First day of school in 2015!

After a month of no school and just doing whatever we liked, school starts again!

Probably the biggest news of today is that Hannah decided to toilet train herself today! We received some new underwear from a kind friend and she loved them so much that she decided that today she won't wear her diapers and starts wearing underwear.

I told her, " Remember to pee pee and poo poo in the potty!!!!"

And she did! She was really good about them, telling me ahead of time. There was only a tiny boo boo when she was too intent on playing and pee on herself a little. But I'm so glad that I waited patiently for her to decide that she wants to move on to underwear. :D

As for actual school... we started late in the day! ;P
Although there was a lot of grumblings especially when it came to Bahasa, Sean finished whatever I set out for him. Both of us are still rusty...... so Dear God, please inspire us and lead us to exciting and fun lessons. Amen!

Mother's Day

Today is Mother's day, but throughout the whole week, my whole time was involved in Mother's day activities. I was preparing crafts items for Hannah's Children's Corner and Sunday School. The whole time I was busy doing these, my thoughts were about how fortunate I was to have my wonderful children.

They're are very generous with their hugs and kisses, especially Sean. he never forgets to give me a kiss every day. I get complimented on how beautiful I am very often. They tell me they love me on a regular basis, and Hannah wakes me up with a beautiful smile. I don't think any other job would give me such satisfaction.

Since we've started homeschooling, Sean has become so much happier. All I can remember of last year was me telling him to do his homework. Now, we have discussions about things that crops up on his mind, such as Is lighting matter?

Sean has is getting used to the routine now. I'm a night owl and sleep late. Sean wakes up first, does his maths on his own, only asking if he doesn't know how to do a question. I'll wake up a little later and get Hannah her breakfast. Sean joins us when he's done with maths. Then we continue with the rest of the lesson. The only things that still causes friction is our BM lesson.

Mondays and Fridays are for Hannah's playgroup at Children's Corner. Hubby takes over Sean's lessons on those days. He has his own thoughts about what's important to teach. He's currently teaching Sean how to take notes from the Mystery of History book. It's great that he's doing that since that was one thing that I haven't thought about teaching Sean. My idea was simpler than that. All I wanted to do to begin our homeschool was introduce him to the wealth of knowledge available. I wasn't even expecting him to be able to take notes yet.

Every time I research for Sean's lesson, I get to learn so many things, for example, when I was researching about how to start our science lessons, I stumbled upon a website called Chem4kids. If I didn't, I wouldn't have known that my science knowledge was woefully outdated! I was teaching my tuition kids for SPM Sciences and followed their curriculum, so I thought science would be no problem for me. But if I wasn't researching for Sean's lesson, I wouldn't have known that there are 5 states of matter now rather than 3!

There is still so much to learn. It's exciting and interesting. I pray that God will always guide me in my journey as a mother.

Our first break from homeschool

The aunty, uncle and cousin are here for holidays and Sean begged me to have a holiday from school. Why not? Sure, I said, go ahead. You can have your break from school. After all, this is what homeschool is about. You are able to plan your days the way you want it.

It's really nice to have a break, although as a mum, I don't get any real holidays.. ha ha... But it allows me to do other things for Hannah's playgroup. I guess this is how homeschool mums all over the world have to plan their time and energy.

As my hubby and I looked back to the first few months of homeschooling, we reviewed our objectives. What did we want from pulling our son from school?

We wanted him to have:
1. An enjoyable childhood
2. A love for learning
3. A relevant education
4. Independence
5. An ability to ask questions

When we look at him, we feel so happy that he is a happier person than he was last year. He has regained his cheerful self. He is showing interest in learning new things and has improved much in his attention span.

What about his study?

I started with wanting to follow Charlotte Mason's method but within weeks, we went into unschooling. It just felt natural to organically tailor our lessons to what we felt was interesting.

But I was glad we stuck through with some of the recommendation from Ambleside Online. I was a bit apprehensive if he would be interested in Little Duke and Understood Betsy when we began. After all, they are rather long books and are rather wordy. But I'm glad to say that he started to enjoy the stories as we got into the book. We spent 16 weeks on them and it was nice to read them slowly rather than rush through them.

Although we read many other books at the same time, I have to say that I remember these 2 books really well because we kept them in mind for so many weeks. They have truly found a place in our hearts. If you ask me what other books we read all these other months, I would tell you, "Hold on.... let me check in my list..."  ... ha ha ha.....

We also did Famous Men from Greece, but because each chapter is a short story of a different character, it didn't really stick with us, well.... not me anyway.... . One of the reason could be that there was not much continuation from one chapter to the next. So it makes sense to look for books that are well written.

When we started lapbooking, Sean began to be interested in doing independent work. But it's still new to us and not everything I found was as interesting to him as it was to me. There's still a lot for me to learn..... In fact, there's so much to learn that sometimes I wonder where should I begin?

March 2014 - The blog is back in business. Beginning of homeschooling journey.

