If I had to describe my child, I would say she was a small, round ball of fluff that bursts into a colourful fire cracker when poked, rolls and bounces off walls most of the time from lunacy and tastes of marshmallows but does not smell like one at all. No, my girl is smelly.

I’m only kidding. She smells of kid’s shampoo because her hair is so thick that she needs to use lots of it! Mind you, she has lots of hair everywhere thus lots of hair to shampoo! We spend enough money on shampoo every month that could feed a starving child in Africa. It’s like bathing a shaggy puppy. Bless.

My girl has a smart ass mouth. The Hubs thinks its genetic and I tend to agree reason being she doesn’t watch TV so there is no attitude influence coming from those smart ass American tweens, thus concluding it must be purely genetic. It’s not clever having a smart ass mouth as I have discovered only 30 years late so I do hope she can curb it sooner than later. Or she would have to learn the hard way as I have. This is her biggest weakness, being bossy and having a smart ass mouth.

My child has a maturity beyond her years, something my teachers and principals repeatedly told my parents and I used to think, don’t they have anything more interesting to say about me??? But she really does. She just gets it, emotional and social concepts, with a snap. Good and bad, but when it comes to memorising her Bahasa Words, she’s nowhere near as enthusiastic as reading The Secret Garden…….le sigh. She loves reading and I’m ecstatic that her reading repertoire have ranged from the wild magics of Harry Potter to the innocence of Enid Blyton to Hollywood movie trash to old English Classics to Archie and Tin Tin comics, to Rick Riordan to Roald Dahl to Judy Blume to Johanna Spyri to George Orwell to we’d be seriously here all night if I carried on. The girl has read more than me and I’m more than four times her age. She brings a book wherever she goes and even to school when her school bag is already so heavy! She reads in the toilet, she reads before bed, she re-reads her books and I know that ideas are churning inside that big head of hers all the time. She has some amazing ideas and they’re all from the books that she reads. This doesn’t mean that she’s necessarily good in English!

My child, she rates her family above all else and loves us with such fierce passion. I will bask in all her sunshine whilst it lasts, for I know with only a twink and she’d soon be trotting off with new interests, such as the big B. How I will absolutely dread that day although she promises us that she wants to stay with us forever and take great care of us in our old age rather than be with boys. Boys? Who needs boys!!! It will happen sooner than I want and I know that for a fact. I’m confident though that she has the insight (well trained by her mother) to choose a beau just like her Daddy. The BEST!!! And she knows it too…..in fact, she says no boy is better than her Daddy so she will marry her Daddy after all. There is no place for incest but for the purity of her love I will share him.

The largest asset (ironically her name spelt backwards) would have to be her incredible heart of gold that she’s inherited from her Nana. I have been told by my own mother that I have a really good heart whenever I wonder what my in-laws think of me and coming from my own mom, that is quite an honour. But my child, she draws tears of joy out of my eyes whenever she reveals her generosity of love to her baby sister who many a time fights against the grain for the pure fun of doing so. And my child, my special child, she always relents; not out of weakness at all but for the pure love for the only sister that she’ll ever have. She knows it too and will always put her family above all else. She’s fiercely loyal and for that I am grateful. Recently, her Nana bought the 2 girls a Hello Kitty beauty bath set and T2 naturally wanted to bathe immediately. T1 on the other hand, told me she was torn. My goodness, what a word to use as a child. I asked her, “Torn? What are you torn about?????” I mean, is a child’s life so hard? She said that although she was really happy that Nana bought it for her, she was thinking about giving it to her friend who really, REALLY loved Hello Kitty who happens to be a very sweet girl at school. “But how can I give away something that Nana gave me, right?” I un-torned her…..We split the beauty set into different parts so that T1 could keep some of the stuff and give some of it away to her friend. She was happy with that arrangement.

My child is a manipulator of sorts and can engineer the winds to go her way when she needs to. Such power can get dangerous in such young hands and I know when her answers to my questions have a millisecond delay because her curious mind is plotting which answer would get her the best benefit. I catch her out many times but I’m sure she’s also sniggering secretly behind my back at some.

She is very creative as she strives to be unique. I challenge her all the time and I know she’s got that X factor within to go far. It wouldn’t bother me so much if she didn’t score good grades at school because who wants to miss out on the real good stuff! But it is the competitive streak of other parents that stresses me out! Let’s face it, in order to get great grades, work needs to be done. She could either have a great childhood living real life learning cool concepts having fun and being incredibly happy or spend that time chasing the 100% score that may earn her a scholarship. I was a part scholarship student and I don’t remember getting any straight A’s let alone 100% marks!! Unfortunately, the benchmarks have altered today but hopefully, the top tier of heads will recognise quality when presented. It is not just about getting straight A’s that make a great person, it isn’t even about getting straight A’s and being multi-talented (although I think that if you have spent so much time slogging away to get that place to perform at Carnegie Hall then perhaps you do deserve a scholarship!) but more what you can do for the world. My two cents and sour grapes but honestly though, I know people who have had straight A’s, won many awards in several fields music included, graduating from Harvard, yet are failing in life miserably. What gives? Obviously, straight A’s account for a very small part of life – it shows you have worked hard.

