Beanicus rex ®

on hot dogs and nicknames

2010-01-31T10:02:00.003+11:00

this morning, bean #1 decreed that bean #2's nickname is "mau mau". when asked what it means she said it's simply #2's nickname. yup, i don't get it either.

we then went on how different her own nicknames are, depending on who's calling her. e.g. her daddy likes to call her "princess" whereas i prefer "angel" or "pookie bear".

bean 1 then asked, "can you say something to me?"

me: "what?"

bean 1: "say something like 'can you go get changed please', and i will say 'yes, your majesty'."

me, grinning: "okay. can you get changed please?"

bean 1: "yes your majesty." and her hands go up, out and down in some sort of old fashioned flurry.

most amusing.

later at breakfast, as she paused from her cornflakes and said, "do you know that hot dogs are called that because the bread is like skin wrapped around the sausage like a bone, which is the tail of a dog. that's why it's called a hot dog."

that's her theory anyhow.

fairy doodles

2010-01-20T18:27:00.006+11:00

bean1's artistic doodlings have for a couple of months now focused on the realm of the imagination.

below is one of her latest - a rendition of a fairy and 2 flying horses heading off from a fairy castle. (jan 2010)

this next one she did in december - it's the sugar plum fairy, as quaintly titled by bean1 (see pix top lefthand corner), after the creature from the nutcracker.

bean1 is very taken with ballet, especially the sleeping beauty and the nutcracker. she loves dancing to the entire nutcracker suite whilst i feed bean2 (btw, bean2 is on solids - ingesting but very little though as most end up on her bib, high chair, floor, head, me).

however, she constantly reminds me that her "star performance", as she terms it, is marred by the lack of appropriate footwear. she has a leotard and skirt already - christmas pressies from dh and i - so we have tried to convince her to wait till we get to china and when (if?) she starts ballet classes before buying them. dh has already seen a shop that sells ballet shoes, but i really insist that classes are found and enrolled in before we commit to shoes.

* to see enlarged images of the illustrations, just click on the pictures.

more utterances from bean1

2009-12-17T23:44:00.010+11:00

on what santa speaks

with crimble really right around the corner, the beans's english grandfolks found a website to get bean1 in the spirit - http://www.portablenorthpole.tv/ - where santa himself can give a message to the young 'un (after a parent has gone through the form filling up with all the relevant details of the child).

so i did that and watched with satisfaction as bean1 sat entranced by a video of santa 'talking' to her. she nodded at all the right spots and responded with appropriate noises whenever santa 'spoke' to her or 'asked' her questions.

later on skype, she told her grandparents about santa talking to her but then added, "he called me lee-ah" (as it differed from the way her name is usually pronounced).

the grandparents said that that's because not being english, his english isn't very good.

bean1 then grinned and said, "maybe he speaks north polian!"

on her chicken diet

took the babies out crimble shopping the other day and our final stop was a sushi restaurant. now, one of bean1's favourite takeout meals is a teriyaki chicken roll, although i hasten to add that the roll's ingredients have to be quite specific - e.g. she prefers cucumber to avocado as the additional filling.

anyhoo, the waitress grabbed a plate of the teriyaki roll (which already looked different as this version was cut into two pieces and didn't have an outer wrapping of seaweed) from the conveyor belt.

when placed in front of bean1, sure enough, she commented on the lack of seaweed surrounding the roll. then she proceeded to pick at the pieces and found lettuce but no cucumber - quelle horreur!

but the last straw was when she found that mayonnaise had been smeared in the roll: "mummy, i don't like tartare sauce!" as she pointed a finger accusingly at the deconstructed rolls.

i told her that it wasn't tartare sauce but mayo adding that both nainai and yeye like mayo. ever her own person, she still insisted, "mummy, i don't like mayonnaise."

she swallowed bits of the rice and left most of the chicken before she turned to the cucumber rolls (i'd grabbed a dish seeing as the teriyaki chicken roll was quite small).

i had to tar pau the remainder as i was adamant she should finish her lunch at home. we had to cut short our lunch at the restaurant as bean2 had woken and needed feeding, and i figured it was better to just head home - afterall, we were only a 5 minute drive away. i informed bean1 of the necessity to finish her lunch at home though.

she must've dwelled on my pronouncement and when i was on the road homeward she piped up, "mummy, what day is today?"

"wednesday honey."

"ah! that's why i can't eat my teriyaki chicken. (pause) i can't eat chicken on wednesdays, mum."

so did she get away with this excuse? let's just say i hear a new one everyday, and i sure wasn't born yesterday either!

on naughty relatives

over a 3 day span, bean1 managed to blame her poor uncle william for quite different things. here's the first one:

bean1 was in my room one morning and we sang songs while bean2 fed. somehow i went onto yankee doodle and bean1 decided to ad lib and do a riff on it. she changed the words and made it even more nonsensical than it sounds (i believe it had chicken and ended up with spaghetti).

when i asked if she had only just made it up, she denied it, "noooo. one of my naughty uncles did it."

incredulous (and curious as to which uncle she could possibly mean), i asked who taught her.

smiling, bean1 said, "uncle william!"

incident #2: a day or two later, in the living room this time, bean1 was being silly with the "poo" word. she was going on and on about "poo pants", "poo bottom" and variations thereof.

i interjected finally to tell her to zip it. defiantly she said, "uncle william told me to say poo bottom."

so that's twice she's maligned poor will.

on colour semantics

i walked the girls to the post office one day last week and as we waited for the lights to change before crossing, a woman with long hair walked by. the bean noticed and stated (rather loudly, i cringed), "she has auburn hair!"

taken aback, i automatically agreed, then wondering if she really knew what it is, i asked, "what is auburn?"

immediately, she proclaimed, "brownish red."

update on bean2 - 4 months old

2009-11-29T11:21:00.003+11:00

4th month report

bean2 is a really lovely baby...she doesn't get agitated often, just only when she needs a nappy change (she is quite a hygienic little girl and doesn't like lying in soiled drawers!) or if i have left her too long without company (she is very sociable and likes to be with the in-crowd).

she's holding her head much better now and can reach out and grasp for things. she likes kicking and when she's on the playmat, she thumps the floor so hard one fears her heels will be thoroughly bruised. when she isn't kicking she often latches onto her toes

Bean1's first outright lie?

2009-11-29T11:15:00.004+11:00

One of my frequently used pet names for Bean1 is "angel". Her father's is "princess". No prizes for guessing which one she prefers, and this morning, she made it all apparent.

As I fed Bean2 while Bean1 followed dh to the kitchen for breakfast this morning, she turned back and came to stand in my bedroom doorway, looking very solemn.

"Mum, I have a question for you."

"Oh-kay. What is it?"

"Daddy doesn't like you to call me angel. That's all." With that she turned around and went to have her breakfast, leaving me agog.

Later, I told dh about the porker Bean1 told me. He told her that it's not good to tell lies, and that if she didn't want me to call her angel, she should just tell me that, instead of saying it was daddy's idea.

when dinosaurs roamed the erth (sic)

2009-11-20T13:57:00.009+11:00

yesterday, when bean2 and i went to pick up la premiere bean from school, the latter came out from class only to burst out, "mummy! i wrote a story today! about dinosaurs. about dinosaurs when they died and then the woolly bird came around and ate all the horses."

apparently this was for writing practice and when i met her teacher this morning at drop-off, i was told, "it was wonderful. there was a lot of information. it was not easy deciding what to write, but we managed finally. all about when dinosaurs died and then the woolly bird ate the horses." her teacher paused, gave me a knowing nod and continued, "yeah. that woolly bird."

i think i know where bean1 came up with this - from one of her dinosaur books. and yes, there is a chapter on the Tertiary period where mammals and large birds called Gastornis existed. The Gastorni diet (according to the book) seemed to consist of the early form of horses.

here's her writing practice sample:

translation: Dinosaurs died when the Earth changed and the woolly bird ate little horses.

bean #1's utterances

2009-10-29T21:42:00.006+11:00

dds's paternal grandparents are in town - to help with the kids and to enjoy the most of sydney before we shift digs to shanghai - and have been privy to dd1's recent zinging statements...

on yeye's DIY efforts
while yeye was up a ladder changing a lightbulb in the bathroom, dd1 went to inspect. as she stood looking up she said to him, "be careful, old chap." her cautionary words and the soubriquet she used did serve to give yeye some pause.

on salami
the 4 of us - her paternal grandfolks, dd1 and i - were having lunch when dd1 saw that we had opened a packet of salami. curious, she asked what it was, and was told that "it's spicy sausage".

but when asked if she would like to try some, she unsurprisingly replied, "little children don't like salami."

this compelled her grandparents to try to convince her that her half-italian cousin probably likes it, and that not only he, but children in hungary, spain and france would probably eat salami too.

unconvinced, she immediately said, "but not english children."

quite.

on toilet seats
yesterday dd1 went to the loo only to call for help shortly afterwards.

when her nainai went to investigate, she was informed by dd1, "i have superglued my bottom to the toilet, nainai. i can't get up."

i hasten to state that she did not indeed have access to superglue and it was merely a figure of speech.

on what she means to her parents
this afternoon, as her grandparents drove her home from preschool, they played opposites, i.e. asking what's the opposite of a particular word.

they got to "sun", which the bean knew was "moon". then they went on to the homonym of "sun", "son". nainai said that dd1's daddy is nainai's "son", and asked dd1, "so what are you to mummy and daddy?"

"i'm their sunshine," was the bean's wonderfully sweet reply.

on nainai's jewellery
a typical female, dd1 finds her granny's jewellery rather magnetic. whenever she sees nainai with a new necklace or pendant, she invariably has to comment on it.

one time it was about a large white flower pendant, to which she gave an emphatic "i like your necklace, nainai."

then yesterday she tried on nainai's many rings. very pleased with herself, she beamed up and exclaimed, "now i am an old lady!"

bean #2 has landed

2009-10-29T20:20:00.004+11:00

(okay, so i mixed my metaphors...)

bean #2 arrived toward the latter-end of july and i've been busy juggling the 2 beans ever since.

bean #1 has been a relatively good big sister - "i luuurve you, little bay-bee", she purrs most days. but there have been the occasional bust-ups with ME.

e.g. last night, bean #1 couldn't get to sleep for a long time (she still needs me to accompany her while she slips into dreamland) and when i had to duck out to feed bean #2, she was completely unhappy. as i stood outside her closed door after feeding the baby, i could hear my oldest recite a litany of my sins..."i don't like my mummy. she's not a good mummy. she doesn't buy me dvds. she doesn't take me to school..." it went on and on till i entered the room. but when i asked if she was angry with me, she shook her head and said, "i love you."

dd2 has been a relatively easy babe. she doesn't feed for as long a period as dd1, but she has been easy-ish to settle. she does look like dd1's twin at the same age, albeit with more gravity-defying hair, a widow's peak and a chin inherited from her father.

why the bean doesn't draw elephants

2009-06-14T11:43:00.008+10:00

it's interesting that the bean doesn't do many representational drawings anymore. at least, none that qualifies in the traditional sense.

she is more interested in doing 'action' art - as she draws, she relates a story, but the end result is often something akin to a cy twombly piece without the calligraphy/graffitti (hey, i'm not equating the bean's output with that from an abstract expressionism icon, but there are similar elements!), where the scribblings will only make sense to the artist, not the viewer.

see an example here that she'd dashed off today, which i shall title emergency rocket ship*:

when i asked her to explain her drawing she informed me that it's an "mergent (sic) rocket ship, mummy" - "it brings people to the emergent (sic) in mars to the hospital".

visual components include: 2 policemen (the blue sperm-like squiggles on the left of the picture) ; a long chain of "prison" cells for the "baddies"; fire from the rocket ship; an area to lock up bad policemen; not forgetting the emergency rocket ship; and a jellyfish.

yes, all quite disparate elements but she has a bizarre narrative going as she drew the picture, all about baddies killing jellyfish and the policemen who put the baddies in jail, in parallel with a rocket ship that flies to mars to help people in an emergency.

anyhow, before she embarked on this 'epic' i had asked if she could draw me an animal, like an elephant, only to be told the obvious, "no-o. the elephant is too big for my paper."

when i asked if she could draw a small/baby elephant instead, she said, "no. it's still too big."

don't ask me about her logic: why rocket ships will fit onto the paper but not an elephant.

then last week, whilst i was cooking she came to the kitchen with one of these 'action' drawings and told me she was going to read me a story. she held her artwork like a parchment, looked at it and then 'recited' a story about 2 children flying all the way from london to visit her in australia.

when i interjected with a question, she paused and said, "mummy, don't interrupt!"

*click on the picture to enlarge

the bean & her cousins: the trio of cheekiness

2009-06-07T10:46:00.006+10:00

we had the good fortune of having the bean's eldest (twin male) cousins visit us from the uk for 3 weeks in may.

i had idly wondered if there would be fireworks when the 3 got together but all fears were unfounded.

they had to share the bean's room (as we have no extra rooms) - the twins on mattresses on the floor. but the bean absolutely loved their company, sharing her toys with them, as well as playing with their toys. she was an eager follower and accomplice to whatever shenanigans the boys got up to.

inevitably, she picked up a few behaviours and speech from them. such as, "cuddlies" for soft toys, and "love" for hugs and kisses ("can i have your love mummy?"), but also more cheeky ones such as the boys' penchant to spout "poo" and "bottom" at inappropriate times.

while she was a willing participant to their games, sometimes she stood her ground. one time, one of the boys declared, "i am going to marry you."

she was indignant and hotly replied, "no! i am not going to marry you!"

i doubt that any of them actually knows what "marry" means or entails* but it was funny to overhear their dialogue nonetheless.

*the twin who was proclaiming marriage had previously told dh that he was going to marry a tree, and later on, a leaf, so marriage to him is not a very exclusive (either species- or duration-wise) arrangement.

the "umungous" jellyfish

2009-06-07T10:01:00.013+10:00

i awoke this morning in the bean's bed (having been summoned by her in the middle of the night), and when i turned around to see what she was up to, i found her sitting up already, looking over the side of her safety rail.

without turning round to look at me, she said, "my toys are in the sea mummy. i have to rescue them and put them in the boat."

with that she got out and returned with the few soft toys that were on the floor, placing them on the bed in front of me. fearing that i would be overwhelmed with a bombardment of toys, i told her that her settee was a rock where the other toys could be safe too. she took up that idea and set the rest to safety. then she clambered back onto the bed.

"do you know the name of this boat?," she asked me, and then said, "it's a dinghy." when i posed the question back to her.

she picked up her mini bolster and said, "this is my oar. i can row with it. to get away from the umungous jellyfish. row row row," she puffed before adding, "oh no, it's stuck in the slimy kelp."

i asked her why the humungous jellyfish was chasing us. maybe it's trying to be friendly because it was lonely. but the bean said, "noooo. it wants to sting us." like i was some kind of benign moron.

when her daddy came into the room, she told her daddy to get into the dinghy as we were being chased by the jellyfish. delighted, i told dh that it's a "umungous jellyfish" but he wasn't surprised, telling me that yesterday, she told him, "it's invisible", which is why daddy couldn't see it (of course).

she's been obsessed with the dinghy and the octopus/jellyfish ever since i read her the story, the hidden forest, a well-illustrated australian book by jeanne baker. her previous book was where the forest meets the sea, which i had read to her when she was in the under 3s montessori programme. it's a book that i have been meaning to buy, but always forget.

anyway, in the hidden forest, the young protagonist, ben, is initially wary of the sea and what lurks beneath the waves and when he gets accidentally thrown overboard he imagines that something sinister is trying to grab hold of him. here, the page shows a translucent giant octopus reaching for the dinghy and ben.

the bean can't discern that this octopus is supposed to be what ben imagines and not a 'real' one, so she gets excited when we get to this page.

i recall that her first enactment from the story involved an octopus, but lately it's evolved into a jellyfish.

pink camel

2009-06-07T00:46:00.004+10:00

I think the Bean did this drawing a few days ago, but my memory is hazy, and it could've been done a week ago. Anyhoo, I can't remember the context, but she told me that she'd drawn and coloured a camel (in one of her favourite colours). The face of the creature can be clearly discerned I think, and I have marked out where she had put the humps of the camel. The 4 legs are there too, with the space between the limbs coloured in.

