Got me tagged for another, err, tag; by Moomykin

Rules:
1. Link to the person who tagged you.
2. List 5 things that could make your life very different should it come true.
3. Tag 5 other people.

1. If I didn’t play dead, I would have drowned that day at the rapids, at Kuala Kubu Baru.
See, since I was young free and single I joined various activities to get to know people. One of them was the outdoor adventure group that rock-climbs (they (used to?) run the indoor climbing gym at The Summit) and also white water rafting. On one of the trips to the river, the water was quite high and fast due to rain the previous few days. Story short: My raft tipped over. My buddy managed to get to the shore, I was caught in a “washing machine” tumble of water behind a big boulder (water physics: this is the resulting turbulence when the water meets back together after going around and above the boulder). I couldn’t get out of it. I couldn’t get up for air easily. Because of the life vest, I couldn’t get down low enough. For a while, I was doing how I used to play in the pool when I was a young’un: Sink, kick / jump up, gasp, sink, repeat. I did that for a while while trying to escape the turbulence, buying time, thinking what to do next. And then I couldn’t anymore. I didn’t know where was up and down anymore. I can swim, but I couldn’t swim out of this one. Kicked, and still no air.

I don’t recall thinking I was gonna die. I don’t recall having the proverbial life flash before my eyes. I also don’t recall panicking. Only Hey, I can’t seem to get out of this shit, man.

After a while, I thought Since I am not getting anywhere struggling, why not not struggle. I played dead.

Turns out that was almost the right thing to do. Then I “came back to life” and tried kicking again, and found myself standing in water only knee high (river bed not always the same depth, okay! It was deep at the boulder!)

One of the guys there is a keen kayaker, from Sydney. Brought his own single-seater too. He was saying that with all this turbulence going on, there is a layer of water that’s passing through underneath all this quite happily. If this happened to anyone, to remember to make like a ball and try to get deeper into the water to let this “layer” take you out.

I was apparently involuntarily dragged out by this layer of water.

The guys afterwards said I may have been under for over 5 minutes. I wouldn’t know. They seemed more scared than I, what with my limp body! I was just busy burping all the water I swallowed.

2. If I didn’t go to this club that I didn’t usually go (likewise with Hot Mummee) we wouldn’t have met!
I went with some work mates. Since I was their boss / supervisor, I thought I should also join in some after work partying. Just that I don’t like the crowd there nor the music (it was Viva- now you know what I mean!). I spotted my cousin, went to say hi. Turns out he and friends were celebrating his wife’s birthday. I went over to meet them, and there she was……

3. If I didn’t leave Australia when we separated, we might still be together and I might be living there now
But… I wouldn’t have (re)connected as well as I have with my family here. I wouldn’t have had the break in my career. I wouldn’t have met Hot Mummee, and wouldn’t have these two adorable kids.

4. If I wasn’t lured by advertising money, I wouldn’t have started this blog!
But it’s all good, if I wasn’t passionate about parenting, I wouldn’t have started it anyway!

5. If I had more time for myself, I would actually be making money with this blog!
I would be spending more time researching and tweaking this blog to go further than what it is now, and probably more mental energy to write better stuff and better writing than the current useless fluff…

Hope this doesn’t drive readers away!

PS: Oops, this is just like me to not follow rules, or not reading instructions (take your pick!)- Anyone reading this is free to pick up this tag; ‘cos I don’t even have as many as 5 friends!

The place where I work has recently just launched a blogsite. To out knowledge, there’s only one other company in our industry that has a blogsite. So, we are kinda proud!

And naturally, I am one of the blog contributors ;D

I wrote this one recently, and thought to share it here too. It may not have much to do about my own experience in parenting and kids, but; well, I’ll let you read it yourself…. Let me know what you think?

The thread that strings the chapters of my life..

I thought I heard Pa mention we were going to fly back to KL. I think we drove up in the car that was meant for his site engineer’s use. I am going to fly to meet Oscar (Goldman) who will brief me on my next exciting mission, to fight the bad guys again, to rid the world of such malice. I will show up in my smartest clothes of giant collared shirt and bell bottoms, man. Oh boy wait till I tell my school friends about this! I will still remain cool even though this is my first ever aeroplane trip; I will listen to my Pa and Kor-kor and remain seated even though the aeroplane has landed but still driving… I wonder why Kor-kor kept looking at this slim girl in uniform; the one who was serving the hot drinks, the one that other uncles near me were also constantly looking… Ee-yer, the stairs coming down from the aeroplane was so steep, but I shouldn’t complain- Steve Austin wouldn’t complain.

