Identifying one’s belongings

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When I went to pick up Pookster from school yesterday, when she saw me through the door window, she immediately came running and gave me a hug. I always love it when she does this and was pretty bummed out the previous two days when she basically just stared at me and continued playing with her toys. I noticed that there was a new boy in the class, and I said hi to him and asked what his name was. When I asked the question, instead of the boy responding, Kaia responded, “Kaia!”

“Pooks! I exclaimed. “I KNOW your name! I was asking about your classmate’s name here!”

The teacher laughed. “Kaia always makes sure everyone knows her name and what belongs to her. She makes a point of it to every single person who comes in!”

She really does do this, and it’s absolutely hilarious and endearing. She loves to tell us at home when food is hers, or when she has her own book or cup. At bedtime, she loves to point at the big blanket and say “mummy blanket,” and insist, insist that I put it on myself after I put her blanket on top of her. She will NOT let me continue reading unless both of us have our blankets on us; Kaia cannot be the only person with a blanket on her!

“Bless you, mummy. Bless you, daddy.”

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The “terrific toddler” moments include when your young toddler is learning more and more language and chooses to express sweet sentiments towards you and other loved ones. In the last month or so, Kaia has caught on to the fact that a lot of the people around her say “bless you” after someone sneezes. She seems the most attuned to Chris’s sneezes, likely because he’s an extremely loud sneezer, and less attuned to mine (Chris claims that my sneezes have gotten louder over the years, likely due to his influence, but I am not totally sure that assessment is accurate). Given that, she almost always says “bless you” after Chris sneezes. The other cute thing she sometimes does is at bed time, when it’s just about time for “lights out” after reading together, she will lie down, put her head on her pillow, look at me with big eyes, and say, “Bless you, mummy. Bless you, Daddy. Bless you, Kaia.” And I just become a big puddle of love looking at her, caressing her sweet little smiling face as she’s all snuggled up in her sleep sack and baby blanket. These are the moments I love the most: when she’s being sweet, affectionate, cute, and sentimental, but she’s also expressing more and more of what she learning and absorbing from her surroundings. The toddler years can certainly be stressful and full of angst and helplessness, but these loving moments always keep me grounded. These moments of her being this age will soon pass, and I will still have all these memories, photos, and videos to look back on and remember how amazing she was in this moment of time.

Peanut butter loving Kaia Pookie

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Since Kaia was six months old, I’ve been actively trying to expose her to pretty much every nut and seed available to us. Early allergen exposure is really important for babies nowadays given the massive increase in these allergies. In addition, I also just want her to enjoy seeds and nuts. They are so healthy and add so much good flavor and texture to foods. Lucky for us, she immediately embraced all things nutty. She obviously has her favorites: she always seemed to enjoy her oat porridge the most when there was either peanut butter or ground pistachios in them. She’ll happily eat almonds or walnuts, but they seem to be lower on the priority list for her.

This week, she’s mastered actually saying “peanut butter.” I gave her a piece of toast spread with peanut butter. She ate all the surfaces with the peanut butter, then asked for more peanut butter on the “naked” parts of the bread. “More peanut butta?” she said, with a hopeful look on her face. So, I decided to humor her and spread some peanut butter on those parts. Then, she pointed at the jar and motioned to have it. I took a pea-sized amount of peanut butter, put it on my finger, and she immediately went to lick it off. She then let out a little giggle, asked “more?” and then got some more.

Kaia Pookie is a peanut butter baby, and even better: she’s a Teddie peanut butter baby.

Terrible Twos vs. Terrific Twos

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I saw a post on Instagram about parenting (that’s pretty much most of my targeted posts now) littles that made me stop for a moment. It talked about how everyone always talks about the “Terrible Twos,” but people rarely stop to think about all the great things about toddlers when they reach this general stage. Kaia is now 22 months old, so while she’s not yet 2 officially, she certainly is a curious, independence seeking young toddler who wants to do her own thing. The post went on and discussed all the great things about this stage of development, like the fact that they can walk, run, and climb; they can speak a little so can actually communicate with you a bit; they are extremely responsive, they can listen to things you say and take action; they can be sweet and affectionate, and they are still in the ‘happy-to-cuddle’ stage.