It seems to be a kind of progression to a more realistic representation of animals. Certainly a development away from the blobs with stick arms and legs that stood for ALL humans and animals when she first started.

mandarin in oz

2009-06-04T18:04:00.003+10:00

a video of justine clarke singing 'gumtree family' was on the telly just now, which prompted the bean to exclaim, "she's in australia!"
i nodded in agreement, and said, "she's australian."
to which the bean added, "she doesn't speak mandarin."

she's learnt that a lot of aussies don't speak her second language. which reminds me that i've not been using it much on her lately as well. yikes.

going on a slight tangent: it's interesting that there aren't any chinese schools in oz. i mean, there are jewish schools a plenty, and french and german schools, even a japanese school. i had been thinking about this for a while before another mama from the bean's mandarin playgroup class voiced it too. she said that she would be eager to enroll her children in one if a group of parents could set one up.

hmmm...i wonder how difficult it is to organise something like this to set up such a school? chinese parents are notoriously pushy and achievement oriented, so the teaching standards will have to be pretty high. anyhoo, an interesting thought.

kuringai wildflower garden + "a nice lady"

2009-04-16T15:03:00.011+10:00

a nature activity
yesterday, i took the bean to a 'bush kids' program at the ku-ring-gai wildflower garden (kwg), which is a lovely bush setting. one of the kwg officers read the 16 children a graeme base book - uno's garden - before leading them to kwg's vegetable garden where they had to search for some of the creatures from the story and then do a craft project*. the kids were also shown a real blue-tongued lizard that was about a year old.

apparently the garden breeds these critters and releases them in suitable home gardens. (they survey the gardens of potential lizard adopters before giving the green light.) it's an initiative** to reintroduce more native animals into the suburban environment, whilst also introducing a 'novel' non-pesticide way to reduce snail populations in gardens: the blue-tongued lizard's favourite meal is snail.

at the end of the session the bean was very reluctant to leave ("i don't want to go home!" she wailed), so on the suggestion from the kwg officer we went down one of the trails that led to the garden's picnic area. some playground equipment there kept the bean happily occupied for a bit, but only after she had some snacks was she happy to leave with me.

kwg is a lovely bushland that is relatively civilised: there are loos, picnic areas, and stroller-friendly tracks besides a couple of more challenging ones for better walkers. we heard the tweeting of fairy-wrens as well as the croaking of frogs in the pond - all surrounded by banksias and gum trees.

however, evidence of civilisation is not far away: we can hear the roar of the traffic nearly all the time as the garden is just beside a major road. but still, it was a delightful way to spend a morning. i just wished that i had done this with the bean sooner.

the nice lady
after lunch that same day, we headed to a fabrics shop to get some haberdashery items. whilst walking down a step to the boardwalk outside the shopping centre, the bean stumbled and fell forward. i caught her in time but an elderly lady coming round the corner was quite concerned. she made a bit of fuss over the bean and then said, "isn't she beautiful!" to me.

naturally, the bean lapped it all up and when she heard the compliment, she said to me, "this is a nice lady."

the 2 of them had a short chat. the bean volunteering most of the information: we were going to buy ribbons, mummy doesn't like the colour pink, mummy likes red. then the bean did a dance - spinning round and round - in the middle of the walkway, becoming a minor obstruction for pedestrian traffic. when she finished dancing, she bowed deeply twice (because the "nice lady" didn't see her bow the first time).

when we finally said our goodbyes to the "nice lady" and walked away, the bean said, "she's old. she's a nice old lady. i did a dance for her."

* i almost forgot: the kids had slices of watermelon that was grown from one of the patches in the veg garden itself. very refreshing...i had a slice too!

** the kwg only releases lizards that are a year old or older because young ones are easy prey for magpies.

our easter long weekend + some choice bean-speak

2009-04-15T18:41:00.004+10:00

friday circus
we've just had a rather busy long weekend. it was the easter break and we began by going down to darling harbour for the hoopla! festival on friday afternoon. the fest is/was essentially a gathering of different street juggling/ acrobatics/ magic acts.

there was a 'big tent' where free performances were put on every 2 hours or so, and we managed to catch one act, which could be italian or albanian or gypsy. the most notable part of this couple's act seemed to be how the female half was able to contort her body to fit inside a smallish acrylic see-through box (with lid). w-o-w...

we also managed to watch some bits of a dance/acrobatics performance. a group of 4 men and a girl did rap-style street dancing combined with some human pyramid-type formations. all quite impressive but i was sorely tempted to yell at one of the performers to tie his hair up. it was long, shaggy and flopped everywhere. thinking of the heat and how sweaty he was, it made me wince with distaste whenever it was his turn to perform.

one of the more impressive acts we caught was a french-canadian who cracked lame jokes, usually at the expense of the audience members. his act was of the lying on long, sharp nails, swallowing flaming batons and juggling nasty, short swords variety. not bad overall and we rewarded him with some dosh at the end. oh, the box in which he keeps his paraphernalia is shaped like a coffin, and we did wonder how he managed to clear all the rather sensitive items through customs.

there was also a mime artist. she had greasepaint on her face, wore a ruby-red lampshade on her head and was garbed in semi-victorian dress. she seemed rather taken with the bean (who was sitting on her daddy's shoulders) and blew kisses at her. the bean similarly blew kisses back at her with both hands and waved goodbye.

as we walked off though, the bean remarked excitedly to her daddy,
"she's white! she can't talk! she's a may-leeyan dad!" (may-leeyan = alien)

saturday mammoths
the next afternoon, almost on a whim, we went to the australian museum for the special once-off woolly mammoths exhibit. the museum is perhaps the bean's current favourite place. she loves the dinosaur fossils upstairs and also likes touching all the stuffed animals poised around the place.

she seems to have an obsession with death and has been asking nearly daily, "why do dinosaurs die out?"

anyway, after coming back from looking at the mammoths, the bean decided that one of her toy elephants is also a mammoth. and her question morphed into, "how do the mammoths die out?"

p/s. once, after we had given her the theories for how the dinosaurs became extinct, the bean asked, "how did nanny and dordon die?" she seemed very thoughtful at the answers we gave her and was a bit concerned that people she loved would eventually die too.

sunday easter show
we tried to rise early for the sydney royal easter show, but alas, only managed to get there around 10.30am. i think the bean expected a large easter bunny to be prancing around shoving chocolate eggs at everybody, so she was a wee bit disappointed when we got there and none was to be found ("where's the easter bunny?"). i don't know how the idea of one was implanted - certainly not from us.

at the show, i think we did less than last year, for some reason. maybe because i'm preggers and don't have the same stamina/speed. we did get a look-in at the following though: woodchop (just one event regrettably), cat pavilion (bean got to pat/stroke an enormous, shaggy grey and white persian-ish cat), pony rides (bean went on 2 rides, and dh made up the names of the ponies for her as the handlers were obviously students on holiday jobs and didn't know the ponies' names), pig pavilion (there was a cute 3 little pigs pen with a straw house, a twig/wood house, and a brick house, but the piggies were asleep in a children's toy nylon tunnel instead), fashion pavilion, food pavilion (the bean was asleep in the stroller by that stage so dh and i could go do our own thing)...and finally, a ride on a carousel.

we didn't get to see the magnificent diving pigs (apparently the only ones in australia) - long queues were turned away at each performance time slot because of the act's popularity.

but we did get to watch part of an erth dinosaur petting zoo, where 'actors' had their arms stuck up the behinds of puppet dinosaurs or manipulated puppets on strings.

monday mooch day
the only day we didn't have a fabulous activity planned was easter monday. dh mowed the back lawn, trimmed a hibiscus bush, and we went to officeworks for stationery supplies and later to borders bookstore. yes, very exciting.

because it rained in the afternoon, the bean philosophically told us, "we can't have the easter hunt," which was an activity that had been promised her by dh.

weird figures

2009-04-09T11:56:00.009+10:00

[figure below] the bean calls this "the maylien". it's actually an impression of the alien from cocoon 2 (the movie) - she saw it last saturday afternoon when dh was watching the film on tv.

[figure below] and this is a "bad man. he catches bad people and puts them in pwison." i had to explain that policemen aren't bad. although they put people in "pwison" it's usually only "bad people" who get put away.

an interesting feature of this figure is that it actually has a body. previously, the limbs of a person just simply sprouted from a giant head, but this time she's added a torso. she's also added fingers to the stick arms - those shorter twig-like additions at the end.

the "funny potty seat" & independent toileting

2009-04-09T10:59:00.020+10:00

our current rental home has a non-standard loo, so the toilet seat adapter that we had been using perfectly fine before, does not fit snuggly on this one and slips. the bean often complained "mama i'm sinking!" when the adapter seat shifted under her weight and a part of it sank into the bowl. apart from this fit issue, the bean finds it difficult to climb onto the loo because she's, well, vertically challenged.

she therefore prefered to use her portable potty instead of the grown-up loo because of all the above issues.

so, when we went to a baby equipment shop recently to get some car seat boosters for the bean's cousins (they're coming over from balmy england to see us in may), i scouted round the store to see if there was a suitable loo solution for the bean.

et voila!
it's a bambino toilet trainer that folds up and stands against a wall when not in use but otherwise, the bean has been able to unfold it, put it on the loo and climb up and down it by herself.

she sometimes goes on her own without telling me first now, but usually she gives me a holler to let me know that she needs to do a wee/poo. when she comes off it she then goes on the little step stool to wash her hands. thus, now she can do her toileting all on her own.

she calls it the "funny potty". e.g. "mummy, can i use the funny potty seat? i like it. it works very well." (she's a hoot!)

it has been a really good investment as an independence-developing tool. i think it's super.

p/s. oh, on the occasions when she uses the portable potty, she often brings it to the loo to empty it by herself. then she washes her hands. i woke up one morning to hear her conduct the entire process, after which she came into the bedroom to play/change clothes.

school daze begins

2009-04-06T20:59:00.003+10:00

in the second week of march the bean formally began her school life --- hub-unit did remark that it's the start of something she will only finish in about 16-17 years time!

however, it was an inauspicious start on a warm, sunny day as the bean fell and grazed both knees as we crossed the road to the school gate. so her initial excitement about attending "big school" was severely dampened as she wailed from the pain. after she was fixed up in the admin office, her directress took her hand after she showed some initial resistance/reluctance to leave my side, and i made a quick getaway. but she seemed fine when i went to pick her up 1.5 hours later (the first 3 days were only 1.5 hours each, to make the transition and separation from me easier). she enjoyed the class and told me that she wanted to bring all the children home to play with her.

however, the excitement or novelty wore off after 5 days. and she was soon telling me "mummy, i don't want to go to _______ montessori school" (she always mentions the school by its full name) whenever we got close to the school in the car.

she did wail once or twice and she often shook her head and shied away from the assistant teacher who greets her at morning drop-offs (the kids have to shake the teacher's hand and say good morning at the door before they enter the premises proper). the first time she wailed, the teacher just carried her in while i ran off.

i later heard from the directress that she would ask "i want my mummy" only to be told by the teacher and/or the older kids that "your mummy is coming at 12" or "your mummy will pick you up at 12". thankfully, the activities in class are usually enough to take her mind off me.

but more distressingly, the directress has told me that the bean has had a few "meltdowns" when she would just stubbornly say "no" and refuse to do something, even when offered alternatives. after reiterating "no" she would then wail and cry very loudly, so loud that the other children would cover their hands over their ears. so sigh...the bean has not exactly exhibited model montessori behaviour...

anyhoo, when the bean hasn't had her "meltdowns" she has been doing typical montessori (and early childhood ed) work (for her age) such as brick polishing, brass polishing, buttoning frames, water transference, beading, threading, pasting, window washing, the pink tower, brown stairs, cylinder blocks, etc. and she does enjoy working on those activities. yet, inevitably, inexplicably, she would end her enthusiastic description with a petulant "mummy, i don't want to go to ______ montessori school".

i don't know if this is because it entails being away from me. she has asked if i could stay with her in the school (often in a tone and with such a hopeful look it made my heart twinge), only to look disappointed when i had to explain that no mummies are allowed in the school, and that i will, however, be there to pick her up when school finishes. this is rarely satisfactory of course, so i only get a sullen, "but mummy, i don't want to go to ______ montessori school" again.

the bright spark for her and often a good way to entice her out of the car is to point out the children i see heading to school. i would say, oh look it's so-and-so and immediately, the bean would ask "where?" and want to get out to see them.

she loves the older kids. and the older girls love her. at home one afternoon, she told me that she was kissed on the cheek by one of the girls. when i said that was nice, and if she had said anything back to her, the bean said, "i said sank you." i then asked if she likes the girl, only to have the bean reply, after the barest of pauses, "she is quite nice."

this is only just week 4 of school of course, so it's still early days as the bean settles in. unfortunately, we have the long-ish easter break now so it means that the bean will need to re-settle into her school routine at the end of april! i wonder if there will be more tears and meltdowns...sigh...

bean #2 and bean #1's reactions

2009-03-09T15:53:00.004+11:00

at the v beginning
yup, the bean will no longer be just "the bean". she's bean #1 now, as #2 is in the oven.

when we broke the news to the bean, she was initially quite excited.

"can i talk to the baby?" she asked.

"of course. come over here to mummy's belly."

she leaned real close, stared at my bellybutton and asked seriously, "would you like a biscuit?"

i'll admit that her first words to the baby took hub-unit and i by surprise. but i suppose she was eating a biscuit herself and probably thought she was being nice and 'sharing' to the baby.

subconscious rivalry?
a week or so after the revelation, the bean began behaving really intolerably. severe tantrums became a near nightly/daily occurrence. and this lasted a month or more.

but i bought her a book, 'i am a big sister' and began reading this to her nightly. this seemed to have some effect, as she now says, "i am a big sister now! i love my baby."

and today she actually looked at a photo of a baby and remarked, "look! a chubby baby. it's lovely."

jan-feb : bean's imaginings & tall tales

2009-03-09T15:31:00.005+11:00

her pink & yellow polka dotted dinosaur
whilst her yeye and nainai were visiting us, the bean regaled them with various stories, such as her going on holiday, airplane trips, on jungle safaris etc. one of those tales concerned a pet dinosaur, who kept getting lost.

to aid us in our search, she gave a description of it - "it's peeenk, with lellow spots. yes, it's got lellow polka-dots. and it has an orange-striped tail. it's lost! where is it? we have to look for it! it's in the forest! we have to follow that road into the forest!"

she actually talked non-stop in a 40 minute drive, all the time about embarking on this search for her missing dinosaur.

welcome to her world
one day she solemnly said to her grandparents, "welcome to leah world."

after her long spiel about looking for her ("friendly") dinosaur, she announced to us, "dinosaurs live in brazil. they live far far away. they live in dinosaur world."

then she clarified, "dinosaur world is in leah world. of course!"

hedgehogs infestation next door
while having breakfast one morning the bean suddenly sqawked excitedly, "look look look! it's a hedgehog! a hedgehog walking on the fence!"

her yeye was nonplussed till he looked at where she was pointing. just then, a couple more 'hedgehogs' appeared, which got her more excited.

he laughed when he realised what those 'hedgehogs' truly were. as our neighbour was having his house remodeled, there were builders walking along the fence and the tops of their spiky-haired heads were what were observed by the bean.

the influence of the evil goggle box? aka the arrival of a new superhero

2008-12-30T22:33:00.003+11:00

this morning, as i sat down groggily to my crosswords, the bean rummaged in her swim bag and produced a pair of goggles.

"my goggles!", she said triumphantly, holding them to let me see, as if she doesn't know that they'd be in the bag.

i turned back to the paper, only to hear shortly, "look mummy! super kitten!"

the bean had put on her goggles and stood in front of me, grinning, "i am super kitten! i am going to save you mummy!"

i told her that super kitten needed a cape too, and tucked two corners of her favourite chiffon green scarf into the back of her t-shirt collar.

she then made me get in between some large cushions, pretending that they were boulders or some such, "mummy, hold onto my cape. i will rescue you. i will pull you out."

she gave me a small corner of her cape to hang onto and together we pretended that she hauled my ass out of my tight spot.

when i said, "thank you super kitten for saving me," she was so pleased, she made me repeat the exercise.

later when i related this incident to dh, he laughed and then reprimanded me, "i can't believe you didn't take a picture!" dh wondered where she got the idea for the superhero.

then dh told me that before bathtime, when the bean was watching telly, he had tried to get her to finish only to be told ever so politely, "no thank you. i am watching cbeebies," intoned while her eyes were glued to the goggle box.

paranoid bean?

