3Y9M Visit to the dentist

Kodi's second trip to the dentist.

We had our first trip to the dentist about one year ago. The lady dentist was fine but she wasn't in particular toddler friendly, I thought. She suggested that we should quite her thumb sucking habit as soon as possible, otherwise it may interfere with her teeth alignment. We are very thankful we did, a journey in and of it self that took 3 months to complete the process.

We decided to try Dr. Rashid, a Singaporean dentist seemingly specialized in taking care of the little teeth!

First impression, colorful waiting area with lot of toys and books. Thumbs up!

Dr. Rashid came to greet us. He is very friendly and seems to get along with kids well. Kodi likes him and giggled from time to time. She got on the dentist chair willingly and put on a cute sunglasses for Dr. Rashid to check all her teeth carefully. She watched Barney from a TV hung above the ceiling.

There was a small beginning sign of decay in the back of her upper front teeth. He said not to worry now because it may not go bad enough to take any action before she gets rid of her baby teeth. 

There were also white rim/line found around the bottom of her two lower first molars. He said this is the beginning of tooth decay when the teeth become more porous and stuff get trapped in that gap. However it is reversible if we make sure that we clean well and stay away from sugar. 

A huge thing I learned today is that, taking care of your teeth has more to do with limiting the exposure to sugar rather than how frequent you bruth your teeth. Wait... that doesn't sound entirely right. We still need to bruth and floss but having a chocolate bar and brush soon immediately afterward is not going to negate the effect because the exposure is already there. Am I making sense? 

A friendly lady hygienist came after Dr. Rashid finished his examination. She gave me a detaild walk through using a big fake teeth to demonstrate the proper brushing technique. She also instructed me that sugar is always bad for teeth, although they say natural sugar found in fruits (not fruit juice) is fine. Therefore, a wie parent would try to limit giving kids sweet snacks in between meals. Sounds simple and doable, doesn't it?

Here are a quick jot downs of the take home message.

Instead of a sweet biscuits, give her butter toast, pretzel, cheese, crackers or other savory stuff. 

No fruit juice no matter how 100% or healthy it seems like.  

Fruits are always ok (even grapes!) but dried fruits are not.

Yogurt is good but try the original, non-sweetened kind (a good thing that we make our own yogurt!)

If we "must" give her sweets (which happens very often in our house because we all love desserts in this house), serve it soon after a meal to limit the frequency of exposure of sugar to the teeth. 

Yeah we passed the check up! I am always worried about her teeth because I had bad teeth growing up. Now that I reflect upon what the lady said, I probably ate many sweet stuff even though I did bruth my teeth twice a day and rinse my mouth in between snacks. However, I probably had too much "exposure" to sugary stuff because of my sweet tooth! 

Some changes in the snack box and get disciplined in when we eat that piece of cookie and chocolate cake! 

Mojito

Hubby used to shake up cocktails in the evenings, as a way of winding down the day. Instead of pouring a glass of wine (which we love too), mixing the liquors with the right amoung of sour and sweet seemed a little bit more interesting. We continued this ritual after we had Kodi. We would sip cocktails (not every night though) after we put her down to bed. In fact, it became an even more important symbol that the busy day of work and parenting/child rearing was over. 

Cocktails disappeared after we moved to the tropical island. 

Recently, the cocktail shaker is out of the cupboard again because we had become unanimously disappointed by the quality and value of cocktails at dining venues across town. Hubby decided that the only way to have "authentic" not the water-down semi-juice like cocktails is to do it by yourself!   

We started out our all time favorite Margarita and now we are making Mojito! The sour and refreshing lime mixed with the grassy mint, balanced by the sweet aroma of Rum,  tickles your throat with the bubbly club soda. It's perfect in this hot weather.  We made a big pitcher of Mojito for our Christmas BBQ party and it was a hit among friends. The drink was gobbled down with the chips and salsa, literally in minutes! 

What should we mix next? 

The advent

The advent period toward Christmas has never been this much fun and hectic in my life. 

I grew up in a family where holidays are mostly about a big meal together, and a good spring cleaning beforehand.  There was some decoration but few. I somehow have been adept to this simple style of celebration and have not been a big fan of deck the tree, baking cookies, and not even buying gifts. For the ten years we have been together as a family, hubby and I rarely bought anything for each other for Christmas. We didn't feel like it's necessary and all the hustle and bustle of holiday shopping just seemed silly.  Call us anti-holiday people?  You may.

