oh boy!

The lil guy and I at the Botanic Gardens some weeks ago (yes, that's how late i've been in updating my photos!)

We're back in action! Mommy's tummy has stopped running, and Grandpa's attack of the shingles seem to be at the end stage. I declare ourselves officially "safe" enough for public interaction with other human beings.....

On saturday, i brought him to a free sampler of ACT 3's class for the VERY YOUNG. Remember ACT 3 - all those from my generation? Ruby Lim-Yang (who used to be the single Ruby Lim) is still heading this amazing drama company for children. I saw her in the flesh, and boy, drama for kids must be quite the elixir of life cos she looks still so energetic and young! of course there were wrinkles, but come on, who don't get them! laugh lines are a blessed feature, i say. But i digress. Anyways, i was full of energy in the morning - even going as far as taking the bus and the train, and then a taxi to get to 126 Cairnhill Road for the class. But the minute i stepped into the courtyard, the lil 'un began shaking his head and refusing to go in. Somehow he had the sixth sense and could tell that this was going to be SOCIAL INTERACTION with other kids, which was still a big no-no for him. I had to usher him into a green room and nurse him (yes yes yes go on and tsk!) cos i really wanted him to feel reassured and confident. But no luck. Soon, there were loud sounds, and noises as big kids outside demonstrated what DRAMA was all about. He began fidgeting and kept pointing to the exit. Then, when the class started - we were led into an air-conditioned room - socks and shoes off. Sat in a circle, parent and kid, with teacher Eileen. Val and 2 other kiddies were obviously unwilling participants. They all stuck to their parents like a koala. Sigh.. It was Tough. I cajoled him to no avail. Even a bright green ball failed to unlock his grasp on me. There were some kids who were dancing delightfully to the music, much to my envy. Oh how i wished.... Then it was storytelling time. He liked it enough to stop wailing, watching from a distance, while the other kids had clambered to the front. But when the teacher told them to "push down the imaginary sandcastle" he gave a wail and shook his head. he was distraught by the thought of them destroying the castle! He wailed so loudly. I didn't know where to place my tomato-red face. Finally, there were more dancing, and one last bit that he loved - climbing up the wall with me supporting him. He kept making me do it, even after everyone had stopped......... err......

Tick tock... the minutes on the watch never seemed slower. Finally the hour was up, and i was LIBERATED. Yeah, let's go. I couldn't believe my luck. He didn't bawl too much at least... But boy, was i defeated. I hopped onto a taxi (no way was i going to try public transport), got home, fed him and fell into a deep deep slumber - the fatigue draining out from my digits onto the bed... gosh. i wonder when i might muster up courage to bring him to another class.

dungbombs

There's now a very good reason for the already anti-social me to reach the acme of anti-social-ness. I have become a walking dungbomb so downright off-putting that i can't even stand my own company. it's the evil fishballs that are still wreaking havoc in my guts. Excuse me while i poison myself, fester in my air-conditioned room, trapped with my own gas. @#$%^&^& Poor Val. he must be wondering what the ....!

the runs - and i'm not talking exercise

i think it was the fishballs. those mega-sized fishballs that should have gotten my suspicion up. but no, we gorged on them. and now, 3 adults in the family are down, stricken by what-should-not-be-discussed. ironically, it is the bedrest that has given me the pleasure of time to blog finally.

so here i am, cloistered in another room - away from my son, he doesn't know that Mommy's in the same house - not yet. i sneak off to that place for a quick solution when he's not in sight, i just snuck back from the kitchen, for that bowl of horrid, plain fish porridge - punishment for gluttony all well deserved. when he was asleep, i crept into our room to stealthily remove my 12" so that i could get connected to the world and do my work.

again, the hiatus from blogging means i know not where to start. my internship with Action for AIDS continues to give me insights into the world of VWOs, last saturday we finally got the final draft of its annual report off to the printer's. fingers and all other digits are crossed that the printing concludes in time - for the annual general meeting's this saturday. Gawp.

i bombed an indecent amount of money on a pair of Oakleys with transition lens. yup. i just had to get those Oakleys because mine have served me for 5 years and are still, frustratingly, hanging in there despite its trials. it had once been swept off my face and mangled in timor, and of course, since Va's arrival into this world, the pair of Oakleys have stood up to much more torturing. so of course, i had to go for another pair of Oakleys when i finally decided to make a new pair of glasses. And why not, throw in more Galleons for transition lens that are touted to protect my twinkies? so there. i did it. it's impusive and stupid but i've done it.

then, there's Val who's become the most talkative babe in the world - at home, that is. he's picking up words, left, right and centre. speaking them, and also reading more of them. he finally learnt to say "ah kong" and "popo" a few days after reaching his 17th month mark - which of course has earned him much more love - sometimes i feel like there's a honey river flowing in our house when he turns on the charm and goes "ah kong" and "popo", with that fluttery eye look. outside the house, he's still pretty quiet, shy sometimes. But just a few days ago, he demonstrated signs of becoming a bit more sociable - the boy was spotted "talking" to a one-year old, and patting her head! Gasp! He still doesn't like strangers to accost him - hates close body contact with people who are brusque, and does not enjoy screaming kids. The time draws nearer to our date to send him to half-day childcare to interact with other babes - but the H1N1 has kinda put paid to that for now. we'll just wait and see how the virus mutates or not.

when the energy comes, i will upload videos of the lil man...

The world according to val....

Pensive? Apologetic? Contemplative? Such an oneiric photo....And yes, this is how he most often poses for the camera. Staring straight in, head slightly cocked to one side, and looking pretty sombre - for a toddler. And if he says "Sorry", with ginger flower in hand, doeful eyes like that, would u ever be able to be angry? Charmer!

