Spy-O-Scope

We're only at the start of autumn over here so the weather in 'sunny' Queensland is still warm on most days. There have been a few sunny days this week but we've also had thunderstorms in the evenings. Today was one of those sunny days but we chose to get frozen in an ice skating rink instead.

I was alone with the two boys in the rink and was worried that I would have to deal with two whiny brats that wanted to go home because they couldn't get the hang of it. My mother came along as backup in case I had to hand one off to her to sit down.

Aaron did very well and was soon skate/walking along without holding on to the sides. Adrian had a frame that he pushed along and he was doing ok too except that he wanted to sit down and have a snack after every loop around. Eventually, he just sat out and spied on us through his Spy-O-Scope. (I asked if it was a telescope and he said "No, its a Spy-O-Scope").

I had a very enjoyable afternoon with the two of them and hopefully, we'll get to go back again soon.

Balloon Twisting

This Easter long weekend has turned out to be very enjoyable for everybody. We took Aaron and Adrian to to the Festival of Sails on Friday. This was a sort of carnival that coincides with the Brisbane to Gladstone yacht race. There were countless market stalls there and plenty of activities and rides for the children. On top of all that, it was held by the beach!

I thought the beach would have been the winner but surprisingly, it was this balloon twisting station that caught Aaron's attention. This man was incredible. He could make anything that the children asked for - ninja turtles, butterflies, something called 'Yoshi', anything. Best of all, the council must have paid this guy because we didn't need to pay for any of it. 

Aaron asked for a ninja. 

Three year olds are sometimes hard to please. Adrian asked for a knight's sword and the guy must have thought it was too easy so he decided he'd make this huge one. Size isn't everything and Adrian was not impressed with this huge sword. He couldn't wield it and there was no convincing him that it was easier to fight dragons from a distance. In the end, we had to dismantle it (out of sight of the balloon guy) and he waved the hilt around instead. 

 Aaron was more than happy with his ninja and wanted to participate in the 60 minute workshop on how to twist your own balloons.

Look what he made. The other little boy is one of Aaron's classmates. Richard (seen in the red cap above) was on hand to help the kids out but they did a lot of the work themselves. Aaron even made that yellow sword for Adrian - a very suitably sized one!

Dominoes

We have been having some fun with dominoes this weekend. Just between us, I thought that buying 100 dominoes was going to be heaps but it turned out to be a really small pack. I think we'll need 1000 to do anything remotely impressive. When I presented it to Aaron and Adrian, I really played up ONE HUNDRED. Thats a huge number when you're six.

I'll need to get more because I didn't get to build anything.

It Takes A WILD Imagination

Its been a day of ups and downs. I'll write about the 'ups' today because they were hilarious. The 'downs' can wait for another day - or maybe never.

Take a look at this photo and tell me what you think he is dressed up as. Don't think of anything obvious....

You guessed that he was a 'knight' right? Isn't it obvious? The helmet, visor, chain mail gloves and sword!

I was asked to call him Sir Dragon but I told him that a more appropriate name for him would be Sir Talkalot. 

And now, here is Adrian's imagination at work. It isn't the best photo but focus on the backpack and the gas mask.

Do you see a scuba diver? We didn't get it for awhile even though he was saying that he was going under water. The mask was initially separate and it was Aaron that made the connection and used a belt to tie the mask to the backpack. 

These two episodes had me laughing long and hard! And it made me feel good that they have this crazy imagination. 

I Need To Learn Yet Another 'Language'

I thought that if I invested the time in learning about all things to do with trains, I'd be set for life with a second toddler boy. Aaron was crazy about trains and I remember needing to go find out what all the different parts of a train were called. I had to draw so many trains that I can now do it in a way super fast way that my pencil doesn't even need to leave the paper. And of course, I know the names of all of Thomas' friends!

Unfortnately, it doesn't look like Adrian is a train guy. Its all about construction equipment with him. These days, I'm trying to draw excavators, cement trucks or cranes. Today, I read to him about an all hydraulic powered ride on trowel. I'm not sure what he understands from it all but he sits there and listens attentively as I try to read about it without using my fairy tale voice. 

