conversations : fart

DH : *Cough Cough Cough*

Niklas: Mommy, you hear that?

Me: What?

Niklas: Daddy farted.

Me: Huh?

Niklas: Daddy farted in the mouth!

LOL

on the other blog

See where we got the jack-o-lanterns patterns and the recipes for roasting pumpkin seeds and steamed pumpkin cake here. (Link)

See our Halloween craft – the cute paper bats and hand prints spider here. (Link)

I finally came to realize that I need to re-focus on homeschooling the children (actually more on the boy).

For a start, since the boy loves Thomas & Friends characters, we made a Thomas the tank engine & friends alphabets chart. Hopefully, he will be interested enough to keep looking at the chart and pick up some alphabets soon.

We did some alphabet “A” activities. The kids did Apple stamping art.

Nikita drew a beautiful picture of the fall in White Mountains and I may send it to a drawing contest.

Happy Halloween!

Trick or treat, smell my feet.
Give me something good to eat.
If you don’t, I won’t be sad.
I’ll just make you wish you had!

Part of our Halloween tradition is to carve jack-o-lanterns on the eve of Halloween. This year we decided on Thomas the tank engine and a funny pumpkin face patterns. I drew the patterns, DH did the carving. All of us worked together to clean the seeds and guts out. The children were very excited about the cleaning and digging part, but the excitement died down pretty fast … i think they last about 10mins. So, off they went to play their own ‘magnet Bingo’ game, leaving DH and I to finish cleaning and carving the lanterns.

When DH finally completed lanterns and lighted the candles, the kids were excited and join us again to admire our beautiful jack-o-lanterns. Ever since the mid-Autumn festival celebration early October, the boy has been very fascinated with candles. He couldn’t stop putting his head into the lantern to look at the candle light! Haha…

The other thing that we love about carving a pumpkin is that we get to salvage the seeds and roast them for a great tasty and healthy snack. This year I even salvaged some pieces of the pumpkin fresh (from the cutouts) and hopefully I will find time today to steam a Chinese pumpkin cake.

Edited: 31 October 09
Yay… I did managed to steam some pumpkin cakes today. It tastes really good! Yum yum!

Oh and those candies were from the Trick or Treating at mall this morning. Both kids have one bucket full of candies each. Now, I have to find some ways to dispose them!

Silly SAHM moment

Woo Hoo! I finally managed to make boy peed straight into the toilet bowl, at standing position, and not on the seat, floor, his pants (or mine) or my hand (*roll eyes*)! I feel so proud of him. Scratch that… I am actually more proud of myself! HAHAA

Pomelo Silly Hat : Oct 2009

As you can see, the girl has totally embraced our “Pomelo Silly Hat tradition” but not the boy. I practically had to force that hat on him, hence the reluctant look on his face. Haha… Well, let’s see how long we can continue with this Silly hat tradition.

See the children’s past pomelo pictures here…
Pomelo Silly Hat – Feb 2009

Nikita’s 4yo (2008), 3yo (2007), 2yo (2006) and 1yo pictures here, here and here.

Niklas’ first pomelo hat 2008 here.

conversations : chinese riddles

Nikita was memorizing some Chinese riddles so that she could share with her classmates today and when she saw DH coming down from the bedroom, she enthusiastically wanted to share it with him too.

Nikita : Daddy!! Guess what animal is this?
会飞不是鸟,翅膀没羽毛.
白天休息,黑夜活动.
捕捉蚊子本领高.

(Loosely translate as “It can fly, but it is not a bird. It has wings, but no feathers. Resting in the morning, active in the night. It is really good in capturing mosquitoes.)

DH: I know!! It’s bat!

Nikita : Oh man, you are good.
(Even I was impressed. )

DH: Ok… now your turn to guess.
我有口,　可是我不会说话. (I have a mouth, but I can’t speak.)
我有脚,　可是我不会走路. (I have legs, but I can’t walk.)

Nikita and I : ??

I: Are you an animal or what? Give some clue.

DH: 我是人. (I’m a man.)

Nikita and I : ??

Nikita : I don’t know. Tell me the answer.

DH in his cheeky, weird Chinese accent: 我是哑巴, 所以我不会说话. 我脚坏了, 所以我不会走路嘛!! 我是人咯!!
(I’m a mute, therefore I can’t speak. I hurt my legs, therefore I can’t walk. I’m a human!!)