Nobody knows who Val was In Conversation with. His apple? An imaginary friend? or was it me? Whatever it was, this was a funny moment, and really captures val's character. i do so often find him with such an expression, just never managed to catch it.

Now he's really talking to someone.... that's my beautiful sis on her grand day.

Hello lil one, what are u thinking now?

Getting up to some mischief... that glint....dead giveaway... i've learnt to spot those just in time to stop the prankster from comitting his funny crimes.

And of course, i'm only gonna show photos that dun make me look too goofy! And trust me, there were plenty bad ones....i was truly the most unglamorous person about - what with an Ergo baby carrier strapped over my dress; no hair styling to speak of; no contact lenses due to an eye irritation (i have dermatitis in my eye!!); and not much makeup to speak of - and any little i had thrown on were probably lost to perspiration, and a very sticky boy face plastered against it. I definitely looked more ready for baby combat than wedding dinner! Haizzzz.... How to be glam mom liddat??!!!

Many thanks to KC of Greymatter Photography for capturing these moments of my son - automatic cameras simply fail to capture his all. :-)

hullo again

On sentosa: Val is enthralled by the nicest smelling ginger flower i've ever encountered. He finally decapitates it, not deliberately of course. ;-P

it's been a long while since i last blogged. many things have happened - most notably, my sis got married two weekends ago so everyone was real busy and caught up in that. it was great. We brought Val to Sentosa (where the wedding was held) and had great fun on the beach. I was a "bad" mommy, allowing him to stay up for the wedding dinner which lasted past ten pm. Finally at 1030pm, i couldn't stand the fatigue and finally brought him back to the room. Val was really well-behaved the entire day - he cried once when i brought him up the stage for a 'yam seng'. other than that, he was a real charmer for all the guests. He was the only child there too - since my sis kept it to a M18 affair. Some other parents asked if Val might have a bad night cos he stayed up late. I didn't know. But thankfully, i put him to sleep pretty quickly when we got back to the hotel room. He slept well - no nightmares or anything like that. And we were off to the beach tmw for a morning of good sunny fun.

On Sentosa: The boy is togged out on "resort wear" the day after the wedding.

Now he's ready to tackle the surf! My very own surfer dude!

The babe has really become a boy - i know i keep saying that! but really. these days he's developed a real penchant for toy cars after we dug out those old metal cars that my mom bought for me and my sis almost 30 years ago! he would lie on the bed and go "boooo" as he moves them up and down the bed, enraptured by his own boy world. He sat in a buggy on Sentosa and loved the ride. Now he signs the word "car" by showing the steering motion (he finally understood what i was doing all this while after seeing the buggy driver do it up close) and says "booo boo" for car. yesterday, he finally intoned "kar" with a sophisticated "r" at the back. He's beginning to speak more in Chinese too. Now he says "gou" for dog, and "shu" for tree.

More words he says now:
"may" - moon
"air-pan" - aeroplane
"mama ne?" - where's mama in chinese
"mama - koon" - mama's room (i have no idea why?!)
"cheeees" - cheese
"boo" - book
"coc" - clock
"beer" - bird
"hug" - hug
"tak" - tap

more words he can sign:
train
sorry
sleep
book
aeroplane
kick

it's really fun to be with Val these days - he scunches up his face, making funny faces that guarantee to make me chuckle. He's funny that way. How not to be in love with this lil fella? :-) That feeling of falling in love - yeah - i'm definitely head over heels with ma-boy.

new words new discovery

Val surprised me a few days ago when i came home and heard him shouting, "throw!" it's funny to hear it, cos he says it with very exaggerated lip action - with his lips puckered up, and with lots of spittle to go with the word that he seems to spit out. Now, occasionally he combines it and goes "throw ball!" and then furiously hurls balls (or any other objects close at hand) all around. He's also picked up another Chinese word - ma (horse). We have no idea how. One day, he just pointed at a picture of a horse, and went "ma." Of course, he doesn't get the right intonation, so he could just be calling me a horse.

balancing act

As Val grows older and more cognisant of the dos and don'ts, he's also pushing the envelope more and more. He KNOWS when he shouldn't do something, but does it anyways to see how I'd react. He holds his spoon out and goes "oh no, no no no" but still flings it down with gusto. He wants to see what i'd do. These days I try all ways.... from stern warnings, to strong eye contact, to holding him back, to light smacks on the hand or the bum. Sometimes they work - especially the eye contact thing. I learnt it from the Horse Whisperer himself. (really!) But still, i think discipline's really a balancing act - how much is too much? Spare the cane and spoil the child? or smack the kid and hurt his ego? There was one night, i was frustrated with him - - he had been awake since 2pm and was still going about like a dynamo at midnight -- I shouted at him loudly. His reaction? He laughed, he giggled, he chortled even. He thought it was funny. @#$%^&&*** Parenthood - tough job

why is he so shy?

