Pig-ump-ooh?

Brought Randall to my mum's house on Boxing Day since she was not working and so was i. Randall was watching the Heffalump Halloween movie and doodled something on the doodling board. Hmm... it looked suspiciously like a Piglet to me. Asked him what he drew and he told me it's Pooh, then after that when I asked him again, he said, "Don't Know". Showed my mum and she commented that the nose looked like Lumpy, the ears like Piglet, and the mouth like Pooh.. :D

i love u

I was playing cars with Randall on our sofa bed and he made the big transformers crane go "BOMB! BOMB! BOMB!" so loud that I made his little yellow beetle car go into hiding in fear. Then he moved his other blue car close to the yellow car and he told the yellow car in a sweet voice, "Don't be afraid. I love you!" awww.... i know it wasn't intended for me. But coming from him, it's really music to my ears. :D

Paintings

Almost every weekend, Randall will ask to "paint paint". We will then move his table and chairs out in the balcony for him to paint just in case he gets all messy. And sometimes, he enjoys mixing all the various paint together rather than actual painting.. Whenever he paints, we will try to date them and paste them on the wall in our living room. These are some of his creations.

Busy Road

This is picture of Randall drawing various family members crossing the road. The light blues are him crossing the road, the blacks are Dad dad, dark blue for me, brown for Gong Gong, vertical red for PoPo, yellow for Kow Foo, Light brown for Bel Yee Yee, and horizontal red for Randall again. Busy busy road...

My brave boy

Not sure what Randall has been eating, but he suddenly let out a pathetic and painful cry in his car seat last night while we were on our way home. After a good 5 minute of showing distress, he then said he was "ok already". We thought he might have bitten his tongue or something but we couldn't find out the reason. And then in the middle of his sleep, he woke up a few times, crying and also trying to vomit but nothing came out. We were so worried we had to rush him to Mount Alvernia 24-hour clinic. The doctor diagnosed that he might be suffering from indigestion or wind in his tummy as it looked bloated. When the nurse told us she had to insert a bullet-size medication up Randall's ass for quick relieve of wind in his tummy, we were pretty worried. I recalled the first time he had that, he was barely a year old and he was suffering from constipation. It was a bad experience as he was really wailing and practically crying the clinic down. Before the insertion, the nurse asked if he'd cry, and I was equally doubtful. I sat him on the patient's bed, and tried to explain to him what was coming up. “Randall, the nurse is going to put the medicine up your butt butt ok? So your tummy won’t be pain pain after that, ok?” Then the nurse showed him the bullet-size medicine. After that, we waited awhile for his response but he didn't seem to have any reaction. So I thought we would just get it over and done with. I turned around to ask the nurse how I should position him for the insertion. Before I could finish my question, Randall just got himself into position! He went on his fours and then, titled his bum towards the ceiling! Hahah… How did he what to do, we wondered. And throughout the insertion process, he didn't even utter a word. He just kept still in the position til the whole thing was over and we told him that it's done. The nurses were so amazed and at the same time amused they kept praising him for being the most cooperative patient ever! Actually, I was amazed by his behaviour too.. ;) The nurse asked him if it was painful, after the insertion. He replied bravely, “No!” Haha… so proud of him.. :D Well, after the medication, he slept through the night from 2am to 7+am. Then this morning, we brought him to see his pedae but his pedae diagnosed that he was having sore throat.. Oh well...

"M"

Randall learnt his first alphabet last week - "M" ("MacDonalds!", he exclaimed excitedly, as he pointed at the letter M on his toy alphabet keyboard). Oh well, it doesn't really come as a surprise since he LOVES to eat the hot cakes & hash browns. And everytime he stays over at my mum's house over the weekend, he will enjoy his MacDonalds breakfast the following morning. No wonder "M" is such a prominent alphabet. Haha...

Picnic

Breakfast Time!

Randall the gymnast








Brought Randall to Botanic Gardens on Sunday morning for a picnic, together with my parents, my bro and his girlfriend. We bought bread from Breadtalk the night before for the picnic, and we prepared coffee and tea in the morning. Reached Botanic Gardens at abt 9am. Weather was great for a picnic. We left Randall with my parents while we jogged ard the garden, and then had our breakfast. Randall enjoyed himself thoroughly, playing "liondance" with my bro seated on his shoulders, making bubbles with his bubble gun, and throwing ball for my bro's dog, Mambo, to catch. His various sizes of balls he brought along, the bubbles and Mambo surely attracted some kids, cos before long, they were all playing alongside one another. I was really fascinated to see Randall going so near Mambo for the first time cos he was absolutely afraid of it whenever we go to my mum's house. Probably cos its bark in enclosed area is too deafening. But out in the open space, its bark was so much softer, almost inaudible. It was so farnie to see Randall going round our picnic mat trying to chase after Mambo to beat its backside. I asked him why and he exclaimed, "Mambo take my ball!" and then continued to chase after him.