It's been 3 years since I stopped blogging. Recently I felt that I ought to take it up again. The one big change at the moment is that we've started homeschooling since the beginning of this year. I hope we'll be able to document our journey again.

I kind of feel bad that I didn't blog anything about Hannah. But I enjoyed being with her so much that blogging just didn't enter my mind. I hope I can record more good memories about both Sean and Hannah from now on.

We've been a trial and error stage since Nov last year, trying out different ways of learning. A lot of the problems have got to do with discipline for all of us, Sean, Hannah and myself.

Sean came out from school disliking anything that has to do with learning. He's been in chinese school since nursery until Standard 1. He didn't enjoy school very much, especially with the bullying that went on for almost the whole of last year. I felt that being in school brought out the worst in him. So we decided to pull him out after his final exams.

Sean has improved his reading by leaps and bounds, but his writing has suffered. He hates BM and writing and it comes to a point where he starts to whine and sulk and throw tantrum. Then I would lose my temper and the situation gets worse.

So I am trying to curb my temper and readjust his lessons. I admit that some of the lessons I plan for him are way beyond his level. So I am changing the curriculum. This is what I love about home schooling. Everything is so flexible and I can tailor the lessons accordingly. It really helps that I didn't buy a curriculum off the shelf and am doing it myself. This way I can do whatever I like. Unschooling is the way to go! :D

We've been following Charlotte Mason's ideas this year, which consists of a lot of reading and discussion. We started the school year with Plymouth Maths, Famous Men of Greece, Mystery of History (history of the church and middle ages), Usborne Geography encyclopedia, Wild Weather, The Little Duke, Understood Betsy, Childcraft: About Animals & Places to Know, Burgess Animals, Parables of Nature,Scott Foresman English and Bahasa Malaysia.

Bahasa Malaysia is the subject that causes lots of flying tempers. Sean hates BM. So I've had to revised our lessons over and over again. Finally we've decided on starting him with really easy BM books in little snippets. BM is going to be really slow going.

Along the way, we've dropped Burgess Animals and Parables of Nature, and last week I've decided to drop Usborne Geography, Wild Weather, and the Childcraft books.

We joined WSC, a home schooling group, that meets once a month. They're starting this year on a lapbook about Desert Animals. Sean seems to enjoy it and looks forward to do more. So we'll be doing more lapbooks from now on.

Our new lessons will include:
Literature:
Time of Wonder lapbook that includes geography, science and english.
Paddle to the Sea
The Castle Diary: Journal of Tobias Burgess
Life Sciences:
Desert, Nocturnal and Polar Animal lapbooks with WSC, and maybe a few of our own choosing.
Chemistry: Matter


Oooppsss.... It's Hannah's turn now. Hannah has been such a blessing. She's pretty, cute and cheerful. She loves to sing and dance. She's still only 2 but she already knows what she wants! She only wants to wear pink pretty dresses. She thinks she's a princess and wants to marry a prince so she can live in a castle. She can play make believe by herself and loves to go to playgroup. I brought her to 3 playgroups last year, but since we're homeschooling this year, Hannah only goes to 1 playgroup on Mondays and Fridays at Children's Corner. She's very friendly and makes friends easily. What's there to gripe about? ;P

The only little complain I have would be the fact that she still breast-feeds and is very sticky to me, so I don't have any personal time at all. I can't even go to the toilet without her barging in and sitting inside while I do my business! So I am always trying to run away and get some personal space while she runs after me looking for me. ;P But it's all good and well. Whatever my complain may be, I really do enjoy being with both my children.

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Sep 2011 - Dealing with 2 kids

Baby Hannah was born last month. She is the most adorable and wonderful addition to our small family.

However, our major concern right now is with Sean. From being a wonderful boy, he's going through a very difficult period. He's been showing his temper, answering back, and generally not listening to us. The last straw was yesterday when his teacher in school finally had to complain to us. It seems that all his teachers have been having a problem with his behaviour recently.

It is probably related to the arrival of Hannah. I have been busy with Hannah and because of his bad behaviour, DH has been hard on Sean. So all his resentment and anger must be manifesting into the current behaviour pattern.

Sean has no problems at all with Hannah. He has issues with figures of authority, i.e. us parents and teachers. We have been pushing him too hard and yet been spending too little time with him.

We are going to have to try out a different approach to tackle this problem before it gets out of hand. Currently, Sean is a different boy from the one a few months ago. I hope we can rectify whatever it is that we did wrong.

June 2011- Number 2 is coming soon!

Okay..... My blogging has been on a hiatus for much too long. But just for updates,

I'm on week 32 pregnancy and it's a girl! =D
2nd trimester has been really good. I had a lot of energy and no morning sickness at all.
Entering 3d trimester, I get bouts of exhaustion, but it's quite expected. So nothing to worry about. I just rest whenever I'm tired. Or eat a bar of chocolate to pick me up. =P

This pregnancy is all about chocolate. I'm glad we have so much chocolate at home, otherwise I would be spending a lot of money on chocolates. Ha ha ha =P

Sean has been accepting about getting a baby sister. At first he wanted a baby brother, but this year he's been playing with more girls at school, so he's quite happy to have a sister. Girls are as fun to play with.

