A Little Bed Time Story

Once upon a time, there was pre-tween girl who desperately wanted to keep her meddling little brother from messing up her room.

She wrote notes:

"Dear B your asleep, I'm awake. Just because I'm not there
doesn't mean you can come in my room!"

She posted warnings:

She even built robots whose sole purpose on this earth was to keep him out of her room.

But this little guy...he didn't give a damn. 

He kept destroying and playing with things that did not belong to him, causing his sister grief. Which, in turn, led to lots of eye-rolling, lecturing and yelling from Mom and Dad.

But in the end, the girl realized that even though he can be kind of a bugger sometimes, he's really not so bad to have around.

Besides, who else would she able to mock and ridicule?

The end. For now.

Way Too Fast

I spent a good part of the New Year's Eve sorting through the kids' outgrown stuff, getting them ready for donation, give-aways and Craig's List. Everyone tells you to enjoy your kids because it goes too fast. But you don't quite realize how fast it really goes until you are staring at the stuff that not one, but both of your kids--who are five years apart, no less--have outgrown.

Here's the changing table that we received as a gift over seven years ago. It managed to withstand both of our wiggling, screaming, poopy kids. Both EB and BBoy pretty much hated laying still so they squirmed, rolled and kicked through most of their diaper changing sessions. Towards the end, one of its corners cracked and K ended up having to reinforce it with a heavy-duty metal wire. It's a simple changing table, but it served us well. In-between wiggles and kicks, K and I would kiss and bite their little toes, tickle them and gobble them up while they belly-laughed. I am going to miss this changing table.

EB at six months

BBoy at three months

Here's the crib that both kids slept in the first two years. Most nights they slept peacefully, 10-12 hours at a time (yes, we got lucky on that front). EB slept in that crib until two-and-a-half, whereas BBoy graduated to a big boy bed a few months shy of two. The little guy kept trying to climb out of the crib (he's a sneaky one), so we figured it was time.

BBoy planning his escape

EB peacefully sleeping

And then there's the little car that EB scooted around in. And the doggy walker that BBoy leaned on and learned to walk. Baby bottles and baby sippy cups. Bags of their outgrown booties, shoes and onesies.

In a blink of an eye, EB has moved on from giggling, singing toddler to to the still-giggling, still singing, sometimes eye-rolling and sulking pre-tween girl. BBoy is not too far behind, trying desperately to keep up with his big sis, struggling for more and more independence each day. And I look at both of them with awe, excitement, wistfulness.
























My 2014 resolution? Cherish each day. Because it really does go too fast.

A Star-Studded Week

EB had a star-studded week filled with personal visits from various Rise of the Guardians heroes.

It all started on EB's birthday--(Seven!!! Where in the heck did the time go!?)--when Jack Frost decided to pay us a big, big visit. I had not seen a snow storm like this since I lived in the Northeast over seven years ago.  Although our plan of celebrating EB's birthday at the movies and restaurant was completely shot, there was no disappointment on her part -- the kids had a blast playing in the snow.

Four days later, the temperature continued to hover in the mid-20s, with no sign of reprieve. We were all feeling a bit edgy--EB's school had been closed for days, BBoy's daycare was opened on a very limited basis, and K and I took turns working from home. At one point EB's sauciness got the best of her, and there were lots of talking back and tears. In order to redeem herself, she wrote a letter to Santa.

"Sorry Santa for being disrespectful to my parents. I should have been more nice to them."

The next day, K Santa wrote back (he's quick to respond, that eager beaver),  and EB found the letter while getting our mail (K had cleverly put it there while EB and I were out shopping).She ran back into the house exclaiming: "Mom, Santa wrote me back!" and began tearing at the letters before taking off her shoes and jacket. To EB's relief, she was given a chance to redeem herself.

Written by Santa's copywriter -- K

That very same night, she lost her second baby tooth, which meant a visit from the Tooth Fairy while Mr. Sandman sprinkled his sleepy dust.

The only Guardian that was missing from her week was the Easter Bunny. But Easter Bunny will have to wait for a few months.

A very belated birthday

Bboy turned two years old., ahm, like, three months ago. Here's the thing--K went back to work this past June and since then, our lives have become a series of schedules, deadlines and a lot of teeth gnashing over our schedules and deadlines. So I guess I've been a bit behind in my blogging and before I knew it, BBoy's birthday has come and gone.

But it's never too late to write about the dear little Man in my life...just look at this little face.

