Birthday Time

Two weeks to go. July 5th is my son's first birthday. He's long been toddling, so will officially leave babyhood very soon.

In my family, there is an unspoken rule that a child's first birthday must be celebrated with a big party. Since Little A is the first grandson on his father's side, we figured we would have no choice but to celebrate. My first idea was a pirate party. How cute would that be? Eye patches for everyone, Little A in his red and white striped Marimekko top from godmother P in Finland, Peter Pan-inspired games. Big A nixed the idea - he said too many people would have the same theme since Disney's big Pirates of the Caribbean franchise had just released its final movie in the trilogy. He was right. At a christening, we overheard the baby's mother saying she was already organising the pirate-themed party for her son's first birthday.

Big A wanted a manly theme. Knights, then. And princesses for the girls (though he preferred Knights and Wenches, with activities like rape and pillage, looting the town and the like.) Excited, I started planning. A 3-stanza poem would comprise the invitation, and it would be printed on tea-stained parchment and rolled up like a scroll. We would hire a bouncy castle, or one shaped like a dragon, and looked into the cost of having Shetland ponies for the kids to ride. We bought plastic swords for the boys and costume jewelry for the girls. Art activities would be shield and cone hat decoration.

But Little A's birthday falls during Manila's rainy season, and this year was a particularly stormy one. Then his grandmother fell ill with a mosquito-borne fever that could be potentially fatal. So the party in my parents' huge garden needed to be rethought.

Indoor venues large enough to hold bouncy castles and tables and chairs for 40 children and 80 adults in our area were not easy to come by without huge cost. Discouraged, I packed away the swords and jewelry and decided to just take Little A and his cousins to Gymboree and then out for a meal and cake. The Knight party could wait for another year, and in the meantime, we could go on a trip with the money we would save.

Two Sundays ago, we went to inquire about a small private party at Gymboree, only to find out it was closed on Sundays. No matter, there was a backup plan. A restaurant with a massive indoor play area had just opened nearby, so we went to see that. Little A was asleep, so he and I stayed in the car while Big A when down to get information, phone numbers and the like.

Half an hour later, he came back with a huge smile on his face. He loved it and immediately booked a 20 child party. I was to take care of the details and we would confirm the following weekend.

Since I hadn't seen the inside, all I had to go by were friends' photos of the place. I selected a menu, spoke to someone on the phone and told them I wanted to see the loot bags and birthday cake that came with the package when we made the confirmation deposit. Unsure about the quality or quantity of the giveaways, I purchased additional ones and had stickers made to label them as Little A's 1st birthday thank you tokens.

I was pleasantly surprised the following weekend, not only by the cleanliness of the play area (Little A is still at the stage of licking everything in sight) but by the loot bags, the cake (though there was no telling what it would taste like!) and even the invitations they provided. We sealed the deal, and in 2 weeks, Little A and 19 of his friends get to run riot for 2 hours under careful supervision by qualified staff. He will turn one with a celebration, that much is certain.

The Reading Bug

Old habits die hard, or not at all. 

As young children, my parents made sure that my sisters and I never got addicted to television simply by giving us more interesting things to do than sit in front of a black box frying our brain cells. Don't get me wrong, we had regular viewing times for Sesame Street, The Muppet Show, Electric Company and Saturday Fun Machine, but television was just something to look at if there was nothing better to do. Of course, it helped that there were only 5 channels and not many children's programs in English at the time. 

In recent years, with the advent of cable tv bringing dozens of channels and more interesting programs, I've been watching much more television than I used to. But since Little A was born, I never get to watch tv anymore, mostly because he's never in one place long enough for me to pay attention to a particular program. 

Today, countless children are obese and/or intellectually-challenged because they sit in front of the box watching all-day cable cartoon channels instead of playing outdoors and reading books. What a shame. Naturally every new parent wants to make sure their child doesn't grow up this way, and I am one of them. I think Little A will have a good chance, with two parents who enjoy reading.