I’ve thought a lot about that this year. While I could certainly do without a lot of the toddler tantrums that Pookster has had (and to be fair, in the grand scheme of everything I hear about this age range, my baby really is nowhere close to being extreme Terrible Twos toddler at all), I’ve really loved this year of development. I’ve loved hearing her say first words or phrases for the first time, even annoying ones like “come on!” when she wants me to get her out of the stroller/high chair faster. I’ve loved hearing her finishing sentences in books. I’ve really enjoyed the journey of watching her grow confident in walking and now running. I love hearing her surprise me with songs she has learned and remembered that I’ve sung to her ages ago, both in English and Chinese, plus new ones she learns at school and through our Amazon Alexa. I love when she asks to hug or kiss me, or when she remembers the Chinese word for some food I’ve given her before. I love it when I watch her figure out how to play with a toy correctly, or identify a new object with the right name, and also when she discovers how to do things like open pill bottles and drawers (dangerous, but still good progress for her development….). I love it when I’m giving her a bath, and when it’s time to lift her feet for a scrub, she lifts the right foot when I tell her to lift it, and then she giggles and smiles while exclaiming, “toesies!” I always tell her, and have been telling her since she was a newborn: “Mama loves your toesies! Pookie’s toesies! I want to EAT Pook’s toesies!” I love the way she smells and sleeps. I still love how she sleeps on her stomach with her tiny butt sticking up in the air. This time will pass, though. It is bittersweet.

I love my sweet cheeky young toddler baby. She really is just so lovable, and I hope I can always have this much love in my heart for her. I hope she will always love me and see me as a safe space, even as she grows, matures, and decides she doesn’t always want to run to me when she sees me at pickup.

Rosemary focaccia this morning

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Kneading dough is a really good feeling. When you have any stress or aggression, it’s a really great, active way to let all that tension go. The last time I made focaccia, I had used my sourdough starter in May 2020 and was just blown away (very humble, I know) by how good it turned out. It rose evenly and beautifully. It had these little perfect dimples at even intersections. It even pillowed on the top and made for great photographs. I also remember it tasted delicious, too: a little nutty, complex, and herby from the rosemary. That loaf had just the right amount of olive oil, too, so that it wasn’t too lean, but it wasn’t at at greasy. I served it with honey ricotta and was just glowing for days about it.

Well, this one turned out okay, but it was nothing compared to that one. This one came out a little flat. It didn’t rise evenly. The flavor was very one dimensional. I also felt it could use a bit more fat from more olive oil, but I had already tripled the amount of oil from the recipe because of all the comments. Unfortunately, my quick pick wasn’t the best pick. I will be more conservative choosing recipes from the New York Times cooking app now, knowing that the reviews were quite accurate with the end result.

Bread baking revived

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Baking bread has always been a passion of mine. While I did attempt the sourdough path during the height of the pandemic in 2020, I quickly realized that it just wasn’t for me. Although tending to a sourdough starter for 15 minutes a day is not really a huge ask, what WAS a big ask for me was to constantly remove or even (gasp) discard starter. I am very anti food waste, so discarding was completely out of the question. Instead, I would always hasten to figure out yet another way to use sourdough starter discard, and eventually, it just got really tiring. I didn’t always want to make or eat bread. I didn’t always want to be fiddling in the kitchen. Sometimes, I just want to make bread and be done with it. And that’s where yeast packets are really handy: I can make my own recipe, get excited at the yeast being alive and growing, bake, and then be done!

Two years ago when I was very pregnant, I went a little nuts at Trader Joe’s and stocked up on six dry active yeast packets. I had this (extremely naive) thought that during my maternity leave, I would knead and bake bread while Kaia Pookie napped. Well, that never happened during maternity leave. In fact, I have not baked any bread since literally this time two years ago! The last thing I remember making was hot dog bao and freezing them to eat while recovering from giving birth. Boy, was our freezer stocked with homemade goodies!

Well, the expiration date on the packets said November 2022. It made me a little sad, but hey, many times expiration dates are not accurate. So I tested one packet of yeast with some warm water and sugar. Ten minutes later, it bubbled and grew large, so I knew it was still good to use! So I decided to make something quick with little fuss: focaccia. I chose a focaccia recipe on the New York Times cooking app that would also include some whole wheat (we have to be healthy sometimes, right?), and hoped for the best. I’m planning to make it as part of our breakfast on Sunday morning, so it will have two days in the fridge to develop flavor, so we shall see how it turns out.

Post weaning weight loss journey update after 4 weeks

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Four weeks ago, when I finally decided to hop on a scale to see how much I weighed and found out (annoyingly) that I was 12 pounds over pre-pregnancy weight, I started weighing myself once a week to check on my weight loss progress. I reduced how much I ate at breakfast and lunch on the weekdays. I pretty much stopped drinking any alcohol (much to Chris’s annoyance). I also increased the rigor of my weekday morning exercise and always ensured that I exercised for at minimum 60 minutes (excluding stretching and warmup). I carved out time intentionally during the day for walking breaks. A few of the people I’ve shared this with have laughed, saying they think I’m being ridiculous for wanting to lose weight, but at the end of the day, I’m comparing myself to myself, not to others.

