Monday, 30 March 2009

Nat's recent swimming lesson, where she dives underwater. She really enjoys swimming, quite the little water baby, she is. And of course, there are pictures of my little man, who loves to stand. I am happy that I have shifted one of the playpens back from my mum's place to mine and now he sleeps with me at night. He really is a sweetheart, you know.

Wednesday, 25 March 2009

It's interesting how your voabulary expands when you become a mum. One new word I learnt recently is babywearing. As far as I can remember, I have been a babywearer ever since nat was born. My very first babywearing tool is my trusty o'le Baby Bjorn sling. I have always had a fear of pushing strollers up and down escalators, so when gary is not with me, the sling is my only alternative. And it's been a great one. Nat loves it, she feels ever so secure in it and it gives her the flexibility and height to look all around. Sometimes she even falls asleep in it. When didi lucas came along, he adapted quickly to the bjorn as well. Sadly, the bjorn can take only up to 12kg and nat is fast reaching that weight. Therefore, I decided to buy another sling, I love it. It is called the Scootababy. Unlike the bjorn, the baby is placed in a very natural side position (similar to how you would carry baby without a sling). I feel less strain on my back and can actually carry nat and lucas for a long long time. Most importantly, I love the feeling of baby so close to me, kissing the top of their heads and smelling their wonderful baby smell.

Then of course, there is the perennial problem of staying on my job or quitting that always gets me moody. Some days, it feels so right and so logical to quit and stay home with the kids, especially when I increasingly feel that I am not spending enough time with didi lucas. He is such a dear sweet boy, who is always ready to shower mummy with a loving smile. Then, there are other days when I feel that having an independent income is important, especially when I love buying little knick knacks for my kids. With my maternity leave scheduled to finish in June, I know that this issue will constantly surface in my mind and affect my mood. Sigh ... well, life goes on.

Finally, I've been thinking of the kids' sleeping arrangements. After my breastfeeding days ended, both kids now sleep with my maid. But i do not think this is something I want to do long term. Should I have both kids sleep with us? Or just lucas? Or just nat? Decisions ... decisions ... no wonder I have been super grumpy and moody lately.

Tuesday, 17 March 2009

Parenting tips #1

Learning how to be a parent is really about knowing how to deal with the darnedest situations that the kids put you in. What do you do when your little one drops her bubble blower into the bubble bottle (filled with liquid soap), empties its contents trying to get the blower out, and screams blue murder over the loss of her precious bubbles?

Solution #1: Distraction. You try your best to switch her attention to the sand castle, the dogs on the beach, anything but the bubbles and bubble blower. But kids have a one-tracked mind when they are upset - this is doomed to failure.

Solution #2: Trickery. You replace the liquid soap with seawater, in the hope that your little one won't notice the difference. Alas, kids are far too smart - they realize immediately that the seawater doesn't generate bubbles - and the wailing only redoubles.

Solution #3: Ingenuity. You take your little one, swim out deeper into the open sea, and show her how dipping an empty bubble bottle into the ocean generates a huge whoosh of bubbles as the air escapes from it. The bubbles are loud and frothy and your little one thinks this new game of making bubbles in the sea, is just as interesting as blowing bubbles in the air.

Parenting - the art of the possible :)

Monday, 16 March 2009

Nat's 2 favourite books for the week.

I'm a Big Sister - Joanna Cole
I first saw this book in the library. Decided to borrow it for nat, just to let her get an idea of what being a big sister is all about. Surprisingly, she loves the book. Every night, she has a flip through it and when she sees the page with the little boy in the stroller, she will say "didi lucas". Then she will go on to say "I am a big jie jie now." Nat is really a gentle and sweet jiejie. She loves her didi even though didi seems to be "bullying" her. In fact, the other night, didi lucas woke up at 3am, making noises and waking nat up. Nat told didi "Didi, no screaming, I want to sleep." So cute hor! Sigh, my 2 little babies are growing up so fast.

