Jaide Learnt Cycling!

Earlier this year in May, I bought Jaide a new bicycle to learn how to ride. Unfortunately, during the subsequent cycling sessions, I was not available to help her learn. Joshua did not know how to coach so she was left to her own devices. To her disappointment, she couldn't get it on her own.

Thankfully, today, I have the chance to teach and encourage her and she finally overcame her fear of falling and conquered riding a bike. Hallelujah! I'm so very proud of her! Check out the first time Jaide learnt to ride in the video below:

Now, Jaide can join the ranks of bike-riding kids with her 2 older siblings. Here's a video of them having a friendly race. Joram, of course, is still using the strider. But it looks like it won't be long before he learns it too. *wink*

My Last Will and Testament

When I was 15 years old, I attempted suicide. I found the world so ugly, evil and meaningless and that I am completely insignificant. I wish I never existed. But God brought me back, whispering to me that there's more to life. When I gave myself to Jesus at 18, I decided that if God had created me and kept me alive, He must have had a reason for it, even though I still can't see it. (Read my full testimony HERE)

Everyday, when I wake up, I am disappointed that I am still alive and I ask God why. Every night, I pray that God would give my life to someone else who wishes to live and that I'll not wake up again. The only reason why I have not killed myself is purely because God doesn't want me to. Everything I do is to please God and be a good testimony for Him. But very often, I fail miserably and I will ask God what is the use of keeping me around.

I never wanted children. Why bring more people into this cruel world just to suffer? I didn't even want to get married because I saw my mother's agony from the irresponsible and deplorable actions of my father. However, God gave me a vision a few months after I accepted Him into my life: a vision of four children who will become God's precious missionaries. Because of that, I chose a husband who would, first and foremost, be a good and involved father for the children rather than merely focusing on my own preferences. 

I've never done anything significant in my life. It already takes all my effort to simply not offend anyone unintentionally or make mistakes which harm anyone else. Even that, I can't do well. I try my best but my best is never enough. But still, I press on. Because of Christ. 

I have no physical legacies. After being a homemaker for so long, I hardly have any assets worth mentioning. Neither am I well-known for any of my abilities. I am a jack of all trades but master of none. All I can hope is that at least I'll have spiritual legacies: my four children who God promised will do great things in their lives.

Joash, God made you creative and sensible. If you learn how to be responsible with the talents which He has given you, you will find new ways for others to encounter God.

Jayna, God made you with great capacity for love. Your physical ailments are to help you to experience God's grace and empathise with the suffering of others. If you overcome your limitations, you can be a powerful agent of charity.

Jaide, God made you a leader with a strong will. If you direct your passion toward good instead of evil, you can literally change the world.

Joram, God made you the most tenderhearted. If you resist following the wrong crowd, you can show others what it truly means to be obedient to God and glorify Him. 

Joshua, if I become incapacitated, please just let me go. I do not want to be artificially kept alive or resuscitated. I know that things will be hard if I were to leave before you do, but you can definitely find someone else better than me to help continue your life and work. Do donate every feasible part of my corpse. Since I have not done anything spectacular in life, I want to at least give others who want to live a fighting chance. 

To my non-believing friends and family, you must be sick of me telling you about Jesus, but still, I pray daily for you to know the Saviour of the world. That is my only wish for you: to see you in heaven with me.

To my fellow believers, please do not be sad if I die suddenly. Rejoice, instead! My work on earth is finally done. God is granting my dearest wish to be with Him in heaven, a place where I will no longer need to struggle with sin. I will not be hurt and nor will I hurt anyone else anymore. 

Indeed, for me, to die is great gain, to live is purely Christ. 

Children's Day 2017

I just started the tradition of celebrating Children's Day last year and thus, other than the buying of presents, there wasn't anything meaningful that I'd thought of to do which could be repeated annually. Judging from the experience of going to the movies from the previous year, I figured that the younger two are still too immature and fussy for it especially if I have to manage them without Joshua's help. So watching a show would be out of the question for at least another two more years.

In the end, I brought them to Sushi Express as a treat instead. The older two were more than capable of serving themselves. Thankfully, the revolving sushi belt was entertaining enough to keep the younger two occupied while I served them food. It was a successful experiment. The food was to their liking and the bill came up to only 42 bucks despite wolfing down 24 plates of food among the 5 of us. Check out the stacks of pink plates behind the kids in the above photo!

Tea break was a disaster though. Our church gave each kid 4 Mr Bean vouchers last Sunday as gifts so I thought to use them up. They were so excited choosing the flavours of the soy-based ice-cream and insisted on having double scoops. I obliged against my better judgement when they refused to listen to my advice of getting pancakes instead. I hate to tell them "I told you so" but in the end they didn't like the taste at all, as I had suspected, and had so much leftovers. I tried my best to eat up the durian ones because it was one of my favourite flavour but that was only two out of five scoops of ice-cream. I felt it was such a waste to throw away the rest so I bought a box of ziplock bags from the supermarket and poured all the melting ice-cream into one of them. It became a nice, chilled, chocolatey soy-based shake for Joshua to enjoy when we met up for dinner. ROFL

I asked the children to choose board or card games as their presents this time round. At home, we have Snakes and Ladders, Donkey, Tumbling Tower, Chess and Checkers which the children have gotten bored of. The older two at least could play Mastermind with me but none of them have the vocabulary to play my favourite game Taboo yet. It is time to invest in more games which we can all play together. Looking forward to happy family times enjoying our purchases!

Lantern Festival Tradition

Part two of our mid-autumn celebration was completed tonight. Since the old lanterns from previous years were mostly damaged, I decided to buy them new ones. We then managed to continue our tradition of having a lantern walk around our neighbourhood. Now that the kids are older, they are walking so much faster! I almost wanted to tell them that it was supposed to be an enjoyable stroll instead of a walking race but then I thought that it might not be a bad thing to speed up the process after all. My battery was already pretty flat by then. *nervous laughter* 

We concluded the evening with sparklers as usual. 

They said they were barbecuing
marshmallows around the campfire

Joram is simply adorable!

At the end, my eldest decided that the music coming from 4 lanterns was becoming annoying because they were not playing at the same time despite having the same tune. So he coordinated the music by making sure that everyone pressed the start button at the same time. I was duly impressed. 

The lanterns up close