“Here, let me pin this on you….” He said, and then leads me to get my passport stamped, by this man in uniform sitting in a very tall counter. I am alone, wearing only my backpack, going to visit my jie-jie in Singapore. It’s the school holidays, you see…. Then he leads me to this big room full of people. We walk towards a counter infront of another door that leads somewhere, and asked me to sit here and wait, and speaks to another man that was behind the counter, and leaves. Later, the second man asks me to follow him; everyone else in the room was still sitting and waiting. I follow the second man through this door, and down this tube towards the aeroplane… After we land, another man comes to me, looks at the pin on my shirt, and asks me to follow him. We walk into another big structure, passing his friend also in uniform, who said “kid’s stuff, eh?” and they both chuckled a little. Yeah, like I don’t understand you are talking about me… We come to this big glass door, and he asks if I recognise.. Ah, there’s jie-jie there, waving….

I am going to be away from home for a long time. Mummy and I flew to Singapore first, for me to catch another flight to Sydney. We are to meet a friend who is on the same flight, in the same boarding school I will be attending. The flights’ timing meant that Mummy didn’t need to exit the terminal, only enough to see me to my departure gate, and she can then board another plane heading home. I will always remember the sight of her walking away from me, after saying goodbye, after trying to hide the tears welling in her eyes. I watched as she started walking away; watched until she couldn’t be seen anymore. She didn’t turn around at all. I know why. I wished she did. But I wished she didn’t. And I am glad she didn’t….

Holidays. I love them. Especially year end ones when I can go home! What’s an 8 hours flight when we have something like 7 weeks of absolutely nothing to do? Oh look- the magazine says “Back to the Future” is going to be on on this flight! Now if only those window passengers would close their shutters so that we can all watch the screen infront, and “Miss, can you ask that passenger 2 rows infront of me to recline his seat? I can’t see the screen, and it’s about to start….” At least they are giving out wired speaker headphones these days, and I hope it’s that crew who will be serving me- she’s kinda hot…

“You nervous, honey?”
“Yeah- do you think your parents will like me?”
“Of course they will…”
“…..”
“Just try and relax; hey look, at least now we have our own screens and you can watch that chick-flick you wanted to watch..” Thank goodness- I was never interested in that movie!

“Headset for you, sir?”
“No thanks…” I don’t feel like it. I am going back for a family funeral….

“How was the flight back, dear?”
“Good; even though we got a bassinet, baby didn’t like it, so I held him most of the time…. The crew was very helpful and understanding.. The flight wasn’t the nightmare I thought it might be with an infant… ”

“Oh, by the way, I will be going on a company trip.”
“Cool, where are you going?”
“Istanbul and Sydney. We are going there as part of the evaluation, as part of our tendering selection process”
“Wah… ”
“And did you know that managers get to fly first class?”
“WAH! No wonder you guys are losing money!”
“No, not really. The plane is flying anyway. We take those seats only if they are unsold….”
“I guess.. First class. I am so jealous…”

“Hey sweetie, wanna go to Sydney and visit Mummee?”
“Yay Daddee! We are going to Australia!”

Okay, now how do I keep a 3 year old entertained on board, and would sleep through the whole journey?“

Caitlin, when she was about 2 years 3 months old, showing how she can rotate her dummy hands-free!

These are screen-grabs of a video clip I took of her just before bed one night.

This was probably only a few weeks before we started weaning her off the dummy. I think it took about under a week to get her off it. Poor kid suffering from withdrawals …. But I am proud of her.

Caleb hasn’t been using one; not that we are going to, we’ve managed so far without one, and as much as we can help it we don’t intend to start.

Just came back from another extended-family dinner at Dr Pixie’s; sans the smiley face candles this time. It was really just a catch-up dinner with my parents, siblings, and the 3rd generation.

One of the stories shared was how one of my nephews had really come out of his shell as he reached puberty and into his teens now.

I do recall most of the stories of how he was a rather shy and quiet boy. When I returned from Australia in the late 90’s he was only just starting preschool, or very close to starting primary schooling. Since the kids of that generation (sorry Caitlin, Caleb, that Daddee married late and had you guys later) are all pretty close in their age, they’d play together and try the new things together too. I remember seeing this particular nephew always sidelining himself. Not really one to wanna try new games or participate in physical activities much.