I was taught to love the written word at a very young age. I am currently searching the bookstores for a copy of Wynken, Blynken and Nod, a book I remember my mom reading to me at bedtime as a very little girl. She made sure we had the complete sets of children's classics, nursery rhymes, Little House books, the Bobbsey Twins, Nancy Drew and many more. She introduced me to Enid Blyton, who in turn opened up my literary world to the wonderful side of English writers. 

Sundays when we were kids consisted of church, lunch, and then a trip to the bookstore, where we were each allowed to buy one title. If we'd gotten good reports at school, we were allowed to buy more books. When my parents travelled to London as my dad often did for business, he would bring back more books by authors that were locally unavailable at the time. As we got older and started choosing our own reading material, my dad always made sure that these purchases were subsidised by him and didn't need to come from our own pockets. College meant each daughter got an extension of his credit card to be used only for groceries, petrol and books. 

By the time I was a teenager, our house was like a public library, with friends trooping in regularly to borrow titles that they couldn't find in the bookstores. When I moved out of my parents' house, most of my books came with me, and to this day there are always a dozen or so books out on loan at any given time. I've mastered the art of finding out-of-print titles in secondhand bookstores and adding them to my collection or giving them as gifts. 

Books were truly a treasure, and continue to be so to me. While I read most types of books nowadays, children's books still hold a special place in my heart, and I hope one day to get a degree in Children's Literature and maybe write my own.

My sisters and I in turn try to provide our own kids with the same well-stocked home libraries that our parents gave us. For other parents out there, here's a list of must-haves for your children's shelves:

Mother Goose's Nursery Rhymes

Aesop's Fables

The Fairy Tale Classics - Snow White, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Rapunzel, Rumplestiltskin, Hansel and Gretel, The Gingerbread Man, The Little Red Hen, The Billy Goats Gruff etc.

The Little Engine That Could by Watty Piper

The Complete Stories of Beatrix Potter

The Winnie the Pooh stories by E.E. Milne

Margery Williams' The Velveteen Rabbit

The Children's Classics - Peter Pan, The Wizard of Oz, Treasure Island, Swiss Family Robinson, Pollyanna, The Five Little Peppers etc.

C.S. Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia

Everything by Roald Dahl

Enid Blyton's Fantastic Four or Secret Seven series

Enid Blyton's Enchanted Wood/Magic Faraway Tree series

The Bobbsey Twins

Judy Blume's children's titles - the Fudge series, in particular

J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series

Eoin Colfer's Artemis Fowl series

E.B. White's children's books - Stuart Little, Charlotte's Web, The Trumpet of the Swan

For Girls -

Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House series

Lois Lowry's Anastasia Krupnik series

The Nancy Drew series

For Boys-

The Hardy Boys series

Older readers may enjoy these:

Isabelle Allende's children's trilogy - City of the Beasts, Kingdom of the Golden Dragon, Forest of the Pygmies

Zizou Corder's Lionboy trilogy

J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings trilogy

With thousands of new titles being published each year, there are so many books and authors out there to discover. May all parents teach there children that the world is much bigger than what the flat screen tv shows, and that reading feeds the imagination the way nothing else can.

A Day for Dads

There are basically two types of parenting styles - hands on, and hands off. Everyone else falls somewhere in between. For a child lucky enough to enjoy both parents, mom's style tends to differ from dad's. While one generally assumes that mothers are more hands-on, this isn't always true.

Funny how it's the men you least expect to be hands-on parents who surprise you. Both my brothers-in-law were not particular child-lovers, but upon having their own suddenly turned into surprisingly doting dads. BIL#1 changes diapers, feeds, burps and puts his kids to sleep - he can sometimes even be more hands-on than my sister! BIL#2 has changed diapers, something Little A's dad has never yet done.

My own father features vividly in my childhood memories, despite his being a full-time working dad. There is a scar on his thigh, maybe 6 inches long, from where one of my diaper pins wounded him when he was changing me. He used to peel me grapes and feed them to me in my high chair, and I bit his finger at least once. As a one-year old, I'd listen to his car come into the driveway in the evenings and if someone carried me high enough, I could watch the car drive in. One evening there was no one to lift me up, so I had the brilliant idea of climbing the glass panes, called jalousies, to see for myself. Obviously I came crashing down and was promptly rushed to the hospital to have the glass shards taken out of my feet.

