Brat Stuff – My Life in Canada

April 11, 2017

Easter Gifts For Chloe’s Teachers

You all know how I feel about thanking Chloe’s teachers every year during any kind of special occasions right? Yes, and this year ain’t any different because Chloe’s teachers does a lot for her. Afterall , these teachers spends like 6 – 7 hrs a day with my child and they nurture her and bring her up to be a proper human being, so how can I as a parent not show any appreciation right?

But this year , Chloe was afraid that her friends may think that she is bribing her teachers, in which I explained to her that it is in our culture to show gratitude to our teachers. And this is not the first year we ‘ve been doing this , we do it every year. So she shouldn’t feel this way at all , but the kid was reluctant until I spoke to some teachers who visits our store right in front of her about gifting for the teachers and they all agreed with me that all teachers will appreciate it.

Plus , when i show my appreciation , it is not just for one or two teachers , it is for all the teachers that is teaching chloe that very year. So no one should feel slighted. I had even wanted to give to the administrative staff but Chloe said she didn’t know them too , too well in this new school , so I didn’t.

So my questions is , does anyone do as I do these days? or am I the only one?

March 9, 2016

OMG ! It’s March 2016 Already !

Yes ! Life happened ! And of course , we had a nasty virus on our blogs and websites that was encrypted into our blogs automatically and apparently the virus had been dormant till now. The script was in place a few years ago as far as we can see it and all of a sudden, it decided to create havoc in all of our blogs. The spouse took time to clean out all the blogs , and if you must know , I have more than a few blogs that I use for monetizing purpose. Yes , yes ! I make money thru’ blogging – bite me !

And of course, Chinese New Year came about and we had to co-ordinate the celebration with our Asian friends , plus Chloe had some health issues and a girlfriend had and online boyfriend issue that actually left me quite perturbed and lost of words. But lesson to be learned her , never , never play match – maker online or offline because you are caught in the middle of it and boyyy! you kenna shit for nothing. But you also get to see who your true friends are and who’ve got your back, so all in all , it was a good lesson learned. You would think at almost 51 years old , I would have seen it all and done it all and avoided it all right? But nope ! I guess one can be stupid still at 51.

Anyhow, my consolations are , the spouse, the kid and many of my friends had been very supportive throughout it all and I cannot ask for a better spouse , kid and friends . Like the saying goes, you can never lose a true friend, you just find out who are the ones who are not. And business continue to thrive and I was featured recently in a local article on Facebook – stoke ! And I managed to get a massage , my hair colored , manicure , pedicure and all kind of good stuff done to my body. I even got to play catch up with my girlfriends. But I learned how to take are of myself and my family first and always ask for help from your neighbors because I’ve got some awesome neighbors now.

September 3, 2015

First Day – Grade 6

My dorky little girl is going on to Grade 6 , she is almost 12 years old now, well, a few more months, but it is going to come around soon than I want. She looks so dorky here don’t she? Yes, she is growing up , where has the time gone? She is mostly a good kid but going thru’ pre-teen syndrome I’m guessing. She is still fussy with her food, which makes me think that I should have made her eat whatever , like sandwiches and cheese and broccoli , but she is eating quite healthy and not drinking pop and eating sugar like other kids that I know of.

Mostly plays well with other kids and still worries too much about stuff that are not important , like a broken toy and not wanting her friends to go thru’ her toys when they are here on play dates. I don’t think she is selfish but she loves her stuff so much, she don’t want them destroyed and even though we tell her that it can be replaced, she didn’t want that , because what she already had has sentimental value. *slap forehead*. We cannot stress enough to her about not sweating the small stuff but at 11 years of age, it can be quite hard to understand that these are only small stuff.

This year will be her last year in her primary school, that is what we call it back home and for those who donch like the way I call it , that’s your problem. Anyhow, I know she has a very good teacher like last year and I hope she enjoys her last year and I know that her school is going to do their best to teach her all they can and more and also enjoy her school syllabus as well. Thus far, her primary school is nothing but the best for Chloe, she has enjoyed every year and looked forward to going back to school after summer. I’m very grateful for the wonderful experiences she has had thus far with this primary school.

July 26, 2015

Lemonade To Fund Raise

My father – in – law , Chloe’s grampie is the best man I’ve come to know after PB. He made Chloe a lemonade stand as soon as I asked him to and also made a flower bed for my cottage , all because I asked him to. I can never asked for a better father-in-law , not because he does things I asked him for but because he really loves me for who I am – even though he calls me the Chinese Jew. hehehe! I enjoy it all because I know he calls me that because I’m family.

Anyhow, Grampie build the lemonade stand for Chloe, so that she can sell some lemonade and do some fund-raising during the summer. My father -in-law drove the lemonade stand all the way from his place to town even though he doesn’t like coming to town that often. The fund-raising part we didn’t really figure what to fund raise for before summer but PB and I wanted to teach Chloe to grow up and empathy as well as with morals.

Of course, the girls also want to have fun. We rope in Jessica from the Chinese restaurant to come help because she is such an awesome kid. And guess who visited the lemonade stand on a cloudy day of the Vintage car parade. Yes ! the Seafest Princesses and what a treat it was for the girls ! they were so happy.

