15 months old

You're having the time of your life with so much attention from everybody. It just melts my heart to hear you laugh and shriek in excitement everyday from playing (although this may be the reason that you wake up at night from being over excited). You have become very cheeky and love being 'chased' around the house.

Your verbal vocabulary still only just consists of
- dada
- mama
- nana (for all food, including milk)
- 'uh-oh' (for everything unexpected)
- taaaaaa (after getting something and I wonder if it means thank you?)
Although I know that every child develops in their own way, I can't help but worry and wonder occasionally about why you are so slow in learning to talk, and hope that you will be talking more soon ;)

You have learnt to walk backwards. You still have your fascination with the washing machine (which is a good 'babysitter' as you'll sit/stand mesmerised), still LOVE eating (especially now when there's so much variety of food), and is as cheerful and always laughing, amusing us.

Last week of research

I can't believe I only have 6 days left before I restart full time clinical work. It seemed just like yesterday when I started the post, and now life has taken a full turn, with having a toddler around. There's such mixed feelings of definitely missing my current job with its flexibility, but had its share of frustrations, and the excitement of being able to 'get my hands dirty' again :) I pray for strength, wisdom and understanding family and colleagues, in juggling roles of being a mom, wife and have a career. I'll also fully enjoy this last week.

Frozen Liverpool

We decided to brave the wintery weather and went for a walk in Sefton Park. It was bittery cold and although the scenery was beautiful, we did not even make it to the 'lake'. We turned back midway as we could hardly feel our toes.

Merry Christmas 2010

'It's the most, wonderful time, of the year' again :) The snow has not thawed so yes, we did have another 'white christmas'. As usual, there was lots of food and eating, and laughter, especially with you, Isaac. I still vividly remember last year when you were only 3 months old, and tried to join in and now have become the centre of attention.

Main courses: roast lamb, salmon en-croute, and roast turkey thigh

Not liking the party hat and keep wanting to take it off

Wanting to open the presents?

Very excited with more toys

You had the exact shot taken a year ago, and can still fit into the 'bumbo'

Having fun after dinner and opening presents

Uh-Oh

This is your favourite phrase over the past 2 weeks. You will 'uh-oh' if you drop something, hear the phone ring, hear the oven alarm, see someone drop something, or if anything is not what it's supposed to be. Maybe if we say 'aiyoh' more often, you will catch that too :) It is however very difficult to capture you as it was always so spontaneous.

An attempt to record by purposely taking the stirrer and dropping it in front of you:

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow

Finally!! It snowed heavily in Liverpool :) AND, I finally built a snowman with you!!!

I excitedly bundled you up in 4 thick layers and went into the carpark behind the apartment, which was totally empty and beautifully covered with ankle deep snow. Unfortunately, you were terrified by the snow and your reaction was totally not what I expected. You refused to walk and looked scared most of the time. It was slightly better when we sat you on the trike. Maybe your feet was too cold in the snow?

The beginning of the snowman, but you were totally not impressed with anything

Our masterpiece, which is still standing now. We'll probably build her a companion tomorrow :)

'Mama' finally?

Yesterday, I heard you call me 'mamamamama', but I don't think you actually understand the sound you were making, or was trying to call me that, although you know that I am 'mama'. You continued with 'Mamaawawawawama' today. Hopefully you will learn to call me 'Mama' or 'Mummy' soon :)

You however have definitely started to call 'banana', 'Nanananananannana' and in fact can't stop babbling 'Nananananana'. You just seem to love this babble. All this came over 2 days. I am really hoping that you will start to say some words soon as many your age can say quite a few words already.

Good times

We are all throughly enjoying ourselves after the bout of illness. It's good to have family around :) Although your gong gong and popo are now in Romania for a week, you have enjoyed more than enough attention from 'sam yi' and 'sai yi'.

