All About Your Child

The rates of the taxi fares have risen tremendously especially since 17 December last year. Rates have been adjusted mainly because of the complaints from the taxi drivers, ever since more companies were allowed to share the pie. As usual there are still some black sheep among the flock. Last Saturday, my in-laws took a cab from Clementi to Hougang. The taxi driver went by a longer route, to earn more, obviously. Even when my MIL told him that he should have made a turn so that the journey is shorter, he refused and continued to drive the longer way. Both my in-laws were very angry and kept reprimanding him for (purposely) missing a few turns, then he vent his anger by driving recklessly.

The 2 old folks were with my niece, 7, and nephew, 1. When they finally reached Hougang, the meter read $22.40!!! My MIL continued to lecture him even after the taxi has arrived at the destination, for cheating on them and driving dangerously when there were 2 young kids in his cab. Humph! He deserved the lecture. 3 years ago, I used to sling Binbin over my shoulder and held the tiny hand of my 2 year old Keatkeat to my in-law house, back then it only cost $9-$10!

The rates are really getting way too high. Ever since the increase, I have completely stopped taking cabs, COMPLETELY STOPPED! Even though it takes 1 hour now for the three of us to take a bus, then a MRT, then a bus before we reach my in-laws’ house, I would rather spend this time then to pay that much! Today, my husband’s friend took a cab from Telok Blangah to Toa Payoh during peak hours, $18!!! Ridiculous! That’s the cost of a decent meal for 5 people and it’s gone in less than 20mins!

If you are a reader from another country, you made be interested to know more about this country from my previous 2 posts ‘Tough Questions’ and ‘Singapore’.

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A friend of mine, Aric, who used to sell hair accessories, has decided to stop his retail business totally and give me ALL his stocks for FREE! He knows that I have stopped my handmade accessories retail business too, but is still consigning my leftovers to others, so he thought it would be better to give his remaining stocks to me than throw them into the dustbin.

The rich man son need not worry about survivor because he is the operating manager of his father’s metal manufacturing company and he is only 25 years old. Thank you Aric!

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If you read My Profile, you know I love to sing. Every now and then, my kids and I will have a theme song, not that we do it on purpose, but a certain song would just keep singing in our head so much, we can’t help but sing or hum that particular tune for a couple of days or even weeks.

These days, this Cadbury Dairy Milk Chocolate commercial has been our song. It’s funny, especially the last verse.

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Many of you know that Binbin is a vegetable lover. Recently he added a new vegetable to his long list - ONION!!!

It was so amazing and funny to watch him eat slice after slice of onion that were fried together with the main dish for presentation purposes, not so much for taste. So the slices of onions were big and hardly-cooked.

He would squint his eyes as he chew it in his mouth with a big frown on his face after he swallowed it, and you think that he regretted his decision; but no, he asked for another piece! This continues till there aren’t any onions left on that plate. *jaw-dropped*

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Keatkeat’s memory power is getting more and more incredible. We could drive him to a place only ONCE and he could direct us to that place! At a cross road junction, he could tell us where it would lead us, if we turned left, turned right or went straight.

I play all sorts of memory games with him. One of my favourite game was to show him 8 cards first, then put them face down, asked him to find the 4 matching pairs and he could do it in one go. Seriously, is that amazing? I’m not sure, because I have taught many kids of this age before and I can’t remember anyone as good as this, especially the way he recognizes the direction to different places. Anyone have kids like these when they were 4 years old?

If yes, tell me, and then I will know it’s just a norm for kids of this age.

If not, could you suggest what kind of lesson should I send him to, to let this talent of him soar? If a child is musically inclined, you send him to music schools to learn singing and play musical instruments. So what about mega-memory power packed kids? Any idea?

Yes! Yes! Yes! Can you see I’m jumping up and down? Finally Syesha Mercado is going Home! I’m evil, I know.

When Ryan Seacrest said that David Cook was going to perform the last song, last night, ‘I don’t want to miss a thing’, my heart dropped. The very first time I saw this man on the TV screen, I’ve wished that he would sing this song, because it felt so him. And indeed he did a FANTASTIC JOB!

At last, my kids can tell me exactly what they liked about David Cook…

Keatkeat: “I like David Cook because he got moustache and beard.”

Binbin: “He can cook!”

*laugh……*

Singapore’s weather is really unpredictable, today is stormy day. Rain, rain, rain. The sky is so dark now at 10.30am and it looks like its 6.30pm in the evening.

