Mindspace

How old is Aidan?

How old is Aidan?

Off to my own space

so i've finally moved off my husband's server. like everything else, it seems like a "technological divorce". Movable type is just too finicky and my husband provides too unpredicatable technical support.
i breathe a sigh of relief to join the rest of the world in the blogasphere. to have predictable features on my site however limited.
i am thrilled.... with livejournal... thank you for the space.
meet me now at
http://www.livejournal.com/users/tchiachoi/

Off to my own space

so i've finally moved off my husband's server. like everything else, it seems like a “technological divorce”. Movable type is just too finicky and my husband provides too unpredicatable technical support. i breathe a sigh of relief to join the rest of the world in the blogasphere. to have predictable features on my site however limited. i am thrilled.... with livejournal... thank you for the space. meet me now at http://scribbles.typepad.com/mindspace/

My baby girl

You are so loving lately,
your teacher said today you were such a delightful child. and i am thrilled to bits watching you laugh at yourself when your shoe fell off. i love coming early and watching you in class without you knowing, and love hearing another parent tell me " is that your child? she is so happy! ". Who would have guessed you were the quiet, slow-to-warm up child that was the youngest in your Pre-School Family class.
These days you are all mommy. You push daddy's hands away when he tries to read to you, you insist on me praying, you insist on me giving you a bath. Our bedtime ritual has become enshrined into something so sacred you let no one in. i am secretly thrilled but overwhelmingly tired. Especially since you howl and throw a tantrum if your father comes get you in the morning and bring you to our bed. You lie next to me and throw a tantrum too loud for me having gotten up 3x for your brother.
But today, i hug you and you curl your arms around me and i kiss you like i kiss your brother, incessantly, addictive-ly and you smile this pleased "baby smile" that you save for when i treat you like a baby. You arch your back and laugh soaking every minute of my attention up, eating everything up.
and i can't help but believe that all this loving gives you the strength to run and jump and play with strength and joy and confidence.

Day of Accomplishments

Baby Girl,
what a big day it has been for you:
-- your teacher said she was so impressed with how you play with the big kids. How you jump in and participate with whatever they're doing ( ie. playing "train" ).
that thrills my heart much more than if you can count to 50. can i tell you that i can't do that now, just jump into a group with confidence and joy, without self consciousness ? i pray that growing up will never take that away from you and that God will protect that joy. You thrill me with all my dreams for you to be well-socialized more than well-learned.
-- you informed me that baby doll "no like it" ( no like bubbles) differentiating your love for bubbles with baby boy's fear of water. You shield his eyes like a good mommy.
-- you grabbed a piece of your 20 piece Elmo puzzle which we worked on yesterday and invited me to come play. ( which is my biggest thrill ). Completed it with suggestions. and then wanted to do it 3 more times ( "again!") i turned you down the 4th time only to call aunty fran to tell her how excited i was that she did it, more that she loved doing it, that she wanted to do it over and over and that you said "hm... hm... hm... " while fitting each piece together.
Can i tell you how it thrills my heart that you like puzzles? because i hated it as a child? i hated not knowing how to do it? i hated feeling like a failure? and all of me wants to protect you from it now, offering help, but you show me how you can sit in the uncertainty of not knowing until you fit the pieces together?
Can i tell you how it tickled me that you wanted moo-moo by your side, and that you were so thrilled when it cheered you on? and said "can i help?"
-- you differentiated between a cyclist and a "picture" of a cyclist on the way home from school.
-- you laughed so hard paused and then asked me if you were funny. " i'm funny?" and then laughed and said " i'm laughing" with such joy.
-- you ate "egg soup" for breakfast ie. half boiled eggs, "egg soup" for dinner ie. egg porridge.
-- you were so upset with the hot porridge, complaining that it was "too hot" differentiating "hot" "cold" and "warm".
-- you said "mie mie jiao" when i said "xiao xiao yang" a phrase out of our chinese book
-- i ran your fingers over the letter M and N and you re-fingered it yourself thrilled.

How can a stay-at-home-mom not make a difference? we've only done homeschooling for a week and you have sorted, and counted and made puzzles and absorbed everything. You absorb everything like a sponge and you are starved to do anything with me, even school. As i work with other moms to create a chinese homeschooling class, i know all of my training culminates for this moment.

