Archive for February, 2007

We completed our Chinese New Year clothes shopping in one day. We need another day for food shopping. And thats it! We’re all done. What a mad rush! But thats all the time we have.

How I love to be able to browse around slowly, picking up items for the kids and myself at a leisurely pace. Hah! Wake up! Thats just a dream. With so many things to do and so many outstanding tasks, if we don’t limit our shopping time for Chinese New Year, we’d never get anything done.

And so there we were, rush, rush, rush, pick, pick, pick. We managed to get the man’s hair cut on the same day, we managed to bring dad along and picked a shirt for him and we got clothes for ourselves and clothes and shoes for the kids. 

Now its just food shopping and we’re ready for Chinese New Year. Need to get some cookies, mandarins, barbequed meat and thats about it. How is everyone else’s Chinese New Year preparations coming along? As rushed as ours? 

The other day I left the following comment on Kat’s blog because her blog post reminded me of my own aging father.

“One of the most painful things that we adult children have to go through is watching our once strong and independant parents grow old, vulnerable and dependant on us. This painful process of taking over and starting to take care for those who cared for us all our lives is a big adjustment to make.”

Father is an authoritative figure, fiercely independant and extremely mindful about cleanliness but a stroke change his personality overnight. The stroke did not have a physical effect thankfully. However, it did leave an impact on him mentally.

Overnight, he became a different person. His memory has become really poor and it pains us to watch him struggle with himself trying to remember things or saying things like “I’m so useless, can’t even remember simple things like that.” Its also hard to watch him looking lost and frustrated because he can’t remember where he kept his things. (You know the kind of feeling you have when you just can’t find something and you want to search endlessly till you find it?) This happens to him daily. He cannot remember to take his medication and sometimes tries to take the same meal twice because he has forgotten that he has eaten.

From being very meticulous about cleanliness, he has become afraid to take his bath. Its a fine line for us to walk to remind him to take his bath without sounding patronising or making him feel bad. He cannot remember how to operate his handphone and often thinks his charger is the handphone instead. 

After his retirement he learned to use the bus for going to town and drove around the neighbourhood. He now has to depend on us for transport and it must be hard on him, this sudden loss of independance and freedom.

It painful to watch him looking so lost and old. Yes, it is indeed difficult to watch our parents grow old but something we all have to go through for thats the cycle of life.

I’m such a dunce. I planned to give him a gift that will only arrive about 2 months after his birthday and then I forgot his birthday on the actual day itself. Hahaha.

I’ve never forgotten Mr MG’s birthday before but recently, with moving house and the coming Chinese New Year preparations, I’ve been so busy and preoccupied that I forgot his birthday on the day until I had this conversation with my girl.

My Girl: Mummy is it Chinese New Year today?

MG: No. Not yet. Chinese New Year is on the 18th and 19th of February. Today is only the……….. Oh My Goodness! I forgot! Its daddy’s birthday today!

Luckily, we had the conversation in the morning. However, I didn’t plan anything for him. No present on the day, I didn’t cook him any special birthday mee or noodles to eat. I didn’t get the kids to make him a special card etc. The only thing I managed was to buy him a cake. However, for our (his and mine) birthdays the cakes are usually so that the kids get to enjoy the singing and candle blowing part so it wasn’t much of a surprise. He bought himself a lime and vanilla stick icecream and said he was happy with that treat for his birthday.

And in the afternoon I was so tired, I zonked out and he had to watch the kids. Poor poor dear. I’ll have to make it up to him for the rest of the year!

Wedding Anniversaries are important occasions yet many of us treat it like just another day especially after the kids come along. Its really something that should be celebrated with joy because its the day when the two of you became one. And thats really something special and calls for a celebration.

Celebrating a wedding anniversary with style complete with wedding anniversary invitations to guests certainly isn’t too elaborate for such an important date. Some anniversary accesories would be a nice touch too for this very important milestone.

The longer you are together, the more important or significant that date is. The 25th, 40th and 50th wedding annivesary which has also been named the Silver, Ruby and Golden Wedding Anniversaries are as important as their name suggests because it definitely is an achievement as a couple to have gone through so many years together. I certainly hope that I will get to celebrate that many wedding annivesaries with my other half. What about you?

Shopping Online is an interesting experience. Now its made even more exciting because you can even get cash back when you shop online. You can do that when you shop at Ebates.

Its always smart to shop using coupons and dicount voucers and at Ebates you can search for good offers and discounts from more than 800 popular stores. For example, you can get 6% cash back at macys and up to 25% cash back from the various other stores.

Your cash discount will be turned into a check and mailed directly to you. This way you can save money when you shop. Anyone who practises frugal living should be happy about that. Its easy too. All you need is an email address. Membership is free. Then you can start shopping and saving!

I was busy moving house and that explains why I was MIA to those who cared enough to ask. Usually when that happens, ie. when I am unable to blog for a few days or weeks, I start to lose my momentum to blog.

Suddenly I run out of things to write. I view my bloglines feedreader which I use mainly for subscribing and reading my favourite blogs and am overwhelmed by the few hundred updates!

I’ve still got many things to get in order, like my broadband for example and need to settle down first before I can get back my blogging momentum. I’ll probably need another week or two to settle in and hopefully I get back my blogging momentum by then. I still need to earn money! If I don’t blog, I don’t get paid. Hehehe.