Archive for » 2012 «

May

Most days, I love my children to pieces. Not yesterday. Yesterday I wanted to wrap them both up and ship them back to the hospital where they came from!!!

Earlier yesterday, after a busy morning at AsianParent.com’s warehouse, I rushed to a local shopping center to buy lunch. I walked past a beauty salon and saw empty chairs. I desperately needed a haircut.

“Hi, how much to cut my hair?” I quickly stepped in and asked.

“Fifteen dollars,” one of the three stylists replied.

Instinctively I thought, so cheap!

Of course, I don’t spend the kind of fortune like John Edwards on hair cuts, but I was concerned about entrusting my precious hair with a $15 cut. I preferred a stylist who wanted to charge me at least $30. I am a strong believer in You Get What You Paid For.

Then, I thought, I have straight hair! How hard can it be to cut 3 or 4 inches off of straight hair.

“Okay, I like to get a haircut.” me.

I even splurged a little, and got my hair shampooed and washed for two dollars more. Sweet!

Then I spent most of my haircut session with my eyes closed. My stylist was stressing me out.

She was a nice woman who appeared to be in her 30’s. Her snips were cautious, much measured, and painfully slow.

Scissor & Hair

Even worse, she constantly turned my chair, moved me up and down in the chair, and hovered herself all around me in clumsy positions.

Occasionally, I took my left arm out of the covering, and looked at my watch. I was supposed to eat lunch. But my stylist was eating up all my lunch time.

My eyes blinked open, when suddenly, I heard her say, “Excuse me!”. She then rushed to put down her scissor and brush in front of my mirror.

One of her fingers was bleeding!! She mumbled about needing a band-aid, and quickly disappeared into the back room, leaving me in my chair looking stunned.

“You get what you paid for!” was blinking in bright neon colors in my head.

A few minutes later, she returned. There was no a band-aid on her finger. Instead, her entire injured finger was wrapped in a large white medical cloth, tied together by strings.

“Hee, hee..the scissor is very sharp.” she said to me apologetically as she leaned over me to pick up her tools.

I was too polite to request another stylist, and decided to just suffer through the rest of my haircut. Plus I felt kind of sorry for her. She was just trying to make a living in a trade that she does not belong.

She was even more careful after that, and I was grateful. I even quit checking my watch to rush her.

Finally, she was done with me.

I handed her $25, and said to her, “I am sorry about your finger.”

She thanked me profusely out the door.

I will never go back there again.

I had to skip lunch, and immediately rushed to my children’s school to pick them up. I got there just in time, and were greeted by my baby’s happy little face.

“Oh, you cut your hair!” baby.

Feeling self-conscious about my hair, I summoned my kind motherly smile, and asked, “What do you think of my new hair?”

My 8-year-old examined me a bit, then blurted out, “You look creepy.”

CREEPY!!! No one has ever used the word “creepy” to describe my hair, not even on Halloween or during my teen years.

Then my 11-year-old appeared before us out of the crowd.

“Hey! What do you think of my new haircut?” I needed a second opinion.

My 11-year-old acknowledged my shorter hair, then declared, “You look weird. ”

Too bad my husband was out of the country on a business trip. I really missed him on a day like yesterday. He has been properly trained to say nice things about my hair.

Category: Humor, Kids, Parents One Comment

May

Mother’s Day Terror

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Last week, I picked up the children from school, and was feeling happy about something…

“Hey, Mother’s Day is this Sunday!” I inherited my father’s habit of reminding people of special dates for oneself.

“Yeah!” the kids cheered from the back seats.

“You should take us somewhere nice for dinner and buy us presents.” 11-year-old.

“No, it is Mother’s Day. Not Kids’ Day. It is Kids’ Day every day around here. On Mother’s Day, it is your turn to do something nice for me for a change.” me.

“But, without us, there is no Mother’s Day for you. So, on Mother’s Day, you should especially celebrate us.” 11-year-old.

I sighed.

The kids giggled in the back seats.

Luckily for me, I didn’t count on the kids to properly celebrate Mother’s Day. I counted on my husband for that. He was their ringleader on Mother’s Day celebrations. He bought the cards, got the kids to sign them behind my back, and made reservations at nice restaurants.

