Miss Responsible

Katrina has been carrying her baby doll David around and tucking him in every night lately. Out of the blue, she did a really long monologue in the car. I was impressed not only by her ability to speak such a long and complex sentence, but mainly astounded by her sense of responsibility:

係噃,我要記住擤鼻涕嗰陣時要擤完左邊先至擤右邊, 咁就唔會病到咩嘢咁喇 (ear infection), 如果唔係如果我病得好厲害, 咁邊個湊David 喎. 因為爸爸又病, 又要揸車, 媽咪又要返工, 爺爺又忙, 嫲嫲又有嘢做, 佢(points to Nathan)又細個唔識嘢, 姑姐又要瞓覺, 咁無人湊David點算呀! 咁唔得咖嘛,係咪 ?

終於識叫媽咪

For months, Nathan would only sound out objects that are phonetically "B-ish": 波波, 鼻鼻, 拜拜, 包包 (麵包), 爸爸, bear bear. The rest were all 嗰個. (Another favorite everyday word was 跌咗.)
After calling me 爸爸 forever, Nathan finally started calling me 媽咪 a couple weeks ago. Not that he couldn't pronounce the "M" sound before - whenever he was frustrated, he would go mamamama (媽媽聲) - maybe I should be glad he never called me 媽媽 and went straight to 媽咪 and didn't associate me with the sound of frustration ?

Costume Contest Winner

We participated in several Halloween festivities this year:
Oct 26: Katrina's school had its Fall festival and Nathan tagged along.

Oct 31: Whole Foods Kids got to Trick or Treat for healthy snacks while mom picks up groceries, perfect for our early sleepers who don't eat candy anyway.

Nov 3: A neighborhood church hosted a Costume Carnival with lots of games. Katrina has probably never thrown bean bags or bowled or tossed rings etc. but she did pretty well as a first-timer on all of them. It turned out there were secret judges walking around judging hundreds of costumes and Nathan won in one of the 4 categories ! Check out the album to see which category he won !

Halloween 2007

Pumpkin Patch

The kids had lots of fun running around a local farm checking out antique farm equipment and the colorful harvest.

Pumpkin Patch 2007

表情多多

Both of our kids have very animated facial expressions - here are a few of the many recent Nathanisms we captured:

...等我諗吓點樣整蠱媽咪爹哋先

啊!!! 笑啊啊就係咁樣咖喇

嘻嘻, 你咁識引我笑呀

唔, 你嗰樣都幾得意喎

吖呀, 乜嘢嚇到我咁驚!

嘩! 嗰度有啲嘢好特別,係乜嘢嚟嘅呢 ?

大頭仔

Nathan had his 15th month checkup the other day. He's still growing right along the 50th and 75th percentile curves for weight and height (ever since birth). His head, however, has been growing progressively bigger and gone from about 90th percentile from his 12th month checkup to a whopping 97th now. (For those of you who'd like to check on your kids' growth from time to time without having to wait for a doc visit, here's the link to those charts they show you: www.cdc.gov/growthcharts

I don't remember what size his head was at birth, but I think it was just kind of average. Thank God for programming him to grow slowly into his current head size - can't imagine how much tougher the birth and postnatal experience would have been if his head was at 97th percentile at birth !!!

怕草的啟示

其實小朋友成日教我好多嘢:

Nathan雖然好怕草,但係佢又願意試吓摸吓. 好驚咁,但係周圍望吓,見到其他啲得意嘅嘢,好快又會笑到擘大晒個口, 開心到咩咁。

其實我哋好多時唔開心或者焦慮煩惱,都可以學吓小朋友,望吓周圍或者望遠啲,話唔定好快又會畀我哋搵到啲令到我哋笑到見牙唔見眼嘅嘢嘅噃。

See the video that showed me this insight:

怕草 Video

Multi-Tasking

Nathan has always been a non-stop baby. He's actually slowed down a lot in this video because he has yet to master his walking skills. This video epitomizes I guess not just his busyness but ours too. Here he is learning to walk with both hands full, reads a map, dials a phone with pot in hand, learns to turn around, finds lost equipment, and continues cooking. Reminds me of how many tasks working moms juggle throughout the day. The other day I had to be on a conference call during which I had to pick up Katrina - had my cell on speaker and mute while asking K about her new teacher, making a turn, shifting gear (don't ask me why I'm still driving a stick), and all of a sudden had to scramble to unmute to answer an unexpected question from Philadelphia....

Busy Boy Video

Sleeping through the night

This is a very rare photo. Whereas we have tons of Katrina's funny contortionistic poses, we haven't really dared to take any of Nathan's sleep pics. In fact, we were scared to even tiptoe in to check on his room temperature ever since he woke up a few times right after the door was opened and took forever to go back to sleep. Katrina was much nicer to us - she would go 12 hours straight without a peep when she was 3-4 month-old.

