I have to confess --- I am a serial killer.

I have no choice. For the sake of my family, I have to kill.

A serial killer of lizards, that is.

Well, now that you are rolling your eyes and silently dissing me off for being so melodramatic, let me try and put forward my case so that my reputation does not completely go down the drain.

(Disclaimer: If you happen to be a fan of the World Wildlife Fund - WWF, or People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals - PETA, I do not seek to offend you. Can lizards be considered as animals anyways? Rest assured, I use humane 'killing' methods)

Let me put it to you this way --- how many of your boyfriends, partners or husbands would flinch and jump on the nearest chair the moment they spot a lizard, rat or cockroach (LRCs in short) in their path?

Yes, yes, I see many hands raised. Those of you who did not raise your hands, it's because you are idol worshipping your partner and their failure to catch LRCs do not perturb you the least bit; or you live in a completely sanitized place (like the Presidential Palace --- the Istana, where even ants are annihilated before they reach the palace gates...I'm kidding).

It's true.

Although Singaporean men are supposed to have undergone rigourous military training where we can kill with our bare hands, things become slightly tricky when we talk about LRCs.

Yes, I sadly admit on behalf of all Singaporean men, that we have phobias when it comes to pests in the house.

Story is told of how 3 grown men jumped onto chairs immediately when they spotted a rat running around in the basement of the building. They had to wait for a brave soul who happened to chance upon their predicament and he used a nearby broom to whack the critter silly. 

Let's face it, LRCs are ubiquitous in Singapore. And while I applaud our town councils for their efforts to eradicate them, LRCs are just everywhere.

Imagine a scenario: Wife is in the kitchen when she sees a lizard on the milk powder tin. Junior is running around until he sees mom's mortified expression. Mom gives a little scream, Junior wonders what happened, and mom calls out for 'Daddy'!

Yes, that's me...Daddy.

Daddy is quietly reading his daily paper after a day at work, not seeking to get into anybody's way when the call of distress rings out.

(in Hollywood-esque fashion, the man usually rushes forward disregarding everything else to show that he is unfazed...truth is, my mind goes 'Sianzzzzz' instantly)

I poke my head out from the newspapers and ask, "Lizard issit?"

"It's on the milk powder tin!"

In all honesty, this is not so bad. Imagine you are in the car driving when the missus screams while you are making a right turn at a 4-way intersection!

"OK, Daddy to the rescue. Everyone clear out of the kitchen and go hide in the bedroom," I reply monotonously.

"Mummy sees Lizard! Mummy jump!" squeals Junior.

I remember the time when Junior first learnt the word 'Lizard'. He proudly declared his new found vocabulary in the car when mummy was sitting next to him at the back (I was the driver). To find out what happened next, go back 4 lines up.

With the family safe in the confines of the air-conditioned master bed room (door closed of course), I suss out the fella. 

Yep, he's there all right. Cheeky enough to cock his slimy head towards me.

I have never found the best method for getting rid of lizards, although there is a lizard trap from NTUC that is terribly effective, but just too expensive. And so, someone's got to do the dirty job.

I usually get a plastic bag and wrap it arond my hands, thrusting my protected hand forward to make the kill. 

Not easy.

Lizards are slimy creatures who are master wrigglers. If you are not careful, they will hop from the milk tin into your handbag or into another room...that's another story altogether. So we want to achieve a first time accuracy and efficacy.

These days, I try and spray some insecticide on it to make it groggy. 

But this guy was on my son's milk tin. Insecticide was ruled out.

I stealthily moved the dining chairs in a position that would block off his escape path. The plan is to corner it into the ceiling to floor mirror and the glass panel separating the dining room from the kitchen.

Then I tried to grab it --- no success. 

It cheerfully leapt off the tin onto a dining chair (don't tell my wife which chair) and scurried off onto the floor --- into the corner.

Perfect.

Insecticide phase --- blast away at the critter!

It took in a mouthful and then flipped onto its back.

Man has triumped once again.

Now that I have made the floor so slick with insecticide, I went over to the living room to grab some old newspapers to pick up the slimy one.

I swear that the fella was taunting me, for when I returned, he did a jackie-chan back flip onto its fours and stared defiantly at me.

OK, now I'm pissed.

I lunged at him...missed.

He was now on another carton box.

'Die!' I hissed as I emptied another breathful of Baygon into its face.

Seeing it being groggy momentarily, I swooped in on him and made the kill.

