It seems surreal that in about 12 hours, I’ll be on a plane to Florida for the Disney Social Media Moms Celebration. We’re not bringing the kids along this time so it’ll be the first time since they were born that we’ll be apart for 10 days. That’s 240 hours of not being able to snuggle in bed or smell the faint strawberry scent their freshly-washed hair or nibble on their cheeks. Something tells me that I’m not going to make it.
In short, I’m going into severe baby separation anxiety mode. 10 bucks says that I’ll bawl like a baby when I board the plane.
Also, I’m pretty sure these are the symptoms of extreme separation anxiety.
1. I’m becoming schizophrenic. I spent the last 24 hours alternating between “WHOOOO I’M LEAVING!” and “I CAN’T GO I MISS MY BABIES”, sometimes within the span of 5 seconds.
2. I have been squeezing the life out of both my kids. I’m trying to hug them extra to make up for the next 10 days, so they’ve practically been stuck to my hips all day. So much so that Truett is all “ENOUGH MOMMY” and Kirsten joins in with “don’t want mommy to hugggggg.”
3. Which is the point I sigh dramatically and say, “you guys will miss me when I’m gone.”
4. I’m considering stealing their precious duck and blankie for my trip so I can breathe in their smell and imagine they’re there with me. The only thing stopping me is the knowledge that my mom and in-laws will kill me for the 10 sleepless nights ahead of them.
5. I’m making soppy videos of my kids so I can watch them over and over again when I’m there. Like these.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D4jdjsB6Rwg
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VEAChqdXWC0
PS. I’ll post pictures when I’m there. Stay tuned.
I came across this ugly dating site recently and it’s got one of the best copy I’ve read in a while. I spent 10 minutes straight laughing till I had tears and then I made the husband read it because it’s exactly the kind of thing we both like. Yes, other marriages are built on awesome things like trust and sacrifice while ours is built mostly upon a shared appreciation for quirky humor.
As I wiped the tears of mirth from my eyes, I got to thinking about the cliches parents love to tell their kids. Like it’s not important how you look on the outside but who you really are on the inside. Or inner beauty counts for more than one’s outward appearance.
Sounds profound and credible but really a ginormous load of bollocks.
Let’s face it, the popular kids in school are almost always the best looking ones. Take for example the jocks with the tight muscles, chiseled features and boyish charm – every girl wants to be with them and every guy wants to be them.
3. Good looking people have it easier in life
By easier, I mean that they are more likely to get what they want by batting an eyelid or a seductive glance thrown in with a hair flick. They never queue up for clubs, never have to buy their own drinks and never ever have to make the first move.
With all that in mind, why in the world would I ever tell my child that their appearance is unimportant? I’m not saying that inner beauty is not important but it’s only by a twisted logic of fairness in the universe can we argue that it’s mutually exclusive. I’m all for being beautiful on the inside but people are less inclined to look for it if they have to dig through 27 layers of ugly to get there.
What I teach the kids is that they shouldn’t judge others by how they look and learn to appreciate inner beauty because good-looking people aren’t always good people. At the same time, I also teach them that first appearances do matter and they will go through life having many people judge them based on how they look.
If they have crazy hair, people will assume at first glance that they are at least a little bit crazy. If they have terrible dressing, people will mistake them for a hobo. If they have bad breath and smelly feet, people without nasal problems will keep their distance. If they walk with a slouch, people will subconsciously think they’re lazy. If they are brash and crude, well, that’s just bad manners.
While they’re young, I take it as my responsibility to make sure they look good. That includes giving them a haircut that enhances their features, dressing them well (not necessarily expensively, just nicely), teaching them proper grooming habits, choosing nice spectacles (if they ever need specs), keeping them at the right weight, ensuring good posture and so on.
It’s a romantic notion that we should be loved for who we really are so we don’t have to try to hard to impress others with our looks but again, that only works if you look like Kate Beckinsale without makeup. For the rest of us, we have to put in some serious work in the looks department.
Now, I agree that there’s no one version of beauty and that it’s in the eye of the beholder. I’m just talking about general consensus here. If 9/10 objective strangers think you’re hot, you’re probably hot. Conversely, if 10/10 think you look like Kim Jong Il on a bad day, that’s some pretty strong indication that a revamp is in order.
I get that not everyone is born with the best features but the important thing is to work with what we have. If you look like a 3, try to bump it up to a 6 or 7, you know what I mean. If you’re already a 7, no harm going for a 9.5.
