"Nature is ONE of the Teacher"

One and half month ago, as I was planning the final charity project for my department. We have decided and gotten the approval to visit the Orang Asli Kampung on 3 Oct 2015, I have this question: "Should I bring both the girls?" in my mind. I have decided to bring the children as Ivan has agreed to come along the trip.

Two weeks before the event, Ivan has to say NO to that as his office has a training in Genting. Again, the thought running in my mind; "Should I bring both of them?". It was then along a conversations with Annabelle and Abigail that firmed up my decision.

****One fine afternoon****

"Abigail, you better tidy up your toys else mummy will pack them and give it to the poor children." said mummy.

Annabelle said:"Mummy, is it the poor children of the home that we visited last time." 

Mummy smiled and answered: "Yes".

***********************

So, the trip was held last Saturday. Both of them were well behaved and got up very early. After settled everything, buy one thosai for them to eat in the car; we are on the road to college to meet my students. On the way, I give them stern advice that they need to listen to me, don't run about in the village. They both nodded with thosai in their mouth. :)

The journey got excited when Abigail saw the bus arrived and parked. This is going to be her first bus ride. You should see the joy on her face. Annabelle was excited too, she was very friendly mingling with my students and addressing all of them "Jie Jie" "Kor Kor".

Fast forward the story, we reached Banting (travelling through the haze), the Orang Asli Kg. on time. We were welcomed with the special hand crafted crown, Annabelle loved it and feel shy when the crown was put on her head.

We explored all activities that the Orang Asli did ranging from menyumpit, anyaman daun, visiting the ancestor home and etc. All these activities was an eye opener for me and definitely my students.

The highlight of this blog post was not the activities but on what Annabelle and Abigail did during the trip. The witnessed the kids at the village playing inside the drain (it is very clean and dry). They played and chased around the compound. Both of them make friend with the local kids, who one of them named Meele. They hold hand, walk together. Meele gave flowers to her on the way walking around the kampung area.

I smiled when my colleague told me, Meele called Annabelle "Jie Jie". When I heard, Abigail called the local boy of her age "Annae"...

Annabelle and Abigail were sweating running, playing catch-catch, swing on the tree, opening and closing the door and windows of the hut that are in the kampung. Really a joy to see them enjoying themselves.

This trip give both of them a good experience. They know the life of living out from the city area where they are in. They making friends with others despite different races and cultures. They learnt how to respect others.

More important; mummy and papa make a right choice to bring them along for the trip :) HoooHoo... 

Is Papa & Mummy 7th Wedding Anniversary (是爸爸和妈妈结婚七周年)

I have updated this blog, translated it into Chinese writing so that my father and mother can read it :) 

“Annabelle，今天是爸爸和妈妈结婚纪念日！”，妈咪说。

“你要怎么祝福我们？” 妈咪问。

“父亲节快乐？快乐的母亲节？”Annabelle说。妈咪笑了。

“不，Annabelle！你必须说，祝爸爸和妈妈结婚周年快乐。”

Annabelle 开心的重复那几句: “快乐，Anniversaroi？”快乐Anniversali？".....

******

如果不是因为我们在7年前的决定，在我们的主耶稣面前宣誓要成为夫妻。这些对话是不可能的! 我们很感谢上帝在过去的7年。谢谢你给了我一个机会- Ivan，我最亲爱的丈夫。他是上帝献给我的一个礼物。在过去的10年了,他带来地欢乐，幸福，以及无条件的爱我。

与我们的小公主,我们建立了我们的家。他是一个好爸爸，并继续成为一个好丈夫。我还能要求更多吗?

有时候,我在忙于做家务时, 当他可以洗房子的厕所，帮忙我给孩子们洗澡时; 想一想, 我知道我没有嫁错了人. 他会想尽一切办法确保我们是安全的。“我还有什么要求呢？对吗？

写着这些回忆,我的眼泪都流下来了.

