Best Mummy

A friend once told me about a friend of hers who, realizing that she wasn't doing great either at her career or as a mother, decided to prioritize and left her job to focus on the family.  I could empathize with that because I too had that uncomfortable feeling that I wasn't doing myself justice.  Now that I'm a SAHM, I am more at peace but at the same I feel I don't have any more excuses - my kids are supposed to be better behaved, display good manners, be able to cope with academics, if not hey what has their stay-at-home mother been doing??  This is my full-time job now and I need to do it well because as I like to say to the girls - anything that is worth doing is worth doing your best.

So I was very pleased to receive a pat on my back from Sai Pi last week.

Sai Pi: "You are the best mummy I ever had in my life!"

Wah, another satisfied customer!  Of course I'm the only mummy she ever had but still I must be doing something right!

Happy 1st Anniversary

Happy 1st anniversary to me. Actually I'm two days late so it's a belated anniversary. It's been one year and two days since I left my job to be a homeschooling mother. When I decided on this path, I was a little scared as I had been working full-time all these years and to suddenly stay home and what more, bear the responsibility for my children's education, seemed kinda crazy.

When I look back at my first year as a SAHM/homeschooling mother, I would say it is one of the best decisions I ever made in my life, choosing to spend this much time with the kids. No longer do I struggle with the work-family balancing act and I have gotten to know my children a lot better this past year. It's good to know that whatever problems there might be at home, you at least can devote the time and energies to resolve them instead of also having to worry about stuff at the office.

The fact that Tai Pi and Pumpkin are no longer in school has also made a whole lot of difference to family life. It's really a great change when you think about it. No work for me, no going to school for the girls. Now our lives really revolve around the family, and that's the way we like it!

"Meal" that Pumpkin prepared for me

in celebration of my 1st SAHM anniversary. Yum!

Big sister

When Pumpkin was born, Tai Pi was barely 2 years old but already Mummy's little helper, making sure that there was always disposable diapers in the cot pockets, pointing out the spots we missed when bathing the baby, and running to tell us that baby's crying (although the cries could be heard throughout the house and beyond).

It seems Tai Pi has quite a maternal streak and enjoys taking care of her sisters.   Pumpkin is not so little now (in fact, she is now physically bigger than Tai Pi!) so Tai Pi's mostly busy with Sai Pi.  Whenever Sai Pi falls asleep on the bus (which is everytime!), Tai Pi is there to wake her up and to carry her home.

Piggy-back (I think the haversack acts as a kind of counterweight)

Yesterday Sai Pi wanted to learn to rollerblade so who better to teach her than Tai Pi who could skate the first time she put on rollerblades.  Under Big Sister's guidance, Sai Pi was able to move a little distance and should be blading in no time.  Well done Sai Pi and thank you Big Sister!

Come to Big Sister

You're doing great

Whoa!

Safe in the arms of Big Sister

Flower girls

This is becoming a bit of tradition in our family, buying flowers for Chinese New Year. We didn't use to do this because there wasn't space at our old place for plants. But now we have a patio and there is also the common area outside which we conveniently claim as our own.

We've been doing this since last year, visiting a nursery to pick out a nice auspicious-looking plant of substantial size and having the girls pick out their own little plants to care for (easier to care for than a pet dog or hamster and no guilt if the plant dies on you!).

We picked out our plants a little early this year. Look at the girls' choices for the Year of the Ox:

Growing roots

It's a pity that we tend to realise the importance of our roots only when we are older. Here I am, a jiak kantang Chinese with very little knowledge of my cultural heritage, trying to prevent my children from facing a similar fate. Sigh...

I like sharing with the girls my childhood stories and fortunately some of that includes certain cultural practices, such as the celebration of Dong Zhi. I told the girls how I used to make tang yuan when I was little, rolling the dough into marble-sized balls of white and pink, sometimes making a little snowman by joining two balls together. The girls were intrigued and wanted to make tang yuan too.

As with any dish that I prepare, I absolutely have to refer to a recipe. The Husband cried, "You need a recipe for tang yuan?! It's flour and water!" Ok ok.... as I was saying, the recipe, it called for glutinous rice flour, food colouring, and water. We got flour from the mini mart and I almost bought food flavouring instead of colouring but that was not my fault because they pack these things into the same type of little glass bottles, and then we were all ready for tang yuan making!

The girls had fun rolling the dough into balls and cooking them, and unknown to them getting in touch with their roots.

