Howdy people! I know…I know. A month of mysterious disappearance from my blog indeed has caused some suspicions from my close family and friends. I was not kidnapped or whatever crazy ideas your highly imaginative minds are capable of thinking. Actually, I was not in the particular mood to blog. It’s a brand new year and living up to my resolutions is hard work, especially on the cooking part. There were a couple of times which I wrote but I was too distracted to load and save them. Hence, the silence.
Sorry to say, I did not blog hop much as well the past month. Really am sorry for not interacting or leaving any comments in the common blogs which I usually dote on.
Anyways, Happy Valentine’s Day to all. I’m not really a believer of this celebration and due to past bad experiences, I had never liked Valentine’s Day. Too much of commercial manipulations, huge throngs of people waiting…no…queuing outside posh restaurants waiting for hours just to get a seat, the over supply of flowers and candies in all sorts of fancy packages and every where’s practically packed. Hmm…just listing these out reminds me again how much I detest the superfluous attention on this so-called social celebration. No offense to all lovebirds and couples out there. I really do hope that your love for each other grows deeper each day and has a reason to rejoice in each day.
So, set aside my humble opinion on V’Day, let’s see how I spent Valentine’s this year.
As per usual, the hubby and I just laughed over our un-romantic notions for this day and life went on as normal as any day. Except that this year, I was assigned to have a fun-loving time with my niece and baby nephew. Being the kind and wonderful sister that I am (ahem!), I consented to this assignment so that my sister and B-I-L could have some time off from being full-time parents to the kids.
So, at dinner time, I showed up at their apartment, ready to face whatever scary things that were bound to happen when an inexperienced adult is left ALONE with a witty and observant five-year-old and a pretty loud but super cute 3-month-old infant.
My sister and B-I-L cheerfully left the apartment for a date while I coddled my naughty nephew with one hand and got my niece to play her jigsaw puzzle. I’ve never had to handle a kid and a baby all by myself before and my mind went on a strategy mode immediately after the adults left.
My strategy was quite simple. Put my nephew down on the mattress. Let him play with his mittens, chew on them, suck on them, whatever, just to keep him engrossed with his own little games while I spend some time chatting with my niece as we put the pieces of puzzle together. This strategy worked. Or at least worked for the first 15 minutes. Both my niece and I released out loud sighs when we found little Nathan asleep.
But, the peaceful moment was broken when he suddenly opened his eyes and spout out a loud wail. Then, strategy no. 2. Get my niece to get his milk while I held him up. Apparently, he was not hungry and we had to put the milk bottle in a cup of hot water to keep the milk warm.
Strategy no.3. In order to keep my niece busy with herself and not keep wanting my attention, I got her occupied with watching Disney’s Ice Princess. I calculated that would take up at least one and a half hours of her attention. At the same time, my wailing nephew got me busy as well. It turned out, he wanted me to play with him. No, to be exact…I think he wanted me to engage myself in clownish acts and make funny faces to keep him entertained. But I can’t seem to resist his cherubic toothless grins. And I’ll do anything just to hear him laugh. Yes, he does laugh out loud. So cuteeeeeee!
So, you see, I spent the entire night scheming on how to get my baby nephew to drink his milk and sleep. It took me a whole 2 hours to accomplish that, after a long time of carrying him around, showing him the house, coaxing him to drink milk and having him burping out most of them on my pants and my t-shirt, smelling his loud and explosive farts and finally, rocking him to sleep on his bouncer. Phew!
My niece had been extra sweet too. She was most helpful at times when I panicked after Nathan burped milk on me. I guess she sensed that I was indeed inexperienced with having two kids alone at home. Hehe!
So, after I got baby Nathan in deep slumber (he should be! Aren’t all babies supposed to be asleep by 8pm??), I spent time getting my niece ready for bed as well. She kept saying that we were playing pretending and I was pretending to be her mommy. So sweet! She even told me she liked having me pretending to be her mommy. Well, which kid won’t after I fed her with a lollipop and ice-cream? Hehe! Those were my secret weapons against kids. Muahaha! Anyway, after she drank her milk, we rolled on the mattress for a while and whispered little stories to each other while giggling softly, so afraid that we might wake baby Nathan.
Well, last night, I left my sister’s home, with the most rewarding feeling at heart and smelling like baby puke and milk. Ahhh….what a wonderful scent. You should try it someday too *winks* Here’re some pics of the kids which I nicked from my sis’s facebook profile. Hehe!