Growing up, he made sure we never wanted for anything, right up until the present, when he gifted each daughter with their own home when they got married and invested generously in his son-in-laws' business ventures. He provided well enough for us that we were able to travel regularly and study abroad, both priceless experiences. He has set the bar high for the standard that we want to meet when raising our own children.

Fathers play important roles in their children's lives. Whether they take on the role of disciplinarian, breadwinner, or playtime companion, a family isn't complete without both parents. As a stay-at-home mother to Little A, there is a definite absence in our days when Big A comes home late because of a work dinner or travels abroad for business. Little A certainly looks forward to seeing his dad at the end of every day, and listens with a smile when he calls home in the afternoons.

Big A isn't very hands-on, never having fed his son or given him a bath in the entire 11.5 months since his birth, but that may change when Little A is bigger. I don't think his hands-off policy is due to lack of thoughtfulness, though, but because he just doesn't realize that 24 hour parenting is far more exhausting than a 12 hour workday, and he probably thinks he would be criticized for doing something wrong if he attempted to feed or bathe his son. (Which may be true, but remains to be seen.)

I know he takes fatherhood seriously, though, because his end goals have now changed. He works to provide his son with a future and no longer spends much time playing golf or drinking with the boys. When he can refuse, he turns down business travel assignments to be home with his wife and son. If he must travel for work, he takes us with him. Little A and I are far more important to him than just bathtime and mealtime would indicate. He has the big picture in mind, and lets me take care of the little details. This arrangement works out fine.

On Sunday we commemorate Father's Day. Whatever their parenting style, provided they are present in their children's lives, that is enough to salute them.

The First Year

A big milestone approaches. On July 5th, Little A will turn one. The first year is nearly past, where did the time go?

My sister gave birth to a baby boy two months ago. I've seen my new nephew a handful of times and barely remember Little A being that tiny. Thank goodness for photos. Maybe it's Caesarean section amnesia or overuse of my mobile phone, but my memories of the past 11 months are somewhat blurry.

For the first 2 months after giving birth, I was still working from home, winding up the last of my responsibilities before bidding farewell to my paycheck and simultaneously sorting out the details for Little A's christening. Funny how most women take 2-3 months off work after delivering a baby and then go back to their jobs, and I did the complete opposite. Anyway, most of what I remember of this time is Little A's rapid weight gain (2.9 to 5.3 kilos in 6 weeks), the dreaded colic stage (evening wailing from 2weeks-2months of age) and his rolling over early. Also being truly dependent on my breast pump. I had so much milk that at one point was feeding Little A and two preemies in the NICU.

3-6months - we made 2 trips to HongKong when Little A was 4 and 6 months old, respectively, so vivid memories of this stage are his first fall (rolling off the daybed at the Hong Kong Mandarin Oriental), his sitting up unassisted at 5months (the pediatrician didn't believe it) and crawling and standing at 6months.

This year he was mobile from the start. At 9 months he started walking and now, a week before his 11th month mark, is walking steadily all over the place, although he still needs more practice walking with shoes on.

Food-wise, he started eating at 6months, and is still being breast-fed. I've been trying to figure out what he should be eating at this stage, and in what quantities. Little A's pediatrician insists that milk is still the main source of food for the first year, and that anything additional should comprise no more than 25% of their daily intake. Still, at age 1, food seems to play a bigger role, and I wonder how best to prepare him for this change.

I recently read a list of 10 things not to feed babies before they turn 1: honey, peanuts, cow's milk, shellfish, egg whites, excessive sodium and a few others. This makes me wonder, what magical thing happens on a baby's first birthday that suddenly renders his or her digestive system mature enough to handle things he couldn't eat just days previously? After 12 months of being so careful to avoid certain foods, suddenly the 12 month mark means all table food is okay? Must read more.

Meanwhile, I'll take more photos as the days pass, because he does seem to be growing up very quickly. It's true when people say don't blink or you'll miss something. Every minute with your baby counts.

Food for Thought

Hormones must do something to the taste buds, because there are things I eat now that I would never have touched before. I've not done any research on this, but noticed that my tastes have become more accommodating when hormones have been at work.

