Monday, March 31, 2014

Sunshine On The Grass: Bittersweet Motherhood



 “When you become parents, then you can relate more to God’s ways.”

That’s what a friend, who happened to be a new mother of a nine-month-old baby, told me and my husband. At that time I was pregnant, and I had no idea what she was talking about, so me and my husband, we just nodded our heads. As if we understood, but we didn’t.
Now, let me tell you a story that happened sometime last December.

Baby Michael was going to turn one year old in a week. He has a very good appetite, and he loves to eat, which is very delightful for us parents, because we have heard horror stories and how big of a headache it is for parents whose children just won’t eat. How they would spend two hours every meal time to feed the child, how agonizing it is that they have very little time to play, because almost every waking hour the child has, the parents spend it on feeding him or her. Baby Michael doesn’t like milk, so it’s a bit of a struggle, and he has a tendency to throwing up, but overall, he is OK, more than OK in terms of eating solids. His throwing up habit, I learned, is genetic. His father was just the same. Nothing alarming.

Then suddenly, out of the blue, without any warning whatsoever, he refused to eat. He would not open his mouth. He would not eat his fruit. He would not eat his breakfast nor his afternoon snack of oatmeal which he usually likes. When I tried to feed him with a spoon, he smacked the spoon with his little hand so that the food splashed all over his high chair, and on the floor. Everywhere. I tried to talk to him. I cajoled him. I added cheese to his food to give it some taste. I changed the texture of his food. I offered some instant food, which I usually avoided at all cost, as a desperate effort to entice him to eat. He didn’t eat anything that day, just drank a bit of milk that I tricked him into drinking when he was half asleep and way too sleepy to do any acts of rebel.

The next morning came. Same thing, He drank milk, I guess because he was hungry. I tried to make him doing activities that would make him sweaty and hungry. He was laughing and we had fun playing on the floor. Then meal time came. He refused to eat breakfast. Again. He refused to eat fruit. Again. Same thing with lunch.

Dinner time came. He ate almost nothing solid for 48 hours straight now, and just a little bit of milk. I was worried he might get ill. I began to understood that it was not the food. It was him trying to state his “independence”. He just refused to eat for the sake of refusing to eat. He could see that Mommy and Daddy are miserable, and he laughed. He was expressing himself in the only way that he knew how. The wrong way, that might hurt himself, as well as stressing out his parents. He didn’t know what he was doing. He didn’t know that the consequences of his refusing to eat will be threat of sickness. If he keeps going, it will even hinder his brain and physical development, which is going very very fast in his age. Must not waste the golden years, the first three years of life. But he didn’t know it. He do not know it. WE do.

So I decided to do something drastic. 



His father held his hands, and I basically forced him to eat. After almost 48 eight hours of “fasting”, we finally decided to force feed him, for his own good. He screamed and rebelled, he kicked and cried. He was angry, upset and perhaps scared, too. His little face was all red, tears of anger were streaming down his cheeks. It cut my heart to see and hear him like that, but we knew it would be wrong to let him not eating. It was really heartbreaking. We managed to get about one third of his food got eaten.

On the second day, he kicked less and screamed less, and we managed to feed him half his portion. On his third day, he whined and made exasperated noises, but he learned his lesson. He ate most of his food. On the fourth day, he ate all of his food, as he used to do before this tantrum.

It’s been said that you must not forcefeed a child, because it will traumatize him. Well, I don’t know how the experts conclude that, but in our experience, it was THE PARENTS who got traumatized. I feared feeding time. It scared the hell out of me. I didn’t want to repeat the experience ever again. What about the child? Well, I guess he hated us in the first five minutes after feeding time, then he started made cute noises and crawled around my feet to be picked up. He would kiss me and hug me because he knew I was upset with him, and he cajoled me to smile at him because he knew Mommy was angry. No trauma on him, I guess. Just on the exhausted mother and father. Not to mention the guilty feeling. And that "I'm the worst mother in the world" voice in my head.

Then it hit me. Don’t we human, grown up men and women react the same way when God “forcefeed” us? How many times have we disobeyed Him, knowing full well that we are not supposed to? How many times have we tried His patience? How many times have we were being like stubborn, disobedient child? How many times have we cried and whined and was angry toward God when He “forcefeed” us, because He knew we would get sick if He didn’t? How many times after He taught us a painful lesson, we sulked and were angry with him? How many times did we think we knew better than God.

More times than I want to admit.