But, my favorite mother’s memory has nothing to do with him at all. It was at the Mother’s Day celebration at my baby’s pre-kindergarten class. Hubby wasn’t in it, because only the mothers were invited.

At the Mother’s Day cupcake party hosted in their classroom, each child got to introduce his/her mom, say a few nice things, and present her with a special handmade Mother’s Day booklet keepsake.

The kids were supposed to open the booklet, read a page or two from the book, shown us the pictures they drew, and give the booklet to his/her mom, while everyone clapped and admired the cuteness of it all.

The classroom air was filled with warmth, love, and the sweetness of cupcakes…until my 4 year old took the center stage.

My baby clutched the book tightly, and totally went off script.

“This is my mom,” my baby said, pointing me out to everyone. All the moms from the class already knew me.

I mustered my nicest smile to the class.

“She is a drinker.” 4-year-old said deliberately.

WHAT?!!!!!

Bloody HELL…

The air was immediately sucked out of the room, the grown-ups in the classroom were shooting awkward glances at each other in every direction.

My nicest smile went quiet, with a lingering smile momentarily frozen in place. It wasn’t pretty, my face had that kind of sorry expression that was menaced by complete horror and embarrassment.

My cheeky 4-year-old was utterly oblivious to my trauma and the eerily silent classroom.

The devil child announced, “She drinks black coffee ALL of the morning,” gave pause, then continued, “and she drinks green tea ALL of the afternoon. That’s my mom!”

Whew…. The awkward tension disbursed. The moms and teachers exploded into laughter and everyone clapped mighty hard.

My baby looked around, then beamed with pride with her awesome Mother’s Day speech.

Mother's Day book from my then 4-year-old

Category: Humor, Kids, Parents Leave a Comment

May

Pasta Night

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Last Thursday was crazy busy. I worked at AsianParent.com’s warehouse until well after lunch, then ran off to do the errands that were becoming impatient with me. At 3:00 P.M., I attended our elementary school’s Parent Volunteer Appreciation Party and inhaled some cookies and lemonade at the party to fight off starvation. Before the party ended, I rushed to pick up the kids from their after-school activity to taxi them to their piano teacher’s studio just in time for their piano lessons.

Finally, at 5:30 P.M., I picked the kids up from their piano lessons, and I was glad to be done with that day.

Just as I turn on the ignition, I remembered something…

“Shoot….I totally forgot about dinner. What should I feed you guys tonight?” I usually had the day’s dinner all planned out early in the morning, and meats that should be defrosted would be pulled out of the freezer.

“Pasta Night!!” the kids shouted together from the back, with their fists raised high above their heads.

Bless them!

Pasta Night, a.k.a. Spaghetti, is such a quick and easy meal for me to make. It was the perfect family dinner after such a long day.

I swung by our local produce market, picked up a few things that I needed, and was ready to have dinner cooked and served under 30 minutes.

Please do not interpret “cooked and served under 30 minutes” as boiling the spaghetti, nuke the spaghetti sauce, and dump the sauce over a bowl of spaghetti. Oh no, my spaghetti is much more exciting than that! It has a restaurant quality look and taste, with lots of homemade goodness.

Paste sauce loaded with fresh vegetables

That’s why we don’t call this one-dish meal just spaghetti: we called it the Pasta Night.

I proclaim my “Pasta Night” dinner easy, quick, and super yummy! Great for those hectic days. Here is how…

This is a list of ingredients that I usually get for my pasta night:

1) One pound bag of thin spaghetti
2) One jar of spaghetti sauce (I have no brand loyalty, I always buy the on sale jar)
3) One jar of Alfredo sauce (also the on sale jar)
4) One pound ground beef
5) A few links of Italian sausage (chicken or pork)
6) A bundle of spinach
7) A couple of portabello mushrooms (or other mushroom)
One white onion
9) We will also need olive oil, salt, and pepper

Preparation:

1) Clean the spinach and mushroom. Slice the mushrooms.
2) Finely chop half of the onion.
3) Pan-fry the sausage until fully cooked, then slice them
4) Warm a large cooking pot with olive oil
5) Place the chopped onion into the pot
6) Add the ground beef into the pot
7) Add cooking wine to the pot and cook the beef-and-onion mixture until the redness of the beef is all gone.
Lightly season the mixture with salt.
9) Add the sliced sausage to the pot.
10) Empty the entire jar of the pasta sauce into the pot and stir.
11) Empty about a third or half of the Alfredo sauce into the pot and stir.
12) Bring the sauce to boil, then simmer.
13) Add the spinach and the mushrooms. Cook 5 minutes more.