We passed by the bus-stop as we were going to the coffee-shop earlier this morning. Within that few seconds of getting brief shelter from the bus-stop, I saw a scene that broke my heart.

This little girl in her Primary School uniform with a 6 year old build, was sitting at the bench at the bus-stop, opening her ‘Want Want’ Biscuit. You know how difficult it is to open such packaging sometimes.

She over did it, the plastic packaging broke into two, the 2 biscuits fell straight onto the floor which was already soaked by the rain. She stared at the biscuit as it sucks up the water on the floor like a sponge, she wanted to pick it up, a stranger beside her stopped her from bending forward.

“It’s dirty already, you can’t eat it. Leave it alone.” The stranger persuaded.

The little girl with her hair nicely tied up in a long pony tail started to cry. Oh dear! My heart was so sour. My heart went out to her at once. The persuader has became the consoler now, the lady stroke the little girl’s back, “oh, don’t cry, no one will scold you, tell your Mommy what happen, she will not scold you.”

I was thinking, what made her think that the girl was crying over the fear of being scolded? *Eyes Rolled* It’s as clear as a white sheet of paper, isn’t it? She is crying because she can’t eat! Ok, maybe I’m wrong too. The old lady was guessing and so was I. No one really knew why she cried. What do you think?

Anyway, my mind was chanting, “is there anything I can do to ease her sorrow?…is there?” Let’s say my guessing was right, then all I need to do, was to get her another one. Just when I decided to go to the provision to get one for her, her maid appeared, got to know the whole story, took the small hand and went straight to the provision shop. I didn’t follow on…

Such scenes just make your heart break, doesn’t it? Or am I too emotional?

Time and time again, we go through every day or week, doing the same things, seeing the same people over and over again…we drag our heavy feet as if they weighed a thousand tons to do what we were already so used to doing…what am I saying? Routine…

Surprisingly, though many complain they are sick of what they do every day or every week, they are actually quite comfortable doing the mundane stuff, for the simple fact that it is predictable. Seriously, how many of you like New Stuff happening every single day? To get you on your feet and pump your energy up to the highest level the moment you open your eyes? And stay at cloud nine every second of the day? I guess I don’t see many hands raised.

So, many of us like to go through simple living. We are not too much like popcorns, popping at every little thing that we see, hear or feel. In fact, such things throw us off-balance, though so often we complain our lives are too boring, yet, deep inside us, we are not prepared to handle such intense excitement.

I am definitely the ambassador of the ‘many of us’ I mentioned above. Though uninteresting as it may seem sometimes, I still love routines. But again, if you have a 3 year old and 4 year old in your house 24/7, you are definitely in the training ground for extraordinary living. So I’m lucky, I have additional spice added to my plain and unattractive plate of rice to keep me away from robotic lifestyle.

Every Sunday, I get to spice up my life to the fullest when I go over to my mother-in-law’s place where all her children and grandchildren meet. It is family day for us. With the 2 old folks, 3 pairs of parents and 7 bubbly kids running around, you can hardly rest and can be quite chaotic at times.

Once a week, I am the nanny of 7 children. My father-in-law would be playing Chinese Chess with my 2nd brother-in-law; My 2nd sister-in-law would chat with me if the kids agree to spare me a few minutes, otherwise she would be watching Taiwanese dramas; My mother-in-law would be in the kitchen the whole time, whipping up yummies after yummies; My eldest brother-in-law is a sleeping-king, he sleeps right after lunch and wakes up at 6.45pm to fetch his wife back from the factory, where she works.

So with my mind constantly thinking at high speed, to entertain kids from age 1 to 7; and with my mouth always moving, be it talking, singing, laughing or eating: and with my hands carrying one kid after another, it is not difficult to imagine how impossible it is to rest on every Sunday and even easier to picture my exhausted look, slouching in the van, with my husband behind the wheels and my boys still high-spirited at the backseats, when we leave at 9pm.

Though completely burnt-out mentally and physically, with a stomach full of goodies, I still treasure every moment at my in-law’s place. I know, I am confident that when the day comes, the 60 plus, white haired, old woman and man, are no longer around, this routine will stop and maybe the closeness we have now between the rest of us, will be gone too….its sad but this day will come.

Till that day arrive, while they are still alive and kicking, I will treasure every Sunday as if it’s the last.

SOURCE: Epidemiology, May 2008.

There was a study done in New York, Reuters Health, which reports that indulging in chocolate during pregnancycould help ward off a serious complication known as preeclampsia.