My child, she eats very well and poos well too! She used to have a sweet tooth and still does but after being educated and being made more aware of the crap that she constantly puts into her body, a body that she is meant to love, she is now a lot more vigilant and disciplined in her food choices. I am really proud of her. Sometimes she even reminds me of MY food choices which is fantastic. We support each other in this healthy eating journey which I really, really want for my family because I want us to live long and healthy without the bane of cancer or other heart diseases or any health issues for that matter. It won’t hit you now but if you don’t start now, you may regret it later. Eating well does not mean a lousy life at all. T1’s favourite food is still American based such as pizzas and burgers, she likes pastas and Japanese and Korean; pretty much a carnivore. But of late, she eats salads too but because she is a growing child, we make sure she always have lots of protein and carbs to go with her meals. What she does love is ice-cream and cupcakes, just like her Mama……oh, and chocolate too; and she absolutely detests durian, just like her Daddy.

She is still a kid at heart being almost 8 years old and spends her time enjoying playgrounds and playing crazily with her sister. She mixes well with kids from all ages and backgrounds having witnessed this recently at the last orphanage we visited last Sunday. She had never met the dozens of bare footed kids but within 5 minutes of our arrival, she was already laughing and bouncing up and down on the trampoline with them. I think that it will be our regular playground and hopefully she will gain some lasting friendships in there to inspire them and no doubt she will also learn some valuable lessons from them.

Although she is mature for her age, she still has a great life of being a kid with a relationship with the Tooth Fairy and Santa Claus and Jesus Christ and how many kids have travelled the way she has? By next year, she would be 8 and would have travelled to every single continent of the world except Africa, South America and Antartica. We’re working on it! Perhaps in a few years time, we’ll make a trip to see poverty in Africa……then Chile or Brazil for the World Cup! I don’t think I ever want to do the Antartic, haha. My cousin has been on an Arctic Cruise to see the hump back whale and we saw her photos – FASCINATING STUFF! Maybe one day……

T1 is doing very well as a kid but it still tends to get boring every time I go to school for a report card because they only have good things to say and nothing to improve upon. *sigh* Nobody is perfect and surely there is something to work on, right? But no, according to her school, she is perfect where she is. Boring……and this is with T1 NOT having perfect grades………so you see? Perhaps the school also realises something we don’t, that good grades isn’t everything. Everyone has their benchmarks on what good grades are, aren’t they? Mine is 100%, poor T1.

My T1, she has such a unique personality, the stamp of T1 and many people have noticed this – such a precocious little girl confident in the ways of the kiddy world, sweet and pretend shy at instances, vocal with what she strongly believes in, loud and noisy when all guards are down (meaning no teachers in sight! as discipline is very strong at school) humorous with a sharp wit making her classroom laugh all the time (she’s the classroom clown!); she’s loving and giving and makes all things so much worth living.

Recently at Math, the teacher started teaching the class about fractions and percentages and when the teacher said the work Prime (referring to Prime Numbers), T1 immediately shouted out Minister?? And then of course, she went on to make jokes about the Prime Minister and prime numbers (pun intended, they are allowed at International School to speak up and learn actively with lots of discussion and exchange of ideas) which made the entire class laugh but it was a great thing because now the whole class associates the Prime Minister with numbers that can only be divided by themselves and nothing else.

I’m loving my T1. She’s a great, GREAT kid if I may say so myself.

But don’t mind me. I might be biased.

Just so you know, the above was written because I had homework one night. I came home and sat there on the couch was an A4 piece of paper requesting me to write an essay as punishment for going out. The title of the essay could be MY CHILD or WHY GOING OUT AT NIGHT IS BAD FOR ME.

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Who is Mamapumpkin?
Mamapumpkin is a former Design Architect turned Multi-Million Dollar Digital Entrepreneur. She sets out to prove to all that you can have anything and everything that you want; if you have that fire of desire burning within and the drive to work hard. Even better with much love.

Mamapumpkin has not only grown corporate businesses successfully in the past and doubled her salary 5 times over 5 organisations but has grown THREE BUSINESSES to 7 FIGURES within an 8 year period. She now shows others EXACTLY HOW after retiring her own husband from employment. He is now the official dog walker, family driver, chef and THE BEST FATHER to their two girls and THE BEST HUSBAND to the woman who CHOSE HIM!

Mamapumpkin is the girl who has nothing but fights for everything including YOU. She is idealistic in her desire to put unbelievable amounts of money and extrardinary happiness into the lives of good people so we can change the world together believing in happiness for ALL. She strives to impact lives authentically wanting to reduce poverty cycles and enable quality education for all and always supports the voiceless. She believes we can all have a life of our own desires to enable real contribution into the world. But first, one needs to understand what this all means.

A beautiful life without limits.

If you wish to learn how to propel your life forward guaranteed, be brave to take action. Mamapumpkin's purpose is to build people. Her gift is to help them UNCOVER their HIDDEN GIFTS. She operates fairly and always leaves an impression. You either love her or not and she is alright either way.

She is a living testimony that women really can have a lot. Being financially and time free has enabled her to travel the world anytime, anywhere, doing anything with anyone, as she spends most of her days with her children, having fun, supporting others wherever she can. Also having fun.