He has a playful, sweet smile, and a flirtatious way about him and makes me swoon with love every morning I see him. Yes, the dude knows how to work me.

He is now speaking in full sentences, and already very defiant ("No Mama, I don't want it!") but also very loving ("I wuv you, Mama!").

He loves to babble on the phone with my parents. Whenever he hears me talking with Mom and Dad in Mandarin, he would run over, yelling: "I want to hi ah-gong and Nai-Nai!" (translation: I want to say hi to Ah-gong (Mandarin for 'grandpa') and Nai-Nai (Mandarin for 'grandma')

And,did I mention that he has an obsessive love of cars and trains? Until this guy came into my life, I had no idea that our house would be bombarded by planes, trains and automobiles. Behold the exhibits.

Exhibit 1: His favorite toys.

Exhibit 2: His favorite books.

Exhibit 3: His favorite PJs.




Exhibit 4: The centerfold.

We had just bought a brand-new Mazda, and with it came a glossy magazine of, you guessed it, Mazda cars. Knowing BBoy's fondness for cars,  I gave it to him for a bit of fun reading. He slowly turned the pages, and when he hit this centerfold page he STOPPED, absolutely mesmerized. He looked up at K and I, and exclaimed: "WOW! CAR!" This made K snicker: "look at him with his Playcar centerfold."


Happy be-lated second birthday, little Man!

First Day of First Grade

So I hopped on Facebook this afternoon, and noticed posting after posting of back to school pictures: beaming kids wearing their new backpacks/uniforms/Shirley Temple smiles, holding a sign that commemorates the occasion (e.g.: "Look, I'm in Kindergarten!" "First Grade!")

And if you look at the photos carefully, you will notice the soft, luminous rays of light beaming down on their child, proving that the picture was taken at the crack of un-Godly hour for the poor, non-morning souls living in Arkansas--some time between 6:45 am and 7:15 am.

How do you all do it? (And quit making us look bad)

This is how our morning went:

6:20 am -- alarm goes off. We hit snooze.
6:30 am -- both K and I reluctantly get out of bed. I make EB's breakfast, K stumbles upstairs to wake her  up.
6:45 am -- K, still un-showered, walks EB to her bus stop.
6:46 am -- I come out, notice that EB's backpack and lunch bag are still on the kitchen table. I call K on his cell.
6:48 am -- K and EB run back to the house. My hair still wet, wearing nothing but a robe, I run into the car, yell for EB to jump in, and drive her to the bus stop.
6:55 am -- I lecture EB about the importance of remembering critical school items like the backpack.
6:57 am -- School bus comes, EB gets in. She looked nervous, but ready.
6:57:57 am -- I drive back to the house, marvel at how fast she has grown, and realized that I had forgotten to take a picture of her first day.

K decided to take a picture of her after her school so that we didn't seem completely delinquent as parents:

Which slightly vexed and embarrassed her, since it was in full view of her classmates:

No matter, it was a good first day for EB indeed. And K and I will try better tomorrow. After all, tomorrow is another day.

Look Ma...

...no teeth! And I wasn't even home to see her lose her first baby tooth *SNIFF*

Happy birthday to....

...Me! Yes, I turned another year older yesterday. I won't directly reveal how old I am, but let's just say that someone got invited to her 20th high school reunion this year. Yes, that someone is getting old.

Birthdays used to be a big deal to me when I was younger--I would take the day off and plan a night out. But as I age, I'm finding that it really doesn't take a whole lot to make my birthday.

Take yesterday for example. It was a work day for both K and me, so we decided to keep it relatively low-key. In the morning, I went to Starbucks to redeem my free birthday coffee, and was completely tickled when I saw the birthday greeting scribbled on my cup:

In the afternoon, I opened up my Facebook and was delighted to see a bunch of birthday wishes from folks from many different facets of my life: best friend, acquaintances, high school, college, grad school, work; you get the idea. It makes me realize at how little effort it takes to brighten up someone's day--just a simple, What's-up-saw-on-FB-it's-your-birthday-so-have-a-good-one message is all it takes. And it takes probably all but 3 seconds. So note to self, I will definitely be giving regular b-day shout-outs to folks going forward.

At night, we went to grab dinner at a kid-friendly restaurant, followed by a visit to the ice cream shop, where BBoy proceeded to feed ice cream to everyone at the table.

Then after the kids drifted off to bed, K and I settled in front of the TV to catch up on another episode of Mad Men.


It was a very good birthday, indeed.