When he started primary schooling, my sister in law was told (or that it was noted in his report card) that he was particularly quiet in class, perhaps almost introverted / reclusive. He didn’t really talked a lot at home either.

My parents have always wanted their kids (and I guess extended to their grandkids too) to be more extroverted and be able to present themselves, in manners of public speaking, etc.. My personal experience of this was when Mum signed me up for a singing competition, when I was in primary 2 or 3. I didn’t want to, but due to her superwoman fierce mother stronger than influence, I “had” to, and subsequently I attended the gig and sang, and kicked everyone’s ass (I guess that could be another post topic!)

So with this nephew my father gave him a challenge, knowing how this young kid was already finding ways to make / save money: If there was ever a chance or event for him to be up on stage in front of the whole school, my father was going to give him 50 bucks for it. It could be for whatever reasons: public story telling, singing, school debate, receiving a prize, etc.

I guess during those school years, this nephew started growing out of his shell. Feedback from the school teacher was that she couldn’t shut this boy up in class!

So much so that during a school assembly once, he and his buddies were caught chatting. And as you know you are supposed to give your utmost attention to the front of the hall during assembly. As punishment, they were summoned up to the stage to sing some kid song, in front of the whole school!

But wait a minute, I hear you say, doesn’t that mean that….

Yup. He came home and demanded the 50 bucks! A deal’s a deal! My father had no choice! I guess he should have reviewed the terms carefully!

He went to school the next day to brag about it to his very envious buddies. His friends obviously couldn’t believe it. He was all of pride and glory when a primary 1 school boy came up to him, pointed at him and laughed, “You are already in primary 6 and you had to sing a kid’s song!”

.
Following up on the first post about my expectations of becoming a dad for the first time, I would like to continue with the second part of the blog-topic sugguestion- this time on becoming a dad for the second time.

I mentioned we were going to only have 2 kids. Since we already have Caitlin, we therefore very much wanted a boy for the second one, and call it a day, so to speak.

Old wives tales as well as scientifically, I have heard and knew stuff about how
- the male sperms swam faster (due to the fact that male sperms are lighter) but died sooner;
- creating an alkali environment which the males prefer;
- certain dates on the Chinese calendar;
- ascertaining the stages of the cycle based on body temperature, to “meet” the egg with the “Mr Right” before he dies;
etc.

We even went as far as to perform an AIH, where basically, I “donated” my sperm for the labs to centrifugally separate Miss Rights and Mr Rights, and then “shoot” the presumably very dizzy Mr Rights into Hot Mummee. Yup, Hot Mummee is so adamant to only have two kids that we had to do this to ensure a boy.

While I went along with this, we both did have some reservations about it. Natural selection means the fastest swimmer wins; which usually also means the healthiest, most capable sperm. This method actually inhibits natural selection- what happens is all the male sperms are scooped up together, healthy as well as defective ones (as they do naturally occur).

Perhaps it was “divine intervention” that the procedure didn’t work. Dr Wong did say after all, that the success rate was only about 70%. Just as well, because I had heard subsequently that there was this family that already had three girls who then opted for this procedure for trying for a boy. They ended up with another girl. Moreover, where the older three girls were slim and tall-ish, this one is rather short and plumb, bearing little resemblance to her older siblings.

After one try, Hot Mummee and I thought better to just go el naturale. It’s also more fun anyway!

And so, we now have the very good looking Caleb! I cannot remember if we took precautions; I think we did monitor Hot Mummee’s temperatures for timing….

Anyway.

As with all precedents, I did fall into the trap of comparing the two kids: On their respective ages of when they started lifting / supporting their heads, when they started smiling, that we should start training Caleb now because the older sister was already able to do this or that; their respective behaviours, weights, “ease” of taking care of them, etc.

Also, I wasn’t as excited about his birth or arrival. When both of them mere infants of only a few weeks old, I honestly did not feel much attachment to them. To me, they were really just “empty” little humans that ate, shit, cry, sleep, basically keeping everyone else occupied in activities that supported these four modes.

I mean, I know they will eventually develop into a human being capable of expressions, speech, emotions, communicative, etc … Eventually.

So, when Caitlin started showing some interactivity, such as responding with smiles, looking me in the eye, general human body language that indicated acknowledgement, that was when I started proactively engaging her. I would talk to her, using the different pitches and tones (that I had read about) to stimulate her, I would sing or hum to her, touch her all the time all over.

