Priceless Mother's Day "gift" from my son

I had the best Mother’s Day ever last Sunday.


I started the day with a simple quiet breakfast at the neighbourhood mamak. Doesn’t sound like a big deal right? Well, it is to me. I seldom get to have breakfast out, or a leisurely quiet peaceful breakfast for that matter. My son and sis were with me but that was fine. I was pleased that my son’s appetite has returned after his illness. He shared a thosai and roti telur, which is really good in terms of the amount he gobbled up!

My husband treated us (inc my sister) later that day to a scrumptious dim sum lunch. Now, the priceless bit was when my son fed himself porridge. He just kept on spooning it out from the plastic Ikea bowl into his mouth, all by himself! There was of course a lot of mess (on the table, his sweater, his pants etc) as this is his very first time he was feeding himself so much. In the past month of trying to get him to feed himself, it was just 2 or 3 spoonfuls and he’d stop. He polished off half a bowl of porridge and half a deep fried yam dumpling (“woo kok”).

He still needs a lot of practice feeding himself e.g. with sticky food stuff, with grains, with thin soups, with cutting into smaller pieces, with different shaped and sized cutlery and crockery etc etc. I was nonetheless incredibly happy – it’s one small step towards independence. My husband was very happy too and took a photo of him feeding himself! : )

By the way, we bring with us a plastic Munchkin fork and spoon whenever we eat out, and use the same set at home so that he gains confidence on exactly the same shape and size cutlery. It’s sold in a set of 8 differently coloured forks and spoons. It coincidentally matches the Ikea set of differently coloured plastic plates and bowls. The handle of the fork and spoon are thick (width wise) but are hollowed out so it’s not heavy, and has grooves on the bottom, which I believe all aid a young child’s grip and effort in feeding himself.

After lunch, it was off to the hairdresser’s with my sis. We both hadn’t had our hair cut since January! It’s messy and we weren’t planning on keeping it long. It’s just that with all that happened since the year started, I simply didn’t have time to have a haircut. Sunday was as good a day for it. I enjoyed the hair wash, head massage, neck and upper back massage that was thrown in! So good!

That was followed by dinner at an Italian restaurant (that doesn’t use MSG). It was perfect. The ambience was relaxed and casual – none of that stuffy fine dining. The food was good – the chef’s Italian – so good that many customers without reservations were turned away. I had checked it out on the internet before leaving the house, and my son indicated he wanted the house specialty pizza. He ate quite well too, finishing 1.5 pieces.

There were so many good moments during the day but the highlight of the day was when he fed himself porridge. It was simply a priceless Mother’s Day “gift” from him! I hope those mothers reading, also had a wonderful day, if not the best Mother's Day ever too!