*As you prepare the sauce, bring a pot of water to boil, then follow the cooking instructions on the spaghetti bag to prepare the spaghetti. Usually the spaghetti is cooked for about 6 to 8 minutes.

cooked pasta

My kids LOVE Alfredo sauce, but the amount of fat in Alfredo sauce is obnoxious. I learned to add about a third of the jar of the Alfredo sauce to the regular tomato based spaghetti sauce to give them that rich flavor, without contributing to our nation’s childhood obesity problem.

I usually serve this dish with bread and butter.

Dinner is ready!!

Category: Parents One Comment

May

Expect the unexpected…

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“Mom, can we go to Michaels?” 11-year-old asked from the back of the car.

“We don’t have time for Michaels. We still need to go carpet shopping today.” me.

We got up blissfully late this Sunday morning. After a late lunch, it was already past 2:00 PM. That gave us only 2 or 3 hours left to visit flooring stores.

“But I need to go to Michaels!” 11-year-old demanded.

“Why?” me.

“I need to get something for my Greek journal project.” 11-year-old.

“I thought you are practically all done with putting your journal book together.” me. I am usually on top of the kids’ school work.

“Yes. But my teacher said that if we do extra things to make our book look extra nice, then he will give us extra credit.” 11-year-old.

“You would want me to get extra credit, don’t you?” 11-year-old added with a big grin.

Yes. I am a sucker for those extra credits.

“Let’s do a quick detour to Michaels.” I instructed my husband, who was driving.

I love going to Michaels. It is mainly an arts-and-crafts store. I go there often to buy art supplies and various school project supplies.

Sometimes, we go there without a hint of an idea on what to get for a specific project. We will simply walk down the aisles and come out with plenty of creative ideas for the projects. They have things that I don’t know I need until I see them.

The kids loving going to Michaels too. As soon as we reached the door, the 11-year-old bolted towards our favorite section of the store, with my 8-year-old running to catch up.

Hubby and I caught up with the kids. “What are you looking for? We will help you look.”

“I am looking for a ribbon.” 11-year-old.

“Oh, I know where that is. Follow me.” I lead them to the opposite side of the store.

“Here! A whole section here devoted to ribbons.” I have bought ribbons before. We have used them in the past to frame the boarders of their projects.

Their ribbons selection was like the jellybean aisle at a candy store. Many fun colors with many types of prints instead of flavors to choose from.

“What sort of ribbons are you looking for?” me.

“I want a ribbon with olives on it.” 11-year-old.

“WHAT?! You got to be kidding!” me and hubby together.

“The olive tree is what Goddess Athena gave to the people of Athens to become their patron god! So, the olive is a big part of my book. I want to use an olive ribbon to make a bookmark.” Then she added, “To get extra credit.”

“Okay! You are not going to find an OLIVE ribbon. WHY would anyone make an OLIVE ribbon!?” me. 11-year-old’s wants can be so ridiculous.

I turned to the ribbons to see what we could choose from.

“NO WAY!!!!!” me.

There they were….3 rolls of ribbons with olives on them sat on their aisle and stared back at me.

“I can’t believe this. There they are. You are SO going to earn extra credit.” me.

The goddess Athena herself must decided that my 11-year-old should have an olive ribbon that day.

The Olive Ribbon

Related posts: The Goddess of Wisdom

The Kind of Heaven

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Apr

A Boring Blog about Boring Things

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Last weekend was no fun! We spent the entire weekend furniture and carpet shopping. Both of which are on our not-favorite list of things to do. But we had lived with the same sofa and carpet for 14 years, and they are both desperate for retirement.

