Gary Phang & Alicia Lee

This year’s Chinese New Year and Valentine Day falls on the same date 14 February 2010.

Again, having very rush birthday celebration for Emelee at home after visiting relatives.

My mom accepted an offer to work as confinement lady in Doncaster, Victoria, Australia (somewhere near Melbourne). She left for Melbourne on 3 Feb at 1:20am on AirAsia flight via LCCT KLIA. My only concern for her was her health. Since it is summer now in Australia, that reduce the worry and anxiety, furthermore I am confident our Almighty God is with her and cares for her.

So this year’s Chinese New Year is going to be another quiet affair since my mom is away and my brother won’t be coming back from Singapore. Leaving our family and my dad. We will be celebrating CNY reunion in KL. Haven’t think of what to eat since just three of us and the little ones. Cook at home may not be practical cost and volume wise. Dad said Western food is ok woh! Got to check around. Heard most of the Chinese restaurant were fully booked till 7th day of CNY. People nowadays opted to eat out due to convenient and you may be surprise it may be cheaper (depends what food menu you choose). 

My uncle and aunty on the far-right help to send my mom to airport from Seremban. Emelee former nanny’s daughter (in orange T-shirt) followed us to take care Emelee. There was a long queue during check-in but they open many counters to expedite check-in process. Seems to be many students are beginning to return to Australia for studies. My mom will be back to KL on 13 March (30 days working plus 10 days holiday!)

Brother and sister or sister and brother (we usually said the earlier). Both Emelee and Weslee were adapting well in the childhood development. Emelee started to attend Sunday school since three weeks (31 Jan) ago at our local church. The first week she was not reluctant to be left alone with other children. But last week, she needs a few words of assurance that I will pick her up after the church service was over. She obediently listen and off she goes and sat with another kids mom. Somehow she likes her. I have also advised the teacher not to give her sweets. Apparently she throws out after eating the lollipop few weeks back. Our challenge these days was getting her to finish her meal faster. She took almost an hour to finish off her meal and we have to persuade, scold and what-not. But when comes to snacks like fruits, ice cream, biscuits, raisin and etc, she finished off faster! The other challenge was her sleeping alone. We some how relented and accepted the fact that she have to sleep with us, at least the last few hours before dawn.

Yes, he can walk we exclaimed. We were overjoyed when we saw him walking a few steps unassisted. Quite stable although it was a few steps before he tumbles down. And he must be really happy to see our reaction. Alicia asked me to record down least we forget!

Nowadays he like to climb over the sofa and sometimes on top of the TV rack. There goes my audio/video speakers & wiring! ~sigh~.

In public or at shopping mall, he likes to make eye contact with strangers. Most people will give a glimpse at him and he always generously smile back! Isn’t he is adorable! Praise God for blessing us with another cheerful and adorable children.

Celebrated Weslee’s 1st birthday on the actual date (13 Jan) with Emelee’s former nanny and family. Bought another jelly cake for him. He really enjoyed himself. Here are some of the photograph. 

Yesterday was Weslee’s 1st birthday! We have thrown a big party for him last Sunday. Most of our friends from church and in KL were invited. We have sumptuous and variety of food. Most of the pictures were taken by church friend and uploaded into Facebook. Hope can sort out more and upload here. He really had a good time although he has not been feeling well for the past few days. Thank God he behave that day!

Yesterday we also had another round of birthday celebration for him albeit smaller one with former Emelee’s babysitter (more pictures again later).

Weslee, we pray that our good Lord Jesus Christ will continue to protect you and watch over you. May He gives you good health shower you with his blessing and guidance.

Lovely cards and photo frame from Alicia’s best friend Siti a.k.a Dodie.

Life at home no longer the same as it use to be where Alicia and I alone at home watching TV, enjoying our dinner and etc without interruption. With the addition of Weslee into our family, sometimes our home become war zone. Much so with Emelee who always with her stubborn character and insist not listening to our instructions. Hell break loose with shouting from both dad and mummy!

Last week both of them having fever and running noose. Emelee throws out whatever liquid or food into her stomach and had ear infection. Thank God both of them recovered in 2-3 days.

Weslee continues to captivate our hearts with his adorable characters and behaviour. We resigned to the fact he won’t be sleeping throughout the night like Emelee. He needs to wake up once either 1-2am and/or 5am.

We have just applied for a passport for Weslee yesterday for our visit to Singapore in December. I shall be there for the Standard Chartered Singapore Marathon on 6 Dec 2009. I have also registered Emelee for Kid Dash (750m) which I shall run along with her.