I don't mind this at all but I do feel a little sad that all my efforts on trains are now not going to be used.
This will be something new to learn about and I like the challenge of trying to be able to identify all the many different types of specialised equipment. Adrian is still better than me at the moment because Richard has been talking to him about the big construction equipment for some time.

Richard doesn't know when or how he did it but he keeps getting sent these magazines filled with advertisements for construction equipment. We get a new one every month - lucky Adrian. 

Mini 'Olympics'

We have been enjoying watching the Olympics as a family. My strict TV watching schedules have been thrown out the window for these 17 days and we have a new Olympics season only habit of watching TV after dinner and staying up past the usual bed time. I'm probably setting myself up for some protests after the Olympics come to a close but I'll deal with that when the time comes.

The school has had two days of their own 'Olympics' too. Yesterday was for the under 6s so I took Adrian along. His class of toddlers were representing Australia so they were all in yellow. There was a parade of the athletes (and their parents), an opening speech, the athletes oath and even an official opening by the Queen. 

Today, it was Aaron's turn. It was a long day in the sun for Adrian and me! The teachers were extremely hardworking and planned out a full day of sports fun for the children. It was well organised with all children have several turns at all the events.

I don't know if this is in keeping with some Montessori philosophy or not but competition was clearly not emphasized. It was all about participation and there were no winners. This was good if you think about all the disappointed, crying or sore loser children that the teachers didn't have to deal with but I do think that the kids need some sort of an introduction to competition so they can start learning to deal with it now. 

Its Friday tomorrow and I have one final, full day for this week. I really need the weekend!

Has It Really Been 12 Days?

We've had a string of unexpected events over the past 12 days. After each one, it took a day for me to catch up on the things I needed to get done. And then, something else would happen and I'd have to play catch up again. It was tiring and I got lazy at the end of each day.

One of the exciting happenings was this little emergency :

He jumped from one end of a two seater sofa to the other and hit his chin on the padded armrest. Who would have thought that a padded armrest would split a chin? Anyway, we had a dream trip to the hospital - he fell asleep shortly after we arrived, didn't wake up when they pulled and prodded at his chin and then was fresh and compliant when it was time for them to glue his chin back together. 

That little bit of pain hasn't slowed Adrian down at all and he has carried on running, jumping and falling as he has done every other day. Unfortunately, Aaron got a round of his tongue ulcers and that pain had him whining for a day. The good thing that came out of that was that Aaron stayed home from school and the extra attention he got led to the start of a new project that he and I will work on - a huge timeline of the age of dinosaurs. Its going to be massive because we intend to draw most the dinosaurs from each of the Cretaceous, Jurassic and Triassic periods. Wish me luck!

It wasn't all unpleasant events, my parents are back here in Brisbane. Earlier on, my cousin from Malaysia was here for a few days and we did all the touristy things. My brother from Sydney also paid us an unexpected visit earlier in the week. 

Now, I need to get to my sewing machine - winter is here and Adrian needs some long pants!

Wordless Wednesday - Thats NOT Putting Your Hat On Your Head

For more Wordless Wednesdays, go to My Little Drummer Boys.

Time For A Haircut

One of the big perks of having children is that you can do (almost) whatever you like with them. Dressing them and making them clothes has been fun but they sometimes don't like to wear the things I make, and its a little disappointing.

The thing they can't escape from is having their hair cut. They can never resist the screen time they get whenever I have to cut their hair. I usually entice them with Peep And the Big Wide World or Thomas clips. Once thats on, I get snipping. And usually, I can't stop! (My very first when-I-grow-up occupation was a hairdresser.)

I was trying to grow Adrians hair to see how a two year old would look with Justin Bieber's old hairstyle. Unfortunately, his Chinese hair is un-trainable and instead of staying to the side and away from his eyes, they started to poke in. I tried hair bands and tying it back but he pulled them off. What did I expect?

No big deal, I get to do what I love doing. His fringe looked much better when it was wet and combed properly - I  might need to snip at it again. Here are his Before and After shots.