We've discussed with him that he's got to learn to be a koko and that when the baby is just born, mummy would be busy with the baby because it's still so tiny and can't do anything much.

Once he asked, "Why can't the baby come now?"
I told him, "Enjoy whatever time you have now, because once the baby is here, there won't be much peace and time!"


When Sean was still a young baby, I read about Attachment Parenting, and tried as much as possible to adhere by it's principles, i.e.

1. Birth Bonding
2. Breast feeding
3. Baby Wearing
4. Bedding close to baby
5. Belief in the language value of your baby's cry
6. Beware of baby trainers
7. Balance

I believe the results are starting to show now. He's a wonderful boy, who is caring, confident and compassionate. Of course, there are days when he does get on our nerves because he's jumping about and talking non-stop when all we wanted was some peace and quiet! He's really quite active and is one of those boys who can't sit still for long. But overall, he's a son any mother would be proud of. =D

Once I was busy cooking in the kitchen, he came over and said, " Call me if you need any help, ok." And then he watched TV. A few minutes later, he came again with arms akimbo, " Why haven't you called me to help you?"

He always says, " I want to help, I want to help!", but there are just some things that get done faster when I do it myself. So sometimes I need to remind myself to let him help out. It does him a lot of good when he feels he has been helpful. He feels really happy about it.

He's quite a joker. Most of his jokes are really NOT funny, but he derives so much fun telling jokes, that it makes me laugh anyway.

He's quite willing to share his things, to the point that I have to tell him to be a little selfish. After Sunday school, the boys would play Bay Blades. Whenever we look for him, someone else is always playing his Bay Blade, and then they would go on playing without returning it to him. I've got to tell him to go and ask for it back. I feel a little bad to teach him to be selfish, but he's got to learn to take care of his own things!

He's still very close to me. Still needs to sleep with me, but I told him that when the baby comes, the baby will need Mummy more because it'll be so small. So I hope he'll be able to adjust to the fact that he won't have as much of my time anymore. But I'm confident that he'll be able to adjust. Some days I'm so tired and need a rest. When I tell him I need to rest, he lets me have my time and try to do his own things.

Many times when I drop him off at school. He would always tell me, " Zai Jian, mummy. I hope you have fun.", then he'll give me a kiss and a hug, and sometimes he add, " I love you, Mummy", and then a flying kiss.

I feel happy and blessed to have such a wonderful son. He's loving and kind, willing to share and to help out and almost always starts his day with a smile and a laugh. It really lifts my spirit up =D.

And I'm looking forward to meet my daughter when she's ready to be born. I hope to be able to build another wonderful relationship with her.

It's only another 8 weeks to go! =D

January 2011

It's been several long months since I've taken any interest in the Internet. It's mostly because my laptop has been usurped away from me by the 2 boys, the big one and the little one. And anyway I haven't really been inspired to say anything.

So since the last post,

Sean had his 4th birthday. Christmas and New year has come and gone, and now Chinese New Year is coming. There are several notable things starting from the beginning of this year.

Baby no 2 is in Production! Yay!

Firstly, number 2 babe is being grown in the oven. It's now the 11th week. So it's still early stages, and it has been an awful stage so far. Throughout the 2nd half of December until now, I feel that I've been incapacitated.

I am nauseous most of the time, and I practically spend all my free time in bed. I can't stand the smell of any chemical or perfume, so I kind of dreaded bathing in December. The smell of soap or shampoo made me sick. So now we all use (yes, both Sam and Sean also) Simple bath soap which has no perfume at all.

Two weeks ago, I was walking near some mamak stall, I had to look for drain holes every few steps to vomit into. In his desperation, Sam went to the pharmacy to look for a face mask for me, and came out with Veloxin (an anti nausea medication). It worked great! First I took one tablet every 2 days, and then it wasn't working enough, I had to take one tablet every day, and now, even when I take a tablet, I still vomit. So I am of the opinion that my body just needs to vomit. I haven't taken any today. I vomit when I need too. But at least I can eat now. It's not as bad as earlier when I had no appetite at all.

I think what's worse is the fact I have really low levels of energy. My energy reserve is probably 3 hours. After 3 hours of doing being up, I am exhausted and need a long rest. This is quite tricky because.....

Maid-less

of the second notable thing, i.e. we have no maid as of 1st january. It's not really that much of a problem not having a maid actually. It's just that, I've been so tired all the time, I don't really have much energy for housework. Our maid has gone to a couple of elderly relatives who need her more, and who is willing to pay her a lot more.

Sean and Sam have been angels. =D They're both really supportive. Sam in doing the cooking. MIL in the housework during times I am too exhausted to do anything. Sean is behaving so much better now. Not as sticky because he knows his mummy is 'sick because there's a baby in her tummy'.