“爸，我可记得在教堂里，走在过道婚礼上时,你牵着我的手。”

“妈咪，感谢你邀请Ivan到我们家的第一顿晚餐; 你用了开郎的心态接受了你第一个其他种族的女婿。

“Amma, 那一天, 当你告诉，叫我”阿妈“，而不是”阿姨“。我高兴死了!

“我的姐妹们，感谢你们多年的支持。”

“Akka Priscilla，我记得你的婚礼演词，你实在最棒！谢谢你！”

 ************************************

“Annabelle and Abigail，当你们可以在多年以后阅读这篇文字，你就会知道，爸爸妈妈庆祝结婚周年，上帝祝福了我们很多. 此外如果没有你己故的THATHA和G-MA，公公和婆婆; 爸爸妈妈也不会有今天”。所以，女孩们，你们请记住，不管在什么情况下，你需要记住主耶稣与你的父母。感恩!

"Annabelle, today is papa and mummy wedding anniversary!", said mummy.
"How you are going to wish us?" asked mummy.

"Happy Father's Day? Happy Mother's Day?" said Annabelle. Mummy just smiled while dressing her up.
"No, ma..! You must say, Happy Anniversary."

"Happy, Anniversaroi?" Happy Anniversali?"... hahaha... it was really a very nice beautiful Sunday (taking away the haze).

******
These conversations is not possible if  not because our decision 7th years ago to vow in front of our Lord to be husband and wife. We are so thankful to God for the past 7th year. Thank you for giving me a chance to meet Ivan, my dearest husband. He is a gift to my life. He brought joy, happiness into my life as well as he has love me so dearly and unconditionally for the past 10th years.

We built our family with the presence of our princesses. He is a good papa and continue to be a good husband. I could not asked for even more. Once this thought ran into my mind, "I knew I did not marry a wrong man when he can washed the house toilet for me, bath the children when I am busy with other set of housework, he will do anything to ensure we are safe.!" What else I am asking for? Right?

My tears flowing down when I recall the following. How God has blessed us. Thank HIM not enough.

"Pa, I can still recall the walking down the aisle in church on my wedding with you holding my hand."

"Ah mi, thank you for inviting Ivan for the first dinner at our house with open heart and accepted your first non-Chinese son-in-law.

"Ma, I am overwhelmed with joy the day you told me, called me "Amma" instead of "Auntie".

"All my sisters, thank you for standing by our side along our years being together."

"My one and only sister-in-law, I remembered your wedding speech; you rock!! Thank you!"

Papa, thank you for this moment. "爸爸，谢谢你"

Ah mi, 喝茶. "谢谢你, mummy!"

We rocked that night!

Happy Day.. 

Jesus, you stood in the center of this marriage. Continue to bless us. 

The Vincent Family.

The Ivan Tharmaraj Family 

Presenting to you, our happy family. 

"Annabelle and Abigail, when you can read this blog post many years later; you will know that papa mummy celebrated wedding anniversary with Lord God in our heart. Papa mummy will not have today if not because of your G-ma, late thata, Popo & Gong Gong." So, girls, please keep that in your mind that not matter at what situation, you will need to remember your God and your parents. 

______________________________________________________________________________

A Little Achievements by Our Princesses

It was a busy August month for me. Busy at work or at home too. :) However, I'm trying to update the blog too whenever I can.

Let's talk about Abigail.

Abigail has achieved her milestones of diapers free in the afternoon. She has done in just in a matter of 5 days, with the cooperation and encouragement from the daycare auntie; I am now saving a little more on diapers money. :) Abigail has done it without any force or using reward chart like the sister. We are so proud of her.

As a mother, we are very concern on our kid's "output" or passing of motion. It is the sign to tell us if our child is doing well as just like the computer term, (Input --> Process --> Output). As some of us may know that Abigail was having so much of troubles passing motion when she was younger. 

Everyone that saw her doing it during those days will asked me the same questions : 

" Did you give her prune juice?"

" How about pro-biotic?"

" Why not try on potty?"

and the lists go on and on. 