Out shopping - entertaining you was not easy, but definitely more fun with sisters around

International buffet dinner and we stuffed ourselves

We are definitely looking forward to my parents coming back from Romania and Siau visiting later on. The last time we were all together was at our wedding 4 years ago. It will be a good winter, no matter how cold it beecomes :)

God is great

Thank God everybody arrived safely as planned for their holidays. It was on the night before they arrived that I started feeling ill. I do not remember the last time I was this sick: fever, rigors, sore throat, and diarrhoea, the exact same symptoms that Isaac and Richard had. God had perfect timing in bringing my family here as Richard was in Barcelona and I would not have been able to cope alone, as Isaac was very clingy and whiny as he was also not totally recovered. Thank you Jesus, for always being faithful.
We are all now recovered from this winter flu, apart from the sniffly nose and cough.

Career mother?

The challenge of which comes first: family or career, is really put to the test when a child is sick. I always quote 'family comes first'. But, when something has been pre-organised at work, and no one can take my place, and then you're not very well, what should I do?

It should be easy if I stick to the rule of 'family comes first'. But in reality, is it that easy to call and say 'sorry, my son is sick and I can't come in?' Even if I could, how many times can I do that? Are work colleagues that sympathetic? All these questions constantly swirl in my mind as I prepare to go back to clinical work. It becomes reality as today I had to send you in as I could not cancel the appointment already made at work, but had to bring you back early as I got called twice about your fever. What should I do tomorrow? I also have another work commitment.

Winter bug

My 2 boys are down with diarrhoea and vomiting :( Praying that they get better soon and I won't catch it.

Mummy's little helper

It's 4 weeks before Christmas and hence time to put up the Christmas tree.
I thought you were going to be very excited with the tree but you were weary. You initally didn't even dare come near the tree and was slightly afraid :) Probably a very cautious boy? You then played with the decorations and surprisingly handled them with care. You were also very helpful and passed me the decos one by one to put on the tree. You didn't really know how to hang it on the tree, eventhough I tried to teach you.
A real surprise: I thought you were going to remove all the decorations from the lower part of the tree but you did not even touch them :)


I tried to take a photo of you and the finished product but there was no chance that you were going to sit still in front of the tree :) So, this is the result.

Standing you in front of the tree, then holding you to prevent you from running away while my other hand holds the camera and quickly takes the shot

In the night garden

Glued to your favourite TV programme - In the night garden. It's the programme that makes feeding time so much easier :) You know how to ask for the TV control to turn the programme on during meal times. I have 1 recorded as back up so that it is 'on' if you do not eat at your usual time.

'Footballer' in training

You do try very hard, but probably need quite a few more lessons before getting it right :) Maybe you'll be ready when the weather gets better.

Self feeding

You have actually become quite good at aiming food into your mouth with a spoon or fork.

However, I do not know why you refuse to feed yourself dinner. You will vigourously shake your head when I ask you to 'put your mum-mum into your mouth' during dinner time as you much rather use the spoon to play with the food. It is entirely different when it comes to your favourite yogurt as you can self feed the whole tub yourself. HHmmm.. are you lazy as you know I will feed you?

My little eskimo

This is how you dress for nursery everyday. Of course your inside shirts get changed :)

Bout of exercise in winter

A friend mentioned tiring you out by 'letting you loose' in the malls. Coincidentally, that was exactly what I did on Sunday. I went to Costco (hypermarket) with some church friends for lunch and to get some essentials in bulk (yes, like your nappies). I let you out from your pram and you 'ran' up and down the aisle with glee.

Washing hands

I've been trying to teach you to wash your hands after a meal. As am writing this, just thought maybe I should be teaching you to wash hands before meals too :) As expected, you LOVED the water. So much so that if I accidentally leave the stool in front of the basin, you'll be on it when I'm not looking, hoping to 'play water' again, but thankfully you still can't reach the taps.

For the sake of recording your 'growing up', you are refusing to brush your teeth over the past few days. Maybe it's the teething process??