Admittedly, I did quite little of these with Caleb. Why? I think it was a matter of novelty, or reduced novelty. While I am not blaming Caitlin, she was also still demanding my attention.

I am not saying that Caitlin was trying to demand more of my attention with the arrival of her little brother. She was already used to a level of attention from me, and so was expecting that of the same even with baby around.

To date I can’t say that she is jealous. There were times when Hot Mummee reckoned she was when she started showing some whiney behaviours. But luckily, I think she is only jealous of the symptoms of having another child demanding our time and attention away from her, rather than being directly jealous of her brother; in which case I think any toddler would then have malicious intent towards the younger. Either she is mature enough to be pissed only at the symptoms, or that she is a rather blur kid… I think you know which I prefer to think!

However, Hot Mummee has actually said that I am biased, that I don’t spend enough time with Caleb, that I am “already happy enough with the daughter”! I guess she may be right in that I am already used to Caitlin, I know Caitlin, and we are already able to communicate with her. Whereas Caleb was just eat-sleep-shit-cry!

Caitlin, however, is still finding it a novelty to have a real life baby around! Caleb’s now over 5 months old. Yet she still finds him fascinating: She likes to hold his tiny little toes, and tells you they are tiny. She repeats Caleb’s mutterings, usually with a mouth-covered giggle; when Caleb’s bored in the car and starts whining, at Daddee’s only-once request Caitlin would sing to him, with whatever she’s learnt from school or with made up lyrics. Those are the moments I gotta capture soon on video…

Going through the second time also meant replaying the same not-looking-forward-to things. Baby poop, to me, would be among the foulest smelling things on earth! In fact, I think breast-fed poop smells worse than baby formula poop. I actually dry-wretched! Absolutely did not look forward to the discovery of them pastey semi-solids and having to clean / wipe their bum cracks and washing!

But there are also pluses. Caleb’s wearing some of the infant clothes that Caitlin outgrew, even if it’s pink! He is using the stroller that Caitlin used very little of; re-using the steriliser and baby monitor; there is a walker waiting for him; I am a little more experienced in handling an infant; Caitlin has had chances to show her parents that she is quite a taking-care-of-little-brother sister, naturally.

To be honest, at 5 months old now, he is already responding to my talking to him. He does already look me in the eye, gets into a giggly fit when I cluck my tongue at him….

I will, of course, still endevour to be his friend too, just likely with a different approach compared to befriending Caitlin. With a boy, and chauvinistically, I am likely to play rougher with him, get dirty with him, take him out on more physical activities.

With Caitlin today, would you believe I comb and tie her hair, buy her stickers with lots of pink, play with her doll with her?

Those who know me might just believe it…!

This is a little-bit-techie post…

You know I like taking photos of the kids. I also like taking videos of them in action: Those first steps, the changing look(s), them in action in the walker / tricycle / simply playing, their vocab, changing the voice.

I sometimes find myself in a dilemma when various occasions present themselves for such opportunity that I am unable to decide which camera to bring along- the digital cam, which takes far more superior still shots than the built-in stills feature on the videocam; or the videocam, which can take better and longer video footage (is there a plural for dilemma?)

I had started out by purchasing a videocam when Caitlin was born. It was a good “business case justification” to Hot Mummee to spend the money. Once a lifetime event; it’s not for me or all about me; it’s our kids; I can make copies for your parents (oops that reminds me!), etc.

I took lots of Caitlin’s first hours (eg, family visiting the hospital) and subsequent months and years. Then I bought a better Canon S5is still camera, replacing the late-90’s Canon ixus model. It was faster, better quality, better storage, and more versatile. I had come to use and rely on it a lot, taking more pics with it at the same time improving my skills with it (well, I hope).

So much so that I haven’t video-taken Caleb’s birth! I had only used the video feature available on the still camera, which are only in *minutes-long snippets. I did take lots of stills of him though, comparatively a lot more than Caitlin.

* Well that’s not actually entirely true. With enough memory, one could use this camera to take video snippets of up to an hour. Just means having to invest in bigger or multiple SD memory cards. One of the main reasons why I chose to spend the prize money on an Apple Macbook Pro was this: To video edit the footage that I have accumulated through the years, and the snippets taken from the still digital camera is able capable of TV-sized dimensions (ie, 640×480). Having said that though, I admit I am still new to this whole video-editing on a laptop thing. Apple’s iWork suite does go a long way to make all this easy, though.

