The Festivities

Totally backdated post here, but I swore to myself I'd put this up before Chinese New Year!
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Christmas last year was a whirl of gatherings, parties and playdates!

The week before Christmas, we had a little playdate at our place for our little friends and their parents from Church.

MSC seedlings

We had a mini-gift exchange - Christian and Connor's first gifts of the season! It was also the first time we discovered that Christian loved giving out presents - possibly more so than receiving them.

Here you go Eli

So many!

Fer me?

Awesome!

On Christmas Eve, we headed to my Aunt's place for a dinner celebration.

The spread

Love this one of Connor with my grandma

Wear the hat Pop pop!

Where's dinner Daddy?

One with mummy

Another with Daddy

And presents, of course

Mine!

Christmas morning started out with Mass, followed by lunch at Ewan's Aunt's place where the family gathered.

Designated gift giver, again

Lil' Santa

Mauling daddy

Dadddy in defeat

One of the cutest things was that the boys turned up in unexpectedly matching outfits with our cousins' three girls... Check mate!

Sitting unbelievably still for a photo

Big bro and lil' bro

After that, we headed home for a little gathering with my parents and Leon.

More opening of presents including those we got the boys!

Lots of ripping

Vtech Discovery Cube for Connor

Thor's hammer and helmet for Christian

In addition to a minion fart gun!

Perfect height!

It was nice that Christmas was actually mid-week this year, which meant that the following weekend was another opportunity for some celebratory fun.

We had a party with my mummy friends and their bubs on Saturday. The babies are all around Connor's age, and it was great seeing how they've all grown in the past couple of months. Most of them were crawling, cruising, and even on the cusp of walking!

Hangin' out with my pals

Chair-struck

Food? We see food?

There was also a little photography corner, where the bubs got their picture taken.

Mums and bubs

Tummy time

Who's that sneaking up on me!

On Sunday, we headed to a friend's place - a condo near Changi Prison - for another party. No pics cos I forgot to whip out my camera (I even forgot to bring Connor's lunch flask back - what's wrong with me!? Doh!) that day. In any case, it was a really nice gathering where we met other young parents and the condo was really spacious and beautiful - possibly because of it's far out location perhaps, space was less of a constraint.

We had heaps of fun this Christmas - and I'm sure the kids had a blast, too. Here's looking forward to a great 2014!

Connor at 10 months

What with Christian starting school and us getting used to a new morning routine, it's been easy to miss how quickly our littlest one is growing.

Brothers

Connor turned 10 months old yesterday. And the little Mister is such a great bundle of energy and it's such a privilege watching him grow.

He's crawling at a super fast speed, pulling himself up, cruising, climbing stairs and outgrowing that stranger and separation anxiety that hit us hardest around his 7th month.



I own the playground

Sleep-wise, we're quite pleased that he goes down at around 7.30pm and wakes around 7am in the morning (I some times have to wake him as we need to get ready to send Christian to school).

As for naps, he's still on two to three naps - a short late morning nap (around 45mins at 10am), a long nap (about 2 hours from 1pm to 3pm) and possibly another short one (about 45 mins at about 4.30pm)

We've been a bit more lax about his bedtime lately, especially on weekends, so he might go around 8-8.30pm - guess as long as he's sleeping about 14 hours a day at this age, we're happy campers!

When it comes to food, my gosh, this little fella is definitely giving his big bro a run for his money. He slurps up his cereal, porridge, and loves taking bits of our food - rice, bread, and basically anything that comes off our plate, he'll assume it's yummy. I've even peeled off bits of chicken to let him gum and it all just vanishes.

Oh, and teeth count at the moment stands at eight - four at the top and four below!

Cheeky bugger

Things between the brothers are getting, well, interesting. I think Christian is beginning to see Connor as a proper playmate - he imitates the way Connor laughs, claps along with him and such - but then also sees him as competition to his toys! Which of course leaves us to much chagrin when they're going for a particular plaything at the same time (which for some reason, is ALWAYS the case!)

Although we think we know what to expect as he's our second, Connor never fails to surprise us with his antics. He's got the most adorable grin which he dishes out to everyone, and loves to "show off" his new skills like clapping, waving his arms and tapping his head.

