Category: week in review

Our Saturday morning cafe brunch was made much quieter for the five or so minutes that Puff was enjoying this berry smoothie. Here’s a time-lapse of part of it.

We also stopped at a playground to try out the play equipment – he had a lot of fun once he’d worked out that this wooden bridge was something he could handle.

We had another midwife visit to check how Huff is going, and when they used the doppler machine to play the heartbeat, Puff started reciting his Greek Alphabet in time with the heartbeat (140bpm).

Puff made himself an impromptu cape, and Mum taped it on – he had a good time running around with it (lots of mileage from the silver wrapping paper from a bunch of flowers a long while ago).

Friday night we tried for a relaxed family dinner out: after a few rounds of Fruit Ninja on the iPhone, he settled down and ate quite a bit of vaguely healthy pizza from Crust Pizza.

Saturday night we went out for dinner, and there was a Koi pond near where we were eating. It was pretty crowded in the pond, but that just made it more fun to watch the fish swim around.

The tendency that Puff has to share Dad’s breakfast has spread from toast to cereal – you might be able to see the spoon in his hand.

The house is set up with some Christmas lights and a tree. Puff isn’t quite sure what it’s all about yet, but he knows not to open the presents that are underneath the tree, at least until Christmas.

Puff has been helping Mum with the Christmas cards by drawing on each one. There was a bit of a production line happening.

The sacrificial lamb became “the sacrificial cat” in Puff’s relentless singing along with “Everybody get Ready” the Colin Buchanan Christmas CD.

What an odd week. Puff has been a bit unwell for some of it, and sleeping at odd hours. On Friday night his nap was late, and so we went out for dinner to the local Indian restaurant. He managed to try a few different things, especially enjoyed the ice cream at the end of the night, and then went to bed very late (a little after 10pm).

It wasn’t the best of weeks for food: during church, after eating his dinner and dessert, as he eased out of his eating chair, he yawned, and his dinner and dessert “spilled” onto Dad’s jeans, arm, and the general surrounds. This is the first time that Dad has been thrown up on by Puff, so it was a pretty spectacular way to start!

Today for lunch we went to a cafe that had stepping stools as chairs – he liked having a chair he could climb up into!

Heading with Mum to a Christmas party for one of the old mothers’ groups, he had the chance to spend a couple of hours at the play centre – his favourite was the giant slide.

He’s had a great time riding on these in-store toys. This week, while he wasn’t quite watching what was happening, Mum added some money to the ride, and waited for him to his to “start” button. He was very pleasantly surprised by the extra music, but then didn’t realise how it had happened, and so went back to being happy to sit on the ride.

This week has seen him start walking around the house with his little plastic phone held up to his ear. He says things like “that’s fantastic”, and talks to whoever he decides. Here’s an excerpt.

One little memory I wanted to capture before it stops: when he eats, sitting in his eating chair, he’ll stretch out his foot and rest it on my knee.

In which we go to the Sydney Aquarium, Puff learns his Greek Alphabet, and we see his negotiating skills further improve.

Puff’s already really comfortable with the Enlgish alphabet, and can count to 100 in English, and from one to ten and back in French and German. So Dad thought it would be interesting for him to learn a different alphabet: this time, the Greek one.

So Dad wrote them out, and showed them to Puff.

He was pretty interested, but the real learning came when I showed him this video – he loved it, and wanted to watch it a lot of times in a row. Soon enough, he’d figured it out.

Saturday, we took the vouchers that uncle J gave us for Christmas and went to the Sydney Aquarium with Aunty C and the other Uncle J. He wasn’t sure about it at first, but after a while, he warmed up to the place. The sharks were a bit overwhelming, but then the penguins brightened his mood.

Another high point for him was this coin-spinner. Given half a chance, he would have had every coin we’d brought with us down this funnel.

One part of the aquarium is hands-on, and Puff had a great time getting his hands in the water, and playing with a shark egg.

It seemed that the overall effect was to make him quite fond of sharks. He spent quite a pleasant few minutes watching all the fish, and was especially excited when the sharks went by.

The next day, when he made it to a pet store, he was nothing short of delighted when he saw this mouse running around in its wheel.

It’s been a good week for uncontrolled giggling. We were taking turns saying “yes” and “no” in a faux-conflict, and he found it hysterical.

And the negotiating skills? Spotting a blue cushion in Target, Mum told him that he had to put it back, and he said “or we could bring it home?” He’s a big fan of the cushion.

One last little anecdote. Mum was eating chips, and had a little container of vinegar to go with them. Puff looked interested, and so had a chance to try it. When he tasted it, he said “It tastes like lemon juice”, and “like Daddy had on his salmon”. It’s scary how well he’s going at putting things together: his memory is already much better than his Dad’s!

It’s the last week of Mum’s amigurumi course, and Puff is finally in bed now after a trip to the library. Dad is feeling pretty tired: it’s been a long day. Puff is now waking up around 7am-7:30am so he can say goodbye to Dad before he goes to work.

We had a rare moment of perfect lighting, and so Puff managed to notice the shadows that he was casting on his tray.

