Journey of Bibma: Five Things My Newborn Son has Taught Me

Little Julius has turned 2 months (by calendar) today! This also means I have survived as a first-time mom for 2 months too! (Yay! I'm so proud of myself!)

During these 2 months, Julius has taught me so much, much more than what I have learnt in school the past 18 years - no I'm not 18 years old this year - that's assuming I started nursery at the age of 5 all the way till my graduation from university.

So here are the 5 precious life lessons that I have learnt from him:

Married Life

Many people whom I have met have been asking me "How's married life?" My standard reply would be "Like that lor, busy". Both of us hold demanding jobs which requires us to work overtime and over the weekend. We dedicate almost the entire day of the weekend to doing housework, and go back to our parents' place for dinner every weekend, one day each. Whatever free time was spent on working for me, and working or reading engineering books for him. This left us no time to date when we used to - exploring new places, new eateries. I can't even recall when we last caught a movie together.

But upon deeper reflection of how we have come for 2 years after marriage, my answer now is "It's not easy".

It's not easy for 2 persons with different living habits to stay together, and see each other every day. For me especially, I begun to take him for granted very soon. I soon forgot the reasons why I married him and chose to spend the rest of my life with him.

I began to lose sight of myself and of who I used to be. Slowly, I morphed into another person whom I wasn't before - naggy, irritable, picky, someone much worser than my already bad character.

I became self-absorbed, much ironic as it may seem, that we are seeing each other every day. But that's precisely the case that I became to turn a blind eye from seeing the goodness in him. Every little actions that I couldn't see eye to eye to disturbed me.

Such damages to the heart and soul are permanent. And by the time you have realised it, which is usually after a big fight, it would be too late.

Much as you would like to reverse the time, the damage has been done, the soul beaten.

There's a saying that goes "time will heal all wounds". Or will it? Only time can tell.

In the meantime, I can only constantly remind myself to be a bigger and better me, and put aside more time for such important self-reflections so that I can ever be so often reminded, like today, the reason why I got married, and how I should view myself as us instead of me, myself and I.

Take a Leap of Faith

The Horny Devil once made a very meaningful analogy.

Life is like taking a bus. You flagged it down, knowing that it will bring you to where you want to go. But along the way, the bus may break down. When that happens, you just have to get down and take another bus to your destination. The alternative route may be longer and bumpier.

But given another chance another day, you will still take the same bus if you are going to the same destination, knowing very well that the bus may break down on you again.

Goodbye 2011, Hello 2012

A new year always brings about a new hope. You may consider this a self-deceit or positivism but many like my Goddess like to make use of this opportunity to make some changes to their lives, be it a new haircut, a new wardrobe, so as to start the new year on a literally fresh note. Whether things will change for the better? Only time will tell.

And me & my Goddess' wishes for the new year? That we can 随心所欲!

Published with Blogger-droid v1.7.4

My Life Begins Today

A year is almost gone. It's been a really crazy year for my Goddess with loads of ups and downs - getting hitched, switching jobs - worse than the Battlestar Galatica Cyclon ride! Think the only thing that is keeping her sane now is positivity. And this song by Bruno Mars really helped a lot! She's like listening to it a few time every day now to get her daily dose of positivism to keep on going!

Published with Blogger-droid v1.7.4

Married Life

A couple of people have asked my Goddess how's married life, and so she's sharing her response here.

Generally, it's not much different from being single. Things are going on more or less as usual.

But guess my Goddess is feeling less of the impact since they are staying at her place currently. Once she needs to pay her own bills, clean the house and wash her own clothes, things will be more different.

Something different now is that she now has to plan her schedule more or less to his. No more going to gym at least 3 times a week or going home alone early. So now they ended up sleeping later after going back from dinner at the in-laws.

And now, she has to regularly remind herself that she's a married woman so must be more accommodating to him and plan things taking into consideration of them as a couple and not separate individuals.

