Baby Brendan's 1st Birthday!

Last Saturday evening after a tiring day of cleaning up our own apartment so that it is ready to be leased out again to a new tenant, we decided to have a mini celebration of baby Brendan's 1st birthday. His actual birthday was supposed to be this Friday, 26 Feb but we decided to bring the celebration forward so that the extended family members can be around too. Also, we might be having a second celebration at my mum's side this coming weekend.

I have been shopping and thinking what to buy for his birthday present a few weeks ago and have absolutely no idea what to get him as we already have loads of toddler toys at home. Most of the toddler toys are identical like blocks, shapes and musical instruments which come in all sorts of different designs. So, we decided not to buy him any toy but to get him a book only. More importantly, we realised that baby Br is not so into reading as his brother, Ry. He is more restless when it comes to reading time and refuses to sit still. Hopefully, he will be "inspired" by the book we bought him. It is the same scenario for my mil and brother-in-law. In the end, both ended up buying new clothes for him.

Ry kept saying this is his birthday and is happily humming away the birthday song. We'll be having an actual celebration for him soon next week at his preschool.

Baby Br modelling in his new set of clothes bought by my mil - his birthday present from her.

Ry looking bored as he can't wait to have the cake and Baby Br absolutely clueless over his birthday!

Cutting the cake! Br is officially one year old!

I am really happy and amazed at how quickly Br's first year has passed. It was an eventful year with the birth, moving back from US and me becoming a full time working mum again. K and I have since learnt a lot more about our kids and how each can be so different. Most importantly, we feel blessed to have 2 healthy, energetic boys.

CNY picture updates!

Today marks the 8th day of Lunar New year by which most Hokkiens would 拜天公 at the strike of twelve in the midnight. Having 2 young kids, I'm spared from the praying so that I can stay at home to take care of them and tuck them into bed but dear hubby would have to go over to my mil's place to pray for the whole family instead, which is usually followed by a sumptuous supper of the offerings after the elaborate praying. So, I thus have the time to upload some photos taken during CNY, which I promised in my previous post. You will probably notice that all the photos are of my husband's family side because during CNY, my parents went to Hokaiddo for vacation.

Ryan and my nephew, Charles goofing around before the dishes were served at our early reunion dinner on 12th Feb, Friday evening.

The first complete family portrait of my hubby's family, which is a rare occasion as my sister-in -law and her family (i.e. the family of 3 standing besides me) stays in Hong Kong.

My mil, baby Brendan and my baby niece, Jaslyn on the first day of Lunar New Year. Remember that I said in the earlier post, Br was feeling insecure during this period as he felt the threat from the other baby.

We were supposed to dress the boys in the traditional Chinese costumes together with my nephew, by which my mum already tailored and altered the 2 suits for them from a "mian ao" that I orignially bought for Ry 2 years ago from HK. However, we decided against it after waking up in the morning in sweltering heat, so decided to dress the boys in bright orange instead. My hubby even joked that we brought 3 oranges to "bai nian" when we carry Br, as he looked like a round mandarin orange.

Ryan putting on the traditional hat with a pigtail that belongs to my nephew and demonstrating a "wong fei hong" stance. I thought Ry has the little emperor look with the hat on. Wonder anyone agree with me?

The first picture of the four cousins together. Don't think we'll have any more additional children in our family in the near future, unless one day, I decided to try again for a girl, which is highly unlikely looking at the circumstances now.

The second family portrait at my brother-in-law's home on the second day of CNY. I love this series of photos because they are really well-taken with the mini-tripod stand, and every kid in the family is paying attention due to the blinking light from the self-timer.

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Happy CNY to all!

I have been very busy over the time leading and up to CNY, partly because of work and partly because of family committments, which explains the lack of updates. My sister-in-law and her family came back from Hong Kong to spend CNY here, which resulted my mil being very stressed and I got to help out to take care of baby Br so that she can run grocery and marketing trips to get things ready for reunion dinner and CNY. In the end, we had reunion dinner on Friday, 12 Feb at a restaurant of having home-cooked food because my mil can't cope with cooking for the huge family and the work of taking care of three young kids.

Still, CNY was still a great time especially so this year since we had a longer break as it spreads over the weekend. Ry is now old enough to understand and appreciate the concept of CNY and I must pay kudos to his preschool to teach him how to "bai4 nian2", say auspicious greetings and teaching them things related to CNY. I was pleasantly surprised when we heard him say "gong xi fai cai" which sounded like "gong3 xi2 fa cai4 " as usual with an ang mo slang to it and happily saying "happy new year" to the elders.

Baby Br is a bit unsettled when my baby niece arrives from Hong Kong. I guessed he felt threatened by another baby so he was extremely clingy to me and my mil if I'm not around. Still, he was getting cuter by the day and we look forward to his first year birthday soon! He had started babbling, "bi di, bi di" and say "bao bao" with his arms opened if he wants us to carry him.

Will update CNY photos in the next post. 3

Passing on the legacy!

I just had a gathering with my ex-students from the 2004 batch yesterday at Raffles City and looking at the 6 girls all dressed up in pretty frocks coming to the restaurant from their work, I suddenly feel old and so so yesterday......

It is not easy for a class to remain connected after leaving the college for 5 years when some of the students have even gone for overseas education, come back and boys going through the National Service. It has been a heartwarming evening to see at least half of my class sitting together at the little round table, having Jap food, chatting and catching up with each other. I think this must be the power of the Facebook age where everyone could keep connected with each other. However, the real life connection is still important and I thank C, one of my most memorable students for taking efforts to organise this gathering. Without him, the connection would just be superficial and fleeting, at least for me.

The class gathering also reminded me why I became a teacher and why the love for teaching have never really wavered through the years, despite leaving the job for two years. I remembered a comment made by my colleague yesterday. He said, "sometimes the best and most memorable students to teach will usually be the "naughtiest", "cheekiest" and "rebellious" type." I do not deny the truth of the statement as it is till this day, I can most probably remember the names of my "difficult" students but I guessed the reality is that the memories resided so deeply because as educators, we believe we have made probably made a little change in these students' lifes. I believe when K is reading this, he'll probably say that I am narcissitic :)

I am happy that all of my ex-students are doing great in their lifes now and are holding good and meaningful jobs. I even have 2 ex-students from 04S64 who have joined my profession to become a Chemistry teacher. I am definitely happy that I managed to pass on my legacy through them besides the genetic part through my dear boys. I wish these two girls all the best in their first year of teaching and hopefully, they will derive as much joy from teaching Chemistry as me.

And, a big thank you to 04S64 for the class gathering yesterday, it really reminded me why I was a teacher and will be a teacher, especially during this time, when I almost lost faith in our education system after the tiring and draining meetings and the endless drafts of work in my current job in the headquaters.