On Friday Mum took a trip to the dentist. A tired Puff managed to spend the whole visit asleep on the chairs in the waiting room!

Saturday saw Mum make her usual trip to the pool, and so Dad cooked breakfast for himself and Puff. He ate it up pretty well, which was good (putting some cheese in with the scrambled eggs couldn’t have hurt).

The big adventure of the weekend was going to Dymocks to meet Spot. Puff had a great time – there was a game of pass-the-parcel, and one of pin-the-spot-on-Spot.

He did so well in the blindfolded game (with Mum holding the blindfold on and helping him walk without tripping over) that he won a Spot toy. So now he has two!

On the way home, we saw a diesel-powered train, and some of the passengers waved to us: here’s the guard!

On Sunday we made the most of the excellent weather, and went to Cronulla for some family time. After playing on the playground, Puff and Mum went all the way to the water, and stepped in. He was so comfortable there that he was keen to step in even deeper – we’ll have to remember his swimmers next time we go to the beach!

For the first couple of nights after winning the new Spot toy, he was a bit obsessed with Spot, and ended up sleeping with Monkey, Cat, Spot and Spot. We’ve manage to wean him of that, but he’s still pretty keen to have them around him.

His negotiating skills are improving – he’ll often suggest something that he might like. His current phrases are “no thanks”, “I think so”, “actually…”, “I reckon”, “pretty much” and “or… I could still be here a bit longer”.

And who could forget the “[Puff] have a little bit of Daddy’s toast?” and “two bits of Daddy’s toast?” – perhaps that’s why he’s been getting up earlier!

This week, Mum had to have another blood test, and so Dad had the chance to take Puff to Kindermusik. This week, it was “bring a drum” week. Dad was the only man in the class, which was a little odd, but Puff enjoyed it.

He was playing with magnets during the week too: he knows a couple of words (Mummy, Daddy and his name) that he can spell out with the magnet letters.

After Kindermusik, on the way to drop Dad back at work, we stopped for an early lunch and to try out the babycinos. This particular place does a giant one, but with enough foam that he managed to consume it pretty tidily.

We don’t normally let him watch TV, but he woke up just while we were watching some Star Trek, and so he caught some of an episode – Dad thought it was worth grabbing a picture of him watching it.

When we went to have lunch on Sunday, we called into another cafe. As soon as we sat down, they provided Puff with crayons and join-the-dots puzzles.

His favourite thing while shopping is to play on the in-store machines. Mum still hasn’t put any money into the machines, but he’s enjoyed the kind donation of a few other parents.

Tonight Mum was at the second of her three night classes of Amigurumi, so Dad had a night of solo-parenting. We went out to the backyard to kick the ball around a little bit. He’s still at the stage where he says “kick” every time he kicks the ball, but it was a good start.

Another week, where we’re getting closer and closer to Christmas, and to the arrival of Huff. Dad has now felt Huff kicking twice, and Mum has felt Huff kicking too often to count (though she has some advantage there).

This week’s behavioural challenge has been his tendency to pull at the edge of his singlet whenever there’s nothing happening. Dad has introduced the question “What does your singlet say?” with the response “Don’t touch me!” in a funny voice. Sadly, this has just made him laugh, and doesn’t seem to have reduced his tendency to fiddle with his singlet.

Given what happened after his last haircut, where his baby hair started to fall out, and wasn’t for a long while replaced with new hair, we were a bit cautious, but with his hair as long as you can see above, we thought it was time.

The hairdresser cautioned us that if he was moving his head around too much, then we’d have to abandon the haircut – it was too dangerous.

So we set about to distract him with some videos.

On Saturday, we braved the threat of rain to go to sculpture by the sea. He had a good time climbing all the steps, and – though not all that interested in the sculptures – seemed to like this one for its textures.

The two characters behind him didn’t really catch his interest, but it was as good a place as any to pause and grab a photo of him in front of a sculpture. He’s changed a lot since last year’s trip and, of course, his first trip.

It seemed like it was time for another photo of him grinning. This particular grin was brought about by a recollection of what singlets say – “Don’t touch me!”.

Oh, and how did the haircut end up? Here he is driving a hot dog van at a nearby Westfield. As you can tell, it’s one of his favourite things.

There have been moments this week that have been so much fun that Dad keeps wondering to himself how much he’s going to give up when there are two kids to divide his attention, let alone being able to get anything else done!

Puff is showing an increasing attention span with books – today he managed to sit through a whole chapter of Winnie the Pooh on the iPhone where a few screens were without pictures – I think he was happy being read to, and seemed to be understanding most of what was going on. He even asked for more to be read to him later in the day – a welcome change from just asking for “videos”!

One of his favourite things to do is to draw, either in one of his drawing books (blank paper), or on his easel. Imagine our surprise this week when he decided that he was going to break all his crayons in pieces! This meant that he had a whole day of not drawing anything (the usual punishment is for him to lose something for a day), and then had to go back to drawing with crayons that no longer have the paper wrappers on them. He’s hesitated a little bit with this, but in general he’s happily back to drawing again now.

