Last weekend, our little family hit the mall and my wife complained that shopping for boys is so boring. Girls have tons of clothes. She was right indeed. There are many cute outfits for girls. Our family is now dominated with testosterones and trains. We need to balance things out. Wouldn’t it be nice to have a daddy’s little girl?

Parenting is not easy, at least not for me. It’s a lifelong commitment. Obviously I can’t ship them back to Russia. There are tradeoffs, however, and time goes by so fast. Other than some discipline issues, Dao is now doing good on his own. We can enjoy a decent meal in a restaurant with him. Dan is already passing one, but still waking up and screaming on top of his lung every night. Taking him to a restaurant now is a nightmare, especially for the servers.

By the time Dan hits two, we could potentially have a third one. After having two boys, I admittedly prefer a girl although we have about 5% of a chance. A quick look and my wife’s and my family, we are male dominated, especially in our kids’ generation. Sure the chance is quite slim, but we have nothing to lose (other than sleep) if we would have a third boy. We’re still going to love him just as much. In fact, another boy would just make the house more fun.

Dealing with two boys with two opposite personality is quite a challenge. Whereas Dao is very careful and meticulous, Dan is careless and incautious. Dan walked right into the wall simply because he turned his head sideway instead of looking straight ahead. He banged his head against the exercise bike yesterday for the same reason.

When they play together, Dao takes his time to coupling the trains together. He makes sure the wheels align perfectly on the rails. Even I have to ask him to help me with it. When coupling the trains, I did the most obvious: connected the hooks together. One time I watched Dao did it. He pushes the train together and the hooks connected automatically. No wonder he calls himself the “engineer.” Then comes Dan pushing the trains and wrecking the track. Dao gets furious every time that happens. I have to calm down Dao and restrict Dan from messing up the trains.

Once Dao is into something, he stayed really focused. Dan just roams free all over the place, specially now that he is capable of walking. If I don’t hear him in a minute around the house, I better check the stairs. He’s probably climbing upstairs. He used to go downstairs facing in. Now he just tries to walk straight down. This guy is fearless. I am hoping that he’ll learn to be more careful soon.

Dan visited the allergist yesterday and unfortunately the result is not so good. He needs to avoid peanut, milk, egg, sesame and shell fish. His mom who is still nursing him needs to avoid those as well. Poor babes.

Dao went to the clinic last Friday and he’s still highly allergic to peanut and cashew. Speaking of Dao, he said some funny things today. When he was done eating, he said, “Đạo xong ăn.” He literally translated from English to Vietnamese.

The last few nights, he prefers one-piece pajama. The only problem is that when he needs to poop he has to unzip the entire suite. Last night when he needed to go, he called me, “Daddy, I need to go poo-poo. The poops wake up.” Really, the poops wake up?

Seeing his mom coming home from work, Dao opened the door and greeted, “Hello mommy! I miss you very much.” He went on, “Do you have something special for me?”

As we walked to our car yesterday from the daycare another Asian kid, probably a bit younger than Dao, was screaming while walking with his mom. I asked Dao, “Why is he screaming?” He replied, “Because he’s not listening. Bạn hông có ngoan.”

At dinner time last night, Dan fell and hit the chair. he had a deep cut in his upper eye right above his upper eyelid like he has a blepharoplasty. We knew that he was alright when he took toys from Dao and ran toward me. It’s always painful to see your kids getting hurt. The playground accident with Dao still haunts me. The good thing is that Dao’s head is very hard. My mother compares his head to a coconut.

I know I always whine about how hard it is to have kids, but they do changed my life. I am thankful everyday to see them play and grow.

I am no scientist nor psychologist, but being a father who witnesses his kids grow everyday allows me to conclude that kids are born with personality. What do I mean by that? Let’s get back to the beginning.

When my wife and I were married, we knew we wanted to have kids, but not right away. We want to enjoy our time before diving into the parent thing. At the same time, we had no obligation not to. Well, Dao didn’t let us wait. He didn’t let us decide when he should be born. He decided to come out on his own term. We were a bit unexpected, but very joyful nevertheless. So now everything he wants to do, he does it on his own. One day he decided to sleep overnight. One day he suddenly decided to walk. No matter how many times we tried to get him off his diaper, one day he just did it on his own. We fought everyday trying to brush his teeth. Now he just does it all by himself. The hardest part about this personality is that he is very hard to control.