New food

I tried cooking dinner for all and it worked. You ate the rice with soup (ABC soup so had all the ingredients you were familiar with) and seemed to really enjoy it.

In another meal, you also amazed us by managing to choose the roast potato over the scampi from your high chair. You kept shaking your head when we passed you the scampi. Both the scampi and potato looked similar to us :)

Winter is here

It was -5 degrees this morning when we left the house for church, and it is still only the month of November. Unfortunately there was still no snow. So, no snowman yet, Isaac :) But, you had to wear 4 layers before leaving the house! This is the first time I wrapped you up so well. I think if you fell, you would have bounced from the amount of padding.


The wintery weather also meant staying at home the whole weekend. Thus, you were more restless than usual, and it did not help that your dada was on call. I had to keep thinking of ways to entertain you and it was both mentally and physically tiring. All full time moms out there - how do you do it???

Thank God I had bought some 'playdoh' after a recommendation by a friend. You were amused by how 'strips' came out with you pressing down and we played for about an hour. You also loved digging your fingers into the playdoh, so washing your nails was 'fun'. We may have to introduce a new activity every weekend if the weather doesn't change.

Developmental update

You finally started teething again!!! I can just see the tips of both the lower and upper right lateral incisors shining through :)

A friend mentioned I should be noting down words you can say or understand. So, here goes:
Words said:
- Dada, Dede, Baba (unfortunately nothing comprehensive and certainly NOT even mama :( )
Words/commands/songs understood and responds with action to:
- NO (like all kids, one of the first few words understood and now replies 'no' by vigourously shaking your head)
- Mama
- Come here
- Sit down
- Light
- Mummm-mummm (food)
- Milk
- Yoghurt
- Pao pao (after a meal)
- Bye-bye
- Flying kiss
- Kiss
- Hug
- Clap hands
- Shake head
- Head
- Nose
- Brush teeth
- Wash hands
- Bathing time
- Shoes
- Socks
- Jacket
- Trousers
- Book
- TV (this is really bad I suppose ;) your favourite is 'in the night garden')
- Row row row your boat
- Twinkle, twinkle little star
- The wheels on the bus
- This is the way the lady rides
(and hopefully the list grows)

You still have quite a short attention span and will not sit still for me to read to you, except before bed. You LOVE hammering, knocking blocks over and putting things in and out of a container, thus tidying your toys when I ask you to. You can also build a block of 3 and is learning to pull a 'pulling toy'. It's quite amusing as you don't really understand the concept yet and keep lifting the whole toy up. As always, you love music and always dance and move to it.

Well, am sure the words will come when you're ready :) I just thank God everyday for your laughter, and the smiles that you put on our faces everyday over the past 14 months.

Male bonding

It was another major milestone :) Probably for me more than anybody else. Yes, I left you with daddy for 48 hours while I went to London for a conference. It was the first time leaving you overnight!! Of course you both coped :) The only small hint that you missed me was waking up in the middle of the night the day I left, and crying for 40 minutes, and on the night that I arrived home, but only for 5 minutes while I cuddled you.. Maybe I was imaging it, but you were super hyper on Saturday, more than usual :) We did plan to enjoy some family time but alas, the washing machine chose to break down. What a waste of a saturday sorting that out.

My 'time away' made us realise how stressful it may be in a month's time when I return to clinicals, and I lose the flexibility of picking you up, and Richard having to rush for 6pm, like he did over the past 2 days. It will extra tricky during the late on-calls and nights. Thank God for a month to iron it out while my parents are here. We pray for strength and understanding colleagues.

Your love for food

A good indicator of your health has always been your appetite. I know you're really ill when nursery reports you don't 'eat all' for everything and you refuse dinner :)

Of late, you've become more choosy and do not really fancy your porridge anymore. You much prefer our food and will climb across your highchair table just to reach it. Even after you have finished your porridge, you somehow find space in your stomach to squeeze our 'junk' in. We've also relaxed more and will offer them to you but it's a little scary as your tummy looks as it's about to pop sometimes. For example, one evening, you finished your bowl of porridge, then had 4 pieces of potato wedges, 2 strips of chicken kiev, 2 pieces of orange, and 5oz of milk before you slept, all in the space of 2 hours.