With the video footage that I have taken with the videocam, I have been transferring them onto DVDs all these years, by using or leeching on whomever has a DVD burner player. It’s been a simple plug-play-burn, so it’s not all that laborious. In fact, recently my dad had bought a Panasonic DVD HDD burner too, and with my Panasonic branded videocam (it was another coincidence of same brand), the player could actually drive the camera- all I had to do was tell the player that, yes, I want to burn the videocam’s tape onto the blank DVD I had just inserted, and come back some 70 minutes later to find it all done.

So what’s all this gotta do with backing them up?

My mistake is that I have been “investing” in medium-level branded blank DVDs. I didn’t realise this was a mistake till I tried playing Disc 3 of my collection (to date I have 17 discs already), one that’s of Caitlin when she was under 1 year old. It just wouldn’t play on my player, nor on my IBM laptop; and today, not even on my super-duper Apple Macbook Pro either! Since I recycle my DV tapes after the footage has been burned on these DVDs, those were my only copies of them! You can imagine my panic when I realised I may have lost those videos forever! This was at a time when I didn’t know much about video technology (that’s not to say that I know lots now, but enough)

Back then I didn’t have anything with computing power for me to toy with video on the PC. What I did was searched and found another PC DVD reader that was able to read Disc 3, and quickly copied over the DVD files onto my external drive- yup, the whole DVD volume as is. Saved them on my external HD ready for future manipulations.

So now that I have the MacBook Pro that has enough grunt power, I have started researching into this area. It’s quite a wide area of codes, mp4, codex, compressions, H2.64, standards, resolutions, frame rates, etc…

To start with, I have found an open source DVD ripping software for the Mac OSX, which I think does a good enough job: Handbrake.

So after digging around for more info, I looked into ripping Disc 3 saved on the external hard drive, and may-as-well do the same for my whole collection.

Here’s a screenshot of the process:

The whole process of ripping DVDs can take up to 2 hours for 1 DVD, because Handbrake also compresses the video as it rips- meaning it will save the video into a new format of smaller file size.

At the very least, this allows me to save the DVDs and its respective footages of 750MB-ish files, which I can quite easily back them up onto PC DVDs; until I research further into video authoring and creating customised home movies, and not just home videos.

I think Gadget Daddy would be more knowledgable in this area since he’s been dabbling in video for a while, and I have a suspicion that Derek too would also be; both of which are Mac users I don’t wanna contact GD yet- he’s swamped with work at the moment. Will research more myself and learn in the process.

Screen grab of Caitlin at the recent Kids Zone visit.

At least now, I have my precious memories backed up in electronic format, and will look for branded blanks for backing them on to!

Phew!

A prequel episode:

Visit to the Doctor!
As with all newborns, Caitlin’s first few visits to Dr Pixie’s weren’t exactly pleasant for her. But the one visit that really stood out in my memory, was the time when her cold / nasal congestion was so bad that she needed suction performed up her nose.

Not a very pleasant experience being pinned down and having the tubes shoved up your nose.

And as with older sisters speaking to the youngest brother, I was made to feel all the well-deserved guilt when Dr Pixie I-told-you-so reminded me why I should have heeded her advice to persistently squirt sodium chloride solution into her nose after each feed, to clear / flush the gunk. “Regardless of how unpleasant it is for her, it has to be done!”

I was the one pinning her legs down, having the full privilege of coming face to face with Caitlin when the tubes were inserted. Her eyes said it all while wailing: Why are you doing this / allowing this to happen to me?? It was heart wrenching! This was when she only managed 2-3 word-sentences, I think…

Strangely though, Caitlin doesn’t seem to mind visiting Dr Pixie’s even after that visit. Perhaps it’s because she looks forward to the indoor gym / playground of slides and rocking horses. Either that or she’s forgotten the experiences even though she remembers having been there.

AHHH! A BIG FAT NEEDLE!
As she grows, the number of mandatory shots were slowly being ticked off the list. But earlier this year she needed a HepA booster shot. I think she knew what was coming, because she knows that people visited a dr when they are sick, but she was healthy. I had to tell her what was coming. Boy was she not happy about it!

She had still put on a brave front when we were already in Dr Pixie’s and waiting for our turn, quietly but persistently “I don’t waaaaant…” It wasn’t until when we were seated infront of Dr Pixie and the sight of the needle that she started crying.

