Some updates about how the boy is doing at the new babysitter’s place. I’m glad to say that I was worrying for nothing yesterday as he was doing just fine. No doubt he did cry badly once in the afternoon yesterday, but that was quite expected seeing that it was his first day with total strangers, right? I expected him to have more moments of unease but he apparently did not. And this morning before going over to the babysitter’s, I told him that we’ll be going to her place for him to play with the aunty and uncle there, and he showed no signs of resistance nor was he unhappy. So with that, I’m very happy that so far the transition has been rather smooth.

Today, both my better half and I are off from work. It’s been a long time since we both have taken time from work on a weekday together and do nothing. But we’re not spending time together. In fact, we’re both doing our own things, having complete me-time to ourselves. I’m at home watching my Wah Lai Toi, blogging and browsing the internet looking for good bargains and promotional products, while he’s gone out for a much needed Thai massage to ease his back. This morning we went out for brunch at a coffee shop which we’ve been unable to do for so long! We actually enjoyed being able to eat leisurely and read the newspapers. We haven’t been to coffee shops for a long time and it was refreshing for a change!

But while we are spending me time, I also feel guilt that the little boy is at the babysitter’s. I think this is normal, as other mummies like Amy and Busy Bee have shared similar feelings too. But like Busy Bee says, we all need some time alone to keep refreshed.

Anyway, I have a week more of such me time and I don’t think it’s too long more for me to enjoy the time. I wonder if I would get bored doing this over a long period of time. Could I just try this out for 6 months? I so wish…

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After more than a week of spending the entire day with my little boy, today I finally had to send him back to be taken care by the babysitter. I normally would miss him terribly having to send him to the babysitter after just spending the weekend with him, what’s more this time I spent the whole week with him and we had so much fun and love throughout the week. It’s also made harder today because he’s starting his first day with a new babysitter.

While we got ready to go out this morning, he was happily playing and walking about the room. Suddenly, he came up to me and hugged me. Then he walked over to his daddy and hugged him too. It made me swallow a lump in my throat. I had half the mind of not sending him to the babysitter today, and postpone it to tomorrow. But the practical part of me knew that’s not what I should do. He had to start his first day with the new babysitter anyhow, and it won’t get any easier any other day.

So we went and I was quite happy that he was rather at ease at his second home. He walked about and found nooks and corners to play hide and seek. I hung around to watch him get used to being at the new place, playing his familiar toys, reading his favourite books, eating his bread and cookies and drinking his milk, having a bath and even poo-ed!

I found myself reluctant to leave even though it was already well past 11am, and it was time for me to take off and let him get accustomed to things without me around. So whilst he was distracted in play, I sneaked out of the house and headed home. It was quite hard for me to tear myself away from him, and at the same time wondering how he is doing.

I wondered even up to now whether he cried when he realised that I was not there, whether he asked for me, whether he was happy, whether he was eating and drinking his milk, whether he’s getting his nap. I don’t dare to call the babysitter to ask how he is either, because I know the moment I hear his voice or worse yet, his cries, I would go weak.

Sometimes I really wonder whether this going to a new babysitter business is harder for him or me.

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I’m having a really long break from work this new year. I’m only going back to work after Chap Goh Meh, isn’t that just great? I love it! But of course it comes with a very good reason. I’m taking time off to help my little boy settle in at the new babysitter’s when he starts going there on Monday. I plan to stay for a while when I first drop him there and check up on him off and on through the day for a week. I truly hope it’s not going to be difficult for him.

Anyway, how was your new year? It’s been a good break for us. We’ve visited most of our family members by now. The boy has met many of his cousins, aunts and uncles, grandaunts and granduncles too. He’s very well behaved when in other people’s homes, so much so that they think he’s a real gentle little boy whereas at home, he’s the king of the house and is very loud! It has been fun watching his antics when mixing around with other kids and adults alike.

He’s also learned some new words in the last one week. We taught him to greet people Gong Xi Fa Cai; he can pronounce “ang pow” very well; he also learned the word “botak” when we used it while showing him a picture of him as a bald baby! But most impressive of all, he learned how to count 1 to 10! I don’t think he understands that he’s counting numbers, he just knows the sequence of the words one, two, three…etc. For that, we’re already extremely happy and proud of him!