Sometimes Dad wonders if he’s taking his drawing too seriously:

It’s not something that needs a lot of worry, though – once the drawing ‘work’ is done, he heads back to his normal, happy self.

We had a visit from uncle M this week, and after a brief period of being quite anxious about him, and a couple of marshmallows, everything was fine, and they were getting along really well. Here they are playing on the Wii together.

Another little craft project that’s come to fruition this week is this set of shoes: he’s not terribly steady on his feet while wearing them, but has a great time scuffing around the kitchen while his balance holds out:

Today in particular was a day where he was really well behaved. Mum took him out to the shops, and he had an extra long play on the shopping centre play equipment (quieter due to Melbourne Cup Day). When he came home, the good behaviour continued: he did a great job eating his dinner, and was particularly happy saying “baa” and eating these “lamb with handles”.

One last cute saying: when Mum spilled her cup of tea today, and Puff was nearby, he took the opportunity to reassure her: “Don’t worry Mum, it was an accident”. Priceless.

See you next week!

Puff is in bed (before 8:30!) and has had his bedtime stories (tonight was The Tale of Benjamin Bunny and Hairy Maclary and Zachary Quack) and his bible story (Entering the promised land from The Big Picture Story Bible), and said his prayers and the Lord’s Prayer. Now that the house is quiet again, it’s time for another week’s update.

On Friday night, Dad was running late to leave work, and so Mum and Puff drove into the city to meet up. We had dinner in the food court at Broadway, and then went for Ben and Jerry’s ice cream afterwards. Puff had a lot of energy by the end of the meal!

On Saturday we caught the train into the city to go to the Australian Museum to look at the kidspace area they had there. Here he is with Mum on the train.

And here he is with Dad on the train (it’s been a while since we had some parent photos). He was pretty well behaved on the train in, had a great time in the museum, and then fell asleep in the stroller on the way back to the train station. While he slept, Mum and Dad grabbed lunch in a cafe (the Museum of Sydney cafe), and witnessed a downpour. Eventually Puff woke again, and we headed to Circular Quay station in a bit of rain.

Rain was the theme of the weekend: after a leisurely breakfast at home, we headed towards the shire for some shopping. Before we were halfway there, Puff was asleep, so we detoured via Grind, and then went back to our plans.

One last photo: Puff spending some time with baby A today.

In Huff-updates, Dad felt Huff kick for the first time on Sunday this week (24/10/10).

See you next week!

There was a bit of an adventure today with Puff taking a small tumble on our front stairs. Mum was right onto it, but Puff is a little bit out of sorts this evening, and we’re trying to work out what the next step in looking after him will be. At the moment, it seems that some Panadol (“I don’t like medicine”) should get him back to
normal again.

On Sunday, Aunty C snapped this picture of Dad reading a story to Puff. It’s hard to do voices for Goldilocks and for the three bears!

Breakfast for Mum’s birthday was pancakes.

Thanks to Aunty C and Uncle J for babysitting Puff twice on Saturday so that Mum and Dad could enjoy some time together as grown-ups for a change.

Puff is still doing impressive things with his number floor-mats: here he is doing some backwards counting while stepping on the mat squares.

On Monday night, we made the trek to the Night Noodle Markets. Puff was a little bit unsure at first, but then managed to get into the spirit of things. This is his second trip to the markets (the first was this time last year) and this year he was old enough to actually eat the food that was on offer!

His favourite part of the markets was this fountain – after some soul-searching, we agreed to let him put his hands into it (it was a cool-ish night, and we didn’t have a change of clothes with us, so there was some element of risk).

This is as good a time as any to mention that little Huff is due in early February. If you ask Puff where the baby is, he will tell you “in Mummy’s tummy”. He’s looking forward to having a little brother or sister, but it’s pretty certain that he has no idea what that will be like. Mum and Dad were thinking about how we’re going to go at next year’s noodle markets with a 3 year old Puff and a 8ish month old Huff!

On the train ride home, he was a little bit hyper (perhaps from the ice cream we fed him on the walk back to Central station) – here’s an attempt to capture the excitement.

This week, a few of the cute things that Puff does at the moment.

Saturday morning Dad does the morning routine while Mum goes to the pool. Puff has some number floor mats that he’s very fond of, and he asked Dad “put three and two on [Puff’s] hands?”.

We were saying something that he suddenly found funny, and we were then going back and forth and he had the giggles. After a day where he’d been misbehaving quite a bit, it was a welcome break in the weather.

The benefit of daylight saving is that Puff can meet Dad at the train station on the way home from work – we can even go to the park before it’s time for dinner. The light is pretty good, even for a phone camera.

We had some time in a cafe this week, and again we distracted Puff with the old faithful Dr Seuss flip books. He’s changed a little more in the way he behaves in cafes: he can generally manage to get the courage up to order a babycino for himself now.

There are lots of things that are tricky when there’s only one income in the house, but it has benefits, like when Puff comes to visit for a lunchbreak. Here he is relaxing with a balloon hat.