2008-12-07T10:31:00.003+11:00

the bean's phrase du jour is "are you talking about me?"

when dh and i are conversing, if she thinks we're discussing somebody, she'd inevitably pop out that question. most of the time, she is correct in assuming that we were indeed talking about her. but once in a while, we confound her by saying "no".

bean's stubborn streak & her dream - our bedtime blues

2008-12-06T08:19:00.004+11:00

i was just telling her paternal grandparents (ye ye & nai nai) that dh has not been impressed by the bean's behaviour the past few days, during which she maintained mexican stand-offs with her dad.

the most recent one occurred on wednesday evening. but let me give some background first.

the bean was given an advent calendar that had pockets for each date which i filled with chocs (foil wrapped choc santas, choc balls) and trinkets (colourful hair-ties/clips). the bean loves this calendar as soon as she found that she could dip her fingers inside each pocket and retrieve a foil-wrapped "tweat".

and because she's got chicken pox, we've been bribing her not to scratch her poxes with chocolate too. so she's become a huge chocolate fiend.

well, dh came home early wednesday and helped the bean get to the no. 3 pocket where she found a choc ball. after that dh told her that it was bath time and she should get ready for it. this is when she 'bit the hand that fed her' - she became petulant, "no! it's not bath time. no, i don't want to have a bath." she continued by saying that she wanted another chocolate ball.

dh then lectured her, telling her that chocolate is only for the late afternoons and she can't have more than one as it turns her into a little monster...or words to that effect.

anyhow, the bean didn't like that lecture one bit and started a one-note protest, "no!"

when dh tried to coax/reason/drag her into the bathroom, she stood outside and just kept uttering, "no!"

she wouldn't let me undress her and when we, finally, somehow, managed to get her to do it by herself, she just stood in the bathtub in her shin-deep specially-medicated bathwater and wailed, "no! no! no!"

i passed her her toothbrush and she just clutched it tightly, not letting go, but not brushing her teeth either, "no!"

when we took her out of the bathtub, which was accompanied by even louder protests, and brought her into her room, she still clutched her toothbrush.

she wouldn't let me put her into her jammies, and just faced dh, yelling, "no!", waving a hand in his face as if to ward him off or to wave him away.

dh turned to me and said, "i won't be defeated by a 3 year old."

eventually i had her bundled in bed and she fell asleep sobbing.

if her 2-3 year old tantrums are any indication, her teenage tantrums will be quite spectacular!

****************

she woke up late thursday night wailing and dh had to eventually put her into our bed while he slept in hers.

when dh asked her in the morning what upset her, she said, "a dream. the little kittens lost their mittens."

dancing bean

2008-12-03T13:48:00.002+11:00

our little dancing queen's favourite move is a twirl/spin.

she just likes to spin round and round in one direction till she stumbles. then sometimes she'd spin in the other direction but most often than not she'd just carry on.

at the end of her performance, when the song ends, she'd bow deeply, with one arm across her abdomen, the other behind her back.

at our mandarin playgroup, while the other children dances along with the jie jie and does the right moves, the bean does her own thing and ignores everybody else.

lack of self-consciousness

2008-12-01T15:24:00.004+11:00

unlike maybe 6 months ago, the bean has now become something of an attention-addict.

near the end of the singing session at the under 3s programme last week, the directress announced that we would be singing happy birthday to 3 kids.

before she could continue, the bean cut in by crying out, "me! me! sing for me! my birthday too?!", as she bounded up to the teacher.

the directress had to tell her that it's not her birthday yet, so we couldn't sing about it, to which the bean announced, "my birthday in januwary!"

i had to take the bean aside and quietly persuade her that singing happy birthday to the birthday kids would be fun too. thankfully she didn't make a fuss and actually sang along.

the bean's certainly no longer shy about going up in front of a group.

at our mandarin playgroup, one of the programme segments involves the children taking turns going behind a puppet stage, peering out and waving at the others as everyone shouts, "ni hao!"

the bean absolutely LOVES this part and would run back to do it over and over if i didn't prevent her. i discourage the extra times as it deprives other children from their turns.

in fact, at our most recent attendance, one parent actually commented to me, "another star performance," after the bean had gone twice, waved enthusiastically and said, "ni hao!" back to the group.

the bean's altruism & self-portrait #2

2008-11-26T13:49:00.007+11:00

dh came home at lunchtime today and as he accompanied the bean at the dining table, she said to him, "daddy, i don't like my chicken pox. (slight pause) can i give it away?"

they continued this conversation in the car later - "who do you want to give it away to?", asked dh.
to which the bean replied, "you".

hmmm...she just might get her wish and one or both her parents could be infected right now.

(btw, dh added that as she was walking to the car she told him that she wanted to leave her chicken pox at home.)

anyhow, this is her latest self-portrait..."it's leah with chicken pox", she announced almost triumphantly to me just now.

i'll describe the portrait a bit - the dot within a circle at the top of the figure's 'head' represents the pox on the bean's forehead (she has just a little pox there); the mad-looking scribbling at the bottom of the figure is the bean's clothing; the two little lines sticking out from the bottom of the 'head' are the bean's legs; 2 circles each side of the wide mouth represent 'rosy cheeks' or they might be ears; figure is missing arms.

note on the picture titles: the numbering of the bean's pictures is just for the blog's reference, and does not correspond to any real-life output.

bean poxed

2008-11-25T15:48:00.004+11:00

sigh...

the bean has chicken pox. it's not full-blown because she's had her vaccinations, but the doc certainly thinks that it is very likely the pox. which is a shame as it means that the bean might be missing her last couple of weeks of "toddler school" (our under 3s programme), as well as her mandarin classes.

the spots first appeared on sunday but they were just a few scattered ones around her abdomen and her back, which i thought were mozzie bites. then when i bathed her yesterday i was concerned that spots had appeared in a cluster around her shoulders. and the itchiness would explain why her sleep has been fitful the past 2 nights.

yet during the day, the bean isn't particularly poorly. she's still got her appetite (she's just announced, "mum! i'm hungry! i'm hungry!" as i type this), although that could change if the pox gets worse, and she's been pretty chirpy and active.

still, the prospect of being stuck at home for the next week or so is a bit bleak...i hope my resources for entertaining her won't be exhausted too soon!

bean's candid observations

2008-11-25T15:43:00.002+11:00

took the bean swimming yesterday. while i was helping the bean to dress in the changing room, the bean, as usual, was being a busybody looking at other people. in particular, she noticed a woman in a corner and asked, "what that woman doing mum?"

sotto voce, i said, "what do you think? and don't point."

bean replied, "she's changing," and added, "she has a big round bottom."

that just gave me a tiny pause, but i said, "so do you."

bean's "big" words & "name of today"

2008-11-21T09:17:00.013+11:00

a couple of days ago, a mum at playgroup told me that the bean knows some big words as she had used the word "decorate" whilst playing at the sandpit.

it set me to wonder at what big words the bean does know. so here're some words and terms she's recently uttered.

- troublesome: as in "troublesome trucks" from thomas & friends

- irritating: as in when i get cross and tell her that she's being irritating and she argues back and says she is not "idditating"

- annoying: ditto above

- difficult: as in "this is too difficult for me"

- suspension: as in 'suspension bridge', although it's pronounced "pension bwidge"

- configuration: as in "i don't like this train set configuwation"

*****************

arguably one of her favourite lines at the mo' is "what is the name of today?"

this is often the first thing she asks in the morning and even though she'd been told what it is, she might ask it again later on, especially when we're in the car.

this morning (sunday, 23 nov), that was the first thing she said upon waking. then she repeated my reply, "sunday. (pause) where we going today?"

me: "maybe we'll do some grocery shopping."

bean: "no. not grocery shopping."

me: "yes, we've run out of some stuff and we need vegetables, fish, tofu..."

bean: "not milk. we don't buy milk." (this is because i keep force-feeding her milk in the mornings and evenings)

me: "milk is good for you. makes you grow big and strong."

bean countered with: "i bigger girl now," as if hoping that would convince me she doesn't need any more fresh cow's milk.

magickazoona

2008-11-21T09:12:00.007+11:00

i put the bean in a red polkadot dress today and with it she took on a slightly different persona. she told me that she is now a fairy and started waving her extra-large bubble wand as a fairy wand. "i not a tiger any more."

she then insisted on wearing her fairy wings (the "pinky fairy wings") that i had bought from cotton on kids.

thus togged out, she then waved her wand at me and said, "i am going to magic you," and enchanted, "magickazoona!"

the things she says

2008-11-18T18:27:00.007+11:00

a few bean-isms today...

while in the middle of her tea, she solemnly, emphatically declared, "mum! horses can't fly." (of course, it came out as "horses can't fwy", the last word i misheard as "cry".) on her 3rd attempt to tell me this very important fact, she was almost fiercely adamant.

then in the bath just a minute ago, she said, "when i was a little boy, i had a pee pee."

afterwards, she sang a song (i can't remember which one!) and commented at the end, "that is a cheerful song." i asked if she liked it, and she replied, "it's a good song."

family portraits # 1

2008-11-17T17:26:00.006+11:00

today the bean decided to use some new marker pens to do a picture of her cousin matteo. he's the one in maroon attached to a green rock - don't ask me what a rock is doing in the mise-en-scene. (sorry, i've been told that it is NOT a rock, it is a golf ball...apparently matteo is hitting it. silly mummy...)

standing beside matteo are his grandparents, the bean's po po and gong gong, looking suitably taller, albeit a trifle gaunt and limbless.

i have to add that these portraits were not commissioned by me. it was the bean's own spontaneous decision to do them.

sep-nov update: cognition & speech

2008-11-08T00:09:00.011+11:00

backseat driver (advanced)
earlier in the week of 3 nov, while we were on the road one morning, we became stuck behind a bus in a bus bay. i didn't know whether the bus was going to move off soon or to overtake it, so in the moments of deliberation i muttered, "stupid bus! are you going to move?"

only to hear from my backseat driver, "mummy, don't be rude to the bus. it is not rude to you. it is stopped because of the red light. so don't be angry at the bus, ok?"

i was kind of pleased that she's able to reason it so logically, but also a little miffed as it is a bit rich, coming from a kid who would sing, "the monkey on the road wouldn't drive properly, drive properly, drive properly" to the tune of 'the wheels on the bus'. ok, so daddy taught her this rather rude song, but still...chagrin...

one of the activities we do to deflect her from potential tantrums, is to ask her to spot street signs. "can you see any roundabout signs? or give way signs?" or we count bottlebrush trees* or look for palm/pine/gum trees. or we look for trucks/diggers/concrete mixers. sometimes, when i remember, i would get her to call them out in mandarin...but this isn't as often as it should be.

jiang hua yu
i have enrolled the bean in both a mandarin playgroup and a zhuyin fuhao class - they're run by 2 different organisations. the latter class is to (hopefully) ground her in chinese phonics and to familiarise her with traditional characters.

she still resists going to both sessions, yet once there she doesn't want to leave! but i guess our efforts are paying dividends...some.

at home, she does sing some of the mandarin children's songs that they use in the playgroup, even though she would just rather spin round and round (that's her signature dance, and she usually ends her twirling with a little bow) than sing along with the jie jie and other kids in class.

we have a simple bopomofo** table at home and she likes to point at the characters and spout its pronounciation.

it's rare, but she does use mandarin phrases or words. like, "bu yao" (don't want) and "bu zhi dao" (don't know).

20 questions - the why phase
folks have written or whined about the onset of the age of "whys", and i had always thought it cute but exaggerated. well, now that the bean's started, those parents have my utmost sympathies.

she doesn't use "why" yet, but the phrase "what's the meaning" and variations there of: "what's the meaning of saturday, mum?", "what's the meaning of parrot?", "what's olives mean?", "what's eggplant mean?" ad nausem...

off pronounciation
at this age the bean obviously still can't get her tongue around some consonant blends, most notably "sp" ("pooky poon" is spooky spoon, a villianous character from the tv show numberjacks) and "st" ("we topping now").

anything!
when the bean is asked if she would like something and she's not interested, she now says, "anything!". after a while we worked it out that 'anything' actually means 'nothing'. but we didn't 'get it' until we've had much tears over crossed messages.

e.g., i might ask, "would you like to wear this outfit or this one?" the bean would look at them and then turn away, "anything! anything!" and then when i pick one outfit for her and try to get her to wear it, she'd protest, "no! no! anything!" only after a couple of these exchanges did i realise that she meant she didn't like any of the outfits.

* bottlebrush tree: shrubs and trees belonging to the genus Callistemon. we have one which i think is a weeping bottlebrush in our backyard. it is very popular with rainbow lorikeets and indian mynahs. around our neighbourhood, this is a popular roadside shrub, but i have no idea which specific ones they are. for more info - http://www.anbg.gov.au/callistemon/index.html

** zhuyinfuhao is aka bopomofo colloquially.

sep-nov update - socialisation

2008-11-07T23:33:00.005+11:00

i have been remiss in updating the blog. what i will try is to group my anecdotes into broad categories - socialisation (covering her interactions with her cousins and other kids), speech & cognition, and random stuff - stuff that don't fit into the above 2 categories.

i had hoped that the bean's trip to the uk, where she would be interacting properly with her older twin cousins for the first time, would inspire her in some ways. well, she did enjoy being near them, although she could take herself off to play by herself (she was totally enamoured by their train set).

"hi guys! i here now!" was a refrain she'd cry before running to see them. but at her age, being a year younger and still really a toddler, she was really playing in parallel with them.

one funny moment came when the 3 kids were playing with a sandpit in the garage. the twins as usual would be talking-bickering between themselves, commenting on their own and each other's work. the bean was in a different corner working on her own thing, then while still concentrating on her work, she announced, "you guys. you are so naughty." (i am not sure what incidents inspired this observation of hers though.)

christopher wasn't particularly perturbed by her comment as he was engrossed in his own plans for the sandpit (involving moving very heavy bits around the garage) but edward was indignant, "we are not!"

another time, the bean was engrossed with crayoning at the easel when she was kissed on the cheek by christopher. she put one hand to the spot, turned and said to him, "thank you." she then turned around and saw me and explained, "kwiffer did kiss me." the boy in question was a little abashed and ran off...exactly like how i imagined georgy-porgy to react after kissing the girls.

but for his affection, christopher was pipped by edward in looking after the bean. when the 3 of them were packed off to a playbarn, edward was the one who kept saying, "christopher, wait! we have to wait" for the bean.

the bean was obviously attached to the elder boys, but unfortunately, because the younger twins are still too young to 'play' with her, she wasn't as interested in them...the younger cousins are still very new toddlers and at the curious stage where they want to grab everything and do not know their own strength. this they displayed to the fullest whenever the bean was near them - they'd reach out and tug at her hair or give her a whack hello. so after a few experiences the bean tried to avoid them as much as possible.

one morning it culminated as we stepped out of the bathroom and encountered the twins' mother, and the bean solemnly declared, "aunty mimi, i don't like florian and samuel."

talk about kids not having any filter for their thoughts. i was speechless at her frankness/rudeness and mortified. thankfully, aunty mimi was a lot more understanding than i!

i am sure though that when the kids are a bit older all the cousins would be able to play together.

back in oz, while the bean likes being around other kids of the same age or slightly older, she still doesn't know how to share or take turns.

everything is "mine", even public stuff or stuff in school. when i told her that she would have to share her toys with visitors to our house, she thought on it then informed me, "mummy, i don't want anybody to come visit me."

and her wants must be satisfied immediately. i have to constantly remind her about this in the desperate hope that she will learn delayed gratification.

bean's self-portrait # 1

2008-11-07T23:10:00.011+11:00

this is the bean's first self-portrait (she'd done a couple of portraits of me before), done yesterday afternoon, thurs 6 nov. it's some evidence of her artistic progress. she began as all kids do, by being content merely daubing on colour and then she moved to what-seemed-like random scribbles and doodles, and thence latterly to 'panda bears', her first 'representational' drawing subject.

after pandas, she did one octopus (with exactly 8 legs, counting as she drew them) and then a few whales and one cat. surprisingly, even though she absolutely adores cats (probably her favourite animal "all day long"*) she hasn't been particularly interested in drawing them.

she really started drawing 'properly' after we came back from the uk early october, when she went into a frenzy of artistic 'expression' - in fact, for a long time, her one drawing subject was the panda bear - a shapeless blob with stick legs, arms and ears, eyes (one big, one small) and gash-like mouth. her montessori directress suggested that i stock the house with lots of paper for her to doodle as this burst of drawing is usually a precursor to actual writing.

our living room is now adorned with a few of her drawings - i've pegged them onto the fishing wire that the previous tenants had left strung on the walls.