In summary, I guess what I’m saying is that looks matter more than we like to admit. We think that we’re mature for being able to appreciate inner beauty but secretly, we all judge others based on how they look whether we’re conscious of it or not. So why not teach our kids to look their best so they get to be beautiful on the inside and out.
This is going to be long, I just got back from KL after 3 days. While everyone else was out doing their Chinese New Year rounds, we drove 4 hours out to KL for a getaway (without the kids yay!)
For 3 days, I had the husband all to myself, feeling all young and in love like we did before the kids came along and our days revolved around baby food and nappy changes. You know what I mean right, when the kids are around, we go into parent survival mode and there’s little time for long walks and long snuggles.
Speaking of our lovely neighboring country, most people don’t know that I spent 21 years of my life as a Malaysian citizen, 6 years actually living there and every single day after that being thankful that I didn’t have to grow up there. It’s nice to go back for a spot of shopping every couple of years but I can’t imagine what my life would be like if my parents didn’t move us all to Singapore when I was 7.
Anyway, this time, we stayed at the Mandarin Oriental (courtesy of a couple of friends), the best hotel in KL according to Tripadvisor. The hotel was gorgeous, the service impeccable and the location nothing less than spectacular. It was literally a 2-minute walk to the KLCC shopping mall.
Now for the best moments hall of fame:
1. Taking a bus to Peel Road for lunch
This was particularly memorable because a. we went back to the same gem of a roadside stall that my daddy used to bring us to all the time when we were growing up and b. the bus ride there was a throwback to the 80s.
2. Swimming in the infinity pool overlooking KLCC at night
We had a brilliant view of the city skyline and got to gaze at the stars in the night sky as we took a leisurely swim.
3. NOT going for a sleazy massage
One of the things I really wanted to do was to go for a massage and we saw a couple of massage places along the streets of Bukit Bintang with aggressive touters. They ambushed us with posters that looked something like this as we walked past.
But mostly what I saw was this.
Not technically on the menu but you could also choose special packages with chlamydia, kaposi’s sarcoma or warts. Thanks but no thanks.
4. Made friends with a Hungarian couple on the train
It was serendipitious that we were all waiting for a shuttle bus back to town from Ikea that never came so we decided to share a cab to the train station and take the train back together. We traded stories and email addresses the whole way back. Now we have friends if we ever decide to go to Budapest.
5. Dinner at Bubba Gump
We last had dinner at Bubba Gump 4 years ago at San Francisco’s Fisherman’s Wharf. I have been dreaming of the shrimpin’ dippin’ broth since then. There was no way we were going to be in KL and pass on that lovely shrimp goodness.
Less than awesome moments hall of fame:
1. Shopping at Chinatown
It was totally hardcore. You could get everything from replica watches to sexy panties at ridiculous prices. Only thing was you had to bargain with the gangster stall owners who looked like they were going to stab you if you bargained too low or worse, bargained and then changed your mind. Seriously, don’t do it.
2. Watching a carjacker in action
We were on the way to Chinatown when we saw this guy use a long metal device to pick the lock in less than 5 seconds. We were too shocked to react and also, we didn’t want to get shot for trying to be a hero. Not in a deserted alleyway.
3. Driving in the wrong direction for an hour.
So we were all packed and ready to drive home and I was all “trust me, I know the way, we just got to follow the signs and we’ll be home in no time.” I drove for an hour in the opposite direction and almost reached the Batu Caves before getting directions from a gas station. Not one of my finer moments.
4. Got stopped by the cops for speeding.
I’m developing a habit of getting pulled over for speeding on holiday. Allegedly, I was going 95km/h on a stretch which was supposedly 80km/h. In my defense, there were no signs to state the change in speed limit and I’m not entirely sure I was in fact over the speed limit.
Scumbag bloodsucking lazy buggers. I should have packed a vial of STDs for them.
5. Getting stuck in a jam for 351 kilometers.
Apparently, the entire population of Malaysia (and Singapore) was heading south on the Malaysian highway yesterday. Driving 351km is ok when you’re going at 110km/h. When you’re doing 20km/h, the experience is exquisitely excruciating. I almost peed in my pants several times.
1. Whenever I ask Kirsten to turn around, she always turns a full 360 degrees to land in the same spot. When she turns around, she turns A ROUND.
2. To the kids, every type of meat is called chicken. Fish is chicken, pork is chicken and chicken is chicken. Good thing they love chicken.
3. According to Truett, only horses and cows eat green vegetables. What does Truett eat? Gummies.
4. Something special is code for chips, chocolate, popcorn or candy. Gummies aren’t considered something special because they’re supposed to get them everyday.