There is always a lot of talk about how the second child looses out (less attention, hand me downs, etc etc etc), BUT, the one big advantage, at least in our house, is that the haircuts get better. Look at poor Aaron here...

I've also been practicing on Richard, anyone else want to give me more practice?

I Can Do It!

Adrian thinks he's very grown up these days. He likes to get in and out of the car by himself. If he had the strength, he'd put the seatbelt on himself. He also tells me to leave the bathroom when he needs to go. 

Anyway, this was the funny little guy I found in the morning when I went in to get him dressed. He already had his pants off and his diapers on!

The room was in a complete mess because he threw a lot of stuff about the place to get to the diapers but how could I get angry when I was so busy laughing.

Simple Prayers - Not So Simple

I'm still on the same theme as yesterday where I talk about how I seem to have spent less time with Adrian than  I did with Aaron. Anyway, one of the areas that I have really slacked off is with our nightly prayers. So slack that I probably only attempted to start the routine of saying a prayer with Adrian a couple of months ago - and I only did it one night.

I'm not very eloquent and have always kept things as simple as possible, and of course, its the same prayer every night. One of the lines that I will have in it, towards the end, is along the lines of asking Jesus to watch over Adrian. Anyway, the first time I said it, he burst into tears. I don't mean mild tearing up at all. This was a full blown, big mouthed, big tears rolling down cheeks sort of cry. The impression I got was that he was either petrified or heartbroken. I think he thought I meant that somebody else, named "Jesus", was going to look after him and that I wouldn't be his mother anymore. Finally, he was pacified when I said that I would be looking after him and nobody else.

Its cruel to laugh at somebody else's expense but this episode was very amusing to me. I mean, I sympathized with Adrian, but it was such an unexpected situation that I had to have a quiet laugh to myself about it.

Fast forward to this week and I finally remembered that I was supposed to get into some sort of nightly prayer routine. I also remembered what happened last time and I tried to word things differently. Specifically, I prayed for Jesus to help me took after Adrian well. As in, guide me in my endeavors to be a good mother.

BUT, Adrian must have once again interpreted it to mean that the person named "Jesus" was going to be stepping in and sharing the responsibilities of looking after him. Again he cried, and cried, and cried.

Writing about it now has got me thinking about it and maybe I've actually pointed Jesus out to him at church but it might have been the man crucified on the cross that I pointed to - that would seem like a scary babysitter to a two year old wouldn't it? I think I might just stick to the usual 'Our Father' until I manage to clarify things to him.

I Need A 'Pause' Button For Adrian

Adrian seems to be growing up even faster than Aaron did. He's exactly 2 years and 3 months today. Unfortunately, I feel that I'm spending a lot less time with him than I did with Aaron. He seems to be able to play a lot more independently than Aaron did at this age but thats because I just haven't spent a lot of sit down time with him. He's also much better at sitting in a car than Aaron ever was but thats because he spends a lot of time in the car with me as I chauffeur Aaron here and there and do the household shopping. 

I like to think that he's picking up a whole different set of skills that Aaron didn't have chance to but who am I kidding? I need find the time to let him work with a pencil more, to read to him more to even play with him a little more. I can feel my Lego creativity skills declining recently from lack of practice. 

Thankfully, he has not been stuttering at all recently and is back to his old chatty self. He likes being a part of the conversation and often asks "What did you say, Mama?". Today, he has been amusing himself by only saying 'Yup' or 'Nope' and refusing to say 'Yes' or 'No'. I think he's picked that up from my father. Those two words sound really odd when he puts in something like this "Do you want to play Lego? Yup or nope?" 

He's very cute and I'm always a little sad when I think that he'll be 3 years old soon and then its sort of a slow decline in terms of cuteness after that. I mean, Aaron is still adorable but he's not longer the baby time of cute. 

Here's Adrian 'mowing' the grass this morning. 

Tomorrow is a new day. I'll try harder. 

Wordless Wednesday - Dishwasher Training

Its been awhile since I did a Wordless Wednesday (although its not quite wordless today). I'm joining in the one hosted at My Little Drummer Boys.