Again this blog in hiatus for some time.  Sometimes I wonder should I continue writing since it may be read by myself. But after some thought it may be good to record down some of my children development. Sometimes I really forgotten Emelee’s growing up years and how we went through it.

Gone are the days where we usually have a tranquil, smooth-functioning period in our house. Emelee’s stubborn and strong-willed characters are driving us nuts and turn our home into war zone. Often our family exploded into confrontation with our daughter. Sounds serious? Nah, I think most parents went through this situation. Maybe I am a bit exaggerated.

She can be quite persistent when it comes to getting what she wants. Sometimes she just refuse to receive our instructions. She took so long to finish off her meals (1 hour). Since last two weeks, she doesn’t want to sleep on her room anymore. Instead we allowed Weslee to sleep on her bed and room alone now. She sleeps at the guess room and occasionally awakes few times during the night and tried to sleep with us (she know how to open the door now).  She also insist us to sleep together with her. ~sigh~. But things are improving slowly.

Weslee starts to roam and exploring everywhere around the house and starts to create havoc by messing up all the toys. He is more interested to scattered all the toys around rather than play with it. He grew up fast, he is now wearing size “XL” diapers and already started wearing his sister’s clothes which she only wear at age 1 year plus.

Must continue to pray for God’s wisdom and grace upon bring up these lovely children. Sometimes I felt really tired, more so to Alicia.

My last post our update was back in May! Do I need to catch up with almost five months updates? I hope not but I shall let the pictures do the talking (as they said pictures tell thousand words! no?) Blame it on Facebook? I have neglected in updating this blog and spend most of my free time when online in Fbing. Probably that’s tell I am not good in writer or plain lazy (aha-gotcha!) And I have also revert this blog to its classic template.

On family life

Since the arrival of our another bundle of joy – Weslee into our life, things have changed quite a bit. Now we have new routines albeit with more “standard operating procedures”. Alicia adapted to it quite well although now she has to handle extra work to take care another child.

Emelee has grown up and started to have her own character. She is full of energy and starts to talk a lot. Sometimes we do understand what she says and we just guess. She also started to become more rebellious. It’s hard to get her to obey our instructions. She also took ages to complete her meal. At the end, she was constantly lectured and canned by us. Sometimes it is really difficult to control our anger. Now, we have to change our strategy, we seldom cane her anymore and start to use some soft but firm approach. So far it works well but we got to have lots of patience. Praise to be God; she plays together with her brother and usually made Weslee smiles a lot with her antics.

Weslee begins to stand and crawl very well since 7 months. He is into almost 9 months coming 13 Oct. He is really a big eater and can’t wait for his meal/milk. He also woke up less during the night with only one feeding at 1 or 2 am until the next morning. He is really puncture and wakes up on the dot, i mean almost exactly at 1am or 2am. He is also very alert and seems like know what’s going on surrounding him.

On parents & siblings

Celebrated dad’s birthday in Jun at restaurant in Seremban. Both mom and dad is doing fine. With dad keeps himself busy with his watch repairing business, almost the one and only such skill craftsman in Seremban. He also faithfully worked as newspaper delivery man early in the morning which we always asked him to quit. Sometimes we pondered if we request him to stop all these activities, how is it going to impact him. Surely he will not get used to it.

(Dad’s birthday dinner in Seremban)

Mom as usual busy with herself shuttling here and there. Mostly she spend her time at my youngest sister’s home. Thank God she also attends church service and cell group faithfully at Grace Neighborhood Assembly.

During Hari Raya holiday, they stayed with us for 2 days in conjunction with our cousin’s – Vincent’s wedding.

(with mom and dad at Genting Highlands)

On spiritual life

This area seems to be difficult for me to explain. Many events happen in the past few months that draws me to rethink my priorities and of course it let me closer to God.

(College youth in Passion Alive cell group birthday celebration)

I have been serving for youth ministry for almost 8-9 years. But do I really grow spiritually besides serving? Often, we just serve out of obligation or treat it as a duty (or the Bible says so!). I asked myself – do I serve out of my love for Jesus Christ or do I serve just because I am part of the team? With the new addition to my family (both Emelee & Weslee), it prompts me to look at the priority of my family (God first, family second). Besides, I am hurt by recent circumstances that I would preferred not to pen down here.

I have also decided to quit serving PA for Music ministry. More often, it’s quite stressful to shuttle to/from church to pick up my wife and kids for second service while I served in the PA during the first service. I felt I am not able to assist my wife to prepare the kids for church service and we often reached church quite late for the second service. With this, I hope I can devote more time to prepare and go to church fresh and stress-free!

I am toying with Microsoft Windows Live Writer and see how this software can help me to edit my blog.