Things started to change last year when we celebrated our first tropical Christmas in Singapore. Kodi was completely hooked on the idea of Christmas trees and lights after the trip to Tokyo in November 2011. So we got a tree and wrapped presents for her to open on Christmas day. We did a Christmas Day brunch, tropical and monsoon season style, open air on a raining morning, in shorts and sandals.

This year the holiday temperature rises exponentially. 

We took out the Christmas tree on Deepavali day (Nov 13) because Kodi kept begging. I couldn't believe that we gave in because it wasn't even Thanksgiving yet. 

In late November, we started to work on lots of Christmas or winter-themed crafts, hand-made greeting cards, and played Christmas carols all day long. I even sewed an felt tree and made an advent calendar out of it.

We also hosted a Christmas BBQ party at our house, let the kids play bingo and cracker games and the adults did the white elephant gift exchange. Lots of cooking, planning, shopping, and of course, lots of laughter and fun.

We are going to another Christmas party this week, more cooking and gift exchange. 

I will have my sunday school kids do a shopping day this Sunday to spend the sticker points they have been collected during this fall. Lots of shopping.

I am going to Kodi's school next week to help them with a jingle bell craft. 

I am planning a family brunch where we can hear live caroling.

It has been a lot of fun during the advent period, in expecting the day of Jesus' return and his birthday. BUT BUT BUT it has also been exhausting because my brain is constantly filled with ideas that I'd like to do in preparation for the holiday. There are simply too many !!

For example, Kodi was in school at 9am this morning and I chatted with her new teachers for about 15 minutes. They had just moved to a new classroom with brand new teachers earlier this week. I was then off to Starbucks to get hubby the gift card and get myself a mocha while studying Japanese lessons. 

At 10:15am, I went to get a small gift for Sophia, the wonderful teen who has been helping in hubby's Sunday school class, at a stationary shop. Done! I stopped by Mark and Spencer to look for a toiletry bag for hubby but didn't fine any that suits him.

At 11am, I was shopping at Daiso, looking for materials for the jingle bell craft with Kodi's class. I also got some rolls of wide ribbons to make pretty bows. 

At 11:40am, I stopped by the newly opened Vietnamese eatery to pick up a sandwich for myself. 

At noon, I picked up the car and fought Orchard road traffic toward Bukit Timah. I munched on the sandwich while driving. Yum but super spicy! 

At 12:15pm, I pulled over the car by the curb, and jogged my way to pick up the holiday photos, parking coupons, and quick groceries. 

At 12:40pm, I picked up Kodi from school and finally the whirlwind morning of running errands was over!

A few minutes ago, Kodi just asked what we should do with the empty Cheerio box. Well... I said that maybe we could decorate it into a nice looking mailbox of our own to put in Christmas cards for each other. Yes, more crafting!

Gong gong 公公

My grandpa passed away six years ago. 

He is dearly missed although we don't often talk about this. Only grandmom does. I guess we don't really know how to express "missing" in a calm and sensible way?! 

I was very close to him since my childhood. I cried often and dreamed about him a lot in the first days and months after his passing. In the dream we did ordinary things we did as a family, eating, riding in the car, chatting, and he was with us. The dreams stopped after 6 months or so. Recently, I started to dream about him again. This time he is in my updated life.

He was a quiet man but a few things he said and taught me proved to be significant and I always keep them on my mind. 

He taught me always start from the bottom rack when unloading the dish washer. This is so that any residual water from the dishes on the top rack would not drip over to those at the bottom. 

He taught me to always organize the kitchen and put away the dry dishes before cooking. A not so common teaching from a grandpa, is it? In my mom's family, he (and now my uncle is) was the one who cleaned the kitchen.  It totally makes sense to start with a "blank" drawing board,  as cooking can be a bit messy and chaotic at times, at least in my kitchen, and you need to find the knives and spoons in their usual place.

He also taught me to put the kitchen towel under the choping board when slicing a water melon. "Otherwise, the juice will run down the board, over flow the countertop and drip down the floor." Isn't it true? 