Success! 

There was a little blood on the floor, and a wriggling tail, both of which I wiped up and threw into the same bag.

"All right people, coast is clear!"

"Wah! Daddy hero!" Mummy effuses.

"Mummy see lizard. Mummy jump!" Junior chants.

The critter is still struggling in the bag. 

I walk to the chute, dump it in and that's that...or so I think.

I just realised that Junior's milk bottles were left to dry out on the dining table, pretty close to where I sprayed the insecticide.

Siannnzzzz...

Grabbing the whole lot of bottles and pacifiers, I walked to the sink and scrubbed them all over again.

'Overkill' is a word that keeps ringing in my head as I scrub the bottles. 

Why didn't I just do like what my secondary 2 science teacher did? Seeing a lizard on the floor, she nonchalantly used her high heels and crushes the poor soul. She called the petrified class monitor to clean up the mess. Taking off the offending shoe, she simply wiped the base of the shoe on the floor, and continued with the lesson, "And so why do we have photosynthesis? It's because..."

Its been a long time since we updated our blog!  What is our latest preoccupation?  TEETH!  Yes, Marc has hit one of his 2 year old phases - refusing to brush his teeth.  When he was younger, he knew he didn't have a choice, every night before bedtime we'd brush his teeth and he would open his mouth to let us brush the pearly whites whilst playing with a book or a toy.  Then around one month ago, he just decided enough was enough - no more teeth brushing.  He would clamp his mouth shut and turn his head left and right to stop us from inserting the brush in his mouth.  Even when he cries, he does it with his mouth clamped shut.  I have no idea how he manages that.  So we've tried everything, from buying DVDs with Elmo and Barney brushing teeth, to letting him brush ours, to letting him brush his own, to brushing the toys, and even brushing whilst he is sleeping.  But he still refuses to open his mouth.  And its a bit hard to brush your teeth with your mouth closed.

So we are rather resigned that he's going to have some form of tooth decay.  And we all know that this may be baby teeth, but the decay affects the permanent teeth.  Our parents assure us that they never brushed ours till we were 4 years old.  That explains all the fillings!!! But cold comfort knowing that one day our son will have to see the dentist cos of bad teeth and its going to hurt and he will hate the dentist even more.  I did manage to teach him to rinse his mouth - so he "mock" brushes twice a day (mock brushing = sticking toothbrush on your lips) and rinses after that.  Better than nothing I say!

The best suggestion I've heard so far - buy him a dog bone - the kind that dogs chew on to clean their teeth.  (this came from a friend who has no kids by the way, and naturally, he owns a dog).  Anyone else with better ideas?

Yes, some parents think it is insane --- sheer madness for some. When I define travelling with a toddler, I mean travelling OVERSEAS by plane. Yes, by plane and not by train or by boat. By plane.

Some of you are already gasping in horror. I know of mothers who dare not step out of the house with their 2 year old unless a grandparent or domestic helper assists. But then again, I, Daddy of my 2 year old son, have had prior experience venturing out alone with the kid to faraway places...err...well...if you consider taking a public bus 6 stops away to Orchard Road and having breakfast with him at McDonalds...yeah, I qualify.

Or wait, wait, wait...there was this time I drove to Sentosa with him and we viewed the flower show together--- alone, without any assistance.

The Wife looks at me and gives me the look that translates as 'LAME' --- bring a boy to a FLOWER SHOW??

Eh? At least I tried right?

So those were some of the prior experiences I've had travelling with my boy. But what about flying to Los Angeles which is about 21 hours away --- including a stopover in Tokyo?

Now we're talking.

The Wife and I felt that we had to put our minds into strategy --- not so much for the kid, but more for the preservation of our sanity. What time should we depart Singapore? What should we do on the plane? Will he play with the games on KrisWorld's entertainment system? Does SIA have 'Barney and Friends' on-demand? Yes --- call SIA and find out of they have 'Barney and Friend's. So what's keep-him-occupied-activity-Plan A? Plan B? What if we exhaust all options? What if he cries when everyone is trying to sleep? Will they kick us out of the plane for a noisy kid? Will they give us a parachute if they kick us out of the plane?