Here is Adrian at his weekly Montessori session. In our house, all the dishes are washed by the men so, he's getting his training now. 

Good Times

Aaron and Adrian are typical brothers. One minute they are professing how much they love each other and how they are each other's BFFs and the next, they are screaming and biting. As such, I'm always being toggled between feeling how great it is to have two boys and asking God "Why me? Why two boys?"

At the end of each day, I always go to sleep with the happy feelings. I know that Aaron genuinely cares for Adrian and is a fantastic big brother. In fact, I think he's doing a better job at being the eldest than I was when my brother and I were little. He protects him, tries to teach him things, engages him in play that is appropriate for a 2 year old and even takes him to the loo (!!). For now, I know that Adrian looks forward to Aaron coming home from school so they can play but I can't clearly see that he cares for Aaron yet. 

I thought I'd share a few photos of a particularly fun time they had. This was taken on Sunday when we were waiting outside for Richard to finish his clogging class. I'm usually outside with the two of them and they are free to run around everywhere, up and down ramps. This particular hall is at the Caboolture showgrounds and on a Sunday afternoon, there are no cars around so I sometimes also take their bicycles along.  

Its night time now and there is nobody screaming. So, I'm thinking "I don't want them to grow up!"

Forgotten Photos From Malaysia

I didn't use my own camera much during the holidays because my brother was around and I just let him be the photographer. So, it was a pleasant surprise today when uploaded whatever I had to my computer.

Aaron's hair is still quite short now but this was the shocking cut that he came back with after my father took him to the barber. I remember not knowing what to say because I didn't want to make him feel bad but looking back at it now, it looks quite cute.

This was my breakfast for almost half the days that we were there. That long, crispy looking loop is Tosai and is made from rice batter and black lentils. My father and I always have that while my mother and Aaron always ordered the Roti Canai. The total cost of our breakfast each time was always around USD3.50.

And finally, here is my personal lion dance troupe. The neighbors must have loved us! One of my friends gave this 'lion' and drum set to the boys. I loved it and enjoyed the drum myself but it was definitely a controlled toy in the house. We played with it often but only when I brought it out. Unfortunately, we weren't able to bring the set back to Brisbane. At least there will be something exciting to look forward to playing next year.

I'm very happy that Aaron enjoyed the six weeks in Malaysia as much as he did. I don't think Adrian appreciates it yet. If only it was a car ride away.

We Will Speak Mandarin

For the second time this week, a total stranger has triggered the feeling of failure in me. The first was the dentist and the second, the audiologist we met with today. I had to take Aaron for a follow up hearing test and the lady casually asked if he spoke a second language.

"No...I tried. I had the best intentions. He probably understands quite a bit but he doesn't speak any Mandarin."

Up until now, I have placed the responsibility of teaching Aaron, and now Adrian, a second language, squarely on Richard's shoulders. After all, he is the one that grew up with Mandarin as his first language. This is the only language his father speaks which made it quite awkward when we visited in December. Richard also went to a Mandarin speaking high school. So, its his language! He THINKS in Mandarin.

On the other hand, my parents speak to me in English. Apart from the smattering of Cantonese that I speak with my grandmother and kindergarten level Mandarin and Malay that I picked up from living in Malaysia, English is my only language.  How am I expected to surround my children with Mandarin?

It is with envy that I observe other mothers conversing solely in their non-English mother tongues with their children. I want to do that too but I'm going to need to learn the language first. I can't wait for Richard because he doesn't seem to be around enough to be effective. I have to stop my half hearted attempts to raise bi-lingual children and get serious about things.

So, I started last week. Unfortunately, Pimsleurs Mandarin lessons are very much for the traveler and are not giving much vocabulary for disciplining children or answer their hundreds of questions each day about the world around them.

We also have a set of childrens story books that build mini stories from some of the simpler characters. The boys and I read through these each day but I'm worried that they will get bored of that soon. I'll be stuck for material then and maybe have to make some of my own. EEK! I have also convinced Aaron to write a page of Chinese characters each day and he has been good so far.