I was pleased to see that in the last four weeks, I’ve been able to lose six pounds already with my conscious changes in behavior. Before I even hopped on the scale this week, I already noticed that the pants I had bought back in the beginning of summer felt less tight, which was reassuring. I’m about half way to my goal at this point, which is quicker than what I had anticipated, so while I am happy about my progress, I know I still have work to do.

10 years of fundraising for AFSP

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2023 marks the 10th year that I’ve been fundraising for the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention in honor and memory of Ed. In the beginning, I set my goal really low, at $1,000, because I wasn’t sure how much, if anything, people would donate. I got totally blown out of the water that year and raised far above $1,000. Each subsequent year for a number of years, I kept raising the goal by a thousand dollars. Then, the pandemic year hit in 2020, and I realized it would be too much of a stretch to keep going on that trajectory. So I scaled it back. Since, my goal has been $5,000, but which each year, it feels like more and more of a stretch to reach. In the last two years, it’s been especially tough with a poor economic climate, seemingly endless layoffs, and crazy inflation. It always feels like it’s a lot to ask of people to keep donating, year after year. It’s tireless and exhausting. I’m 10 days away from the Out of the Darkness walk and still haven’t hit my goal. I am currently ranked 6th for fundraising in Manhattan.

But then I have a friend who has been fundraising for breast cancer research since we were 18 with her sisters in memory of their mother, who died suddenly from breast cancer (caught just 3 weeks before dying). She’s been doing this fundraising for almost 20 years now and never gives up. I took a look at her donation page today, and she’s barely raised $400. It kind of goes to show that people tire of these asks after a while, and we can only expect so much.

It’s rough. Losing someone you love prematurely is hard. Trying to keep their memory alive is hard. Fundraising and asking loved ones and colleagues to donate year after year is hard. It’s hard to know when it’s actually too much to ask. But at that point, are you letting your loved one’s memory essentially die?

When you’re close but never see each other

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People oftentimes make comments about how sad it must be for Chris and me to live so far away from our families. Our family members are all either in San Francisco or somewhere in Australia, neither of which is a quick car ride or flight away. Both trips take both money and time commitment, and outside of Chris’s parents, no one really wants to come visit us here regularly, as strange as it may sound since New York City is likely one of the most exciting cities in the world.

The thing about commenting on the distance is always funny to me, though. Just because family members or friends may be close distance-wise, that doesn’t necessarily mean that we’d see each other more often. It might be easier or cheaper, yes, but that doesn’t necessarily equate to more frequent visits or hangouts. At most, I see friends who live here in New York once a month, and that’s only very close friends. We all have our own lives and commitments, and it really does take a strong desire to commit to spending a day or evening with someone.

My aunt, who lives in San Francisco, texted me a some photos of when her middle child, his wife, and their two teenage children came to visit her at her house two days ago. I knew that they barely saw each other at all even though my cousin lives just a 30-minute drive away. When I asked my aunt when the last time they’d seen each other was, she responded, “at your wedding.”

Hmmmmm. That was in March 2016. So they literally have not seen each other in over 7.5 years, despite all living in proximity right in the Bay Area. That’s what happens when you’re close distance-wise to family – you can just tend to forget about them completely.

Basketball Hall of Fame

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i think it goes without saying that if you know me, you will know that I care little to nothing about sports. Do I think sports can be fun? Yes. Do I understand the value they bring to people and communities? Of course. But I don’t really get much joy out of watching games. The closest I’ve ever really enjoyed sports as a spectator has been at a couple hockey and basketball games. I suppose the World Cup football in Brazil was fun, but I think that was more about the atmosphere as opposed to simply watching the sport itself. I also do not have an athletic bone in my body (though, I have a feeling that as a young child, if I had really put my mind to being good at something, whether that something was volleyball or basketball, with some grit and coaching, I probably could have played decently). But I do appreciate learning the history of sports, and they do a pretty good job of detailing this specifically for basketball at the Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield.

I didn’t know that basketball was created by a Canadian American physical education teacher who was charged with the task of creating a sport that could be played indoors between (American) football and baseball season. I did not know it was created in 1891 in Springfield. I also had no idea that the first “basket” they used for the hoop was actually that of a peach basket. On the ground floor of the Hall of Fame, they have a big open court where you can freely shoot hoops, so we indulged in this while Pookster napped in her stroller. You had the option of shooting into a regular hoop, as well as two peach baskets. Getting the ball into the peach basket was especially interesting because of how the ball enters the basket and then proceeds to spiral slowly down. That would definitely slow down the high speed of basketball!