restlessness

claire seemed very restless after 3 weeks of hol. she's most happy when she meets her cousins for bfst and to play.

well, maybe it's the raging hormones age. maybe, it's just her fidgety nature. maybe, she's got too much energy.

she looked like she just couldn't settle down to do her work well. i reckon it was the uncomfortable dining chairs that resulted in her not wanting to sit at the living room area. so, doing hmewrk for her is simply sitting on the floor at TV area, and bearing with all distractions. this caused her hmewrk assignment to take longer time to complete, not even mentioning about she taking time in between to do other things like i-touch, hp or talk/ watch tv.

i hv alerted to hubby to getting new chairs. but he prefers to wait for the renovation work to be completed in the rooms, which i couldn't understand. they are independent matters. i will convince him to doing the shopping with me soon...else, claire's posture will suffer.

just last nite, this audacious girl saw me lying down on the sofa working on my math problem sums.

she asked,"mommy, i thot u said we must watch out for our posture!"

i 'retaliated', "i'm not doing work, just running thru questions!"

she rattled on a little bit more, so i decided to get up....痛脚被抓，我还能躺得那么舒服吗？

then, claire alerted me that she needs help on sat morn to work on her chinese compo. i casually answered,"no need lah. u sure can do it! just look thru the book with gd phrases and copy here and there lah...that's how i learnt when i was young too!"

she started whining,"u always dun help me. i cannot handle myself. it's very tough this time round. i dunno what to write!"

in a fit of mild rage over her whining tone, i said,"then sign up for creative writing class and attend weekly sat lesson lor!"

ha, u could imagine the silent battle break out again!

from her view, i wasnt helpful. but from my perspective, she's 11 this yr and needs to develop independence. i knw it's not an easy stage, but what i like to see is, a kid needs to put in effort to try...always seeking help from the parent will only paralyse them in due course.

when she argued that i'm not giving her much help, i started my story again," u hv so much and yet always demanding for more. soon, u will find ur friends all leaving u, and u will be left with nothing!" ha, there went my harsh statement again.

so, she kept silent and showing the moods again.

sleeping time at 11 plus....we went in to the bedroom, but she was still sulking. reaching puberty, i guess, since many things were done and said without rational thinking process.

when i tried to patch up by asking her,"eh claire, who told u that 'kungfu panda' is a nice movie?"

she just mumbled,"...everybody". "who's everybody?" i quizzed.

"everybody lah, those who hv seen the show!" such an elusive answer from her.

i surrendered, lord.

not easy to deal with at this age. parenting can be difficult, esp when kids are never satisfied with so many things that they own. yet, to make them see the rational side of things seems to be a tall, challenging affair.