(written by Footywife)

My mum nags a lot when I was a kid.  Even now she nags a lot.  I never understood why mothers nag until I become a mother myself.

It’s all thanks to the super short-term memory of young children.  “Don’t jump around when you’re eating Jadon or you’ll choke”, I called.  He stopped but 10 seconds later, he’s at it again.  “Stop jumping around I say, Jadon!”.  He stopped again but 10 seconds later he’s at it again.  “I say STOP Jadon!!  Do you understand STOP?!!”… …

Or it could be “Don’t jump on the sofa, Jadon.  The sofa’s for sitting, not jumping”  He jumps a while more and comes down.  You go into the room and when you return he’s jumping on the sofa again.  You repeat the same instruction and inevitably he does it again later.  And the next day.  And the day after.

And because I know that their memories are short term, I repeat instructions over and over again.  “Be careful Jadon because the floor is wet” - I say this without fail whenever I see wet floors.

So I can just imagine how this business of “repeating the same instruction over and over again” everyday, 7 days a week, 365 days a year is going to CHANGE me. It WILL become a habit such that even after my little boy grows up and no longer requires instructions to be repeated because he has developed a longer term memory, I will still continue to “repeat the same instruction over and over again”.

By which time the same act will be called “nagging”.

I have been REAL busy, hence missing in blog action for a LOOOONG while.

On the work front, I have been quite stretched as I worked in the financial industry. Needless to say, the current financial turmoil is the reason for the increased workload. Thank you sub-prime, thank you Lehman, thank you investment bankers, thank you FED, thank you structurers for coming up with “wonderful” products that no one fully understood the risks until now…or maybe not even now.

On another front, for the past week after l returned from work, I have poured myself hard working on this wedding montage for a good friend of mine. I had always wanted to do this for him, so understandably there was a very strong desire to make sure I did an excellent job.

You tell me if I can make a career out of this and dump my job! Oops…I forgot recession is coming….

If you find them interesting, you can view some of my other works here.

I really enjoy doing these things despite the hours I spent on them.  The above montage took me about 20hours (!!!) to do, but I really do love working my socks off. The satisfaction I get from the appreciative couples is indescribable.

Its a sad day today.

I have just finished reading an email from my soccer friend JC. He told us his baby girl arrived into this world last Wednesday, but unfortunately, she passed away two days later on 10 Oct 08 due to complications at labor.  His wife P, is recovering and doing ok.

I don’t know what to say…it is quite heartbreaking.

My wife and I have been through a similar road (we had a miscarriage before we had our son Jadon), yet it is so difficult to find the right words to express our grieve, except maybe to say nothing and acknowledge the loss.

Frankly, I think the best thing I can do now is to solicit prayers for my friend and his family, and the Baby girl.

I believe your generous prayers will do much to help comfort them in such a difficult time.
Thank you friends.

Oh by the way, for those reading the previous post and wondering who “Mack” is….he is the big truck that “ferries” race cars in the DISNEY PIXAR movie “CARS”.

And I just found out that the name “Mack” came from “Mack Trucks”, one of the world’s leading truck manufacturing companies.

(This is written by Footywife)

We celebrated our little son’s 3rd birthday last weekend.  He is a die-hard fan of the Walt Disney movie “Cars” so I got him Mack (the truck that carried Lightning McQueen, the protagonist in the movie).  Needless to say, that got my little son really happy and excited.

He hugged me and told me “Mama I love you because you bought me Mack”.

Which prompted me (and any parent I’m sure) to ask “Would you still love me if I didn’t buy you Mack?”.  “No” came the reply, without any hint of apology, simply as a matter of fact.

That got me really upset and I immediately launched into a lecture of how love ought not be tied to material things… how he should still love me even if I don’t buy him any toys… how love should be unconditional love…Well, that’s easier said than done.  I fumbled to find the right words, the right analogy to explain this as simply as I could.

In the end I got a blank look and a very disinterested 3-year old.  I simply gave up and told him I will talk to him again about this some other time. How do we explain unconditional love to a 3 year old?

