Anniversaries and stuff

These are some strange times. We were supposed to be in Austin for the South by Southwest conference and 3 days before we were scheduled to leave, the whole event got cancelled and everything escalated everywhere so we decided it was best to stick around at home instead.

Times like these, I’m glad Singapore is our home and I can’t think of anywhere safer to be right now.

The kids are pleased about this development. Well at least my 3 babies are pleased; they were like “You’re not leaving anymore? I can spend all my time with you now? YEAHHHHH!!” while the 2 big kids were all “Ummm, so does that mean we won’t have 2 whole weeks without parental supervision? Aw mannn, I mean…yay??”

Sigh, almost-teenagers are breaking my heart.

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Hayley has finally started school and it’s been rough. On me, mostly.

This baby is having a great time hanging out with kids her age and after a fabulous start (zero tears!), she’s acting like she’s done this all her life.

The school recommended easing her in with a half day program on the first week but she was totally flexing by volunteering to do the whole full day right from the get go. “Are you sure? I can come pick you early if you’d like,” I offered, but she just put her little baby hand on my shoulder and said, “I got this, mom.” Okay, yes ma’am!

And to think that there was a time where I was complaining about not having enough me time. 2008 sleep-deprived, postpartum me clearly knew nothing about how good she had it. Now, I’m a walking cliche of a mom who’s wistfully browsing old baby photos and going on about how these babies used to be all mine all the time.

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It’s our anniversary today. 13 years in and I still wake up feeling like the luckiest girl in the world because this guy right here is the one I want to spend all my good days and bad days and average boring days with. I think that means I still kind of like him.

Also, these kids have set the bar for planning surprise parties. They put together a whole dinner thing for us yesterday and it was straight up the best anniversary celebration ever.

Preparations started two days ago with K and Tru holding a 2-hour long meeting with all the kids in the room. They were so excited to be sworn to secrecy and I love how babies get so excited about a huge secret that they kept coming out to update me like “MOM!! SOMETHING HUGE IS ABOUT TO HAPPEN BUT I CAN’T TELL YOU WHAT IT IS OK FINE IT’S ABOUT YOUR ANNIVERSARY TOMORROW...” and one of the big kids will yell “NOOOOO STOP TALKING YOU’RE GIVING AWAY THE SECRET!!” until finally Hayley came out and whispered “later after the meeting I will tell you the secret okay I’ve got to go back, bye.”

Yesterday, the 3 big kids went on a secret mission to Waterway Point (on their own for the first time). They made me give them $30, which they used to eat Japanese food and “get stuff”. Apparently, they had a really hard time deciding on what to get because Tru was the Money Planner and every item seemed to be out of their budget. Kirsten found a bunch of artificial flowers that was necessary for the deco and Tru was like “we don’t have enough money, let’s do without the flowers,” but after a long discussion, K outvoted him with her Overall Planning Chairperson status + her superior decorating abilities.

At 5pm, they banished me to the room so they could set up the decor and cards and dinner. I was tasked to order food, which they plated to perfection. Then they ate their own dinner, dressed the kids all spiffy and waited for the husband to get home before I was allowed out of the room.

These guys sure know how to make a girl feel special.