The long and short of it --- we decided to fork out a little bit more to do the following:

Stopover in Tokyo 

No kidding. This was a life saver. It helped us all recuperate faster from any potential or actual jet lag. Sure, we forked out an extra couple of hundreds of dollars for each plane ticket, had a total of 3 nights accommodation at Japanese hotels, but it was worth it. We got to see Tsukiji Fish Market all over again --- thanks to my jet lagged boy kicking us out of our slumbers at 5am. Where could we do at 5am in the morning with a jet lagged toddler anyways?The bonus --- we had great sushi for breakfast. Itadakimasu!

Buy a full seat on the plane

Yeah, we could have put him in the bassinet on the plane and got him on the plane free --- if he is under 2 years old, which technically at the time of travel, he was. But it would have been terribly uncomfortable for him. Size was a factor. Also, imagining taking him out of the bassinet everytime the plane hits turbulence? Nope, get him a seat --- 75% of full adult price.

Make Play Dough

The Wife found this recipe mixing flour and cream of tartar to make play dough to bring onto the plane. I was concerned. For a moment, it looked like Semtex --- you know, the stuff that looks like plasticine and can be used as an explosive?

"You think they will let us onto the plane?" I asked my wife looking at her kneading the putty looking stuff. "I mean, the US customs might just freak out and put our poor 2 year old kid on the Terror Watch List."

I got the same 'LAME' look (pls refer to the part above on FLOWER SHOW).

But yeah, it was quite ingenious of her, and it worked wonders on the kid.

Bring lotsa diapers

The airlines do provide some complimentary diapers for kids (I mean, if they carry diapers...I mean, pads, for ladies, diapers for babies are a no brainer, right?), you should be ready to haul a decent number onto the plane --- my kid poos 5 times a day. You get the picture. As for changing the kid in toilet, that's a whole new ball game altogether. In short, if you are Asian, not too tall, not too fat, you would both fit in to tag team a diaper change in the plane toilets. Where to throw the diapers? Hell no, not down the toilet bowl! You could cause the plane to nose dive and then there will be decompression and those dangly oxygen masks will start falling in front of your face --- all because of some crap. Do the right thing --- put it into an air sickness bag and bin it. 

In short, we survived the travelling. The Wife did a great job of explaining to the kid that we were going onto the plane (the open air aeroplane viewing gallery at Narita airport really helps, but what a potential terrorist launch point), the singing and the reading of story books...we all did not get to sleep much. But for seeing the joy on our kid's grandparents' faces...priceless.

I'm feeling nostalgic today...perhaps its because my son turns 2 tomorrow...perhaps also because the day after he turns 2 marks 8 years since I've known The Husband.  Yes September is a special month for our clan...I first met The Husband on 12 September 2001 - the day after "9-11" as we know it.  And 6 years later, on 11 September 2007, our son was born.  I can hardly believe 2 years have flown by in the blink of an eye.  2 years ago, at this time, I had just finished a lovely pizza delivery dinner and was getting ready to go to bed!

I can remember the days events vividly, as if it was just yesterday...I woke up on 10 September 2007, all ready to go to work as it was a Monday.  Just as I was using the bathroom, I realised I had started spotting.  This was some 2 weeks earlier than expected...spotting is one of the signs that baby is ready to arrive.  I woke up The Husband and once it was close to 9am, I rang my Gynae.  She told me to have breakfast, have a shower, get dressed and come into the hospital.  When I arrived, I was ushered to a room outside the delivery suites.  The nurses checked my details and hooked me up onto a monitor, much like an ECG except that it monitors contractions.  I had to sit there for an hour to be monitored and towards the end of the hour I was VERY hungry.  I asked the nurses if I could have lunch and they said no, not until my results were interpreted by the doctor.  Of course, I disobeyed and sent The Husband down to get me a tuna croissant from Delifrance - YUM!

My Gynae managed to give me a call and explain that I was getting contractions but they were not very regular.  I asked her if real contractions should hurt and she said yes, absolutely.  I was puzzled because I felt no contractions at all.  I was actually worried that I could go into labour and not feel it!  Spotting means I could give birth today, tomorrow, next week or the week after, so she asked me if I wanted to let labour happen naturally or to induce it.  I was hungry so I said I want it to happen naturally.  Plus I wanted to let nature take its course, so I was allowed to go home.

