nooniink!

Kecil at the door

I think I must have turned my back way too long. Wasn't this baby just crawling yesterday?
Honestly! At the very least, since when did she manage to get a good grab of door knobs & handles and start playing with doors & locks & such?

Which reminds me, oh dear, I'd better get that set of master keys in some hidden yet convenient location. Just in case somebody get locked in some room or other.
And always a set of keys when we are out of the house, even in the yard. Just in case.

As for the title nooniink?
Ahem, yeah, nowadays Mama would get locked in Kecil's bedroom (as per her highness' instructions, of course), Kecil would close the door (with some difficulty - she hasn't quite mastered the trick of twisting the doorknob while closing the door), stay out for a while, then burst through the door while greeting Mama "Noooniink!"

No clue yet?
That must have been inspired by Mama waking her up every morning. Haha.

Night time happenings...

(This post wouldn't have been possible without GramPa, who had kindly provided Mama the tool to take such beautiful photograph. Thank you GramPa!)

Baby in Bed

If you ever notice the blog background, you might notice some degree of similarity to Kecil's quilt on her bed. Indeed, the choice for the background was somewhat made because of that similarity. Somehow, it just felt appropriate. Especially given the amount of time (and patience... and effort) spent at this spot...

It's part of our daily routine, these nightly happenings.
As Mama approaches the end of her energy, or her patience, it is usually with gratefulness we will go to this spot, where we would plonked ourselves (or, rather, Mama will), get the necessary set up ready, and start the wait for the 'falling-asleep' moment.
As you might be able to see, this moment is not complete without the Mama laptop (on which will play Kecil's favourite Baaa), a full bottle of milk, and maybe some soft toy of choice.
Hidden from sight would be Mama's 'supplies' for the wait: a book, maybe some crocheting, and a sturdy pillow to lean on.

There was a time when timing for bed depends on the clock on the wall, and Mama roughly calculating the remaining waking hours.
While the rough calculations still continue up till today, nowadays, there are times when Kecil would readily 'inform' Mama that it is time for bobo, or sleep (She has mastered both words, and also understood that the meaning is the same).
There are times when she's on the spot, and she fell asleep not long after we hit the bed, but there are also times when she's way off, and Mama became a hostage on the bed for a long long time before she finally drifted off.

Last night, fortunately, it was the case of the former, where she fell into deep slumber just minutes after she hit the pillow. And as Mama left to refill the bottle of milk, here's what she came back to find:

Sleeping doggie on the Bed!

Ahem!
Oh well... I guess it was a warm spot, especially when the house gets cold with the air conditioning on at night.

 Sleeping together

 

Disclaimer: This Mama would like to assure you that Kecil's bed is not in fact the spot of choice for the Dog to sleep in. The Dog actually prefers Daddy's, but I guess she usually waits until the bed is occupied and warm.

little shepherd girl... a story

umm... whittling?

The Little Shepherd girl sat down on a rock one day, and whittled a flute under the afternoon sun...

Hmmm... testing?

 As the flute came to be, Little Shepherd Girl blew and tested her creation.
And a smile bloomed on her face to show her satisfaction of a job well done.

Playing for the... 'sheep'?

And she played for her charge, a gentle, kindly, old 'sheep' indeed, grazing to its heart's content...

Companionably resting

Till finally they both sat down and rest, after a day well spent in music and in each other's companion.

Mama's note: There are indeed times when I looked at these two and the phrase "anak gembala" came to mind. It must have to do with her clothing, both the baby and the dog's attitude. And seriously? The dog grazing soo does not help. Anyway, they make a cute couple. I do hope you enjoy the corny story. Hehehe.. this Mama is bad like that at times.

Vintage weekend: Bobo

Baby sleeping on the sofa

When we moved back to our apartment after extended maternity leave at the Grandparents' house(s), we were quite unprepared to accommodate a baby in tow. Ahem.
So... for temporary sleeping arrangement.... Haha...
Rest assured, the Baby did not fall or meet any other gruesome fate while she slept there, she grew to be the lively girl as we know her today.
In any case it was really a temporary thing, read: 2 nights at the very most, because Mama's nerves couldn't take it.
We bought her a crib on the third day.
But this picture remains, as a reminder of those early days...

Eating in progress...

Nyam!!!

Sometimes it feels as if I turn back and suddenly Kecil had mastered a new trick, a new hobby, a new something.
This weekend, I turned back, and just suddenly realize that Kecil had grown quite a love for various junkfood, especially the kind that can be eaten by hand.
Like pizza
And burgers (even those which are bigger than her tiny mouth)
And cheese rings

Ugh, I think we need to stock better food at home.
And I suppose Mama can't get lazy to cook too often.