Oh... how cutting a water melon reminds me so much of my dear grandpa. How I wish that he was saved by Jesus before passing so that I could see him again in heaven! This has become one of my most agonizing thoughts after I became a Christian. I pray that God will save the rest of my family everyday so we are not just an earthly family, and that our relationship will be eternal in Jesus Christ. 

Thanksgiving 2012

Definitely a year with lots of thanksgivings. 

It's our second year of living on this tropical island. We are more accustomed to the weather and the culture, and it feels more like home to us. Our community has been expanding, we made more friends (although said good bye to a few too), got more involved at church, hosted more dinner parties and play dates, traveled to see family and friends, and explored more places in and around Singapore. 

It's also a year of growth and change. 

Kodi started school early this year.  It was initially 2 mornings a week and became 3 mornings after 6 months. She likes school and often talks about the things she did and learned from school. I am very thankful for her loving teachers and her lovely friends. 

I joined BSF to study Acts this year. I benefited a lot from regular bible study and devotions, and made local friends through this group. 

Joy, our loving and wonderful babysitter, who became an integral part of our family. She plays with Kodi every week and they enjoy each other's company. 

I also started Japanese lessons. Learning Japanese has always been something I would like to do, part for the culture that I am interested and in some ways adore, part is to support hubby because he has to learn Japanese as an unofficial job requirement. Matsuyama San is a great teacher who is creative and effective in her teaching. I actually look forward to the class on Wednesday evening. I feel like it's something I do just for myself! 

It's a year of peace. 

The year started out with the lingering sorrow of a miscarriage. I was not sure whether we should have another child, considering that I often felt overwhelemed with hubby's constant traveling, and I sometimes have doubts about whether we are good parents. Thanks to God that He used Kodi to remind me that yes, in my heart, in hubby's heart, we would like to have a second child. Kodi has been praying regularly for "baby sister and brother" since she turned three. She wanted to be a big sister, taking care of the baby, sharing her out-grown clothes and toys with them, and teaching them the various tricks or little things that she knew. She has been so confident that a baby is going to come, albeit she doesn't know the timing. Her sheer faith makes me ashamed that I don't surrender to God and His plans.  We have been praying with her for God sending us a baby as a family. We don't know if God would grant us our wishes, but we decided putting forward our request before Him is all that we could and should do.  

Another exciting thing about this year is that I am getting back to cooking! 

Well... the statement isn't exactly true as I am always cooking. What I meant was the passion for cooking, to make something that tastes yummy and looks good, and to try new recipes. 

Well, my first ever home-made apple pie didn't turn out so great. The apple fillings were tasty but the crust was hard as rock! 

3Y5M Bye to size 8

Kodi hit a growth spur in the past six months. Her feet have grown from size 7 to 8 during late spring and again out grown her size 8 around late October. I let her hang on to these lady bug sandals because the two pairs of size 9 shoes I got for her seemed too loose on her, and the adjustable straps seemed to provide some leeway. I noticed today, however, that after a trip to the library to get pre-school science books, there was a patch of redness around the back of her left foot. I asked if it was itchy (perhaps was a mosquito bite) and she said no. Instead she said that the shoe is getting tight. 

So here it goes. We said bye to size 8. Another minute milestone that she is crossing over. 

One down, lots more to go!  

3Y4M Chopping zucchini

Kodi has been super interested in being a "super little helper" 超級小幫手, as she put it. 

She would help put away groceries, wash rice and vegetables (which she's been doing for about one year now, on and off), snip the ends of the green beans, beat the eggs and stir liquidy things, and her recent favorite is chopping! 

She started using a "knife" around 2 and half years old with her baby cuttlery. Of course, the "knife" wasn't meant for real slicing so she often ended up severing the pancake or vegetable by the counter pulling and pushing from each hand. 

Now she uses IKEA's children cuttlery and the knife has the serrated edge that makes slicing easier. She is also more able to pronate her forearm and her wrist is getting stronger so she is able to hold the blade down. I found that cucumber, zucchini and mushrooms are the easiest for her to work with. She enjoys practiving this new skill and she could almost make the chunks even size. And, the chunks are also less mushy now. 

What are you thinking my little sweet girl? 

There are her finished chunks. Not bad, isn't it? 