Playgroup?

I think my poor son is bored outta his mind at home with my mil. A couple of evenings ago when I was changing him into his pajamas ready for bedtime, I asked, "So, did you go out today?" He replied in a bored monotonous voice, "Noooo....", turned away and tried walking off. I asked him again, "No? No even downstairs for a walk?" He replied in the same old bored monotonous voice, "Noooo..." I could even hear a sigh coming out at the end of his reply. That was when I know that yes, he should do something other than staying at home on weekdays.

Last evening as I was showering him, I asked, "Do you wanna go school?" His eyes brightened up and said, "Yes!" I wondered if he knew what "school" was, so I told him, "School has kids like you, and teacher you know? Then you will play, sing song and colour there while Dad Dad & Ma Ma go work, ok?" He replied with as much enthusiasm, "Yes!" Haha... well, we will know if he likes it when he really attends one then.

Daryl and I have taken leave to go on his playgroup recee tomorrow. Hopefully we can find somewhere which he enjoys going to, and have fun!

Sleep Over

Since 4 months ago, Randall has refused sleeping over at mil's house on Fri nights (our usual practice since he was born). So, when he volunteered to sleep over at my mum's house (which he has never done so before) last Sat after my brother's birthday dinner, you can imagine our disbelief. Initially, we just thought that he did not have enough fun yet so we brought him to Toa Payoh Hub for a walk. But he was insistent about going to my mum's house and when we asked him a few times, "Go home Choa Chu Kang ok?", He went, "Go Toa Payoh!" So we had to buy his milk powder and neccessities from Kiddy Palace for him to stay over. That night, he did not have a hard time sleeping though he tossed and turned abit. We suspected his reason for wanting to stay over was cos he wanted to play with my brother and his girlfriend. Haha... At such young age, it is already not difficult to see his playfulness! Well, I guess it's a win-win situation since we can have our breaks too.

Sick

Poor Randall has been coughing with lotsa phlegm the past few days. I think the medication he took induced him to cough out his phlegm. So, in the middle of his sleep last nite, he woke up crying and finally vomitted the phlegm out (of course, together with his dinner). Unfortunately, I didn't manage to catch hold of everything and some of it splashed on Daryl who was carrying him then. While we were cleaning up, he looked apologetically at his Dad Dad and his t-shirt and commented, "Dirty already... I clean for you". Hee... how could we bear to reprimand him since it wasn't his intention to vomit on his poor Dad? We just assured him that it was ok and it was good that he puked out his phlegm.

Sweet Sweet!

Randall woke up last Sun morning and decided not to disturb us so we could sleep for a while more. He went up to his Dad Dad, saw his t-shirt being flipped up slightly. So he pulled it down for him so the t-shirt covered Daryl's tummy. Then he went over to check on me and did the same thing. I thought that was very sweet and considerate of him! :)

self-feeding

Randall tried feeding himself last Saturday and I must say he did a good job. At first, he tried scooping the fried rice (his fav) and sending it to his mouth. As expected, half the spoonful of rice dropped along the way. so he decided that putting his mouth to the bowl and scrapping from it was more efficient and effective. When he gained more confidence in feeding himself, he tried scooping and sending it to his mouth again, and he did better this time round. It was interesting to see him self-feed. For almost 2.5 years, Daryl and I were busy taking turns to eat (at high speed) since Randall needed to be fed and entertained. So now, as he began to self-feed and eat with us, I kinda felt lost as to what to do. Haha...

empathy

My knees suffered from abrasions from tripping over uneven grounds while jogging last Sunday. And ever since, whenever Randall sees my bruised and bloody knees, he will cringe his face and comment "Pain! Pain! Got BLOOD!" Well, at least he's showing some empathy.