Lesson learnt.

And just some vintage photos to go along:

Eating pasta on her baby chair

Ah, the baby chair.
She outgrew it pretty quickly, not because she got too big to go in,
I think she did not like the fact that she can't get in/out by herself
Plus, she wanted to be with the adults on the table, on a proper chair

On the table

Oh, dear. Did I say ON the table? I guess I did.

Messy eater

Definitely ON the table. Need to work on the manners, here, Bad Mama!

(Ahem, this Mama happy to report, though, that Kecil actually is quite amenable to sitting on the chair during meals. It's just that Mama does not have a good pic of that currently. Hehe...)

Gong Xi Fa Cai!

Wishing you a very happy, prosperous new year!
Remember, make lots of noise to scare all the monster and ghost away (a task Kecil is very happy to do),
do your clean up BEFORE, not on new year's day itself (they say it will sweep away your good luck),
and eat all the good, meaningful stuff (noodle: for longevity, sweet stuff: for sweetness in life, orange: for prosperity, etc)

Sub-urban Photography

Little Girl, Graffiti & tall grass

With our week currently composed of 5 days of Kecil School and Saturdays of Mama School, Mama just realized that the opportunity to go out and learn to use her new toy is quite limited indeed.
So when Sunday came about with Little Girl, Mama and Doggie all awake pretty early, we took off carrying the new toy and went to take some shots.
Ahem, this is of course the heart of the contention that resulted in that fabulous photo shared a few days back.
But well.. we had fun, with just a couple of photos and some learning.
We do look forward to the next weekend where we might stretch ourselves even more.

In the meantime, enjoy!

Little Girl being pushed on her bike. Hmmpph!

Still with the Graffiti

Stop hiding behind those huge lenses, Mama!

magic....

Sleeping Baby with her Precious Milk

 There's a special kind of magic that happens the moment the Little One closes her eyes and drifted off to sleep,
No matter how excitable, how hyperactive, how (sometimes) extremely annoying even (especially in the way she holds Mama hostage at her bed with BAaa playing until she falls asleep)...
The moment those lashes meet....
The breathing becomes deeper, and slower,
And somehow, she turned into a totally different being,
Almost an angel, with all those curls, the long, beautiful lashes, the apple red cheeks,
And all the possessiveness a 2-year old baby can have around the precious bottle of milk...

Magic indeed, that melt all the bad feelings,
that makes everything all right again,
that makes all the hardship no longer so, the annoyance inconsequential
Just the quiet... and the sound of deep breathing....

Until it's time to wake up, until tomorrow...
Sleep tight and sweet dreams, my sweet.

Because these too, are precious...

 

Baby crying on the street

As priceless as the smiles, the laughter, the antics and everything else, these tears too, are precious.
Because not only they provide the whole picture, of who and what this Little Girl is,
They say, ever so strongly, how deeply she feels about certain things

And so, even with the every so great reluctance, Mama complied to her wish
For it was finally clear, indeed, how strongly the Little Girl feels about certain things

For the curious lot of you, we were going for a leisurely walk on a Sunday morning, and she insisted that I brought along her push bike, just so she does not have to walk. Hmmph. 
So.. overburdened as Mama was with the huge camera (which was taken for a learning process), Mama still had to push the Little One on her bike. Such is the life of Mamas everywhere, I suppose.

Vintage weekend: Mama & Baby

"Vintage" Mama & Baby

Just because this Mama does not have a lot of time during the weekend to write, maybe we'll try posting 'vintage photos'.
Just because we have lots of those laying around, that I am pretty sure have not been shared.

This one was taken (coincidentally) exactly 2 years back, although slightly earlier in the day.
I hope you'll enjoy the series.

Little Girl & Skool

4 weeks into the school term, I think both the Little One and this Mama had come to term about the minutiae involved with a kid going to school. Well.. somewhat.
The uniform, the waking up early, the snacks, the filling up the time... well.. especially the waking up early. And for that part, even Daddy had some getting used to. He arrives at the office pretty early nowadays, right after he drop us at school.

It had been an interesting journey so far, though. And since it's a bit hard to share that bit about waking up early in pictures (this Mama not being an early riser, herself, hohoho), let's just share the bit about the uniform.

1st day of Skool: Kimono

Kecil attended the school on the first school day this year in this Kimono suit she got from her friend, Little Lady A. It was only after that first day that we hit the idea of using Kecil's friend's uniform, Little Lady N, who left in preparation for her baby sister's arrival.
So we did not get a set of brand new uniform, then we hit a snag.