I went home and started to unpack the steriliser and try to do some last minute preparations...I told The Husband I wanted a hearty pizza dinner so we ordered pizza delivery and I wolfed it down happily.  Later than same night, I started to feel painful contractions at around 2am.  I tried to sleep through them but lying down actually made them hurt more, so I got up and paced around the room to see how frequent they were.  The Husband slept through all this of course and I finally woke him at around 5am as they were around 5 minutes apart.  We waited till 7am and I ate some breakfast bars just in case (as you can see, food was still a priority when in labour).  We arrived at 7.30am or so and the nurses got me into a gown right away and administered my enema.  (it was horrid I can assure you)

I was told that whilst my contractions were regular, I was only 1cm dilated...I was in for a long ride.  After an hour and a half, my Gynae came in to check on me and told me I was only 1.5cm dilated...she said that she would burst my water bag to speed up labour and administer oxytocin to induce stronger contractions.  The pain was still bearable so I told her I would do without the epidural.  But once the oxytocin kicked in, The Husband was constantly rubbing my back to ease the pain and as I was still 1.5cm, I gave in and said, GIVE ME THE EPIDURAL!  The Epidural itself didn't hurt (I don't mind needles) but trying to remain still despite the pain was the hard part.  Once it kicked in though, it was like HEAVEN. 

As i settled down into a comfortable position to rest, The Husband sat down to read and we waited for what every woman in labour waits for...DILATION!  The worst part - I COULDN'T EAT!  The constant shivering that came with the epidural was bearable but I started to feel the gastric juices churning and that was horrid.  Around 5pm or so I told the nurses I felt the urge to push, and I was right, because I was fully dilated.  The pushing is the hard part, cos with an epidural, the full pain and contractions is not felt.  The Husband was the ultimate midwife - he stayed by my side, encouraged me, read the contractions on the screen and updated me on my progress.  I remembered asking for lipgloss at one stage as I wanted to make sure I didn't look horrible in the pictures...At 5.30pm or so, Marc finally made it out!

I recall the whole thing in slow motion...Marc screaming away whilst being weighed and tagged (like a chicken)....the nurse showing me my placenta after it was delivered, me trying to nurse him and managing to successfully...its quite surreal.  I remember being wiped down by the nurses, being wheeled into my room and being greeted by my in laws and sister in law who were waiting eagerly to meet us.  I even remember the sleepless first night in the room...(in fact, the total lack of sleep for the few months after)...whilst I remember being extremely tired then, I also remember the excitement at finally meeting my baby...and now my baby is no longer one and has grown into a drooly, sweaty, loud, cheeky toddler! 

Having a child is one of those life-changing events and it has truly been exhilirating.  What a wonderful 2 years it has been and I look forward to many more exciting years ahead!!!

One of the toughest things a parent faces is when your child misbehaves.

 Just yesterday, we were at Shokudo, Raffles City. There's a nice little play area for kids and a slide thrown in for good measure.

My boy was getting ready to climb up the slide when another boy, about 3 years his senior, came charging in and cut the queue.

The wife chided the boy gently and asked him to take his turn, hoping that his parents would do likewise. However, the boy's parents were not in sight and so 'charging boy' got his way. And he did not stop at that; he continued cutting the queue of other kids. 

This was when I came in and gave the kid a stern 'you must take turns' but to no avail. By this time, his parents had appeared and we so hoped that they would do something about his behaviour.

I walked away from the slide to chat with some friends. Some time passed and from the corner of my eye, I saw the wife come fuming towards my direction and muttered something about wanting to give that boy 'a tight slap'. 'Charging boy' had wanted to jump the queue again and my son was in the way. For some reason, 'charging boy' decided to take a swipe at my son, throwing a punch at my son's head because he could not get his way. Thankfully, he is not a born boxer and missed.

I stood up and headed toward the direction of 'charging boy'. His parents were not around again. I walked up to him and as soon as I did, his parents reappeared from nowhere and beckoned him to follow them home. In response, he gave a scream of dissension, to which, his father (i suppose it was his father) gently told him in a soothing voice, "No son, you cannot do that."

Not giving his father two hoots, he ran out of the restaurant into oblivion.

I do not claim my boy to be an angel all the time. He has his moments and there are times when we have to deal with him. Of late, he has gotten into the habit of throwing a tantrum by lying on the floor and beating his arms and legs on the floor. Sometimes ignorance works; other times smacking him works. But in all those cases, he got the idea after we applied discipline to his behaviour.

With 'charging boy', I do not actually blame his behaviour. It is his parents I have to take to task.

