puff and huff

Dad has had a couple of days off, which has led to a lot more interaction with the kids than usual. It’s made for some long days, and sleeping in the car.

 

He managed to crash the tail-end of a morning tea, where Huff was working away at some low-tech telephony.

A birthday party for a visiting friend had us make a trip to Symbio wildlife park. Puff fed his first kangaroo (and, less successfully, had a goat steal not one but two bags of food through the fence)

The high point for the kids was to see some animals up close, and get to touch them. The underbelly of an alligator is the soft part, Puff found out.

Huff only made it as far as the scales on the top.

A little more soft-toy like were the possums. Huff loved the brush tail possum.

And the ring tail possum grabs your finger with its tail when it gets the chance.

Puff was sitting on Dad’s lap, so it was a bit trickier to get the action photos, but his reaction was unmistakeable.

With some extra time, we’ve managed to grab the DSLR camera, which has made for a few extra close-up photos.

A trip to the Blue Mountains saw us get a rare family photo together (with the three sisters).

It turns out that we have a lot of warm clothes, but they’re all pretty masculine.

We also took a trip on the Scenic Skyway: Puff was uncomfortable on the outbound trip, but seemed to have overcome his anxieties for the return journey, even asking if we could go again. One day.

He also found his first pinball game – it was on free-play, and had a chair set up next to it, so Dad thought it might be fun.

We’ve had quite a few extra trips to cafes this week: Huff’s babycino technique has significantly improved.

One downside: the family has been sick for most of the week: lots of colds, more waking in the middle of the night than usual: – we’re hoping for some more unbroken sleep and a chance to get well again. See you next week!

A journey into uncharted territory for Dad this week, putting both kids to bed by himself two nights this week. It’s a slightly larger challenge to read a book to two kids while keeping one of them from turning the pages or otherwise damaging anything. It went smoothly, and both kids went to sleep very quickly.

We’ve had some trouble getting Huff used to cleaning her teeth: we’ve tried lots of different things – the latest has been letting Huff copy her big brother. Puff has taken this a step further, and he now brushes his toy monkey’s teeth while Huff gets her teeth brushed.

A trip to Chinatown for a mid-week lunch with Dad saw us walk past the brightly painted alley – there was time to take a couple of staged photos with Puff: this was the best of them. Impressively, he can (pretty well) navigate from here to the shop where we buy the custard puffs.

Here we were at lunch: Dad was watching the kids while Mum wandered the food court. They were very well behaved.

Huff has a gorgeous grin.

Puff and Huff had a few chances this week to help mum in the kitchen. Here they are helping clean the various beaters and stirrers from a cake.

Huff, sharing Mum’s kebab, decided that it wasn’t enough to eat the meat out of the kebab, she had to hold the whole thing!

Puff and Huff spent time with a bunch of friends this week: – here he is H and J: they were trying to see who could get into the leg irons.

There was a lot of walking on this day – Puff took the opportunity to rest for a bit by the harbour.

A few other events:

• a trip to a cafe in Engadine where Dad, Puff and Huff sat and watched the babycinos being made in front of us
• birthday party for a friend where Puff played outside in “plain feet” until it was dark, bouncing on the trampoline and taking the occasional goal attempt in soccer
• lunch at a dumpling shop in Hurstville
• caught up with some visiting friends – more on this next week.

A bit of a quiet week with a packed weekend. Dad even managed to have a night out (once the kids were in bed).

During the week, Mum took the kids to Costco. They both still fit in the trolley, and the shopping trip is much easier when they’re sharing one of the giant smoothies across two cups.

Saturday was a trip to a friend’s birthday party (little J turned 4). Huff enjoyed crawling around, and even started to navigate some of the single steps that separated a couple of rooms.

Puff had his first ever go at pin the tail on the donkey – he managed to beat the veterans, and win a prize!

Huff varies between being extremely unhappy, and being happy and wanting cuddles with her Dad. Here she is, happily distracted for a period of time.

Mum and Dad took some time on Sunday afternoon for a date of sorts – we all wandered up to a local cafe for hot chocolates and babycinos. The kids were blissfully quiet and distracted for a short period of time. 

