Estella: Waking up meimei this morning

If I have a choice, I would always like Estella to wake up earlier in the morning so that she can be ready first, i.e, wake up, get changed into school uniform, wash up and finish her breakfast.

This morning, the ideal happened...

After Estella finished her breakfast, she asked if she could go wake meimei up. 'Sure, of course!' was my reply, and I carried on with the dishwashing in the kitchen.

Just curious how Estella is going to do that, I put aside everything and trailed her to the room. Eliana was already awake by then. So I asked Estella how she woke meimei up.

Her answer:

Estella: Oh, I said to meimei... 'Good morning meimei, it's time to wake up...'

Meanwhile, she showed me how she bent over very closely to the sleepy meimei as she said that in a gentle, coaxing manner.

I thought to myself - how sweet is that!

Eliana is completely opposite if she were the one waking up Estella.

Will save the details for another blog.

Estella: Did she really say this??!!!??

After she was done with poopoo this morning, Estella commented, 'Mama, look! My poopoo looks like a 撇...'

Ok, in case you forget, this is a 撇 (pie3)- 丿

Alright, this really made me 啼笑皆非... don't know to laugh or cry!

My positive thinking tells me, not bad, her Chinese is improving!

A Date with Estella

Instead of heading to school as usual, Estella and I went on a date yesterday. After checking Meimei into school, we proceeded to Estella's old school for her to meet up with her old friends and teachers. This was something we had wanted to do for a while ever since Estella was transferred out of this ccc 4 months back. Though it was just a 30-minute catchup/play with her friends, it put a closure to her sudden withdrawal from the previous childcare centre. She was so happy to be able to play with her best friend YX. On the car ride there, she was calling from her memory things she used to do with her best friend. I think the value of friendship should start young, and I didn't want her memory of YX start fading from here. The only question that was hard for her to answer was when her other friend P commented 'Why did you change school? We like you to be here.' My heart felt a tug when I overheard that...

Anyway, the 2nd stop was the library. It was a wonderful time exploring the children section and she simply loved the books! When I asked her if she wanted to read ALL the books in the library, she excitedly exclaimed 'YES!!' When we finally got home with the 6 books that took us a while to choose, she happily laid them out on the dining table, wanting to show her Daddy when he returned. That night, she happily sat on my lap and read her favourite title (Corduroy's Sleepover) twice. Library is such a fun place to visit! Yes, that's should be a regular schedule from now onwards.

Next, she joined me to meet up with 2 dear friends for lunch. Guess what she ate with us? Coriander Cafe Curry Fish Head! She actually tried and finish the portion I gave to her. My little brave girl! :)

I am looking forward to more 1:1 dates with my girls. Hmm... where can I bring Eliana to? Any suggestion?

Recent Fun Outings!

Eliana: Starting to talk

It was raining yesterday morning and there were occasional rumbles of thunder. Awakened by the rumbles, Eliana sat up on her bed, and said, 'thunder, I scared...'

One of Eliana's fav activity is to empty her school bag, either right before we leave for school (when everything is nicely packed), or after school when we rightfully need to unpack. She likes to unzip the front pocket to check out her mosquito repellent. 'Help me... open... please [occasionally]'

Being the earlier one to wake up one morning, Eliana pounded on Estella and shouted, 'JIE JIE! WAKE UP! Nah... uniform...'

She is also capable of telling us, 'Meimei cough (and show us her cough), medicine... red...'

Yes, we told her before the red medicine is for cough, brown for running nose, etc...

Whenever she cannot find her daddy, she will break out in this song 'Oh where, oh where did daddy go... oh where, oh where can he bbeeeee!!!'

Her recent phone conversations. 'Harlow, Daddy, Byeeeee!' or 'Harlow, Zengqi, Byeee!!!' or 'Harlow, Jie Jie, Byee!!!'

Yes, very standard lines. It's a conversation. There is a greeting, identification of the person she wants to speak to, and an ending note.

Leaving Grandma's house, Eliana said, 'I want to hug Popo...', and insisted we open the metal gate again so she can hug popo before heading into the lift.

Many more interesting excerpts. I am trying to remember and blog them along the way... :)

Perfect 7!

Just a couple of weeks back, we celebrated our 7th wedding anniversary. It was a time to pause and count our blessings, and give thanks...

Estella: New Passport

With Estella's development from a baby to a girly look, it's time for a new passport!

Today, I pulled Estella out from school right after her nap to rush down to ICA for our e-appointment! It was a nice chatty ride with her (despite the rain) since she got the much-coveted, privileged front passenger seat (in her car seat of course), her tabao-ed Yakult and pancakes from school, and a mini pack of Hello Panda all to herself.