There was a story documented some 3,000 years ago, of a father who was a high ranking religious leader in a foreign country. His had 2 sons whom he raised but were a handful for him to handle. The 2 sons went into neighbouring countries to rob the people and rape the women. When this religious leader found out about their deeds, he called his sons and basically said this to them, "Sons, I have heard about the things that you have done. It is not good."

And that's all he said to them.

His sons became more rotten and eventually were killed in the midst of executing their evil deeds. Their father, upon hearing of their deaths, slipped and fell to his death.

My friends, parenting is not an easy task, but it has to be done. I pray you have the courage to do what is right for your children, and for society at large. Otherwise, the people that will suffer might ultimately be yourself.

OK, I can blame no one else but myself for allowing this fiasco to take place.

You see, you dads out there, how many of you have actually brought your 2-year old son to the toilet and made him wait for you to pee?

Mums would know what to do --- just bring them to the toilet cubicle! It's a no brainer for the ladies.

For the men, ermm, you have options.

Option 1: Bring them into the cubicle and make them wait as you complete what you have to do, whether it is big or small.

I have been adopting this option consistently without any trouble. I remember the first time I brought him into the cubicle for me to do execute my 'small business', I found him leaning from behind my legs and peering at the curious site of daddy projecting a fountain into the toilet bowl. I was half expecting him to actually play with the stream (he usually likes playing with water) and so I quickly did the deed and closed shop. 

Option 2: Do your deed in the urinal, praying that your son behaves

With that, I mean that every dad hopes that their son does not stick their hand into the urinals and explore the bacteria count in the toilet.

It was on this particular day, when I had just picked up Marc from childcare, that i needed to use the loo for 'small business'. And so I parked the car and walked into the nearby toilet. 

I decided to take a chance. There was no one in the toilet. I felt confident about doing a neat and quick job. So I headed to a urinal.

Now, the toilet has a row of about 10 urinals. 

Yikes!

But I shall forge on.

"Son, you wait here. Daddy will be right with you. Wait wait."

Marc looked curiously around the toilet as Daddy did the pee.

I kept my eye on my boy, as if my stare could direct his every movement.

But of course that did not work. For my boy is a smart and inquisitive chap who decided that it was time for him to learn new things and experience new sensations. 

I was helpless as I saw him walk up to urinal number 6 (I was at number 8) and reach into the urinal.

You know this scene --- child reaches out to touch the forbidden fruit and dad yells out a 'NOooooo' in slow motion...but to no avail.

What you see next is Marc holding up the cake of deodorant found in urinals, and he smiles at Daddy, showing his new found prize.

The subsequent scene is really not much to mention, but basically, close shop fast fast and then grab my son, dunk him into the sink and was, wash, wash, scrub, scrub, scrub.

And of course, I have an alcohol based sanitizer in the car to top off the decontamination process.

As I buckled him into the child seat, I looked at him with a mixture of disgust and a tinge of admiration. Digust is self explanatory. But the admiration part, yeah, it was like my son had gone where no sane person would have gone (no, my son is NOT insane, thank you). And yet, I was tempted to ask my son how it felt like being so brave to hold up a cake of urinal deodorant. 

I am pretty sure that if he could string his sentences right, he would say something like, "Oh, it was nothing really, dad. This one was dry, not wet and dripping like the others at Vivocity."

Can you just see me beaming with pride? 

And why not? Perhaps sometime down the road, when the time is right and the perfect opportunity comes along, we might do just that!

But for now, let's just float gently back from cloud 9 and arrive on terra firma...good ol' solid ground.

When I was approached to be interviewed and photoshot (if there is such a word), I gave it some thought. Was this the right time to 'go public'? Some of you might think --- 'Are you nuts? Newspaper want to feature you, say yes lah!'

Timing is everything. With H1N1 going around, the Asian Youth Games, Michael Jackson's passing (hey, it matters!) would it be appropriate and timely for us to be featured in an article? Well, the decision was made, and so the paper sent along a photographer to do the shoot at my place.

To any of you who might think that doing a photoshoot is easy, think again (I actually now do pity those who participate in 'America's Next Top Model'). I mean, in the past, I used to do work supervising photoshoots. Now, being 'shot' at, it was whole new experience. Along with me in this experience was my dear son, who is actually the focus of the photo, honestly.

So we sat down and arranged some props, trying to put Marc in position --- that was the easy part. The tough part was getting him to smile.

"Your son very serious leh," quipped the photographer. I really admire her patience as she tried coaxing Marc to smile and 'look joyful'.