The trip up to the cafe was fun: Dad and Puff ran ahead, at Puff’s insistence. To try and keep ahead of Mum, we ran at various speeds. First 60, then 100, then one million, then some new numbers. Dad has taught Puff about a googol, and a googolplex. Puff made up the number “1 pintillion” (1 with a million zeroes after it) and “1 pintillion plex” (1 with a pintillion zeroes). It’s fun watching his brain work on these things.

With the rainy weather today, Mum took Huff and Puff to an indoor play centre. Puff is increasingly confident and agile in these spaces.

One favourite is the ball pit: they’re getting better at playing together without disagreeing.

A couple of other highlights:

• a trip to the local sports club for dinner and gelato ended up a late night when Puff was still asleep as Dad arrived home. Dinner went well, but dessert saw some frayed tempers
• Mum took both kids into the city to run some errands. She called into her old work to say hi to some old friends, and visited Dad for a coffee (more frayed tempers)

See you next week!

A few stills from this week. 

Puff and Huff were a bit stir crazy after a wet weekend, and so Mum took them to Cronulla for a run on the beach (Puff had a great time chasing seagulls and looking at the footprints they’d left behind) and some gelato. Here they are in the stroller with the gelato: the facing-opposite-ways helps resolve arguments of who has what food.

Food envy remains a big problem for Huff. If someone else has food that she doesn’t have, she immediately decides that the food in front of her is no longer appealing, and demands the food that the other person has.

Little milestones often go un-noticed, but Puff is competent to work a bubbler now.

Sunday afternoon saw us visit some friends; everyone played together quite happily, and we re-watched the Muppet Movie on DVD. 

Here’s Huff beating out a rhythm while waiting for lunch to arrive.

Puff’s highpoint of a trip to Bondi Junction Westfield was a visit to T2, but he seemed to like some of the furniture too.

A piece of paper was turned into confetti by Puff, and here he is cleaning up the snowstorm into a little bucket (rest assured the car was safely parked for this bit).

Here’s Puff getting to know Buster – believe it or not, he’s just a puppy.

Puff continues to amaze with his complex sentences: I’m “too incredible for you to imagine”

Huff has learned to answer the question “What does a duck say” with something that sounds like “Quack”. We’re very proud.

Another big week. Mum and the kids came into work to visit Dad so we could go for a lunchtime walk. Huff was rugged up very solidly – lots of layers seem to be a running theme for her at the moment – her pyjamas are layered too, in an effort to have her stay warm through the night (and not wake up cold).

One of the big advantages of being a single-income family is the chance to see the kids during the work-day, sometimes. The obvious disadvantage being the single income. We walked down to Chinatown, and found that Puff knows his way around pretty well – he even stopped us walking at one point because he noticed we weren’t going the most direct way to buy “emperor puffs”.

On the Saturday of the long weekend we caught the train in to the city. There was an anti-whaling ship at Circular Quay, so we stopped to have a look around.

After an indulgent lunch, we stopped at sticky for a surprise. He was hoping it would be emperor puffs again, but instead we went to a lolly shop in the Rocks.

Sunday afternoon (after a peaceful lunch with some friends) we watched a DVD (Emperor’s New Groove… probably a bit old for the kids, as it turns out). Huff was keen to share her popcorn with Dad.

Long weekend Monday we went for a long drive to visit some friends. With all the rain, the kids were getting a bit crazy trying to stay indoors. Before too long, the tunnel that they’d been crawling through became a more imaginative toy.

Dad’s looking forward to next week, when his exam is over for the semester: it’s tricky balancing time.

Puff is starting to sing more of the songs at church. Huff is more clearly expressing the words that she uses, but still hasn’t worked out the difference between “done” and “I’m still eating”. Hoping that day comes soon!

Not as many Puff photos as usual – he’s been a bit unwell, so we haven’t been doing as many things that need photographing. Time for a Huff update.

She’s better at expressing herself, but just as strong-willed with what she wants. Here she is using the grindenstein (usually used for cleaning up Dad’s coffee-making) to store her banana.