* "all day long" is bean-speak for 'all the time'/ 'always'/ 'everytime'/ 'forever'...

making the acquaintance of a feline neighbour

2008-09-18T13:04:00.002+10:00

we've now been resettled for almost 2 months in the new neighbourhood. however, we've been away for half of the time, so we still have lots of rearranging to do in the home - books and toys and other paraphernalia all in the wrong places.

anyhoo, we'd left behind 2 friendly feline neighbours and i'd wondered whether we would make some new ones here. well, today, my wonderment ceased. around lunchtime i espied a trespasser slowly prowling her way across our garden along the back fence. presumably stalking a feathered quarry or 2.

i opened the kitchen door and called to it...uh...it means that i made loud "miaowing" sounds. it certainly caught the culprit's attention and after some time assessing me, she decided to come forward to investigate.

the bean was alerted to the cat's presence by my unsubtle meows and immediately rushed to the garden without bothering to put on shoes.

she and new feline friend spent some time getting to know each other...or rather the cat was its usual disinterested self while the bean kept tailing it, saying, "hello."

when the cat became bored of this it lounged under our clothes drying rack where there was some shade from the sun. and when it tired even of lounging it wandered indoors to snoop around our house. typical cat behaviour.

by this time the bean had been summoned back to her lunch and she was less obsessed by it.

nursing a bumble bee

2008-08-18T08:34:00.010+10:00

the bean and i have been under the weather for the past few days. i don't know how the bean got sick in the first place but her nose started dripping badly on friday. so it was that all day long she kept asking, "i need a cloth mama! i need a cloth!" (to wipe her nose). i caught my cold from the bean, naturally, and wonder when it will be dh's turn to fall ill.

anyhow, despite her cold, she's been remarkably chirpy and this morning she played happily outside on her ride-on toys. then suddenly we (dh was still at home, prior to heading out to work) heard her call out loudly, "i found a bumble bee! i found a bumble bee! it's got wings!"

turns out it was indeed a bee, but it was very obviously dead, lying motionless on the brick-tiled yard. i told her so, but she doesn't yet understand what 'death' means and continued to talk to the bee as if it could understand her. i returned to the kitchen and from the window i could see her reaching out to the bee chatting to it. then, inspired, she cried, "i going to feed it!"

she toddled up to the garden and plucked a few strands of grass and presented them to the bee. perhaps a breeze made the tiny blades disappear because i next heard the bean call out, "the bumble bee ate the grass! it ate all the grass!"

this inspired her to get more, "bumble bee, i get you some more. then you will feel more better."

when the bee didn't ingest the latest grassy offering, the bean talked to it awhile before losing interest. soon after she got onto her trike and called to me, "mummy cat! can you help me?" when i went to her thinking that she needed help with the seat belt buckle, she knew her ruse worked, "mummy cat, can you push me?" i decided to humour her a bit and pushed her around the yard for a bit before making my excuses and got back to my chores.

much later, after finishing breakfast, she announced, "i found a dead bumble bee."

the fussy eater

2008-08-15T12:39:00.006+10:00

i'm listing the bean's peculiar dietary preferences just so's i can compare with what she will or won't eat when she's older. by the way, i am hoping she will grow out of her pet food hates and become a more catholic eater.

meats/fish
1. salmon - she'll eat it ovenbaked or grilled, not dressed unless with a light sprinkling of salt. (unlike some kids, the bean doesn't like any sauce on her food.)

2. ocean trout - again, ovenbaked or grilled as is.

3. birdseye frozen fish fillets with spinach & feta - i've tried her on normal kids' fish fingers and she is not terribly fond of those, nor would she gobble down other 'flavoured' frozen fillets as much as she does this particular version with spinach and feta.

4. beef - she likes the japanese-style very thinly/finely sliced beef. i think she likes beef only when it's tender and not chewy.

5. chicken - normally she hates whatever chicken i cook her but yesterday i tried her on small pieces of teriyaki chicken and she liked those.

vegetables
1. broccoli - she'll eat a few and then needs lots of coaxing to finish the rest. plus, she's partial to the stems. she doesn't like the florets part of the veg.

2. celery - she likes this raw, without the leafy bits.

3. spinach (or any other leafy veg) - will eat only when i spoon-feed her.

4. kailan - she used to eat a lot of this (simply stir-fried, not too oily, and must be tender) but we haven't been giving her much of it lately

fruit
watermelon is arguably her favourite fruit, tied with blueberries and mangoes. she will eat the usual apples/pears/mandarin oranges/grapes et al but they won't be greeted with the same enthusiasm.

she told me today, "i don't like it" looking at the bowl of rockmelon i had placed on her table, but when i asked her to try just one she managed to scoff down most of it.

as a baby she used to retch when i tried to give her bananas. but after she turned 2 she began to like them more. she still won't finish an entire banana but now she will pick one up and peel it herself - when she is in the mood.

rice/pasta/bread
she likes boiled rice (she used to like fried rice but she doesn't like egg, in whatever form) and she prefers plain brown bread to any fancier gourmet variety that i am partial to ("without the seeds mama"). she will eat ravioli if it's just stuffed with spinach and cheese. i tried her on beef ravioli and that was a dismal failure.

miscellaneous
1. macaroni cheese - the easy-cook pasta packs are her favourite. she doesn't like it when i melt cheese into cooked macaroni - i think it's the lumps and gooey cheese that turns her off.

2. spaghetti bolognese - this is on every children's menu in restaurants, but the bean hates it

3. sushi - to be precise, it's "cucumber hosomaki", i.e. the plain nori-wrapped cucumber rolls that have been sliced into bite-sized pieces. she doesn't like it when i change the filling to chopped carrots/tinned tuna etc.

4. spinach/ sausage rolls - yup, those rather unhealthy pastry shop snacks. she usually gets a sausage roll and a cup of hot chocolate after her swim lesson. and when we used to do kindermusik, we used to pacify her with a roll and a babycino after class too.

5. french fries - the chips in fish and chips used to be a bean favourite. but lately she is not as into them as before...or maybe it's just that she prefers sushi now?

food hates/loves
egg could top her list of food she dislikes. she doesn't like egg in any form - boiled, fried et al - which is a bit inconvenient as a boiled egg is such a wholesome all-in-one food. several months ago she used to be given one at least once a week, and although she'd only eat the egg white portion she would at least go them a go. not so now.

an inherited trait, her very favourite 'food' is ice cream. i even tried her on green tea ice cream yesterday and she loved it.

it's a sign that childhood is no longer what we remember it to be when kids cry out for a babycino. and er...the bean is no different from any other middle-class aussie brat with a penchant for the foamy milk concoction laced with cocoa, having announced 2 days ago as i drove her to playgroup, "we are going to a cafe. i want a babycino mama."

food for thought? it's truly bemusing business feeding the bean.

i'm going on holiday

2008-08-14T09:53:00.008+10:00

after i got out of the shower this morning i came into the living room calling for the bean. only to have her answer from the backdoor in the kitchen, all togged out already - sunnies on her face, slingbag on her arm, favourite necklace and bracelet and shoes on, "i am going on holiday! i can't be late. can you help me?"

i burst into laughter and asked what sort of help she needed. she didn't elaborate but reiterated, "can you help me go to the* holiday?"

*hopefully, the bean's grammar will improve, along with her grasp of abstract concepts such as 'holiday' and 'months'. she still thinks that her nainai and yeye live "in the month of august", because we had been saying that we'll be visiting them in the month of august.

well, i didn't bring her on her holiday (just yet) but we ended up in a sushi restaurant for lunch, where i very nearly fed my daughter wasabi instead of green tea ice cream. how was i to know that the large, attractive, round ball of green sitting in a pretty bowl with a small plastic ice cream spoon wasn't ice cream???

luckily for us a hawkeyed waitress came up and asked, "does she really like wasabi?"

me, "isn't it green tea ice cream?"

waitress, "oh no no!" and hurriedly whisked the fat bowl of wasabi away before the bean was about to scoop a mouthful.

she returned with a small tub of the proper stuff from the fridge. and the bean was mollified (she was most anxious about the faux ice cream's disappearance thinking that mummy was about to gipp her yet again), so much so that she refused to share the ice cream with me. even when i blackmailed her by saying that she was being as mean as diesel**.

**diesel is, as his name implies, a diesel engine from the thomas & friends pantheon. he's one of the few engines that the bean always insists, "i don't l i k e him. he is n a s t y." she tends to drawl out certain words in emphasis.

the magic word

2008-08-12T08:22:00.006+10:00

i forgot to post this when "normal service" resumed - the event took place the day we got the keys to the new house and we launched our move, so it's a few weeks' old.

it was a saturday and dh had taken it on himself to cater to the bean's breakfast needs. she was given some cereal (or maybe it was toast with honey - that's her favourite brekkie) and then she asked, "i want some apple juice, dad." almost like an afterthought she added, "in a teacup. i want some apple juice in a teacup."

dh is quite particular about Ps and Qs and he prompted her with, "and what's the magic word?"

the bean replied loudly and slowly, "teeeaa cuuup."

this temporarily floored dh as he was expecting her to say "pweese".

i guess we should be somewhat thankful that she's still wee and doesn't yet know how to truly talk back. when we related this incident to a married friend, he said that when he asks his wife what's the magic word, she inevitably growls, "now!"

while the bean still has yet to have courtesy ingrained so that it's second nature, she can trot out 'please' when it suits her, as the episode with the sydney airport immigration officer showed.

(inherited?) scatalogical humour

2008-08-08T20:59:00.008+10:00

i'd found a new thomas & friends audiobook in an auckland children's books and toys shop and when we returned to sydney the first chance i got i played it on the car stereo. most of the stories should be familiar to the bean as the little thomas storybooks she has at home replicate them. however, the cd stories expand on the paperback versions and anyway, the bean is captivated by anything thomas related.

during a recent drive home the bean listened to one of the stories - about thomas and terence, a tractor with caterpillar treads. after thomas made fun of terence's caterpillar wheels and scoffed at the effect of snow to deter trains, saying, "pooh!", the bean burst into a peal of delighted giggles. at the next instance when thomas disparaged snow ("soft stuff!") and made another "pooh" interjection, the bean had another fit of giggles.

i was amazed and gratified. i hadn't heard this giggle for a while (it is one of the best sounds from the bean - most infectious and cute) and i wanted to know what about the story made her laugh so happily. that night i asked the bean what made her giggle, giving her a few prompts to remind her which story it was. and her smiling reply was, "thomas said 'poo'."

i related the episode to dh, and he wondered if she thinks "poo" is a naughty word. i don't know as i couldn't get the bean to give me a better reason.

finding beauty in little things

2008-08-08T18:27:00.005+10:00

yesterday the bean found an evil eye amulet* hanging from the doorknob in the kitchen. she looked at it and exclaimed in awed tones, "what is this? it is so beautiful! it is precious!"

you'd have thought that the bean had stumbled on the most stunning sunsets or most precious of jewels, not a small gypsy souvenir.

* a traditional turkish (istanbul-style) amulet to ward off evil looks from jealous or ill-wishing people that was a present from one of dh's brothers.

charm offence on an immigration official

2008-08-08T18:03:00.007+10:00

we had a comparatively good flight from auckland to sydney earlier this week. the bean had a short nap on the plane; she ate a tub of chocolate ice cream; and she had watched a little thomas & friends on her portable dvd player, so i guess she was in a good mood when we landed at sydney international.

after a bit of a wait we finally got to an immigration counter and when i picked the bean up so that the official (a woman) could take a look at her, the officer greeted the bean with "hello gorgeous". this probably set the tone as the bean smirked back and when i placed the bean on the ledge at the front of the counter, she leaned over the counter and engaged the immigration officer in a huge charm offensive. dh and i were virtually ignored as the immigration officer talked to the bean. so our ordeal was a little longer than usual at the immigration counter but it was a great deal pleasanter.

a snatch of the banter between the woman officer and the bean:
"and who is this?", the officer pointed to my passport photo.
"mummy."
"do you love your mummy? is she a good mummy?"
the bean straightened up, leaned over to me, wrapped her arms round my neck, and smiling coyly said, "yes."
"what's this? a stamp. i am stamping all your passports."
"can i have one too? pweese?"
"awww. she said 'please'!", this was to the officer's neighbour in the next counter.
"sure you can. just wait till i'm done."
the bean then said, "this hand too! pweese?"

i couldn't see the bean's facial expressions as she had her back to me but dh said that from what little he could observe the bean did a couple of her special beams (where she scrunches up her face in a funny smile) and smirks to the officer. truth be told, when she wants to she does simper quite well. dh is convinced that the bean's charm and social skills comes from him. (roll eyes)

moving house (again) & montessori update

2008-08-08T13:20:00.003+10:00

i am typing this up from our 3rd residence in oz amidst a chaotic house still full of boxes/binliner bags of clothes etc, having just shifted. last month our old landlord decided that s/he will be upping the rent and we found that we had to find a new house and move in just a week short from an overseas trip that could not be postponed. all rather inconvenient but we have found a cheaper place and the saved money will go to the bean's preschool fees instead!

with the move and the trip, the bean's sense of order has been inevitably affected. so she was "all over the place" on the first week of term 3 at her montessori playgroup. however, she did demonstrate that she has advanced in her motor/spatial skills and she performed some of the practical life exercises admirably this week (wk 2).

e.g. she was shown how to undo the buttons of the big button dressing frame only once last term (and then she had not been much interested, to tell the truth) so i thought she would've forgotten how to do it and needed a new demo from the directress. but this time she just took over and unbuttoned and buttoned up the frame very efficiently. when the directress found that she had completed this one, she showed the bean how to do the buckles dressing frame. after seeing how it was all done, the bean also managed to do this exercise rather quickly. once completed, she then went to the dressing frames basket and proceeded to work through the rest of the dressing frames till she completed them all. thereafter she announced in rather self-satisfied manner, "i did all of them!"

bean the fashionista

2008-07-23T10:15:00.003+10:00

i don't know where the bean gets her girlie fashion sense from - it ain't from me (although i'll admit to guilty tv pleasures like 'project runway') as anyone who knows me will testify (my own style is pretty much in the preppy-practical-jeans-&-tees category).

she is soooo into her "ballerina dress" i.e. any full-skirted dress that balloons out when she twirls and spins in it. and this must be worn with tights. she usually picks out her own outfits and she tries to match them colour-wise but the overall effect is still somewhat psychedelic.

today, she decided on blue and purple striped tights. then she said she wanted a blue ballerina dress to go with the blue in the tights. i offered 2 dresses and she picked a dark blue-almost purple dress, crying out delightedly, "this one! it's quite perfect!"

the nascent imelda bean
unfortunately (or fortunately) she doesn't have many fashionable shoes. she is very partial to a pair of white sandals with pink flowers and she usually insists on them especially if she's wearing a dress.

last weekend when we went to queensland, i only packed a pair of light green crocs for her. big mistake.

she was happy with the crocs for a (short) while as it has a nemo button attached but then she got bored with them and wanted to wear my shoes (i had taken a pair of silver ballet flats with me) instead.

then at the children's playground in the resort's grounds, she came upon a "little girl" (it doesn't matter if the girl is heaps bigger than her, it's still "little girl" to the bean) who was wearing a pair of keds-style flats - red with white polka dots and white toes. the bean immediately zoomed in on the girl and reverently said, "i like your shoes", while reaching out her hands to caress them.

thank goodness she doesn't have a thing for handbags yet.

who is a homo? (warning: non-p.c. post)

2008-07-20T18:04:00.021+10:00

story #1: sweets r thicker than blood
we have just come home from a very short weekend away in the gold coast, queensland, with a couple of friends. the bean is very fond of this couple and "uncle jon" is always entertaining, although not always with age-appropriate speech and/or games.