HAHA… so lame, but when my dear hubby attempts to speak Chinese, he can crack me up easily!!

hu

on the other blog

halloween craft

Come and see some of our Autumn & Halloween craft projects that we did recently.
- Simple Autumn leaf craft
- Acorn Jack-o-lanterns craft

A simple “Welcome Home” banner craft, specially made for DH by the kids.

This year we made a few Fish Lantern craft for our mid-Autumn festival celebration.

The Life cycle of a Lime Butterfly.

Niklas @ 24months

Growth statistics (taken on 2 Oct 2009)
Height : 32.8″
Weight : 22.1lbs
Head cir: 19.1″

No surprise at all that the boy’s weight is off the chart again. I recently read an article about how mothers tend to influence the weight of the children (while fathers determine the height.) and if that study is correct, it explains why both children are always on the low side of weight chart! I was extremely underweight as a kid and so I guess they are going to be underweight kids too.

As for his height, he is at 11-15 percentile range. The replacement doctor (Dr M is fully booked till end of Dec! Argh) bluntly told me that the boy would be short when he grows up after he learned that both DH and I ain’t ‘tall teck goh/bamboo sticks! giants’! (Hur! I’m going to feed him more chicken, burgers and dairy to make him grow tall! ) His head is the only one that is still on the average side – between 50-75 percentile range. Well, he has big head like his daddy!

Like most boys, his gross motor skills are more well developed than his language skills. He can climb up and down the stairs by himself, throw and kick a ball forward, jump with two feet together, run, walk and balance himself on a beam. (We recently enrolled him in a gym class and he is loving it! )

He is also getting better with his fine motor skills. He holds a pencil/crayon well, can pick up small things (as small as a broken pencil lead) without any problems. He can feed himself better now, without making too much mess. As you probably already know, he is able to put on his own pants & socks himself already. Well, now he has progress to trying to put on his own backpack and shoes when he has the mood to do so.

As for his speech development, he is right on track. He is speaking mostly in short sentences. His vocabulary continues to grow at an amazing rate. During our recent trip to the Lost River Gorge, he surprised DH by calling out “waterfall” when he saw one there. (Sometimes, watching cartoon programs is not a bad thing! Haha.) As he is able to communicate with us and express himself much better now, that actually spares him the toddler angst since we pretty much understand what he wants most of the time.

But being able to communicate well also means he discovers the joy of communication. An apple does not fall far from the tree… he is a little chatterbox too. So now I constantly have to fight for my turn to speak with my hubby when he is home. -_- Previously, with Nikita as my only competitor, I still get my fair chance to speak with DH since she is big enough to understand what “taking turns” means. But with this little one, it is almost impossible to ask him to wait for his turn because 1 min mean forever to him!! =_= Now if I want to have a good conversation with hubby, I must wait till both of them are asleep. Sigh.

Comparing to Nikita, Niklas is a much better sleeper. He sleeps through the night (usually 930pm-730am) and is still keeping the 1-2hours nap in the afternoon (which is good becos I get to do my own thing). The complaints i have about his sleep habits are that not only that he still needs a pacifier to soothe himself to sleep, he also needs me to be next to him so that he can feel my tummy! (Baby Nikita was the same too and I wonder why.)

Anyway, about his pacifier, we are trying to cut down his need for it now. Usually, if he is engaged in other activities, he doesn’t need a pacifier in his mouth. I’m still thinking if i should use the “cold turkey” method to help him to get over the pacifier. But he is such a persistent little boy (read: can whine for a long time) and that little stopper is the only lifesaver that can spare us the headache and let us have some peace when he is cranky/ sleepy/ grouchy/ emotionally stressed. So, I really need a little more time to persuade myself that I can handle the consequences of implementing the cold turkey.

Since we returned from our Singapore trip in mid-July, Niklas has gone diaper-less throughout the whole day, except at bedtimes. Even though he stays dry most of the time from the nap/sleep, I’m not taking any chance. Besides going diaper-less, he has skipped using the child potty and went straight to using the regular potty. That means we do not have to empty a potty nor clean a soiled diaper. Woo Hoo! We are so proud of him.