The first time this happened was a decade and a half ago, when I was at boarding school in England. Marmite on toast was common breakfast fare, and since we had unlimited quantities of bread to snack on in our common room, it also became a popular tummy-filler in the evenings and on weekends. I first tried it at age 14 and hated the stuff. Yuck! It was salty and sourish and smelled just plain strange. But a few months later, in the throes of PMS, I decided to try it again. And this time I loved it, and there began a love affair with Marmite that lasts to this day.

Always try everything twice. That's my belief, because the first time could be a one-off, and they say everyone, or everything, deserves a second chance. So I generally do try everything twice, from sports to food to even men in my dating days. Epicuriously though, I still never liked tongue or liver, and after a long flight was convinced I could never again stomach smoked salmon after they served it before and after every one of 4 stopovers.

Pregnancy and the Palate

In the first trimester of pregnancy most smells made me feel nauseated, so eating wasn't so much an adventure but a necessity to survival. The second and third trimesters I ate and ate and ate, but was limited by my OB-Gyn - no swordfish, marlin, tuna or salmon because of their mercury content, no raw fish, no raw eggs. That meant Caesar salad and sashimi, two of my very favorites, were on the no-eat list for the next 5 months. Sob.

Fast forward to post-pregnancy, when it was all systems go, although my husband still wanted me to keep away from potential salmonella-carrying foods (namely the raw stuff) because I was breastfeeding. Alcohol and caffeine were to be limited too, and while it didn't matter so much that I couldn't have wine, I would dream of cups of Earl Grey and chai.

As Little A got older, I got braver. I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of times I've had raw fish since giving birth, but do allow myself 2 or so cups of decaf or tea a week. I've had a few glasses of wine with no adverse reactions to Little A, and couldn't give up chocolate even if someone held a gun to my head.

However, the hormones had done their job again. Suddenly I find myself eating quantities of pate when any form of liver would previously make me gag. The texture of foie gras is no longer so disgusting either, and I can eat it now when I never could before. Tongues, kidneys and cooked liver I have yet to give another try, but am willing to - for the third or fourth time.

Healthy Eating

Maybe this is how certain people learn to eat vegetables as they grow up. I wish it would apply to men as well though, because Little A will no doubt ask when he is aware why Dad never eats broccoli or cauliflower (or most veggies, for that matter) when he and I do.

For the most part, we eat properly enough as a family, though I believe we don't have enough fish on the menu at home and fruit is sometimes abundant (when in season) and sometimes scarce. There is a vegetable dish with every meal, and we buy only lean meat. We went through a stage of mixing red with our white rice, but that stopped when polished red rice became hard to find.

Big A though, is not such a healthy eater. Aside from this aversion to vegetables and limited fruit consumption, he eats altogether too much red meat for a man in his mid-30s (client lunches and dinners have him ordering steak as often as he can, when he could opt for lobster instead) and way too much processed food. He has McDonald's for breakfast every morning at work, because he claims he leaves too early to be able to eat a healthier one at home. Grrr.

Growing up, we only ate healthy at my parents' place. An uncle who suffered a heart attack in his early 30s gave my dad a scare, and he promptly gave up red meat. Only fish and chicken were served in our house, with the occasional pork dish. As both sides of the family tended towards hypertension, salt was limited too. Veggies were a must. Since I was slightly anemic, I was encouraged to order steaks or red meat every time we ate out, which I gladly did.

Now I have my own home though, we eat beef 2 or 3 times a week, but I have switched to whole grain bread and veggie pasta and plan to serve these to Little A as well. Big A and I were very fit as young people - he was a national swimmer and I a professional ballet dancer before we both opted to become corporate rats. While we exercise much less now (actually, we don't anymore), we both still sport lean, toned bodies, though that is no indication of healthy arteries.

Goal for the family: to keep making sure we eat a good diet. There is too much pollution in our city's air as it is, so we need the rest of what goes into our bodies to be good for us.

Here Comes the Rain Again

There are those who say it is always summer in sultry Manila, but in reality it's just warm all year round. There are actually two seasons - scorching and soaking. You know the sweltering summer is at an end when the typhoons start coming, one after the other. There's a respite around Christmastime, when if we're lucky there are crisp mornings and cool nights.