Cars (Advanced)

Since Randall is still into cars, I took the opportunity to teach him the different models. So now, he will look out for them on the roads or carparks and pointed out excitedly that it's a Toyota, Honda, Mitsubishi, Hyundai or Audi. Others that are alien to him, he'll just name them "Happy car!", "Fierce car!" etc.

my emo boy

Just as Randall turned 2.5 years old last Saturday, he was also beginning to turn into an emo boy. It wasn't that he has not been showing his emotion before, it's just that he has become emotional and sensitive when it comes to saying NO. Just like last Sat, Daryl forbade him to play with his Spiderman Megablock figurine, he immediately pouted and lied face-down with his hands covering his eyes on the sofa bed. When I picked him up, he was already in tears. Last Sunday, I stopped him from finding jeeps parked in the IMM carpark (everytime we park our car, he'll go around the carpark looking for jeeps) since there were too many cars driving in and out. He told me, "Randall is angry!" and refused to move an inch. I had to drag him along to the cafe, and when he saw his Dad, he hung onto him the whole time and refused to speak to me, despite my explanation.

taste buds

It's just so amazing to see how much Randall and Daryl have in common when it comes to choice of food. It all started at a hawker in Bukit Timah many Sunday mornings ago. As we approached the hawker, Randall pointed at one of the stalls very eagerly and said "Want to eat that!". I carried him to take a closer look while Daryl went to find a table for us. After finding out that he wanted rice dumplings, we went back to ask Daryl to order. Coincidentally, that was what Daryl had in mind for breakfast. Ever since, I noticed they always end up eating the same food whenever we eat out. Both of them love fried stuff and rice dumplings (which i have no fancy of). Their fav food include fried rice, rice dumplings, fried luncheon meat, hotdogs, lor mai gai (glutinous rice with chicken). Fortunately, amongst all the fried food and rice, Randall loves fruits (just like me), although his choice of fruits is pretty limited (sweet grapes, sweet strawberries, apricot and banana, and they have to be sweet!)

Matching game

Randall was hooked on this Mummy-baby animal matching game ever since we first played it at my auntie's house when we went visiting. With our assistance, he managed to complete it. Here's his completed project.

Painting

Randall had his first go at painting last Saturday. He enjoyed "digging" at the water and paint, and then smearing them all over the Pooh Bear colouring pages. He added so much paint he couldn't see the pic of the Tigger, and he had to ask me, "Can't see Tigger already. Why? Why?"

weekday routine

Randall's daily routine at mil's house:
Breakfast, showers, watches Hi-Five (we term it "doing his homework" cos he does that everyday deligently), excursion at void deck/ nearby amenities with mil, lunch, nap (2-2.5hr), watches Pooh Bear VCD (not always), entertains himself while mil prepares for dinner. It's good Randall learns to self-entertain at mil's house since mil has to do household chores/cook. His entertainment varies daily. It includes, arranging and gathering his dinosaur toys for a "meeting" as he calls it, or some other games he comes up with. Just last evening, he built a really tall "rocket" with his building blocks. Too bad he knocked it down before I could take a picture of it.

yellow dino

We bumped into this "I love my library" yellow dino mascot on our way to the children's section in Choa Chu Kang library last evening. Randall literally jumped when he saw this big yellow thing. I was taken aback too cos I wasn't expecting this big yellow thing coming our way when we turned at the sharp corner. I was wondering what that creature was until the mascot's chaperon told us that it's a dino. He took a sec to recover from his shock before he got interested in the dino and reached out to touch its mouth, and even shook its hand.

My colleague asked me this morning whether I prefer Randall when he was younger or now. I told her it's definitely now. He does and says so many things that amazes and tickles us.. Like last Sunday, he saw Daryl walking around without his t-shirt after shower, he commented in Chinese, "Kuai4 dian3 chuan1 yi1... deng3 yi1 xia4 leng3 dao4.. (wear your clothes before you catch a cold)" - something my mil always tells him....

Home visit

Brought Randall to Daryl's colleague's house last Saturday. They have a daughter who's 1 year younger than Randall. They were slow to notice each other and Randall was just interested in her toys and Doraemon TV program that was showing on TV. It took them a while to warm up and parallel play. They attempted to "speak" to each other but I guess they wouldn't know what each other was saying though. Before we left, we managed to persuade Randall to give up his favourite fruit snack bar for Mei Mei Beatrice. As an only toddler in our family and immediate family, I guess he needs to know there are little people out there his age whom he needs to socialize with. Well, one good way is to bring him to school you'd say. At his impressible age and what's with the HFMD & all kinds of virus going on right now, we have decided to put this on hold till he's about three.