Homework time

There are friends who feel that Sean's current school doesn't really prepare the kids well for chinese primary school. But I don't want to take him out and put him in a traditional chinese kindergarten because it took him a whole year just to get used to his current school. I don't really want him to have to adjust to a new environment all over again.

So during the holidays, I started a homework habit with Sean. Nothing much, just doing a few pages from workbooks. On days he didn't want to, I didn't push. I don't ask him to do anything on weekends. But when he does it, I give him a nice sticker to stick on his homework calendar. He loves counting the number of stickers he has on the calendar.

We usually do his 'homework' at 8pm. But yesterday, I just couldn't be bothered. I wanted to watch TV.... he he he.... I mean, So what if he doesn't do his 'homework' for a day? But he went upstairs, and I thought he was going to play computer games. When I came up at 9pm, he was doing his homework (with a little help from Daddy) all by himself! Wasn't that a pleasant little surprise? =D

The homework idea wasn't really to push him to study harder, it was more of creating a discipline habit. To set a little time to do some school work. I'm glad he's showing independence in this area. I don't know if this wonderful behavior will be the norm or the rare occasion. But it was a pleasant moment. =D

Visit to the KL Zoo

Akong and Ama brought us to the zoo. It was a week day, it wasn't crowded, so it was quite nice to walk about.


I like the Safari area, at least the animals look as if they have enough space to roam about. We got to see a little zebra fight.

Sean's favorite animal is the giraffe, and there was plenty of those in the safari.

Surprisingly another area that he really liked was the butterfly enclosure.

While I thought the horned toads were quite cool. =D

There was these rather steroided looking bulls with huge muscles. I wonder if that's natural.


I think we'll go back again. It's really quite nice and not too far away. =D

Bullied

On Monday, Sean did not want to go to school. He was being quite difficult so I was rather testy with him. I told him to stop talking for a while while I concentrate on driving him to school and keeping a cool head. So he did. He went really quiet. With my son, being quiet means something is wrong. I asked him if he was ok, he said, " Yes, I'm ok." ( but rather subdued)

This was after a battle of getting him to eat before school. I gave him more than an hour to eat and he still didn't finish his food. The moment I parked the car, he said he was hungry. So we quickly nipped to the supermarket nearby to get him some pastries to eat.

So as we were walking to school, he said again
" I don't want to go to school. My friends are stupid."
I was surprised because that's not how he usually behaves. So I asked
" Why do you call you friends that? That's not nice."
"My friends are stupid"
I asked, " Did someone call you stupid?"

I was guessing, but I know that he hasn't been picking up mandarin at school. After 8 months at school, he still speaks mostly English at school. So maybe some of his friends who are more fluent may call him names, and then he said,
" Yes. My friend call me stupid."

He didn't want to enter his classroom. I talked to his teachers about it. They said they don't allow name callings in class, but they'll be more alert and talk to the kids about it. When he came home, we found out further who this 'friend' was.

It was a girl. She seems quite nice enough, and even passed me Sean's water bottle once when he forgot it. Sean says, " Yen Ling calls me silly and stupid."

I can quite imagine the situation because Sean is a joker and likes being silly. But he is very sensitive and must be feeling very hurt. My cheerful son who is always a joker has been rather subdued these last few days, and does not want to go to school. He hasn't been himself

I feel very sad for him. :(

I think it's hard for a boy to be bullied by girls. I always tell him to treat girls nice. But little girls can be hurtful in their words, and he has no defense against this. I do hope mummies with little girls would remind them that they should be nice to little boys too.

P.S.
This lasted only a few days though. After that things went back to normal.

Sean @ 47 months - Almost 4

He's not looking forward to being 4. I told him that once he's 4 years old, he has to leave the playgroup at the library. It's the rule and there is nothing that I can do about it. So he's been saying that he wants to always be 3 years old!

He's becoming more independent, but yet still a baby, for example

When he bathes, he closes the shower door and tells me that he wants to bathe by himself. But other times, especially when he's sleepy, he wails and asks me why does he need to bathe at all?


He can switch on the laptop, and play computer games all by himself, but still needs to be fed during meal times, otherwise he just won't eat.

He's still not interested in eating. The only food he'll eat without complain is Unagi. But on the bright side, he's starting to eat more and putting a bit more meat to his bones. But sometimes I feel as if I'm always telling him, " Sean, eat your food!" But in the evening, my MIL, would feed him, which makes things easier for me.

He tells me not to hug him when he goes to sleep, but he'll hug and kiss me instead. He still digs my belly button to sleep, otherwise he can't sleep. And I'm expected to close my eyes too. I'm not allowed to read or talk. * roll eyes* I have to sleep too ( or pretend to sleep at least =P )

He can mentally add numbers up to 10 when he wants to (it's a rare occasion though), but likes making up nonsense words which sometimes get really irritating because nobody understands what he's talking about, not even himself. *shake head*

He's got plenty of confidence, even though it's sometimes misplaced LOL.

