K took D’s brand new toy without asking. D wanted it back. The kids got into a fight. The parents pulled the kids out and explained to them the important of sharing.

K’s mom opened a brand new toy for K. It’s the toy that D also loved. D asked to play, but K said no and K’s mom said that it is K’s toy and he can’t play with it because he didn’t share his toy. D went crazy.

Instead of teaching the valuable lesson on playing together, the adult took the revenge on the kid.

This morning I took Đán to preschool, but forgot that it is closed today. When the guy at the front desk told us that, Đán’s face lid up. I said to him, “Let’s go back home.” He replied, “Yes, I am so proud of you, daddy.”

At dinner time last night, Đán went to the restroom and went back out. I told him to wash his hand before he eat. He argued back, “I didn’t touch my cu (penis).”

On Monday, I took him to the pediatrician for his four-year checkup. He did everything the doctor told him to do such as hopping and balancing with one foot, reading the shapes on the board for his eyes test, and answering a few questions. He took three shots on his arms, cried a little, and went for some donuts.

I am indeed very proud of him. I enjoy spending time with them now more than before. We can actually go places without all of the extra baggage. It will be tough with another one on the way.

Đạo is at lesson 39 with Let’s Read: A Linguistic Approach. We have been reading three to four lessons each night. He shows tremendous improvement. When we read together Đán also wants to read. I started him with the alphabet. The book doesn’t have the letters in the alphabetical order. It starts with A, I, Q, and so on. For the past five days, I couldn’t get Đán to get past the first two letters. He doesn’t seem to be focused or he’s having a hard time recognizing the letters. It’s frustrating and worrisome at the same time because he’s turning four soon. I am hoping that he’s not focusing. I’ll talk to his teachers today to see if they can help him or figure out if he has some learning disability.

On a rainy Saturday, my sister-in-law’s husband and I took the boys to Kid Junction. What I like about this place is that the boys can play for five or six hours by themselves and I can read my book. They got to do some physical activities on the multi-level climber and be off the iPad. It’s well-worth the ten-dollar-admission for each kid. It’s a good marketing strategy that adults are always free.

As I cut my boys loose and enjoyed reading my book at the cafe table, a mom asked if she and her two-year-old girl could share the table. As we had our little chitchat, she asked me if I had any ground rule for the kids when they were younger. She and her husband are having difficult time with the little girl because she doesn’t understand or listen yet.

I gave her my honest answer. I had no rule in place and I improvised my way through. Although I am flattered that she asked me, but I am the wrong guy to ask. I am not good at parenting. In fact, I am terrible at it. All the things kids do that I despised when I was not a parent, my kids had done it or doing it. When I refrained from spanking them, all the rules and disciplines broke. Even when they disrespected me by hitting or screaming at me, I took them. It angered me, but it would hurt me more if I hit them. It’s a horrific feeling to hit my children, something I wouldn’t do to anyone else. Rising kids have been extremely stressful for me, but things are getting better. My six-year-old still whines a lot, but he is no longer hitting. My soon-to-be four-year-old still does it every once in a while. He hits his brother more than us. I gave him timeout and other kind of disciplines. Though he’s a lovely kid most of the time.

As far as school goes, I had not done much for them. Đạo’s reading assessment dropped in the beginning of the school year. To help him read, I have been using Let’s Read. We have been reading three or four pages each night and his reading had improved. He recognizes the words quicker and reads faster. I am so glad that I have found this book in the library. I came across it while looking for a grammar book for myself.

Parenting is a long-term commitment with patience and discipline. It is a constant challenge. Even though the excitement of the third child is not as much as the first one, I am very much looking forward to seeing him. Again I’ll just go with the flow.

My three-year-old Đán and my six-year-old Đạo have very different ways of dealing with their emotion. Although Đán is younger, he is stronger in both physical and emotional. He doesn’t get offended easily. That’s why I love messing with him because he has a comeback for everything. When I joked, “I am going to smack you on your butt.” He would replied, “I’ll smack you on your face.” Because he doesn’t take insults too serious, he would always win verbal augments over Đạo. Even though Đạo knows more words than Đán, he gets extremely mad when the little guy said something back to him.

Đán also has a charming side. When he hurts someone unintentionally. He would give that person a kiss and make sure that whoever he hurt is OK. I often faked hurting just so he could give me a kiss. Đán loves dinosaurs and has no problem watching them eating each other on the Discovery channel. I am a bad parent for letting him watching violent video, but he understands that some dinosaurs eat other dinosaurs.

In addition, Đán always cracks me up. Like yesterday when I spilled coffee on the floor, he criticized me, “Daddy, you’re bad coffee bringer.” When I mopped up the floored, he gave me a compliment, “Daddy, you’re good cleaner.” This morning he wanted to eat instant noodle and I offered to cook for him, but he turned me down, “No daddy, you’re a bad cook. You burned popcorns the other day.” So his mom had to cook for him. I didn’t mind at all.