on this trip uncle jon decided to tease dh by trying to get the bean to either say: "daddy is a homo" or "humpty daddy" (after humpty-dumpty). for 2 days the bean resisted jon's attempts at brainwashing, adamantly insisting, "noooooo. daddy not homo. it's not humpty daddy. it's humpty dumpty."

then over lunch on saturday, after she'd been egged about this for a while, the bean declared almost exasperatedly, "uncle jon is a homo!", making the entire table roar with laughter as we took in jon's redfaced chagrin.

to his credit, jon took this in his stride, although a bit later he did muse, "hmmm. how did i become the homo?" to which the half-dozen replies were in the vein of "you reap what you sow."

probably encouraged by the delighted response of everybody at the table (there were about 8 of us) the bean kept to her declaration and didn't waver...that is, till jon finally found a way to overcome this.

sunday. today. we were heading home. at an outdoor cafe of the gold coast airport. the bean had still been sure uncle jon was the homo. then jon took out a packet of jelly babies.

jon to the bean: would you like one?
bean immediately reached out her grubby fingers.
jon: who is the homo?
bean pointed to his wife. jon shook his head. the bean immediately pointed to dh.
jon: yeeeessss! well done! daddy is a homo! (and gave her the sweet)
bean: thank you uncle jon.
jon: you want another one?
bean stretched out her grubby hand again.
jon: what do you say?
bean: daddy is a homo!
dh: how easily loyalty is bought by sweets.
jon, in glee: sweets are thicker than blood obviously.

story #2: turn it off
when we were in the taxi going home from the airport, the bean entertained herself with a couple of her favourite nursery rhymes - 'ding dong bell' & 'sweetly sings the donkey' - tunelessly sung and lisped in places too (e.g. "sing" becomes "hing").

but as she became more engrossed by her own performance, the decibels started increasing. finally, both dh and i turned to the bean and softly went, "shhhh."

to which the bean quickly added, "too noisy. turn it off."

story #3: i told you
i cooked rice with carrots and ham for her dinner tonight and placed the dish on her little table as per usual. when the bean was finally persuaded to eat her dinner before watching "telly", she said, "i going to bring this to the big table."

i didn't really hear what she had said and only reacted when dh asked her, "honey, what are you doing?" - he'd noticed her carrying her bowl and was naturally a bit concerned.

our queries and admonishment made the bean indignant, and she said, "i bringing it to the big table! i told you!"

pop concerts for preschoolers

2008-07-18T11:50:00.007+10:00

because it's the winter school holidays i had lined up a couple of concerts to bring the bean to: a playschool concert and a concert by justine clarke - pop star to the under 5s.

the playschool concert was hosted by 2 not so current presenters - alex and angela - although the bean should be familiar with angela from a couple of playschool dvds we own. it wasn't too bad - nursery rhymes and some skits were rehashed from old episodes and most of the children were well entertained. i say most, because the bean spent a large chunk of the concert being miserably snuggled against me. i don't know why she wasn't enthused. perhaps the auditorium was too big and airy; maybe cuz we were at the back and she couldn't see much of the stage; maybe she didn't like the crowds of kids and parents. who knows.

despite her seeming lack of enthusiasm for the concert itself, she did perk up at the merchandise counter. when i offered her a choice of jemima or humpty finger puppets, she picked humpty. angela and alex also signed a colouring book i'd bought the bean. i don't think she is as impressed now as she will be (i hope) when she is (much) older.

justine clarke in concert was a much more positive experience for the bean. as soon as the first chords of "i like to sing" were played the bean began spinning round and round* (almost non-stop), pausing only between songs. it's also a testament to her enjoyment of the concert that she was courageous enough to move away from me in order to get closer to the stage.

i did wonder if the bean would yell at justine "no, no, not that one" if she were to sing a not-so-favourite song (the bean's partial to 'the gumtree family' instead), but she was happy to just spin and twirl till she got dizzy.

unfortunately, when the show ended, justine didn't hang around to sign autographs although i did buy a concert souvenir - a t-shirt, which the bean later stained with orange juice.

back home, the bean was still pretty psyched about the show and insisted on watching justine's dvd. the ironic thing is that when it came to a song she didn't like on the video she did yell at the tv screen, "no! not that one! the other one! the other one!" - hmmm...where was her voice when she had the real justine in front of her eh?

* spinning till she stumbles from dizziness is the bean's idea of dancing

yes, sir & plops

2008-07-14T14:49:00.009+10:00

for the past couple of days the bean has been responding to my demands or queries just like how a tank engine would to sir topham hatt (aka the fat controller from thomas & friends).

a few samples...

me: would you like some blueberries?
bean: yes suh!

me: do you want to poo on the big potty?
bean: yes suh! i try.

me: do you want some sushi?
bean: yes suh!

and yes, the bean has begun opting to do her #2s in the big potty now (it was her 2nd time this afternoon), so we are definitely 'seeing the light' at the end of our toilet training 'tunnel'. (if one is allowed such convoluted but strangely apt metaphors.)

and uh...she likes the sound the poo makes as it drops into the bowl - "plop!" "three plops, mama!"

i'm a little kitten

2008-07-11T20:32:00.014+10:00

yeeeees (roll eyes), the bean does indeed think she is a little kitten. i have countered if she is instead a tiger cub or a teddy bear, but she unfailingly asserts her right to be "a little kitten".

i do find it amusing at times when she refers to herself in the third person/cat, as in "the little kitten still crying", "the little kitten is upset", "the little kitten is not feeling well"...etc. a couple of times she's also told me that, "i have pink whiskers!"

when dh or i asks how is the little kitten she invariably (if she is happy, playful) goes, "mee-ow!" and looks up smugly, just like a cat that's got the cream. she might then also try to lick our faces. most times these days it seems she's substituted kisses with licks anyway.

our feline visitor
anyhow, today we were again paid a visit by one of our neighbours' cats. (they sometimes drop by for a nosy wander round the house and a kindly scratch behind the ears.) naturally, this event delighted the bean no end.

she followed the cat wherever it moseyed and tried to converse with it, "cat just like ginger*. i show you." then she went off to get her toy to show this cat. later on, she told the cat, "that's big thomas**. see big thomas? come see." the cat, being a cat, was imperiously disdainful/dismissive of the bean's friendly overtures.

*ginger is one of the bean's stuffed toy cats.
** big thomas is actually a ride-along thomas the tank engine designed for toddlers. i had rented it this week from our local toy library.

non sequiturs

2008-07-11T20:21:00.004+10:00

at bedtime, as the bean prattled to her daddy, her near-soliloquy went thus (spurred as it was by dh asking if she'd like a little brother or sister):

"i have a little cousin. his name matteo. there are two other cousins. edward and kwiffer. but not flo-flo and samuel."
dh had to interrupt her to say that florian and samuel are also her cousins. but this only waylaid her a smidgeon.
"there is a bell!", she pointed to a room decoration and segued into "ding dong bell, pussy's in the well. who put her in. little tommy thin. thomas and diesel 10! i dropped goldie*. little boy from the swimming class took it away!"

* her swim toy: a small, rotund yellow fish with big lips.

more classic phrases

2008-07-09T19:48:00.009+10:00

some stuff the bean's been spouting/spouted recently:

1) "you are driving. don't talk." - this lecture was given as i tried to converse while driving her to school one day. talk about backseat driving!

2) "i don't eat this. it's nasty." - first time she used this line was in reference to bits of seaweed that was in her rice.

3) "haircherly" (for 'actually') - this adverb is sometimes misused in her speech but she does throw it out at least once a day.

4) "i seenk" (for 'i think') - e.g. "i like egg yolks. i seenk." (this statement is untrue actually as she balks each time i try to give her egg - in any form.) her pronunciation reminds me of that german/british advert with the deutsche ship's captain asking, "vat are you sinking?" of the british captain on the 'sinking' ship.

5) she was well pleased with the fit of her new swim goggles today and told me why: "it fits. it's perfect!"

purple pants & the big potty

2008-06-27T12:56:00.009+10:00

some good news to report on the toilet-training front...

a) the bean has now been in panties (instead of nappies) for 1 week now. once she realised how much more comfy trainers are to nappies (with their bulk), she's insisted on wearing panties all the time. (although we put her in all-in-one nappies for night sleeps still.)

there is the occasional 'accident', when she'd come tell me she needs to go wee wee after she'd done it. but i try to stave off these incidents by prompting her very regularly: e.g. after breakfast, before heading out the house, coming home, after dinner or snacks etc.

b) although we have been ready to put the bean on the "big potty" (i.e. the adult potty) for some time - what with buying at least 2 children's toilet seats for her use - she was weepily resistant to using it, adamant to stick to her "small potties". in fact, she was so resistant to the whole idea, she actually threw a HUGE tantrum after i'd tried her on it for a few days, saying, "no more, mummy, okay? i don't sit on big potty."

but we had a breakthrough recently. our montessori under 3s facility has only 1 restroom - with a kid's toilet seat for use. i'd been observing the bean carefully the whole morning and noticed that she was getting a bit antsy and that enough time had elapsed from the last wee to warrant a visit to the restroom asap. so i brought her there. she was willing to come with me. but once i told her that there wasn't a small potty, only a potty with a child's toilet seat, she immediately said, "mummy go wee wee. i don't sit on big potty."

i then gave her a choice. i told her that she could either hold it till we got home, or she could wee in the big potty (with the kid's seat installed). i said that she must not wee in her panties as i would get extremely cross. she was by then halfway to the door then she stopped and came back to me and got onto the big potty! impossible to describe how pleased and proud i was. wanted to tell the whole world about it.

anyhow, since that fateful wednesday morning, she has been happy to sit on the big potty. i would now say that she uses it about 60% of the time.

...YAY!

i had a busy day mama

2008-06-21T00:41:00.002+10:00

i love this classic phrase from the bean, "i had a busy day" that she trots out every second or third day.

she first used it on dh about 5 weeks ago when dh came home one evening and asked what she did at "school". he reported to me that she appeared not very interested in his question and merely replied, "i had a busy day daddy" and walked off.

anyhoo, 2 days ago she actually elaborated on her busy day by telling me the things and places she'd been to - a first! - "i went to toy library. i went to playground. i see xxx at school. i had a busy day mama."

1st baby proms failure?

2008-06-20T17:54:00.007+10:00

took the bean to a baby proms at the opera house yesterday thinking that she would enjoy a different performance experience - one that combined art with music.

it turned out to be a rather more cerebral and staid affair although quite a number of kids did get 'it'. however, the bean was not so impressed and i had to keep prompting her on what was happening 'on stage' - really a large plastic screen on which a painter was trying to illustrate the story of a red dot. perhaps because it was a darkened room and the painter was a man (she has an aversion to any strange males of late), whatever the reason, the bean wouldn't keep still for long and at one point she even asked, "mama read me a story" and tried to rifle through my bag.

i asked if she enjoyed it when the performance ended and she said yes. but i wonder if she had really absorbed anything...e.g. the slightly abstracted trees that the artist painted the bean thought were "lollipops" and that the sun he painted was really a "starfish". so maybe the narrative eluded her.

maybe her initial enthusiasm to go to the proms was to see her other set of grandparents. whilst in the car she did shout, "we go see nai nai ye ye in august in opera house!" (i have told her that we would be seeing them in august, but she must take "august" to be an actual place.) well, perhaps her one lesson from this proms is the realisation that they don't reside there afterall.

beauty & the beast OR jekyll & hyde (the toddler version)

2008-06-15T16:32:00.010+10:00

today was a pretty good demo of the bean's dual nature a la jekyll & hyde midget-style.

we had to go to a busy shopping centre to sort out our banking and have some "yum cha" (as they call "dim sum" over here). the bean behaved very well for most of the outing. she was happy to play with the bead frame toy at the bank for a while and to listen to a thomas & friends story before she got bored.

then after we took a queue number from the dim sum restaurant we paid a visit to borders. there was a nice children's section in the book store where we found a book about diggers. i told the bean to take it to the reading table and she obediently did so thus allowing me some time to browse the shelves without distraction.

shortly after, though, i thought i'd better pop my head round to see how she was getting on.

she was doing fine without me apparently and appeared to be entertaining 2 ladies who were also sitting at the table. when i came up to them one of them told me that the bean had been reading to herself and pointing things out to them. (she'd the book opened on her lap.) we were soon joined by dh and they asked us the bean's age. (she's the same age as one of the ladies' daughters.) the woman added as she walked away that the bean was very good to sit and read by herself.

at dim sum the bean attracted the attentions of the servers - even though she didn't put in any effort to charm - she was either too busy stuffing her face or turned shy and quiet. still, despite not cooperating, she was rewarded with a chocolate frog by one of the waitresses!

i think things sort of deteriorated after that. perhaps the bean was fatigued; perhaps she was bored by the grownup preoccupations; perhaps chocolate was the bean's kryptonite...whatever. in any case, carpark-bound, as i wheeled her towards an escalator she spied one of those dratted musical mini-rides (where you slot in a small fortune and get 10 seconds of canned music and the airplane/dolphin/car/etc makes vague bumps and shudders). she got very excited and wanted to get out of her pushchair pronto. i pretended not to understand and we wheeled her away kicking and screaming her lungs out, "noooooo! that one! that one! noooooo! i don't go home! i don't go home!" (repeat ad nauseum)

determinedly, i avoided eye contact with anyone as she carried on the titanic tantrum on our long walk to the car. and then when we had to get her out of the pushchair she became the kind of squirmy, screaming monster-toddler i'd always shaken my head and tut-tutted at, the kind one sees devil-spawned by other parents, the kind one thinks ah, but my little angel will never do that...until today.

there was a snowball's chance in hell that she would allow us to put her into her car seat and dh didn't even whisper the idea. i just sat her facing me and pulled the seatbelt over us.

she wailed for a bit more after i calmly told her a fib: the carousel was broken...that's why we didn't see any children on it...(repeat)... soon the lie worked its magic. she was still a bit sobby but she bought it.

once she was calmer i then told her that we were not supposed to let her sit with me: if a policeman saw us he'd get very cross with daddy and mummy and punish us by making us pay a big fine, which is a lot of money.

the bean didn't like that at all. she said, "no. policeman not hurt mummy, daddy. no. i don't let policeman hurt mummy and daddy." i thought that was awfully sweet...from a little demon.

poet laureate in the making?

2008-05-18T10:29:00.004+10:00

dh was chatting to the bean as they were eating brekkie this morning. he said something about singing songs or nursery rhymes and that set the bean off.

the bean: "yah! goldilocks and the three bears."

dh: "do you know a song about goldilocks and the three bears?"
then he made up some lines about the characters to the tune of thomas and friends's theme song.

bean: "nooooo."

dh: "how does it go then?"

bean: "goldilocks and the three bears. goldilocks and the golden hair."

we were impressed but that was as far as she got, so we are not convinced that she did the rhyme deliberately.

still, maybe we should start looking at applications to oxbridge?... ...

who's fat in the family

2008-05-18T09:47:00.004+10:00

the other day when i was putting on my swimmers the bean was hurrying me up and fussing around. i cast a critical eye on the whole in the mirror and sighed,
"mummy's fat."

she looked at me with a smile and said,
"nooo. mummy not fat. (pause)
daddy fat."

all can be forgiven...

p.s. i solemnly swear that i had not implanted this idea in the bean.

obnoxious behaviour?

