not unusual to delegate tasks, like the bringing and fetching of kids to various enrichment activities, to the maids. I myself have been guilty of this on many occasions.

While this scene isn't uncommon, it really struck me then that if I wasn't careful in allocating my time properly between work and family, my kids would likely end up in this situation in the not too distant future.

As I had said earlier, the helper wasn't in the wrong. Her job was to make sure she brings the child back safely. Her job scope definitely did not include teaching and nurturing the little girl. That sacred job was solely reserved for parents. However, at such a tender age, I didn't want my kids to go through such similar monotonous journey of not experiencing, not observing and  not communicating everyday. 

What I wanted for my children who are still so young and not yet ready to face the world on their own, was someone who would hold their little hands tightly. Someone who would point out buses and signs, butterflies and kittens along the way. Someone who would engage them when they made their own observations and comments. Someone who would smile at them adoringly and laugh with them along the journey. Someone who made them feel important. 

I wanted to be that Someone. So that I could enrich my children everyday on simple little things. I wanted to be there, in part of their lives in all sorts of journey. Be it along the complex journey of their education, or along the simple journey home.

Of course life would be so much more easier if I left everything to the helper. But that would mean that I would lose a chunk of their lives daily. And if I accumulate those times, that would account for a lot! 

Kids grow up so fast! While they are still young and think the world of me now, I want to cherish every opportunity with them. Very soon they are going to grow up and have their own friends and activities. They would not want to spend time with me, I'll hardly see them. And I'll be left wondering where my sweet little babies went to. 

I do not want to wait till then to regret all the lost times. Some things can never be brought or bought back and we know Time is one of the the notorious ones. Given our current commitments, it is impossible to think that I can be with my kids all the time. I would still have to rely on my helper for certain occasions. But I would need to make more conscious efforts in spending more times with them.

So in meantime, I'm going to be the mother hen who will hold their hands tightly, give them plenty of hugs and kisses everyday, chat with them, laugh with them, play with them, learn with them, read with them and when they have grown big enough to face the world on their own independent feet, I'll learn to let go and I'll learn to let them face their challenges on their own.

But I won't wonder where my little babies have gone. My little babies would have grown up. And I was with them during that journey.

Hold my hand, Mommy

5th November 2013

Hold my hand Mommy, the plane makes such a LOUD sound!
Hold my hand Mommy, I'm afraid I'll fall down.
Hold my hand Mommy, later the water will go 'glug glug glug'.
She tells me as I drain the water off from the bathtub.
Hold my hand Mommy, follow me I'll show you something.
Look! I made a sandwich! (Then shows me a plate of nothing.)
Smell the flowers! She tells me. Then thrusts me plastic daisies.
I pretend to sniff and then she asks me why I didn't sneeze. (Ah, ah, Ahchooo!)
My little chatty lady, so full of imagination.
My precocious, precious, witty child, you have my full adoration.
When I ask her if she loves me, she'll pretend to give some serious thoughts.
Yes, she answers. How much? I ask. A lot, a lot, a lot.

♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡

I'll hold your hand my Darling. Planes aren't actually that scary. 
It's just the noise that's loud. There's nothing there to worry. 
I'll hold your hand my Darling. Hold it tightly in my hand, 
I won't let you fall, step by step, we'll walk together till the end. 
You're afraid of the water, because it goes 'glug glug glug'? 
Look, it's just because the water is draining from the bathtub. 
Oh! You've made a sandwich? A delicious, yummy sandwich? 
I imagine that I've eaten it up, and now it's all finished. 
You asked me to smell the flowers, (they're plastic!) I obliged and pretend to sniff. 
Hey Mommy, you didn't say 'ahchoo', so I sneezed and sneezed and sneezed. 
Filled with such imagination, and funny with the things you say. 
You bring me such great joy and delight in each and every day! 
I will hold your hand, I'll hold it tight, I'll guide you as you grow 
Into an independant young woman, till then will I let go.