The boy @ Let's Take A Walk Dec 2008 (Gosh time does fly!)Photo by Linus Long

Val is literally a "long" or dragon at home and a "chong" or worm when he's outside. He screams, he runs, he chuckles, he does all kinds of weird stuff at home but once he's outside, he's usually "too" well-behaved - to the extent of being timid. He hides behind my legs to peer at the world ; when bigger kids brush past him or take his toys he bawls; he seems scared of so many things when we're outside. i dun mean being at the beach or at the mall when he's still essentially interacting with us, but when we're at someone's home and there're other kids, he really becomes another person. It takes him a loooong while to warm up - usually when i'm about to leave (yes, his engine takes that long to warm up!). The only explanation is that he really doesn't have enough kiddie company during the week, so i really have to bring him out to places with more kids. 2 weeks ago, just being in Go Go Bambini was enough to freak him out - - the hordes of screaming kids at OTT decibel levels just didn't do it for him. I remember once we were in Vivocity and there were loud announcements made by the DJ - Val hated that to the core. He much preferred being out in the open. Today at JH's house, he also refused to be indoors, much preferring to kick a ball in solace, fleeing to me once a stranger came up. He even cried when an older boy tried to hug him. HARUUMPH..... Guess we really need to help him socialise more. Right now, there're plans of sending him to a 2-hr daily playgroup when he hits 18 months....

our lil mime actor

i'm pleasantly surprised by the benefits of sign language, even my parents have cottoned on to the advantages of a toddler being able to express himself - he hardly cries because he can actually tell us what he wants with his hands and eyes, and by making lots of expressive sounds. recently, he has also invented new signs for the things he wants but can't say - - e.g. for crayons and pens - he signs with his hand how we would sign to waiters asking for a bill - you know, like clutching a pen and signing something. yesterday he told me that he wanted something on the desk by vigorously blinking his eyes and then putting his hands in front of them. When i figured out that he meant the camera, he was quite delighted. And of course, he never fails to tell me when he wants his milk - now that sign he is very proficient in making. in fact, i have a suspicion that he's now jus making the "milk" sign for fun, rather than when he really needs the breast. My mom calls the breast his opium. it's true - when you occupy him with things to do, he never asks for "milk" but once i am alone with him and he is not doing something, he leaps onto me, signing vigorously for milk. i try not to oblige but when the lil bugger actually adds on a sign that looks like "please" how can i say NO? haha.....see, We've trying to get him to sign "please" and "thank you" - by doing it ourselves whenever we ask him to do something - so must lead by example right....

anyways, a quick update of what he can say now (more for my own benefit as i haven't been keeping a real journal)

Truck - - says "tuck"
buckle - says "tiak"
car - - goes "booo booo"
thunder --- goes "brrrooom" with fingers in the air
cat --- says "mao" - his first chinese word!

***funniest****
"OH NO..." - - yes yes, he actually says that... with a really nasal accent that totally mimics my dad. it's super hilarious cos my dad always go, "oh no, no no no" with Val


other gibberish
wawabu -- we suspect it's from a chinese song he often listens to "wa wa bing" (meaning toy soldiers)
papuji - - we suspect it's mimicking my mom going "pua pua si" (fall to death) in hokkien when she chides him for spilling water on the floor cos it could make her fall to her death


no videos or pictures to show cos i've been a lazy photographer... and also the fact that it's close to impossible to snap him in action - because the moment i whip out the camera, he forgets everything else and leaps towards it.

life lessons

ONce again lil Val taught me something today: no matter how much you plan, things may not work out to your heart's desire! :-) Our family had set about making elaborate plans to visit the Jacob Ballas Children's Garden on Sunday - what time to go? who would be free? where shall we eat after? The adults were in a tizzy shifting around plans to make it one fun outing. And then Val develops a fever this afternoon after coming back from a lunch with my friends at Dempsey Hill (my gosh this is another post for another time ! i totally felt out of place at one of the eateries) - which means all our plans for the grand excursion tomorrow are chucked. Oh well.....as long as the lil fella get well soon. that's most important eh?


@Sushi Tei some weekends ago when the boy was well and up to all sorts of mischief

does filial piety count excuse my spending? tell me ...

So i went to the interchange this afternoon and had the time to stop by the telco shop. see, i've been thinking for a while to get my dad to stop his pre-paid phone cos it costs so much each time we call him. So i found out that if i got a new line under my name for him, it would cost only $9 a month for him. COol right? money saving right? so i went ahead and got him a new Nokia phone for $48 plus a sim that cost $26 - totalling $77, and then upon walking out, went DOH! i spent ! how? yikes?

So my question, dear friends, does it count if i spent out of piety? ;-)

maybe he really can read...?

leafing through nature
Originally uploaded by tumbleweeed

i bought a doodle pad - one of those with a magnetic pen and you scrawl on the white board and then erase everything with a button - when Val was few months old. sometimes, i just pick it up and scrawl pictures or write words for him. maybe 2 months ago, i wrote 'ball' and kept showing it to him. Obviously due to his Ball infatuation, he had no problems pronouncing the word. In fact, it was clear that he wasn't reading the word - just associating the doodle pad with ball really. cos, occasionally when i pick up the doodle pad, he goes "ball" already. Anyways, so yesterday, i decided to just write the word 'dog' , and guess what he went 'dot'. I thought i heard wrongly, and wrote 'ball' and he went 'ball' and then so on and so forth. So thanks to "My Baby Can Read" videos, i am quite sure that Val can now at least differentiate between 'ball' and 'dog' he may not even understand what these symbols mean right now, but he sure can tell the difference. It's an interesting start - cos according to the researcher who made the series, the first 50 words are the hardest to pick up, but once that happens, the baby's vocab simply accelerates, soaking up new words all the time.

