Monday Musings: Reflections on blogging

This is how blogging looks like these days.
I only get to write after the kids are asleep, and I use the time spent writing to unwind,
with the buzzing baby monitor for company, as well as a nice hot cup of milo.
I blog on my laptop, which has one key cover missing courtesy of Lil J's itchy fingers. I
ronically, the letter that is missing is the most used alphabet for us: J. 

Writing this blog has been quite a journey. It started off as a means to record our life as a family and Junior J's milestones, and along the way, our learning activities and crafts got added to the mix. I've discovered that I love to share what we do, as I've been inspired greatly by the sharing of other mums. Blogging also builds community in a variety of ways, and I've been blessed by the people I've gotten to know through this blog. I'm thankful that God gives these avenues for self-expression and for linking up with others.

Speaking of community, I'm really excited that we've been selected as a finalist in the Family Blog category in the Singapore Blog Awards! I'm still in shock, but also very thankful, especially for all the support we've gotten from our friends and family. Thank you, dear readers, for reading, for leaving comments, for your encouragement and prayers. I thank God for all of you. 

That's us, at the bottom right corner. (But I think the pictures do shift each day.)

Here's how you can vote:
1. Hop over to this page. 
2. You should get a prompt to sign into your Facebook account, if you are not signed in.
3. Sign in, and click on the "Family category", and click the vote button! We are signed up under the blog's name "Mum in the Making". :)

You can vote once a day for each category, for the whole month of July, and I'm really grateful for those who have voted for us. Thank you so much! I'm feeling rather shy to ask for votes, so I guess I'm not going to mention about voting anymore. Do check out the other blogs, and I'm sure you'll be able to find some that you might like to bookmark for your reading. 

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The blog awards aside, I've been invited by another mum blogger, Estella, to blog about my writing process as part of a blog hop. I enjoy reading Estella's blog, especially her posts on home and design (after all, most of my regular reads are design blogs). I also admire her optimistic nature, and how it shines in her posts, since I know it must tough doing solo-parenting as her hubby is now based overseas. You can read her about her writing process here.

Anyway, I thought it was apt to take you behind the scenes of this blog, especially as an introduction for those who are hopping over from the blog awards page, so here goes:

a. What am I working on? 

I'm currently trying to finish a few reviews, while trying to sort out the boys' homeschooling activities. I'm hoping to share more about homeschool and our journey, as we stumble along figuring out how to live and learn with the boys. It's both exciting and a little scary at times, having the responsibility of education placed squarely on our shoulders, and I hope to share more in the future. I'm also hoping to work on more crafty ideas, which I would love to share in time to come!

b. How does my work differ from others in its genre?  

The blog is a reflection of our life. As each family is unique, our experiences and journey would differ too, and I guess that means each blog tells a different story. In general, I tend to shy away from most reviews, and as a family we like pottering in parks, so we are probably not quite the usual parenting lifestyle blog you'd go to for the latest happenings and giveaways. We homeschool, so you'll be reading a lot more about learning, and not so much about tips on surviving or preparing for Primary school. 

c. Why do I write what I do? 

I guess I write because I enjoy the process of writing, of putting feelings and thoughts into words. I also like the idea of chronicling down the story of our family, and telling our story through text as well as photos. I've learnt that words can be powerful, and with the internet and social media, words do have a lot of impact, and can be either a positive or negative influence. I am hoping that this blog can be used for good: for championing social causes (like our recent fund-raiser for MINDS), for sharing how motherhood can be tough, life can be messy, but how children are such blessings. Also, I hope that by writing about homeschooling, we can increase awareness about this alternative for education, and also remove common misconceptions about socialization and the need to be perfect parent educators. 

d. How does my writing process work? 

I don't really follow a set process for writing. Most times, I have a topic that I wish to write about, and then it usually takes a few days to slowly write a post (Writing relaxes me, but I am a slow writer and words do not come easily to me.). Sometimes I already have photos I would like to use, sometimes I go about snapping and editing photos to suit the post. Sometimes, the photos are the ones that inspire the post. It's relatively free-flow!

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To continue this blog hop, I've invited two of my favourite bloggers to share their own writing process:

Evelyn is a mum to two, and one of the coolest mums I know. I really enjoy reading her blog because of her ability to write well, and I've invited her because I am so curious to find out more about her writing process. 

You'd enjoy reading the thoughts and reflections on her blog, as well as the crafts that she shares. She blogs over at "The Bottomups Blog", and you can read about her blogging process here.

Susan is mum to little Sophie, and I take my hat off to how she manages to juggle between work, motherhood, crafting, preparing healthy meals and exercising. She is also a fellow "washi-oholic" who loves her tapes! She is a great example and shows that it is possible to find time amidst our busyness to get moving and get fit, and she blogs over at "A Juggling Mum". You can find out more about her writing process here. 

Monday Musings: Decluttering

I spent the weekend clearing out the study, as we're expecting family to stay with us in the coming week. Remember that crazy mess in there? It now looks a little better, but there's still a lot to pack. Getting started was overwhelming, since we had so much stuff! We had all these things from years back, that just got moved from our parents homes, to our homes (hubby's parents even brought down his stuff all the way from Penang). Then I was a hoarder: I can't seem to throw recyclables since I always have projects in my mind, and I have difficulty letting go of sentimental stuff. And I have alot of half-done home decor projects/items sitting around waiting to be sorted. It was a recipe for domestic disaster. Add to that my perfectionist streak, which makes me procrastinate... and well, you just have mess upon mess, and it was drowning us. 