(Note: The photo shoot was taken just before dinner time and Marc was really hungry. Bad time huh?)

There must have been more than 50 shots taken from all angles to try and capture a 'smiling Marc'. Yeah, he was cranky, fussing and hungry. Who could blame him? (Strong reaction to hunger and lack of food is genetically traced from The Wife)

Just before the shoot, I had completed a lecturing assignment and was rather pooped. So Daddy has to look energetic, Marc has to look happy. It was not going well.

As the shoot was taking place, Ah Gong was snapping away with his panasonic lumix camera, beaming with pride that his grandson was going to receive so much publicity (he used to be in advertising). The repeated pleas of 'Uncle, uncle, try not to blcok my camera flash' was not really heeded. But eventually, Ah Gong was disciplined enough to restrain himself from compromising the photo quality.

Ah Ma was singing and clapping her hands in tandem with the musical rhythm from an episode of Barney & Friends, urging Marc to react joyfully. We sort of stumbled upon the idea that if we put on a Barney DVD with the 'If you're happy and you know it' song, he would react animatedly, as he usually does. It worked...for a while. And then Marc sort of quizzically looked at us when we kept playing back the entire song over and over and over again.

He's a smart boy.

But that was good enough. Photographer called it a day and it was a wrap.

It took her 1 hr and 15 mins to get just this one perfect shot.

Daddy fell exhausted onto the sofa. Marc ran to his booster seat and was promptly fed his dinner (we usually let him feed himself. You can understand why we fed him this time around). Ah Gong and Ah Ma browsed their recently taken shots of Marc and were gushing praises about how Marc looked so handsome.

Now that I have to agree.

This fact can be genetically traced to The Daddy.

(I see my wife's eyes roll in disgust)

Marc can finally feed himself!  Going to school has done him a world of good and I'm a school convert.  Its not so much the academic learning at this age but the basic skills like self-feeding, putting on and removing shoes, packing up toys.  We recently taught him how to throw rubbish into the bins at home too.  (next on the list: fold own clothes!)  He creates an almighty mess when he eats, which shocks quite a few people.  But we're fairly renegade parents and would rather clean him up and give him the chance to learn to feed himself.  Plus he loves food, so feeding himself keeps him occupied, which means we can eat!  We take his feeding chair everywhere, which means we have peace of mind letting him eat off the tray as we can remove it and wash it ourselves. 

And his latest indulgence - MACDONALDS!  He loves the Fillet O Fish, which is our favourite too.  We're pretty indulgent, but hey, life is short, live it to the full right?  :) And to think i was totally anti macdonalds before I had kids!  Somehow, they have the recipe down pat.  Firstly - their eateries are air conditioned - a BIG PLUS in hot humid Singapore.  Secondly, they have kid friendly equipment - high chairs, happy meals.  Thirdly, they give kids free stuff which they like - just last Saturday they gave out free balloons to the kids.   Balloons don't cost much - but it made Marc so happy, he was SOLD before we even walked in.  And if the kids like the place - the parents will go!  If only other businesses learnt this trick too.  We were at Han's just last week for lunch and Marc was making a mess as usual.  I got several dirty looks from the waitresses, who came up midway with a broom to sweep the floor.  I had no intention to leave the restaurant in a mess, and was planning to clean up the chair and pick up whatever food bits I could from the floor.  But even if I didn't - as a family restaurant, having kids mess up the place is part and parcel of customer service and running a restaurant.  If you don't welcome families, then families won't come, simple as that.  Of course, a lot depends on the service staff as well, but Management should communicate to their staff their business philosophies and enforce it.

The other bad thing about school - is that kids will fall sick.  Marc's pretty strong and recovers quickly.  Which leaves me sick for a week!  I tell people that I have no immune system left,  as I gave it all to my son!  Oh well, its part and parcel of having kids I guess!

Keeping toddlers occupied - the obsession of every parent with one!  What do you do with a ball full of energy, who gets up to all sorts of mischief if there is nothing to occupy them?  We've literally had to give furniture away because they were either damaged or too dangerous to keep.  Perhaps its just our son, but speaking to other parents we know we're not alone!