I don't harbour big dreams of him becoming a genius and neither do we hothouse him at all - he watches the videos only once a day or sometimes twice a day after his baths. My only hope is for him to discover the same joy of reading as i did when my sis and i were given a few dozens of second-hand Enid Blytons during our primary school days. I am a staunch believer that if one is comfortable with words, and books, you can never be a real loner. I was always at ease with being on my own - solitude was never about loneliness cos i always had the worlds of acclaimed writers to visit. Ah.... reading. Love it!

err.... the fiscally impossible update

okay i 'fess up. yes, much to the delight of those laying bets on the sidelines, it would seem that the odds are definitely against me. i was boobytrapped yesterday into spending. (yeah yeah blame it on others you say) but truly! it all started out as a perfectly innocent idea of tagging along with my mom and sis to the mall - mom had to make glasses, while sis had shopping to do. for more than an hour, i was being the good girl - just window shopping , i even resisted the temptation to make new glasses, reminding myself to delay the spending till april.... and then when we were about to leave, the instigator (aka Sis) asks me to treat her to a coffee. Being the generous person i am (*cough*) i agreed without thinking. Sure, why not? So we headed for a cafe (all this while i must have been hypnotised or something). Then we all sat down, and then, i suddenly remembered that the instigator has a Dome card with really good deals - and then in a flash, i had agreed to also sign on to be a Dome member - dishing out ......$80 ... wait wait..but in return, i got $43 worth of coffee credit, $30 of vouchers, plus five or six more food and beverage vouchers. good deal right... i mean, i was going to fork out at least $20 for 3 cups of coffee and cake.. so why not go the full monty right? haha... right....... whatever. so that said, i now have a grand total of $100 to donate to a charity once easter is over..... please people, stop laying traps for me! ;-P

learning curve

Val's been on a steep learning curve this week, so i have been told by Grandma. The most significant would be that he is now indicating that he would like to learn how to put himself to sleep on the bed unassisted, i.e. without us carrying him in the ERGO and rocking him to sleep. Grandma says for 3 days now, he has insisted on tossing and turning around on the bed at nap time to try to go to sleep. He would try to shut his eyes close very tightly and lie down on the bed trying to nap but normally he would fail. Then after a lot of lolling about and whining, he would finally fall asleep. But today, somehow, after an hour of the sleeping attempt, he was still wide awake and frustrated so it was back into the Ergo again to rock him to sleep. I'm really proud of his attempts and hope that he will continue to do so over the weekend while he's with me... hmm.....

the other significant achievement would be that he has finally decided that he will now sign MILK MILK again with his hands! Yeah! YEAH! YEAH! so now, he promptly signals MILK whenever he sees me and i always try to nurse him if we're at home and if he's had his meals first. and suddenly too after this, he now signs "rabbit" as well! But he only puts his little hands up till his ear level instead of on his head to indicate the long rabbit ears. Cute. Oh, and a self-invented sign for "Scared" . he's a little drama king - ever since he learnt the concept of "scared" (he puts his hand on his chest and pats himself) , he kept going around being "scared" of everything - from the neighbour's dog barking, to people talking to him. Oh, and that poor neighbour who cut his hair a second time? Val bawls at the sight of her - he goes "scared scared" with his hands frantically whenever he sees her now. :-)

On the speaking front - Val has finally progressed beyond "ball ball" he nows goes "butt!" when he sees a bus, "tuck" when he reads the book with trucks and tractors, and of course, his new favourite word is now "dog dog" - and may i say *brag*, like the word "ball" , it is PERFECTLY pronounced ;-P it's funny cos sometimes in the middle of his sleep, if he hears the dog barking, he would rouse, sit up, point outside, go "dog dog" and then tumble back to sleep. Aiyah. he's so cute. i love my lil man.

another observation - i dunno where he learnt this - but he teases people. he would blink his eyes and tease us with it, knowing his eye blinking attempts are so comic. Then recently he learns to pretend to give you something, and then runs away with it, cackling with laughter. nobody taught him this. so where did he pick it up? grandma asked, with some concern today, whether he might become a lil bully in school - since he loves to tease people. hmmm..... only time will tell. we just have to teach him properly - draw out his boundaries for him.... ah... parenting... complicated.

fresh air #2

Yeah. i did it again. This morning, i managed to drag my tired ass up Fort Canning Park again. I was soooo tempted to just say "another time" but decided to just get out of the office and go for a morning walk. It wasn't as cool as the first time, since i was about 15 minutes later than last week's jaunt. But it was just as nice and refreshing going up the steps and circling the mound briskly. I saw a little squirrel scurry up a tree... a black moth flitter up the stairs.. and of course, the endless chorus of the cicadas made me think i was in a forest. Nice. Are you also minutes away from a brisk walk or a quick swim from your office? Do you feel tired and listless during the week? I highly recommend a 20-minute break from the routine to get your blood pumping, rejuvenate your mind, and just let the stress out. Better than Yomeishu i believe. It's free too.

lent part #2

call it an impulsive move: i broke my lenten promise without even realising it until seconds later. and it was for the silliest thing. something that i usually DON"T even buy. arrgghhh... guess what it was? drumm roolllllll......

A box of Magnum ice cream on promotion! Comes with a free ice bag! Plus five sticks of solero ice-sticks too! For just $20.

My eyes must have glazed over the moment the ice cream sales woman flashed me a picture of a Magnum. Perhaps it was the past two days of "abstinence" that just got me silly. But there i was, without a moment's hesitation, i went "yes yes yes, i'll get it" and then realised, oops i did it.... and it was just way too pai-seh to tell the woman i didn't want it anymore. So there. Yup. $20 bucks spent and wasted on fattening and unhealthy MAGNUMs no less....

so that means $20 will now be pledged to a charity - i haven't decided yet. it's silly really. not the pledging - but the buy. so impulsive, so irrational. so dumb dumb cos this morning i was going to buy a bag from Bloom - run by Diana based in Siem Reap - and then told her i was on this no-shopping thingie and then tonight i splurge on bl***dy ice-creams! Arggh....

but boy, these 2 days have been quite challenging and interesting in more ways than i expected. First, there were all those 20% discount vouchers for TopShop and Karen Millen passed around the office - they expire before my 40 days so i had to pass them up. Then, i chanced across the cutest key chains at a mall going for $2.90 but i managed to walk away. This morning, i walked past Starbucks and was so tempted to have that warm blueberry skinny muffin.... aw.... nope, i gritted my teeth and plodded on. I have bought some Old Chang Kee fishballs though - but for subsistence really cos i was so hungry going home. And then, the MacAddict texted me this morning that a cheaper version of the imac is now on sale! What shall i do???? Chewing my fingernails already. Aw........ and the IT show's next week......