Chocolate, especially dark chocolate, is rich in a chemical called theobromine, which stimulates the heart, relaxes smooth muscle and dilates blood vessels, and has been used to treat chest pain, high blood pressure, and hardening of the arteries, Dr. Elizabeth W. Triche of Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut and colleagues write.

Preeclampsia, in which blood pressure spikes during pregnancy while excess protein is released into the urine, has many features in common with heart disease, the researchers add…..

…..Women who ate five or more servings of chocolate each week in their third trimester of pregnancywere 40 percent less likely to develop preeclampsia than those who ate chocolate less than once a week….

…..Theobromine could improve circulation within the placenta while blocking oxidative stress, or it could also be a stand-in for other beneficial chemicals found in chocolate, Triche and her team note in the May issue of Epidemiology.

“Our results raise the possibility that chocolate consumption by pregnant women may reduce the occurrence of preeclampsia,” they write. “Because of the importance of preeclampsia as a major complication of pregnancy, replication of these results in other large prospective studies with a detailed assessment of chocolate consumption is warranted.” - See Complete Report Here

If you have read My Profile, you would know that I am a chocolate lover to the core. To be honest, I need (notice I didn’t say I want) to pop in at least one or two chocolates everyday to complete my day, even if its M&Ms, so use your wildest imagination of my fridge…*laugh*. Its a craving. Its an addiction. Its like coffee to my husband and to Slouching Mom. Without one cup a day, they feel empty in the fulfillment section of their souls.

So this news came as an encouragement for my desire. Many say its too heaty, causes pimples, makes you fat, too much carbohydrates, nah….for me, I just love it! Ooops! Let me clear the air, I’m not pregnant in anyway or any sooner or may never be pregnant again, so I know this news doesn’t really concern me, just felt like sharing, maybe, just maybe, you might be a chocolate lover too and IS pregnant right now as you read, so go, eat more now.

This was what we had yesterday….chocolatie Mother’s Day Cake….

To all my pregnant mommies, especially Lynn, go on, grab a hearty piece…*wink* Oh, I’m not that unkind, the currently non-pregnant mommies come and eat too….

I had a great Mother’s Day, simply because my boys were angels yesterday, that’s what makes Mother’s Day special, isn’t it? Your kids listen to what you say without you repeating a thousand times and the best part was, I didn’t need to break up any fights yesterday!

Happy Mother’s Day to All Mommies out there!!!

These are the 2 Mother’s Day gifts I’ve got from Keatkeat so far. The one on the left is this year’s present. But I prefer the one he gave when he was in Nursery, the flower on the right….looks like there’s more involvement in the artwork.

Going over to my MIL’s place now, (its the usual Sunday practice anyway) to celebrate Mother’s Day with the other 3 mothers…(MIL and 2 sis-in-laws).

Short post but my heart goes out to all wonderful mommies, have a great day….ohhh…drop that vacuum cleaner please and go enjoy yourself, won’t you, just for today, at least! Try to smile EVEN IF that little figure is almost driving you to tears with his/her tantrums…

HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY!!!

Mommy can be this POWERFUL! How would you feel if Cancer took away your child’s both eyes at age of 2? Look at how she handle this…..

Are this kind of Mom?
Never being over protective….
Never putting limits on your child…

Like she said, “We have to give our kids confidence, we have to give them pride, empower him with who he is and (tell him) be proud of who you are no matter what….there’s nothing you can do that I can’t do better….that’s the attitude….and that’s what I wanna give him…”

This mommy has always inspire me that when we think our kid is that great, he/she CAN BE THAT GREAT!

My car-crazy boys have watched CARS from Disney over 400 times, not exagerating. They watch it every morning as if its their breakfast. Without it they can’t get on with the day. They watched it soooooo many times, they were actually narrating the same words as the characters throughout the entire show! And that was when Keatkeat was only 3 and Binbin was just 2!

Now, its worse, whenever Speed Racer’s trailer come on the TV screen, they would freeze , eyes completely glued to the squarish box that flashes rainbow colours of high-tech racing cars zooming every where and when the 15 seconds shots are over, their active self comes back alive again. Its like as if there is an ON / OFF switch on them. Its really insane.

Not that I’m against it, it just amaze me at their unbelieveable passion towards those four-wheeled thingy and neither Allan nor I go mad over automobiles, wonder who they inherited that from?

Do you have boys? Are they such cars-fanatic?