(This is written by Footywife)

“I am a selfish boy” - my little son told me that the other day.

It pains my heart to hear that.  It is one thing to tell a child that his action is selfish and quite another to hear the child regurgitating the same sentiment about himself.  When my little son said that, a sense of guilt just swept over me for making him feel this way about himself.

And this is not the only thing he makes me feel guilty about.  The other day he told me “only you smack me!”.  That’s of course not true.  I just smack him more often than his papa given that I spend 24/7 with him.  But the accusation makes me feel guilty and left me wondering if I am smacking him too often?

And whenever he makes me so angry that I lost it and started roaring at him, I will no doubt be plagued by a guilty conscience after that.  “Mama, you scream at me two times already” was what he told me few days ago.

Parenting, they say, gets tougher as the child gets older.  I am beginning to experience the truth behind the statement.

Take a Ride!

This is the World’s Tallest Ferris Wheel, The Singapore Flyer.

And we went “spinning” on it last month. It stands at 165m tall, but it won’t be the tallest for long.

With the 208m tall Beijing Great Wheel due for completion in 2009, the record stands to stand (no pun intended) only for a year plus.

Still, it was an interesting experience. You can see my son enjoying a good time there in the “capsule”.

(this is written by my wife, henceforth known as “Footywife”! )

Sharing is a difficult thing to teach.

We try to encourage our little son to share by letting him experience the “negative effect” of not sharing.  For example if at church he refuses to share his toys with another kid and the kid went away after a while, we’ll point out to him that if he doesn’t share, he has no friends.  If he sees a kid with a toy which he likes, we’ll ask him to share his toys with the kid so that the kid may share the toy with him.

It all went well.  Our little son started sharing some of his toys some of the time.

Last weekend we went to church and brought along some coloring materials.  Now, coloring is not a favorite activity for our little son. So when we took out the materials it was met with lukewarm response.

Our little son then saw a few kids having fun together and wanted to join them.  Before we knew it, he took the coloring materials, ran over to the kids, held out his hands and “offer” it to them.  The kids received the coloring materials with excitement.  They stopped whatever they were doing and started coloring together (with my son).  And thus my little son was “accepted” into the group.

As we look upon him, we can’t help but wonder if we have in our quest to teach him about sharing, unknowingly taught him that material things can be used to “buy” friends?

Yesterday we were at the playground.  A boy was playing with a small car.  My little son wanted to play with it (he adores anything that resembles cars, however remotely!).  He pulled me aside and said, “Mama let’s give him sweets ok?  Then we take the car and play” !!!

Indeed, sharing is difficult to teach.

(this is written by my wife)

(1) The other day my little son and I were at the playground.  He befriended a boy of about 5 years of age and started playing ball with him.  However the ball did not belong to either of them but to a third boy who was generous enough to share.
The 5-year old boy (whom my son was playing ball with) had a bicycle which he parked by the side.  The boy who shared the ball saw it and wanted to ride.  The 5-year old boy immediately swung into action, ran to his bike and positioned his butt on it.  He wouldn’t move his butt and proceeded to play ball with my son while riding the bike.  That kind of slowed the momentum of the ball game and after a while the game died a natural death.

(2) We then went on to another playground and met a 4+ year old boy.  When he saw my son, he said “You didn’t let me play with the black bicycle the other time so I will not let you play with my pokemon toy”.

“Oh!”  I thought, somewhat surprised by the unprovoked comment.  But I know what he said is true because (a) my son’s bike is black and (b) whenever we bring the bike down my son will get me to sit on it when he is unable to man it to prevent other children from riding it.

However, almost in the same breath, he said “Never mind, I let you play”.

It was indeed a day about sharing.

(This is written by my wife)

Last weekend we decided to go to a part of Singapore that we have never been to for ages.

The car, driven by my husband, seemed to be bringing us to obscure places.

“Are we lost?” I asked.

“NO, I am driving in the general direction” was the reply.

I am not sure about you but I can’t make anything out of the reply.

Needless to say, my little son sitting at the back of the car heard everything. Would he pick up the same baffling behavior from his papa?

Well, I surely hope not.