I have to be more creative in my cooking, or maybe just let you eat our food, chopped into smaller pieces. You have been eating these food in nursery all these while I suppose?

Your first home cooked pasta meal

Finished a whole hard boiled egg for breakfast

Wolfing down the wedges after a full meal

Daily exercise

Thank God for a relatively long hallway that allows you to roam up and down. This is probably where all the food you eat goes to :)

(please mute this while you watch it)

Wacker Quacker Weekend

As a treat to us all after your week long illness, we decided to do something different and brought you on the Yellow Duckmarine, also known as the Wacker Quacker. This is an amphibian vehicle which drives on land and in water. It is one of the visitors' highlights and we can finally say we have been on it, after 6 years in Liverpool.

We really had a good day. We started with a full English breakfast as the morning tour was full. You were entertained by your favourites - breadsticks and a balloon, so, we ate in peace.
After your nap, we boarded the bus/boat. You were very excited and stood on my lap nearly the whole tour, holding on to the bar of the front seat, laughing/smiling, either looking outside or in front. It must be so much more fun compared to being strapped in your car seat. We learnt a few new things about Liverpool too. But, I thought it was a little overpriced. I suppose it's the novelty that makes it so popular.


Then, we went to the Tate Museum for some 'culture' :) It was of course shortened by your ability to 'make your presence known' and left before we got asked to. We then had a take-away for dinner. It'll be good to do something special like this about once a month. Totally takes away the mundanity, and something to look forward to.

Adult Food

Thank God you have totally recovered, and is back to your usual self and enjoying food again :) I can also enjoy my sleep too.

MMR/Hib/MenC/PCV

These were the vaccines you were given all at once, and it made you so ill. You have not been this ill since catching the 'viruses' when you first started nursery about 6 months ago. You ran a high fever, could not keep food down, refused to eat and was coughing/sniffling all the time. Thank God you were still quite good natured, but stuck to me like glue. At night, you woke up every hour or so and it brought back haunting memories of the past when you woke 4-5x a night.

Thankfully you are nearly fully recovered today, but have broke out in a nasty rash. Still, you did not eat normally. I wonder if you are becoming more fussy with your porridge? Or is your apetite taking its own time in returning to normal? I just pray that you will be back to your normal self soon.

My boy's growing up

Sigh... I do wish you will not grow up so quickly. You're at the perfect age and we're having so much fun with you. I do not want to worry about having to discipline you, get stressed about what school to be putting you in etc.. Can we please stop the clock?

You sitting on the throne like a little man

After your first hair cut - you surprisingly stayed very still for the aunty. I tried cutting for you and you kept turning your head to see what I was doing, so I gave up. It was a good thing as she took only 10 mins. I would have taken at least 2 days!!

Your new cotbed duvet set in preparation for the winter months - it must be comfortable as you do not 'helicopter' around as much with the duvet

You are also no longer in the baby carry cot and have a new front facing car seat.

The throne

No, I'm not planning to toilet train you at this age. All I want to do is prevent you from always bathing in your own pee.

Over the past few weeks, you always wee when I place you in the bath. So, I started to say 'wee-wee-wee' when I put you in and you actually start to wee but the moment I push you forward to prevent you from weeing into the bath, you stop. So, I bought this so that you can sit you on it to wee before your bath. Tried it out today, and it worked!! You peed when Ric said 'wee-wee-wee' and you had a clean bath :) Maybe I will try putting you on it after your meals so that I do not have to wipe your poo too. Then, hopefully you will just indicate to want to go when you're ready to be toilet-trained.

Fearless

Dare I leave you alone?