With Dan, we had a clearer plan because we knew that we wanted a younger sibling that is close enough for Dao to play with. As a result, Dan is much more cooperative (at least for now). He doesn’t fight back when I brush his teeth. He just bites my finger. He doesn’t refuse food when we feed him. He doesn’t demand much like his older brother, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t a badass. Still I predict that we won’t have as much time with Dan than Dao. Let’s see when he reaches his terrible-two stage.

We finally figured out Dan’s first love. When he was grumpy and sleepy, he wouldn’t take milk, water nor snack. The only thing that would calm him down was Thanh Thao’s Nonstop. As soon as he heard the music, he would not only stop crying, but also go to sleep. Not sure how he found the club beat to be so soothing. He was actually sleeping with his right foot still tapping. Unbelievable.

We went to the mall today and grandma told us to swing by my sister-in-law’s house for dinner. Her house is about 10 minutes from the mall. I put on the album a bit loud to jam on our way over. By the time we arrived, he was also knocked out. So I stayed in the car catching up my reading while he was sleeping.

When we first arrived to the mall, Dao took a nap so I waited in the car and read. Before that we went to the grocery and Dan was sleeping. So I stayed in the car and read. It’s always a good idea to bring a book along when traveling with kids. It’s a waste of gas to keep the car running, but it’s definitely worth it.

After being forced to brush his teeth, Dao complained: “Daddy, I don’t like that. You’re not nice. You’re not listening. That’s why I am not your best friend. You will be alone… all yourself.” Wow, five sentences at once. I was a bit shocked, but then realized that if he fails at whatever he pursues in his career, he could always make a decent living at the fish market.

As we walked upstairs to go to bed, he slammed the safety gate and woke up Dan. I ordered him to go into his room and I went into Dan’s room to sooth him back to sleep. Then I heard him cried in the other room shouting, “I want my mommy. I want my best friend.” He ran out to the gate and creamed, “Mommy, please come up here with me.” He didn’t hear any response so he peaked into our room. I felt bad so I told him to come and join us. He ran in, lied next to me and said, “Daddy, I lost my best friend.” All I could do was holding him tight and said, “Your best friend will be up soon.” This little guy is a heartbreaker.

My nose has been bleeding daily. Getting out of the heated car to the outside temperature could easily trigger the breakage. I felt the blood flooding down my nose this morning as I dropped Dan off to grandma. For a second I almost passed out.

It’s definitely caused by the dryness of the cold, but the cough syrups and coffee might have made it worse. My cough is gone so I am not taking any more syrups and I am trying to take it easy on the coffee, but it is so damn hard.

For the past week, Dan woke up almost every two hours. He’s probably teething or his allergy is bothering him. I can’t wait for him to see the allergist next week. When he got up he rubbed his face against the pillow to the point that made electric static; therefore, I had to pick him up to sooth him back to sleep. He slept much better on my shoulder than on the bed.

The first few nights I was quite cranky, but now I am getting used to it. The only problem is that I really need caffeine in the morning to get by, but then this whole nose bleed is giving me no choice. I don’t want to go back to cauterization, which helped for a few ears, again. It burns like crazy.

It occurred to me today that Dan had not worn a pair of shoes yet even though he already started walking for a week. Because of the weather, he had been walking mostly inside the house barefoot or with socks. This late afternoon I took him straight to Stride Rite to get his first pair of shoes.

I picked out three pairs for him. Getting him to tried them was not hard at all. I remember trying get Dao to put on the shoes took quite a bit of efforts. Dao is very resistance. He wouldn’t do anything I asked him to. Dan, on the other hand, would do anything I would like him to. He trusts me completely. The funny thing was that he didn’t know what to do once the shoes were on. He just looked at his feet and wondered why he was wearing them. I would never forget that expression on his face.

I couldn’t get him to walk so I picked the pair that I liked the most. After paying for it, I held his hand and we walked together. He started out walking on his toes, but once we got to the big water fountain he began to walk on his feet. I let go of his hand and we walked like a little drunk kid. Five minutes later he was speed-walking all over the mall. I was too excited as well as too anxious that I forgot to film his first walk.

After we left the mall, he drank regular cow milk and slept. Today I am transitioning him from breast milk to cow milk. He took the first sip of cow milk and tossed the bottle. Five minutes later I gave it to him again and he drank it all.

I really enjoyed spending my last day of the long holiday break with him. I will never forget this fond memory with my lil Dan.

Please put down that iPad, iPhone, iPod, laptop or any Internet-connected device and play with your kids. That goes for yours truly as well.