I even have experiences that people think I tortured my child when she try to strain it out or push it in order to pass her motions. She will be sweating, her face will be red; she cried and tears. So, as a mother; I am tearing too for her. I used to ask her to put her hand on my shoulder, I will hug her, I will make the sound "hmmm... hmmm..." to help her. I will encouraged her. I tried everything for her from prune juices, pro-biotic, potty, seater, Elmo toilet training books for her to see, rewards chart, asking friends on paed contacts who are able to help..

So, when thinking back those days when people asked me the questions above; I was really feeling mad as "No Mother" like to see their child suffered like that. As I am writing this, I can remembered all those difficult moments, Ivan and I will be discussing about how to help her, daycare Amma will text me and expressed her happiness in text message "Abigail has poo-poo.". We tears a lot for her over "poo-poo" issue!... how ironic and funny parenting processes! 

Now, Abigail is able to do it for herself. She is able to pass motions without any help now. She even learning and wanted to clean after herself. We are so happy for her now. :)

And now let's talk about Annabelle.

Annabelle now can relates many things that she learnt in school and in her life. Her command of words are good, although sometime the words "La...", "this one?", "that one?" will come into the conversations. But she accepts feedback very well and will correct it herself. 

Annabelle loves writing Chinese wordings. I am glad she does as we would like to send her to Chinese school at Year 1.

Now, whenever I have time at home; I will coach her on her writing, her reading, and also recognizing Chinese words. The roads are a little steep as I rarely speak to her in Mandarin which I regretted. But I know it is still very much possible to do it now.

Gambateh to Jie Jie Annabelle and mummy Shirley.

(by the way, need to loop papa Ivan along to speak in Mandarin.) :)

Annabelle and Abigail are our jewel.

Papa Ivan Vincent once said:"There is nothing can replace and nothing more precious than having them."

Jie Jie Mei Mei Growing Up Well

Both our princesses are doing very well since the last updates of our blog. They both just completed their ~4 years and 2 years 6 months check-up respectively at the Klinik Kesihatan, papa and mummy are very happy with their growth. 

Annabelle is handling her school well and had grown taller. It is about time to get her some new dresses and she has finally able to keep her hair long.

Abigail too are well. She is able to communicate well with us. Some of her famous phrase are:

"Oh, Mei Mei, see..." ~ actually means "Oh I See"
"Papa mummy no don't like!" ~ actually means "Papa mummy don't like!"
"Of course!" she will answered lowering her voice.
"Mei Mei, doing work!" ~ Oh yes, followed the way the mummy speak.
"Why pull mei mei's baju?" ~ fawning while saying it..

Abigail has a hobby reading storybook. Her version of storybook is picking up one of the two photobook that mummy made, flipped it and tell us who is in the photos, what we did there and she will questioned "WHY?"... and many "WHY..."

Annabelle enjoyed her school so much and especially Chinese classes. She told me many times that she likes to go to Chinese school. I had read up and had done some research about Chinese schools and had taken steps to expose Annabelle to writing strokes and also recognizing Chinese characters. I am guilty in this that I should have spoken more Chinese with her at home and now I am doing so and hoping that she is able to pick up well.

Annabelle loves her sister so much.

She will ensure papa or mummy will carry her sister when leaving the house in the morning, though we are pulling her leg that we will leave her sister behind in her room.

She will kiss the sister when seeing her sleeping in the room.

She will tell the sister, "Don't do that again, Mei Mei Ma.. You will jatuh!"

She will ensure the sister get out from the lift on time. If the lift shut, she will scream ensure the sister is with her.

Abigail on the other hand too very caring to her Jie Jie. Probably she is still learning on how to express that. Both sisters will fight and Abigail mainly will be more stubborn while Annabelle will normally giving in. Abigail is apologetic and often will apologize to the sister and even to us if she is at fault. It was so nice to see them hugging each other, talking to each other and playing with each other.

It was really so lovely to watch them grow,  and the two sisters are so dear to each other. We hope that relationships will maintain and will grow stronger.

"Girls, keep the laughter, keep the love, keep the care and joy in both of you. Papa and mummy are very proud of you both. We love you."