I forced Baby Michael to eat after 48 hours because I knew there is a danger he might be taken ill if he continued to do so. I also wanted him to learn that disobedience will not take him anywhere, and that experimenting is a good thing, but if it might endanger him, Mommy will step in and take charge. I guess God forced me to “eat”, or do something I don’t want to do, or experience something I don’t like, or take charge of my life when I want ME to take charge, also has the same reason. Bottom line is, He knows better than me, He wants the best for me, and He wants to keep me out of bigger trouble. It’s just, more often than not, I don’t want to admit it. I feel like I know better, I know what’s best for me, and I’m a big girl who knows how to stay out of trouble. Sounds familiar?

So, next time I have that urge to rebel and yell at God, “Why are YOU doing this to me?!”, I’ll try to remember parenthood, I’ll try to remember that no matter how old, grown up or capable I am, I am still a child of God, and I’ll try to remember this verse that He gave as His love letter:

“For I know well the plans I have in mind for you, says the LORD,
plans for your welfare, not for woe! plans to give you a future full of hope.”

(Jeremiah 29:11)

By the way, if you are a mother, have you ever felt like the baddest, the worst mother in world? Please share in the comments! I would love to hear from other mothers!
 Son, I love you and I'd rather you hate me now and thank me later for doing what's best for you - no matter how not nice that'll make me look -, than spolling you now and not building the strong character that will serve you well for the rest of your life.

If you love me back, it will make me happy, and I love you.
If you don't, it will break my heart, but I still love you.

working mom


I love the detailing and accessories on this outfit. I especially love the necklace and the bracelet. Just take a look of this snapshot here, of the green tree, the little woman on a scooter. So cute!


The bracelet with multicolor stones is a darling thing Mom brought me from her latest trip to China. While the mint star bracelet, a coworker brought me from Hong Kong. I love them both.



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Monday, March 24, 2014

Frugal Organizing: Tins N Cans

No outfit post today, Ladies! Instead, let's talk today about frugal organization. I love this topic, and I have read a lot of blog posts and watched a lot of YouTube videos to inspire and motivate me. I hope this little, humble post might give you some ideas, too on how to get more organized at home. If not, well, let's just say this is  just a sharing, because I'm sure there a lot of readers who are much much much better organizer and homemaker than me! ^__^

Getting organized has never been easier – or fun – for women than it is today. Think about it. We have tons of products that can help us to get organized on daily basis: agenda, Filofax, various containers in any shape and color and model that you can think of, colorful highlighters, stickers, sticky notes, color-coded pens, smartphones… Practically in every store we can find pretty tool boxes, shower buckets, make up traincases, lovely pouches in various materials and patterns. The list go on and on.

Yet the massive amount of products can backfire. Instead of helping us, they are hindering us, getting us confused. Too many options is just as frustrating as no options at all. Almost. Instead of assisting us to get down and get dirty and really getting organized, they fool us with wishful thinking: “If I buy this pink container, this cute agenda, all these highlighters and stickers, and if I watch all these YouTube videos and read all these blogs of organizing, then I’ll get organized in the end.”

Well, Ladies, as tempting that thought might be, and as useful and nice having all those tools in our arsenal, we will NEVER get organized if we don’t start DOING it for real. Good planning is half way there. But not there yet. We need good actions, too.

As much as I’m fond of those delightful-looking containers and organizers in all those cheerful colors, I’m even more fond of practicality and frugality. I’ve been known to use everyday things that I can find around the house to store and organize things. My coworkers call me Mrs. Salvage for always salvaging used tins and cans and jars. ^__^

For example. Every year, I receive Christmas parcels gifts with goodies in pretty tins and cans and containers. I use them to hoard sugar, tea, coffee and snacks at my home. At the end of the year, when the tins have started to rust and oxidized, I just threw them out to the recycled trash bins and change them with new ones from the new Christmas parcel gifts. My office received plenty of those every year and it seems like nobody wants the containers but this gal right here. I will share how I use those at the end of this post.

I believe in recycling and reducing our consumption instead of substituting. I live in the tropics where they grow palms to make palm oil. The eco-friendly cars that Hollywood stars promote? You think they are really that eco-friendly? Well, big corporations have been chopping downs thousands of acres of trees in the jungle (not woods, in the tropics it’s called jungle, for real) to make palm plantation. Use woods instead of plastic? They sell it with more expensive price and chopping down trees to make the “green” wood products. So yeah, reduce and recycle. If you substitute, do think about the implication it might cause.

So this is what I place at one corner of my dining room. It's a two tier basket that was used as a parcel basket that my office received several years ago. Nowadays, I use it as a multi-tier portable rack to store goods like cofees, sugar, teas, honey, etc. I even hang my bottle cleaner and sometimes some bananas on the curvy wire. I like the fact that it has two layers and open so you can stack a lot of things and you can see everything all at once. Very convenient. 