This summer, Little A's first, wasn't too long, thankfully. A year ago, 36 weeks pregnant, we had a proper summer with searing hot days and steamy nights from mid-February to June. I actually looked forward to going to work and got in earlier and left later than I normally would, just because the office air conditioner, normally so cold that it required me to leave a jacket at my desk, kept the temperature just right.

This year, due to climate change, no doubt, summer came later and appears to have left sooner than it normally would. Usually by Easter weekend people had been to the beach and were bronzed and lean. But the weather stayed nice and cool until mid-April, when the heat finally came.

Our electricity bill for the month of April was 50% higher than the previous month's, and apparently this held true for most of the people we knew. It was hot hot hot, and with a toddler who seems to have a perpetually sweaty head (despite his lack of hair) and an apartment that bakes in the afternoon sun, we needed to run the air conditioners nearly the entire day.

It's barely mid-May now, but the worst of the heat seems to be over. The past few days have been overcast or drippy, with slow rain falling all day long. Maybe it's a tropical monsoon and the hot days will be back tomorrow, but maybe it's the rainy season come early. Who knows? Little A seems to enjoy watching the rain and doesn't mind the thunder and lightning. Now if only there was in indoor playground or a covered walkway to play under during the wet days.

Becoming a Fairy Godmother

On June 1st, I will be a godmother for the 8th time. Baby G, Little A's playdate from the last christening we attended (when I was godmother for the 7th time) will be baptized on her father's birthday. As she was born 2 months prematurely and my milk fed her for close to a month in the NICU, it's only fitting that I become her godmother. Still, it makes one think: Godparenting - what is it all about, anyway? 

Wikipedia, today's source of all knowledge, defines it as someone who "takes a vested interest in the child's personal development." Traditionally, godparents are considered foster parents of a sort, those who will look after a child and be responsible for its upbringing should it be orphaned. But there are many kinds of godparents, in my opinion, namely:

1. The Mario Puzo godparent - these are the patron sort, chosen for their power and/or wealth, under the assumption that they will literally "protect" the child all their lives. Two of my godsons fall into this category, I think, not that I'm particularly wealthy or powerful. Sons of former officemates, I believe I was named godmother because at the time it seemed I would go far, career-wise. Numerous job changes over the years have left me out of contact with these godchildren, but just to be safe, I always have presents ready for them at Christmas.

2. The best friend/return favor godparent - these are the most common sort, as these godchildren are those whose development you most likely will assume a degree of vested interest in as the years go by. Good friends have children and name you godparent, so when it's your turn you're more or less obliged to do the same, though many times you "return the favor" out of free will. I am godmother to my best friend's son, and she is godmother to mine, likewise with my sister's eldest daughter. 

3. The "no choice" godparent - some people either have more children than they do close friends and siblings, or get so excited with the eldest child's birth they name everyone near and dear godparents, leaving no one left to godparent their succeeding children. Suddenly, new friends and virtually anyone they know a little more than casually have equal chances of becoming godparents to children they may or may not particularly care for. The noble step up to the task and take a vested interest in the child, but others just show up at the christening and then vanish into oblivion by the time the child's second birthday rolls around. Sadly, I have a godson in this category who I have not now seen in over three years, but still always remember at Christmas.

What kind of godmother does that make me? My ardent wish, along with becoming a domestic goddess, is to be the Fairy Godmother - the one who makes every godchild's wishes (within reason, of course) come true. As it is, I'm known as the Book Godmother and Aunt - the one who only gives age-appropriate reading matter to nephews, nieces and godchildren, a tradition that started when my first niece was born 13 years ago. It's not that I mean to inflict my love of books onto these children, but that I truly believe in the value of reading and that there is no better time to fall into the habit than when one is a child. Children nowadays watch too much television and play too many video games, so adding to, or in some cases singlehandedly building, their libraries is my personal task. Not very fairylike, but it's a start. I need to keep my magic wand waving (yes, I do have one - when I bought one for each of Little A's godmothers, I kept one for myself) and start making those wishes come true. Bibbidee bobbidee boo!