Anyhow, the girls fund raised $101 , for the family who lost their home in a fire in Richmond Road.

The girls then handed the money to the mother of the family – Simone. She came to collect the money a couple of days later and was very appreciate and hugged Chloe for her kind deed.

So yes, this summer, we taught Chloe something new and a lesson for her to continue on a yearly basis now , to raise fund for a charitable purpose. It doesn’t need to be a huge amount of money, but it would definitely means that she would have to work at it and know her purpose in life is not just about herself but to help the less fortunate along the way.

May 15, 2015

Playmat

Bought this a few weeks ago, for little Liam because we didn’t get to buy it for chloe when she was a baby. They didn’t have this I think when chloe was a baby, so what do we do? we spoil someone else’s baby of course ! heheh!! yes, that’s how we roll , we loved buying things for friend’s children and usually, we get stuff for just everyone of the, so that no child will be left alone.

But this mat from our local small business and they are wonderful, wonderful people. Loved Sandy’s.

May 10, 2015

Mother’s Day 2015

Mother’s day this year like every other year since my mother-in-law is no longer around, I prefer to celebrate it quietly at home. I slept in and had a quick breakfast after being woken up by Chloe and wishing me happy mother’s day. What else do I want besides having an awesome daughter and spouse right?

We didn’t go out to eat but I cooked for myself and I can tell you I enjoyed this plate of noodles more than I would if I had gone out to eat. Because I loved my own Asian food more than anything else in the world. Chloe already gave me her handmade Mother’s day present the day before, so that she won’t have to wake me up too early in the morning because she was too excited to wait. She is such a dear I tell you. So loving and 90% a very good child and the 10% she can be quite sassy if she wanted to.

I called my father – in – law the next day and apologized for not visiting but he said he didn’t think I would go since I wanted to laze around at home the previous year. I think even my in-laws understand me too well these days . But after 15 years of having me as the Jewish chinese daughter -in-law, I guess they better know me well – hahhahaa!

I loved how we celebrate Mother’s day because everyday is Mother’s day for me. I’m thankful and grateful for our little family. I cannot ask for more.

PS : And the spouse bought me my favorite treat from UK – Rowntree gums – 4 of them ! woohoo !

March 10, 2015

Results For Term 2 Grade 5

Chloe said she tried her best, so I didn’t turn into monster mom this time – hahhaha! while the rest of the extended family gave her a pat on her shoulder, I tell them not to spoil her by praising her, she definitely has room for improvement.

Her teachers are awesome and her syllabus are easy, so she should have done much better this term. Don’t get me wrong, I know she has done well, but definitely, definitely could do better if she puts in more effort and more practices at home.

I asked her before the parents and teachers meet what did she think her teacher would say about her, and she replied that they would say she is awesome ! hahahha!! that kid is funny to the max!

I’m very happy that she is very happy in school and with her teachers and peers but I would definitely want to see more effort on Chloe’s end.

March 1, 2015

Making The Best Of SnowDays

There has been a lot of snow day of late because we had been getting some whip lash from Mr Winter. I guess, we are getting all the snow that we didn’t get for the last few years, so it’s payback time for us while Toronto seems to have gotten better weather than us.

So what do one do when you have a snow day? of course, go out and play with the snow with the kid. Chloe loves going out in the cold and snowy weather and PB would go out with her like a good daddy when no one is out there with her. And when the neighbors come out and play, he would leave them alone.

Kids loved having their parents play with them. Chloe especially loved PB to go out and play with her because he is the more active parent between the both of us. When she is at her Grampie’s , her grampie , PB and her aunt helena would go out sledding with her, she looked forward to sledding everytime we get some snow. This years, she had been out sledding a few times already, so she is one happy kid. But she doesn’t like too many snow days, because she wants to go back to school.

December 19, 2014

Simple

Our theme this year for the holiday season is simple. Yes, I told everyone from home not to send anything to chloe for both her birthday as well as Christmas. And if they are planning to give Chloe something, to please use the money for her pressies and give it to a charitable organization. If they feel inclined , they can donate using Chloe’s name.

Why? because we are teaching Chloe that it’s good to give others and not just do things for herself as she is the only child, we want to make sure that she learns to care for others as well. This year because of how busy PB and I are due to my new assignments on vlogging and meeting up with new advertisers, I cannot do as much for others as I hope to either.

So to keep our sanity and to focus on the most important things in our lives, we’ve decided that this year, we are going to take time for ourselves first. This year, we want to look at the bigger picture and give to a worthy cause around the world. So Chloe’s birthday was celebrated last week at Grampie’s with only immediate family and fund raiser at her school was done by her alone as well as picking up her teacher’s presents and wrapping them all up on her own. I’m very happy that we are doing this because it is very less stressful for me and we are really happy giving to help an organization to safe other people.

November 30, 2014

Halloween Fun 2014

Sorry i took so long to put up pictures of Chloe and her Halloween Night. She had loads of fun in school as a cat girl and in the evening, we went on our usual route and popped in at Gerald’s and Adele’s and chatted and had candies and so much fun.

Look who’s the Alien this year. We had so much laughter with the Leblanc’s.