Category: Brat Stuff

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Nurturing Your Child

Mother’s day just came and went but I’m still thinking of my mother and my family from home – and how different our style of raising our children are. While of course, my mother didn’t have friends and family who are supportive – I’m more blessed with PB – his family and lots of friends who gives me lots of support emotionally and physically. It warms my heart when Grammie said to bring chloe over this weekend – if she wasn’t too tired from attending a wedding in Moncton because I never had a grammie who was really closed to me. My grandmother passed away from cancer when I was 9 years old – and from my memories of her – she wasn’t the nurturing kind of grandmother because my grandfather was kinda a tyrant – so she was always tip-toeing around him. Therefore, I made it my mission – to make sure that Chloe has a more special relationship with her grandparents and extended family than I did. I feel it is so important – because I’ve always lived with regrets not knowing both sets of my grandparents because my parents were either too busy – or the other one didn’t care at all about extended families.

I grew up without a lot of hugging, kissing and chatting with my parents or grandparents – but with Chloe she is always surrounded with people that loved her and willing to play with her and read to her. I don’t believed in expensive clothing or toys but I certainly believed in spending quality time and being there for Chloe. I never encouraged expensive stuff – but I believed in healthy eating – even if they were more expensive – if they were good for her health – I would buy them. I believe in nurturing my child – supporting and encouraging her and not just giving her everything she wants, I believe in balance – I believe in moderation.

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Target For Racism Already

So we went to pick Chloe up from her After School program today and she complained that she had a bad day. We asked why? she said one of her classmate – a boy said to her – that he hates CHINESE! *slap forehead*. We asked Chloe if she had spoken to her teacher about it – and she said yes – and that her teacher had spoken to her entire class about it. I don’t know how a 7 yrs old would said something like that to another kid in his class. In our household, we never use the word “HATE” – according to Chloe “HATE” itself is already a bad word. While we constantly teach Chloe right from wrong – why are other kids saying hurtful things to my daughter? What had that kid been taught at home or around home/friends? I’m curious to know exactly what is going on at this boy’s home/friends. Should I be worried for Chloe? or should i just brush it off as a kid’s thing – that they don’t know any better?

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Flossing Her Teeth

Finally, she is ready to floss her teeth! for years – we’ve been trying to get Chloe to floss her teeth – and today she is ready to floss her own teeth without much fuss. Happy we are – because like all parents we want what is best for her – and we really don’t want to see her go thru’ another hospital trip to get her caps in and putting her to sleep. So yes! hopefully, she will continue flossing without much fuss – and now to push PB to get Chloe’s dental insurance in place – because MSI only covers her dental till she is 10 years old – and that certainly isn’t enough time to cover her braces and all.

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A Gift For Chloe’s Teacher

May is already here and the school year will be coming to an end really soon. Each year – we try to show our appreciation to Chloe’s teacher for all that they have done for her and this year it will be no difference. I’m sure teacher gift from students is common but we don’t want to just give a mug or a box of chocolate – we would like to give her teachers something that they can remember her by and something really useful. Besides the regular personalize note pad that we made for Chloe’s teachers yearly from a printer shop in town – we will have to think of something else to give her. I cannot express how grateful we are to Chloe’s teacher – for taking care of her and giving Chloe so much confidence in her reading – Chloe has definitely done so much better in the last 1.5 years. Plus we also need to get some gifts for her after school program teachers as well. Therefore, I need to start now to buy the presents and not wait till the last minute.

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Kids & Vitamins

Like every parent – we want what is best for our kids – from buying them the most expensive books to nourish their mind – to getting them the best multivitamins to nourish their bodies. I’m no different and I strongly believed in multivitamins for kids – as well as ourselves. Of course, the doctor had said that if your kids are given a well – balanced diet – they don’t need any more vitamins. But if you have a kid like mine who don’t like greens – then you’ll have to find a vitamin that can supplement that right? Yes – I’m the official helicopter mom – but nope I don’t overdose her with vitamins – although I’ve heard that if you feel like a cold is coming – you should get an overdose of Vitamin C. Anyhow, I’m sure if you are a mom who cooks home cooked meals a lot for your kids – and is a stay at home mom – it will be easier to monitor their diet – but for moms like me who needs to work, it is harder so don’t feel bad if you are making your kids take vitamin because you feel they are not getting enough from their food.

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Umbrellas Don’t Work Here

It had been raining a lot here – and for years, we’ve tried all sorts of umbrellas but they don’t work – because PB gets all upset – that the umbrella is just not strong enough for the wind and he claims that it gets blown away. So for years, we haven’t really bought any umbrella except for the few that we’ve had sparingly – that always end up somewhere – like the garbage in the basement. So the other day, I saw some very cheap rain coat from the dollar store and picked one up for her because I saw one of her school friend wearing it. Chloe liked it a lot and it did the trick to shield her away from the water – while walking into school from the car. As for PB – it was so cheap – he didn’t really protest – because to him – little rain is nothing – but he doesn’t know that it’s so irritating to be wet. Yes! he rather get wet than to wear a rain coat.

