Incisors

The upper incisors are coming in. However, this does not mean that she has improved in her eating ability. I guess this is one area where Jaide is much slower than her older siblings...

Walking

At 13 months, Jaide has started walking in earnest! Here are two videos of her lastest accomplishment: one using a push cart and another entirely on her own. I'm so proud of her!

Happy Willow

The area named "PLAYPEN"

At first, we planned to visit "Happy Willow" on boxing day because the kids had no school and Joshua could take leave. Unfortunately, we realised Daddy still needed to return to work for an important meeting during the exact 3 hours slot that was ideal for us to go. (The playtime is payable every 3 hours) Not wanting to disappoint the kids, I decided to bring them there myself despite my physical limitations. 

The first 45 min was pretty relaxing for me as Jaide was still taking her nap and the older ones were exploring the big structures. Jayna, however, quickly grew bored and started pestering me about silly things. She has been acting up recently so once again, I find myself having to spend quite a bit of effort to deal with her unreasonable demands and tantrums. And of course, her crying woke Jaide up from her nap prematuredly.

Despite all that, the trip was quite worthwhile. The children seemed to like the playpen area the best and spent half our time there. I noticed that Jaide was cruising and walking to get to where she wanted to go a lot more now. It's so cute to see her toddling around. *beam*

Pretending to be a chef

The loyal 'customer'

Want some too?

The big structures were completely empty during the last hour we were there so we had the place to ourselves. There was a huge horse and the 3 of them had so much fun laughing and screaming in delight as they rode it together that I was glad there weren't anyone else to be disturbed by their noise. Pity that there were no pics or videos cos I had to hold onto Jaide the whole time in case she fell!

How do I play this?

Jayna enjoyed the colouring corner too. I wonder why the Hello Kitty was coloured blue though...

Here's a video of Jayna bringing Jaide along for a merry-go-round ride inside the big structure. They were at it for nearly 15 min while Joash went off on his own having a fabulous time exploring every nook and cranny.

Slow Down, Baby!

For the first time, my husband actually told me that Jaide is so cute that she can take her time growing up. I've always cherished the baby days of each of my children but for Joshua to wish that our daughter would stay a baby, I was quite surprised, considering that he has to do much more caregiving now that I'm not functioning at my full capacity. 

Of course, I can attribute that to the fact that Joshua is getting more experienced and adept at taking care of the kids so he can focus more on enjoying them. However, it is also true that Jaide is learning things and reaching milestones pretty quickly.

She took her first step even before she hit her first birthday. Now, we're seeing her walk a few steps unassisted and she's able to stand without support for long stretches of time. We were quite taken aback to watch her learn to "cook" with the toy utensils from her sister and move the toy vehicles around, complete with engine sounds, the exact replica of her brother at play. You can imagine how far our jaws dropped when she started keeping her own toys after playtime too! Even Joash didn't do that despite my constant drilling and coaxing till he was almost one and half years old. As for Jayna, well, she was being spoiled by her brother who was eager to keep her toys for her so she didn't learn to clean up after herself till she was more than two.

Jaide will no longer be the baby of the family in a few months' time. So, my little cutie pie, you can take your time for the moment. You can take your time. :)

God Is Gracious

A page in Jayna's report card

Today, we had a Parents-teachers meeting and received the older children's report cards. Jayna's excellent performance in school has encouraged me tremendously. All along, everyone has noticed her intelligence and capabilities which are more advanced than her peers. Her emotional maturity is another story altogether. It has been an extremely trying journey in teaching her to submit her emotions under the lordship of Christ. Dealing with her regular outbursts and screaming tantrums was particularly exhausting.

However, God is indeed gracious. All the efforts in filling up her love tank relentlessly and disciplining her firmly for the first half of the year through homeschooling have paid off. Even the teachers also marvel at how well behaved she is now at school. At home, even though she is still harder to manage than the other 2 kids, she is able to listen to reason and respond better to our love during her tantrums. She is definitely so much better during this pregnancy than last year when I was pregnant with Jaide!

I simply can't thank God enough for the miraculous change we see in her throughout this year. It makes for a far more peaceful and enjoyable family life now that she is more emotionally developed. I look back on the days in the past when she made me cry in despair on a regular basis and I'm just so grateful that it is a thing of the past. 