Day 2 till 10 (or thereabouts) : white Ts and Uniform shorts

Kecil recognized the uniform as something that her friend had worn before, and she flat refused to wear the shirt. Only the shorts.
Did I say flat refused? Oh, yes I did. Because that is indeed what happened.
No matter how sleepy she was, how groggy in the morning, she WOULD check on what Mama tried to put on her, and promptly screamed her disapproval when she found out that I tried to slip her the shirt. Ahem.

And so, I think on the third week of school, on the day when everybody wears the same uniform, I brought the shirt to her teacher and asked if maybe she can help with the problem.
The teacher managed to come up with a brilliant idea of assigning a special name for the shirt, the BEE shirt (there's a bee illustration in front), and somehow managed to get Kecil into the said shirt.
That was on a Friday.
The following Monday, voila! no more tantrums, just eagerness to put on the Bee Shirt.

Day 11-13: Proper uniform, bag & not so proper Crocs

Maybe it also helped that by then she also got the bag as an additional 'sign' for school.

The next problem, then, was the shoes. The pink ones pictured above was still slightly too big, but her other one was falling apart. In any case, I would like her in socks and shoes, instead of just Crocs, so she can be jumping and running around with better foot protection.
THAT shoeing process took more effort around more refusal, which was finally solved by pointing out that Daddy wears socks as well.

Until in the end, up to this point anyway, we have this lovely school girl that I barely recognize:

Proper school uniform, finally!

I am sure there are still other challenges ahead, but for the time being, I think I'll be content in celebrating smaller victories, like getting her into uniform each day, feeding her (and her Daddy) some sort of breakfast every morning, waking up on time... those kind of things.


There are still battles to be fought each day, so I am going back to plan for the next one, with the hope of managing with the challenges better than I have done so far.
Wishing you victories on your daily battles as well!

Kecil after school: still not willing to let go of the uniform

A little ode...

When the head is heavy, yet sleep doth refuse to come,
Let's write a little ode, for the past and the years to come.


Also, I think I promised some 'vintage' photos. So.. here we come...

Little Lamb Friend

Have you met our Little Lamb Friend yet?
This is our very special friend, whom we take for almost every single walkies, apart from the Dog and the Little Girl, that is.
It's actually attached to the tricycle which I bought quite sometime ago for the very purpose of taking walkies with BOTH the Baby and the Dog.
Well, there's also that part about the Little One not being able to keep her hands away from the neighbor's tricycle, but we shall not mention that, ya?

So, here was the trike when I first bought and presented it to the Little One...

Kecil on the trike

 Twas indeed a long time ago. Haha...
It was chosen and bought based on just a few basic criteria: it has an adult size steering handle, and not electronic thing-a-magic in front. Those kind of thing usually do not last very long. Hence we have just a simply squeaky toy in the form of Little Lamb Friend.
Of course, we somehow lucked out in many ways: the color scheme (blue and pink) happen to match the neighbor's trike (which Kecil had set her heart upon), the whole construction was pretty sturdy and well thought (with the baskets both in front and at the back of the trike), the design would be usable through several stages of growth... etc. Simply said? I love that trike, and as the one pushing it on daily basis, that's important.

Kecil on the trike

Thankfully, the other party, the one who has to ride it on daily basis, also love it.
From the squeaky toy, the safety belt (a bit hard to see), the everything.
And for a while, she was content to ride while Mama push the trike on daily walkies with the Dog.
Once she's bigger, of course, she wanted to copy Mama...

Look, Mama, I can push it too!

I can push and bring the Dog too, Mama. Oy, Dog!

Posing

Ahem, Ok, I do NOT pose with trikes. But then again, maybe I do show off. Ahem. So...

Curly Kecil on the trike

Well... the color has somewhat faded slightly, but the trike is still going strong. Nowadays, Kecil is already strong enough to walk run(!) on her own during walkies, but we still bring along the trike anyway, just in case she got tired.
Better on the trike than being carried by Mama, ya? She's not that light anymore.

Unfortunately, there's no escaping carrying her should she fall asleep. The seat simply does not accommodate a sleeping baby.
Just try not to make it a habit. Juggling a dog, a trike, a sleeping (heavy) baby and some funky terrain is sure no joke. Fuh.
 

embracing good weather

As Mama moved outside to enjoy the fantastic weather over the weekend, the Little one followed suit, carrying all kinds of things with her: a sofa cushion and 2 milk cans she found in the laundry room.
Then she bugged me for these huge straws I bought some time back for drinking pearl tea. She had been using those straws to drink her Yakult, and I was mystified at first, since she already finished all the Yakult in the house.