A trip to a fun park so Mum could catch up with a friend was a chance for Huff to work on her climbing skills, and Puff to do his usual adventuring.

She set a new record for herself, climbing up the steps of the bouncing castle. She had a great time bouncing around on the castle, but her climbing was particularly impressive.

 

Saturday was a chance for Dad and Puff to get haircuts. The high-point for Puff was getting a lolly afterwards: Puff was full of advice for Dad – “if you are a good Daddy when you get a haircut, you can have a lolly”, but it didn’t pan out for Dad. 

Sunday was a trip to yumcha to catch up with old workmates. Puff wasn’t feeling well (we found out once we arrived), but we managed to grab this snap. Huff had a great time, ate a lot, and spent much of the time trying to eat with chopsticks.

Huff is always trying to do things her big brother can do. Here she is practicing her drawing. 

 

 

Huff is getting better at talking too: she can say “ba” or “plis” for please, and “da” or “ta” for thank you, and something like “gya” for yes, accompanied by a nod. She can even wave and say “bye”. And this week, she’s started with her first joke. When Dad is at work, she will say “Ma?” “Ma?” “Ma?” “Ma?” and then, when mum says “What, bubba?” She will say “Da!” (Dad) and laugh. We think Puff appreciates the humour more than the grown-ups.

We also had a chance to celebrate Doc’s birthday with a visit to Grandma and Doc’s house.

Another big week. A trip to Heatherbrae, a trip to the Vivid Sydney light festival, a Tupperware party and dinner-and-dessert out of the house. 

Puff and Huff are both travelling well in the car – Huff might be upset after a while, but she tends to go to sleep. She has a great time at the stops.

Puff has plenty of things to distract him in the car: there are books to read, toys to play with, and occasionally a phone to play games on.

This week there was a short-ish road trip to see the Grandragon. Puff loves spending time with his grandmother, and looks forward to his chance to play with her dog.

Huff really likes desserts: here she is tucking into what should have been Mum’s dessert.

With Mum’s turn to go to the dentist coming up again, it was time for Puff to have his first go in the dentist chair. He was a champion at it, being happy to climb up into the chair, sit down  and open his mouth, even before she was ready for him.

Huff is confident in crawling around, but when you put her on her horse toy, she’s happy to move around back and forward on the horse – she was even using it at one point to help Mum sort out some laundry and put it in the laundry basket!

At the vivid festival there were all kinds of different artworks to look at, and some to interact with: here’s Puff playing with a Kinect that is projecting onto the wall of the Sydney Museum of Contemporary Art!

Another artwork that was fairly interactive was this chime. Puff was interested in how it worked; certainly enough to get in and figure it out! 

Huff, though not so good at moving around autonomously, nonetheless found a lot of interest in looking at the sculptures (and saying something that sounded like “light”). This one was even more compelling for her.

Another thing she’s learned to do this week is “cuddle with arms”. Before, when you asked her to cuddle Mum or Dad she would just lean in to them, but now, you can say “cuddle with arms” and she’ll stretch her arms out (at least for Mum). Very cute.

 

Miscellaneous updates:

• Dad has started reading “the hobbit” to Puff. He’s memorised one of the songs from chapter one.
• Puff showed he may have what it takes to be an assistant Tupperware demonstrator, expertly encouraging a couple of Mum’s early-arriving friends to play an egg-and-spoon race game, handing out pens, and being very excited at a game where things needed to be remembered and written down.
• Mum, Huff and Puff had a sleepover at Aunty C’s house where there was, sadly, not much sleeping. Dad found it very odd to need to set an alarm in the morning to make it to work.
• Uncle J was back from an overseas trip, and neither Huff nor Puff seemed to have forgotten him (in fact, in the midst of an unsettled day, Huff was only too happy to go to her Uncle).
• Despite many attempts to correct him, Puff still emphasises the first, not the second word in “New York”.
• So sleepy were Huff and Puff on Sunday afternoon that Mum and Dad had a picnic. In the car. Near the beach. Ah, how much life has changed.

 

This week was our first holiday of sorts for a while – a three day trip to Diamond Beach in the NSW coast, where we could catch up with the Grandragon and Aunty C. Puff and Huff travelled well, though they didn’t sleep in the car.