With her stubborn personality and certain idiosyncracies in her character, I cannot be complacent and must continue to teach/remind her the right way to interact with others despite the strength of her emotions at a certain point. She is no doubt gradually growing into the beautiful princess of God that I constantly remind her that she is meant to be.

May she become the powerful agent of empathy that God has shown me she'll be. Praise be to our gracious Lord!

Performances

Open....

... and close!

There are days when the children are in a showing-off mood and are eager to perform for me what they know how to do. Jaide has recently mastered the art of opening and closing bottle caps and lids. Whenever she successfully does that, she'll look at me with a wide grin and clap her hands, fully ecpecting me to applaud her efforts and praise her too. 

The older ones are proud to demonstrate new items in their favourite choice of activity. Jayna loves to sing, even though she seems to be tone-deaf, and dance. She'll perform for me the latest song which she learnt in school. The video clip below shows one such song. You can hear Jaide's laughter in the background as she is very much entertained by her sister's rendition of the song too.

Joash, however, has passed the song and dance phase and is now into reading. He would be excited to read the new books which the teachers gave him to bring home. Usually, he'll point at the individual word as he reads but for the case in the video below, he had to read very quickly as Jaide was forever itching to grab his book and tear it to pieces! LOL

Jaide is One!

My new bumblebee rompers!

Joash and Jayna have been to Singkids before Jaide was born so I took the opportunity of her first birthday to bring her there to experience it too. We decided to go there a week before her actual birthday so that she can enjoy the discounted rate for those less than a year old. Hee hee...

Checking out the place on a slow merry-go-round

Taking a ride with her sister

Hello there!

Jaide was intrigued by the fast moving balls at the merry-go-round for older kids and went to explore. That was until she discovered that the balls kept knocking into her head that she cried for help.  Poor dear...

Fascinated by the lights

Her favourite part was the room with flying balloons. It took her a while to get used to the strong wind but thoroughly enjoyed herself when she got used to it. The video below shows how she managed to catch her first balloon.

Licking the balloon she caught? Yuck!

Needless to say, the older two went around on their own having a fabulous time in the playground.

After the fun at Singkids, we chanced upon a train ride near the waterfront. Jaide enjoyed it tremendously! Thankfully, it lasted less than 10 min because Jaide became impatient towards the end with not being allowed to crawl around the cabin as she wished.

Here we go for the ride!

One happy baby!

I was hoping to get a soft enough cake for Jaide so that she would be willing to eat some of it. Unfortunately, she didn't fancy taking a bite at all. Oh well... She'll be ready in her own time. Also, unlike her sister, Jaide hates having anything in her hair or on her head. She was very irritated with the princess headband I tried putting on her. I somehow managed to take a picture of her wearing it without her looking mighty annoyed. It was pulled off by her in mere seconds. 

What's this thingy doing on my head?

It was a good thing that she regained her cheerfulness after hearing us sing the Happy Birthday song to her. She even started clapping her hands. After the traditional birthday prayer, she reached out to touch the flame but thanks to Joshua's quickness in blowing out the candle for her, she did not succeed. Hiak hiak hiak....

May you continue to grow in the Lord's goodness and show His goodness to those around you, Jaide!

First Transition

With Jaide becoming more and more agile, the day when she gives up sleeping in the playpen and upgrade to the children's room is near. As with the older ones, we're beginning the process by letting her take her naps on her new mattress and get used to the new environment. I've yet to buy her a pillow so for now, she's using her sister's. 

She has learnt to climb onto the beds well but she's still figuring out how to climb down safely. I've been teaching her but I guess it'll take some time for her to internalise it. Once she's able to walk steadily and climb up and down the bed with confidence, she'll be ready to complete her first transition to toddlerhood and relinquish the playpen to her new sibling. *grin*

Two Front Teeth

 

About two weeks ago, Jaide suddenly made a clicking sound that could only be possible if you have both upper and lower teeth to hit against each other. My suspicion proved correct when I checked her gums: her upper left central incisor was starting to emerge. A week later, she began cutting the right one. Now, her two front teeth are clearly visible. Let's hope that this means she can start chewing better. Can't believe that she still needs her porridge to be blended real smooth to avoid gagging... And yup, that means she isn't even ready for Gerber star biscuits. :P

5th Birthday Celebration

All ready to go!

Yesterday, we celebrated Joash's birthday the way he wanted. He asked for a pair of sunglasses to wear on the day and really took his own sweet time to select them last Sat. I wonder where he picked up his sense of fashion? Hee hee...