2008-05-15T11:37:00.008+10:00

the bean is definitely exerting her will these days; found her ego and is using it to the max.

take this afternoon. when i found the bean had moved onto a different activity, i asked if she'd finished playing with her lego set that she'd left sitting on the floor (with the implication that she should therefore pack it away), she said, "no. (pause) i busy at the moment." (!!!)

i am also finding it difficult to get her to go to the potty willingly lately. when we wake each morning it is a lottery game of whether she'd like to perform her ablutions or whether i have to use a combination of coercion and bribery to get acquiescence.

i can almost believe that the middle east "problem" could be easier to resolve than my daughter's intransigence!

another horrible development is her preference for "pink". i suspect that the bean has probably absorbed this insidious virus through observation of other little girls. for the past week or so she'd ask to wear pink-coloured clothes. i have taken to calling some shades of pink "violet" and "lilac" in the vain hope of expanding her repertoire - both in vocabulary and sartorially.

i don't care much for the opinion that it is natural for girls to like pink. it is an unfounded theory that is truly sexist. there is too much out there that is mono-coloured pink (albeit in various hideous shades) all marketed to girls and parents from infancy. it is brainwashing by media and commerce.

a few classic pronouncements

2008-05-13T20:55:00.007+10:00

the bean had some classic lines today.

when i asked if she would like to speak to her popo on the phone, she primly said, "no thank you" without looking up from eating a small bowl of blueberries.

later, at dinnertime, when i tried to charm some nutritious tofu, tempeh and carrots into her, she finally (after MUCH MUCH persuasion and negotiation) gave in and reluctantly (opening her mouth as small as possible) ate a tiny piece, before declaring sullenly, "mummy i don't like tofu anymore."

then at bedtime, when we were horsing around a bit getting her dressed in her pjs, she playfully went, "bububububububububububub...(pause)...i am a bubber!", and giggled.

we have gone a week without bf milk!

2008-05-09T15:36:00.003+10:00

as posted earlier, the bean had been going on only 1 bf milk session for a few weeks - part of my gradual weaning 'plan'*.

then i decided to wean the bean off bf milk completely last week. it started on the friday morning (2 may) when i refused to allow her to bf when she got antsy between 4-6 am. she cried, shouted, pleaded and prodded and pulled, but i outmanoeuvred her. when she woke up properly just before 7am she demanded, "i want bread and honey!"

this became the pattern for the week; the bean asks for bread and honey for breakfast everyday. now that bf milk has ceased, i find that she doesn't reject cow's milk (hurrah!) and in fact will drink a whole glass of it.

does she miss bf milk? you bet your bottom dollar! when she goes to bed, she still sometimes slyly tries to pull up my blouse/t-shirt but it's mainly a half-hearted attempt. unfortunately, the 4-6am wake-up call remains a fixture. it's my hope that now we have ceased bfg, she will slowly learn to sleep through the night to 7am. she still needs me as her sleeping mate - i am her teddy bear. but instead of letting her wake up and walk to the master bedroom and climb in with dh and i, i have decided to sleep in her bed with her: hoping that she will learn to sleep through in her own bed.

anyway, i think it's been a success weaning the bean off bf milk. my goal of bfg till the bean turned 2 has been reached. she is eating a variety of different foods - not as varied as i hope but at least she takes cow's milk now - and she is still alert, happy and playful during her waking hours. i am glad i took a gradual approach to weaning instead of the cold turkey option. that would've been too traumatic for both of us.

* it was not a proper weaning plan at all. i just decided to cut down the feeds one at a time and see how the bean responded. when i got more fed up with bfg i then cut down yet another feed. and this went on until i decided it was time to really end it.

the "real thomas" tank engine

2008-04-23T23:24:00.003+10:00

last week we took the bean on a special outing - a ride on an actual steam train that looks like thomas the tank engine. it is a quarterly event held at the zigzag railway in the blue mountains and i thought since the bean is so obsessed with thomas, why not an actual train experience?

suffice to say that the bean enjoyed it although it may have been a little overwhelming for her at first. she was also a bit nonplussed about having to sit in the train instead of being where she could stare at thomas's 'face', but the rides at 'tidmouth sheds' made up for the boring real train ride.

but now she calls this the "real thomas", as differentiated from book or tv thomas!

new(ish) speech developments

2008-04-23T22:20:00.010+10:00

what's going on?
for at least 2 weeks now, whenever the bean wants to know what i am doing she would come over and ask in a very serious voice, "what going on mama?"
like today. she had been playing on her own for a while when she must have suddenly felt the need for my company, so she came over to where i was hanging up the washing and even though she knew what i was doing, she still asked, "what going on mama?"
i was not sure if she referred to something more profoundly philosophical (such as the existential state of the world) but i just answered as simply as i could, "just hanging the washing to dry."

birthday celebrations replay
i don't know if it's the influence of the song "it's my birthday today" by justine clarke (on a cd - i like to sing - that is constantly played in the car) but this afternoon the bean informed me that, "my birthday today mama. i want presents. with big ribbons. purple. pink!"

where's the tickle monster?
since sunday, when dh or i asks her if she knew where the tickle monster is, she would point to some random place and say, "over there", knowing full well that one of us would be launching a tickle-fest on her by responding variously, "are you sure it's not over here?"/"no it's not; it's here!"

gender-bender & then some
i've posted about her referring to herself as a boy. well now it's a bit more precise: "little boy!"
99% of the time when i sayang her and say that she's "mummy's little girl", she'd retort, "nooo."
if i ask her, "then what are you?" she'd proudly/triumphantly/cheekily say, "little boy!"
but yesterday, instead of claiming to be a boy, she just went, "miao!" and miming a kitten bouncing off my shoulders and head, she went, "miao! miao! miao! little kitten! bouncing off mummy!" she was shaking with laughter and then she finally admitted to being "silly".

missing her daddy
last evening when it was nearing bathtime, the bean suddenly went very pensive and pouty. she moped around the living room and then declared, "i want daddy. where's daddy? i want daddy."
when i asked if she would like to speak to him on the phone (he was still at work) she said, "no! i want daddy here. daddy at home!"
this evening she missed him again at bathtime but it was just a one-line pout this time, "i want daddy."

yes i am

2008-04-16T18:17:00.004+10:00

the bean had to wait a bit for her tea tonight and she got a little antsy about it, even leaving the goggle box to pester me in the kitchen. so to distract her, i asked her, "aren't you going to watch little einsteins?"

the ruse worked and she immediately turned around, tossing back her reply, "yes i am."

a puppetry 1st

2008-04-15T23:22:00.007+10:00

we attended our first puppet show today, and i think the bean enjoyed it. the show was titled hickory dickory dock so i think she expected more of the clock and the mouse. but in fact, they were featured only at the beginning and end of the show which strung together several disparate stories - like a vaudeville act.

there were 2 parts of the show separated by a short interval. the stories performed were all quite apt for the age group (2-4 yr olds): peter rabbit & farmer macgregor's veg garden (part 1); what's the time, mr wolf? and 10 laughing clowns (part 2).

during the main performances hand puppets were the main 'actors' - all performed by a sole puppeteer (the "lady" as the bean calls her). but the kids were shown wooden, stringed puppets at the beginning of each half of the show. i think leah really liked the frog that came out as well as the dancing monkey and violin-playing gypsy.

at the end of part 2, there was a shadow puppet segment and that was well done. however, because the screen for this was located at a corner, and rather small, i felt that some of the kids may not have been able to appreciate the performance properly. e.g. from where the bean was sitting on the floor, a 'stage' light was actually blocking part of the screen. i told her to stand up so she could see the entire screen to better enjoy the performance.

she was quite fascinated by the puppets as they are really toys that can move. she was especially taken by a green hanging puppet that she insisted was a dinosaur. (the 'theatre', really a sparse shoplot in a suburban shopping plaza, had strung up various puppets from the ceiling as part of the minimalist decor.)

however, i was impressed that she was not at all clingy at the theatre. i told her to sit at the front with the other children (most of whom were slightly older - maybe round 3 years old) and she wasn't fazed that i didn't sit with her (she did look back to see where i was). instead, she started chatting with a mother who sat upfront with her 2 charges. the bean kept pointing things out (characters from the performances, or the "dinosaur" above, et al) and that poor accosted mom had to repeat after the bean in agreement.

during the interval when the bean came to me for refreshment, i saw a handbell sitting on the "box office" counter and pointed it out to her. we soon found out the purpose of this instrument, when the puppeteer came out to announce the end of the interval and the imminent start of part 2. as soon as the bean saw the puppeteer pick up the handbell, she zoomed over and said, "i wan ring bell."

their brief exchange was as follows:
"oh, would you like to help me ring the bell?"
"i wan ring bell."
"alright, will you help ring the bell?"
"i wan ring bell."
i guess once the bean has set her sights on something she can be quite single-minded.

in any case, as soon as she got the handbell she shot out the door of the theatre. i dumped my rucksack in a mild panic. as i got up from my chair to check on the bean, i saw a grandfather smiling at me, so i said, "she's making a run with the bell." (or something to that effect.) but the puppeteer was with the bean, teaching her how to hold and ring the bell.

i think she was the envy of some of the other children, but then she seems to be the one who was able to make the most of the opportunity...with a little (unwitting) help from me.

bf update

2008-04-10T22:42:00.004+10:00

i've whittled our bf sessions from 2-3 times per day to just 1 now. the bean's been put to sleep in her "big bed" for several weeks, but she is only just learning to sleep without relying on bfg.

for the first couple of nights there were tears and implorations but i was steadfast that i wouldn't give in. then on the 3rd, or was it the 4th, night she fell asleep without asking for "milk milk". however, and this a huge however, she still needs me cuddled up close to her before she can go to sleep.

i am my daughter's security blanket/ cuddle toy.

my baby has asthma

2008-04-10T22:21:00.006+10:00

one of my minor fears has been realised: the bean has been diagnosed with childhood asthma. she'd been having an irritating (to me) cough at night for about 2 months but because it went away during the day and because all of us thought this could be from teething symptoms (all the extra drool), i wasn't unduly worried. at least not until this monday past when she had a very runny nose the entire day, followed by a night of extreme wheeziness.

so i brought her to the doctor's where she behaved impeccably - she went straight to the children's corner in the waiting room and started colouring with the materials provided, and when she eventually met the doctor she wasn't shy or afraid. she was a bit fidgety because she didn't have any colouring materials in the office but she did a little exploring - she even went to stand on the weighing scale without being asked.

anyhow, the prognosis ain't too good. on top of this chronic asthma, she has an ear infection (left side only) and a cold. her breathing is laboured and the doctor was a bit surprised to find the bean so bright and happy, belying the seriousness of her condition. the doc said maybe it's just leah's nature but that with the ear infection she'd have expected her to be more miserable.

so we're back on ventolin and singulair, both medication we're familiar with because of the bean's previous bout of bronchiolitis. she also has to have a not-so nice tasting antibiotic (for the ear infection which the doc suspects is bacterial), which i am proud to say she downs (albeit reluctantly and with a screwed up face) like a little trooper.

i hope she grows out of this asthma soon...

thomas the tank engine

2008-04-10T20:35:00.004+10:00

for a couple of weeks at least now the bean has been obsessed with thomas - thomas the tank engine. (thank god it ain't barbie!) everyday she wakes up and asks to "watch thomas deeveedee mamee" or "thomas teevee". i've lost count the number of times i keep telling her that we don't have the dvd nor that i know if a show will be guaranteed on tv that day.

to cap her obsession, just before bathtime tonight she went, "puff puff puff!" i didn't know what she was on about till i was told that "leah choo choo train. puff puff. like thomas."

later, just before she drifted off to sleep she said, "nemo*, thomas, leah's friends."

* yes, nemo from finding nemo - every durn anemonefish is now called "nemo" and any fish that is blue in colour is "dory".

i love you daddy

2008-03-31T20:34:00.003+11:00

as we were putting the bean to bed last night, dh was bowled over when she suddenly said, "i love you daddy." and reached out to give him a big hug. he was so chuffed by it.

more on manners

2008-03-23T22:20:00.005+11:00

finally! today the bean actually put her hand to her mouth before she coughed. i noticed this as i was sitting beside her in the car, so i gave her the deserved praise.

before, she would usually cough and then when reminded about the hand gesture she would proceed to make a fake cough (which sounds like a little belch really) before placing her hand over her mouth.

"oh my god"

2008-03-23T22:13:00.003+11:00

i admit, hesitantly, nervously, that the bean may have picked up the phrase, "oh my god" from me some time ago, but she does use it well in context.

e.g. once at the beach, when she got excited about the waves splashing at her she squealed it out a couple of times.

and more recently, she used it to refer to the number of spiders (on spider webs) she can find in the garden or near the house. she isn't afraid of spiders (yet) though and thinks that they are "cute".

her other variations on the theme: "oh me", "oh my", "oh my gosh".

"listen justeeen! animals"

2008-03-23T22:04:00.003+11:00

for the past week or so everytime we got into the car, she follows "seat belt please mummy [or daddy]" with "listen justine! animals!" which in bean-speak means: let's listen to justine singing; the song about animals please.

she knows which one it is too so if we put on a different track, as soon as she hears the intro she goes, "no no not dat one! animals!"

the song she harps about is the gumtree family and it is sung by justine clark, a presenter from abc's playschool on her album i like to sing. we have both the cd album "deedee" as well as the dvd "deedeedee".

the bean's fave song on this album used to be the title track but these days she only cares for the animals being sung about under or on the gumtree. she always tries to sing along, mumbling along to most lines (usually half a second behind) but really belting out the last line of the chorus: "part of the gumtree fameelee!"

our 1st royal easter show as a family

2008-03-23T09:35:00.020+11:00

a few years back dh and i had gone to the sydney easter show and loved it - from the lumberjacks throwing axes at targets to the different homemade produce and crafts on sale. it must be one of the largest, if not the largest, agricultural event in oz open to the public.

so now that we are living here, we had to do the easter show again, especially as the bean can appreciate the farm animals on display. unfortunately, we "chose" the wrong day to go - on good friday itself - and it was overcast and wet. the coldest day in march so far (max. 19 degrees C), bringing with it a real feel of autumn-winter (even dh wore his lightweight fleece jumper and his raincoat).

i don't know whether the easter show has always been this big, but this year it lasts over a week (from march 20 to april 2) and every night there will be fireworks. needless to say we didn't plan to stay till the evening - we don't have such stamina and the bean certainly won't last that long.

anyhow, the first thing we went to see were the cats at the cat pavilion. the breeds that were being judged that day included ragdolls and norwegian forest cats. and there was a ragdoll for people to see and stroke during the purina cat talk. its fur was wonderfully soft and it lay limp in its handler's arms looking faintly sulky and petulant. when the bean entered the cat pavilion, she was "i want that one!" at every single cat. she did get to touch the ragdoll that was being displayed but she could spend an entire day happily playing with a cat if she was allowed.

post-cats, we went to the dog pavilion where dogs were being trotted out and being judged. that wasn't very interesting and we went to watch the woodchopping instead, in the stadium that
has been purpose-built for this 'sport'. we got there in time to see some lumberjacks chop trees. there was a token canuck who was useless really. took him forever to do just one side but he got there in the end and the crowd encouraged him on towards the end (especially this enormous chap sitting in front of us).

the woodchop was dh's favourite event and the only thing he would come to the show for, really. and i have to admit that it was pretty interesting to see these rugged men and women make short work of very chunky slabs. (the commentator seems to think that everything needed explaining to the audience. and at one point, he even told the audience that the hunks of wood being used for most of the competitions are called "slabs", "that's s-l-a-b ladies and gentlemen". i had to roll my eyes there and stifle a giggle.) it is quite an international sport in that we saw reps from kiwistan, usa and canada besides those from the other oz states - queenslanders being fairly well represented after the nsw-ers.

the bean got very restless after about 4-5 of these woodchopping and sawing events. a change of scene was called for, although dh would've gladly stayed for the axe-throwing contest. too bad; maybe next year we'll get a chance to see that.

when we got out of the woodchop stadium, i saw a sign for the r.m.williams's sale so we went to the store, which had a few ersatz stables leading to it with real horses in them. (r.m.williams is a large chain of expensive country-bush gear, selling clothes and gorgeous boots to city-slickers who would never be within 10 yards of a tractor.) the bean was very very taken with the horses, "i want that one!" to all 4 that were there.

after dh had indulged in his retail therapy, we went to another horse 'barn' where a dear little miniature pony was on display. children were allowed to come up to it and pet it. the owner said that it had no function other than as a family pet. it was gorgeous. a lovely black sweetie. the bean got a chance to stand next to it and stroke its mane and head.

we then did the 'heritage walk' and found a pony ride that didn't have a massive queue. the bean was probably one of the youngest and smallest there but she behaved very well on the pony, whose name was snot (yes, really). dh held onto the bean as she and snot were walked around a paddock, and he said that the whole time she kept going, "riding pony! having fun!" so i was well pleased we did this.