Gosh.. i never guessed that i was so addicted till now.

MY BABY CAN READ! ..... not

Here's Mr SmellyBottom Lay with his daily fix of the news. He has, at the tender age of 14 and some months, formed a studious habit of studying the papers, many times each day.



Here he is again. Making some humanly contact with the beings around him to express some disgruntle that he cannot seem to find that piece of news he is hunting for.



Finally....... he finds that thing he is looking for...BALL BALL! Yup, the sports pages are his favourite read. :-) cos he sees grandma reading the papers everyday. One day She had graciously lent him the sports section to browse on his own - and what can we say? The rest was history. He is officially in love with the inky smudgy prints and he flips through them quite a few times a day to find the elusive rounded objects. Talk about a positive influence! Maybe the lil man might just grow up to be a sports journo? Hmm....

wabbit

Val's first close up encounter with a wabbit - he only has those "touch and feel" books with a black wabbit on the cover that he sayangs. So upon sighting the real thang, he runs and hides behind my legs to peer at the furry thing.


he makes lots of high pitched excited sounds "hnh...hnh.... hnh...." and begins yabbering away in his lingo


he decides that Sugar's orange cage is waaay safer to tackle... goes over boldly and begins walking around with it... FYI - we don't know Sugar or her master.... just complete strangers on a beach but this fella went around carting Sugar's box like it was his.


finally the lil man musters up the courage to stroke the rabbit and is delighted with the experience. A little ang moh girl nearby goes "it's a wabbit!" and Val suddenly bursts out crying and runs away. *DUH* i have no idea why!

for Lent

and so it's Lent again... a season to reflect and think of all our past doings... and certainly i've got plenty to think about though this blog isn't quite the space to discuss those matters. anyways, the priest asked us today to think about of what we would give up for the next 40 days in preparation for Easter. That set me thinking of how $ can really change our way of life and i asked myself if i could possibly NOT BUY ANYTHING for the next 40 days.

i remember how during those days when i'd given up a full time job to volunteer - how even a cuppa coffee meant a lot to me. $4 for a cuppa was unimaginable. I ate at home a lot, and met up people after having my meals, and even left singapore for 4 months to backpack cos that was a cheaper option than staying here. when you have little to spare, you tend to think more clearly i believe. there's less clutter in the brain - less options, and thus what you need to do is clearer. now that i am earning an income again and being in the city that never stops shopping and selling, suddenly i feel the breathlessness of being caught up by a shopping bug again.... now i find myself surfing the net looking at computers when my trusty G4 is still plodding along; i pick up a handbag online cos it's on sale; and i can now afford organic stuff when previously i just closed my eyes and picked the cheapest on the shelf. Sigh....this jungle bunny feels like an animal unleashed in shopping galaxy. Thank the stars for the values of thrift that's been programmed into my system so i haven't gone TOTALLY berserk swiping those cards. i know of people who max out their credit, and deplete their monthly income on a regular basis. For me, it goes back to how one's brought up i believe. My mom was uber strict with us growing up - if we wanted something, we had to save up for it, and we never got to buy it at the first encounter. that was usually a good test of whether we really wanted something bad enough. i try to practise that principle as much as i can. and so , if i DO try the ambitious task of abstaining from purchase for the next 40 days, this principle would be something to rely on.

I thought about whether i should be writing about this online cos we really should not broadcast to the world what we plan to do but thought the online record would press me to stick to it cos of public accountability issues. So there you have it: i am now saying that i will NOT buy/ consume anything unneccessary for the next 40 days till EASTER is reached.

i've drawn out some rough guidelines to this abstinence.

1. it starts on monday 0000 hrs (which means i have one more hour to shop!)
2. it excludes daily subsistence such as lunch, but it DOES include designer coffees and expensive meals such as sashimi, steaks, lobster, anything consumed in a restaurant (unless i am made to go because it is part of a family outing cos it would be rude otherwise no?)
3. it excludes necessities such as tissue paper, sanitary pads, toothpaste but i am limited to buying generic ones nothing branded
4. it excludes my $100 zara vouchers because they expire in April! (not using them would amount to waste ya?)
5. it excludes magazines i buy for work purposes.

Specifically this means:

1. i will not buy another new pair of shoes
2. i will not go to the IT show that starts in mid march
3. i will opt out of restaurant meals as much as possible without becoming the most anti-social person around.

All that said, may i stress that i really am not a spendthrift, ALSO i know that i really should not be doing this only at Lent but make it a daily practice. but hey, baby steps are a great way to start.

ONE LAST THING:
if i should falter, i will put aside the equivalent sum spent and donate it to a charitable cause. ;-)

FRESH AIR...

a little yellow butterfly flitted past me this morning as i traipsed through the greens at Fort Canning Park.
how do i describe that feeling of being in the woods again?
the cool, refreshing micro climate afforded by the trees...
the crickets chirping...
the quiet bustle of the city in the background...
ah.... it's been a long while since this has happened.
the sweat that dripped down my back was like a long overdue detox...
i hope this won't be the first and last.

