Category Archives: Child rearing

“Couples” date in Elmhurst today

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Today, the three of us met up with my friend and her husband for lunch at an Indonesian restaurant we like in Elmhurst, Queens. The funny thing is we originally met them at a food event in a Brooklyn backyard just over a year ago, so this wasn’t actually our first time meeting her husband. I’ve met up with this friend over the course of the last year one on one, but we’d never arranged for the guys to come until this time. Kaia was intrigued by the “new friends” at the table. My friend’s husband knew way more about Bluey and Peppa Pig’s family than we would have ever guessed. And we talked a lot about family and cultural dynamics, travel, and college experiences.

The “couples mingling” thing is always funny because two friends can get along amazingly well when it’s just the two of them, but their spouses may not get along when in that group setting. Or, one of the friends may detest the other friend’s spouse, or whatever other combination you can think of. Given this was the first time we were all hanging out together, the conversation was fairly neutral and tempered, and nothing really edgy came up. But I was thinking about “couples friends” and how hard, in reality, they are to make, given the above potential situations. In most of my friendships, I far prefer just hanging out with my friends vs. hanging out with them and their spouses. I like being with them all occasionally, and I do enjoy seeing potential group dynamics and how they can unfold. But I almost always would prefer their spouse not be there. There are very few people I can name where I can say I equally enjoy time altogether as much as time spent with just my friend.

So, we’ll see if we all hang out again. I hope we do, but if it doesn’t happen that often or again, it won’t necessarily be the end of the world. The good news, though, is that both like kids, and they definitely enjoyed spending time with Kaia Pookie. I could tell Kaia was warming up to them, too. When we took a bathroom break, as we washed our hands, she asked me if my friend would still be at the table when we came back. When she asks questions about my friends, this is how I know she likes them.

Halloween with a sweet little ice cream vendor, and Kaia’s first real packaged Halloween candy

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This year, we dressed Kaia up as an ice cream vendor for Halloween. It was Chris’s idea, and Kaia was obsessed with it. The costume came with a hat, shirt with a big red bow, and white pants, but the part that really reveals her costume is a large white cloth tray that houses six detachable ice cream cones in six different colors. It has straps that you velcro onto your child. So it’s a bit bulky and annoying to carry around. Kaia did embrace carrying it around in the beginning, smiling and giggling endlessly while saying “Who wants ice cream?” and then naming her (constantly changing) flavors by color.

This year’s Halloween was quite cool and windy, so she had to wear a jacket over her costume to keep warm, as did all her classmates during their annual Halloween parade that the parents come for. Once we got to the playground and took group photos, she immediately wanted to rip off her ice cream tray and ice creams and run around freely. So of course, she handed all that over to me (which her teacher eventually took).

In the evening while Chris passed out candy to our building trick-or-treaters, I took Kaia trick-or-treating in our building for the second time ever. Last year when it was her first time, she did not completely get what was going on, but went with it. This year, she understands that when she rings doorbells and the doors are opened, if she says “trick or treat!”, then she gets candy! She got really sad, though, when some participating neighbors didn’t want us to ring their bell and instead set up “self serve” candy stations, either with large bowls, buckets, or bags full of treats. I’m still very impressed by some neighbors’ selections of treats they are dishing out, some of which I can remember from last year. This year’s treats handed out ranged from authentic packaged stroopwafels, Walker’s shortbread, granola bites, to “healthy” lower sugar options. When we went to all the units to trick or treat, we relented and finally let Kaia eat some of her Halloween candy (last year, we confiscated all of it). Chris let her choose two, and she settled on one tiny box of Nerds, and one Twix (mama’s favorite Halloween candy from childhood!). She savored both of them and ate them slowly. In the end, she declared she liked the Nerds more.

People ask us if we let Kaia “indulge” on Halloween. Well, that’s as far as “indulgence” is going to go for our almost-four-year-old! And she seemed quite happy with her overall Halloween experience and her candy eating allowance today!

Elementary school applications, tiger parenting, and the desire to “have a happy child”

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Years ago, when the “tiger mom” book was making lots of media headlines, I thought that I might be a Tiger Mom Lite. I’d push my child to be the best that they could be within the bounds of what they actually enjoyed. I’d demand obedience (to a limit) and self-discipline. I’d expect them to do house chores, homework, and extracurriculars. And hopefully all that would culminate in their developing into a good citizen of society and the world — growing into an adult who would be intelligent, curious, empathetic, disciplined, globally minded, and passionate.