after this we went to see the cows, whom the bean insisted were "horses" instead. we had to repeatedly assure her that cows can indeed be this big, especially the holsteins. as the cow barns were really aromatic and i was feeling faint from not eating a proper lunch (and the miserable weather didn't help with my mood either really), we speeded through those and decided that the farmyard nursery would not be for us. i just had visions of the bean contracting mad cow disease or hand-foot-mouth from too close bovine and poultry encounters. i know it's irrational but...

we then went to see what the kids world pavilion was about but it just had stalls selling very gaudy, plasticky toys and tat for kids. big yuck! however, it was useful as a temporary retreat from the rain that was beginning to sleet down.

we missed the morning abc kids show as we were watching the lumberjacks - i was hoping the bean could see the bananas in pyjamas in real life - but with the rain in the afternoon, i doubted that there would be a repeat performance, so we did a brief visit of the world bazaar (tat for adults) before finally entering the woollies food pavilion (my objective).

in the food pavilion, also sheltering from the rain were the rest of the easter show crowds. we managed to get some free wheaties samples from the uncle tobys (or was it the kelloggs?) stall and huddled at a costi seafood oyster bar table, where dh and i took turns to look for food: he for more free wheaties and me for sushi (which i paid for).

i think some folks could have free meals at the pavilion just by going round the stalls and getting enough free samples: e.g. we managed to get some biscuits and cheese dip and chocolate macaroons.

after meandering around the woollies pavilion and then through the arts and crafts section, we headed out to see if it was worth it to visit the showbags pavilion, as i was in two minds about getting the thomas the tank engine showbags. they seem quite interesting, with a wheely bag, beach ball, etc etc advertised inside, but i have been disappointed with the quality of showbag contents before and wasn't willing to part good money for tat.

then as we turned i saw the longest queue i had ever seen (even longer than those of the customs queues in the airport) - people were queueing just to get into the showbag pavilion - i didn't want to know what the queues at the showbag counters would be like. so i had to not look back and repeat to myself, "je ne regrette rien."

that was the finale for me - we walked back to the car park and sang to the bean to make sure she kept awake. she was a little trooper the whole day. apart from some minor truculence earlier on when she insisted on meandering off on her own, she had been quite accommodating.

dh remarked that the easter show seemed bigger this time, or maybe it was just that we had the bean with us and negotiating our way around is a little bit slower.

p/s. i felt strangely flat walking back to the car park from the show, but what cheered me up was this very unexpected "have a happy easter!" from a man on duty who was monitoring the buses ferrying people to and from the show. the kindness of strangers sometimes...

rude boy

2008-03-16T19:59:00.004+11:00

took the bean to a 'country' festival this morning, which is really just a 'bush' band on stage performing songs about sheep shearing and a couple of fenced pens with goats/chooks/ducks/sheep/rabbits. there were free 'train' and pony rides but the queues were so long it was not worth waiting: imagine just me (dh couldn't be with us) standing in line for over an hour with a toddler when it is near lunchtime and there are kids eating ice creams nearby...nah-uh.

anyhow, despite the heat and the crowds (it was a spectacle of prams/strollers too and it made for quite interesting traffic congestion around the kindy farm exhibits) i had to honour my promise to show the bean "farm animals". i think she was more fascinated by the rabbits - there were a few largish ones twitching their noses about - as she was able to pet one very docile floppy-eared critter at the zoo 2 weeks ago. so i had to find a space for the bean to see the animals and especially the rabbits up close.

after waiting patiently for other children to have their fill and get out the way, she finally had a chance to stroke or at least get closer to a rabbit. but after a short while, a boy (considerably older - maybe around 6?) who had been hogging the rabbit space started to shove the bean out the way. so i went up to them and told the bean loudly, "this boy is very rude for shoving you." and then extricated her from the scene. because by then the rabbit was trying to escape from the boy's clutches too and i was thirsty and needed a break.

the organisers had promised dorothy the dinosaur and wags the dog (they are part of the pantheon of characters from the wiggles' tv show) but it was approaching high noon and there was no sign of them. so i got the bean a lemonade and we went home. me having decided that i didn't want to wait another 20 minutes in the heat for a character in a saggy suit with an irritating high pitched giggle (i.e. dorothy).

i am not sure what the objective of this post is. maybe just to observe that the bean still isn't quite able to stand up for herself. for ince, she didn't/wouldn't muscle her way to the fence of the animal pen the way the other kids did and didn't really fight back when another toddler muscled in, pushing her out of the way.

when dh was told about the "rude boy"'s behaviour, he advised that next time, the bean should say, "stop! don't push me." to whoever tries it.

everybody poos

2008-03-14T14:07:00.004+11:00

"everybody poos" is the title of a book by a japanese author. it's a nice one to teach the bean that all animals and people poo, and that people poo in special places.

a couple of weeks ago she took this lesson really to heart and would inform anyone who would listen that "everybody wees" as well as "everybody poos".

this morning, when i strapped her into the car seat, i told her not to wee there (she was only wearing a swim nappy - offers no protection to my car at all), and she gave me a 'of course i know that' look and said immediately, "wee wee in potty!" - i was both relieved and proud.

and more, sort of, on this subject...

when her nai nai and ye ye were still visiting us (they've sadly returned to the uk), the bean would go to their room in the mornings and greet them.

one particular morning, her ye ye had got of the shower and was alone in the bedroom when he heard a little voice pipe up, "ye ye got bottom!"

he turned around to see the bean beaming at him, to which he could only reply, "yes, everybody has a bottom."

years of therapy to come?

2008-03-09T17:33:00.006+11:00

one day, some weeks and weeks ago, after the bean's 'uncle whim' had buckled her into the car seat he took the liberty - unwisely it turns out - to bite a bit of the pink jelly snake she had in her hand. however, he did this without asking her first, and because he did it so quickly/abruptly, i guess the bean was taken aback. in fact, her look of petrified horror was a classic - the rest of us in the car, her nai nai, ye ye and i, were worried that she would burst into tears. in fact, i think she was pretty close to it.

anyway, since this incident, whenever a pink jelly snake is offered to the bean, she would say, without fail, "uncle whim. bit head off hnake." it's a matter of fact statement, rather like reciting a mantra.

sometimes, she would preface this statement by saying, "naughty boy". prompting us to ask, "who's naughty?" and to which she would then trot out the homily, "uncle whim. (pause) bit head off hnake."

"whaadat?"

2008-03-09T16:41:00.009+11:00

the bean's definitely speaking better and using more and more words and sentences so that we can have a nice long conversation with her sometimes. however, her enunciation is still far from perfect.

e.g. she can't pronounce the "s" sound if the "s" is paired with a consonant. to wit: "hark" (shark), "hip" (ship), "hnake" (snake), "himming" (swimming), etc.

the odd thing is she can say "lots" properly, i.e. if a word ends with the "s" sound: "else", "house"...and usually if the "s" is paired with a vowel: "sea", "sand"...etc.

the other one she can't get right is the phrase "what is that?" or "what's that?", which from her cherubic lips becomes "wha dat?" - she sounds like she is about to go into a rap song or something everytime she says it. and she uses this phrase A LOT. she will point to a picture or object and ask "what dat?", sometimes not even waiting for an answer, and most times, knowing the answer herself. usually, i will try to turn the tables and ask her, "what do YOU think it is?"

"Cheeeers!"

2008-03-09T09:50:00.004+11:00

cheeeers
not sure if the bean is picking up alcoholic behaviour from her ye ye and nai nai but she does tend to want to raise her glass at nearly every meal. she would raise her glass of oj/apple juice/honey water/choc milk (you delete) to her ye ye and/or nai nai and it doesn't matter if the other person only has a cup of tea. it's still, "cheeeers, nai nai!" and one *must* clink cups/glasses to complete the ritual.

count to the beat
the other evening the bean took out her xylophone and banged away on it. then she started counting aloud, "one! two!..." etc till she got to ten. she couldn't say eleven properly except with prompting then she continued counting. when she got to fifteen though, there was a very slight pause before she said triumphantly, "nineteen!" and then stopped.
unfortunately, she couldn't quite synchronise the xylophone banging to the counts.

bubbles bubbles everywhere

2008-02-26T17:15:00.004+11:00

last saturday the bean was given a bottle of bubbles with a wand in her music class (which she then didn't want to let go off the entire day) and it's been another fixation ever since.

if it wasn't "daddy blow bubbles" it would be "mummy" or "nai nai" but usually it's "ye ye blow bubbles". and when the bubbles are blown, she instantaneously turns into psycho baby, shaking her hands, dancing on tip toe, stamping on bubbles that have landed on the floor or waving at them, all the while squeaking staccato phrases: "ooh ooh ooh!" "bubbles!" "oh oh oh!" "bubbles! every-where! every-where!"

at one point, her ye ye heard her actually cry out, "too much bubbles!" as if the excitement was overwhelming.

let's hear it again...and again...and again...

2008-02-26T08:21:00.004+11:00

it's interesting how the bean can get fixated on a particular nursery rhyme or song and would be able to endure multiple repeats of said song/rhyme almost ad infinitum.

nai nai and ye ye bought her a cd of nursery songs sung by a playschool host and it's since been the most requested (in fact, the only requested) cd in her collection. everyday it's been "dee-dee!" (i.e. "cd") and "george sing please!"; then it seems she'd pick a song from it to repeat.

so today the tune of the day was "the sailor went to sea to see what he could see see see..." i decided to put it on repeat mode so that i needn't keep going back to the stereo when it ended.

two days ago though, her song of the day was a nonsense one about 3 elephants having fun up on a spider's web.

oompah oompah!

2008-02-19T23:34:00.006+11:00

the bean has been learning a few new songs* from her ye ye and nai nai. one of the early ones that she used to like she has now decided she doesn't. that was "we're riding along on the crest of the wave/ and the sun is in the sky/ 2-3-4/ keeping our eyes on the distant horizon/ look out for passersby..." and she used to like doing the actions to the words, albeit a half second later. then recently everytime we tried to sing it in the car she would stick her fingers in her ears and say, "no no no. not that one."

her latest favourite is "gingangoolygoolygooly whatcha gingangoo gingangoo". on our recent hunter valley holiday, to please her, we had to sing it several times in a row as we headed back to the cottage from a day's wine-tasting. she particularly liked the "oompah!" with raised fist that her ye ye does to punctuate the end of the song.

although we're back home now, tonight, during bathtime, knowing how much the bean likes the song her nai nai decided to sing it to her. and when she got to the end, before any prompting, the bean raised her left fist and shouted "oompah!", giggling hysterically after she did it.

later on, her nai nai told me that we'd need to watch it as we wouldn't be able to put anything past the bean.

*these are very very old cub scouts' songs.

a bossy ("bosshee") bean?

2008-02-11T10:44:00.000+11:00

talk about backseat driving...

our little miss manners here not only says "bless you" to a person when he/she sneezes, but she also likes to remind folks to "seat belt buckle" (i.e. to buckle one's seat belt) when she's in the car.

when she thinks daddy is driving too fast (e.g. when going downhill) she'd call out, "be careful daddy!"

with prompting the bean will also help us to signal left or right when turning the car - by raising whichever arm is relevant.

and when we arrive at our destination, no matter where it is, she would announce, "home!"

manners maketh the bean

2008-02-02T10:26:00.000+11:00

the past couple of weeks has been very exciting for the bean...and dh and i too.

we had dh's youngest brother and his girlfriend over from the uk to stay with us. our party was later enlarged by the addition of dh's parents so the bean could get reaquainted with her ye ye and nai nai. the last time she saw all of them was a year ago when she turned 1, but because of skype sessions and phone calls, she was quite familiar with ye ye and nai nai's faces and voices, so it didn't take her long to bond with them. however, it was quite different with her uncle william as she had only seen his photos and had hardly spoken to him. i don't think she can remember anything of him and was rather scared/shy for the first 2 days. she didn't have a problem becoming friendly with his girlfriend though. it's interesting that she is more at ease with women in general. i guess it's social conditioning - she spends all her time with me and when we go to our playgroups and classes it's usually the mummies or female carers with other children.

anyhow, with all the adult attention the bean has begun picking up more and more new words and is stringing together more sentences, as well as using phrases in the right context.

some new vocabulary:
- superdooper ("hooper dooper")
- fantastic ("fan tash teek")
- holiday

we've been trying to inculcate some good manners in her as well: to thank someone when he/she does something for her, to use "please" for requests etc. and it appears that this is paying off...not all the time, but it's becoming obvious that she is not an impolite child.
e.g. last evening, without being prompted, she said "thank you nai nai" (pronounced "sang kew nai nai") after her granny read her some stories.

bean's favourite books - as of 2 ys old

2008-01-20T00:56:00.000+11:00

sheepishly, i have to admit that my biggest extravagance is books for the bean. she has a lot of books, some presents from friends and relatives, but the bulk from mommy (not even daddy).

while there is a big shelf of books the bean does tend to make beelines for a select few, although some days she can go through nearly every single book on a shelf.

here are her current favourites:
- the p.b. bear series (written by lee davis and now out of print)
- dr. seuss's abc
- dr. seuss's 10 apples up on top
- eric carle's the very hungry caterpillar
- the spot series
- ginger (by charlotte voake)

hot on the heels of the above:
- karen katz's lift-the-flap books
- dear zoo
- where the wild things are
- the snail and the whale
- we're going on a bear hunt
- bouncing ben and other rhymes
- mog the forgetful cat
...most lift-the-flap and pop-up types are pretty irresistible to the bean.

turning 2 yrs old

2008-01-20T00:25:00.000+11:00

we had a very small celebration for the bean's 2nd birthday. no big party, just a cupcake with 2 candles and the opening of her presents, which wasn't a big pile by most middle-class kids' standards. we just commemorated it by filming the event on a proper videocam.

from her daddy she received mainly clothes: a uv rash vest, a short-sleeved uv suit from ripcurl, cotton pjs (jonasjodie), a dress from chateau de sable (the bean gave an excited cry when she opened it up and took out the dress), and 2 long-sleeved tees with a pair of pj bottoms (from a new malaysian brand). the only non-clothing pressie was a very soft sheep toy from kiwistan that he bought whilst on a business trip.

from me: 2 new wooden puzzles (slightly more advanced than the ones she'd had) and 2 books.

but her favourite present has to be the dog soft toy (from friends of dh's family). it has a collar and a short leash, a simple detail that makes a world of difference between any run of the mill soft toy and one that can "come alive". the bean was immediately smitten with it and took it for a walk around the living room as well as tried to sit on it. (she does have a weird tendency to want to sit on her toys, as if they could be mounts like her rocking horse.)

i think at this age she would be impressed with most anything she receives - every present merited a "wow" or an "ooh". the major part of the fun is actually tearing off the wrapping paper. we had to keep asking her to come back to look at the present after she'd torn up the packaging; to the bean, the paper tearing part was probably the objective and she would get up and start wandering off once that's done.

she does seem to understand that birthdays are pretty significant events, unique from a routine day anyways. when she received a new birthday card the next day (i didn't tell her it was a birthday card, i just told her that it was for her and that she could open it) and saw the birthday cake with its candles on the cover, she immediately sang the happy birthday song. she couldn't read what the card said of course but she made a show of looking at the text inside as if she could. very funny.

flying with a toddler

2008-01-12T00:03:00.000+11:00

i would like to imagine that i could provide some expert advice about how to have a successful (i.e. relatively tantrum-free) flight with a toddler. but the truth of the matter is that the only way to really ensure an easier time of it is to fork out the cash (or air miles) and wrangle seats in business class.

our flights to and from singapore were hell and heaven, respectively. we were in cattle class from sydney sitting in the middle row bassinet seats, sharing the row with a couple from spain (or germany or south america, i couldn't quite make out) who were politely tolerant, but only just. i was trying to get us the bassinet seats on the sides (i.e. window seats) but they had been booked up already. (why is it that we can NEVER get our favourite seats even when we log onto the internet seat booking service at the very minute it is open?)

the bean was fidgety and antsy every half hour, except when she was asleep*. thankfully she snoozed twice. she even screamed several times and frequently pleaded with her daddy or me to bring her "out! out! out!"

and when she wasn't being a fidget-ma-gidget she would be staring at the chap seated next to me, pointing at his reading materials, at him, at his shoes, and even trying to touch him. it was inevitable that he was prodded a little at times because we didn't have much elbow room...even in the wider seats of the a380 plane!

during one particularly irksome episode, she slid down my lap onto the floor and i let her sit there for a bit as she was temporarily distracted by shoes and books and toys. anyhow, suffice to say that my cheeks were inflamed at each of the bean's outbursts.

so i was not looking forward to the return trip, which i would be doing alone with the bean. (dh had to fly back earlier for work.) what compounded matters were that it wouldn't be a direct flight - we had to transit in kl - and that the flights were at night. hmmm...no rest for me! (i never sleep well on planes anyway.)

luckily dh managed to get us onto day flights, and used his points to try to get us upgraded. the upgrade came through the day before we flew and i was literally hooting for joy, dancing a jig, when i received the call with the good news.

it was a pain lugging the bean through 2 airports (changi and klia), in a borrowed cotton ringsling which is not good for long periods with a heavy toddler**, but it was so amazing to be able to relax in an airline lounge and enjoy a semi-civilised breakfast. the mas lounge (in klia) scores points over sia for its kids play area. that kept the bean pretty happy for half an hour.

then when we finally got on the final leg of the journey home, i found that the crucial differences between business and cattle class are service and space. because there were fewer passengers to look after, the stewardess in the business class cabin could keep coming over to make sure that the bean and i were well catered for. i had ordered a child meal beforehand, having learnt my lesson from our flight from sydney***, and besides the meal itself (mostly sugary confections - a lot of empty calories, and there wasn't a single french fry i requested in sight), the bean was given a hershey bar and a small tub of apple jelly. she was also provided with her own set of headphones (which weren't used).

instead, i amused her on the flight with a new storybook (a previous day's purchase i had to make knowing that she, i.e. we needed new entertainment), which we read twice, and with some new toys. (mas gave her a funny-looking police car soft toy that vibrated when you pull on the attached string.) we also sang songs - action songs were big hits. e.g. one potato; dingle-dangle scarecrow; incey wincey; hickory dickory; row row row your boat...

we were placed in the centre row bassinet seats in business, but because there was only one other passenger at the other end of the row, i cheerfully used the middle seat for our barang barang. when the bean finally fell asleep in my seat, i just happily transferred myself to the middle seat and got comfy with vanity fair magazine. ahhh...a sleeping child and a trashy mag - luxury.

i said it before and i will say it again: business class - the only way to survive the toddler years.