Dr Pixie, in her years of experience, was a little disappointed that we had told Caitlin that she was there for a shot. “It’s usually a lot easier that the kids don’t know what’s coming, to then distract them and quickly and swiftly ’sneak in’ the shot, so that by the time the kids realised it, its over and done with. Knowing beforehand, the kids would put up a fight.”

So, Caitlin was putting up some resistance. She wasn’t wrestling, but she wasn’t going to remain still either. Dr Pixie was about to do the I-told-you-so again, when Hot Mummee and I then decided to ask Dr Pixie to wait for a few minutes while we have a quiet word with Caitlin. Dr Pixie didn’t think that would work, but she didn’t have a choice.

Hot Mummee went into the adjoining room with Caitlin, while I waited with Dr Pixie for a while; all the time feeling a little tense that we were wasting her time while other patients were outside waiting their turn. But to Dr Pixie’s surprise (and not too surprising for me), Hot Mummee soon returned with Caitlin, all ready for the shot.

Hot Mummee coaxed her into taking it, much to Dr Pixie’s (further) surprise! She even asked us how we did it!

The idea of sticking a needle into your flesh is one that isn’t easily stomached by anyone of any age.. Well, that’s not true, I don’t have a problem watching someone sticking one into me, but we are not talking about me!

And apparently HepA shots are quite painful. Caitlin had a plaster stuck on the site immediately after this shot. Earlier inoculations I guess weren’t as painful, cos this time she was really quite sob-ish about it, not allowing anyone near the plaster, and mere suggestions will bring her to tears again.

Poor kid…

These days, Caitlin is very relieved it isn’t her anymore, to require shots. You can tell that when she is being told that her little brother needs to visit the Dr’s to get an injections, that she is weary of it and even shows signs of sympathy (she has that OOoooooh poor baby it’s gonna hurt you know look) but I am sure she is glad it isn’t her anymore.. for now!

So how do you prepare your child for the next visit to the Dr’s?

I got this email from a friend, from his friend. Must be the season for it

When I was 4 Years Old : My father is THE BEST

When I was 6 Years Old : My father seems to know everyone

When I was 10 Years Old : My father is excellent but he is short tempered

When I was 12 Years Old : My father was nice when I was little

When I was 14 Yrs Old : My father started being too sensitive

When I was 16 Years Old : My father can’t keep up with modern time

When I was 18 Years Old : My father is getting less tolerant as the days pass by

When I was 20 Years Old : It is too hard to forgive my father, how could my Mum stand him all these years

When I was 25 Years Old : My father seems to be objecting to everything I do

When I was 30 Years Old: It’s very difficult to be in agreement with my father, I wonder if my Grandfather was troubled by my father when he was a youth

When I was 40 Years Old: My father brought me up with a lot of discipline, I must do the same

When I was 45 Years Old: I am puzzled, how did my father manage to raise all of us

When I was 50 Years Old : It’s rather difficult to control my kids, how much did my father suffer for the sake of upbringing and protecting us

When I was 55 Years Old: My father was far looking and had wide plans for us, he was gentle and outstanding.

When I became 60 Years Old: My father is THE BEST

Note that it took 56 Years to complete the cycle and return to the starting point “My father is THE BEST”

Let’s be good to our parents before it’s too late and pray to GOD that our own children will treat us even better than the way we treated our parents .

If you are a regular reader, you’d have picked up that Caitlin is in my mum-in-law’s care during our working / office hours. This was the arrangement pretty much right from her birth.

Mum’s key to toilet training Caitlin was regularity. At almost-specific times of the day (maybe 4-5 times a day) she would bring Caitlin over to the toilet & coax her to pee. Special attention was paid when Caitlin has consumed more than usual amounts of liquid, but basically her toilet-training was to catch it before it rains, figuratively.

While I generally practise positive reinforcements, we also did show some friendly-disapproval (if you can call it that) to Caitlin if she did wet her diapers. OOooooh look- it’s wet. But generally we practised the former: Cheering when Caitlin’s diapers were dry after waking from both her afternoon naps & overnight sleeps. We also bought a toddler’s toilet seat & made it a big deal to her about her very own special seat to encourage her to use it.

It was as simple as that. She started telling us when she needed to go. She still does now mainly because she is not tall enough yet to get on the toilet on her own, or wash up after she’s done.