Birthday Treat

For this year's birthday, I got to enjoy a couple spa package (Harmony At The Aspara) at The Aspara, Goodwood Park.
Had a hour of steambath and soaking in the bathtub filled with Dead Sea Minerals, followed by body scrub and massage. Very relaxing... Ah.. Just the way I want my birthday to be... No eating please... sick of eating and eating...

Weekend activities

Brought Randall to National Museum to see "A Banquet in Stone" last Saturday. The exhibition features about 50 dishes like shark's fin soup, "Buddha Jumps over the Wall" etc. made up of rare strones. They also feature a stone that has a natural aroma of chocolate. Randall was particularly interested in the "Fried Rice". Well, he got his wishes as he had fried rice for dinner at Raffles City's Din Tai Fung.

On Sunday morning, we brought Randall to cycle at East Coast Park again. Halfway through, one of Daryl's bicycle tyres punctured and we had a hard time taking turns to cycle back with the punctured tyre, with Randall on it, going "bom bom.. bom bomm" at the rhythm of the bumpy tyre. Only when we reached the bicycle store did we realise that we could just call up and their staff would bring a new bicycle to us in exchange! Oh shucks... well, at least we had our workout for the day :P Randall must've picked up his cycling skill from East Coast Park too, as we just found out yesterday that he actually knows how to peddle his tricycle, straight ahead without turning for now, that is. Bravo!

Story Telling

Brought Randall to his first story telling session for toddlers 1-3yo at the library @ West Mall yesterday afternoon. He walked up to all the kids and shook hands with them graciously when the lady asked them to. I was pleasantly surprised as he would never do that in the past. Randall showed keen interest when the lady started off with the first story about farm animals. I had to stop him from going up to touch the book constantly since he would block the rest of the kids. In the half hour, we listened to 3 stories ("The Very Happy Hen", "Peek-a-boo Who?" & "Just Like Mr Croc") and sang songs at each interval. At the end of the session, Randall said he liked the story about Mr Croc best. It was a pretty enjoyable session for him and myself. I think I'll bring him to the next session which was scheduled on the third Tuesday of even months. One of the songs we learnt from the session-
(To the tune of "Are You Sleeping")
Peek-a-boo Peek-a-boo
I see you I see you
I see your button nose
I see your tiny toes
I see you I see you

Daryl's "words of wisdom": Life is not a box of chocolate. We don't always get our way. There is always a choice
- to get negative, complain and whine about it; or be positive (or at least act positive).

Father's Day

On bahalf of Randall, I bought a Lamy pen from Takashimaya for Daryl as a Father's Day gift. It's not expensive but it's the thought that counts eh. As for Randall, he was more excited than Daryl and insisted tearing off the wrapper.

A tribute to hubby

Everytime when I'm down & out, Daryl will remind me of the bigger things in life and appreciate what we have. I really need reminders like that 'cos I tend to take many things for granted. He will come up with some "words of wisdom" which are like a wake-up call to me. So when I'm all fumed up or when I'm upset abouth how some things go, I like to talk to him to soothe and calm myself down. Like this morning, he emailed and reminded me that "we can go thru life worrying about what others are talking or thinking (or perceive to be thinking) about us and end up being paranoid OR we can just ignore them and be happy... remember we can not control how others think of us and we can never satisfy everyone around us". Nothing new, really. But it hits the nail on the head when he said it.

Boy or gal?

Does Randall look like a girl? Cos it's been a couple of times that toddlers of his age call him "Che Che" / "Mei Mei". Just last Tuesday, we were in the lift of West Mall when we saw this boy whom was just old enough to start talking. He stared at Randall, then his dad asked him to call. He blurted, "Che che!" My parents & I gasped and then started laughing, while Randall smiled and exclaimed, "Eh?". I think that boy's dad was rather embarrassed and proclaimed that he called everyone Che che. Haha..
When Randall was less than a year old, a neighbour's boy who was about 3yo then had also identified him as "Mei Mei" too. Is it cos his hair was not short short? Or simply because he has a pair of pretty eyes? ;)

Happy Car, Sad Car

Ever since Daryl borrowed this book on cars from the library for Randall, he started to attach emotions to cars, be it on the book, in the carpark, or on the road. To him, certain cars are happy, some sad, some quiet, some fierce etc. We made a few hypotheses on his labelling. Could he be labelling the cars' emotions based on the colour? Or is it the shape of the headlights? The shape of the metal grill between the headlights? Finally, we concluded that he doesn't label them based on anything. Probably just based on his gut feeling and his mood. Oh well.

