Nostalgia

Our baby bassinet has been sitting in our storage room for over two years now. We bought it a month before Scarlett was born, almost 6 years ago. A year after she was born, the bassinet was recalled. Having a hectic life at that time (looking back now, we didn't even know what hectic was as life was easier when we only had one kid), we didn't rush to return the recalled bassinet. It sat in our storage room until the second one came around. We figured that there's probably very low risk in using it, so we used it for Elliot. A couple of months after his birth, the bassinet went back to the storage room. I finally got around to taking it back to Target today, where we bought it from, since we can't in good conscious give away a recalled bassinet. (Although, I have mixed feelings about recalls. True, that a few children may have died to cause a company to recall an item but our crib tent was recalled and we still use it for Elliot. The chance of him getting hurt by the crib tent is miniscule compared to the chance of him hurting himself trying to climb out of his crib.) To my surprise, we got our money back, despite how long we've had the bassinet. Even though I see it every time I go to the storage room, actually pushing it from my car to the Target store brought back nostalgia of the kids sleeping in there as babies. Maybe that's why I'm a pack rat...

Things to be Thankful For

I know Thanksgiving has passed but with Christmas just around the corner, I'm also thinking about things to be thankful for that I consider "presents". Obviously, the gravest thing lingering on many people's minds is the recent horrific mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School of 20 children and 6 adults last Saturday. It devastated all of us, especially parents of children of similar age to those who were killed. While our mourning doesn't come close to that of the parents who lost their children in the shooting, we were all deeply affected because we know that there was nothing "violence-prone" about that specific school. While incredibly rare, it could happen anywhere, in any town, suburban, rural, or inner city. Even though the statistics are really minuscule for something like that to happen to any one person, tell that to those parents who lost their child or loved one. Even though it is very distant from where I live and I don't personally know any of the families affected, my good mommy friend was not so lucky. Her best friend's daughter and only child was one of the victims. I can't imagine what they're going through right now. She flew out there the day after the shooting to help her friend get through it all. So I am very grateful to have two very healthy children, alive and well. It's really not fair for those parents to have lost their precious children and I'm deeply saddened by it. I know I am human and will still get mad and yell at my kids but I will continue to remind myself how lucky I am to have them in my life.

The other "present" is my parents selling their store. They've ran that liquor store for 30 years now and I've almost given up on my hope of them visiting here. While escrow hasn't closed yet, it's still very happy news for me. I don't know what they plan to do with their next phase of life but I'm glad that I can take "store hold-ups" off my list of things to worry about soon. I can't wait for them to visit so that I can take them to wine country, since my dad enjoys drinking wine (esp. Napa wine).

Busy Times

Time seems to slip by when life gets busy and months later, I'm wondering to myself how much my 2-year old has been talking when just 4-6 months ago, he barely said much. Over the last two months, my husband and I have been constantly marveling over how much he talks and in complete sentences. I must have noticed it a couple of months ago when he was playing with his wooden train tracks and exclaimed to me: "mama, look what I made!" Research has shown that the more time the TV is on in the background, the less words little kids hear in a day, and thus, slower verbal and cognitive development. Well, I think Elliot's exposure to words per day is less of a function of TV exposure (or the lack of) and more of a function of how much his older sister talks. I'm sure hearing her talk all day (and she's quite loquacious) had the most impact on his verbal development. Now, he says funny things like, "baba, you're funny" when my husband is being goofy, or "jea-jea (sister), you go to time out!" when he's mad at his sister. Other funny things that he says are more toddler-like. Six months ago, he used to call truck "fuck". He doesn't say it as much but I found it quite funny. Or when he wants to watch trucks on TV, he calls it "fuckin TV!" I wish there are easy ways to capture and archive the things they say (in their own voice) to save for eternity. Little things to look back on or otherwise I'll forget. I remember Scarlett used to say some pretty funny things too but all I remember now is her telling people to "ass" when she wanted people to sit. Maybe they're glad that their mother has a shoddy memory these days.