While the little boy learns all this during the new year, I’ve been putting my cooking skill to use during this period. You see, he doesn’t quite want to eat his porridge as main meals anymore. For a while now he’s been loving steamed white rice which I sometimes feed him when we eat. Seeing that he doesn’t want his porridge and asks for rice, I decided to cook him rice and steam fish and vegetables for him. The daddy went one step further, pan frying fish and eggs for him. Unfortunately, our efforts in the kithen didn’t pay off that much. He ate a little bit and would rather food that we didn’t cook! Sigh, are we bad cooks or what? I guess so.

Speaking of cooking, I also got to witness for the first time how the famous Hakka dish of abacus is being made. During the new year, my PILs were trying the dish out for the first time and it was actually pretty good. Here are some pictures of the process in shaping up the abacus. Sorry, no pictures of the completed dish because my camera battery ran out by then!

The yam all rolled up into little balls

They were gently flattened down with a chopstick

Here they are, ready to be soaked in water

Don’t they look quite like “tong yuen” too?

Fishing out the soaked yam, ready to be stir fried

How was your new year? Any good stories to share? I bet you have, so share your new year time with us.

By the way, I’ll be running a giveaway soon, and if you are headed towards a holiday in the US or live in the US, stay tuned for it!

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Today is the babysitter’s last day to take care of the little one. All the days leading up to today, I’ve been wondering whether I should be telling my little boy of the impending change. We didn’t really talk this fact into him though. He’s only coming to a year and a half, and you would think he wouldn’t know better even if we try to prepare him with the change by talking beforehand. That’s true, but part of me wish that I had done that now. I think to some extent, he may be able to understand it although he may not understand the impact of it.

This morning when I handed him over to the babysitter, I just casually said that today will be the last day that she’ll care for him since we won’t be sending him over in the last week of the month. She looked quite sad. Actually, I think I sounded sad too. She’s been taking such good care of him for over a year now and I think she too feels some attachment towards him. He may not be the most precious child to her, but I’ve got to say that the little boy does have his charms and can be really sweet to her. I’ve seen it myself. So I suppose it’s natural for her to feel a little sad although she’s the one who is quitting on us.

So to make things a little brighter, I told her that when we return to town next week, we’ll bring him over for Chinese New Year visit and she readily nodded and agreed we should drop by. With this said, I felt slightly better that today won’t be the absolute last day that my boy gets to see his babysitter.

I’m still trying to shake off this feeling of sadness. I’m sad because I think the little one will miss her and the other 2 kids he’s enjoyed playing with. I feel sad because at the new babysitter’s place, he won’t have other kids to play with as he will be the only kid there. I can only hope that he finds the same kind of joy and fun playing with adults alike.

I read some articles that came in rather handy at a time like this about how to help kids adjust to change. It takes patience and understanding of the child’s emotions, thus parents need to be more nurturing but not to the extent of spoiling the child whenever the child throws tantrums or behaves badly during the period of change. These simple tips sometimes serve as great reminders to us, who may have overlooked the small things. Thankfully I joined a parenting group in Facebook from which this tip was shared. It has many other useful resources at times, I remember reading about how families deal with illnesses like Mesothelioma, getting through ordeals like crimes committed upon them and growing as a family in times of disasters. I think all these situations are very real to us.

Anyway, I’ve digressed. The new year is just around the corner and we should all be in celebratory moods to welcome in the Year of the Ox. I know I will be, I just need to shake myself out of this gloom. I know things will work out fine with the new babysitter. I just can’t help but feel a little sad. Which is okay, right?

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Since we’re sending the boy to his new babysitter starting next month, we have to do some shopping for a couple of baby stuff. The current babysitter’s place has a playpen for him to play in as well as a bouncing net to rock him to sleep.

The new babysitter doesn’t have any baby stuff so we’ve got to bring over some of these items to make things more comfortable for the boy. He’s already coming to 1.5 years soon, and I’m thinking that he probably wouldn’t be using the playpen and bouncing net for that long anymore.

A playpen is really expensive to invest in, and we already have one at home too. I’m not sure if we should bring the one at home to the new babysitter’s place or we should just find cheaper alternatives. Some friends have suggested that we visit some discount furniture stores and see if we can find secondhand playpens and bouncing nets. Well the bouncing net is not that expensive and I won’t mind getting a new one. We’ll just have to assess the conditions of the used playpens and compare the prices against buying new.

Changing babysitters do cost a lot of inconveniences!

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