His school had an idol contest to either sing, dance, do martial art moves or recite poetry. It's really just to get the kids experience performing on stage. So Sean went up, sang really loudly (and a bit out of tune =P) the first 2 lines, and then he promptly forgot his next line. The teacher on stage siddled next to him to whisper the next lines. He continued singing (loudly) with no apparent distress. Both Sam and I were shaking so much from laughing that the video that Sam was taking with his handphone was shaky. He was really loud and out of tune. It was just really funny. =D

Updates for the last 2months

A lot has happened over the past 2 months so this is a long and condensed blog entry. I've been busy, but it's also because I've been too lazy to blog. =P

At the beginning of June, Sean's uncles John, David, and aunt Mary came back to celebrate Akong's birthday, and the whole Wee family and my sis-in-law's in laws ( Uncle Paul and Aunty Dorcas) went for a driving trip to Terrengannu, Kelantan and Ipoh. It was really fun. The first time we went together as a family on a long driving trip. Sean really liked playing with uncle David and uncle John. It was really good for him to have them around to play with. No photos because I forgot my camera and have forgotten to ask for photos from John. (Will upload the photos once I get them)

At first, I wasn't quite sure how he'll behave on the long car journey, but he behaved really well. We both sat at the back of the van and played together. He filled in his maze books, did some drawings and colorings during the drive.

This was also the first time we brought Sean to the beach. We were there only overnight, so there wasn't that much time, but we tried to make full use of it. We played in the waves and built a sand castle surrounded by a moat.

In Kelantan, we stayed at Ah Co house which has a fruit orchard behind. I tried to follow my FIL when he showed everyone around, but I wasn't wearing the correct footwear. Slippers are just no good for walking through tall grasses crawling with big red ants and bugs! But we got to see durian, rambutan, pomelo, lime, jambu trees. There was a lady finger plant next to the house. Actually there were plenty of plants and trees, I just didn't know what they all were! =P

On our way home, we stayed overnight at Ipoh. I like Ipoh. It's really quaint. Many of the older shophouses are still in good condition. It feels like a throwback in time.

When we came back to KL, as usual all of us fell sick for almost 2 weeks. I don't know why, but holidays give us the flu!

In late June, we flew over to Jakarta to spend time with my family.

I spent the whole week trying to get my IC done. It's a decentralized system and I had to get a letter of recommendation from the RT (Rukun Tetangga) first. It just so happen the RT changed in my neighbourhood and I got the wrong address. So I went to the wrong house and knocking on the door 4 times, before I got the right address, but then he sent me to the RW. And then it was to the RW (Rukun Warga), who told me to get a police report first. After the police report was done, I had to go home and get my birth certificate and Kartu Keluarga.



After which, I went to the Lurah, whose official said that my IC was expired, which meant the letter had to be sent to the Walikota! I had to asked the person really nicely to go to the Walikota office really soon, because it was already Wednesday. On Friday, when I went to the Lurah's office, the system was down. The guy said if I didn't believe him, I could go in and try to get into the system myself, which I did! I spent 20 minutes trying to get into the system on his computer. The system was really down, and so I had no choice but to come back in the afternoon again. Luckily the system was up by then and I could take my IC photo. But I had to go again later in the evening for pick up the IC.




During the week, I went on 15 visits to various officials before I could the darn thing done! It was a good thing I didn't plan to do anything else that trip. I knew it was going to be tedious, I just didn't realize how difficult it was going to be. But I was surprised that I didn't get angry at all. I thought the police and the government officials were really friendly.

My dad, who wasn't around, managed to get a flight back in time to meet us so we could celebrate his birthday with him. So besides the ordeal in getting my IC, the whole week was really relaxed. It was really for spending time with family. We also met up with friends, Eny and her cute daughters, Yulius and Paula. It's always great to spend time with family and meet up with old friends. =D

And what's best, we didn't get sick after we got back!

Sean loved his koko Fen fen and koko Frederick. I didn't have to entertain him this trip at all. He was quite happy to hang out with them. He followed them around all the time, they were quite happy to let him join them in whatever they were doing until inevitably the big boys complained that he disturbed them too much with his antics =P.

Fendi, Sean and Frederick.

Papa's birthday dinner

Sean and Lau Ma

Sean and Rena

The week after we came back, it was Kristen's 4th birthday. So we all trooped to Kristen's house to celebrate with her. But since the playgroup does not allow children above 4 years old anymore, the kids are not able to meet up anymore since they all go to different schools now or at different sessions. So this is becoming a rare occassion for the kids to play together.

Sean and Kristen

Nikita, Kristen and Sean

Aria, Kai, Sean and Isaac

The maid is back

The maid is back!

When the maid left, I was kind of glad to get the house to ourselves. By the end of the 2 months, I think we were getting the hand of it. I wasn't so hung up about getting everything done within the day.

