side effects of motherhood

One of the things we had planned to do in New York was to catch a Broadway show (Disney’s Aladdin!!) but with a party of four, paying full price for all 4 tickets was a little steep, especially since Finn was likely to either sleep through the whole show or get restless and make me leave the theatre 20 minutes into the performance.

Our solution to this? Lottery tickets.

Here’s how it works: several pairs of tickets are reserved for the lottery each day and 2.5 hours before the show, they’d open up a counter for anyone to put their name down for a lottery draw. Winners of the draw could then purchase a pair of tickets (usually worth $150-220) for $30 each.

It was quite an experience. There were like 200 of us huddling outside the theatre in the cold, looking very hopeful as the names were called out one by one. The winners would squeal in excitement as their names got called out and after the last name was read, there would be a collective sigh of disappointment from the crowd.

We tried this 3 times until finally, we heard the lady yell “Kirsten Kao” and I couldn’t help squealing “YES YES YES!!! Over here!! 2 tickets!!”

So that’s what it feels like to win the lottery. Totally rad!

Kirsten was so thrilled that her name got called and she had a wonderful time watching Aladdin with the husband (whose favourite Disney show happens to be Aladdin). They both agreed that it was a fantastic performance.

While they were watching the show, I thought I’d bring Finn over to the Museum of Modern Art for an afternoon of art appreciation. Despite the fact that I have very little artistic ability (both to create or talk about art pieces), we had a great time at MoMA. In fact, I was surprised that I enjoyed it as much as I did. It would be pretentious of me to tell you about how the reductive quality of the spatial relationships contextualised the eloquence of those pieces, but seriously, some of them were really quite um…nice.

Finn liked this watermelon so much, he stood there and made me take a photo.

There was even a very fun kids area for the little tots to express their artistic side. Here’s Finn getting all artsy at MoMA.

Oh wait, back up a little. So Finn and I hopped on the subway to get to MoMA from Times Square and we got off at 5 Av/53 St only to realise that there were no elevators at that station. We stepped off the subway and stood there looking up at what seemed like 30,000 steps to hike up. With a massive double stroller.

I considered my options, which were a) to make Finn walk beside me while I attempted to carry the stroller up the steps (and hope he doesn’t run off) or b) take the subway to the next stop with elevator access and walk back to MoMA. I was leaning towards option b when a burly black guy walked over to us and said “Hey let me help you with the stroller. I’m late for work anyway.”

“Wow thanks!! But this stroller is really heavy”, I started to say, then I looked at his giant biceps and I figured it would be insulting to his muscles. So I said, “Thanks, but I really don’t want you be later than you already are.”

“That’s alright. Why don’t you carry the baby and I’ll help you carry the stroller. I have 2 kids so I know how crazy this is.”

I picked Finn up and he helped to lug the stroller up a ridiculously long flight of steps while I thanked him every step of the way.

People say New Yorkers are impatient but we met a whole lot of kind, helpful people who would stop to hold doors open for us to pass and give up seats and offer to help with the stroller on the subway. Ok, there was this one guy who tsked and said some words I will not repeat when we took an extra 3 seconds to navigate the stroller up a kerb while crossing the street but that guy was the exception rather than the norm.

On our last night in New York, the husband bought me a ticket to Wicked and offered to watch the kids while I had a night out. Best. husband. ever.

The set was incredible. As was the story and script and singing. It’s every bit as good as it’s hyped up to be. Possibly even better.

Not a bad way to end a visit to NYC. :)

Is it too late to be wishing you guys a happy lunar new year? I hope you had a good one, with much bak gwa and lo hei and lovely family time.

We got back just in time to catch the last of the family celebrations. My mom sent us this photo of baby Theo all dressed up and holding an ang pow while we were on our way back from NYC. So festive!

I’ve missed my babies an awful lot. The downside of rotational traveling is that you leave a part of your heart behind and no matter how much fun you’re having, it’s just not quite complete without all your babies there to share it. Kirsten spent her holiday looking for presents for Tru (“I think kor kor will like this…and this…and this”) and teared up several times because she missed her brother too much. She has since decided that she would rather choose her precious Truett over a holiday in the future.