I feel quite self conscious when we are out and about and I speak to them in Mandarin. If the people around me are not Chinese, I'm a little more comfortable but if they are, I try to whisper. Whispering doesn't work with these two boys so I inevitably fall back to English. Its terrible to look Chinese, have Chinese looking children and not be able to speak Chinese. Especially these days when there is so much emphasis on this second language business.

Anyway, I've set is as one of my major goals as a parent. Its going to be a miracle if I actually end up making them Mandarin speakers but at least I'm trying.

When Did I Become A Referee?

I don't like barking like a dog or stomping around like the irate mother that I sometimes am. Despite the age difference I have seen them play extremely well together. So, its not like I'm asking for the impossible. But these two boys! Why don't they just do that the whole time? Why do they need to provoke each other? Isn't it more fun when you have a happy playmate? And then, why change a calm and peaceful game into some risky, jump off the side of the house, super hero game? (No need for anybody to answer these questions...)


Anyway, I often find myself suddenly jumping up and yelling out commands. Or stomping up to them and taking something away. Its not a nice feeling and I'm sure it doesn't look pretty. Yes, there is always the option of calmly voicing my opinion but I'm not good at that yet. There is good news though...


I had a brilliant idea this afternoon. And I think that they (or at least Aaron), might think its a fun game to play for awhile. 


Firstly, I realized that I have a new role. Take a look at this definition from Wikipedia...


A referee is the person of authority, in a variety of sports, who is responsible for presiding over the game from a neutral point of view and making on the fly decisions that enforce the rules of the sport. 


Supposedly I am the person in charge here and the antics that these two boys get up to each day can well be classified as some sort of sport. I try to be neutral and the decisions are definitely on the fly. The rules are probably not as clear cut as professional sports but everybody knows there are rules. 

Now back to my latest parenting idea. Its a small step and is extremely simple but I think that with the right introduction to it and a few fun rounds, it might help me out. I'm introducing the Yellow and Red card system. 

You don't think a whistle would be too much like Captain von Trapp do you? 

More Photos From Our Garden

I can't help it. Adrian was doing such a good job at watering the plants this morning that I just have to share it here. Both Aaron and Adrian seem to be growing up with gardening as a very normal, every day part of life. They enjoy it out there and even ask to do weeding! For example, Aaron might say "Can we watch TV?", I'll say "No". He'll think awhile and then jump up and down asking "Can we do weeding instead?? Please!" And Adrian, well, he just gets excited about whatever Aaron is getting excited about.

Definitely very different to how I was when I was a kid. In fact, up until two years ago, I detested having to do anything in the garden.

These photos were taken right after we came home from dropping Aaron off at school so there wasn't even the older brother influence around to make him do all this work while I walked around with my camera.

Adrian's 'New' Playhouse

When Aaron was just over two years old, we happened to be in Brisbane on holiday. One day, we came across a used playhouse and promptly brought it home with us. You can read all about it here and check out a photo of the two year old Aaron.

Fast forward nearly three full years and the playhouse is back in action. I put it away when Adrian was born so that it could be a 'new' toy when he was old enough to appreciate it. Its very appreciated now!



And as you can see, I have added a new kitchen.



I really enjoy watching the both of them playing in that house. Actually, not a 'house' but the restaurant that Aaron said it was two years ago. They cook me dino burgers and other delicacies and deliver it to me while I sit and surf the web.

No Wonder He's The Favourite

There is no doubt about it. Favoritism is very much practiced in this household. Not by the adults of course, but by the two little ones.

The focus of all their love and attention is definitely on my father. They never refuse when he asks to share their food. He is the first one that they say 'Good Morning' to. For a long time, my father was also the only person that Adrian would give a kiss to. From the minute they realize he's awake until their bedtimes, they try their best to hang around him.

It really is no mystery why this is so. My father is like a big kid and is constantly thinking up new ways for them to have fun. Very often, it doesn't even need to be something new and exciting - just an everyday job will become fun.

He took them for an afternoon of watching the comings and goings at a huge construction site.



Here's a 'trapeze'...



And here's my poor father trying his best to get his garden in order.



And there you have it, the favorite adult in our family.