W is for water

Excited! He picked up the Water sign in ASL last night after showing him for a few months. It seems that suddenly it clicks in his mind. But instead of the W sign on the side of the mouth, he puts his entire five fingers over his mouth like a Red Indian about to whoop. Cute....

Val + FOOD = ?

Oh, he eats.........
Quite a fair bit..........
He loves new food.......
especially those of the adults'.....
He's tried even kimchi (with distaste), and chilli (with horror).......
But burn burn burn...
His food gets turned into fuel pretty quickly......
So SKINNY he stays....
for now at least....




Hey they smell Tangy but they're round, so they must be nice smelling balls that Mama's got for me - throw, hurl, toss, pitch....




During that period called CNY, I saw everyone holding the two balls and passing them from one to another - i dunno what games the adults are playing, but it sure isn't as fun as what i do with them!



Now, for a quick laze in Mama's lap while watching the world go by from the gate....Bliss*



Checking out that thing Mama's holding in her hands.... sometimes i see myself in it!



I love CORN! i hate it when Mama gives me bit by bit i prefer the entire cob!!!
p/s: dun worry for me, i can handle it better than an adult!



Sometimes when i'm good, i get to sit in my little chair for breakfast. I love COLD fresh milk, YUM! but i still hate the milk bottle....



Wassup........no mamarazzi allowed when i'm enjoying my milk please...




This is how hungry i am - that i am eating my sleeve -- Mommy.... me want sushi!!!!



*SLURP* i LOOOVE japanese sticky rice and unagi..... so sweet, so nice... i like....

Valente's day

Yup, that was his day on Saturday but we did nothing significant to mark the day - perhaps next time when he's older and definitely a skirt-chaser then will the day be of greater importance (?). Anyways, a way overdue post this is. Been superbly busy at work - finishing up an inaugural issue of a magazine for a *challenging* client and also trying to finish up my second Gender essay for the semester (yes, still late and past the deadline... again). tomorrow will be the day i sit down and eke out that essay. So yeah, after this week, i shall have the time to blog and update photos of my lil man who has been growing (not so much sideways but definitely vertically) and now seems TOO much for his own good. I feel like i have to invent a new language so that he won't understand what we're saying. In fact, there are times i've resorted to spelling words out while talking to my mom. The koala bear still clings onto me at times, but much much less so compared to when i first started working outside the house. But he really cottons on fast - whenever there's a brief mention of me needing to change my clothes or to go toilet, he latches onto my leg sometimes crying blue murder. thankfully, he's very easily distracted - yes, by BALL! so we have a permanent friend in BALL to always rescue him from tears. He's started talking a lot more these days.

Sounds he makes now:
FISH - - phisshhhss
Bus --- but
Lion - - grrrrrrr
Tiger --- grrrrr
Aeroplane --- errrr (plus hand sign)
Bird --- psst ( plus hand sign)
Ball --- ball ball, ball ball.... BALLLLLLLLLLL (plus hand sign - like patting a basketball)
Bye -- a high pitched bye! and elaborate hand waving
mommy - - short abrupt MA!
No --- sometimes he goes "bu yao" we don't know if this is a coincidence but he's done it more than once!

Antics he gets up to:
Blinks his eyes in a really funny way to tease us
scrunges up his nose, flattening it, to snort like a pig
waves his hand infront of his nose to say his shit is smelly
pretends to give you something but takes it away
if you hold his nose, he snorts like a pig too

Surprising things he knows:
Our chinese names!
he points out my clothes (including the bras) and pronounce them as mine

well, that's about it for now, as far as i can recall. will blog more when i have energy......

Val turns 3

Technically - going by the lunar calendar - Val should be 3 years old by now. And boy... has this past year of the Rat been long and short in different ways. Breathe in... breath out... I shall focus on the good things now.... The boy is skinny skinny skinny. He loves Balls (still) and no matter how clingy and whiny he is, set him down in an open space with a ball (or any vaguely round object), and he'll forget Mommy in a flash, preferring to go with ANYONE who has possession of that ball.

He can READ one word - the word BALL (lol) I promise that i am not boasting. It all started out as a joke - i thought that since he loves Balls so much and he shouts the word at everything, i might as well write it out and show the word to him. Of course, when he sees it now, he goes "BALL" but wait.... when we watch those baby videos, he is usually quiet but these days when the word BALL is flashed, he shouts BALL before the narrator speaks. So i'm convinced that Val knows ONE word though i can't say the same for the other caregivers in his life. They are convinced i have mommy delusions. ;-P One thing that everyone agrees is that Val picks up sign language pretty fast. He saw an aeroplane while riding the MRT and i signed to him "airplane" moving my hand in front of him. Later that evening, when we asked him if he saw any aeroplanes, he signed something similar - - with his hand up and down like washing a window! So cute.

It's a joy being with him. But i must admit that since i started work, he's become EXTRA SUPER DUPER elephant brand super glue whenever i'm home, especially on weekends! It's really tough. somedays i even have to pee with him in the toilet with me, cos he wants to be where i am - - literally everywhere. MY mom complains that Val is so much easier to care for when i'm out of the house. He becomes the sticky koala whenever i'm home. There are times it does get to me. Especially this CNY period. Gosh. i feel like i've grown a boy on my hip..... plus it's a little bit pai seh when everyone remarks, "he's very sticky, hor..." sigh.... i can feel the "judgement" in their voices and can see their thought bubbles flashing in front of me - ya, cos she carries him in a sling, practices whatmachacallit attachment parenting thingie, breastfeeds, and blah blah blah - but i just try to remind myself that hey, Val will be older very soon and he'll not want mommy around anymore so i should just treasure this time with him. So there! Harrumph! Anyways, here're some snaps to share. i know i've been so lax updating the blog. He's learning to climb stairs and doing it very well. He sucks at the fine motor skills movements cos he has no patience. And lately, he's been showing some attitude..... boy attitude - - i dunno how to describe it but i think the pictures will explain (you know, with those thousands words they are suppose to have).