Think for him, the major inconvenience is travelling to work. There's no mrt around her place so he has to take buses to work, and it takes him at least an hour and half to work. Plus he's not used to having the bathroom so far away from the bedroom and now he's beginning to understand why my Goddess sometimes feel lazy to bathe. And they have yet to sort out their laundry yet, so her mom is still washing her clothes :p and he intends to bring home his for his mom to wash.

Furthermore, the 2 of them have peculiarly different habits. He's often feeling warm and needs the aircon cold she's afraid of the cold. She needs to have the tv on in the morning to wake herself up but he needs peace and quiet in the morning. And despite them being a messy and lazy couple, he's more messy than her and even she cannot stand it herself and have to pick up after him.

Think the happiest person in the house is me. Whenever they come home, I will jump and bark and growl like mad. I will follow them upstairs to check out what they are doing. It's great fun to have one more person playing with me!

Busy wedding prep weekend

This weekend, or rather, these 2 weekends have been super duper busy for my Goddess and the Horny Devil.

With only 6 weeks left, they still had a few things not completed for their wedding. So it's pia time for them!!

To start the weekend of madness on a good note, they had a good brunch at Cedele!

Time not enough

Time has been flying really quickly for my Goddess these few months. Before she knows it, the one work week is gone and weekend has finally arrived (yeah!). Then, within the wink of an eye, the weekend is gone, and it's the start of another work week (boo!).

And so my Goddess decided to investigate how did a day just pass so quickly, and so she did a breakdown of her time.

As you can see, she spends the most of her time at work - 9.5 hours (minimum) and sometimes even longer. It's 3 hours more than her sleep time. So disgusting right?

The next most disgusting fact that she has discovered is that she spends 2 hours travelling a day! That's time same amount of time she spends to bathe/prepare for work like putting on makeup etc.

This leaves her only less than 3 hours a day to spend on her business Paper Polly (how can she find time to improve her business since most of the time it's spent on answering to shoppers' emails/updating the new collection), and leaves her no time to prepare for her wedding and self-improvement.

Luckily for her, most of her wedding preparations is done. It's left with the minor details which unfortunately also needs time for research and coordination.

It's been a long time since my Goddess read a book. So in order to squeeze in some time for this, she's lugging a book with her in a bag these days, so that she can read while she's travelling. At least the 2 hours will not be wasted. However, that also doesn't mean that the whole of 2 hours is spent on reading. My Goddess gets car sick easily when she reads on the road. So the only time she can read is when she's travelling from work to the gym on the train.

Sigh, 24hours is not sufficient for my Goddess. She needs another 2 more hours for herself/Paper Polly, and especially for me!

A Tribute to All Parents in the World

Parents are the most selfless humans in the world. Their love and sacrifices that they make for their children is beyond any word can describe. In order to help their children succeed, they don't mind sleeping for 4 hours or even lesser each day; they don't mind depleting their bank account to get a car for their child or set up a business that their child wants to do; they don't mind taking public transport or climb up the big lorry so that their child can have the comfort of driving in the car; and the list goes on.

Since the day we are born, their lives revolve around us. Never is there a day where they can stop worrying about us and start living their own lives. They give all their lives to us, and ask for nothing in return.

When will we as children truly understand and appreciate our parents? Will there ever come a day when we will stop taking them for granted and start repaying them for all the things they have did for us?

To all the parents in the world, and my own included - I know a million thank you's will never be enough to thank you for all that you have done for us. Thank you.
 

Do Business within Your Own Means

I totally cannot fathom how some how some people can do business at the expense of others, especially your loved ones. If you want to start a business, you need to have your own plans and resources, and not take it for granted that you can own a family-owned property 24/7 just so that you can do your own business; or take loads of investment sums and manual labour off your loved ones, and not pay them duly, but expecting that since they are your family members, they are obliged to help you till the end.

To summarise, if you don't have your own resources and expect people to do the job for you, or using off people's possession, DON'T F-ing start.

On a lighter note, a new collection from Paper Polly has launched. Do check it out. 80% of the items are personally chosen by my Goddess.