Since Kaia has started at her new school in Manhattan Chinatown, there have already been a number of birthdays that have been celebrated across the 2s, 3s (her class), and the 4K class. Cake, fun snacks, and goodie bags have been provided by the families, and so we thought Kaia would like it if we also did this for her early birthday celebration for her classmates, as they are essentially her day-to-day friends. She clearly loves birthdays and parties, and she has been saying she wants her own birthday event endlessly. Chris organized all the goodie bags for the three classes, and I am taking care of ordering her birthday cake (a mixed fresh fruit sponge cake from Manna House Bakery, one of my favorite spots, in Chinatown) and birthday balloon and delivering them to the school.

Kaia knows she’s having a little birthday party at school. She’s been talking nonstop about her birthday party, her birthday cake, and her presents. As one of her many gifts, Chris got her the most requested present she’s had since September: shoes with lights on them. Chris told her she would get shoes with lights — *if* she only pooped in the potty. And Pookster certainly listened. She’s had zero poop accidents since as far as I can remember now. Chris unveiled the shoes to her tonight, and she went nuts: she immediately wanted to put them on and constantly stomped her feet on the floor to get the lights to twinkle. She even wanted to take them to bed with her along with one of the goodie bags!

It makes me so happy to watch her face light up when she sees things that excite her, like shoes with lights, or a cake she knows is just for her. Her excitement is pure, unadulterated, and unambiguous. Unfortunately, the school wouldn’t let us be there for her little birthday party, so I asked them to share the photos directly with us so we’d have the original files. I’m sure we will have more birthday festivities for her once we’re in Melbourne, but I know she will enjoy all the attention and the party centered around her with her classmates.

People often ask us if Kaia prefers one of us over the other. I think for the longest time, she preferred Chris for comforting and holding, but occasionally in the last year, she has shown a preference for me. I think it’s very much situational: if one of us is not giving her what she wants, she will prefer the other and say she doesn’t like the other parent. That’s typical and expected toddler behavior, so I try not to let it get to me when she says things like “I don’t like mummy” or “I don’t want mummy.”

Tonight, I went out to meet a friend visiting from out of town for dinner. Before I even said anything, she knew I was getting ready to go out. She got feisty and said she didn’t want mummy to leave, that she wanted mummy to stay. I explained to her that mummy’s friend is in town and wants to have dinner, so I will just be out for few hours and come back. She had a melt town in the doorway and said she didn’t want me to leave and go out with friends. She kept demanding, “I want a hug! I want a kiss! I want a hug! I want a kiss!” over and over again. I kept relenting until Chris looked at me and said I needed to just go, otherwise this would go on until I would be late. By the time I got to the elevator, I could still hear her crying and yelling for me. She had just done a big poop in her little potty, and after most poops even now, she still wants her “reward” of a sticker. So she asked for a sticker from Chris, who gave one to her. She usually likes to proudly show me her new sticker after he gives it to her, but I wasn’t there this time. So instead, she “showed” it to me by bringing the sticker over to the front door and holding it out to “show” mummy.

Chris shared this story with me when I got back. I couldn’t help but “Awwwwww!” at how cute and sweet it was. That’s my sweet baby Kaia Pookie.

Being in the ER was no fun. It was also frustrating because I spent so long there, just over six hours, when I was originally told I’d be there for about four hours end to end. And not knowing whether I was going to be able to make our original flight was unnerving from a logistics standpoint. But what was cute was seeing how Kaia responded to all of it. The night before, when it was evident that I found it challenging and painful to speak and eat, I tried to explain to her in my croaking whisper voice that I wasn’t feeling well and that I needed to rest in Chinese. She responded back in Chinese, “No, I want mama to be comfortable. I want mama to be comfortable!” It was really sweet and almost made me tear up to see how affectionate and concerned she was being.

While spending almost all Saturday at home when she expected to head to the airport, Kaia got upset when Chris tried to get the both of them dressed towards the end of the day to pick up soup and yogurt for me since I couldn’t eat solid foods. Kaia had a melt down and started screaming and crying, saying she didn’t want to go to the airport without Mummy. “We need to wait for Mummy to come home! We can’t go to airport without her!” she cried. My heart almost broke when Chris told me she said this after I got home from the ER.

I hope Kaia is always filled with this much love, affection, and empathy. These are the moments I absolutely love — seeing her grow and blossom and show how deeply human and compassionate she is as a growing tiny person. It would be a shame not to write all these moments down and document them to share with her once she is older and able to see how far she has come. These are the special moments that make me realize exactly how lucky I am to experience motherhood and having a child — a truly beautiful child, inside and out.

Kaia’s school had a Halloween parade today at 11am, so I decided to book a co-working space through my company and work in nearby SoHo so I’d easily be able to attend. The “parade” is basically just the kids and teachers walking a number of blocks around the school to show off their costumes. Occasionally, some businesses will have employees who will come out to cheer the kids on and even offer them trick-or-treat candy. A lot of parents showed up, and we had a lot of photos taken of the kids with the parents, as well as multiple group shots. It’s always so adorable to see the kids dressed up in their costumes. They’re always so proud to show off and be seen.

The parents were asked to wait outside the front entrance of the school for the parade to begin. As soon as Kaia saw me, she immediately tried to run out to greet me, but she was told to wait until she was told to walk out with the teacher holding her hand. She came out and was very clingy, but as the parade went on, though she continued holding my hand and hugged me when she had a chance, she was still eager to chat and interact with her friends. When it was time for the parents to leave and for the kids to go back into the classroom for their Halloween pizza party, she barely kissed or hugged me and ran inside, yelling, “Bye bye, mummy! See you later!”