Mama Loves You - Caroline Stutson
Another favourite, we have read it so many times that nat can recite it. There is something about rhymes that naturally attracts kids to them. The main theme of this book is about a mummy loving her baby. Nat's favourite rhyme:

Give me kisses
Give me hugs
Mummy loves you
Little bug

Saturday, 14 March 2009

Yesterday was the last lesson of Julia Gabriel for the term. Finally, nat seems to have settled down. Although, she still cries during the story segment, she is enjoying herself more. She is friendlier to the teachers and even allows them to hug her. See ... patience does pay off after all.

Last week, poor nat was having a bout of bad rashes. I really have no idea what it could have been caused by, sublock? her organic body wash that I changed recently? food? chlorine from the swimming pool? Anything ... Brought her to Dr Terence for a check and some medicine and luckily she has since recovered. Those few days though, she was scratching and scratching from head to toe, poor thing.

Didi lucas is now officially 6 months old and how my little man has grown. Flipping from front to back is no problem, often you will find him sitting up quietly when he is awake, just amusing himself. In fact, in the past few days, he has been pulling himself to a standing position in the playpen. When he succeeds, he gives everyone around a smug and satisfied smile. Somehow, I always feel a warm sense of pride when I see my little man standing tall. I often look at the kids and wonder how they will be as young adults ... hmm ... makes me sound very old doesn't it?

The kids also seem to be able to interact and play together better. I am quite surprised that nat is actually quite gentle with didi. When he tries to pull her hair or touch her, she will just tell him "don't touch me" or "help, don't pull my hair". I realise that some form of discipline has helped to curb nat's terrible twos phase. As compared to a few months ago, I think she is more well behaved now, well, not exactly your textbook toddler but it doesn't really matter. I have also implemented the "naughty chair" system and when she is really misbehaving, she goes onto the naughty chair and faces the wall for a minute or two. Usually, that is enough to make her remorseful for the misbehaviour.

Monday, 9 March 2009

I love bringing the kids outdoors, breathing in the fresh air, running in the open spaces, letting out all the pent-up energy and seeing the brightest smiles on their faces.

Sunday, 8 March 2009

The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry, especially when you have kids. Yesterday was the opening night of the Act 3 Singapore International Festival for Children. I had got us tickets to go as a family, thinking that nat would surely enjoy it. It's quite an interesting concept. The theme is a pyjama party and the kids are encouraged to dress in their pyjamas. Over the hour-long event, they would go from room to room watching short plays. The timing is just right so the kids do not get distracted. As we were lining up to go into the building, a kindly old man came out with his bird puppet which got nat really excited. Hmm ... it bodes well, she wasn't scared of it.

However, once inside the building, as we settled nicely into the seats, waiting for the show to start, nat got increasingly fretful. First, she wanted to be carried, then she wanted to me to walk around looking for the bird puppet. Finally, when the show started, and the puppets (the first story was on trolls, i think), nat decided it was the final straw and wailed. Sigh ... I had to bring her out of the room to pacify her, leaving poor gary to enjoy the trolls. The next segment was on making music with teapots, no puppets. Yet, nat refused to go into the room.

Argh ... no choice ... no point hanging around, so gary and I decided to go off. At the door, they were giving out milk and cookies and end off the pyjama night, so nat had some. Haha, what expensive milk and cookies ... I was disappointed but I told gary that one can't really control how kids react. This fear of puppets will probably be something nat will get over as she gets older.
Later, I heard nat talking to herself "Puppets are nice, puppets are toys, no scared the puppets." Haha, she was trying to convince herself not to be scared, poor thing.

Tuesday, 3 March 2009

It's really not easy finding books that interest kids. In fact, kids are often in a world of their own. Sometimes, you think that a certain book is "suitable" for them, in reality, they do not even give it a second glance. One such book I had that experience with is Goodnight Moon. I first heard one of the teachers read it to the kids at nat's Julia Gabriel Playnest class. Even then, I thought it was quite a good book, relatively engaging in getting the kids to say goodbye to every item in the big green room. When I saw it at the library recently, I quickly borrowed it for nat. My conclusion - she hates it, in fact, didn't even last through 3 pages before she got bored.