Then the concert began.... oh, dear!

One Little Drummer Girl, a bit late for Christmas, though

Hahaha... what a great idea!
At least with those straws, she made marginally less noise.

Go for it, Kiddo! I hope you'll never stop amazing us all!

Great Friends part 1

Happy Little Girls @ StudioMama

Among the many things that we are thankful for about our current place, friends for the Little One (and therefore the Mama) must be one of the top contender.
We were really lucky to have just next door, another little girl, just barely a year older than the Little One, who gets along famously with the Little One.

More than a year ago...

You might think that one year difference is big, especially when you are barely a toddler, not more than 3, 4 year in age. It was pretty obvious that they were not quite matched when they first met, but after a while....

Little Girls get along fine

They play together anyway, despite the difference in age, the gap in physical and mental development (Kecil was still learning to walk while Miss A was already running when this photo was taken). Even the different language and cultural background did not faze them.

Mischievous Duo on the bike

The Mama's are always happy when the two girls play together. Not only they make a real cute picture, but having each other for a playmate means the Mama's are free to do other things. Especially now that they only require minimum supervision around the house.

Bike racing (under supervision, never fear!)

We never know where the future will take us, but I do hope that where ever we might go in the future, my Little Girl would have fond memories of the fun she had with her friend from next door, and hopefully, even a lasting friendship, through days when even the photos have already faded.

And so, just because they made such a cute picture, I give you one more picture:

Little Girls playing @StudioMama

End of Holiday

Kecil going for boarding

I think this should conclude the series on this holiday. We are already back home, with Kecil already back to school, adjusting.
If you can't tell, I can tell you that school is one big reason for the frequent post. Those two precious hours while Kecil is under the care of someone else... sure make a difference in the daily routine.

Well.. so till we meet again. Be prepared for some 'vintage' stories and pic as this Mama runs out of new photos to share.

Holiday theme: Family & Friends

Kecil & GramMa

I suppose it's part and parcel of living abroad, but holidays in general are usually not just 'holiday' but would also include some sort of reunion, with family, with friends.
Just so with the last holiday. In fact, one would say that indeed, that was the main purpose of the 'holiday'. But it was great.
It was cool that we get to buy things we wouldn't have found back home, but the experience of meeting family and friends after so long? Priceless.

Kecil & GramPa

On their part, I do believe that the grandparents were very happy too to see Kecil, even if it's getting more obvious that Kecil can outrun them with great ease nowadays.

Kecil running towards her Tante

There was also the Tante, who happened to be at the same place and so could join us for dinners and stuff.

The girl with a balloon, and the fairy from fairyland

And a new friend, from old friends...

Kissing cousins, posing for photos

And from family.

We wished it were a longer holiday, we wished the new friends can make better acquaintance of each other, but I suppose there will always be another day
And so we just hope that we'll always have the memories to carry us through.
Until we meet again....

Holiday theme: Minnie Mouse

Pajama party with Minnie

Imagine being in a super crowded 24hr department store with that huge stack of stuff you are carrying home, and progress was held up by a little girl who refused to be parted from a (uhm, slightly ugly, color-challenged) Minnie Mouse softie. Oh, this Little Girl is one canny one. She managed to bully Mama into getting her that (uhm, ugly) Minnie. Oh well. I guess she did learn something about Disney character from her trip to Disneyland last time.

And so Minnie becomes a new bedmate.
It's kind of cute when she mis-pronounces the name to Wiiwii..Wiiwii...
Not cute when this Mama is the one to fetch Minnie from whatever end of the room/house just so she can sleep in peace with Minnie in her arm. Hmmph.

Minnie-play in the afternoon

How did Minnie end up at various corners of the room?
Well... the Kid is... well.. a kid. So.. while she might hug Minnie at night, afternoons are a totally different ballpark. Minnie might get thrown, hidden in the drawer, tucked in the extra bed, anything.
Such is life of a softie, I suppose. I just hope Minnie will stand the rigour of the Kid's toddler years.

And just one last story,
Kecil has learned to put away her shoes at a designated point from school.
So.. in the hotel room, the designated point was the wardrobe, in the space under the safe.
On the day we brought Minnie back from the store, Kecil took of her shoes, then proceeded to pull at Minnie's shoes as well, an effort doomed by the fact that Minnie's shoes are merely yellow colored fabric sewn on the legs.
Ooo... the distress when she couldn't take of Minnie's 'shoes'.

Ah, Little One, for the entertainment value alone, yes, I freely give you Minnie, and all the effort I need to expend in fetching Minnie from various corners of the house just so she can accompany you to sleep.

More afternoon Minnie-play