Surprise Surprise!

Randall loves Pooh & friends so much he's always mimicking the characters in this Pooh Bear VCD which my bro bought for him. He was at it again last evening. He hid his toy dumper in his hands and told Daryl, "I've something for you." Then he gave Daryl the dumper and exclaimed, "Surprise!" oohhh... that's so sweet!

Violence & Death

I was playing elmo and cookie monster small soft toys with Randall yesterday and he suggested they fight. He chose elmo and handed me cookie monster. I used cookie monster to "punch" elmo a couple of times. Then he brought his elmo further away from cookie monster and "seat" him in a cringing position. As his elmo was out of my reach, I told Randall to put it nearer so they can continue "fighting". He looked up and told me a matter-of-factly, "Elmo die already." Ahh.. violence & death.. thanks to Daryl's WOW.

Regression

It's so tiring for mil and us, and I'm sure, for Randall himself, to go through his regression phase. It's like he's becoming a baby all over again, except that he's like, about double the weight now. He wants to be carried all the time, even in the middle of the night. He'll ask me to carry him and starts crying if I don't. He cries easily at a slight hint of our displeasure against him. Every morning, I dread it when he asks me (without fail), "We go where?" When I reply, "Mah-mah's house" or "Bukit Batok", he will start crying, whining, throwing tantrums and all. Then the cycle repeats itself every morning. With an almost 14 kg wriggly worm in my arms, it's hard not to get frustrated after a while. I think he dreads going there. But then again, we dread going to work as much. His temper is getting very erratic. He can be fine one day and throw tantrums the whole of next day. We just cross our fingers and hope that he'll get over this phase quickly!

Dental Visit

Randall went for his first dental check-up last Saturday. Wasn't really a success but I guess it was a good start. He was all happy until he entered the confined dentist room. The lady dentist, together with her 4-5 year old daughter, told him a Dentist story with him seated on my lap on the dentist chair. The book was pretty interesting. It shows the dentist chair moving up and down, a boy opening his mouth while the dentist checks his teeth with a scaler etc. When it was Randall's turn to sit on the dentist chair, he kicked a fuss and insisted on exiting. I had to demonstrate and show him how I sit on the dentist chair and open my mouth wide while the dentist counted my teeth. After some persuasion, he was willing to open his mouth a bit, but not wide enough to show his teeth. He was also reluctant to polish his teeth. The dentist polish his thumb just to show him how it felt during polishing. I think he found it quite interesting cos he stuck out his other finger for the dentist to polish after she finished polishing his thumb. Finally, the dentist managed to polish one of his front teeth. So we left the dental clinic, spending 20 bucks for his 2 polished nails and 1 polished tooth. Well, at least Daryl & I learnt something out of it - that kids have 20 teeth in total. 10 on top, 10 below. We also learnt that our second set of teeth were already hiding in our gums when we first had our milk teeth. Well, at least he had his treat after the dental visit - You Tiao for breakfast.

Mine!

I'm quite happy that Randall is getting more assertive nowadays. He has been quite meek & shy with strangers and he would just stare at me in shock when other kids snatched toys away from him. At Daryl's relative's house last night, his cousin, a 3yo gal, snatched her motorised aeroplane which he was holding and playing with. She then placed it in the balcony for it to run by itself and went away. Randall came complaining to me, "Jie Jie take my plane!" Well, I could only tell him that it was ok, that the aeroplane belonged to Jie Jie anyway, but if he really wanted it, he could go take it from the balcony since no one was playing with it. He went to the balcony and took the plane. Immediately, the gal snatched it away from him again, which made him pretty upset. He decided to snatch it back and hand it over to Daryl, telling him, "Dad Dad, switch off!" Haha... and the plane was just left on the table, untouched by either party after that.