As we were driving out of the carpark. I thought of using this chance to teach her personal responsibility in taking good care of her new passport. She had been holding it so proudly the moment we got into the car. So... here's our little conversation:

Mama: Estella, it's important to take good care of your passport. If you drop it, we'll need to call the police...

Estella: [Probably shocked by the mention of 'police', the passport actually slipped from her hands and fell on the floor, in the car of course] Oh... Mama...

Mama: [Focusing on traffic, trying to join up to main road]

Estella: [Long pause]

Just as I was wondering why she had the long pause, I noticed she was looking a little troubled. I saw the passport 'dropped'. Instead of picking it up straightaway, she was looking at me.

Estella: Mama, we don't need to call the police, right??

Then it all clicked! She thought we had to call the police because she dropped the passport!

Ok, we have to use another word to complete the whole lesson now.

Instead of 'drop', 'missing', 'stolen', 'cannot be found' are better choice of words in this instance.

Eliana: Counting 1 to 10!

At 20 month plus, Eliana is capable of counting 1 to 10. This is a new since for a long while, she has only been mouthing '3, 4... 3, 4... 3, 4....'

She also has many strings of new phrases, like 1) object identification, 2) colour identification, and 3) ownership identification, 4) instructions to yield to her needs...

Just to elaborate what 3) is.

Eliana will go into 'jiejie's pillow', 'mama's pillow', 'daddy's pillow', 'meimei's pillow'. And she will start all over again using blankets, shirts, pants, towels, shoes, etc...

Yes, very soon, she is going to be talking like one of us! Looking forward to that.

(which also means I have more questions to answer, and lesser 'airtime' myself. Hahahaha!!!!)

Starrie Turned 4! (Oops! ~4 months ago)

'Playback' - starred by Starrie

One late afternoon after school, Starrie just finished Ice Age 3 at home. She happily ran up to me and said she wanted to play 'Mommy/Daddy'. Curious what that was - she explained it was a game to pretend to be Mommy/Daddy. So, she started setting up her workstation which consisted a toy laptop (a wonderful edutainment gift from cousins), 2 story books, and her Hello Kitty mobile phone...

Starrie: (Happily typing on her laptop) 'Hurry up! You are still taking your own sweet time... I am going to be late for work!'

[Now, that really caught my attention... I went on to observe what she would do next...]

Starrie: (Some more typing on the laptop) 'You are talking so loudly. Be quiet! How am I going to do my work like this?

... ... ... ... ... ...

Oh my! It was a moment of awakening for me! This is what Starrie thought work is all about... Although she uttered all these in a fun, playful, innocent way, these are exactly how I've talked to her before! It's an exact playback of how I prodded her to hurry and quieten down in the name of work.

This is really setting me thinking...

6 months of 'drought' - Over, I hope :)

It's been 6 months of complete inaction on this blog. There is just too much going on and it's hard to keep track on everything. ;)

Anyway, I hope to stay on track again - to at least track the major milestones for the girls.

We are the Best of Pals!

Estella & Eliana: Growing faster than mama can blog...

More adventures together

Eliana: 1st Birthday

This is so, so delayed. Here are so snapshots of the event. Eliana is already coming to 14 month when I finally made this post.

Leaps and Bounds! Some recent happenings

Daddy holding the two darling girls for a walk in the park...
Jiejie blowing bubbles for Meimei to pop...
Off for a walk in the park... Cycling and bubble-blowing!
A funny face I've got when I tried to snap her doing this girly act - brushing her hair...
See, Eliana has conquered the playground too...

Eliana is walking! (or sprinting, shall I say...)

Mama's not been able to update the blog in the last few months due to work volume. Eliana has made tremendous progress in terms of her motor development. It's almost like an overnight change that she could walk around the house unassisted. Many times, I also caught how she 'sprinted' across the room to chase Estella or grab a toy.

As for her verbal skills, it also funny how she uttered 'MAMAMAMA' when John stepped into the house; and then 'PAPAPAPA' when I came back 30min later. Not sure if it's the sequence she remembers, as it's always Mama who reached home earlier than Papa.

Hope to update the blog more often from here. She is growing up fast!

Estella: Days of MC

This is how Estella spent some of her time throughout the recent 5-day MC...

Estella: Another Fashion Parade

Check out my new jacket from Ah Yee (again!)

Operation Eviction Success

This is just to put on record that Eliana has been successfully 'evicted' from Daddy/Mommy's room since August 2009. It's so endearing to see the girls having fun, sharing the room.

**Room sweet room**