One of these days, we’ll just go all in and bring 4 kids along with us. When we were at Disney, we saw several families with 4 kids in tow – granted, the parents always looked like their souls had been sucked out of them but still, one day I will do this and live to tell the tale.

Theo has gotten so chubby in the past 3 weeks, it now feels like I’m holding a pudgy little panda baby, it’s the cutest thing. We got back late on Saturday night and I immediately went in to pick him up, breaking my “no waking a sleeping baby” rule because I wasn’t waiting another minute to cuddle my baby. And then I almost dropped him because I wasn’t expecting him to be this heavy.

He rubbed his sleepy little eyes and reached out to touch my face several times like he wasn’t sure if it was pretend mommy on the laptop or real mommy. When he was satisfied that this mommy was the real thing, he broke into the widest, silliest goofball grin.

It’s taking me a tremendous amount of self control not to chomp on these superior quality baby rolls but I don’t expect I’ll be able to resist this for much longer. Chomping will begin momentarily.

I’m sorting out all the photos from the trip and those updates will be up soon, that’ll be fun.

But first, baby giggles!

This second leg of the trip is turning out to be so exciting on so many levels.

We were heading into New York when our plane flew into some birds during takeoff and we had to turn back to Orlando airport “just to be safe”. It happened while we were getting airborne – there was a thud, followed by a grating sound and then the plane started shaking like it was going through some nasty turbulence. I had no idea what was going on so I glanced at the stewardess seated next to the exit row beside me. Flight attendants are usually pretty cool but she held on to the bottom of her seat and the look she had was the very definition of a face cramp. There was definitely more than the average amount of concern on her face right then.

Moments later, the pilot’s voice came on saying, “ladies and gentlemen, as you may have heard, we have indeed flown into a flock of birds and we will be turning back into Orlando International airport to assess the damage just to be safe.” Ok, good call because on our way back, the plane was making terrible sounds, vibrating and accelerating mid flight. I don’t think I’ve ever felt like I was going to die on a flight before but for a moment there, I had my life flash before my eyes. I thought the husband’s last words to me would have been “I love you” or something deeply touching but he turned back and mouthed “we should have made a will.” Romance is so overrated. I married a practical man and that’s a good thing.

After some checks, we made it safely to New York (yay!!) and it turns out that we’re here in the middle of the most brutal winter in the last 20 years. It’s unbelievably cold, the coldest I’ve ever been in my life. Today’s weather was 13 degrees below 0, with wind chill that makes it feel like it’s 24 below.

Look at the face of hypothermia. Poor baby sat very still like a block of ice the whole time we were out.

We had all these plans to stomp around in the snow in central park but there’s been no stomping to be done in this madness. We did take a snowy valentine’s selfie when it started snowing but I almost lost a finger while attempting to take this selfie.

It was so cold that the kids were bundled up in 2 layers of thermals, 2 wool sweaters, a polydown jacket and a heavy coat, all huddled up in the stroller while we blitzed from point to point. The first day, I tried to ask a nice NYPD officer for directions and my jaw was so frozen I couldn’t enunciate my words. “Cortland Sthreetthhhhh…” My mouth was making unintelligible sounds like I was slurring and he just looked at me with pity until I finally decided to smile and make a hasty getaway. So embarrassing.

We could barely make it 3 blocks without having to take refuge in a store or cafe and one point, we decided to just hoof it for 6 blocks straight and by the time we got back to the hotel, I thought my right ear had fallen off from frostbite. You’d think it’s hyperbole but I really did panic for a split second while I frantically tried to feel around for my ear that had lost all sensation. You don’t know how thankful I am that I still have my extremities intact.

But we’re crazy tourists so instead of staying indoors in the hotel like we’re advised to, we’ve been out shopping, being all touristy at Times Square, having shakes at Shake Shack, lobsters at Chelsea market and shrimps at Bubba Gump, ice-skating at rockerfeller (Kirsten’s bucket list complete – I wasn’t too keen on spending an hour out in the snow but she was so excited to try it so we did and while we were holding hands skating, she looked at me and said “thanks mom, I’ve always dreamed of going ice-skating in the snow” so well, at least my heart was all warm and fuzzy).