Pacifier Weaning Attempt

We found a hole in Randall's pacifier last night which we suspected was a result of his biting. So, we took this opportunity to try weaning him off the pacifier. We showed him the hole and told him it could not be used. Then we asked him to throw it into the rubbish bin, and told him no more pacifier. He was ok at first but started asking for it just before he went to bed. We reminded him that his pacifier had a hole and he has thrown it away. He asked for "the blue pacifier" (which was the other pacifier other than the white one he was using). We reiterated there was no more pacifier and that he's a big boy now, he could sleep without it. He tossed and turned restlessly, yawning all the while with his eyes wide open. Then he asked, ""Zui zui" (pacifier) where?"
"In the dustbin".
"Why in the dustbin?"
"Because it's spoilt"
"Why spoilt?"
"Cos there's a hole"
"Why there's a hole?"
"Cos Randall bite it"
"Why Randall bite it?"
"That, you'll have to ask yourself"
Silence...
"Why yourself?"
"yourself means Randall. Who's Randall?"
"Don't know.." (Hmm... In denial)
I think we repeated this conversation over and over again like 10 times. Finally, he knew that he would not get his pacifier and he started to repeat to himself, "Pacifier spoilt", "Pacifier in dustbin".
One hour past his bedtime, he was beginning to become hyper, grouchy and irritable, like a drug addict without his drug. It's probably understandable since he was at it for the past 2 years. However, between sucking pacifier and his thumb, we decided then that the former would be a better choice. We can take him off his pacifier ultimately but not his thumb! Looking at him suffering from his withdrawal syndrome, Daryl almost wanted to give in and give him his new pacifier but I persisted. Finally, with much patience and struggle, he was exhausted enough to sleep 2 hours past his bedtime.
After 2 hours' sleep at midnight, he woke up in tears, feeling agitated and grouchy, asking for his pacifier again. That was when we decided he should have his pacifier back. Poor boy... I must give him credit for trying but I don't think he is ready to go cold turkey for now.

Boobs?

We were in the lift of our block last evening when Randall pointed at Daryl's chest (fortunately, with no one else around) and asked, "What's that?" Daryl replied, "Boobs." And Randall went, "Boob... Book... Boobs.. Boobss..." all the way to our house and then, he blurted, "Dad Dad's Boobs!" Hmm.. On hindsight, we should have told him that was Dad Dad's chest. Sounds more... polite.

East Coast Park

Brought Randall to East Coast Park to cycle last Sunday morning. He LOVES it, which is good for us since it's one of the few exercises we can do together with him now. At first, Daryl was careful at riding his bicycle with him in the baby seat in front. But I think this little boy found the speed too slow and told his dad eagerly, "Faster! Faster!" Haha... ya, he's one hell driver himself. You should see how he turns the sharp corners and stops abruptly when he drives his little car at home! By the end of the one-hour ride, Randall was so tired he mistook a lady (wearing the same colour) on bicycle for me. I was returning the bicycles and when I turned around, I saw Randall standing beside this lady, hugging her leg and shouting, "Mummy carry! Mummy carry!" Her guy friend (or boyfriend) who was on another bicycle behind her stared at them, flabberghasted. Haha...

Secrets

Just because Randall understands English, Chinese & Cantonese, we have problem telling secrets in front of him. So, we resorted to using Hokkien (which I suspect he understands abit) and spelling the word. Like this morning, I wanted to tell Daryl that I forgot to bring his favourite yoghurt along to MIL's house. Knowing the consequence on reminding him of his favourite food (bugging MIL the whole day to eat yoghurt), I'll have to tell hubby mindfully, "Oh no, I forgot to bring... y-o-g-h-u-r-t!". Hmm.. Wait till he starts schooling and learn spelling.

Quality Time

Randall has been really grouchy on weekday mornings lately, and it got worse the past two mornings. We contributed it to his emerging molar teeth. We also suspected that it's due to our limited attention for him on weekday mornings. As he gets older, we realise that he needs more of our time and attention. Of course, we'll be more than happy to spend our time with him but unfortunately, we don't have the luxury of time on weekdays. Most of the mornings, he'll start hounding us to play/read/watch TV with him. He'll pass me his toy aeroplane/bulldozer and ask me to play with him. I'll just put it aside and ask him to play by himself, or just play for a sec before carrying on with my stuff. I believe he can sense our patronizing attitude. It'll be at this point that he starts kicking a fuss and ask me to "Carry! Carry!". Well, being a 12-14kg boy himself, I could hardly carry him and do my stuff at the same time, without ending up sweating like a pig. So most of the mornings, I will end up sweaty AND feeling sorry for not being able to give my darling boy more time and attention. And knowing myself, I'll definitely go crazy if I stop working to be a sahm (stay-at-home-mum). So, I think I'll just try to spend more time with Randall during the weekends and as and when I can. Hmm.. How can anybody ever cope with more kids??