Love you Baby Connor! All too soon, you'll be turning one!

All smiles in the morn!

 



 

Two weeks in...

And still loving it, thank goodness!

Christian took to school pretty easily, but I was a little afraid the novelty would wear off after a while. The good thing is, he's still enjoying it.

He likes the teachers, the principal (we once caught him having a deep one-on-one conversation with her - what's that all about?!) and of course, learning loads of stuff. It's incredible how he comes back humming new tunes, saying new rhymes, all of which leave me and Ewan exchanging incredulous looks, like, where was that from?!

Who could forget his second day of school, where it took nearly all of me to just stand watch from the windows (parents were still allowed in, but I wanted to leave him to his own devices and see how he handled it all). He, well, pretty much stole the show during story time.



He seems to have toned down somewhat though - think he's learning how he's supposed to behave in a social setting - he even sat down throughout during a storytelling session at the library last weekend.

Hope he continues to enjoy school!

First Day At School

Just about to head out - with Connor's biscuit

Christian started playgroup at St Francis Xavier Kindergarten on 2 Jan.

I was so nervous for him the weeks prior, because I'd heard so many stories of how tots bawl their little eyes out on their first day of school.

We constantly talked to him about going to school - I'd say "You're going to school soon, ok" and he'd reply "Yeah... next time," which got me all the more anxious!

Class starts at 8.15am, which is not the easiest thing, seeing that we'd have to leave home at 7.30am, drop Connor off at my mum's at around 7.45am before heading to SFX. Which means waking at 6.45am and rushing to get the kids fed and changed.

So, on the day, I set my alarm for 6.45am, but Connor actually woke up at around 6.30am (strange, cos he usually sleeps 7ishpm to 7ish am). This woke me up and woke Christian up as well - which suited us fine, I guess, since he had to be up soon anyway.

I changed Christian into his new school uniform (a tad big), gave him his morning milk and a cheese sandwich.

Soon, we were off!

My school

To be honest, it was pretty chaotic when we got to class. It was helmed by three teachers, and there were 15 kids in all. Out of whom, some were sobbing, some were clinging and refusing to leave their parents.

He's in Grace A!

Nice touches like a chart with everyone's birthday

Thankfully, Christian didn't shed a single tear, and was, in fact, really excited about everything. We really got lucky with this kid! Helped of course, that there were tons of toys and things to explore around the classroom.

Doodle masters

Lego time

Making "Mama's big ship"

When mealtime came along, macaroni was served.

Weekly menu

Waiting to be fed

I guess Christian's a pretty big eater, because the portion dished out to him was MEASLY compared to what he usually eats at home! It was a tiny bowl of maybe 15 pieces of macaroni?

Seriously? That's all?

While some of the other kids could barely finish their portions, Christian polished it off in a jiffy and asked for seconds. He would have gone for thirds if I didn't tell him not to ... and pre-empted him saying there was lunch shortly after.

Yums

 Soon after, little chunks of play dough was brought out and little hands started moulding and cutting. It was tremendously cute! Since he was preoccupied with it, I felt it was time to leave him on his own for a bit.

Play dough time

Like every anxious parent, I hung around outside, peeping at him occasionally. He barely seemed to notice I was gone! 15 minutes turned to 30, and soon it was more than an hour. I was so proud of him!

The kiddos had some time to run around outdoors as well, in the little playground.

Behind the vehicle-crazed boy he is, he grew attached to a red tricycle. I didn't know it then, but somehow he had learnt how to pedal!

Pedal to the metal

 I watched him, while trying to keep out of his sight, as I noticed he would keep coming towards me and not listen to the teachers if I was hovering too much.

Case in point, when I got a little too close when the kids were lining up against a wall, and he spotted me trying to take a picture. Guess who was made to line up against the wall with him, before he agreed to go back into the classroom -_-

Lining up

Spotted you mummy!

All too soon, class was over, and they gathered on the floor to sing a goodbye song.

I'm really glad we chose to go with SFX kindy... Christian's really familiar with the place as we go right next door for Mass every Sunday.

Looking forward to his little learning journey here. :)