We spent the past Saturday night at the club celebrating Lantern Festival; strolling along the golf course greens with the lanterns and later eating mooncakes with Chinese tea.

I’ve always found such programs contrived but still, we thought it would be fun since we’ve never done this before.  The boy was elated of course and was happy to hold on to his lantern even though it kept slipping out of the stick and dropping to the ground.  Daddy was the busiest, fixing the lanterns, lighting the candles and then re-fixing the lanterns, re-lighting the candles every 15 mins or so.

We ate an assortment of mooncakes and they even had this lady singing two Chinese numbers related to the moon!

The funniest part was Gavin going up near the stage to dance to one of the Chinese moon numbers.  We had no idea what he was up to when he stepped down from his chair to move forward.  By the time we realised what was happening, both of us were laughing like crazy and I had to use a napkin to shield my face from the embarrassment as well as the laughter.

Then we shook our heads and asked each other, “Eh, your son ah?”

I haven’t been giving the man enough attention of late and I’m so aware of that.  I am not ignoring him of course but I realised that I have in a sense, neglected him quite a bit recently. 

He has been asking me to have breakfast with him since I’m free during this period and yet I said no, preferring to sit in front of the computer every morning.  He has also asked me to watch Hairspray with him but I didn’t exhibit any interest.  I don’t sent him off to the door when he leaves the house unless he ask and neither do I sound warm when he calls back every evening.

I guess it cannot be helped because I did say that since the boy arrived, both our affections have been transferred.   I know I have also been too self-focused during this stage to look after his needs and interests.  And I like to think that I’m not alone behaving this way.

But those aside, I really need to do more.  With him.

While there is nothing wrong with our relationship at the moment, I have to consciously tell myself to be more attentive to him because he is afterall, the one I’m going to grow old with.

So this morning, when he asked me to have breakfast with him again, I agreed even though I was slightly reluctant to leave my computer.  And he was very happy, even though I made him wait a good 15 mins so that I can finish up whatever I was doing online.

Note to self:  I is not belong to the computer only!  

My hairstylist was lamenting to me that he can no longer go out for any drinking sessions in the evenings because his two teenage daughters would take turns to call him, asking his whereabouts as early at 11pm.  As such, he felt pressured to drop his drinking plans altogether and go home immediately. Of course he wasn’t too pleased especially because he doesn’t have a history of being checked by his wife.  

(Maybe his wife was beside his daughters all those times and he didn’t know.  Ha.) 

But he concedes that he is lucky because he cited a friend, whose wife uses the kid as a means to control the husband’s movement by making the little one call him every 15 mins or so, everytime he is out with the friends.

(Wa.  The woman is such a sly!)

Well, since having a kid, I don’t check on mine so much either.  However, with the boy growing up and becoming more aware of what is happening around him, things have changed recently.  Just the other night, he asked me why daddy is always out.  Well…in a negative tone I would say.  When informed about this, the man threw his arms in the air , protesting that he’s gonna lost his freedom because his son is “monitoring his movements”.

I swear I have no part in influencing the boy.  I swear.  I swear.

(But I did ask the boy to make those phone calls to ask: “Daddy, come back early!”)

Just to prove to my son that mummy is not belong to the computer only.

But what I don’t say is that this is actually inspired by my blogging too.

I was looking forward to having some piping hot porridge at Ikea this morning again but it seems they only have it on certain days.   So I settled for a mee siam and ordered pancakes for the boy. 

Oh yesh, he skipped school this morning, thanks a slightly stuffy nose.  Effectively playing truant with mummy as his accomplice.

Guilty as snapped. Heh.