Exploring Our Children’s Potentials

It’s Tuesday already and here in Singapore we still get to enjoy the Chinese New Year Public Holiday! *Woohoo*

And so we went to West Coast Park today. There were more than 20 of us. Six families in total.

It rained earlier on but the dampness of the grass and sand didn’t stop us from having fun.

Even the little ones had a blast!

A great get-together, I think!

Having fun with Elissa

I was really blessed by today’s sermon. Rev. Stephen Tong preached about the relationship between ‘wisdom and knowledge’ and how crucial it is for us to understand its importance and apply it in our daily life.

>> Very often, most of us only aim to ‘fill our brain with knowledge’. While it’s completely okay to do so, it is crucial for us to also realise that we must ‘fill our hearts with wisdom’ too.

>> Wisdom is not the same as knowledge. When someone is full of knowledge but has no wisdom, he is just like a ship without a rudder, sailing away without any direction.

>> Great knowledge must be coupled with high morality, otherwise one will only become smart, yet destructive towards self and others.

(I guess it’d be like a high-class criminal … real smart, but uses his knowledge to destroy others)

…

I personally think that unlike knowledge, wisdom cannot simply be gained or learned from textbooks. We however can slowly grow in our wisdom when we continually learn from our everyday ups and downs.

And most importantly I think … we should always ask HIM to give us more wisdom as HE himself is the Source of all knowledge, wisdom and strength.

When I was still in Indonesia, up until I left for Australia at 14 years old, I went along and celebrated Chinese New Year (CNY) with my big family every single year, and in a very ‘chinese’ way too of course.

The big reunion dinner. Having CNY breakfast together. Visiting our older family members’ houses, in my new clothes! And … getting lots of hong baos from our relatives!

It was so much fun! (Especially when we all got home and it’s time for me to count how much I received that day! Hehe).

Ah … how I miss celebrating CNY in a traditional way.

Now to those who celebrate, here’s our wish to you: ‘Happy Chinese New Year’!!

May you enjoy the warmth a family get-together brings.

They say kids are great imitators. They tend to copy what other people do and say.

And I completely agree.

Anya carries her bear just like how I carry Vai. She rocks her bear to sleep sometimes. And, she can even pretend she’s breastfeeding her bear!

When she saw me giving solids to Vai a couple of days ago, she immediately took out her ‘cooking utensils’, started mixing some ‘cereals’ and fed her toy-horse!

Ah. Anya, without her realising, constantly reminds me of how I should go about doing my everyday things. The words I use. The things I do. The way I treat other people. Etc.

It’s an added ‘burden’ of course. You know. Having watchful eyes and ears following you around most of the time.

But I have to say … such a constant training is a good thing.

Tough. But good.

PS: Oh btw … we didn’t go out to ‘celebrate’ Valentine’s Day today. Instead, Wilson chose to cook dinner for the two of us. Yummm…

Okay.

I decided to hand express some breastmilk today (instead of thawing yesterday’s frozen cubes) since I still don’t need that much to mix with Vai’s cereal.

It’s faster this way for now, especially after the let-down reflex comes in (read: it’s when your milk automatically starts to come out real fast)

I guess later on, when Vai needs to eat a much bigger meal, I’ll start pumping, freezing and thawing them. Hmm. We’ll see. I still have to figure out what works best for me and the kids.

Ah, you see … even second-time mommy needs to keep learning and adapting.

PS: Vai is just sooo serious when it comes to his meal.

Vai had his very first solids today.

He’ll be six months in eight days and I do notice that he’s been asking for more frequent feeding at night time these past few days, which most likely indicates his readiness for something more than just mommy’s milk.

And so he had his first few tiny spoonfuls this morning. He had Heinz Baby’s First Rice Cereal, mixed with some expressed breastmilk (the exact same way Anya had her first solids).

He frowned, squirmed a bit and gave me funny looks.

Haha.

He’ll have his meal just once a day for now and we’ll try again tomorrow.

(Click here to watch a video on how to introduce your baby to solids)

Oh, btw, as much as I want to always mix Vai’s cereals with breastmilk (well, until he’s introduced to formula milk, that is), I really do find it troublesome to always pump just before his every single meal.

And the thought of sterilising the breast pumps (or even expressing by hand) is just TOO time-consuming.

So this is what I did this morning.

I pumped some (about 120ml), used some of it and mixed it with Vai’s cereal. I then poured the remaining into an ice cube tray. I used a Tupperware one as it comes with a cover. I then put the tray in the freezer.

This way, the expressed milk is frozen and whenever I need some, I’ll just use the cubes and thaw them accordingly.

Voila.

And in terms of whether it’s okay to freeze and thaw your breastmilk, websites, books and doctors say that it actually is completely fine (though of course it’s always best to immediately feed your baby once the milk is pumped).

Anyway. We’ll see how Vai takes his thawed milk and cereal tomorrow.