But it's nice to have her back. I no longer have to iron clothes for the 5 of us anymore. Laundry can be really mountainous in this household and all that ironing was really drying up my hands and giving me sore hands.

I also get more time with Sean now, which is what we both missed the most when I was so busy doing this and that. There was one week, when I was so busy working as well as doing the housework, that he told me that he didn't need any help anymore. That kind of broke my heart a bit because I know it was because I was always so busy.

By the time he woke up, I was not next to him because I was busy doing something about the house. Then I would rush him through breakfast, lunch and send him to school. By the time he comes home, I wasn't not home and was only back at 9 or 9.30 pm ( during that really busy week), and then I had to have a quick dinner and shower. By the time I'm done, I had to get him to bed.

I felt him change that week. He was more grown up, and maybe a bit sad that mummy was too busy to play with him.

So I'm really glad to have the maid back. Sean and I can spend more time together doing things we like now.

More water please

Today, Sean was eating dried sotong. He enjoyed it so much that he kept eating more and more. Since I was doing my work, I didn't really keep track on how much he ate.

He kept asking more more water. Now, Sean doesn't like drinking water. So I was very surprised when he asked for water. Only after the third cup of water and when he said, "Water, water, quick, my tongue is hurting!", that I realised that the dried sotong must be quite spicy!

He he he he.... This little boy of mine is developing a taste of spicy food. We are not much of a spicy fan, but we let him try anyway.

Now I know how to get him to drink more water! =P

Oooops!!

Now he has a sore throat! Okay.... no more spicy dried sotong for a while for him. =P

Sean @ 44 months

I've been busy with the housework, so I haven't been taking photos of Sean this month. This was from last month. He drew "Red" the fire engine from the book, all by himself. He was very proud of his work. =D

Until I started interfering and then he lost interest. So ok, mummy shouldn't interfere so much.

Here is his corner. He likes to stick his 'work' on the wall. I can already imagine how his room will be like next time. It's going to be really messy!

He cut the Chugginton section from the Toys'R'Us pamphlet and pasted it on his wall. He told us that he wants all the Chugginton trains!

He was sick for a whole week and lost some weight to the point that his school pants would drop to his butt when he jumps. So I'm trying to fatten him up now.

He stopped drinking milk a long time ago and is a fussy eater, unless it's Unagi or mushroom and Fung Chau. Since he doesn't want milk or yogurt on it's own, I've been making fresh Mango lassi or banana lassi for him, which luckily he enjoys. So at least, he gets something milky into him. But that craze only lasted a few days, so now I'm back to persuading him to drink a small cup of milk every morning again.

If you remember, in the last blog, he has been wanting to help me doing the housework. So I've been letting him help me when ever he wants to help. Cooking is still a no-no because of the knives and fire involved. So I'll ask him if he would like to help me clip the clothes when I hang them. So during the week he was sick, he helped me a bit and then went back watching TV.

I asked " Don't you want to help?"
He said " Helping you to hang clothes is boooring."
Boring!!???

I thought I wouldn't get this kind of answer until he's much older? He's not even 4 and he already thinks that certain things are boring???

He's been getting bouncier, in the sense that he literally bounces here and there, making us feel tired just looking at him, and getting himself sent to the corner, just so that we get some peace. Every time he goes hyper-bouncy, we ask each other, "What sweet drinks have you given him today?" We don't really want to deprive him of his apple juice, but it really shows when he drinks sweet drinks too much. But despite his hyper-bouncy behavior, he can be really sweet.

I get lots of hugs and kisses all the time, and he tells me he loves me several times a day. No complains there :D It's God's way to reward mummies after a long day. It's a wonderful gift.

The day before Mother's Day, while I was baking an apple pie, he came to the kitchen and asked
" What are you making?" I said, " Apple Pie"
He said, " Hhmmm... sounds yummy. Thank you for making it, mummy."

Isn't that sweet?

Of course, when it comes to actually eating it, he only ate a small piece, and only after I pouted and said, " Don't you want to eat mummy's apple pie?"
He said, "ok. Hhmmm that was yummy."
I asked, " Do you want some more?"
He said, "No."

Darn it....



It's like when I slaved over making these colorful cookies with him because he's been asking me to make cookies together. And how many did he eat? 3 cookies! and after that he wasn't interested in eating them anymore. What am I going to do with the others?

Oh well, we did spend quite a fun afternoon together shaping all these cookies. It's the time spent together that counts, isn't it?

Sean @ 43 months

There are positive and negative things with a 3 year old boy going on 4. He is at this exasperating but lovable stage.

On the positive side:

Since I've been doing the housework, he's been wanting to help out, I guess to spend more time with me, and it's something new to him. I'm sure when he's a teenager, it'll be something he'll be trying to avoid all the time!

Mummy, I want to help you cook,wash the dishes, wash clothes, sweep, etc, etc.... Of course, I'd have been happy to let him help if Sean was 6 years old already, but at 3 going on 4,there are many things he still can't do. So I have been giving excuses why he can't help me.