Although Nathan was right on time on his other milestones, he sure took his time on this one but at least he finally made it ! It was probably partly my responsibility as I ALWAYS fed him when he cried in the middle of the night. Since he's over 50th percentile in weight and I'm like in the negative range, I always assumed hunger as he wouldn't take any supplemental bottles like his sister did. Right around the 9-10 month mark when he was eating a lot of solids, I started thinking he couldn't really be hungry and refrained from feeding him automatically although it was always the quickest and surest way to calm him.

I still remember the night of "the turning point." I was so tired I actually didn't hear him cry at around 2-3am (Jonathan usually does but didn't that time either) When I finally did hear the screaming, I remember this out-of-body experience of trying to get up - it was like I was floating above and looking down at my exhausted achy body and trying to wake it up but couldn't. Magically, after a while, (didn't even know how long), the crying stopped !!! No feeding or other intervention necessary ! So we started letting him settle himself for a few days and lo and behold - he's sleeping through without needing to nurse !

Although he still cries during his sleep on days when he napped poorly and I still have to go in and soothe him at times, he's definitely a much better sleeper now. Maybe I can finally pay back my own very deep sleep debt one of these days......

嘟嘴

From time to time, Nathan would make this funny face that would always elicit a smile from me. Although Katrina also had a very wide range of facial expressions, she's never made this one before - so I've been wanting to take this picture for quite a while. But as most moms know - by the time you pull out the camera to capture a moment, kids are usually onto their next thing - so I was glad this time I got it.

Eat at school

Since we want Katrina to stay proficient in Cantonese, we haven't really taught her how to speak in English athough she does know single words like numbers, colors, animals, etc. We just assumed she'll one day magically learn to speak perfectly all on her own. She did pick up a few phrases here and there from preschool but I guess all bilingual students need a little help every now and then:

Out of the blue, Katrina proclaimed: Saturday and Sunday, I don't go to school eat,

then added prouldy: 即係 Saturday and Sunday 唔喺學校食嘢啦 !

Jonathan smiled and said: 唔係咁講, 應該講 I don't eat at school.

Katrina repeated: I don't eat at school...

then went: 喔,咁咪即係食咗學校囉?

攞檯

With Katrina talking like an adult most of the time, we don't usually think about whether we have or haven't exposed her to certain concepts when we talk to her.... (Having always gone out with everyone in our 7-seater, we must never have first sent part of the group to "reserve a table" before....

After leaving the house for dim sum, being the astute observer that she is,

Katrina asked: 姑姐喺邊度 ?

Jonathan: 去咗攞檯囉.

Looking around again, Katrina: 咁嫲嫲爺爺呢 ?

Jonathan: 佢地都係去咗攞檯囉.

Katrina: 點解嫲嫲爺爺要同埋一齊去呢 ?

Jonathan was concentrating on driving and didn't answer right away, so Katrina came up with her own answer as she often does:
喔, 姑姐梗係唔夠力, 所以佢地要一齊去先至夠力攞檯喇 !

Super baby

Nathan sustained a 4+ ft fall from his crib 2 days ago . I'm still stunned and the whole incident still surreal. Fortunately, Dr. grandpa was here to check him over and declared he appeared fine although he then told a horror story of kids that seemed fine at the ER but stopped breathing the next morning due to undetected brain hemorrhage. Even though my mommy instincts also told me he was probably fine after he still managed to smile while I nursed him a few mintues after the fall, I still couldn't sleep well that night of course.

For a short while, I was tempted to give our trusted nanny a hard time for forgetting to pull up the crib gate. Instead, I decided to be gracious and tried to comfort her when she profusely apologized. I realize I've already been quite grumpy lately from prolonged sleep deprivation, but life is too short to be mean ! This incident really reminded me how fragile life is and how I probably don't spend enough time enjoying Nathan. I had little energy left from nursing, working, and other care giving basics to all 3 kids (hubbie included) that I often don't just sit down and marvel at how cute and strong my baby is. He often pulls himself up with one hand and had actually been "walking" around his crib at this early age. Being a second-time mom, however, I no longer marvel at all these important milestones, yet he still deserves every bit of attention and wonder and excitement as a first-born !

大大後日

Katrina usually starts her day with: 爸爸 (or 媽咪),我瞓醒覺啦 ! After hearing the knock on her door, she would ask 邊個呀？Upon hearing the answer, she would then say 爸爸(or 媽咪) , 你入嚟啦 ! Then she would usually asks "今日星期幾呀 ?" - so she can tell if it's a school day or the weekend when Mom & Dad won't have to 返工 and can hang out with her.

She had learned her days of the week in both English and Chinese quite a while ago but hasn't quite learned the concept of past and future quite yet, so one day we started by asking 今日星期幾呀 ? To which she replied: Monday. 咁聽日呢 ? After thinking for a bit, she answered cautiously, Tuesday ? I was thrilled she caught on so quickly, so I asked again, 咁後日呢 ? She wasn't quite sure but still ventured: Wednesday ? I clapped and said yes ! 咁大後日呢 ? She must have picked up the sequence and said confidently: Thursday ! I clapped again and said 咁大大後日呢 ? She was now sure she was on the right track and answered: Friday ! After soaking in her new knowledge, she thought it's her turn to pose a question, so she asked, 咁細細後日呢 ?