Earlier in the week, Mum took Huff and Puff out for a play in a playground, and to the Baby and Children’s expo.

Huff is getting more confident in playgrounds – she doesn’t always look happy when she’s on the play equipment, but if you try to stop her, she will make her unhappiness felt.

Puff had a great time, as usual, playing, spinning, climbing, and sliding.

The food samples seemed the most popular part of the “Pregnancy, Babies and Children’s expo” that Puff and Huff went to. Or perhaps the miniature playgrounds dotted around. This picture was on the way there, and wasn’t promising.

Puff’s chef tendencies continue on unabated this week – he’s cooked crumpets for everyone a couple of times. He’s a little too keen to operate the toaster for Dad’s liking, though is sensible enough to stay away from the toaster when it’s hot.

Taking advantage of our proximity to the Forster-Tuncurry bridge, we took everyone out for a walk and scooter ride on the bridge – we made it about halfway across before one of the dogs was too tired to keep going.

On the way back, we played in yet another playground. Huff wasn’t completely sure about this boat, but equally wanted to try every piece of equipment she could gesture at.

Monday morning was the last day of the trip. With Huff in the ergo carrier, Dad and Puff headed to the beach to look for shells. This wasn’t the ideal angle for a photo of the two of them, but you get the idea. Puff also learned about leaving footprints on the sand.

Puff had a great time walking Bandit while everyone else supped on coffee for the trip home. They both looked really happy walking back and forth.

Puff and Huff had a great time with Aunty C and Grandragon; he was sad to see them go back home.

Mum is getting more crafty – she sewed a pair of wings for Puff to wear at his Kindermusik class – he had a great time “flying” around the house picking up worms.

When Puff is a man, apparently, he’ll go to work with Daddy, and then he’ll come home and cook the dinner.

It was a great trip to have a sunroof in the car – on the drive into Forster, Puff had a chance to look at all the stars.

Huff is continuing her adventures in crawling – Mum was looking for her: can you spot her in this photo?

Huff’s favourite thing at the moment is still being on a swing. She’s not so sure about the spider swing, though.

On Thursday Huff and Puff came in to have lunch with Dad. Dad found it tricky to keep his work shirt clean while Huff was eating, but managed it somehow! Sadly, Mum came down with a migraine, so didn’t have a very good week!

Huff had her first ferry ride, and seemed to love it – is there a difference between being in a stroller on a ferry, and being anywhere else on a ferry?

There wasn’t much for a pre-walking baby to do at the zoo, but she liked looking around at the animals, and enjoyed being in the ergo carrier with Mum.

Travelling by public transport came with lots of opportunities to spend time with Grandma. Mum took this photo, which might explain her “why aren’t you holding me yourself” expression.

Puff continues to grow up: he was helping Dad with some gardening work. He’s still a bit too small to work with the gardening tools, but he made up for it with enthusiasm.

While Huff was downstairs in the stroller, Puff led the charge for Dad and Aunty S to the top of the ferry. At first he wasn’t sure about it, because there were no windows on the top deck, but once we’d pointed out that he would still be able to see the water, he was fine, and had a lot of fun watching the harbour on our way to the zoo.

We had a lot of fun trying out the different interactive elements at the zoo. Here’s Puff, a few feet off the ground, seeing which bird matches his wingspan.

He’s getting more confident with his climbing, and quite enjoys exploring new playgrounds. It’s still surprising to see him triumph over a piece of play equipment that, a week before, had been too tough for him.

 

But perhaps the most impressive thing we saw this week was his desire to cook scrambled eggs for dinner. Ask Kel to see her video of a tired Puff explaining what he was doing to prepare dinner.

Earlier in the day he’d made crumpets for breakfast (he retrieved the crumpets and the jam from the fridge, and had everything laid out until he realised he needed the toaster, at which point he said “Mum! You need to help me with the toaster”). Once they were ready, he ran over to sit in his eating chair, and then grabbed his sister’s hand (she was already sitting in her high chair) and said grace with her. It was a beautiful moment.