Another book we read recently was Mister SeaHorse by Eric Carle. Had been having quite good luck with this author and nat generally likes his books. This book is interesting because it has a page that is printed on transparency paper and it hides the fish. When you flip the page, the colourful fishes including leaf fish, lion fish and stone fish are revealed. Again, nat was just obsessed with flipping the page and finding the lion fish.

I Want My Mum by Tony Ross. Nat is fond of this book, it's about a little princess who is always looking for her mummy, when she falls down and skins her knee, when it's bedtime and she is scared of the monster under her bed, mummy is always there to reassure her. Nat especially likes the part when mummy kisses the princess's knee and makes it all better. She always wants me to do the same.

I first got introduced to Peppa Pig on Jim Jam. I kind of like the characters, Peppa Pig (girl) and her little brother, George. The story is usually quite simple, nothing too exciting but the illustrations are very colourful . Nat likes reading this as she sits on her potty.

I also promised a Chinese Book review, so here goes:

This range of Chinese readers is really quite suitable for pre-school kids. Short sentences, repetition, exciting sound effects. I first posted a review on the spider title in the series. I have read it so much to nat that she is now familiar with the whole insect family in Mandarin, ranging from flies to mosquitoes to cockroaches. We have since gone on to other titles like this crocodile one. Nat gets really tickled whenever I make the sound effect of the crocodile snapping his jaws.

Sunday, 1 March 2009

An early morning swim with the kids :) Congrats to me, I can finally wear 2-piece swim suits again ... sigh ... not the best figure, but acceptable, I guess.

Sunday, 1 March 2009

Yesterday was an exciting day for didi lucas as it marked a day of many firsts for him. His first swim at the beach, his first taste of baby cereal (porridge) and his first library card. He has been having rashes for the past few weeks as he is now in a drooley phase. My maid was just sharing that in her country, when babies have rashes, they brought them for a dip at the beach. Maybe it is something about the salt water that clears up the rashes, it's totally unscientific. However, since yesterday was not too hot and since we had already signed for the Sentosa card some time back, decided to pack the kids off to the beach anyway. I am super amazed! 2 kids, 5 bags of stuff - including the clothes, sand toys, milk bottles, camera, my own bag for miscellaneous barang. At the end of the day, didi's rashes did not miraculously disappear, maybe, just maybe, it does look less red and fierce. Babies are such natural born swimmers, look at didi and you can see that once you put him in the water, his legs start kicking away furiously. I always believe that one should start babies swimming as early as possible, that is when there is no fear of water and by the time they get older, they would already have been used to it.

By the way, if you look at the pic of nat with an 'o' shaped mouth, that's a surprised look! So far, she has mastered the happy, angry and surprised emotions, thanks to my flash cards. She is also very obsessed with the Gingerbread man jingle and yesterday, when I chased her around the house, she kept egging me on by saying "Run, run as fast as you can, you can't catch me, I'm the Gingerbread man!"

We have also recently subscribed to Jim Jam on Cable TV, which nat absolutely adores. It has got really interesting channels for pre-schoolers. Besides the usual Barney and Friends, Bob The Builder, Thomas and Friends, there are also other new shows like Igloo-Gloo (about 2 white seals in the north pole), James the Cat, Rubberdubbers (some plasticine looking characters in the bathroom), Bonny, Banana and Mo (animation), Gazoon (animals) etc, that I find quite entertaining, and nat loves it.

Sunday, 22 February 2009

Inspired by my mummy friend, I am attempting to do a reading list/book review on things that nat reads. Good platform for sharing as I found my friend's review very useful. Enjoy.

If You Give A Mouse A Cookie & More Treasury - Laura Numeroff
I first heard of this author through some book discussion on children's books in the motherhood forum. Later, I took a look at the book in Borders and decided to buy it. Good decision as nat adores it. A must-read before bedtime. It is a good book for learning new words and is really quite creative as it gets the child thinking what happens next? I have read it to nat so many times, she knows exactly what the mouse is going to do next even before I get to that page. Buy it at Borders when they have their sale coupon, it's more worth it then. Her fave is still the Mouse & Cookie but recently she doesn't mind the Pig & Pancake either.