Fast forward years later, after a year of futilely trying to conceive, IUI, IVF, and finally the birth of Kaia Pookie, and I think I’ve softened quite a bit. I’m no where as strict as I thought I would be as a parent. I’m a lot more gentle than I ever imagined. And all I can think about is how not to continue intergenerational, “inherited” trauma in her. In my mind, I just want her to be safe, healthy, and happy.

I think about this during the recent weeks’ worth of elementary school tours, open houses, and parent outreaches and conversations. And all these parents seem to say the same thing: we want our kids to be happy and thrive in their environments. But then the big question when choosing a school is: which environment is best for my child to optimize their happiness and learning?

I recently finished reading this culinary memoir called How to Share an Egg: A True Story of Hunger, Love, and Plenty by Bonny Reichert. Bonny’s father survived near-starvation during the Holocaust in Auschwitz-Birkenau, and this legacy of hunger impacts the family’s relationship to food. The book, though repetitive and slightly irrelevant tangents at times, shows how trauma can continue across generations even when the older generations who directly experienced trauma try so hard to shield it from their offspring. In Bonny’s case, her father steered as clear as possible from sharing vivid details of his struggle and survival during the Holocaust, insisting that she and her sisters not worry or think about it. He constantly says over and over to the girls that there’s no need to know about all that in the past. “Just be happy. I want you to be happy.” But the anxiety from not knowing the details but being aware of their father’s Holocaust experience constantly echoes in their lives and causes Bonny an internal instability that she cannot shake. We spend most of the book navigating this journey, which leads her… right back to Poland.

I suppose the reason I thought about this book during this elementary school application process is that it’s not really enough, at the end of the day, to focus on our child’s happiness, as made evident in Bonny’s case with her dad. What does “happiness” mean to kids at each stage of development, anyway? At times, it can seem like an empty, meaningless word. Something actually needs to drive them internally for them to move forward. And all we can do, as their parents, is to be the one to help them navigate through all their options and choose what we think is best for them as individuals.

That feels very difficult (and vexing) right now.

More autumn leaves, Mark Twain House and Museum, and skeletons galore

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I’ve never been a big Halloween person. When I was young, I never got to have fun or elaborate costumes. I basically was a pumpkin for years on end because my parents didn’t care for Halloween, nor did they want to pay for us to have different costumes every year. But while I don’t really care for dressing up myself, I do love seeing other people’s Halloween decorations in front of their homes. In New York, we mostly see it when we go to the outer boroughs. Or in Manhattan, you can see a good amount of Halloween decorations at brownstones on the Upper West and Upper East Sides.

This trip, we’ve already seen endless massively large skeletons everywhere. Skeletons as tall as twenty feet have towered over people’s lawns. At March Farm where we stopped by for some apple cider donuts and photos so Kaia could frolic amongst the pumpkins, there was a huge tractor that had “run over” a skeleton. While we pointed this out to Kaia, she did not seem to mind much, as she was enjoying nibbling away at her first apple cider donut that she did not have to share.

During our coffee stop this morning before the Mark Twain House and Museum tour, we parked next to a car that had a skeleton in the front passenger seat. He had both his hands up… as well as his two middle fingers up! The Mark Twain House and Museum tour was fun and informative, though I will say that while the inside was quite elaborate that I enjoyed walking around its grounds just as much given all the fall foliage. It’s like the house was made to be flanked by these gorgeous autumn colors. The tour also kind of made me want to read Huckleberry Finn again… Maybe this time if I read it, I’ll do the audio version.

Maybe next year when Kaia has better fine motor skills, I’ll actually go get us a pumpkin that we can carve and light up — it will be Kaia’s first jack-o-lantern. Though I also did not do much of this growing up, when I’ve done this with friends or at work festivities, this has always been really fun and creative. Plus, there are so many tools available now that make pumpkin carving safe. It wouldn’t be like what my dad did when we were kids — he used an extremely dull (AND DANGEROUS) chef’s knife to cut poorly shaped triangles and squares to make a jack-o-lantern!