* the first time, she fell asleep whilst bfg in a toilet cubicle. i had to pop her off and carefully cradle her back to the seat, making sure that her head or feet didn't hit anyone along the way. i had a mental picture of the bean's feet hitting the heads of seated passengers like they were xylophone keys.

** i really regretted forgetting to pack one of the becos or a meitai. a 2-shoulder carry was what i desperately needed. and i was only too happy and relieved to offload the bean to her daddy when he came to pick us up at the airport.

*** we suffered on the sq flight partly because the bean didn't have a proper meal of her own. sia didn't even give us a baby meal!

everybody "pai hsi"

2008-01-11T23:50:00.000+11:00

as mentioned in the previous post, the bean has acquired some (really, just a few) teochew slang. one such is the phrase "pai hsi" which means "very bad". she likes to accompany it with an apt finger waggle towards the person she says it. all picked up from her po po naturally.

but it is highly likely that the bean doesn't understand what "pai hsi" means. (by the way, she says "pai hee".) during a short quiz by her daddy, when he asked if so-and-so is "pai hsi", she said, "pai hee" to every name he brought up.

her daddy was quite amused by this and has marvelled at how much her speech has improved during this week away.

***************

not sure if i have documented this, but it seems that the bean has her own special noun for cats - "minh" - the name of a neighbour's cat, whom she saw one day a couple of months ago.

for ince, she has 2 schleich cat figurines, both of which she calls "minh" (in a dreamy sort of way). btw, she also likes to cuddle them, uttering, "aw, cute" at the same time.

Oi!

2008-01-09T01:57:00.000+11:00

took the bean up to singers on a week-long trip to see her po po and gong gong and instead of picking up some useful mandarin words or phrases, she's ended up with teochew colloquialisms!

to be precise, when she calls out to her po po, she expects her grandma to say, "oi!" instead of "yes!"; in turn, she will reply with an "oi!" if one of her grandparents calls out her name.

she's also, sometimes, taken to putting 'suffixes' at the end of noun or verb words. e.g. "put-na", "there-na", "on-na", "phone-na", which is a very teochew way of speaking.

...unfortunately, she hasn't really learnt any proper teochew words.

this & that

2008-01-02T23:09:00.000+11:00

a newish development is the bean becoming more precise in communicating what she wants/needs - particularly in the "wants" department.

an example today, when the bean woke from her midday snoozette.
bean: "book" pointing to a stack.
me: "ok, here it is."
bean: "no. that one" pointing again.
me: "alright, here you go."
bean: "no no no. that one" and jabs a fat finger in the same direction yet again.

it's now "that one" and a couple of times of "this one".

fireworks!

2008-01-02T14:44:00.000+11:00

the bean had an uncharacteristically late night on new year's eve. she had a shower with me and then her dinner, but after that daddy took her out on a walk - or rather he walked and she sat on her trike.

but instead of heading home and thence to a bath/bed, i came to join them and we went to a lookout point that had a view of the harbour bridge and sydney cbd. there were already many families there - some sitting on camping chairs with their coolers, videocams on tripods, all ready for the action. we arrived at 8.30pm and had another half hour to while away before the fireworks.

it is wonderfully thoughtful of the aussies to organise 2 fireworks displays: one at 9pm for "families" and the other for the big midnight do.

it was difficult keeping the bean from becoming too antsy. had to sing, distract ("oh let's look for a cat", "can you see the stars?", "ooh, that was a bat" etc etc) and pass her back and forth between daddy and mommy. when the fireworks FINALLY started it was none too soon for me as the bean had begun pleading "mirk mirk peeese" and plucking at my collar, just milliseconds away from an all-out paddy for bed and milk.

she was duly diverted by the fireworks - the different sparkling, trailing, noisy, booming colours, like shimmering stars. there were also patterned ones like outlines of cubes and heart shapes. they were entertaining and there was much oohing and ahhing from the crowd around us.

well, all too soon the show ended. as we walked home in the deep twilight, the bean chatted to her daddy about it. she concluded by saying, "thang you farh-wer" (thank you, fireworks).

back at home, as soon as her head touched the bed she was asleep. the sleep of the innocent.

footnote: her first word(s) when she woke up in the new year was "farh-wer!", followed by "dair-ee, ma-ee, you, farh-wer!"

her longest sentence to date

2007-12-26T17:16:00.000+11:00

dh decided to get the bean out of my hair and let me have some rest today as i had a frightful night, with the bean crawling over to me for "me meo" (that's "milk milk" to the uninitiated) seemingly every hour or else asking "hand hand" (i.e. to hold her hand) the whole night.

however, his invitations to "go out with daddy" was just met with "no no mai" as she knew i wasn't coming along. finally, the bean made her point by saying, "ma mee, dair ee, you, out, now, peeeese".
(read: mummy, daddy, me, go out now please)

after much cajoling and bribery though, she set off with dh in the end.

* * *

footnote to the above
the bean gave a new interpretation to the phrase "asleep at the wheel" when daddy and bub were returning from their outing - she fell asleep on her trike!

dh rang me when they were at the top of the drive to the house, and i walked out to see her head resting on the handlebars with arms hanging over it and feet hardly touching the pedals as dh trundled her along. dh said that she didn't even stir when they went over humps.

probably remembering the countlessly retold story of how dh as a little laddie liked to crawl into the basket under his younger sibling's pram to sleep, dh admitted that the bean is definitely her daddy's daughter.

milk now please

2007-12-24T19:43:00.000+11:00

the bean reserves the use of the P word for really urgent matters: bf-ing! that's when she doesn't need to be prompted.

this morning she sidled up to me and said in an almost coquettish manner, "ma mak now peeese?"

her father was rather amused/impressed with her deployment of 'please' to achieve her aims.

if i follow through on child-led weaning, i really wonder when the bean would give up bf. when she is about to bf she sometimes says, "yum yum!"

peek-a-boo / dress with poo

2007-12-21T19:08:00.000+11:00

some interesting achievements:

1) peek ah boo
this morning, whilst her daddy was at his ablutions, the bean decided to play a trick on him. first, she went up to say 'hi', then after a moment, she loudly called out, "bye!" before walking out the bathroom. almost immediately though she was back to say, "peek ah boo!"
dh thought it hilarious and he was, i suspect, rather proud of her.

2) dress in poo
since today was the hottest it's been for the past 1.5 weeks, i deliberately left the bean nappy-less for most of the day and placed her 2 potties (yes, there are 2) in plain view of her play area.

the whole morning she avoided the potties quite steadily until the moment i was engaged somewhere else. when i came back to the living area i was surprised (albeit delighted too) to find her sitting on her potty. unfortunately, her nice jersey dress was tucked under her!

i went over to pull out the back hem of the dress and as i did so, what i feared might happen did occur: out plopped a nugget onto the carpet. sigh.

i didn't lose my cool over this as the bean did what she was supposed to do afterall, i.e. to poo in her potty, and she filled it admirably. so it's mummy's lesson: i have to put her in t-shirts instead of dresses.

p/s. i can't remember when it started but the bean is now calling me "ma ee" instead of "ba", the latter having been her name for me for the longest time - probably since she started making specific sounds to mean things actually.

gender-bending already?

2007-12-20T21:56:00.000+11:00

at bathtime this evening i was bantering with the bean when she came up with something truly unexpected.

it started out simple enough...
me: "are you a little girl?"
bean: "nooo" (she said, not really looking at me as she was playing in the bath)
me: "are you a baby?"
bean: "nooo"
me: "are you an aeroplane?" (she was playing with a toy plane then)
bean: "nooo"
me: "are you a bird?"
bean: "nooo"
me: "are you a butterfly?"
bean: "nooo"
me: "what are you then?"
bean: (turning to me) "boy!" and she beamed brightly.

hmmm, should i worry?
maybe it explains why she is so hooked on breastfeeding... n-aaahhhhh

awww...cute! cont'd

2007-12-20T16:33:00.000+11:00

this morning, bean said, "aw, cute!" to a spider! ok, so it was a cutely drawn little spider in a children's book, but still...?!

awwww...cute!

2007-12-19T22:19:00.001+11:00

the bean hadn't seen her daddy for a couple of days as he was away on business, so when he rang this afternoon i called her over to speak to her father.

"dair Ee", she cried out as she took the receiver, beaming with joy. she answered a few questions from her daddy (whether she'd been a good girl for her mommy etc) to which she emphatically replied, "yessh" to all. i think he could've asked her if she'd been to the moon and she'd still have said "yessh".

then dh said, "i love you." so i asked her to say the same thing back. "i uh you" she said, which was immediately followed by her uttering, "aw, cute!" and trying to hug the phone.

she has been using this phrase ("aw, cute!") for a bit recently for anything worth cuddling and even some that aren't: pictures of bunny rabbits, teddy bears, dogs, cats, even butterflies, besides the 'real' teddy bears or other soft toys at home.

when she was being affectionate to me one time, she gave me a tight squeezy hug and said, "aw, cute!" too.

maybe she picked this up from when i read to her. if we see a picture of cute animals that would be what i tended to say...and perhaps i say it to her too. as in, "aw, sweetie, you're so cute!" before giving her a cuddle.

toddlerific idiosyncracies

2007-12-16T23:25:00.000+11:00

just a short list of some of the bean's toddlerrific idiosyncracies:

a) the toothbrush tussle - when the bean insists on clamping down on the toothbrush so that you can’t brush her teeth properly, or she might simply keep turning her head away each time a toothbrush is brought to her so that you get to shove the toothbrush into the air with each manoeuvre! i’ve ended up doing the carrot-stick approach (“you get milk later” or “mummy will get VERY angry” when the former fails).

b) potty pugnacity - these days if she gets too caught up with playing or the (i admit this guiltily) telly, then she would rather go in her nappy instead of telling me about it so I can whip out the potty.

c) the potty-mouth echo - there were a few times when dh and i were not as careful with our speech as we should have been and the bean repeated our more colourful language with extreme accuracy. admittedly, this is quite an achievement since she doesn’t usually enunciate well. e.g. “heemah hee” (can you guess she means ‘christmas tree’?), “dairh-ee” (daddy), “fwy” (butterfly) et al.

d) birthday suit preference - lately she has decided that she would rather not get dressed when i take her out of her nightwear. so i have the joy of running after this naked child who takes delight in calling out “nayk” “nayk” (naked, naked) then pointing to her chest to proclaim, “neep” (nipple)!

e) mad dancing - the bean's combines a bit of that 60’s dance move The Monkey (arms go up and down) with spinning around till she stumbles dizzily. she likes to groove in this manner first thing in the morning, once she’s out of the bedroom, and it doesn’t matter if it’s to bach or barney, mozart or mickey mouse, it’s still the same dance.

our rare slinging moments

2007-12-12T15:19:00.000+11:00

it's been a long time since i put the bean in a sling. i believe our previous experience was at the zoo nearly 2.5 months ago, when she refused to go into her stroller OR walk on her own. and that was with a beco.

but yesterday i had an opportunity to sling her again when we had cleaners come into the house. the bean is almost petrified of the korean couple - especially the man - and wanted to be held for at least the first 15 mins. they were here. so i popped her up into our trusty storch onto my back and she was quite happy, especially when i passed her knick knacks to play with back there. in fact she deposited a laundry ball down the back of my shirt.

coming out of her shell

2007-12-12T13:05:00.000+11:00

after two terms and lots of dodging behind my legs, the bean is finally able to shake the directress's hand at our montessori playgroup...on the last day of term, of the year, no less.

the directress commented on how chatty the bean's become. and today, the bean was in top form.

she wouldn't shake the directress's hand at the start of our session but she looked at the other children, point to one and say the kid's name.

she really does like to point and say, or comment: "hair clip", "coin box", "put back chair", "mommy"...

btw, she now says "yessh" more than "yup", but it comes with a lisp, which i think is endearing.

during the singalong session, the bean took centrestage for a short while and stood up next to or in front of the directress to do all the actions to the songs. but not before she tried to pre-empt the directress by posing in 'rocketship' mode. the directress had to tell her, "no, not time to do 'rocketship' yet." ('rocketship' is the second last song we do, right before the 'goodbye' song.)

during the colour song, the bean took it upon herself to call out the colour we should sing for another child who was too shy to pick a colour. then when it came to her turn, after the directress asked what colour we should sing for her, the bean loudly proclaimed, "blooo!" and tweaked at her blouse.

at the end of the session the bean said goodbye to a few of the children. i believe she is the ONLY child to do so, as sadly, no one reciprocated. the directress mollified her by saying, "i don't think they heard you."

but i think her sociability today at our montessori playgroup is kind of unique. it takes her a long time to get comfortable in any new environment to be able to be so expressive.

so i wonder how the holiday break would influence her behaviour: would she become all shy and self-conscious again after 2 months away from the montessori environment? would she remember the directress and the other children?

we shall see.

naughty ant/ reach/ run/ tiptoe/ big hugs

2007-12-07T23:37:00.000+11:00

just to continue from yesterday's post about the bean's ant bite...

this morning she wandered into the bathroom where dh was in the midst of his morning ablutions. there she pointed to the bathtub, repeating the words, "nauh anh".

dh was a bit nonplussed at first but then he understood. the bean was saying "naughty ant", showing him where the ant bite had taken place.

it is remarkable how, in the last 10 days or so, the bean has started stringing together rudimentary sentences.

anyhoo, today she began this fixation on "reee", where she would almost get up on tiptoe and raise her arms high. i later figured out she meant "reach". i don't know where she got this action from - the wiggles? little einsteins maybe? i think there is one segment on little einsteins when the kids exhort the audience to "raise your arms" (before yelling blast off) and perhaps that's where the bean has copied this from.

also today, she nearly tried tiptoeing. first time really that i had seen this. or at least it's the first time she deliberately brought it to my attention, by treading more carefully across the floor and saying, "teeh toe".

'tiptoe' came after she did a series of runs (called "wuns" - she does speak like a chinese who can't roll 'r's ) - she likes to back up some distance then 'run' (more like speed walk) into my outstretched arms. occasionally, she would modify the runs by spreading her arms wide, fall into my arms, and exclaim, "beee hug!" (i.e. big hug.)