The breakthrough, not surprisingly, was when we explicitly explained to her that we wished (keyword) that she’d stop wearing them when she slept at night, & made it an adventure for her. I guess it also helped that, in our day-to-day interaction with her to develop her self-confidence in life, that we really do cheer her on when she accomplishes something, whatever the size of the accomplishment. The cheering does spur her on to want to do it.

Of course there were still accidents the first few nights, but I gotta say I don’t recall it being more than 3 times. I think it was because it was suddenly cold (airy??) without diapers!

This skill is something I will forever be indebted to mother in law- thanks Mum!

2am, almost every night: Daddee….. DADDEE…. I need to go shee shee!

While I am one of those who really treasures sleep (‘cos I get headachey and/or isn’t fully functional from lack of sleep), it’s nothing compared to this; especially that adorable sleepy face & the occasional out-of-the-blue questions, like last night’s “Why did the neighbour-boy come asking for sweets all dressed scarily?”

You know, Caitlin, that the day you were due to be born, Mummee & Daddee still attended Aunty Ivy’s wedding dinner? Everyone was amazed that Mummee & Daddee actually turned up at the banquet hall despite telling everyone that we may have to give it a miss! Do you remember hearing all the happy cheers at the dinner?

Dr Wong, who is looking after Mummee now with your soon-to-be-born little brother, was also your Dr then. He had told Mummee & Daddee that we should go see him soon after that- Dr was afraid that you would continue growing & become too big come out naturally.

Mummee & Daddee brought our bags to the Dr’s work a few days later, where we were lucky to have a room all to ourselves. Daddee brought his laptop along for music, but you were cheeky & everybody wasn’t prepared for how long we had to wait for you!

Dr Wong inserted half a pill of something to induce Mummee. About 6 hours later Dr came back & there was little change; Mummee didn’t feel any different, just bored.

Dr Wong then inserted another half a pill of something. Mummee was still only bored hours later. Do you remember?

Dr Wong then decided to rupture the amniotic sac, hoping that this time there would be some action. Mummee was still only getting more bored. Cheeky you!

Dr Wong then decided to put Mummee on a drip. Do you remember that only then did something happen in Mummee’s stomach?

Dr Wong came to check & told Mummee & Daddee that Mummee was slow to respond, that you would only be coming out in 7 hours?? Cheeky you, Mummee then was in so much pain that Mummee decided to have that injection in her back to make it less ouch-ouch!

Dr Wong is so clever- you really only were ready to come out about 7 hours later like he said! And Daddee hadn’t showered for over 36 hours! Eeew, Daddee was so smelly!

You probably don’t know the Transformers cartoon, but when you were ready to come out, Mummee’s bed somehow had so many things added & so many things folding so quickly to welcome you, that it didn’t look like the same bed anymore!

Mummee told me afterwards that it was really helpful that Daddee was watching over Dr Wong’s shoulder when you were coming out giving encouragement with Daddee’s thumbs-up, because Mummee couldn’t feel what she was doing or doing it correctly… It’s okay, Mummee can feel now, sweety.

But you know what, sweety? When your head came out, Daddee actually thought you looked so much like Daddee! How do I know? Maybe someday Daddee will show you Daddee’s baby photos with your own, then we can both have a chuckle together! Hee hee!

And maybe one day too Daddee will show you the video of you coming out! It’s okay, Daddee’s clever camera didn’t show anything, only when the nurses brought you to Mummee the first time!

Maybe you can also see how red your skin was.. It’s okay, Dr Wong said that it was normal, & how it would also be normal that a few days later you would turn a bit yellow because the red was going away. But you didn’t turn yellow! You just turned into “normal” colour- so clever!

It’s okay, Daddee wasn’t scared. Daddee was only scared of your poop-poop; it was so smelly!

One of the essential items parents of newborns need is a baby monitor.

We got ours from Toys ‘R Us, at RM179. It wasn’t the cheapest nor the dearest, but we thought it would serve our needs.

Inside the packaging are the baby unit, parent’s unit, & an AC adapter. Both units can house 4 AA batteries, but we opted to use the adapter for the baby unit, since anywhere we went there was always a powerpoint available. On both units is a slide switch to choose / sync the radio signal; presumably to circumvent radio frequency interruptions from other sources.

The baby unit also has an on/off switch for the monitor in the centre of the unit. On its side is another slide switch for a nightlight- the little flashlight bulb inside actually gives out a warm orangey light through the blue plastic housing. I can’t say we have ever used it- it is too dim to be of any real use. The parent’s unit has a wheel-switch which doubles the on/off function as well as volume.