3Y4M love bouquet

It was a Sunday school activity with my class, helping the children to practice how to love like Jesus. Everyone were to make as many as pospsicle flowers as they'd like by cutting out flower shapes, print a phrase or word about showing love(something like, be kind, help others, share toys), and fasten them to a stick and then tie the flowers into a bouquet. They were encouraged to give the flowers to family members, friends or others to whom they would like to show God's love. 

I thought it would be fun for Kodi to do this too. But I improvised the activity to make it simpler for her. She would just color, cut and paste, and tell me to whom she would like to give the flower. For each flower, she would cut two flower shapes, and I would write the name one one side and "Jesus loves you" on the other side. 

We made many flowers, from mommy, daddy, friends to her teddy bear. We also made many for our family members in Taiwan because we are going to visit them at the end of the month. It was a lot of fun, and a great way to practice how to show love to someone you care about! 

Go hiking

We discovered the McRitchie Reservoir when my parents visited us 2 weeks ago. We had a short hike and ran into a bunch of wild monkeys and giant (but slow) lizards. The place offers a vast open space and walking trials from easy to moderate difficulty level. 

We woke up this morning to a beautiful weather. So we packed our own trial mix and water, and put on hiking shoes and mosquito patch for a walk in the tropical woods at the McRitchie. Kodi was very excited about this and she walked for half of the trip. We chugged in about 7 kilometers! We will definitely do this again and on another Saturday! 

Sunday school teaching

Hubby and I both started teaching Sunday school this fall. 

It's my second experience teaching kids and his first. He teaches the grade 1 kids while I take the grade 2. It's been a exhausting, chaotic, but at the same time joyful and rewarding experience for both of us. 

The two first weeks hubby came home defeated, telling me that he was not sure whether he could serve in this direction. Things simply didn't work! He had a bunch of handfuls on top of one with ADHD. These few always find a way to create a scence, somewhere, and somehow. Starting the third week he got an assistant to literally "shadow" the ADHD kid, and things were turning better. He felt like he finally saw hope that he could survive in that room. The fourth week, however, the class grew from 9 to 15 and the chaos came back again.. alas. 

I am co-teaching with an experience teacher and she took on the first two weeks so I just flew through being a dedicated assistant, handing out materials and snacks, maintaining the needed classroom order, and taking kids to bathroom or water break. The third week Traci was away so I started solo teaching. It was the day we talked about loving your enemies. I had them do a word scramble to fill in the blank of verses, listen to Jesus teaching about love, and work on a cross with two hearts craft. The idea is to bring the two hears together through the cross, and reconcile any issues with Christ. LH, one of my lovely students, made the above and said she wanted to give this to me as a present. Also on that day, J, my student with peanut allergy and always comes in with his inhalers and custom snack, told me that he loves his sunday school teacher, who is standing in front of him, when being asked who are the people you love. They also talked about the kind of people they find hard to love, such as one's brother, and the bully kids at school. Lovely, isn't it? 

Today was focused on the great banquet parable Jesus told the Pharisees. I had them each make a cone shaped party hat, which took a lot longer than I had planned. We all put on the party hats while listening to the bible about being invited to a feast. I paused and asked them questions to make sure they were listening, which worked! We had a bit of discussion about being inclusive/exclusive and what party Jesus was referring to after the story. Last but not the least, I had them do a short play of the parable. I was the director, and I had the name tags (big ones that they wear in front of their chest) and the lines for my casts, the master, servant and the three guests that each gave their own excuse. 

It was a big hit among the kids! The volunteer response was so great that we did the play twice to make sure those who were interested in acting would get a chance. N, the restless, independent (aka do not make me do anything I don't care for), and chatty kid did a great job acting. I made sure that I mentioned this when mom came to pick up. 

Hubby is away today, fishing at sea with the guys, a fun trip organized by the men's ministry. Not having someone to remind me I guess, and I was so focused on the Sunday school teaching today that, I forgot, completely slipped my mind about picking up Kodi from her first sunday school classroom. I was doing the last minute prepping when I heard "Mommy!" and saw Kodi and teacher B standing by my classroom.. Needless to say, I sincerely apologized to B about my forgetfulness. 

Give myself a pat on the shoulder for another week of teaching. This is really a lot more fun than my old days where I would go through a hundred slides and sometimes got lost in my own class...