Jeans with belt loops for my very verbal and demanding toddler

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As Kaia has gotten older and more verbal, she’s been expressing more of her wants in terms of actual things she wants. In recent weeks, she has explicitly says she wants a Hello Kitty pink dress with sparkles, a birthday hat (I’m assuming it’s the cone type?), a play kitchen (hmmmmm, I am not sure about this one– we have a real kitchen. Is this really necessary?!), and new ice cream hair clips. In addition, she’s actually said for months that she wants to wear jeans. Earlier in the summer, I made the mistake of going to Uniqlo, being a practical toddler mom, and getting her faux jeans, as in, “jeans” that did not have an actual zipper, fly, or belt loops, but were simply denim in appearance with an elastic waist. When I told her I got her jeans and unveiled them, she was not happy. Her disappointment was written all over her face.

“But it doesn’t have belt loops!” Kaia cried, staring at her new “jeans” with the most horrified look on her face.

Yep, that was a failure. She ended up still wearing them fairly often (because we made her and had already removed the tags). But alas, I’ll have to give them away now because they were already running short back then for 4T (how the hell did this happen at Uniqlo?) and now, they are basically like cropped pants on her. This is definitely not good living in a place like New York City where we experience four seasons. And yes, we are currently in fall and quickly transitioning into winter very soon.

So as I usually do for her once a year, I did some online shopping this month with all the seasonal fall sales and got her a few things she needed. And I happened to find jeans with a “faux fly” and REAL belt loops, so I ordered them. And when they arrive, we shall see very soon if they live up to her standard of what “jeans” should be!

Very “clean” baking mixes

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The neighbor I’ve been hanging out with while having play dates with our kids gave me a Simple Mills box mix for banana muffins or bread loaf. She said she has so many of this brand’s mixes that she’s gotten bored of the flavors, and she thought that maybe I could work my baking magic and jazz it up. The slogan is, “Only purposeful ingredients. Nothing artificial, ever.” The mix is gluten free and vegan (though it does call for three eggs and suggest using yogurt in place of water to increase moistness of the muffins). And when you look at the “simple ingredients” list, it just lists these: Almond Flour, Banana, Organic Coconut Sugar, Arrowroot, Organic Coconut Flour, Baking Soda, Organic Cinnamon, Sea Salt.

Based on the above ingredients list, there’s no weird artificial or “natural flavors.” No dyes or preservatives are listed. No weird names of things that the average person cannot pronounce are here. The average grocery store box mix has preservatives like propionate, potassium sorbate, sodium benzoate, and other emulsifiers. Simple Mills really is what it states: straightforward, simple ingredients. I wanted to believe this had to be good, so I decided to whip it out today and see how it was.

The instructions say to use three eggs, 1/2 cup water, and 1/3 cup oil. I used two eggs, replaced one egg with a “flax egg” (1 tablespoon ground flaxseed to 3 tablespoons water), replaced the water with yogurt as the suggestions stated to increase moistness, and used 1/3 cup coconut oil. The mixture seemed really thick, so I added some coconut and oat milk to thin it out a bit. I also wanted to add more spices because the only spice mentioned here was cinnamon, so I added some ground cardamom, ginger, allspice, nutmeg, and mace. I mixed it all up, added the batter into my mini muffin pan, and baked it. The bake time was also longer than I thought by about 50 percent, which was weird, but I’d rather have done muffins than liquidy ones.

Once the muffins were done and cooled, I tried one. It did not poof up the way wheat flour muffins do and was quite flat on top, but the flavor was pretty decent. The texture was soft and on pair with other almond-flour-based breads/muffins I’d had before. The spice flavor was very good. The one downside, though, was that there was absolutely zero taste of any banana. The spices, coconut milk, and oat milk had completely drowned out any banana fruit flavor.

I had one first and didn’t tell Chris what I thought. I did not want to influence what he tasted or thought. After he had one, he immediately said, “Not bad. Did you put something Indian in it?”

Touring schools while checking my Chinese proficiency

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Yesterday morning, Chris booked a tour of a private Chinese immersion school in our neighborhood. We actually visited this school about a year and a half ago when Kaia was getting ready for 3K, but because we found our current school in Chinatown, we decided to give this place a shot (and ended up really liking it). Fast forward, and believe it or not: we’re already looking into kindergarten and elementary schools for my sweet Kaia Pookie. Sometimes I just can’t believe how quickly time has flown. It was like just yesterday when I was still pregnant, nesting and getting everything for her arrival. And then she exploded into this world and made my heart swell more than I ever thought possible. She’s a tiny human with a strong personality making more and more sense of the world every day.