5. Kirsten knows the right names for all the body parts except for belly button, which is called ORT. Because whenever she digs momma’s belly button, momma always goes OUCH.
6. The kids unanimously go “UNCLE!! What are you doing??” with vigorous hand gestures every time I have to jam the brakes while driving. I’m not saying who they learnt it from.
7. When Tru is supposed to eat vegetables, he falls mysteriously ill and “needs to vomit”. When it’s time for ice-cream, he’s miraculously not coughing or vomiting.
9. Telling them not to do stuff is basically saying “kids, this is more fun than riding a unicorn while feasting on gummies; you want to do this if it’s the last thing you do”.
10. They are more likely to do something if I can somehow manage to con one kid into doing it. “See, korkor/meimei is doing this” is extremely effective.
When you have a newborn who ignores everything that you say, you don’t mind making scrunchy faces and goochie-goo sounds at your adorable little snookums all day. “Oooh smile for momma, princess cupcake snuggly pants…so cute, you’re putting your fist in your tiny mouth you’re going to be such a genius…” and so on.
When you have a toddler who ignores everything that you say for the 15,000th time, you want to hang him upside down on a meat hook (only through his pants, aight?) and make high-pitched shrieking noises that shatter your living room windows. “NOOOOOOOO, DON’T DUNK MY IPHONE IN THE TOILET BOWL, THAT’S THE THIRD TIME!!!!”
Now the trick is to make them listen before you get to the point where you are in danger of losing your marbles. I’ve realized that using words of varying decibles can only do so much and there comes a time where other more effective methods must be employed, which will not only reduce the strain on your vocal chords but also make life a lot more enjoyable.
1. Create plausible imaginary scenarios of undesirable outcomes.
At one point, Truett developed the nasty habit of putting gummies in his mouth and taking them out to examine after coating it with a thick layer of saliva, followed up by smearing his sticky fingers all over my person/clothes/furniture. I was turning into a broken record of “Stop taking out your gummy or I will take it away”, which was as effective as not saying anything at all.
Short of not giving him any more gummies, I found a live ant, put it on his hand and told him that he will be bitten by ants if he takes out his gummies again. Following a major freak out session of the “I don’t want ants to bite me” variety, now all I need to do is say ants whenever he so much as thinks of taking out his gummy. Bam, problem solved. For bigger kids, you can use cockroaches, lizards or spiders.
*To the argument that it is effectively lying to the kids and inculcating unnecessary phobias, I’d say that in view of having my person/clothes/furniture face an imminent threat of ant infestation, it is both true and *entirely* necessary.
2. Create friendly competition with awesome prizes that they will want to give both their kidneys and a lung for.
Take mealtimes for example. If you have kids who prefer to stir their food, keep it in their mouths for hours, spit it out and fling it around regardless of how many times you tell them to finish their food, you want to encourage some competition. Get a prize like a lollipop covered in chocolate and drizzled with caramel sauce for the one who finishes first. Then sit back and watch them eat brocoli with alarming speed and without the usual accompanying puke faces.
If you have one kid consistently winning all the prizes, level the playing field a little and give him 5 extra celery sticks, like a handicap. You want both kids to have a fair chance of winning.
3. Play the wild card every once in a while to keep them on their toes.
If you find yourself nagging at them to pick up their toys for the 42nd time in a day, chances are they’re blocking out whatever you’re saying with a skill called selective listening. In order to make them practice HOLISTIC listening, you have to completely lose your cool when they least expect it. So at the 43rd time of nagging, you start grabbing your hair and flailing your arms while screeching “PICK UP YOUR TOYS NOW, if I have to say one more time…” Then calmly smile and leave the room.
The difference between this and really losing it is that this is a preemptive strike and you’re still in control. Also, it’s very cathartic so you don’t get pushed over the edge.
I’ve finally thrown out my bathtub. Not the baby or the bathwater, but the entire bathtub.
I’ve been wanting to do it for a long time now, because it’s been accumulating algae and fungus at the bottom from being left on the moist bathroom floor for two years. I know the responsible thing to do is to scrub it and hang it up in a dry place after every bath but that happens up to 4 times a day (2 for each kid) in my house and it just seems like an exercise in futility to keep cleaning it and hanging it up and taking it down when I can just leave it there.
At first, when I was still obsessed with de-germinating every surface my newborn came into contact with, I would scrub the tub at the end of every day. Which turned into once a week, then a month, then never. Now it just sits there on my bathroom floor with its algae and unscrubbable dirt, just taunting me.
The only thing that’s been keeping me from chucking the tub out are these happy moments of peaceful coexistence.