Đạo, on the other hand, takes emotion way too deep. I don’t mess around with him much because he could be easily offended. When he doesn’t get what he wanted, he would cry, “Nobody loves me.” Đạo is a very smart kid, but his emotion is his weakness. When I said no to him, he would say something like, “I don’t love you and I won’t get you any Lego for your birthday.” If I wanted to piss him off, all I had to say was, “I’ll buy [his favorite Lego] for myself.” He would go berserk. Then I have to calm him down. Sometimes I feel really horrible, but I don’t want him to be too emotional. It breaks my heart to see him takes things too serious.

Đạo’s charming, however, always melted my heart. He is a mama’s boy and has no problem express his love for her. Even when he was mad at her or vice versa, he always made sure that his mama still loved him. What he did yesterday made me all choked up and I would never forget the emotion on his face. Before going to school, he handed his mom his very favorite Lego figure and told her, “Mommy I want you to keep this so that when you miss me you could look at him.” I must admit. I was very envy of her. He never ever expressed that sentiment to me. What a lovely boy.

I talked to my wife every now and then about the kids’ emotional states. I sympathize and worry about Đạo. One day, a girl will break his heart if he doesn’t stay strong. In contrast, my wife feels bad for Đán. In a way, we treat him like he’s a big kid, but he’s only three. We unintentionally compare him to his older brother. I love Đán, but I am not worried about him as much. He always showed his independency. He can take care of himself and his older brother. I can’t wait to see how the third boy express his emotions.

I am pleased to announce that one more boy will be joining our little family early next year. I nicknamed him Done because we’re done with baby-making after him.

I must confess. I was hoping for a baby girl—even the boys wanted a baby sister so that mommy won’t be outnumbered—but we are happy with what we get as long as the baby is healthy. He is doing great so far.

My poor wife has been going through quite a bit of challenges in the first trimester. She has been experience nausea and fatigue much longer than she had in the past. She bears all the pains in carrying a new soul. Mad love and respect.

Last Monday I woke up with a migraine. Đán woke up with a fever. Đạo woke up and didn’t have to go to camp. Since all three of us stayed home, I decided to take them out for some light activities so their mom could do some work and rest.

We went to the park and they could play mini golf. I still think golf is extremely boring, but enjoyed watching them played. Then we took the train ride. Something about sitting and holding my sons on both arms and feeling the breeze took away my migraine.

In several occasions, the train ride had released my stress even for just a short five minutes. In that short period, mind was so clear and focused. Life felt simple and I treasured every second with the kids. I just closed my eyes and held on to them slightly tight. Not because I were afraid that they would fall of the train, but I needed the affection.

If I were to have five minutes left in this world, that how I would spend my time.

On several occasions, my three-year-old son corrected my word choice. I am both amused and grateful.

Me: You just spit on me.
Đán: You mean sneeze on you?

Me: Look at those dinosaur bones.
Đán: You mean fossils?

Me: Look there’s a cock.
Đán: You mean a rooster?

Last night my three-year-old Đán scratched his private area and bawled out. I shined a flashlight on him and saw that he had rashes all over. He was having some allergic reactions. I took off his pants, picked him up, and my wife gave him some Benadryl. To prevent him from scratching himself, I put him down and blew some air to soothe him. He fell back to sleep, but when I stopped, he said, “Daddy, blow me.” That was the first time in my life I had to give a blow job.

Early today as we made way toward the boardwalk, we spotted a bunch of girls in bikinis in the opposite direction. Đán said to me, “Daddy, there’s a lot of ‘con chim.’” He meant to say birds, but you have to know Vietnamese to understand the other context.

I haven’t blogged about my boys for a while and don’t even know where to begin. So much had happened in the past few months. I am just going to write what I can remember.

Let’s start with soccer. We signed up soccer camp for Đán again in the spring after he showed some interest in the sport from last winter. Every Saturday morning, I took him to soccer with Đạo tagging along. Unfortunately Đán had lost his focus and attention. He rather walked around the field than joined his friends and coaches for soccer. On the other hand, Đạo started to show interest in soccer. I wanted to sign him up, but they did not have class for his age. He ended up playing in Đán’s class. One of the coaches invited him to join the group and he had been part of the team ever since. With Đán I just let him do whatever he liked. If he didn’t want to play soccer, I let him roamed around the field. He could join in whenever he wanted too. Most of his teammates were in the same boat. They just ran and did whatever they wanted rather than paying attention to the coach. Poor dads chasing after their kids and giving them warnings again and again. It’s the middle-class problem. We paid for our kids to play soccer, but ending up babysitting them.

Lately Đán had been obsessed with dinosaurs. He took his dinosaur toys with him everywhere he went. He even knew how to pronounce their names. I nicknamed him the Đánosaur. My wife and I had a conference yesterday with one of his teachers and we were surprised to learn that she had no behavioral problem with him at the daycare. Then again she was a very strict teacher. She told us that he always shared his dinosaurs with his friends in class, something he hardly did at home with his brother and cousin. We were glad to have her as his teacher this year.

Đạo is also wrapping up his kindergarten with his fantastic teacher. On Monday, he and his friends performed 9 songs for us. Each song lasted a couple of bars. One of their favorite tunes were about Abraham Lincoln. After the performance, I asked him who was Abraham Lincoln and what did they mean when they sang, “he freed the slaves.” He responded, “Abraham Lincoln was our 16th president and he gave people money.” I learn new thing everyday through my kids.

Summer is coming and we had some vacationing lined up.