Library

Randall enjoys going to the library. Everytime he's there, he will hum his song and walk ahead, straight into the children's section where his shelves of toddler books are placed. Last Saturday, as he was walking in the children's section, he bumped into this malay boy of the same height. His hands were at his waist, chest out and his chin tilted up, looking and behaving very challengingly at Randall. Being a protective mum myself, I hurried towards them, just in case he started hitting my boy. But Randall just looked at him in amazement, with the what-are-you-trying-to-do look. They stood very closely, staring at each other for a good 10 sec. No action, no talk, nothing. Then the boy decided to move backwards, while Randall just stood in his spot, swinging his hands, in his extremely good mood and oblivious to the "danger" he was facing. At this point, I quickly pulled Randall away. Sometimes I just hope that Randall knows how to protect himself in circumstances like this. But then again, if not for his amiable approach (to anyone other than his family, that is), I think they might have started fighting already. :P

You're my sunshine

Everynight, Randall will sing himself to sleep, and he'll also ask me to sing to him. Lately, he seems to like "You're my Sunshine". Kept asking me to sing it to him. So there I went, singing the same old song to him last nite. When I sang the last phrase ("...Please don't take my sunshine away"), he asked, "Why? Why take sunshine away?"
I was stunned for a moment, "Urm.... why... hmm... cos Randall's gonna grow up and have his own life... And then.. urm... he'll have his friends and work?"
"Where's DadDad & MaMa?"
"Eh.. we'll be old and then... urm.. DadDad will stay home and play his computergames and MaMa will watch TV. Randall will go work, OK?"
He seemed pleased and said, "OK!"

"I like this car!"

Randall's car sticker creation on dad dad's car seat while on the way to mah-mah's house in the morning. Randall holding the car sticker asking, "What colour is this car?"

Sun Morning Excursion

Since Randall loves toads, we brought him to see the closest thing to toads last Sunday at Jurong Frog Farm. How do we know he likes toads? Cos that is always one of the first animals he'll ask us to find in his all-time favourite Animal encyclopedia. Once, he put his hand against the picture of the toad's leg, and said "same same". That was when I thought he'd appreciate the Frog Farm. He was elated and definitely amazed to see so many bullfrogs in the many sections in the farm, going "croak croak!". We brought him to see the tadpoles in another pond and he commented, "like salamander like that", which appears to be quite a keen observation. Since we were at it, we brought him to Hay Dairies which was a few minutes' drive away. He didn't seem to be too interested in the goats though. Maybe he was too tired to enjoy fully or the weather was too humid. On the whole I think we all had fun going on our morning excursion. We would definitely bring him to the Qian Hu Fish Farm again now that he identifies and appreciates animals more.

Short-term memory

Daryl will call his mum a few times during the day to make sure that things are going well with Randall. Most of the times, he'll come back with little funny stories about what Randall did. For instance, just this afternoon, mil went into the storeroom to get hangers. Seeing that she was inside, Randall closed the door, and went to play. After a while, he realised that his "mah-mah" was nowhere to be found. He ran all around the house looking for her while shouting anxiously, "Mah-mah! Ni zai na li (where are you)? Ni zai na li?" It took him awhile to recall that he locked his mah-mah in the storeroom. He quickly rushed to open the storeroom door and said, "Mah-mah, ni chu lai (you come out)!" Haha... I think they don't have much memory capacity at this age, do they?

Stay over or not?

Wanted Randall to sleepover at mil's house tonight since we're bringing him home after dad's bd dinner tomorrow. It's a practice for us to leave him over at mil's every Fri so we can take a break and have our personal time. Told him this morning but he didn't really respond. On our way to mil's house, he just sat quietly in his seat, fondling his doggie's ear and looking out of the window. It was so unlike him to be that quiet. I could sense his reluctance in staying over. So I asked him if he wants to come back home to sleep or stay over at mah-mah (mil)'s house tonite. He said immediately, without thinking, "Home! Choa Chu Kang". It was only when we told him ok, and that we will fetch him home to cck tonite, that he started to cheer up and be his usual self. Hubby & I thought that he's a big boy now and wants to come home more often. But the funny thing is, he wouldn't insist if he knows that he has no choice. He'll just be very solemn and give us the sad expression. Hmm.. maybe he's like me. We just keep our mouths shut when we're not happy.

