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Happy birthday Daddy!

Woof! Woof!
Cookie Girl

This was one rare time that he did not stop counting when my phone was whipped out.

I was told by my helper Rose that the little guy yesterday, after school, ran up to her calling “auntie auntie!”

and then proceeded to ask her,

“Where’s meme?”

Rose told him that I am in the office.

Then he continued,

“Where’s papa?”

Rose told him that he is at the office too!

Then he persisted,

“Where’s jiejie?”

Then he dashed into the living room, pointed to his sister who was playing by herself there and said,

“Thereeeeeeeeeeeeee!’

and then started chuckling!

I was torn between wanting to laugh and feeling sad…I am not sure if the awareness that I am not at home during the day just came to him or that he knew all along but only have the capability to verbalise it now.

Going to work on this Friday morning with a heart a little heavier than usual…

This is now the little boy’s favourite phrase! He will lift up his hands, palms facing up and jiggle them up and down and go “Where’s jie jie?” cheekily.

He also did his first 4-word sentence - screaming “I want to go!” last week when he saw us getting dressed and ready to go out of the house without him! I think nothing like desperation to conjure up an intelligible sentence to make sure we know what he wants!

He is now able to imitate almost all the words we say to him, whether he understands them or not is another matter altogether though. He recites 1 to 10 in both English and Mandarin now but I think he has no concept of counting yet though. We have the 我会读 level 1 mandarin flashcard-concept books and he could follow after us and read almost all the words with I would say 95% correct pronunciation. We were actually rather impressed because Talia’s mandarin is still rather accented compared to his.

Singing remains a favourite with him and he could carry a tune quite well, doing his rendition of twinkle twinkle little star with maybe about 50-60% of the words clearly audible (usually the beginning and the ending words) and the alphabet song with the same tune, with most of the alphabet audible too. We did not bother to teach him any alphabet and he picked up singing the alphabet song from the leapfrog fridge magnet thingy. But I think he recognises quite a number of alphabets because at the trial montesorri class, he stood up and shouted “M” when he saw it! Took us by surprise actually.

Our stern NO is still able to deter him from doing certain things. Like when he wants to climb up the stairs and we say NO, he will stay there and whine “I want!”. When we repeat our NOs, he will start crying with more “I want”s but will not climb the stairs anymore.

He melts my heart by calling me “meme” (nobody taught him that and Talia calls me “mummy”) and rushing over to me calling out “hold hands” when we are out walking. At 18 mths now I really think he can’t get any cuter than this, walks like a penguin, grins like a cheshire cat, chuckles like an old man and talks in a cartoony voice! and boy, how much I love this little guy!

Unlike OCBC TV ad’s empty promises and unwilling fullfillment, as always Coke delivers!!!

The little guy turns 18 mths old this month and I signed him up at a non-parent accompanied Montesorri playgroup near my place. He’s on the waitlist of Julia Gabriels like for the longest time and honestly its going to be a logistics nightmare sending him there. So I figured I would just settle for this Montesorri place if its not too bad. The advantages of having it being so near and not needing someone to go in with him are big pluses.

Today we went for a trial class to see if he’s going to be alright by himself. It’s a 2 hr playgroup. The first half hour, the children will play toys on their own. I think the Montesorri program encourages independent free play where the children can learn through playing with puzzles and wooden toys etc. The next half hr would be music and movement where the children will sing and dance along to songs. After which they will have phonics or story telling, followed by snacks and then 15 mins of Mandarin.

For the first half an hour, I went in with him, sitting a distance away watching him play. He soon got absorbed in the toys and before long was walking around the classroom looking for new toys to explore. When it was time for the music and movement, I went out of the classroom.

Music and movement about to start!

I think he started to look for me for a while, looking around the room but the songs and dance proved too infectious that before long he was clapping and shaking his bumbum to the music.

Grooving to the music!

After that was phonics and the little chap actually stood up and shouted “M” when he saw it as this is one alphabet that he recognises.

They were then led to the table to do some colouring. The rest of the children all had their own individualised worksheets except him and he looked so downcast when everyone started colouring and all he had was a crayon in hand but nothing to colour on.

The teacher quickly reappeared with a sheet for him to colour and it wasn’t easy with the paper going everywhere as he doesn’t know how to anchor it down while colouring.

Trying to colour…

The teacher with a quick eye saw that too and quickly came by to help him.

Colouring properly now with the help of the teacher!

At the end of the day, I must say I am not like WOW over the premise, or the curriculum or the teachers but it will suffice as a nice learning environment for the little boy before he goes to pre-nursery at his sister’s kindergarten and I think he is going to be just A-OK going in unaccompanied even though he’s the youngest in the class.

This will be the 2 happy faces I will be missing when I troop off to Sri Lanka tonight. I know I should be seasoned already, I know I have made countless of trips without them. But I know I will leave a part of myself behind when I leave tonight. They are just growing up so fast and I really resent the time when I am away from them.

I just want to be grateful that I will be back on Thursday. And no, I’d better not have them send me off at the airport even though the excursion to the airport would be fun for them. The last time I was still there in tears watching their retreating backs as they skipped happily away after their dad. ~sobs~

…the other day I was at the beach…and the wind was strong….

Well, today is the last day of year 2009 and I just sent a dear friend who was visiting from Germany to the airport last night. She took a well deserved break and stayed with me for the last 3 weeks and it has been wonderful just catching up with her. I could hardly believe it that the 3 weeks flew by with us just going to church together once, having lunch together twice, going to a concert together and having her celebrate Christmas together with my family on Christmas eve. We have known each other for almost 20 years and held each other’s hand when we broke up with our exs and dried each other’s tears, did crazy things like queue overnight for concert tickets and now we are both mothers of two.

And coincidentally another dear friend who is posted to India was visiting during this festive period too and I had to say no to meeting up last night and today’s lunch as I am meeting up with yet another group of old uni friends for lunch. Isn’t it just apt that this is the season for singing Auld Lang Syne and I am doing so many catch-ups?

Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
And never brought to mind?
Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
And auld lang syne!

Chorus.-For auld lang syne, my dear,
For auld lang syne.
We’ll take a cup o’ kindness yet,
For auld lang syne.

The words ‘Auld Lang Syne’ literally translates from old Scottish dialect meaning ‘Old Long Ago’ and is about love and friendship in times past.

I realised it is so much harder to forge good friendships as we grow older and which is why we should hang on more to our old friends!

Here’s to friendships and a brand new year of reconnecting and re-establishing old bonds! Cheers!

Even during Talia’s time, we have noticed teaching counting to be most effective during games of hide-and-seek. I would lie down on the mat covering my eyes and start counting 1,2,3 and she will do likewise and parrot the numbers after me, while the daddy scrambles around trying to hide!

Now that she can count very well on her own, I no longer have to count with her. Thaddie boy to our surprise picked up this counting very fast even at 17 months. When he sees his sister laying face down on the mat counting, he would quickly lie down and start counting after the sister with the cheekiest grin on his face but halfway through, normally when his sister is only at 5 or 6, he would hurried up and run as fast as his little chubby legs could carry him to try to look for his daddy, squealing with peals of laughter as he dashed along.

The last 2 weeks, he is even counting on his own 1,2,3,4,6 (always missing 5 and stopping at 6) without needing to parrot after his sister and in exactly the same kind of drawl which adults use to teach numbers to children.

He does the same thing when we go into the lift and the numbers appear on the panel. So there you go, nothing like hide-and-seek and the lift to teach counting!