♥ from Mommy

Little L's Tooth Extraction

Backdate 12th November 2013

Today marks 'Tooth Extraction Day' for my baby girl. At the tender age of 3, my little girl has got her tooth decayed so badly, it decayed right through her roots and infected the gum. The result was a big abscess of pus that manifested just above the decayed tooth. 

I had tried to prevent 'The Extraction' as long as I could, by filling up the decayed cavities, cutting down on her sweets and candies, making sure her teeth were brushed AFTER her nightly feeds and regularly checking on her teeth. But when the abscess appeared, I knew that it couldn't be delayed any longer.

So I made that dreaded call to the dental centre for an appointment. Because she is still so young, she had to be put under general anesthesia for the procedure in a day op. Aside from being worried about the aesthetic factor of her being bogay for another 3 to 4 years before the adult teeth grows out, we were even more worried about the effects of G.A. at such a young age. After seeking another opinion from a pd, it seemed that we were left with no other choice.

For the procedure, I knew that she had to fast the night before and that it wouldn't be pain-free. So I prepped her. I read up. Hub and me  talked about it. I thought I was mentally ready after my simple mind had progressed past the 'vain' factor.

But No. 
At the O.T, they had to hold her down because she refused to breath in the 'gas'. 'Smelly', she had said. And a struggle ensued after that, for 4 adults to hold my screaming, struggling, crying baby who was fighting for all she's worth, down to place the mask over her mouth while I stood there. Helpless. 

Me. The Mommy who was brave and fearless in her eyes. The one who would swoop in and rescue her whenever she needed help.  

The one who would smash a cockroach with a rolled-up newspaper with just one scream from her. The one who would put her arm into dark crevices filled with dust, dirt and other unknown stuff, just to retrieve the toy that rolled underneath. The one who would protect her from all the scary shadows and monsters at bedtime. The one who had not backed away in squeamishness in the face of vomit and poos. 

In the time when she depended on me for desperate help, her brave and fearless Mommy was powerless. I had failed her. I left the O.T on the verge of tears after she was sedated, with my face white as a sheet, my soul deeply shaken and my heart painfully sliced into a thousand pieces.

The procedure took about an hour. In the end, she had to have the tooth beside it removed too because it was as badly decayed. We couldn't bear to subject her through another round of trauma in future so we decided to extract it as well. I was lucky to have 'escaped' the heartbreaking episode when they woke her up from her 'sleep' because I was talking to the doctor then. Daddy went instead. But the sight that I saw when I joined them awhile later would be enough to traumatise me for quite some time.

There she was, so small and vulnerable and feeble, huddled in Daddy's arms all wrapped up, with bits of dried blood crusted in several places on her swollen face. But the worst were her heartrending wails. It seemed to me that the helplessness, sheer terror and defenselessness that she felt during the sedation process were still fresh in her memory. And those emotions were  translated into these heartwrenching cries; into a universal language all parents understood instinctively. 

In her semi-sedated state, she didn't recognise my voice or my touch, wailing, crying and thrashing around at hands; my hands, that were trying to comfort and soothe her. She rejected my embrace and swung at my arms, clinging only to Daddy, the first and only trustable person she could pick out from the sea of frightening strangers once she opened her eyes from the nightmare. Once again, I stood there helpless and unable to offer her any form of comfort or assurances. 

Hours later, she was still lying limply on Daddy's shoulder refusing our attempts to put her on the bed or into my waiting arms. The 'procedure', as they so simply termed it, was not as simple as it sounded. It was extremely traumatising and distressing, both for L and for us.

But what that was needed to be done, is already done. I only blame myself for not looking after her teeth better. L is a brave girl and a fighter. I look forward to seeing that smile back on my bright and cheerfully animated girl soon. 

Her smile hereafter will be two teeth less. But nevertheless, it will still be the brightest, sweetest smile I see.

*Note: NO children or parents should be ever subjected to such trauma, unless unavoidable. On hindsight, I had overlooked on getting her teeth checked when she was about a year old and wondered if the decay could be identified earlier and prevented then.
So Parents, please do not neglect the teeth your young children have