Bedtime On Demand

Lately Charlotte has her bedtime on demand that I have to fulfill in order to tuck her in smoothly. Here is what she will request:

1. Read a book - sometimes, she is ok with just once. Other time, she asks to repeat. I have learn the trick that if I told her it is only for once before hand, she will be ok with it. So I need to make a deal with her before start reading the book.

2. Sing - this is really on demand, at least 5 songs. The list goes on with every new songs she learned or heard (only those captured her attention). No deal can be made with this demand. I think she enjoys music/songs. I will sing whatever she requests and when I think it is time to stop, I just have to tell her ok, it's time to sleep. If I am luck, she will agree with me and call it a night. If not, I will have to try again after another song. My mom said I am Charlotte's living radio :)

3. Say a prayer - this is usually my request, but she follows.

Here are the list of songs and how she named it:
Star = Twinkle twinkle little star
Moon = It's a chinese song
Sun = Oh Mr. Sun
Woody song = when she loved me
God so good = God is so good
Bluebird = a song from Kindermusik lesson
Sun behind mountain = God is all around us (this is her new favorite)

Just to share with you the lyrics of God Is All Around Us by Twilla Paris

The sun behind the mountain is setting in the west

The bluebird and her little ones are gathered in their nest

And I am on my pillow because I need my rest

God is all around us, and He knows best

He's higher than the treetops in the tallest wood

Why He would come and speak to me, I'd tell you if I could

It makes me want to please Him in all the ways I should

God is all around us, and He is good

God is all around us everywhere we go

Caring for His children that's all I need to know

He's stronger than the eagle circling above

He's wiser the oldest owl more gentle than a dove

He's closer than pajamas that fit me like a glove

God is all around us, and He is Love

4 Contented Mommies + 4 Happy Kids

It's almost time for my Equinox membership renewal come this June and I still have 7 guests coupons unused and will be expired by June 1st. Coincidentally, a few of my mommy friends were talking about swimming last week and I invited them to the EQ pool.

However, it rained the entire Friday night and I was so worried that we have to cancel our plan. I told Charlotte that I have invited some of her friends to go swimming and I asked her to pray so that she could go to the pool. She did before she went to bed, this was her prayer: "Jesus, please don't rain. Little Charlotte wants to go swimming. Please don't rain. Thank you Jesus. Amen"

I woke up around 1.30am and it was still raining but I know Jesus heard Charlotte's prayer and I went back to sleep after I said the prayer myself quietly. When I woke up around 8am, I went to check at the window and it was a bright sunny morning and off we went to EQ!!!

We had so much fun swimming and singing with the kids. We spent about 1 hour in the pool and we were ready to head for lunch at Kampachi! The kids were very well behave at lunch, it was beyond our (mothers) expectation to have lunch with 4 kids to our own!

After lunch, we spent a short moment at the pond outside of Kampachi for the kids to see the Japanese koi and some photo shots.

By the time we left was about 1.30pm. Charlotte napped from 2.00pm to 5.00pm that afternoon! It was so much fun for all of us, the kids enjoyed the outdoor playtime and the mommies were good companions.

I took Charlotte there again on Sunday evening, and as we were about to leave to meet her grandparents for dinner she pointed at Kampachi and said "I want to eat mee mee there!" *faint*

Follow Instructions

Charlotte loves to read and draw. So packing up books and drawing tools are very important when we plan to dine out, to keep her on her hair chair while waiting for the food to serve.

Instead of scribbling, she is now able to draw meaningful object, close enough for us to recognize it. I have also started to introduce stencils that she can use to trace, which needs more of her hand and wrist coodination.

She also loves to play with stamps, she calls it "chop chop". I bought many different stamps for her and she started with just learn to use the stamps the correct way and as she has mastered the stampping skill I am adding additional instruction to her whenever she plays with stamps. I drew square boxes on the paper and asked her to stamp inside the box. Of course, the boxes are much more bigger than the stamp to start with, and she did it very well.

I also started to let her do some simple coloring. I drew some basic shapes, and ask her to find the shape and color it. The instruction given to her was that the color needs to stay inside the line, and I could see she was trying very hard to accomplish it.

I started of by showing her what it means by coloring the 2 at the bottom right corner. She then did the square beside it, the second one on the left is getting better and then the pink color circle was very good. She then moved on towards the left with the green but it was not done very well and when I interupted her she was more like in giving up mode and she started to scribble again, those were the yellow lines...but she continued the day after and the result was quite good (to me).

This is just a begining, simple task to us does not mean as simple as to the toddlers/preschoolers. They are at their exploring stage and I know she is going to master the skill soon.