Hop on Pop - Dr Suess
I brought nat to the library yesterday. It's quite a difference from half a year ago. Then, she ran around the library and played hide and seek with me. This time round, she did not mind sitting down at one of the lanes and taking out books to read. She would choose a book, shove it to me and say "Mummy, read me". I borrowed this book because it is quite catchy and full of rhymes, like "hop on pop", "mouse on house". There is a lot of repetition of words and after a few reads, nat can remember some of the words . The pictures are not super exciting but overall, still a book worth reading.

Little Miss Series - Roger Hargreaves
I have always loved this series, ever since I was young, so I introduced this book to nat very early on. To date, she has read Little Miss Stubborn, Little Miss Shy, Little Miss Tidy. The text is a bit complex for pre-school kids and she loses interest towards the end. So instead of reading all the text, I kind of make up the stories based on the pictures as the cartoon is quite well drawn.

The Very Hungry Caterpillar - Eric Carle
Nat's absolute favourite author, and one of the first books we started reading on a regular basis. It's about a caterpillar and his eating adventures over a week, after which he transforms into a beautiful butterfly. Cartoon is very well drawn with lots of colours and the sentences are not too long. Even teaches the days of the week. A very good read for young kids. Nat can flip through the book on her own and she half babbles the story to herself.

Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What Do You Hear? - Eric Carle
Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? - Eric Carle
The first book features different animals like leopard, flamingo, hippopotamus and the sounds they make. The second one is also on animals but more focused on colours. We had this initial fear before that nat is colour blind as everything was red to her. But after reading this book numerous times, she is now familiar with all the colours. Phew! Again, I think the drawings are great and you can even sing a tune to the text. Youtube it and you will be able to find the tune somewhere.

From Head to Toe - Eric Carle
A very interactive book. The animals are made to do an action like a gorilla raising its shoulders, a donkey kicking. Then a question is posed to the kids on whether they can do it? Nat likes to show me the action when I ask her Can You Do it?

The Very Busy Spider - Eric Carle
This book is about a spider spinning her web and as different animals approach her, she is not distracted and keeps to her task. The spider is kind of small in the book so I love to ask nat to spot the spider on each of the pages.

I will do a review of some Chinese books in the next update, so do look out for it.

Saturday, 21 February 2009

My kids never cease to amaze me. Nat has a new toy, a cheapie guitar I bought, which makes a pitiful twanging sound when plucked, but nat loves it very much. She picked it up, pretended to play it and to my amazement, started to hum Edelweiss. I realised later that there was a scene in the Sound of Music, where the Captain was strumming a guitar and singing Edelweiss. How interesting that she can remember these things, and associate it with her own toy guitar.

My little man, Lucas is growing stronger every day. Flipping is a piece of cake for him and these days he is attempting to crawl, although he looks more like a worm at the moment, using his head to wriggle about. His favourite activity when you are carrying him is to step, step, step all over you. He can sit unassisted for a few seconds before he topples over. Gary's expensive carpets have become crawling mats for the kids, much to his dismay. Well, might as well put it to good use, right?

Sunday, 15 February 2009

Need I say more? His smiles are enough to melt your heart :) But when he is grumpy, he looks exactly like daddy. My advice: don't mess with him!

Saturday, 14 February 2009

Nothing too exciting to update, just some pictures and videos I took recently. Trying to introduce Chinese kiddie songs to nat, which she seems to enjoy. Even I enjoy it as some of the songs are quite catchy and I remember my mum singing it to me, when I was younger. She also likes role-playing these days, arranging her dolls on the carpet to watch tv together with her. Included a video we took of nat, when she was about a year old and just starting to explore walking, sigh ... brings back such sweet memories for me. Like I was telling gary, such moments cannot and should not be outsourced to the maid. Although it is very stressful running home from work to bring nat to Julia Gabriel, there are really no regrets :)

Haven't been taking many pics of lucas these few days, probably because he is rather cranky. He is teething, you can see the slightest hint of his pearlie white teeth at the bottom jaw. He wants to be carried all the time and requires the rocking motion before he sleeps. I also introduced that French boy choir to him today, seems to calm him down slightly, just like it did for nat.

