The Georgous

When asked “What religion I am?” I often stumble and then mumble something about being culturally Buddhist – but in all honesty I find myself at odds to define that I belong to a specific religion.

I grew up with taoist influences (with Gods, Goddesses and ancestral worship), Buddhist teachings, in a Convent school and have been to Churches (Roman Catholic and a range of Protestant ones too).

We have prayed in Hindu temples, visited shrines, bowed our heads at Japanese Shinto temples and seen the inside of mosques.

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Overheard Georgia on the phone with Mama (grandma) yesterday…

G: Do you know what day it is today?

G: It’s Burnt Wednesday or something like that…

Then to me, “Mum, what day is it? Like Burnt Wednesday or something?”

Can you guess what she meant?

You know how it is, people always say ‘Kids are really wise’, I always took it at face value (meaning I thought it might be, but never really bothered to work out why) and then today, the realisation struck me.

In their honesty and directness, children cause encourage us to re-evaluate our thoughts and opinions, indirectly it seems that they are wise, but what happens really, at least I think, is that they raise an issue, give us something to think about then we come to some realisation and attribute it to them.

This is exactly what happened today, in the car going to ballet.

It’s only a 10 minute drive to ballet, but we have often had ‘profound’ conversations, Georgia and I. Conversations between the backseat and the drivers seat…. Today it was about people, more specifically friends. Read more »

Georgia came back from spending a few days with Mama (Grandma) and Grandpa, and she said to us:

G: You know, we went to the garden centre and it was really nice, we saw guinea pigs and rabbits and even some fish.
Me: Mmm…What did you do there?
G: We had some lunch, I had some jacket potato with cheese.
Me: That sounds nice.
G: Yeah and you know we saw this really funny hanging thing that Mama wanted to buy!
Me: Oh is it?
G: And do you know what it said? (With a very serious expression, and very big eyes)
Me: No, what did it say?
G: It said, ‘God if you can’t make me thin, please make all my friends fat!’ Imagine! (she says with a shrug)

At which point, we both burst out laughing! 🙂

In the Sunday Times newspaper a week ago today,  (OK in all honesty, I probably read it in the middle of the week) at the end of the Money section was an interview with Hilary Devey who was taking over from James  Caan as the next Dragon on Dragon’s Den. (Dragon’s Den is a TV programme in which potential start-ups are given the opportunity to pitch their business/business ideas to already established (read Rich!) entrepreneurs)

Multi-millionaire Hilary Devey made her fortune with a pallet distribution business that she started in 1996. In typical rags to riches fashion, she had her fair share of extreme poverty moments, living above a fish and chip shop (cheaper rent) and even describes having a Christmas dinner out of a tin. The business/entrepreneurial and over-achiever side of me admires and is rather jealous of the tenacity, hard work and steely resolve Devey must have had in order to be so successful.

However, in the interview, there is a telling sign, her answer to the question ‘How much money do you have in your wallet?’ is ‘ My purse is often empty because it’s raided by my son….’ Read more »

What would you do when your 5-year-old comes home everyday with tales of ‘C says I’m naughty but I’m not!’ ‘C says I smell’ ‘C always tells on me’ ‘C doesn’t want to play with me’…. Read more »

As Georgia progressively interacts with more and more with people outside of our home and our immediate circle of friends, I have become more aware of how many different ‘parenting faces’ I have and which I call upon depending on the situations.

It often feels as if we have an embedded inner compass of actions, reactions and culture that unfortunately, unlike a true magnetic compass that points due North; this inner compass often flip-flops between East or West (cultural influences) and all points in between.

I have often attributed a large part of this, to the fact that we are parenting and raising a child in a culture and environment so completely different from the one we were raised in (being immigrants).

Beyond cultural influences, however, it has also occurred to me that technology, the changes of societal demands and simply how things have changed over a generation is reason enough to continuously reflect on and question the decisions we now make, or have to make, as parents.

The oft-heard cry of ‘Back in my day…’ is universal; we have added recently though a ‘We do not do that…’ to our arsenal of reasons or excuses, often, rightly or wrongly (any thoughts would be welcome here!) with a cultural implication.

An example is saying ‘Yuck!’ to food. Read more »

With Chinese New Year just around the corner, we sat talking about how we could celebrate it in our own way, especially as it’s not a public holiday here. Somehow the conversation progressed from, who we would invite, what we would eat, when we would celebrate to…

Dad: It’s actually ‘our’ year. Year of the Rabbit

G: Why is it your year?

Dad: We were born in the Year of the Rabbit.

G: And me?

Dad: You were born in the Year of  the Dog…

G (at this point looking at little confused): …and after that it’s the Year of the Hedgehog!

Dad: … ????

to Reinforce the Positive and Encourage Achievement. First let me explain how we came to create the Star Book.

Throughout almost all of last term, Georgia, moaned and whined and made a fuss of going to school. She would be clingy and there were even daily tears.  It was awful! For those of you whose children skip happily along to school, you’re really lucky… 🙂

It helped tremendously that I knew and trusted her teachers and their feedback was always taken positively, and it was great knowing that we were partners working together towards a common goal. However, it was still a challenge every morning.

Over the Christmas and New Year holiday, as a treat to myself, (I had been good :)) I read Jack Canfield’s The Success Principles. Now if you like me watched The Secret and liked it but never really got to the practise of  ‘the secret’, Canfield’s book provides and almost step-by-step guide (an all very logical too) to achieving anything you set your mind to. One of the chapters in the book, suggests that you list every day, 5 achievements for the day (even if you did not accomplish things that you set out to do that day, if you reflect on your day, you will often find achievements each day) and to focus on goals for the next day.

So we thought, what a great way for Georgia, and especially for us, to focus on what we can achieve and to celebrate the successes each day, and that was how we came to create the Star Book. Read more »