On Saturday, we dragged ourselves through various furniture stores. We walked upstairs, downstairs, paraded by numerous designer showrooms, and nothing caught our fancy. No sofas even had the appeal to slow down our pace. No salesperson bothered us with offers of help, because they all knew better than to waste time with customers that lacked an obvious buying signal.

Late that afternoon, we ended up at a furniture store that makes custom design sofas. The owner was a very nice man, and he spent over an hour with us, helping educate us to learn that he can make a couch to our exact liking. The size, shape, firmness, and the fabric. After going through 3 large binders of their fabric samples, we left his store feeling good about having the perfect new couch.

On Sunday, we went carpet shopping. This was even less fun than furniture shopping. The large showroom at the carpet store was headache-inducing. We had a hard time picking out a color. We were much too focused on getting the right color, as our salesperson busied himself with attempt to sell us on the quality and brand of his carpets. Finally he let us take 3 color samples to fuss over at home, and we scheduled for one of his guys to come over and take measurements.

We contemplated a great deal more at home, finalizing on the exact design and size of our sofa, and putting the 3 carpet samples under different lighting and sunlight to compare our feelings for them.

I am happy to report that we have reached a decision. And then it hit me…

We want our new sofa to look just like our old sofa, and we want our new carpet to look just like our old carpet!!!

Our old but beautiful blue sofa

Looking for the closest match to our old carpet

We must be the world’s most boring couple.

Category: Humor, Parents Leave a Comment

Apr

Beautiful Sugar Cookies

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We devoted a day of the kids’ spring break to baking cookies.

Cookie dough

They love baking cookies; especially sugar cookies.

When my firstborn was just a toddler, I had the brilliant foresight to purchase a huge box of 100 cookie cutters. We had put them to good use over the years, and they provided our cookie dough with an endless supply of fun shapes.

fun shaped cookies

As soon as the cookies were properly cooled, the kids spent the rest of the afternoon decorating their cookies with these edible coloring supplies.

cookie decorating supplies

Edible art

A lucky few even got special cookies with their names on it.

Nai Nai and Mark's cookies

After a day of hard work, they had two trays of cookies to show.

Beautifully decorated Cookies

Aren’t they all beautiful?!

Actually, not all the cookies turned out beautiful. The kids were deeply embarrassed by the ugly cookies. Those were immediately devoured, so no one had to suffer through them. I got to peek at a few, and they were hideous!

Category: Kids Leave a Comment

Apr

Poor Fred

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“Psst. Fred is not looking well,” Hubby whispered into my ear.

I quickly walked over to where Fred was. Fred was beyond “not looking well.” Fred was dead.

I tapped at the side of the fish tank closest to where Fred lay afloat. Fred remained motionless.

I peeked up at hubby, who was hovering over me and the fish tank with a grave look on his face.

I whispered back at him, “The kids need to know. We can’t just pretend this didn’t happen.” He nodded.

We turned to look at the kids.

This was Sunday night, we had just returned from a late dinner, and were trying to rush the kids to bed. The kids were not cooperative, and they were trying to keep the imminent bedtime at bay by laying on the family room floor, rolling and chatting about their day.

“Hey, kids. I am afraid that we have bad news.” me.

They looked up and saw us both surrounding Fred’s fish tank, and jumped up and came over to examine their Fred.

“Oh NO! Is he dead?” 8-year-old.

“Yes, Fred is dead. He went to fish heaven.” I stated flatly.

“Maybe he is playing dead…”11-year-old said faintly. “You said Morgan’s fish plays dead sometimes.”

“Yes, but our Fred never played dead with us. Fred is dead.” me.

Their attempt at denial was nipped in the bud. They understood the finality of death, and a gush of tears washed over their cheeks.

Fred was their very first pet. A small goldfish with a charming personality that was assigned to him by our own imagination. We will all miss fussing over him, watching him swim forward, and sometimes backwards in his clean and nicely decorated tank.

Fred

“We are very sorry that Fred has died. It is getting late. You have school tomorrow. You two go to bed right now, and tomorrow after school, we will bury Fred in our backyard, and we will have a funeral service for him.” me.