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She Won’t Eat Lunch In School

A few months ago, we noticed that Chloe won’t eat her food during lunch in school – of course, we asked her why – and she didn’t want to say at first – and just told us that she didn’t have enough time to finish her food. So we told her that we were gonna talk to her home room teacher to let her stay till she finishes her food before going out to play. Of course, that didn’t sink in too well with Chloe – so she told us the truth about her lunch time. Chloe explained that some of her friends in her class – said that her food was smelly – so she didn’t want to eat it in school as it embarrasses her. Yes! kids can be insensitive and we believed that it wasn’t meant to be mean but we also know that you can’t control what other kids think or say to our kid. So we enlisted her teachers help and also tried to explain to Chloe that not everyone need to like her food – and that she can go right ahead and finish her food even if someone in her class don’t like her food.

A month later, still Chloe would eat a bit more of certain food but some food – she just won’t eat them even though she loved the food at home. So what do every good parents do? We made extra food – first for the home room teacher to try and then 2 weeks later – a bigger batch in a corning ware dish (presentation very important too eh) and sent it to school to offer to Chloe’s classmate to eat. And guess what? today Chloe came back with her thermos empty ! woohoo!!! so if your child ever come home without touching their food – there may be more to it than meet the eyes.

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Happy Easter

Happy Easter everyone ! This is Chloe getting ready to go to church for the Easter hunt and then headed over to Grammie’s and Grampie’s for another hunt and then supper there. Every year’s Easter is much more enjoyable for Chloe now that she understand the hunting of the easter eggs – but this year – she knows that Easter Bunny wasn’t gonna bring her any toys but chocolates and candies because she admitted that she has got too much toys. The dress is from her Kai Mah Lina – from Singapore and this is the first time she is wearing it. Her grampie said she was all dressed up fancy today – hahah!!

Time has really flown – she is still our baby but yet look at her – she is all grown up – it seems only yesterday that she was still a toddler learning how to walk. She is as naughty as ever – and so whiny – she would win the contest for the Whiniest child hands down. But she is also adorable, cute and most times very funny – we count our blessings every day – and Easter today – also reminds us of all the blessings we’ve received indirectly because of Chloe. All we wished for Chloe is to be healthy, happy and honest.

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Explaining Death To Kids

We passed by the cemetery today – and Chloe who had been obsessed with death lately asked PB why is there so many dead people at the cemetery and she also wants to know if we were gonna buried her there – when she dies. We’ve not been very good in explaining to her about death and in fact had been avoiding it – because Chloe had been a little dramatic since her cousin’s sudden death last year. At one point – Chloe had said she felt like “killing” herself – and PB had shouted at her and told her never to say something like that – because her cousin Nick had done just that – and that was unforgivable! Yes! trauma or what!

Anyhow, what made me really sad was that she wanted her to get her pink flowers to be put on her grave when she dies! *sigh* – so I knew that we had to explain death clearer to her – without traumatizing her further. But how the heck do you tell a 7 yrs old about death – and how would she deal with it? So we tried – but then Chloe told her that her Aunt Helena told her that everyone dies at some point *slap forehead* – so she wants to know when she will die – and what if we died ? so what is going to happen to her ? she started wailing and said she didn’t want us to die – so we had to stop. Now we have to go and find out from Grammie what Aunt Helena said to Chloe and then try again another time – in a different setting and in a different way but yes ! we read more about it – talked to our doctor about it and will try again – when the question is being asked again.

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Celebrating The Small Stuff

Did I tell you that I’m a helicopter mom? Yup ! that’s me alright! and although PB never ever tell me not to do anything – whether I’m being overly protective or overly alarmed or immediately jumping up to help Chloe when she falls, gets upset that her friends don’t want to play with her – or even if she gets mosquito bites – I’m also learning to take a smaller step backwards each time Chloe complains about something.

For those who had been following this blog for a long time – you would know that Chloe had changed school last year – and her Grade Primary teacher had gently mentioned that her diction isn’t all there yet. Of course, we had refused any help given that she had to change school in the middle of spring – we didn’t want to stress Chloe. But that didn’t mean that I wasn’t stressed nor was I not thinking about it. I thought of it constantly and almost signed Chloe up for private tuition or was checking out Mariposa – a learning center in town.

As usual, PB was very relaxed about it – and didn’t agree nor disagree when I had suggested help for Chloe and Chloe’s Grade 1 teacher had helped by putting her in a reading help class in school – not the recovery program but something extra on the side. We are grateful for it – because Chloe loved her reading class and we are pleased to announce that Chloe’s reading had improved tremendously since her last report. Like Chloe’s grammie used to say – it will come when she is ready – and I’ve gotta constantly remind myself of that – when someone says that Chloe is not there yet about anything. Different kids just are ready at a different pace – and I cannot compare my kid with others.