Instead of a cake, he had Swensons' The Rock sundae which he ate all of it by himself!

The birthday prince

And off we went to the Jewel Box to take the Angry Bird themed cable car which came with complimentary masks and fruit punch.

Yellow mask

There were stations to play the Angry Bird game for free and so Joash passed the queuing time enjoying them. Jayna couldn't reach the touch screen and resigned herself to merely drinking the fruit punch. :P

Inside the cable car, there was a huge angry bird stuffed toy and a short Angry Bird cartoon clip shown on the TV for the first 5 min. 

Happy boy with the Angry Bird

Looking at the scenery

At Sentosa, we bought a small pair of stuffed toy Angry Birds for the 2 older ones to commerate the journey. Then, it was time to head off to the Underwater World. Joash has always loved watching fishes swimming in tanks everywhere we go. Now, he'd have a taste of the big aquarium and finally get to see the dolphins which weren't available at the zoo.

Putting his hand in to feel the fishes

It was really dark in there and the sea creatures swam faster than my camera was equipped to capture. Thus, I only got pics of two of them which moved slow enough for it.

Jellyfish

Seahorse

Waiting for the Dolphin show to start

And there they were!

It had been an unimaginably difficult day for me to get through and I could only have done so by the grace and strength from God. It was already a miracle that the weather was the best type for me: cloudy and windy. There were countless times when I had to fight blacking out and severe nausea due to standing still for too long, catching whiffs of people's body odour, bad breath or the smell of cooked food. Each time, I would hang onto God in prayer and somehow managed to avert disaster. I really would hate to spoil Joash's fun if anything untoward were to happen.

I didn't dare to eat or drink much the entire day in case I vomit and I'm really grateful that I only finally emptied the meager contents of my stomachs in painful retching the moment we reached home at night. I was so relieved that I made it! Thank you, friends, who had prayed for me to survive the day!

I'm so glad that Joash enjoyed the day tremendously. *grin*

The Value of Siblings

It is such a joy to watch the children play. Now that Jaide is far more active and mobile, the older children have also learnt to include her in their play, though Jaide is often happy enough to tag along and get her hands on a few of their toys. Thankfully, most of their toys are pretty baby-safe.

Unless the children are sick, they play very well together and can be left alone by themselves for quite some time. Not that there are no arguments over toys or the way they play, these little fights are easy to manage with a few ground rules.

Looking for hidden blocks

Hi, Mummy!

As it is, I can see that there is a much bigger developmental gap between Jaide and the older ones as she is 2.5 years younger than Jayna while the difference between Joash and Jayna is a mere 1.5 year. I'm just glad that the next one will be closer in age to Jaide (also 1.5 year) so that she'll have company in the same sort of toys or games to play. I look forward to seeing all 4 of them have fun together! *dreamy*

Hair Matters

Jaide has much lesser hair than Jayna as a baby and thus everybody thinks that she looks like a boy. And it doesn't help that I sometimes dress her in her older brother's hand-me-downs! LOL The only part of her head that has a bit more hair is the fringe. Recently, it has become long enough to poke her eyes. Unwilling to trim her meager amount of hair, I use a hair clip instead. Finally, enough hair for a clip! Haha... 

Alas! she hates to have anything in her hair and will pull it out almost as soon as I put it up. Sigh... Looks like trimming her fringe is an inevitable thing. :P

Under the Table

Joash loved playing
under the table...

... and so does Jaide!

Lip smacking

Jaide loves to make interesting sounds. She began by growling and you might remember her pursing her lips, making kissing sounds. She also knows how to click her tongue, blow raspberries and now her latest fad is smacking her lips. Watch the video to see her do just that. :)

Active but Obedient

Now that the older kids have converted to full day childcare, I have more time to play with Jaide and appreciate how much she has grown. In a blink of an eye, she is now an active baby romping all over the place. It has become difficult to capture a decent shot of her as she moves too fast and the pics turn out blur most of the time. Using flash would improve the sharpness but the contrast and the colors are hideous, like the photo above. LOL

I've begun to teach her the concept of obedience since she's mobile enough to reach things that are potentially dangerous for her such as the fan and the power sockets. It took a while but it totally warms my heart when I see her flash a brilliant grin at me and crawl back to me for a hug after I speak her name in a stern tone which indicates that what she's about to do will earn my disapproval. How much more our Father in heaven delights in us when we obey His commands!