Learning Alphabets

I bought the LeapFrog ABC refrigerator magnet for Charlotte last year but I wasn't really teach her on recognizing the alphabets until lately. I started to associate letter with words that she knows, and also trying to show her the shape of some letters like O, H, and I to help her to relate and remember it.

From the recent week learning, once again she reassured me that she IS a fast learner. She is now able to recognize the bottom 2 rows of letters on the picture. Although sometimes she still confused with O and Q, H and I, but she is definitely getting there.

She Loves To Sing!

Charlotte started her singing "talent" by completing the sentence with the last word, like this. Remember her favorite lullaby? She is also able to fill in some of the words everytime the song is play. She is now able to sing a few complete songs like twinkle twinkle little star, rain rain go away, happy birthday to you, and others.

Last week, I bought her a new toy after discovering that she was pretending to sing using a microphone. I was very surprise to see that because I have not told her about microphone. She probably pick it up through TV program, wedding receptions that we have attended and etc.

The toy set comes with a microphone, a mic stand, a base that has a musical feature that plays 24 different songs, and a mini amplifier. First, I only gave her the microphone and keep the rest for other days. She was very excited when I gave it to her and she happily singing away. I kept the rest of the set in my room.

Yesterday morning, as I was getting ready to work she discovered the remaining parts of the microphone and requested for it. I have no choice but gave it to her as she seems to know that those are suppose to complete the microphone that I gave her earlier. So, I took the set downstairs and set it up for her.

See how stylish that is...

Toilet Trained

Charlotte is now graduated from potty to toilet. I posted about her potty training in Nov 2007 and I bought her a children toilet seat some time early this year. I started her with just wee wee using the toilet seat. At first, like every other new toy she was very excited with it and always wanted to go toilet instead of potty whenever she wants to wee wee. When the excitement went ago, it will only depending on her mood. Sometimes I took out the potty but she wanted the toilet, other time I took her to the toilet but she requested the potty instead.

Lately, it has been very consistent that she would want to go to toilet whenever she wants to wee wee. She also has successfully did her "big business" since the last 2 weeks using the toilet!

I took this picture last week as she did her big business, cute eh?

Happy Mother's Day

Really what it means to me is nothing more than seeing Charlotte growing healthy and happy. I started to REALLY realized the real meaning and responsibility behind this simple yet warm title "mother" after I became a mother myself 30 months ago.

Is it a stressful, exhausting and around the clock responsibility being a mother? You bet but yet it is the most satisfying accomplishment you will ever get. Every night before I shut my eyes, I look at my beautiful girl and she means the whole world to me. It's worth the effort and I can't be more satisfying doing everything that I could, for her.

Charlotte, of course is still too young to understand what Mother's Day is about but we celebrated Mother's Day with a full day of agenda, revolving around Charlotte's interest though...that's what mothers do after all, right? She only napped for 1 hour that day before we headed out to EQ for a swim and celebrate Mother's Day with my mom.

Here is what did for my mom, because I know Charlotte means a lot to her too.

Happy Mother's Day to all mothers out there!

Who Is Charlotte's Brother?

Charlotte woke up this morning in a very happy mood. She played with me as I was getting dressed to work. In between, she suddenly sat down on the bed and pout...

Charlotte: Charlotte sad (crossed her hands, and pout)
Me: Why?
Charlotte: My brother?
Me: Huh? Who is your brother?
Charlotte: My brother?
Me: Who is your brother? Where is your brother?
Charlotte: People take my brother away...
Me: Huh? Who?
Charlotte: My brother...
Me: People take away? Where?
Charlotte: Shop
Me: Huh?? Which shop? Queensbaymall?
Charlotte: No...

In fact, she has been talking about "my brother" very often this week and every time it's with that sad looking facial expression and tone. I really don't understand what is she trying to say or is it just her imagination?

We have been teaching her about "grandmother", "grandfather", "father" and "mother" by associating them with KongKong, MahMah, Daddy and Mommy but we have yet to introduce her "brother" and "sister" because I think it is difficult for her to associate since she doesn't has anyone to associate to.

I am puzzled about the "my brother" thing that Charlotte has been repeating lately. Hopefully it is just her imagination.

Professional Shots

I didn't blog about the family photos we took back in Oct 2007 at Shalom, where we took our wedding photos too. We were not given soft copy and I couldn't reproduce it because I don't have a scanner at home. I tried over and over again, and finally I got the best of it although not as good as the original copies.

I did a digital scrap using a free trial from Smilebox and checkout my creation of our first family album taken by professional!