New function for the trike

It was such a sunny day (but cold) last Sunday that we all went for a picnic after church. You had a ride on your trike again to the park but the moment we arrived, you only wanted to push it around. You walked non-stop for about an hour, and richard and I had to take turns 'walking' you. I think we were more tired than you. You also had a very good time with all the 'kokos' and 'che-che'.



You've also grown a lot since the camping trip as you 'fill' a lot more of the director's chair :)

Hello?

This will serve as a reminder of why we have to be so careful with what we do and say, and what we expose you to. I never taught you to use the phone and today you just picked it up and had a 'conversation'.

First handicraft

You came home from nursery with this. Wonder if this was in preparation for Halloween?

Language

According to baby centre, you're supposed to be speaking 2-3 words at this stage. But, the only 'words' you say are 'dadadadadada', 'dedededededede' or 'babababababa', and no sign of 'Mama' or anything else that resemble a word yet. You do shout a lot though, and we always have to hush you. There's a friend's son who can already say 'I want', and 'I don't want', on top of the dada and mama. So Isaac, there's some catching up to do :)

You do understand a few commands, like sit down, come here, give mama/dada, dance, clap hands, shake head, brush teeth, splash, and will wave bye-bye and 'flying kiss'. Recently, u also recognise the words 'light' and 'nose' as you will point to it, and 'milk', 'yogurt' and 'mummum (food)' as you will be very excited/laugh/stop what you're doing and follow me to get it. I'm trying my best to speak some mandarin to you too but somehow I always revert back to English. A beginning is counting in mandarin when I walk up and down the steps with you.

Reading's supposed to be very good but unfortunately you have a short attention span and love to just flip the pages, close the book or crawl away, rather than listen. So, I bought you a pop-up book with sounds to attract you. Alas, you seemed frightened by the pop-up characters. Maybe it should not have been the 'Spooks' theme :) Well, at least you like carrying all the books around the house and fortunately do not tear them.

Less tumbling

You're no longer tumbling along or walking like a drunkard as much now :)

New shoes - Clark Cruisers

Your 'chubby' feet has been confirmed today when we had your feet measured in Clarks. You were a size 3.5H (range from E-H, H being the widest). The service was really personalised and good, and I was impressed.

I am sure we made an impression on them too, with you walking along and pulling off every shoe from the lower rack and throwing them on the floor; creating a fuss when we tried to put shoes on you because you wanted to continue playing with all the shoes, and a summary of my conversation with the salesperson going:

SP: Those shoes (size 3.5H) fit very well, and they look good
Me: Do you have them in size 4? and can I try them please?
SP: But we do not recommend size 4 as they may cause your son to trip and incorrect shoe size may hurt his feet
Me: I'll still like to try them please
(so she comes with the size 4 shoes, puts them on Isaac after a fuss and he walked away)
Me: He seems to be walking alright with them, how much bigger are they anyway?
SP: 4mm
Me: 4mm????? and when do you recommend I bring Isaac back again for refitting?
SP: 6 weeks
ME: 6 weeks?? You mean a pair of shoes only lasts 6 weeks? I'll have the size 4 please
SP: But, we do not recommended size 4........... (and it went on a few times)

Well, she must be thinking, 'why do you bother bringing a kid for fitting if you don't follow advice'. But, I remember rolled up tissues in the front of shoes and I'm sure that's more than 4mm in diameter, and we all learnt to walk just fine :) Do parents really buy shoes every 2-3 months for their kids when they are growing?

Apparently, your feet will also grow thinner as you walk more and the 'fat' in the feet will go away. Isaac, you better walk a lot more as there's nothing wider than a H.

Your little obsession?

You're not the tidiest of toddler, but you ALWAYS put the 'piano' on top of the trike box, no matter where it has been left. Maybe it's because it's the perfect height for you to play on it.

Your look of shock and dismay when you couldn't find the box to put the piano back on (as the trike was being assembled) was so funny that I have to share it. It's probably time that I start to teach you about tidying up also. Well, we kept the trike box for your sake.