This year, Chris got Kaia a cow costume, which Kaia was completely enamored with when we presented it to her last night. We made the mistake of letting her try it on, and she refused to take it off and had a huge melt down when we finally got it off. She was completely obsessed and kept admiring herself in the mirror with it on, constantly yelling out, “Mooo! Mooooo!” She insisted that she sleep with it as though it was a stuffed animal, and she continued to hold onto it and drag it everywhere with her. When she inevitably made it to our bed in the middle of the night, she dragged the cow costume with her and screamed and yelled when she couldn’t locate where it was on the bed (even though… it was usually just at her feet or beside her, and she just couldn’t see it).

We’re planning to let her do a little trick-or-treating in the building this early evening, so we will see how that goes with getting the candy out of her hands… As we know that mummy and daddy will need to “test” all the candy out for her to ensure it’s safe for consumption…

When I was growing up, I fondly remember claiming all of my mother’s belongings as my own. I’d try on her shirts and sweaters. I would put on her jewelry every time I was able to get my hands on them (and occasionally, much to her anger, would break some pieces…). I’d walk around with her high heels (and then subsequently fell down the stairs that way). I even got into her bathroom cabinet and applied her face cream. She drew the line, though, when I attempted to apply her eyeshadow and lipstick: she did NOT want me putting anything on my face. I did all these things before the age of 5. Like most little kids, I loved the idea of “playing grown-up.” The world of grown-ups, from a child’s perspective, is truly riveting and endlessly exciting, full of possibilities. So it’s no wonder that Kaia shows all of these same desires every time she sees Chris and me do anything she knows she’s not supposed to do.

She will oftentimes ask if she can drink some of our coffee or tea. She always tries to put on my shoes and has recently attempted to put on my hoodies and socks. Instead of playing with her own play pots, she will want to play with my real pots. She knows that when I put sunblock on her that I have my own sunblock, and so she’s asked to use mine (and I usually say no). She has recently asked if she could wear my earrings, but I told her she can’t (yet) because she doesn’t have her ears pierced. She loves to twirl them around in her hand and play with them while they’re dangling from my ears. The rare times she gets her hands on my phone or Kindle, she says that these items are hers.

And perhaps the most frustrating (and cute) thing she has been doing lately is that at some point in the middle of the night, she will creep over from her bed onto ours. I will try to set up a pillow for her at the foot of the bed, but she will consistently refuse. Instead, she will insist that she sleeps right in the middle of MY pillow on my side of the bed. And she knows exactly what she’s doing: she will have this huge grin on her face as she looks up at me, sleepy eyed staring back at her. I have to fight her for my pillow and side of the bed. Sometimes she will stage a protest and try to sit up and not sleep. Or, she will run to the couch and just sit there and wait for me to get her. Chris always wakes up and lays down the law, though: she either has to sleep at the foot of the bed between us, or “you have to go back to Hoji’s bed,” he admonishes her. She usually listens to this and then acquiesces, placing her head on the pillow at the foot of the bed and minutes later, passing out.

Since Kaia has started at her new school, we figured it would only be a short time until she caught something from one of her classmates. She became boogery and snotty about two weeks in. The last week of September, I also became a little under the weather and had a stuffy nose. I was constantly blowing my nose, but the good news was that it ended there. It didn’t develop into a sore throat or cough or anything worse. I was still functional, as was she. But in the last week, she is still boogery and coughing, and I can hear phlegm when she coughs. This past Saturday morning, I woke up and knew something wasn’t right. My throat was sore, and my nose didn’t feel right. After Saturday’s Rendang Hang, I woke up with my throat hurting even more, plus my body felt sore. All the talking probably didn’t help that evening, and fast forward to now, I definitely know I am under the weather: headache, sore body, phlegm, stuffy nose, sore throat. This is no fun.

I am lucky to say that this is the first time I’ve actually really been under the weather this year. To date, I’ve taken zero sick days from work, which is pretty impressive since Kaia has been in school this whole time, actively collecting germs and snot from her little friends. So I guess October isn’t too late in the year to take a sick day.

Like every toddler, Kaia has her moments with food. Although relatively speaking, she is a very adventurous toddler and loves a large variety of foods, I suppose it’s also helped that I was extremely rigorous with exposing her to as many flavors, foods, and cuisines as possible before she turned age 1. I am proud to say that she loves many of the foods of her cultures, whether that is various forms of tofu (she is particularly fond of pressed smoked or five-spice tofu), gai lan and other Asian vegetables, dal, many different curries, cha lua, and pho broth. And her absolute favorite food, noodles, certainly defines her as my sweet noodle slurping baby. Today, she gobbled up a large amount of stir-fried pressed five spice tofu with celery and bell peppers for both lunch and dinner.

Sometimes when I watch Pookster eat, I am reminded of a conversation I overheard between my aunt (my dad’s younger sister) and one of my cousins shortly after he and his wife had their two kids. My aunt was asking my cousin what his kids like to eat. When he named a bunch of generic American junk food like chicken tenders, fries, and pizza, my aunt, clearly not happy, asked why he and his wife let their kids eat all this junk. “Do they eat Chinese or Filipino food?” she asked. My cousin said they did not, and my aunt goes into a rage, pressing him as to why. My cousin insisted they “just don’t like it.”

“They are Chinese and Filipino! This is their culture!” my aunt cries. “How can they not eat their own cultures’ food? This is your fault! You are their parents! You have to teach them!”

As much as I disdain my aunt, she had a valid point. It’s really on parents of children to lead by example and teach them how to eat, what to eat, and what their heritage is about. The easiest way to appreciate culture is through food, and so if you cannot teach your child to enjoy their culture’s food, then what luck are you going to have with your child embracing other parts of their culture?