Change

If there is one thing enoch has communicated to me clearly in all the years we've been married, is that his parents cannot change. They are not open to change and is incapable of dialoging about change. After 10 years of protest, incredulity, rage and grief i have to finally concede, agree with him and accept that. One of my biggest fears in this marriage is that same impenetrable resistance to dialogue would continue in our relationship.
But as i wade through this murky amnesia, trying to nail down the reasons for this low level of rage and anger i feel all the time towards them and my husband, i realized that through the years, the reasons i've had for being mad at my husband don't exist anymore. i can't use them as an excuse for being angry at him or them. Lo and behold, without me knowing God has changed my husband.

Ways enoch has changed:
-- he has demonstrated that he puts his family's needs first before mom and dad's errands and requests
-- he says no to mom and dad more
-- he doesn't "automatically" assumes that i'll take the kids when he makes plans for himself
-- he never doubts how much work it is to take care of them
-- he takes care of nally alot
-- he wants to take care of aidan
-- he supports and appreciates my care for them ( correcting my sister when she says i don't work )
-- he genuinely appreciates my methods of child-rearing eg. sleep, boundaries etc ( recognizing them in front of his mother )

All this time, while i've been "dutifully" mad at Enoch, i've targeted mom and dad alot with my rage. i've held them responsible for his problems with financial accountability, consistency, follow through, sense of responsibility and work ethic.
But one day i wake up, and God points out, i can't use those reasons anymore. My husband is changing, my husband has changed .... with God's strength i can change.... there is hope.
The curse stops here, it stops with us.

Ways i know God is working through Dad's sin

1. The sin that i have suspected and talked about all these years is finally exposed.
2. Enoch is forced to confront it
3. Enoch is taking baby steps to protecting me and our family.
4. Enoch has given me permission and support to protect myself.
5. i am confronted with my sin of accepting M&D's money
6. God has put everything in place ( enoch's partnership and raise ) for us to finally take steps of financial independence from M&D
7. We are praying together and talking more.

I am not crazy

So it finally happened, i am not dreaming, delusional or paranoid. What i've had a haunting suspicion in the 10 years of my marriage finally happened.
The other day when i told my father-in-law for the 100th time that no we will not give him the keys to our house, he pulled the money thing on us. He brought up the fact that he was legally co-owners of our house.
Amazingly, it must have been God because i was pretty numb when he said this. i told my husband with his father sitting there " i told you this was going to happen and we've stayed in this house for only 4 months and he brought it up." It's my fault, i knew it all along, i went in with my eyes wide open. i take responsibility.
Dad was on a rampage that day and i can't say that it wasn't painfully productive. All these months, i had forgotten why i hold this family at arm's length (especially dad), why i avoid spending time with them like the plague. Just only the day before during date night enoch and i had the age-old reprise discussion on why "i don't spend time with his parents". His reason "i spend time with your parents" being sufficient reason for me to do the same.
i restrained myself from going into this long discussion on the enormous values differences in the two sets of parents.
But two days ago, dad answered his son's question for him. Unequivocably, he made it perfectly obvious why. i don't spend time with his family because they are toxic. The whole family, those who are, and those who stand by say nothing and pretend that nothing is wrong.
So how do i know God is working after 10 years of marriage? my husband finally agreed, and gave me permission to protect myself and when the time comes my children from this toxicity, while he goes on his journey to learn to protect himself.
So thank you dad, for making it obvious, that i am not crazy.

Teeth Brushing

She is really into brushing her teeth tonite. Walking all around with our Baking Soda Mentadent toothpaste dispenser and her Barbie electric toothbrush. i made this little hum every time we switch sides and so she is humming by herself. The only reason why i am letting this go so long is because we've been really bad about teeth brushing. i figured, 30 mins of teethbrushing makes up for 20 months right?

Technological Baby

The other night, we set up our brand new ichat webcam and connected with long-lost college friends of enoch's. They have 3 girls now and the kids were just enthralled with the camera. what really perturbed me was how natalie just took to it so naturally.
She looooved watching the kids and sat for a good 45 minutes in front of the screen. ichat is blazingly fast so it was as if it was in real time. She tried to feed the baby milk from her sippy cup, was showing them all her toys, was singing and talking. And the other day when we hooked it up again with no one on the other side and it was just her, she maneuvered it around like a pro realizing that it was focussing on her.
Our baby will grow up in a different world of technology. She will expect her books online to be interactive, she will learn to listen and respond to cell phones with different rings ( and alert her mother even from outside the house ), she will connect with other babies via webcam as if it was the most natural thing in the world.
The other day when she was playing in the front seat of the mini-van and pointed for us to turn on the navigational system, we knew we were in a whole different era.