He's always loved arching his back and recently took to lying on the pillow by the bed this way with a super cool expression.


Rapping career in the horizon?


Cool top, not so cool bottom. Ratty shoes. Shucks. I can't get down but i'm not letting anyone know i'm pissing my pants!

Life back in the workforce (read: days of WAHM over)

Wake up at 630am
Sneak out of bed to get ready
Val's eyes pop open instinctively and jumps onto me koala-like
Walk around with koala, both have eyes half open, trying to get dressed
Unable to get dressed with koala attached to hip
Wake grandma up; she wrestles with val to get him off me
Screaming fest which dies down when distracted with strange food
Stumble out of house
Get on bus
Reach office
Work; get distracted; attend meetings; lunch; work; gosh it's 5pm!
Get on bus
Reach home
Koala screams in delight at sight of mommy; becomes surgically attached again
Gobble down dinner; bath (without koala who has been wrestled off again);
play with val and beg him to sleep while stifling yawns and trying to keep eyes open
Lose patience at 9pm; begin to look menacing to threaten sleep to come
Val nurses enthusiastically until asleep *yes yes go ahead to tsk tsk me
Sometimes i fall asleep and wake up at 1am, wondering where time has fled
When successful (like now), surf net, read blogs, catch up on news, check emails, never have time to reply or blog
Continue working or studying
Collapse into bed

Go back to beginning....

Weekends are another story for another time

ambling tottering totem pole bottom lay

he celebrates the New Year by learning to walk - turns around, squats, stands up, pivots, runs. HAPPY NEW YEAR, PULL YOUR EAR.

The You.Can.Tell.I'm.Avoiding.My.Deadline.Blog.Post

Since this is meant to be an intellectual respite, i shall list down what i want in the new year. Warning: nothing highfalutin here, nothing abstract, just pure materialistic wants.

1. New Knickers - - i've lost a lot of weight since pregnancy and deserve nicer looking, better fitting knickers. Read: i have a smaller ass now! Last i measured, i have dropped 7 inches!!!!

2. New spectacles -- 4 years i've had them, though they have a life-time warranty, i'm getting real tired of them. Plus Val's helping me destroy them everyday - flinging, squashing, sitting on them at every opportunity.

3. New MAC -- either a desktop or a laptop. Slurp. Yummy. Drool. Cos my 4 year old Powerbook can't open up PDF attachments online - good enough excuse right??? it hinders my academic pursuits. (**roll eyes**)

4. New Shoes -- why not? everyone i know has more pairs of shoes than I. Flats are nice, more my style.

5. New Clothes -- ermm that Zara voucher expiring in April needs to be used up!

6. New eyebrows -- been a long while since i put myself through plucking torture. I don't like the experience, but i do like how it makes me look more energetic.

7. New makeup -- dare i say!!! i have thrown away all my makeup since i stopped using them 5 years ago. these days, if i am invited to a wedding or anything semi-formal, i realise that i have nil, nada, zilch to slap on my face. but regrets at those last moments before an event usually means i go sans makeup. Not that i really like all that stuff caking on me really. Hmm.. okay, change that to MINERAL make up how bout that?

8. New tan --- been a while since i soaked up the sun and my inner melanonin is screaming to unleash my freckles! Come mid-Jan that should not be an issue anymore when i bring val for swim classes.

9. New phone --- yes yes am still hankering after an iPhone but have momentarily succeeded in staving those irrational desires - which really are the engines of this capitalist world. Instead i have bought dental floss to participate in a lucky draw that promises free iPhones - how pathetic is this!??

10. New books -- and okay - more time to read them! Arggh.

So there, end of my bimbotic exercise. Back to the grind. Ta.

p/s: everyone should do one of these cos it's incredibly therapeutic. Especially when you have no time to really SHOP, this list at least satisfies the raging retail hormones within.

hello 2009

i can't believe i let 2008 slip by without ceremony. but the truth was that my head was buried under papers, and my eyes squinting at the computer screen as hundreds and thousands of people were ushering in the new year. Exhausted by the mental rigours, i fell into bed near midnight, not even bothering to catch that "moment" when we became 2009. In bed, i heard the faint 'boom' 'boom' 'boom' of the fireworks exploding off the bay - they reminded me of the grenades and bombs in Dili in 2006. Still, that could not peel me off my rest to catch the spectacle on the goggle box and so passed 2008 like any other ordinary day. I had a nightmarish encounter with Val all night. Young as he is, he must still have sensed the excitement of a new year buzzing in his blood - he was up and down the entire night - or perhaps simply because he, in recent days, has mastered the art of walking and that was thrilling him to bits. All the while, i was lamenting to myself and wondering how i would complete my essay - due Monday - in a matter of days. And so 2009 came by in the most unceremonious manner. You can probably sense my utter lack of excitement - maybe it's the age, or maybe it's the stress of studying, or maybe just maybe i finally see through the whole falsity and manufactured happiness of welcoming new years with wasteful fireworks, helium (animal-endangering) balloons, and commercialism. Or maybe i'm just being the New Year Scrooge. Bah, hum-bug. Don't let my ennui affect your party mood. Whatever it is, 2009 is here and life proceeds as usual, although i do hold a faint hope that things will get better for me.

i had meant to close down this blog to start another one since it has morphed from its original mission (of my tumbleweed days) to something else. I thought that New Year's Eve would be a significant day to do it but even that I couldn't muster up energy for. And so, this blog continues to exist for today but for how long i have no idea.