We tried out finger painting a few weeks ago and as you can see from the collage, Marc didn't really paint.  I read on another mother's blog about some activities she came up with to keep her kids busy.  Using the corridor outside her home, she made them finger paint, play with flour, sand and other fun stuff.  The pictures showed the kids having lots of fun and I thought what a great idea!  So I got together with my neighbour who has a daughter 6 months older than Marc and we decided to have a finger painting session at our lift landing.  It started out rather innocuous - we took out the paints and encouraged the kids to paint.  S did start painting, Marc just squished the paint between his fingers and smeared them all over his legs.  He was very happy, but he wasn't painting.  My neighbour brought out a tub of water to let the kids rinse the paintbrushes and to dilute the paints.  Marc was thrilled - he started splashing away at the pail of water.  Before we knew it, the entire floor was flooded and he had not painted a single stroke.  He was entirely soaked, and so was the painting, but he was very very happy.  So this week we decided to bring them swimming.  Literally swimming.  My neighbour bought an inflatable tub and we filled it up with water and the kids loved it!  No pictures cos I was in the pool with Marc, but suffice to say it kept them occupied for a VERY long time.  So if you are looking to buy a flat - one tip - get a point block or a very private corner where you have lots of space to yourself!  We are blessed to have great neighbours with kids around the same age as Marc.

Other things he loves at the moment - escalators!  He bugs us to bring him on the escalator at every shopping mall and we lift him off right at the end.  He shouts "weee!!!" and lifts his feet in the air, forming a 90 degree angle.  Quite impressive I must say.  We think he has potential to be a high jumper or long jumper.  He also loves the supermarkets.  He runs along the refrigerated section and points at every single item, stopping to read out numbers on the price tags that he recognises and scaring all the other shoppers with his shouting.  It doesn't take very much to make him happy and its such a joy to see the wonder in his eye at the simple things in life, which we adults take for granted.

Just when I thought that Marc was not going to speak for a looooong time - he starts making sounds that sound like words! HURRAY!

This is his current vocabulary:

Mum Mum (food)
Men! (Amen)
More (More....food mainly)
Ppppuh! (Please)...ok first 4 words are all food related...let's move on
Daddy (Daddy)
Mama (Mummy)
Ye Ye (Paternal Grandpa)
Nai Nai (Paternal Grandma)
Ah Gng (Maternal Grandpa)
Ah Ma (Maternal Grandma)
Ka Ka (Helper)
Niao Niao (Cat mewing)
FFF...FFF! (Dog Woofing)
Ba Ba (Sheep baa-ing)
Eh Bow (Elbow)
Car (Car)
K (OK)
Awok (A Walk)
Up! (please carry me/elevator/i want to go out)
Ya (Yes)
Ah Guh (Number 7/Train)

Marc also knows the phonetical sound of most of the alphabets from A-Z, although he trips up on the letter Q, U and V...he also loves the number 8 and can repeat it all day, point it out on blocks of flats, car licence plates, lifts...he also knows the number 1, 4, 7, 9 and 10.

We've started playing Chinese children songs at home and he loves them, he can even say the odd Chinese word that he recognises.  He's also started to learn counting in Mandarin.  Our helper has taught him some words in Bahasa too.  In fact, he knows more languages than me!

He's also started to throw tantrums.  Just the other day, Marc refused to keep his cards after playing with them and kicked and screamed for a full 15 minutes before he finally gave in.  The Husband and I sat there with him screaming on the floor and we had to shout to hear each other speak.  Honestly - its much more tiring to NOT discipline him and to let him have his way, I know why so many parents do it.  But we aren't doing him any favours and as Christian parents, we know that God calls us to teach our children in the way that they should go and in the way of the Lord.  So we pray for strength and collide headlong with him.  I am most tired on Mondays - partly the Monday blues and partly what feels like a weekend of fighting with Marc.  He's a headstrong boy who knows what he wants and how to get it, on his terms and on no one elses.  He bullies our Helper and makes her do everything for him.  Which is why we're thankful we sent him to school!  The teacher tells us he's learning to feed himself and just the other day, The Husband saw Marc packing up toys after playing.  He even knows how to remove and put on his Crocs - he doesn't do this at home unless we enforce it as he expects our helper to do it for him.

On the flip side - he's starting to be very charming!  Just the other day, he ran up to me whilst playing at the fitness corner at a nearby block, and gave me a great big hug, before running off to continue playing.  He knows how to give his Mummy a kiss and a hug, which really makes my day.  He's also learnt a few action songs from Sunday School, which he loves to bits.  The only way to really calm him down or to get through to him when he's hysterical is to sing.  I'm glad he loves music and I hope he learns to play an instrument someday! :)