These cookie jars are made of thick cardboard boxes and tin lids. I used them to hoard my husband's ready-to-drink cofee sachets (with no lid, for easy access), and sugar (with closed lid). I love the mustard and teal green colors! Last year we used real tin cans, but they have become dirty, so I replace them with these for another year.


In the pink flowery tin I keep all my fancy tea bags, The tin came with gingersnaps and it's so pretty I just couldn't throw it away after my coworkers finished off the cookies!



I store already-opened formula for my child in this giant cookie-tin. I bought the formula in one-kilogram packages, so it's huge and needs a big container. I don't want to spend money on yet another container. This cookie tin does nicely and I love the pictures on the sides. My son loves it too, he loves to bang on it with his hands and make "music"! Haha!


This electric blue cardboard box with fancy, magnetized lid came with cookies inside a plastic package. I gave the cookies to share among coworkers and brought home the box because nobody wanted it. Then I realized that the tissue box at my dining room was broken and I have not replaced it, so this is what I did...


Voila! No need to get a new tissue box at the store!


Yet another blue and red cookie tins that are now housing some of my condiments that came in sachets.



Some of my container collections for pantry, kitchen and dining room, packed neatly in the dining room cupboard. I don't think I bought any of them. I got them free when I bought cookies, or cheese, or coffees. The chocolate brown with double yellow lids are my favorites because the shape represent cookies with chocolate filling. They are so cute and yummy looking, not to mention, very useful! I have another collection of pretty boxes for make up and jewelry, but it's for another post! ^__^


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Monday, March 17, 2014

Are You A Fashionista Mom?

stylish mom

stylish mom

This is another way I wear my momiform or mommyform. Casual, comfortable, no fuss, no frumpy mommyform. I'm a big believer in say no to frumpy mommy look. ^_^

A friend called me "Fashionista Mom". Though I think she used the word 'fashionista' too lightly, it was a nice compliment. I imagine fashionista as very high fashion, elegant, and expensive-looking. You know, glamorous. I'm more into having fun, cheerful, wear-what-I-like, wear-whatever-makes-me-happy, modest, feminine, and frugal fashion. Yet, I also cannot understand women who spends tons of money and time to make their five-year-old daughters into carefully-made-up Barbie dolls, makes meticulous scrapbooks, arts and crafts, while they themselves are dressed in sloppy clothes, oily face, unkempt, greasy hair. It seems a bit un-balance to me, to be spending so much effort on others, and so less on one self. Well, everybody is different, and is entitled to live their lives in the ways they see fit. Let's try not to be judgemental here, shall we.

I basically wear ensemble that lift my mood, makes me happy, nice to look at, yet comfortable so once I dash out the door I can forget about what I'm wearing and concentrate instead on the tasks I need to do, the errands I need to run, the people I need to meet, today's Bible verses I want to read on my iPhone, where I am going to go for lunch, what groceries I need to buy, the menu for my child, dinner for Hubby and me, things for the home, cleaning, writing a blog post, what book to read before bed time, etc.

When I put on make up and dress up in the morning, I prepare myself for the day not just in terms of look and physical manner, but the process also sort of spiritual preparation on the many roles that I will play that day: a wife, a mom, a friend, a sister, a daugher, an employee, a homemaker, a career woman, the list goes on. We women play a lot of roles in and outside of the home. Let's play them all wholeheartedly and look as fabulous as we know while doing it!

"She makes her own coverlets; 
fine linen and purple are her clothing."
(Proverbs 31:22)

stylish mom

Btw, before I get down to the details of my mommyform, here is what I did in my spare time... Creating Lung2Comic about my baby boy that I posted on Instagram @stylenseason ... Enjoy!

baby comic


Mommy can wear cartoon T-shirt, too! This one is so cute and cheap, I couldn't resist buying it! Everybody said it's too childish, but I loved it, so I bought it. It has lasted me about four years and been worn many times. Definitely cheap and good buy!

stylish mom

This cheerful plaid blue purse I got on sale three years ago, and I'm wearing it out! The material has started to peel off at some places, but I bet with some TLC I can still carry it for another year or even more, if I'm lucky. It adds a stylish note to even basic T-shirt and jeans combination, which I love.

les catino

Layering with a light jacket is a good trick when you know it's summery and hot outside, but you will go to some cold indoors like the mall, or the frozen food section of the grocery store. This jeans-like, light jacket is a good investment which I got for about six bucks in an outlet. The fabric has a very nice sheen to it, rather like satin, but it also looks like casual jeans. When shopping, use your guts. My friend ruled it out, saying it's too shiny, but I got it and have no regret. What can glamorize a jeans and T-shirt combination? Shiny jeans-like jacket, that's what!
stylish mom

stylish mom

gold sandal

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