Sunday, 8 February 2009

They say that when the 2nd baby comes along, the first one will be neglected. Definitely a myth. In reality, your first baby is at an age when she can demand your attention constantly. When this happens, it is oft the second baby that gets neglected as he is usually satisfied once he has been fed. I sometimes feel very guilty for "neglecting" didi lucas. As he reaches 5 months old tomorrow, I sense that he is beginning to want more attention from me. So this weekend, I arranged for gary to spend some time with his firstborn, while I tromped off for a walk at the nearby park with didi, just him and me. It felt good, I sang to him, pointed out the birds and interesting sights along the way and after a while, lulled by the comfort of the sling, he fell asleep. Moving on, I think we will try to have such "solo" outings, once in a while, especially when both kids get older, it's good to spend some time alone, with either one of them.

Time seems to have just flown by in a flash, these past few years. We got married in 05, conceived nat in 06, had our first kid in 07 and our second in 08. From swinging singles, we have become parents of 2 beautiful kids. Every day is a learning experience for us as we spend time with our kids.

Happiness is:
When nat comes up to me, plants a big kiss on my lips and says I love you, Mummy.
When lucas wakes up, looks up at me with his sleepy eyes and gives me a bright smile.

I love my kids :)

Saturday, 7 February 2009

A Letter to My Sweetheart, Natalie

Dear baby,

Yesterday, at Julia Gabriel, you cried and cried. Somehow, you have become scared of going for classes there. I noticed this happened after the Chinese New Year class, when one of the teachers dressed up as a dancing lion for the occasion. During a certain segment of the class, the teachers will hide behind the door and re-appear as interesting animal characters, lions, monkeys, rabbits, etc with their headgear.

These days, whenever you see the teacher heading towards the door, you will start crying. For the life of me, I cannot imagine why? After all, I think the teachers do look kind of silly and really unscary. It was only later in the car, when I heard you mumbling to yourself the following, that I realised just how differently babies think, as compared to adults. You were quietly telling yourself "Lion hiding behind the door, no scared lion will mum mum you." Your super active imagination is running wild, with thoughts of big and fierce lions hiding behind the door, ever ready to pounce on you. It is no wonder you end up in tears. I guess mummy has to be patient and learn to get through this with you together.

During the class, the teacher will sit you down and read out some Chinese characters to you. In return, you've got to parrot what she reads and she will reward you with a sticker. You absolutely love this segment, and are always ever eager to lay your hands on the sticker. Interestingly, this is the only time you will allow the teachers to hug you and talk to you. Any other time, if they even try, you will let out a big wail.

Every day with you is different, darling. Some days you are so super well behaved, it surprises me. Other days, you whine at the drop of a pin. Yet through it all, you have taught me to have patience and the meaning of loving someone without condition. As I was telling my friend, I never realised parenting was so hard i.e it does not just come naturally the moment you become a mummy. But you know what, it's all worth it when I see my 2 kids, happy and healthy.

Sunday, 1 February 2009

Yesterday, we had an early birthday celebration for nat. Her birthday is on 5 Feb but since it's a weekday, I decided to have a mini celebration for her on Saturday instead. Invited a few of her little friends over. The party was held at my mum's place as there is a big garden for the kids to run and get wild. I also rented a few toys for them to play, including good o'le thomas the train (pool) and a slide playset. They also had a blast playing with the sand and water play equipment I bought as a birthday present to my baby. We were blessed with really good weather, slightly cloudy with some sunlight. At first, I thought it was going to rain, but it never did.

I can't believe it, nat is going to be 2 years old already. Time has just flown by in a flash. Nothing has changed though, I still adore my kids. I love hugging them, smelling their baby fresh hair, listening to nat chatting away and didi cooing. I want to enjoy every minute of my kids' growing up experiences with them. It gets really tiring sometimes, but believe me, it's all worth it.

Oh yes, check out the Barney agar agar jelly cake, it's a change from the usual sponge and cream cake and was quite enjoyable.