One part of the private tour we were on included observing a kindergarten class, so a class Kaia would hypothetically be in if we got in and chose to matriculate here. We entered and watched the teachers conduct the class. The kids, for the most part, were extremely well behaved, always raised their hands to speak, and their Chinese was quite good; I heard no one speak any English in this class. The teacher had images and Chinese words on the screen, and she was asking the kids to describe what they were seeing. As I looked at the projector and observed all the interactions, I was heartened and relieved by one thing: I could understand and read everything that was written and said in that classroom during that quick visit. So yay, I have at minimum kindergarten level mastery of Mandarin Chinese!

Although Kaia mostly responds back to me in English, occasionally she does surprise me by responding in Chinese. Sometimes, she shouts out the Chinese name of whatever object or thing it is that she sees. And maybe even once or twice, she’s corrected my Chinese. Yes, my almost-four-year-old wants to correct her mama’s Chinese! If she ends up going to this school, I may have to take a deep breath and just remind myself that if she continues to correct my Chinese, it’s actually a good thing, a sign that she’s getting more and more proficient, and way past whatever my level of proficiency is in the language.

Mudita and a mama’s heart swelling

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One of the friends I was planning to see while in San Francisco in August ended up having to cancel last minute. Her brother, who lives with her, had tested positive for COVID, and given their proximity, she figured she could possibly also have it and didn’t want to risk spreading it. I was really sad to not see her since that would mean I would not have any chance to see her in 2025 outside of this. But I knew she was just being prudent. A few days later, she actually developed COVID symptoms so bad that she had to take a few days off work, so it was a smart call in the end. The last thing I would want to deal with is having COVID again after my 2022 experience with it. Plus, the following week Kaia would have started Pre-K, and we wouldn’t have wanted her to miss her first days of preschool.

My friend told me that she had all these gifts she had gotten for Kaia that she’d originally planned to give us in person, but given she wasn’t going to see her, she would send them. She messaged me this week with the tracking number, and it arrived today. When I opened it, I was a bit overwhelmed with how many things were in here, plus the sheer variety of gifts: A Disney picture matching set, a wooden Peppa Pig dress up kit, a Halloween spooky sticker face decorating kit, three Halloween themed books that include Peppa Pig and Pookie (by Sandra Bounton), a card for Kaia wishing her a happy Halloween and apologizing for not being able to see her in person when were in San Francisco, plus some matcha and cookie treats (for Chris and me) from her recent Japan trip.

I laid out all the gifts and took a picture of them together. And then, out of nowhere, I suddenly felt like my heart was swelling. I smiled looking down at all these presents so thoughtfully chosen and purchased by my college friend for my sweet baby, and it just made me feel this intense sense of gratitude and joy. First, I knew that my friend took time (and spent money) to choose all these gifts; they were not hastily thrown together. Second, I was positive Kaia would love all of them. And it just made me feel so happy, so grateful to know that I have a friend this thoughtful, and that my Kaia Pookie would be so happy about these gifts. In the book I just finished reading, The Book of Joy by the Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu, they mention the concept of “mudita,” which is a Buddhist term for being happy for others’ happiness. It is a Sanskrit word that translates to “appreciative joy” or “sympathetic” joy and involves delighting in good fortune and happiness of others without jealousy or envy. Mudita is considered one of the “Four Sublime States” or immeasurables in Buddhism, along with loving-kindness, compassion, and equanimity (it is the opposite of schadenfreude, which is the feeling of pleasure at another’s misfortune). In the moment I opened this package, it was like mudita swept all over me. I just couldn’t stop smiling and thinking about happy this would make my baby.

I also just felt this overwhelming sense of gratitude for the friends I have. My college friend visiting this week showered Kaia with special presents especially curated just for her — super sparkly, colorful, and blingy. Then, this second college friend basically did the exact same thing via mail. I’m so touched that after all these years, not only are they still my friends, but they think of my little daughter and want to give her things that will delight her. Before I had Kaia and became a mother, i’d always heard of the term “heart swelling,” but I never knew what the feeling was like. And now that I have her in my life, it’s like my heart swells all the time — at things she says, does, and learns, and also seeing how much love, kindness, generosity, and grace those around us shower her with.