I realized I just had to get down to throwing out lots of stuff, and that going slow gets you there quicker than going nowhere. So my parents kindly took the older kids on two evenings, and I stayed up late to declutter. Throwing out all the random dusty bits and bobs felt liberating! We packed off a whole pile of books to friends, and another pile is waiting to go over to be donated to Dignity Kitchen, where proceeds from the books support the disabled and disadvantaged. (We figured Salvation Army is usually swamped by books, so we wanted an alternative!) 

I've realized that its not that hard to throw out sentimental stuff, all I do is take a photo of it, before I throw it out or give it away. The one that is tougher would be certain gifts from friends or family: do you keep them even though you don't use them, or do you re-gift them? I'm still struggling with regards to this area. How about you? What do you do with stuff from others? Is re-gifting taboo for you?

Linking up with:

Monday Musings: Keeping it real

I like to take pretty pictures of what we do. Or of our house. And I've been getting questions on how we keep the house so neat. So I thought a glimpse into another part of the house was in order:

This was the state of our study room a couple of weeks back when I was trying to clean it out. This room usually looks like an explosion has gone off in a bookstore or educational store. Given its current messy state, we hardly use this room, and we tend to just shove things in there to get things out of sight. It's still a work in progress. 

Our living room usually boasts a huge mountain of unfolded laundry on the sofa. There are toys scattered on the floor everywhere, and most days it is a struggle to get the boys to mind and help to clean up their messes. The dining table usually has a pile of half-opened mail, and books and toys and all manner of paper clutter. 

So why am I talking about all these messes? I just thought I should mention them, as a reminder that we are just perfectly ordinary people, with our ordinary messes (and a ginormous mess, looking at our study room, sobs!). Our home isn't totally organized or neat. You just tend to see the nicer, neater bits on the blog, because I love taking photos of the nicer, neater parts. It helps me to feel a little better, especially on crazy chaotic days, knowing that there are at least these nice little corners at home where the whole crazy whirlwind of life hasn't really left their mark. However, this blog is about the snippets of our life and what we do. And our life in general can be chaotic and messy, and at most times not picture-perfect, so I guess this post is just checking in and keeping it real. 

I'm no supermum, and our home's not "Home and Decor" picture-worthy. We have our beautiful messes. I'm still working on that study, and hopefully in time to come it'll be a room we could actually use. Meanwhile, let's celebrate the ordinary, and don't forget that what you see in blogs is just the lovely edited corners of someone's life!

Have a blessed week!

Monday musings: Light at the end of the tunnel

Picture taken at Taroko Gorge, Taiwan

Junior J is much better now, and we can say that we are seeing some light at the end of the tunnel... :)  We must say a big thank you to all those dear people who left us messages empathizing with our situation, those who prayed for us, and those who popped by to visit (even when they were actually had alot of work to do).  It has been such a great blessing to have such concerned and caring friends and family!

After my post on Saturday, the boy actually seemed to get worse and his fever spiked up beyond 39 degrees, leaving him restless, cranky and uncomfortable... He spent Saturday night crying and tossing around, and much as we tried, we were unable to make the boy eat his fever meds since he wised up to us trying to introduce all those weird tasting syrups to him in various ways. We were getting a little desperate when a nurse friend suggested we try using paracetamol suppositories, so hubby popped by KKH to get some (Thanks, Strawberry!).  Thankfully he managed to get the meds in, and the boy's fever went down after that.  However, we had given him his antihistamine as well, which made him go gaga in the middle of the night (he woke up and wanted the hubby to carry him to and fro between the windows in our living room, to see the cars in the carpark, at 4 am in the morning!).   

He was much better on Sunday.  The fever was down thanks to the meds, and his coughing was less "tight" and frequent.  We left off the antihistamine yesterday night, so he slept pretty well save for a few bouts of coughing.  Today saw him toddling around the house as per normal, and the fever's gone.  His cough still bothers him though, and he's still really sticky and insists I stay with him, especially at night.  And we're still having a really tough time trying to get his antibiotics in (3 times a day, for 10 days, but I'm very doubtful we'll be able to last out that long!).  I don't blame him, since the smell of the amoxicillin makes me want to puke as well, and has been causing him to have diarrhoea. :(  

Ah well!  I'm glad all in all he's taken a turn for the better... and on an totally unrelated note (except perhaps that its related to Taiwan like the picture above), here's a really interesting concept: An exhibition hall, made from recycled plastic bottles.  

AP Photo/Chiang Ying-ying (Via The Star Online)

Called the EcoARK, this is the going to be the main exhibition hall for the Taipei International Floral Exposition that is set to open in November this year.  The structure is built using polli-bricks, which are formed from reprocessing plastic bottles, and is strong enough to withstand major earthquakes and storms.  Also, the structure cost less to build compared to a conventional steel and glass structure, and the processing of plastic produces less carbon emissions compared to if glass was manufactured.  Cool huh? And green too!  Read the full article here.

Here's to a great week ahead! :)