Today, we even made it to church at Christian Cultural Centre after a treacherous 2-hour journey with 2 babies. That we even attempted it was crazy but being in Brooklyn listening to Dr A.R. Bernard made it feel like home.

We’ll be here for a couple more days so hopefully the weather’s a little kinder to us.

Or maybe we’ll acclimatise to the subzero temperatures ‘and then we can go stomping in the snow. Haha, said no one ever.

Middle of Jan is when I typically do my new year resolutions. I used to make these ambitious lists on 31 December that quickly get shelved come the 2nd of January. The new year high has a way of clouding your judgement so these days I like to give it some time to get to know the new year a little bit better before making my resolutions.

By the time I get to the mid of the month, it’s like third date territory. By now, we’ve had a few drinks, watched a couple of movies together and are sort of comfortable enough to trade embarrassing stories. This is a good time to start planning for the rest of the year and talking about the number of babies we want together. What? Is that not a thing people do on third dates? It’s been a long time since I’ve had a third date so my memory of this is a little fuzzy. Although I’m pretty certain I told the husband that he should be prepared to have 7 kids sometime around our third date.

But let’s get back to discussing resolutions. Resolutions are my way of providing focus for the year and I feel like I need to refocus my life. Simplify things. Let some things things go. Account for my time better.

Okay, here we go.

// Educate my babies. Is it bad that this is at the top of my list for the year? All these years, we’ve been of the opinion that the kids should spend their childhood stress-free. Go play their crazy games of superhero tag (which is like regular tag but with capes!), or build forts with blankets, or have a spontaneous wedding ceremony in the living room. But with Truett officially in the system (and Kirsten about to enter the system), we’ve been spending our afternoons going through worksheets and drilling them on spelling lists. I imagine much of this year will be spent on learning the many ways we can say “yu” or “yi” and working out convoluted math scenarios. (If John has more apples than Lily and Lily has fewer oranges than Ali, what is Mary’s grandmother’s favourite colour?) On the bright side, Truett has been responding well to all that learning so we’ll try to keep this up.

// Love on my babies. These 4 babies are growing up way too fast. Just last night, I was holding baby Theo to get him through a coughing fit. He had his little arms wrapped around my neck just so and all I could think of was how my chubby mr cuddles is now the perfect size for holding. Soon, he will be all limbs everywhere but for now, he’s my just right ball of squishy baby fats. I want to get in as many snuggle sessions with these babies as I can.

// Simplify. Part of this involves decluttering. It feels amazing to need less stuff and to be happy with less. I hope to extend it to other areas too. Focus on the things that are important and let go of those that aren’t.

// Date nights. I’ve missed date nights. Having a new baby on top of 3 other babies has made date nights a scheduling impossibility. With Theo reaching the 6-month mark, I think it’s time to bring back date nights with the husband. It doesn’t have to be all fancy, I’d be happy just to have a few hours holding hands and walking with this man that I love.

// Read. And I don’t just mean catching quick articles on my phone in between diaper changes or kids books (great as they are). I mean getting lost in a good book the way I used to before babies came along. Nothing too ambitious, but I intend to read one book each quarter this year. I’m curating a book list to get started on and I’m open to suggestions if you guys have any to recommend!

// Dance. Did you know that at one point in my life (a very brief point!), I wanted to be a dancer? I’ve since discovered that I can’t dance to save my life but I still enjoy it and this dancing that I will do is not to be seen by any other human people except the small humans I gave birth to. Silly dances, crazy dances, get ourselves out of a slump dances, we’ll do them all and we’ll do them often.

// Laugh. I’m on a mission to fill this house with laughter. If there’s one thing I want the kids to remember of their childhood, it’s that it was filled with laughter. And love. And warm hugs. And magic. And wait, I did say one thing, so I guess it would have to be laughter.

I suppose it says a lot about my baby obsession when I’m already 4 kids in and I still get excited about baby milestones.

Look who’s just become a food-eating expert!!

I would have expected mister chubbs here to be the most expert food-eater of them all but turns out that he’s the only kid who’s taken a while to master this critical life skill. All the other kids tasted their first bite of baby food and they were like “YUMS GIVE ME MORE!!”