Bonne soiree!

I'm learning French from company's sponsored lunchtime class and so far, I've already missed 3 out of 9 classes. I think I'm pretty hopeless in languages. Took up Jap for 2-3 yrs a few yrs ago, and I still couldn't figure out what conversations, not to mention speaking it. I'll stutter when the teacher asks me questions and I think it's obvious from my facial expression that I'm trying to (i) figure out what she's asking and (ii) constructing my reply in the right sentence. It doesn't help that ALL objects in French, including beverages, countries etc have a gender, and we're supposed to use the correct "a", "the", "my" etc attached to these objects. Only 9 lessons and I think I'm almost dying. Despite all these, I admit that I feel most delighted when I can recognize what the actors in movies (like the waiter in Spiderman III) are saying when they say "Si'l vous plait!", "Monsieur" etc. I'll nudge Daryl and whispered excitedly, “Hey! That means "please"!”and "That means “Mr.” in French you know?" ;) But to my dismay, hubby didn't seem to be impressed.. haha.. Well, I guess I really need to be disciplined enough to make some time to sit down and go thru what has been taught so far and I'll try not to skip classes if possible.

Current Obsession

Randall has invented a new game called “Xiao Huang Doing What”. He'll ask us, “Xiao Huang Doing What?” and most of the time, his beloved stuffed dog, Xiao Huang would be sniffing his sole or kissing his cheek. Usually, it's the former followed by the latter. Then we'll have to answer what his dog is doing.

He's over "The Wheels on the Bus" phase and doesn't seem to be too interested in TV very much nowadays. His obsession at the moment would be Pooh & gang, cars and computer games. His favourite character varies from Pooh to Tigger to Owl. I think his obsession for Pooh & friends started when we introduced him to this animation movie "The Tigger Show". Ever since, he would point out all things related to them and exclaim, "Like this!" or "Love this!” to each and every Pooh character he encounters in the shops/malls. Fortunately, he has not shown signs of getting the gimmes for now. His obsession spreads to my family too. My bro would buy things like Pooh magazines or Pooh hp carrier for him. One of his favourite books currently is the Pooh Animal encyclopedia, which my bro's gf bought for him. It's his daily routine for Daryl to go thru the book before his bedtime. I think he can name all the creatures in the book, from sea anemone to toad to crickets. On each page, there will be pooh and gang making some comments. He will follow his favourite Tigger's action (e.g. pouncing) and say "Like Tigger like that". He will also make up stories like the page where Pooh throws a ball and the next page of a pic of a crab. He'd go, "Pooh bear throw ball ball, hit crab. Crab eyes come out!” As for computer games, he obviously picked it up from Daryl. Daryl has been showing him flying monsters from his WOW game. So every time he wakes up from his afternoon nap during the weekends, first thing he'll do is to dash to Daryl's computer room and insisted on sitting on his lap to watch "monster". This obsession gives me some time to distract him on our shopping trips. Daryl can now bring him to the game shop and watch computer games while I eat my meal in peace or do some shopping alone. Once, Randall even offered to buy a car racing game for Daryl, saying "Randall buy for Dad Dad". You can imagine how touched Daryl was.

Good Friday

Had a wonderful Good Friday hols this year. We booked into Marina Mandarin hotel with Randall on Good Friday itself and stayed for 2 nights. We had Fish & Co. for dinner and. Randall loved the fries and rice! At bedtime, he became cranky and wanted to leave hotel. Kept saying “want to go back Choa Chu Kang!” Hubby & I thought that it was a very good idea for this "trial" test cos it would be horrendous if we started him with an overseas trip like going to HK. We couldn't afford to fly back all the way to CCK if he became really cranky! We managed to persuade him to sleep in the hotel in the end by sleeping on my lap and singing songs to him.

The second day, we went to AquaMarine café for complimentary buffet breakfast. Randall enjoyed looking at the "bubble" lifts (those see-through ones) ascending and descending while we had our breakfast buffet at the couches beside the lifts. He loved the raisin muffins and cereals with milk. Ever since that day, he always asks for “Cereals with milk. Want cereals with milk”.

My parents came the next day in the afternoon to babysit Randall while we prepared to dine out to have some couple time and headed to Esplanade for Phantom of the Opera. The performance was excellent and we enjoyed every moment of it.

Overall, I think all of us had a pretty good experience away from home, in a way.