That and the fact that my attempts at making them bathe standing up haven’t been entirely successful. They are like 80-year-olds with arthritis whose legs give way after 30 seconds of standing in the shower and they end up sitting on floor. And they keep harassing me for bath toys because “momma, you can’t expect me to just stand here for 3 whole minutes without any toys, right?”
Last Saturday, during our weekly clean up of the house, we decided it was time to get rid of the tub and replace it with a tiny stool for them to sit on during their bath sessions. My bathroom suddenly looks so HUGE and I don’t have to navigate past a minefield every time I need to pee.
And here’s why a stool is so, so much better a bathtub.
1. In and out in 3 minutes flat.
Bathtubs encourage prolonged soaking. A quickie bath defeats the very point of having a tub full of water to soak in. You spend 5 minutes filling the tub, throwing in bath toys, adding a few drops of that organic bubble bath, and you feel like you need to make it count. But with standing showers, the whole point is to do your thing and get out of there in the shortest time possible.
2. 4 words: Poop in the tub.
This is every bit as EEEEWWW GROSS as it sounds. It’s happened to me enough times to make me hate tub time. Once, it happened during a particularly bubbly bath and I didn’t even notice it until I was pouring the soapy water into the drain when I discovered several brownish lumps which I presume have already disintegrated after having been swirled around for half an hour. This was also after I got them all dried and changed. Immediate re-shower.
3. 4 more words: Pee in the tub.
This could be better or worse than having poop in the tub, depending on how you look at it. The good thing is that pee is always less gross than poop – it’s colorless and mixes fairly well with bath water so much so that you usually can’t tell if it has happened. But not knowing for sure means that there’s always the chance they could be walking around all day with a layer of pee residue.
4. Slimy squirties.
They always make these bath squirties look so cute and colorful and you think of how awesome these would be in the bath, squirting fountains of water in all its majestic glory. But what they don’t tell you is that it is nigh impossible to squeeze out every drop of water from these sneaky little water traps. You’ll either be the sucker who spends 15 minutes squeezing squirties after every bath or the sucker who has a bunch of slimy algae-covered squirties after a month; your choice.
5. Save the earth.
Save water, save the earth. Do I really need to explain this? Didn’t think so.
A lot of moms get really stressed out over cleaning. I used to be one of them, especially when it seems like I’m spending so much time cleaning and things never stays clean for more than half a day and I get all frustrated and start yelling at everyone a lot more, which is all so unnecessary. Until I discovered a formula to determine what needs to be cleaned up immediately and what doesn’t. Now my house is in a constant state of disarray but the important thing is that I feel SO much better.
Formula:
M (How bad is the mess) x B (How much does it bother you) / H (How long it is likely to stay clean) = C (Should I clean?)
Let me illustrate with examples to make it clearer.
#1: Kid’s Room = Don’t Clean
I call this the war zone because epic battles go on in here. At any given point in the day, someone will be emptying boxes of toys into a massive heap on the floor and then someone else will observe the destruction, throw her head back in maniacal laughter, and proceed to fling toys everywhere. Because it’s so fun to watch mommy grab her head and look horrified.
I used to categorize their toys into neat little boxes. One for vehicles, one for play cooking, one for animals, one for pirates and one for weird items (broken doll limbs, that kind of thing) that don’t fit anywhere else. I had a whole complicated organizational system going on that made the Dewey Decimal System look like child’s play. But the moment it’s all neatly packed up, they would drag out all the boxes and dump them onto the floor all over again in less than a second.
With the formula, I’ve learnt to leave it the hell alone. That way, I didn’t have to spend hours packing up or nagging at them to pack up only for it to be messed up again. WIN.
#2: Dishes, Laundry, Spills = Clean
No brainer. It’s relatively easy to clean and it stays clean for a decent amount of time. I mean, only slobs leave dishes piled up in the sink for weeks and I’m no slob. Only a cleaning pragmatist. There’s a difference.
#3: Living room = Debatable
I have clearly demarcated territory in my house. The kids know that toys are meant to be played with in the room but the occasional toy encroaches into my space and I put it right back where it belongs, i.e., the war zone. Other times, I leave it until the end of the day when I do my evening clean up of the house.
Cleaning is like money – there’s never enough. Everything could always be cleaner if it bothers you enough to get off your ass and put on those scrubbing gloves. Or if you have someone to do it for you then just flog them every now and then to give them some added motivation. But if you find yourself getting all high strung over cleaning, I suggest you try the formula and spend that cleaning time having a cup of coffee.