This baby tasted some baby rice at 4 months and he was not impressed. He made a face and just let it fall out of his mouth apathetically. I caught it with the spoon and shoved it back in like the expert food-feeder that I am but he just let it dribble back out again, like “eww mom, what is this?? It’s not worth all that effort it takes to push it to the back of my throat with my tongue and then swallow, here, just take it away.”

So it was back to breastmilk for this baby.

I waited another month and I figured it was time for a second introduction to solids because some nights ago, we were out for supper at four fingers and the way he looked at me eating my soy garlic crispy chicken? Let’s just say I really started to feel bad for enjoying it so much.

This time, I introduced him to pureed pumpkin with baby rice and breastmilk. Mmmm, yeah, now that’s more like it. That’s the face of somebody who knows something good is about to make its way into his mouth.

When he finally tasted the food, I think he felt a bit cheated to be eating mushy pumpkin instead of crispy chicken.

In fact, he tasted the first spoonful of his baby food and decided to inspect the next one closely as it was going in. “Um…THIS DOES NOT LOOK LIKE CHICKEN, MOMMA!!”

Hey, easy there tiger, it’ll be at least 2 more years before you’re getting any of that soy garlic chicken action. Here, have another spoonful of delicious pumpkin instead.

Alas, behold the face of crushing baby disappointment.

“Okay mom, guess I’ll have to make do with icky baby rice then.” *sad eyes*

On some Tuesdays, I think a lot of thoughts. This is one of those Tuesdays.

On balancing it all.

I remember doing an essay in school once about my strengths and flaws. My younger, more pretentious self wrote something like “I’m very driven, which is both my greatest strength and weakness.” So obnoxious.

Over the years, life has taught me to dial back on the obnoxiousness but I realise that I still like to push myself just to see how much I can manage, like it’s some imaginary contest where nobody wins. Except me. I feel like I’m winning when I can do a lot. So I keep adding things to my plate. Squeeze a bit here, pack things in nice and tight to make more space, and over in that corner, I see a tiny spot to add in something new. One kid not enough, must have four. A few jobs, new projects, more, more things to my plate!!

Until things start falling apart and I start to accept that by overextending myself so much, the things that really matter get pushed back and neglected. I don’t think I’ll ever be happy not doing a lot, so I guess the solution is to pick the things on my plate a little better, and to know when to let things fall.

Dr Seuss puts it most succinctly,

So be sure when you step, Step with care and great tact. And remember that life’s A Great Balancing Act.

Breastfeeding is kind of awesome.

I could be politically correct about the wonders of breastfeeding for my baby or I could just come out and say it – one of the benefits of breastfeeding is that I drop weight faster than any diet/exercise regime can offer. One of the non-benefits is that with this in mind, I throw in a couple of extra cookies into my non-diet because “I need the extra calories to make all this milk”. Every night, while I enjoy my chocolate chip cookies with a glass of milk, I ponder the awesomeness of being able to magically transfer my fats to my baby and it makes me smile. I’ve now grown rather fond of having cookies as a late night snack and I’m not looking forward to the day I have to stop breastfeeding/having cookies.

Small monkeys grow up to be big monkeys

Finn: Mommy!

Me: Yes, baby?

Finn: Nothing!! Hahahahahahahhahahhaahaha.

Me: Eh, monkey!! Aren’t you a bit young to be up to this monkey business? Is Finn Finn a good boy or a monkey?

Finn: A good…monkey.

Also, this is Finn learning how to wink at the ladies. This one will grow up to be a handful.

*In case you missed it, I’m having a special “12 Days of Christmas Giveaway” over on the Mother, Inc. Facebook page. We’re into day 3, with 9 more to go.

Go join if you haven’t already done so, lots of really great gifts in there that you don’t want to miss.

A month in and we’re still trying to get our groove with this 4-kid routine. It’s turning out to be trickier than I thought – meal times that have to sync with nap times that have and milk times and bath times and a whole bunch of other unscheduled times like spelling practice and reading and crazy games.

More often than not, it’s just a series of mayhem moments that last throughout the day.

But then right there in the middle of a crazy day, there’s one of these moments, the “4 kids? Nailed it!” kind of moments.