I don't want to deter him from offering his help in the future when he can actually help. So I do allow him to help out, such as helping me put on the clips while I hang the clothes, which of course takes us twice as long to do it than if I do it by myself. Once in a while, he'll help me water the plants and feed the rabbit, unless he's watching TV and can't be bothered.

He wants to help me wash the clothes, so he kept opening the washing machine to look inside. *roll eyes* He keeps offering to help me cook, which of course, I'm always saying "No!" to. But I did let him wash the potatoes which didn't make too much of a mess.

He's getting better at sweeping the floor to clear up his own mess after cutting papers with a small broom and dustpan. Of course, it's not perfect and I have to finish the job, but it's a start.

He's been trying to wash the dishes whenever I send him to wash his hands at the sink. I'm always telling him not to touch the dirty dishes, but tonight, I let him wash his own plastic cup after he drank.

At school,

I'm quite positive that he's a class clown (not sure if this is a positive or negative =P). He is a bit of a joker at home, and it looks like it continues at school. He seems to be rather well known. His classmates often point him out to their parents. " That's Sean!" And when I asked him if he knows his classmates names, he says, "I don't know." Ok lah, he's getting better now, he remembers maybe 3-4 names now.

His classmates keep a look out for him when we pick him up from school. "Sean! your mummy/ daddy is here." Yesterday, one even passed me his water bottle which he forgot to put in his bag. They're really sweet.


On the negative side:

He still can't sit still unless he's watching TV. When watching TV, he'll be so glued to the TV that he's deaf and blind to everything. At other time, he'll be jumping here and there. So much so that his teachers lament that he can't sit still during lessons. He'll be monkeying around the class while he's supposed to sit and listen.

He's quite lucky his teachers dote on him and don't punish him often, and if they do, he probably gives his sad puppy face that they let him go free. But it's still a problem because his next teacher may not dote on him so much, and then he'll be punished very often.

The aftermath of being robbed

The act of crime was done within seconds.

I was sitting in my locked car waiting for the gate of my student's house to be open. As it was opening, there was an explosion of glass on the passenger glass. I screamed. Turned my head to the left and saw a hand lifting my handbag out of the car. The person went out of my vision and immediately ran off with his accomplice on their motorbike (which I didn't see but the maid did). I drove into the house. The gate was closed, and I went in to borrow a phone to call Sam.


The ordeal started after that.

First, I had to cancel my handphone, bank card and credit card.

The police report took 3 hours and we had to go to 3 police stations. We went to the one nearest our house first and had to sit through the excruciating slowness of the police officer typing the report into the computer with 2 fingers. We actually did our own report and printed it for the Police, but they needed to type it into their system. When he pressed enter, the whole report disappeared. He retyped it 3 times, and it disappeared 3 times!

So we went to another police station. The 4th entry also disappeared! Luckily the 5th time was successful. Then we had to wait for them to get a reply from whoever it was. We were then told to go to another police station to see an inspector. Luckily, that was the end of the reporting line.

I wasn't sure what I could tell them that wasn't already in the report. Basically, I didn't see the perpetrator. So I knew that it was futile since I couldn't give any descriptions. But it took 3 hours anyway.

Next, I had to replace my hand phone, new bank card and get new SIM card, which didn't activate, and therefore I had to go to Maxis again. It's a good thing, the people at Maxis are efficient. But Sam wanted to register with Maxis for land line and internet. So this week we’ve been to Maxis 4 times!

I still haven't had the time to report to the Embassy about the loss of my I/C and driving license. The car can't be used too because we need to order a new window. Unfortunately, our car being an old Opel, spare parts are hard to find.

Of course, with no license, I am practically legless. I'm going to have to get a Malaysian driving license since I won't be able to replace my Indonesian one any time soon. And that's going to be another ordeal. *Sigh*

Sam told me I have to sit through a 5 hour instructional video. Something about the danger of driving. I'm not looking forward to that. And then of course, go through driving lessons, which I don't think I really need, but have to do anyway.

I'm also going to have to replace a library book that was in my bag. I'm not looking forward to report it to Maria, the librarian. She can be quite sharp. *Shrudder* Especially since the book is an old edition. I wonder if it's still being sold in the bookshop. It's the first book of a series. So it's quite important to get it replaced. And I'm rather upset that I didn't get to finish reading it too!

If sitting in a locked car while entering a house compound is no longer safe, I wonder if any single woman driver is safe from these criminals. This definitely hasn't been a good week.

Maid-less in KL

The maid had to leave suddenly because her mum was very ill. We got her a plane ticket on Wed evening but she was too late. Her mum died on Wed morning.

I haven't been happy with the maid. She talks back to me, and since she's not my maid, she doesn't listen to what I say. I feel bad that this had to happen to her though.

Anyway, we're maid-less for the next 2 months. And it so happened that the first day we had no maid was my busiest day of the week and it was one of those days when you just didn't get enough sleep. I think I barely had 4 hours of sleep.