And then there is the other half of my roots - the Peranakan half. That is even more alien to me because I lost my mother when I was young. All I remember is eating spicy food and simple words like "manja", "tidor", "sakit", "kacau", "skali". I never wore Nonya attire and even my mum rarely did. When I first visited the Peranakan Museum shortly after it opened last year, I felt a wistful longing for my Peranakan roots.

This feeling was amplified when my whole family became avid followers of the popular Chinese serial Little Nonya, the most watched show in the past 15 years. I explained to the girls that Mummy is half Peranakan which makes them one quarter Peranakan (a little math lesson thrown in there) and they were very pleased about that. Now they want to dress like Nonyas and learn beading. But I have nothing from my Peranakan past to share with them. So sad.

We did the next best thing and visited the Peranakan Museum last evening. We enjoyed ourselves there ("I want to be a Nonya!" the girls cried) but at the same time, I was filled with a great sense of loss and regret. Sad, so sad...

My great grandma

I am, I can, I ought, I will

The name of our homeschool may be frivolous but the same cannot be said of the school motto:

I am, I can, I ought, I will

It was educator Charlotte Mason who came up with that motto. Since I subscribe to her education philosophy, it was quite natural for us to adopt it for our homeschool.

I am an important and unique human being. I have the powers of doing, thinking and loving.
I can use these powers and do what is required of me.
I ought to do what is right because I owe it to myself and to my parents.
I will choose to do what is right even if it’s not what I want.

Quite good eh?

Mamegoma Homeschool

You know how educational institutions generally have pretty serious names - they get named after some important historical figure or a saint or a road, etc. Our homeschool is different. Well just the idea of homeschooling is considered to be radical, so it is not surprising that we did not bother with convention when it came to naming our homeschool.

But why Mamegoma? What is Mamegoma? Mamegoma is a character created by San-X which is a Sanrio type of company. They are adorable baby seals which the girls and I absolutely love so we decided to name our homeschool after them. The classes are named after their favourite species of Mamegomas - Tai Pi is in Pandagoma class, Pumpkin is in Shimagoma class and Sai Pi (who attends Kindergarten in the morning and is a "part-time" student with Mamegoma Homeschool) is in Sakuragoma class.

So that's the origin of our homeschool name. No fancy history or meaning; just based on something we love.

Aren't they adorable?

Zzzz

There was an article in today's Straits Times "Start school later, sleep in more" where the journalist advocates a later starting time for schools to allow children to have sufficient sleep which is said to impact on one's learning and development.

Here at Mamegoma Homeschool (that's the name of our homeschool; more about that later) we don't have a problem of students having insufficient rest. Lessons start at 9am, or later if the students wake up late (mainly Pumpkin whom I keep nagging to be punctual for lessons). And if students are in a hurry to turn up for class, they sometimes come in their pyjamas (yes the nightmare that the rest of us sometimes have of turning up in school in pyjamas is a reality for the girls!).

Here's Tai Pi in science class still in her PJs, busy labeling the parts of a flower.

No Pool? No Problem

Boring. That's how some of my friends' children describe my home. No pool, no tennis court, no playground, no Xbox, no Playstation, no Wii. The only saving grace is that we have a computer hooked up to a 42" TV so a whole group of children could amuse themselves watching YouTube or playing online games. But really, the only time we do that is when we have guests. The girls do just fine without computer games; all they need is a bit of imagination and a lot of space.

So exactly what do they do here in this place that has nothing but a car park? Rollerblade, skate-scoot, skip, play catching, water guns, water bombs, etc.

I especially like the camping pretend-play they engage in, complete with "food" such as seaweed on a stick (leaves wrapped around a twig) and orange shish kebab (pieces of lime skewered with a twig).

There was also the time when the kids in the neighbourhood adopted a stray kitten, taking turns to play host (that meant keeping the kitten in a box outside the front door). But that little adventure ended when the estate caretaker took the kitten away amidst outcry from the children.

Today was pretty interesting too. A neighbour got some coconuts down from one of the trees in the estate so we had a little coconut party at the carpark. The milk mostly didn't taste very good but the kids enjoyed scrapping out and savoring the flesh.

After that, the girls and their cousins gathered little stones and pounded them to powder which they collected into little jars. I don't know what the idea is behind it and it looked to me kinda like the hard labour that slaves or prisoners are made to do, but it kept the kids amused till dinner time.

So no, it appears this place is not boring after all. As the girls have shown, it's not where you are but what you choose to do with yourself that makes the difference.