Reception is not the best, depending on what is between the 2 units- distance & how many walls; though these things are not meant for long range use.

Caitlin is nearly 3 years old now, & I must admit this monitor has lasted all this while. There are, however, the occasional no-reception-where-there-should-be; flicking the A-B signals can sometimes fix the problem. Lately too, the parent’s unit is making more hiss-noise when there wasn’t before.

We use rechargeable batteries for the parent’s unit. With everyday use of about 3-4 hours each (plus the occasional weekends) I think we go through one charge a week.

At the recent Children’s Fair expo in PWTC however, I saw some monitors with built-in cameras, much like those found on mobile phones & laptops, with tiny TV screens on the parents’ unit. Both units physically not being much bigger than mobile phones. I saw them side by side on shelves though, so I couldn’t tell how well they’d perform “in the field”. I guess I could have taken the parents unit for a walk just to test it out, but I doubt the salesperson would appreciate that.

Still, you gotta admit the TV idea is kinda cool.

Having older siblings help. They sometimes share their “if only” stories.

“If only I have taken more photos of my kids..”

Fathers, invest in a good (digital) camera, in a good video camera, & time.

I, for one, am already missing some of the phases & moments of my (only a very young) going-on-3 years old little girl… for they are already gone forever.

Recently I had decided it was time for Caitlin to “move on” to another stage of her young life.

As with all babies & toddlers, all this while we have had to carry her on & off her cot, over the protective barrier that, obviously, keeps her from rolling / falling off her cot.

For over a month now, Caitlin has been showing signs that she is toilet-trained. She would wake at nights exclaiming that she needs to go pee, where this groggy Daddee would drag himself out of bed, lift & carry her over the barrier (mind you she is getting heavy too), sit her on her toddler-toilet-seat over the adult toilet, wait for her to finish, and lift & carry her back on her cot.

She has also demonstrated that she could get on & off the seat on her own with the help of a foot stool that lives in the toilet.

So over the weekend I had modified her cot for the third time. No wait, second time, for the third stage.

Stage one: The cot is set up where the bed / mattress is about stomach height. This is obviously for the infant stage where it is the ideal height for tending to them.

Stage two: This is for toddlers, where the little ones can be lifted on & off their “bed”. One side of the barrier is actually slideable, presumably for ease of access.

Stage three: Freedom!

She is now able to get on & off her “bed” all by herself, which, I am not sure yet if it’s such a good idea after all!

She was having her daily nap when I did this. When I showed it to her when she was awake, she didn’t seem too excited either way. But when bedtime came, she had actually said that she will lie in it for a while, but will still want to fall asleep on my bed as she does, and she did! Thought that was quite cute, that she wanted to test-drive the getting on / off on her own initiative, but knew that she would still miss her Daddee comforting her to sleep beside her!

Sigh.. they grow so quickly…

We got this cot from Planet Enfante.

It is still clear in my head, the visual “playback” of my schoolmate’s reaction to my statement, & my reaction to his reaction; from so many years ago during a class break.

We were talking about what we do at home after school, during free time, etc. Don’t forget this is all pre-internet days!

“I get on my Atari and startup Pele Soccer…”

“I dunno; watch TV I guess. Maybe badminton or soccer..”

And I said “I chat with my mom..”

“You chat with your mum??” His reaction: How weird are you??

My reaction to his reaction: How weird to think that is weird.

Reflecting on this years later, it occurred to me that not everyone was as fortunate as I (we) were. Other than being a stay-home mum catering everyone’s need, & unlike my schoolmates’ mums who just provided food & shelter, mum was a person to really talk to, provided feedback & guidance, provided & sought our companionship.

It was these interactions with my mum that may have nurtured me into the parent that I (want to be) am today. I feel I can tell my mum anything (sometimes too much!) & not feel reprimanded for sharing. It also creates & maintains that bond which unites the family.

Above all, it is likening it to being “friends”. And as we all know, we can talk to friends about (almost) anything.

A chat with an ex senior management colleague echoed this. He said he treats his kids not with a parent-child relationship, but like they are friends.

I see this also practised especially with my older brother. From the start, he has been very interactive with his daughter & till today they speak like they are friends (as he is with Caitlin too today).

When Caitlin was born in the delivery room, I heard myself saying in my head: I am gonna (try and) be your best friend… OK, right after “Oh, it IS a girl!”

And thus the name of this site!