The Bub in the Belly

I am still working hard on a little creation so please bear with me a little while longer. It's coming along slowly but, hopefully, surely. Will share soon.

In the meantime, here are some snippets from the week that was. Sorry, no pictures - I haven't been snapping, which is unusual for me - I will get back on that horse soon!

- Ryan has been repeating phrases that he picked up here and there. Sometimes, he does it at random. Driving to his nanny's place with him sitting at the back, I might hear him say, "Stand back, please!" or "I like yellow!" (his favourite colour is actually green).

- Ryan has been keeping extremely late nights lately, often getting to bed at 2 to 3 am. Last night, he was dancing and singing (screaming) from midnight till 2 am. I think we have the makings of a party animal here.

- Lately, Richard has been very involved in taking care of Ryan in the evenings after work, mainly because I've been so tired. So Richard has been doing the evening-shift, playing with Ryan while I rest. Then, when Ryan is ready to sleep, I'll take over. Ryan insists on latching to sleep and sleeping while stuck to me - and that contributes to my tiredness because he has been keeping such late nights. I usually only get to fall asleep after he falls deep into slumber and unlatches.

- Ryan told me that "A" is for "Aiyo".

- I pointed to my boob (the nipple) and asked Ryan, "What's this?"
He replied, "M-I-L-K."

- Richard set up a small basketball hoop in Ryan's room and they've been playing with it non-stop.

- Ryan had his last Edudrama class last Saturday. There was a mini-party for the English session and we brought some mini Chips Ahoy! as our contribution. Somebody brought packets of dried Japanese seaweed for the children (huh?).

- After many months of neglect, playdough made a comeback!

- We finally opened the very last of Ryan's birthday presents (yes, from January!). We've started talking, just casually, about Ryan's next birthday. The timing is a little awkward because it falls on the eve of Chinese New Year, so if we want to throw a party, we'll have to plan it carefully. But first, there's Christmas!

Hope your week was as interesting!

Yes, I know I took twice as long a break as I said I would. All in the name of good things!

Rest assured that the absence of blogging in the past two weeks translates directly to the presence of lots of hearty living. Some highlights of the past two weeks:

- I was interviewed via phone by Young Parents Magazine on my thoughts on enrichment classes for little ones. No claims to fame - I was only one of many parents interviewed. Will share when I see the article in print.

- On 7 November (which was a public holiday), we went to see the musical Jack and the Beanstalk by SRT's The Little Company (still showing up till 11 Dec 2011). Ryan enjoyed that very much.

- Ryan is getting noticeably taller and heavier so we dug out the stroller from the storeroom to see if he might have any interest in sitting in it. He never did and still doesn’t.

- Richard and I took two days off work last week and had some couple time. Spent a day running errands and the next day at the movies. We watched Hugh Jackman do his stuff in “Real Steel”.

- After missing swimming class for three weeks, Ryan finally got into the water last Sunday and he was all smiles. He’s probably the student who has made the least progress in his class but, as long as he’s flashing that dimple, who cares.


- I’ve been reading food and cooking blogs and getting inspired. We finally checked out the ToTT store at Dunearn Road last Sunday (we had lunch at the Bistro) and after walking through all that cooking and baking goodness, I’m more than inspired now.

- Artwork continues in all mediums. Looking at these two pieces, I'm starting to understand why abstract art is so valuable. As an adult, I can never paint like this. "It took me four years to paint like Raphael, but a lifetime to paint like a child" - Pablo Picasso.



- Like most children his age, Ryan is still ambidextrous. He did this using both hands simultaneously. This piece is strangely psychedelic - staring at it for a while makes me go into 3D mode.


- Ryan has also become very interested in writing – here’s something he wrote recently. Can you decipher it?


(It's the word RADIO)

- And yes, I'm making something! This little project is extremely energy-zapping! I’ll share it with you when it’s a little further along. At the moment, it looks nothing like the end-product.

Hope you've been living it up!

After posting nearly every day for the past two months, it's time for a short break. I plan to spend some time pursuing a few small projects, so I'm going to take a week's break from this blog to do that. I've not been producing much "output" ever since I stopped making costumes for Ryan (see here, here, here, here and here) and ever since I finished the quiet book. All the inspirational "input" is building up in my head and needs to get out!

I also need some time to beef up our home practice materials and write up some more notes on Shichida for the blog (those notes take days to write!). I'll share some of the materials when I get back.

So don't go too far away! I'll be back real soon.


Leona

The funny thing about slowing down and doing nothing over the weekend is that, when Sunday night approaches, you wonder, "Hey, where did my weekend go? I haven't done anything and it's back to work already?!!"

Sigh.

Truly, we didn't get up to much this weekend. When Ryan was not having classes, we preferred to just stay in. We took long naps, drove out nearby for meals, resisted going out to town for the 20% storewide sale at Kinokuniya, and played with Ryan at home.

We built dominos - tricky! This one took us four tries!

Ryan did some painting (under Richard's supervision). These were done with poster colours.



Hope your weekend was relaxing!

Ryan's nanny just got back from a holiday in Bangkok and Ryan got loads of gifts, including this outfit.

Top: Ovo babies
Bottom: Cotton On Kids

We are driving back to Singapore today. Ryan had a fabulous time with his cousins (he spent almost every night playing till late at their house) and we had a wonderful time catching up with family and friends.

One of the highlights of the trip was our outing to MV Logos Hope, the world's largest floating book fair. It's basically a large ship that travels the world bringing books to everyone. It was docked at Glenn Cruise Terminal in Port Klang and Margaret took us out there on its last day. We picked up loads of books for Ryan! You can see some photos of the ship on Richard's tumblr.

Having ice-cream at the ship's cafe!