Rest.In.Pieces.

How do u read this picture? A book so well-thumbed it has fallen apart, or a book so well-thrown that it has succumbed to its end prematurely? To be fair, it is a combination of both – the book has been well-thumbed but it suffered courageously (and exponentially) from Val’s powerful pitcher throws. Welcome to Val’s world where books and balls are no different except for the quality of their bounce. Val is the bogeyman of books, as the bogeyman is bogeyman to kids. I can imagine the tomes shuddering in their skins, contemplating their imminent doom in the dark of night when we have all fallen asleep. They huddle in serious conference: contemplating when their spines will be broken, their pages torn, and their sleeves ripped apart. They trade tales of their torture, Oh you were only tossed? I was bitten, then pulled apart, his mommy wasn't in time to rescue me. Some grimace in disgust as they recount how he slobbered over them in moments of crazed affection or extreme hunger. Others, especially those with the flaps, bemoan how they now nurse injured appendages. This blog entry is in memoriam for the many books who have now retired from service – they did honorable duty at meal times, providing Val (the little boy who doesn’t want to sit still) with endless distraction - Point starfish? Stroke the rabbit’s fur. Where’s the alligator? These noble hardboard books that are now reduced to cardboard will forever remain deep in our hearts. Now, I just need to surf online for more discounted books for my little book warrior and hope that he will one day learn to only hug them, not chuck them. Or someone, please invent some Val-proof books.

And he turns ONE

Here in this little red dot, turning one takes the form of birthday bashes and presents, cakes and streamers, songs and games, and frenzied parents worried if everything would turn out right - so that Precious Baby will have that dream birthday bash of his lifetime. But in another world (where we were from), turning one is a real achievement in itself. For a baby to reach one, it means the baby has triumphed over the milieu of diseases threatening to snuff out his/her fragile life. Malaria, dengue, tetanus, chicken pox, cholera, etc are some of the illnesses that babies in another world from ours have to contend with. And so, that is why the UN's way of measuring survival is to see how many children out of 1000 reach the one year mark, and then the five year mark.

And so, even as we celebrate Val's birthday today, i can't help thinking of all the kiddies i had written about during my time in ET. They remind me daily of the privileges that babies in our world have that those children can hardly imagine. So i think it's appropriate to give thanks to the Man Above for giving us the joy of Val, and for Him to have protected this little man so well, blessing him with health and happiness. It is not something we can take for granted. I want to remember that, for some parents, when they celebrate their children's first birthday, it is truly a celebration of life - in fact, many parents in ET only baptise their kids after they turn one - almost as if it is only now that they are truly acknowledged to 'exist' or be counted. This was just one of the many challenges we had, persuading parents to bring their newborns to be registered, as many still don't have this practice. To them, they would rather wait till they're sure their babies are gonna survive before getting into the whole process of registering, and then baptising them.

So what did we do for Val's birthday?



For a host of reasons, we decided to have a very simple and intimate celebration - we brought him to the zoo - just the immediate family. I thought that since he has been reading so much about polar bears, tigers, elephants and all those animals in the books, he would really revel in seeing these animals up close and personal. And boy! Was the lil guy thrilled! First stop, after blowing off the candle on his Ben & Jerry's Banana split ice cream (that i called his cake), we set off to see the polar bears.



Val was enthralled by the huge white hairy mammals that were the polar bears swimming so gracefully in the glass tank. You could almost see the synapses in his brain firing away like fireworks as he put two and two together - Yes, these are the same white fluffy things i see in my book everyday!



Then, we had a field day seeing the zebras, giraffes, rhinos and the world ugliest monkeys (in my opinion) - the proboscis monkeys with their bulbous noses. just as we were about to see the penguins and sea lions, Val fell asleep, so the adults had fun instead.



I threw a frisbee at Philip the sea lion and was rewarded with a wet sloppy, and shall i say absolutely fishy smelling, kiss! Val woke up to see the white tigers but he couldn't (with his tiny brain) figure out why those tigers were not orange and black like the ones in the book so they didn't interest him. Of course, those white tigers (after the macabre attack) have become celebrities - everyone wanted to see the maneaters.



Coming home, he got to play with one of his birthday gifts - - - -

100 balls from ELC that Grandma couldn't help buying. She loves the fact that Val is infatuated with balls, and reckons that picking up these 100 balls might even be a great exercise programme for her.





Well, he certainly had a ball of a time in his playpen! I wish we could have bought him 500 balls - that would certainly overwhelm him! Happy birthday my little guy. Mommy loves you so much.

One more day....

Growing up...












Funny shot of him @ a mini piano at ELC United Square. To watch the cheesy video of the lil maestro in action: click here.

He's going to be ONE tomorrow! Once again, i am amazed by the speed with which time has slipped by. To be honest, the first few weeks did seem loooong especially since Val was a typical Dr Sears "high-need" baby who needed a lot of carrying, cuddling, nursing and gentle handling. I really despaired thinking, Oh no, this is the most challenging task i've ever experienced. Give me a mountain to climb any day! But once he learnt to smile at around that magical 6-week mark, things really became a lot rosier. I hope that this weekend, i will have time to write a better, and more thought out The Year in Review on that boy named Val. Oh, and Val's managing to walk up to six steps now (click here to see video) before collapsing into a sack of giggles. He's also crawling strangely - - like doing a wheelbarrow push - lifting his kneecaps away from the ground so instead of looking up, he stares a lot at the ground and of course, ends up crawling smack into walls, doors, you name it. Sigh.