So the first day went like this:

Morning: Woke up, washed clothes, cleaned rabbit's cage, fed him, watered the plants, put the dry dishes back, washed dishes in the sink, hung clothes, made sure that Sam got Sean to bathe and brush his teeth, fed Sean breakfast, rushed to playgroup at 9:30am.

We were a bit late but that's ok. Returned and borrowed books, did a craft with Sean, cleaned up playgroup with the other mums at the end. We skipped story telling and rushed home. Heated up food for lunch. Got Sean to eat lunch (Feeding Sean is one of the most tasking tasks!), got him to bathe again because it was such a hot day.

Afternoon: Sam sent him to school that day while I took down the laundry and ironed. Then at 1.30pm, rushed out to teach 3 students. Came back at 6pm, had dinner that Sam cooked, washed dishes, ironed more clothes. After that, I was too tuckered out and had enough for the day. There's always tomorrow, right?

I was feeling rather kindly towards the maid. I thought: Oh, she must be so grumpy because she was worried about her mum, blah, blah, blah. Until......

I actually did the housework while still having to work (part time) and send Sean to school and playgroup, do grocery shopping, etc.

She really doesn't do her work very well.

After I mopped the floor, the floor felt so much cleaner than it has ever before. We resorted to walking with slippers at home because we couldn't stand the dust. We thought that the new place is extra dusty because of the proximity of the road to the living room, but I realized that it's just because she doesn't mop the floor.

She doesn't vacuum that well either because when Sam vacuumed the carpet, they were very dusty.

I wash, dry and ironed the clothes within the day, while clothes would take days to come back when she does it.

We wash the dishes right after we use and regularly put the dry ones into the cupboard, while with a maid around, the dirty dishes seem to pile on the table or the sink.

I do realize though that all these housework that the maid used to do is taking time away from Sean. Sean has had to entertain himself more and more. And sometimes the result is disastrous, like him spilling a bottle of sand-like basil seeds all over the carpet and making a huge mess of his toy area, smearing playdough all over the table or playing with bottles of paint when I'm not looking.

But he's been behaving well otherwise. And I think this experience with no maid is a great time for him to learn to do things for himself.

As for myself, I'm hoping the housework will give me a good work out. After not exercising for 4 years has made my body rather soft, and my belly big. People keep thinking I'm pregnant when I'm not! So hopefully I get to lose some belly fat during the next 2 months. =D

Bed sheets are important

I never realized how important bed sheets are until Sean slept in his own bed. The maid washed his bed sheet are replaced it with a plain one. He went back to sleeping with us.

I thought, Oh, maybe it was only the novelty of moving into a new place that caused him to move toward independence on his own. He hardly slept on his bed for the whole of last week. Sometimes Hubby or I would sleep there because it gets crowded with the 3 of us on a Queen size bed.

Then I had a thought. I changed back his bed sheet into the Mickey Mouse bed sheet. Just an experiment to see if he would behave differently. And YES! He went back to sleep on his own. =P

He still creeps into our bed in the morning, but that's ok. We kinda miss him sleeping with us. So this is a good arrangement. More space for me at night (and I don't get kicked when I sleep too!) and we get to be cozy in the morning. =D

On a side note, this morning I said to him, "Wan An" I mean " Zhou An" (good morning). He asked what was "Wan An" because he usually calls out to his teacher "U An" (good afternoon) when he goes to school. When I told him that " Wan An" "Zhou An" means "Good Morning" in Mandarin.

He said with this incredulous face, "You know how to speak mandarin too!!!!???"

LOL..... That really cracked me up, because I only know a few phrases, and my son was so surprised. Ha ha ha....

Sean @ 42 months

Sleeping in his own bed.
A few days before we moved house, Sean said, " I don't want to sleep on a baby bed.", referring to his bed. And yeah, he'd never liked his bed. He's always crawling into our bed and proceed to kick us around the whole night, going round and round while sleeping.

So in the new house, we gave him John's old single mattress, covered with brand new Mickey Mouse's bedspread,on the floor next to our bed and he had no problem sleeping in his own bed. Getting him to sleep early is still a problem, but once it's late enough and he's tired, he'll go to his bed and I'll cover him with his blanket, and he goes ZZZZZZZ.......

Another change is bathing.
It used to be really difficult to get him to bathe. But somehow over here, it's much easier. He picked his own bath soap in the Supermarket," I want to buy this soap ", a Mickey Mouse Strawberry soap. And bathes himself in the shower. I help him to wash his hair and back, but when hubby bathes him, he let's Sean bathe on his own.

This is Sean's Corner. It's usually rather messy because he's into cutting papers now. He's also been doing a lot of drawings. His latest craze is drawing masks. He tries cutting them himself, but they end up in the bin. So I have the task of cutting his masks neatly for him.

And you can see in his photos, he's becoming more and more a cheeky monkey, quite like Calvin from "Calvin and Hobbes", who makes faces in photos!