The next day, when I brought the children home from school, Hubby was already at the house waiting for us. Yes, he took off from work for a couple of hours to pay his final respects to Fred.

We decided to bury Fred under our jujube tree. My father had planted this young tree in our backyard a few years ago, and every summer it produced this tart-tasting small fruit that was surprisingly tasty.

I put on my much-neglected garden gloves and set out to pull weeds from under the tree to make a clearing. I told the rest of them to gather tools for digging a small hole in the dirt. Everybody wanted to participate in Fred’s final preparation.

The weed-pulling took no time at all. A nice patch of dirt underneath the tree marked Fred’s final resting place.

Then Hubby and the two kids appeared in our backyard with rusty tools. Two big shovels and one big rake.

They looked either out of practice with burying something small in our backyard, or about to bury something much more sinister than a fish.

Big rusty tools

“I was thinking of using that hand-shovel I bought for the kids’ science project…” me.

They stared back at me. I gave up.

“Go ahead and dig right here.” I pointed at the patch of dirt I had just cleared.

Three shovels in, and a hole way bigger than necessary was created.

Huge hole in the dirt

We placed Fred in a small raisin box (emptied of raisins, of course). The raisin box made a good coffin for Fred, because both of my children loved raisins, and it is bio-degradable.

Raisin box coffin for Fred

We placed the box carefully into the hole, and pushed the dirt back on top.

My 11-year-old made a tombstone out of white cardboard for Fred and had it wrapped in a Ziplock bag to protect the tombstone from the looming rain in the forecast. The kids carefully placed the tombstone on Fred’s patch of dirt and dressed the grave with tiny flowers.

Fred's tomb

Finally, we said a prayer for Fred, thanked him for being our pet, and told him to rest in peace.

But Fred’s story did not just end there. A few days later, my kids received hand-made sympathy cards from their young cousins, who had learned of the awful news.

My 11-year-old particularly loved my 5-year-old niece’s note:

“I love your fish, I love your fish, so bad, I am so sorry.”

Sympathy cards from cousins

Such sweet and loving children…

Previous related post: Meet Fred…

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Apr

The Goddess of Wisdom

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Last week was uneventful. Boring. Nothing blog-worthy.

A weekly blog is sort of on my weekly to-do list, but luckily for me, I have always known that a self-made to-do list can also be torn to pieces, and simply be allowed to perish in a trash bin. It is good to be my own boss, or so I thought.

“Mom! What happened to your blog last week?” 11-year-old.

“I didn’t write one. Nothing interesting happened last week.” me.

“Well, hurry up and write one! I need to make my $5 dollars.” 11-year-old demanded.

Note to self: don’t hire your own children to work for you. Especially the bossy one.

Now, I need to generate a blog to satisfy my money-hungry kid…

I racked my brain for 10 or 15 minutes and found a worthy blog material, and I meant “found”.

My 11-year-old’s 6th grade class had all sorts of interesting projects this school year, and their current one is a two-week daily journal from the perspective of an individual from an ancient civilization.

The students chose an ancient civilization, such as ancient Egypt, Greece, China, Rome, etc., and write journals as a member of that civilization in the ancient times.

My 6th grader chose Greece. While the instructions clearly specified that you are supposed to be a person from the ancient times, my child argued successfully to do this project as the Goddess of Wisdom, Athena.

So you wonder, just what does a Greek goddess put in her daily journal….

Below is my 6th grader’s first journal entry as the goddess Athena:

Athena in Greek

Saturday, April 4

The sound of a calling horn pierced through the sunny morning and brought me out of my slumber. Seized with panic, I immediately bolted to my large, ornate bedroom window and leaned over the olive-green windowsill. “What’s wrong? What’s going on? What happened?” I shrieked at a nearby wood nymph. I knew her well; her name was Doila, and she lived in one of my sacred olive trees.

“I don’t know,” she said, quickly and excitedly. Her head popped out of a hollow in the tree, and her long, greenish hair flopped out and rested on the ground. “But I’ll find out.”