Childhood Memories

Part of my childhood memories consisted of times spent with lots of cousins and aunts and uncles who visited from Taiwan and New Jersey and would stay at my parents' house for an extended period of time. I remember having lots of relatives at my parents house growing up and had fond memories of that. There were some cousins who I was much closer to than the rest of my cousins (and I have A LOT of cousins since my parents each have 8 siblings). Now that I have kids, I feel sad sometimes that they don't have cousins who they see and know on a regular basis. A few months ago, my closest cousin who is 6 years younger than me and spent every summer of her childhood visiting us from New Jersey, suggested that we start seeing each other on a yearly basis. I thought that was a great idea. Now that we both have kids, it would be great for our kids to know each other, even though they live on the two separate coasts. So we decided on July 4th week to raid my parents' house this year. So far, Scarlett has been having a great time getting to know her cousin (my cousin's 16 year old daughter) and her aunties (my two cousins from the East Coast). Elliot is more reserved but seems happy too to be running around my parents' house and hanging out with new relatives.

I'm looking forward to this becoming a new tradition.

Kindergarten Will Be Upon Us Soon!

I've always thought of kindergarten as something far in the future for us to think about. Now, I can't believe that Scarlett is starting kinder in the fall! I'm suddenly starting to mourn the loss of freedom and the early childhood years. I know that starting kinder is also the start of Scarlett's formal education and her development into a well-informed individual but I'm just not ready yet to give up on the flexibility that we've had the last 4 1/2 years and be bound by the rigidity of the school calendar. The ability to go on playdates on any weekday, the rare occasion of going camping at Costanoa along the coast mid-week, the freedom to leave early in the day for a long weekend trip, or go up to Tahoe for our annual ski trip Thurs.-Sun. on a non-holiday weekend... I guess this all started with Scarlett's Chinese preschool asking parents to re-enroll their children, if they desire, for the fall programs by the end of this week. It got me thinking about what I want to do with my work schedule starting this fall. In a lot of ways, I have great flexibility with my consulting work. On the other hand, I also have a lot of inflexibility for potential projects that require all-day sampling at client sites. Do I sign her up for the after school program at the Chinese school? They don't pick-up kids so I'll have to take Scarlett mid-afternoon from her kinder to her Chinese after school program. What if I have to do all-day sampling on one of those days? What about Thursdays, where the kinder class has minimum days? Do I sign her up for 5 days of after school care at her kindergarten (probably through the YMCA)? Will those costs add up to the childcare/preschool costs we've been paying for her now? That defeats our hope of starting to save some money once she starts kindergarten. I'm just not ready yet...

First Love Letter?

Scarlett has known one of the boys at her preschool since she was born. Caleb was the first child of one of my mommy friends and he also has been at the same daycare/preschool since he was 3 months old. They're pretty good friends and it was just too cute to see this when I picked up her school papers this morning when I dropped Scarlett off:

I'm pretty sure that's Scarlett's writing but did she mean, "I love Caleb, Scarlett"? And did she draw that rocket or did he draw it? I'll have to find out today when I pick her up. Here's what she drew for me:

First Disneyland Experience

We've always thought that we should wait until Scarlett is 5 years old before taking her to Disneyland. But since we were visiting my parents in L.A. this past January, it was too tempting to resist. She's 4.5 years old so close enough, right? Since we were down there for a short trip (mainly to celebrate Chinese New Year), we only had one day to visit Disneyland. I had all this stress built up about making the trip fun, worthwhile, and not stressful for my husband and I. Even though I've probably visited Disneyland about 20 times in my childhood, I still stressed over it because it costs so much now. I didn't want it to not be fun for my husband and I (kids getting overstimulated, not being able to wait in lines, melting down...) and yet, I also wanted us to get our money's worth. So we got there a little after they opened and much to my surprise, the kids lasted until about 5pm, which was much longer than I had expected. I had mentally planned to leave once the kids started getting tired and starting throwing fits. Luckily, that never happened. Around lunchtime, I forced Elliot into the ergo carrier and got him to nap for 45 minutes while Scarlett waited in line to see a princess. Other than that, they were pretty good about waiting in lines and not melting down.