College friend is in town and immediately makes nice with Kaia

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One of my college friends is in town this week for her cousin’s wedding, and she’s brought along her boyfriend of the last 1.5 years. We haven’t seen each other since her second wedding, which happened in March 2017. Since then, she’s had a baby and been through a pretty nasty divorce. Her baby is now 6; mine is almost 4. A lot has changed in both of our lives since we last saw each other in person. But it felt so good to stay connected to her all these years and finally see her again. She said she was excited to see me again, but honestly even more excited to finally meet Kaia. And of course, she made sure that Kaia would like her right away by coming and bearing gifts for the little Pookie.

My friend showed up with a glittery rainbow purse, sequined, multicolored unicorn slippers, and a set of rainbow pencils. Kaia was smitten almost immediately and wanted all the things. She usually doesn’t want other people in the room when one of her parents is reading bedtime stories with her. But with Ellis, she insisted she sit with us while reading on her bed. This was definitely a first: Kaia doesn’t even really like it when Chris’s parents are there at bedtime. So clearly my friend did something right. It was fun to see their smooth interactions and how my friend entertained Kaia, but with an adult-like conversational approach.

Kaia asked multiple times if our friends would stay or go home. And I said that they’d go home, but maybe if we’re lucky, she can see them again. Kaia said she definitely wanted to see them again.

When OMNY card fails, mass pandemonium erupts, and two teenage boys save the day

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I went to pick up Kaia from school this late afternoon, and as usual, I walked her one block over from her school to the Grand Street B/D subway station so we could head home. Before I even got into the station, I knew something seemed off: there were huge crowds of people trying to get in. When we descended the stairs, something seemed very, very wrong: all of these people were trying to scan in with their OMNY cards to get through the turnstiles, and it just wasn’t working. All I saw were error messages and red flashes, indicating the turnstiles weren’t letting people in. I observed several people ahead of me, who tapped their OMNY cards so many times and failed that they gave up and just tapped their phones to pay because that looked like the only thing that worked for people. People were complaining loudly that OMNY cards weren’t being recognized; the MTA guy behind the counter was doing zilch to help (and sadly, even if he wanted to, he’d likely be powerless to help). I wasn’t sure what I was going to do. Everyone ahead of me only scanned in and got through because they tapped to pay. And I did NOT want to tap to pay. Chris already mentioned that OMNY had an outage earlier this week, which resulted in him having to renew our weekly pass one day earlier. We hate losing out on money we spent. When I finally reached the front of the turnstile, my card did not work. It wasn’t even registering that something was being scanned. I tapped it at least 10 times, and still nothing.

Kaia had no idea what was going on, so as per usual, she ducked under the turnstile ahead of me and started heading towards the stairs to the uptown track. I called out to her to wait for me. She kept looking back to see what was going on and even asked a few times, “What happened?” I continued calling out to her after tapping another 10 times (no exaggeration) to please wait for me. But then when I poked my head over to see her, I noticed there were two teenage boys — they could not have been any older than 15 — who were hovering over her and telling her to wait for her mommy. One of them tapped her shoulder and said, “You can’t go! You have to wait for mommy to come.” I was immediately so touched; they were watching over Kaia because they saw that I didn’t get through with my card, and they were concerned for her safety. I yelled out to thank them, but then also told Kaia to come back with me so I could figure out the card and not have to inconvenience the boys from getting to where they needed to go. She initially pouted but came, and then the boys went down the stairs to wait for the train. Maybe on the 21st or 22nd tap, my OMNY card finally (and luckily) registered, and I was able to get through. When we got down to the stairs to wait for the B/D going uptown, I saw the two boys again and thanked them profusely for looking out for Kaia while I was occupied. They waved me off and commented on how cute Kaia was.

As a person living in New York City for over 17 years, I have always believed that the vast majority of people here mean well and look out for others. I’ve had countless times when people have been incredibly kind to Kaia and me, and it’s always given me a little more faith and hope in humankind. Usually, though, when these kind moments have happened, it’s always been other adults, both men and women. But in this instance, it was two boys who were either pre-pubescent or just going through puberty who really shocked me with their maturity and concern. I don’t know who their parents are or what communities they have grown up in, but I just felt this deep gratitude to whoever raised them to be kind, caring, concerned citizens of the world. I wish I could have shared this story with their parents or caregivers, but I hope whoever they are that someone is telling them that they are doing a truly amazing job; their boys are truly good humans, and I have a feeling they will grow up to be truly good, well meaning men.