I watched, frozen with fear, an she chattered to the other nymphs, who had also been woken by the horn. What had happened? Was Dionysus so drunk that he had disappeared (again)? Had Artemis been hurt in a hunt of some sort? Did Apollo crash the sun chariot? Has Ares once again killed thousands of mortals by starting an unnecessary war? If he did, shouldn’t he have learned his lesson last time? Calling horns almost never meant anything good. I knew I had to report to my almighty father’s Great Hall soon.

Doila broke my train of thought by telling me, “Echalia said that Zeus is holding a meeting to decide a patron god for a city in Greece. It’s big and destined to be very important! And only someone as brilliant as you can patron a city like that!”

All my dread washed away, replaced by excitement. A patron god for a whole city? That was amazing! I wanted to be a patron god!

As I flew out the door of my Olympian palace, Doila sensed my eagerness to be a patron god and halted me. “…Athena? You aren’t looking very…patron god-ish…” She trailed off.

I examined myself. I was wearing a thin and revealing nightgown, which made me nearly toga-less. That may be okay for Aphrodite, but not for me. My hair was tangled, and I was barefoot. I haven’t fully washed off the olive oil that had been poured on my face when I won the trivia about Greece’s cities last night, and I was still very dirty from when some naughty satyrs threw mudballs at me. (Of course, I turned them into pretty little water dryads and let them be chased by their own kin, but that didn’t make me any cleaner.) Basically, I was filthy and unrecognizable, my father may not be very pleased to see me like this.

Previous related post: The Editor and the Shoe Cleaner

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Mar

The Editor and the Shoe Cleaner

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I write like how I do most things in my life; fast, but lacking perfection. So, I like to have someone proofread my writing to correct misspellings and bad grammar.

My 11-year-old is an excellent writer. So, for the past few months, I have hired my own child to be the editor of my blog on AsianParent.com.

I pay five bucks per blog. And since I blabber on my blog about once a week, my 11-year-old has accumulated a nice stack of five-dollar bills. This is upsetting my 8-year-old.

“I want to make $5 too!” 8-year-old demanded one afternoon.

“You are just not ready to proofread my blog yet. You are only a 3rd grader.” me.

The baby gave me a very sad face…so sad.

“I am sure when you are a 6th grader, you will make a fine editor too.” I comforted the child.

“But I want to make $5 NOW!” baby.

11-year-old watched us in amusement.

Then an idea came to me, “Actually, I have a job that you can do.”

“You can wash our dirty shoes! I have been wanting to clean them, especially both of your muddy tennis shoes. I will also pay you $5 a pair, but you will have to use a brush and soap to clean them.” me.

My 8-year-old clapped with pleasure. The baby loves money.

That was perfect, and everybody was happy. But my brain started cranking…and notified me of a teachable moment.

“Kids. I have always told you how important it is to be educated, and this is a good example of it.” me.

I pointed at my 11-year-old, and said, “When you get to use your brain to make money, you get to have a fancy title, like the Editor of AsianParent.com, and all you have to do is to read a blog to earn five dollars. Some of my blogs are so short.”

“And you!” I pointed to my baby now, “you don’t have enough education to use your brain to make money, you will have to use your muscles to make money.” Pausing for a more dramatic effect on my lecture, I continued, “You have to get a stool in front of the large sink in our laundry room, step on it, roll up your sleeves, and wash stinky shoes to earn your five dollars.”

“You kids better go to college.” I delivered my obvious punch line.

The baby’s beaming face turned into an unhappy frown.

“I don’t want to clean stinky shoes anymore!” 8-year-old.

“What, wait…you get five dollars.” me.

“No!” baby’s face turned away from me, with arms crossed.

Oh no. This teachable moment backfired on me.

“Hold on, kids. There is no shame in hard work. Sometimes, you have to do what you have to do.” me.

“I have worked lots of jobs since high school. And in college, I had a job cleaning dorm rooms.” me,

Silence from the kids.

“I cleaned other college kids’ dorm rooms and their bathrooms to make extra money. There is no shame in hard work. You can clean the shoes, your own shoes!”

“No!” baby.

Apparently, I need a new lesson plan on work ethics for these two. And I could really use a shoe cleaner around here.

Lots of shoes

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