Other random stuff …
- Niklas loves music and enjoys singing too. His current favorite songs are Wonder Pets, Thomas the tank engine and Little Einsteins’ theme songs. Oh and he even knows how to sing part of Singapore National Anthem and the Phantom of the Opera song!! (Note to self: must remember to take the video clips!)
- He loves trains and he especially loves his Thomas the tank engine toy. He brings that toy everywhere he goes, even to bed.
- He enjoys painting and sidewalk chalk drawing, but doesn’t have the patience to sit down to draw or work on a craft project.
- He drinks 12-18 oz of whole milk every day.
- His favorite vegetables are broccoli and leafy greens like spinach, cai xin and Chinese kale.
- He loves most fruits, especially grapes and oranges.
- His favorite snacks – crackers, string cheese, and junk food (Doritos, chocolate, corn chips etc )
- He still enjoys watching Barney shows, but his favorite is Thomas the tank engine shows. He also like Wonder Pets, Ni Hao Kai Lan, Dora the explorer and Go, Diego Go!
- Other than the trains and train tracks, he enjoys playing lego, puzzles and balls. He also likes to play catching, hide and seek and sometimes pretend play with his sister.
- He knows the colors by the names of the Sodor trains e.g. THomas = blue, Percy = green, James = red, Molly = yellow, Diesel = black, Toby = brown.

Hmm… it’s getting late and I can’t think of what else to write. So, that’s all for today on Niklas’ 24mths old updates.

Overheard – the phrase that does wonders!

“Niklas, come and help Jiejie pack the DVDs!”

“No, I don’t want!”

“Come and help! If not, No TV FOR YOU! Do you want to watch Thomas?”

“Yes.”

“Then, help me!!”

“O-k-a-y…”

Haha… I guess Nikita learns to use that magic phrase on her brother because I use that phrase a lot on both children, especially during meal time and when I want them to drink more water. It is very effective to get them to do what I want by just threatening to not give them watch a show.

Do you have a phrase that does wonders too?

overheard

*whispering*

“Korkor, you and Siew Yee jiejie can call me either Nikita or by my nickname, Marikita now.”

=_=

Nikita’s first award from school

Nikita was awarded a certificate (code of conduct) from her principal two weeks ago for helping her friend at school. We are so proud of her!

美

诗媛: 妈妈, 你小的时候很美吗?

妈妈: 没有啦. 小的时候妈妈最丑!

诗媛: 妈妈, 哪谁最美?

妈妈: 三姨最美.

诗媛: 三姨有比我美吗?

妈妈: 当然有啦!

诗媛: 哦! 那三姨真的很美!

妈妈: 什么??

诗媛: 我已经很美了, 可是三姨更美, 那她真的很美咯!

妈妈: LOL

=_=”
(我的宝贝, 妈妈其实很想对你说… 在东方人的眼里, 你真的不算很美吔! 可是在妈妈的眼里, 你是最美的!)

(Top-Bottom, Left-Right: 大姐, 二姐, 三姐, 我)

Post Remarks:
When Niklas saw the above picture, he pointed at me in the picture and said, “Niklas is here!”
HAHAA…

lantern craft 2009

Come and check out the lantern craft that the children and I made this year!

Click here for our Lantern Craft 2009.

Related Posts:
Mid Autumn Festival Crafts 2008
Lantern craft
Mid Autumn Festival crafts 2006
Mid Autumn Festival 2005

chalk art and bubbles

Sometimes I get so distracted by work and the hurrying demands of modern life that I’ve forgotten simple activities like bubbles blowing and chalk drawing can bring lots of fun and joy too!

I-M-u-s-t-L-e-a-r-n-T-o-S-l-o-w-D-o-w-n.

Happy Birthday, Niklas!:

Our baby turns 2 today!

PS: Celebration pictures coming up soon.

We had a simple birthday celebration for Niklas. Nikita and I baked the cake (from cake mix obviously!) the night before and decorated it in the morning together before Niklas woke up. Then their cousins in Singapore joined us to sing the Birthday song to Niklas at Skype and they also made us watch them eat the sinfully rich (I-really-want-a-bite) chocolate cake on screen.

(To my beloved nephews and nieces, Si Yi don’t have to eat it also know how it taste like, ok!)

Luckily, our cake tasted not bad too.
Both Nikita and Niklas love the candy bits most. * *

More pictures…

Maybe you can’t tell, but the boy was really happy and excited to see James!
Now he brings James everywhere he and Thomas goes.