Josiah - 9 months old

Josiah is already 9 months old and still as cheerful and good-natured as ever! These are some of the interesting things he can do:-

1) Climb up the staircase! (most dreaded milestone for a baby to reach, because it means we cannot leave him on his own already...)

2) Cruise while holding on to furniture

3) Vocabulary: 

"teh-teh" (meaning jie-jie refering to his older sister)

"daa", "dee", "ba", "aahhh!"

Unfortunately, despite my many attempts to teach him the word "Mummy", he is nowhere near saying the word "ma" yet!

4) Absolutely detests water. Even baby fruit juice does not entice him at all. He now refuses to play with his water bottle (let alone drink from it) because once he sees the water bottle, he associates it with plain-tasting water. 

5) Eats a gigantic bowl of porridge for lunch and dinner. In fact, I am pretty sure the amount of food he eats is bigger than the size of his stomach! Wonder how can a tiny baby eat so much?!

We are thankful for him being such a good and endearing baby, who does not mind anyone carrying him at all. I suppose that's the difference between girls and boys - girls tend to be more sensitive about such things! 

Does Jesus Live in Your Heart?

"Does Jesus live in your heart?" is the question that Janine has been asking me since a couple of weeks ago. 

Today I had the great privilege of leading my 3-year-old to say the sinner's prayer and invite Jesus into her life. After taking some time to explain what it means to have Jesus live in her heart (ie. doing and saying things that will make Jesus happy, sharing toys, being kind to others, etc etc), she prayed this simple prayer with me:

"Dear Jesus, I invite You to come into my heart. Thank You for dying on the cross for me. Thank You for forgiving me of all the bad things I have done. Help me to do and say things that will make You happy. In Jesus' Name we pray, Amen!"

After praying, I then asked her: "Where will you go to when you die?". Janine excitedly answered: "Heaven!!". 

It was a divine moment in the midst of daily hustle and bustle. One would think that such a moment would be sacred and take place in a church setting or something like that, but with young kids it is probably as impromptu or as unexpected as can be. In fact, this simple prayer took place at our dining table just after I had fed Josiah his lunch and he had done a poop. But he was still sitting in his highchair, happy to watch us pray and talk. 

Straight after that, we went to give Josiah his bath and as I was doing so, I reminded Janine that there are so many beautiful angels in heaven dancing and singing because they are so happy that she invited Jesus to live in her heart. (my version of Luke 15:10 - "...rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents")

I am so reminded of this verse:

"Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven."

(Matthew 19:14, ESV)

Funny Episodes

Episode 1

As we were driving past McDonald's....

Janine (excitedly): Look Mummy! MacDonald's!

Me: Oh yes. Do you like McDonald's?

Janine: Hmmm....Yes!

           And I like the pigs, the chickens, and all the animals in the farm!

Me: ?!?!

After-thoughts: Glad that Janine has got this 'McDonald's-innocence'. To think she associated McDonald's with "Old MacDonald had a Farm"!

Episode 2:

After Josiah regurgitated some milk....

Janine: Eeewww! Yucky! 

*pause*

(pointing to Josiah): Di-di is yucky! 

(pointing to herself): And I am yummy!

(pointing to me): And you are Mummy!

After-thoughts: Never knew that Janine could conjure up such an interesting rhyme.

Episode 3:

I was downstairs and the girls were upstairs in their room when the garbage truck came by to collect our garbage. Both Janelle and Janine then came downstairs to look for me and this conversation took place right in front of me...

Janine (to Janelle) in a loud voice: Jie-jie, don't tell mummy that the rubbish truck came to take our rubbish, okay?

Me (trying to suppress my laughter): haha!

Janelle (to me): Mummy, mei-mei said don't tell you that the rubbish truck came to take our rubbish.

Me: Hahahahahaaa!!

After-thoughts: Both my girls are so silly!!

Josiah - 7 months old

It seems that with each month that goes by, our little boy just gets cuter and cuter! I suppose that's the beauty of parenthood - that your child always seems cute in your eyes

Crawling
Josiah has started crawling efficiently around the house and so we have barricaded the kitchen entrance from the living room. However he has also learnt to crawl round the other side of the living room to get to the kitchen so there is no way to prevent him from entering the kitchen :( Another downside of Josiah learning to crawl is that he deposits his regurgitate or puke all over different parts of the carpet!

Eating
Josiah eats really well and enjoys most foods! He still dislikes water or juice and spits it all out. Very smart boy indeed! He has also tasted some forbidden foods like chocolate - from an easter chocolate egg that was left lying around by one of our girls. Apparently Josiah managed to find the chocolate egg, peel off the foil wrapper and munch on the chocolate while we left him unattended for a minute!

Standing
He can now pull himself to stand and each morning, we open his room door to find him standing in his cot with a big wide grin on his face :)

Communicating
Josiah can really communicate more now through his expressions and blabber and actions. It is so endearing to see him "appealing" to me to put him to bed, or to feed him milk, or to carry him!! Thankfully he is still very contented to allow others to carry him and is a very cheerful little boy

Josiah and his Avocado

Josiah dislikes avocado (just like his daddy) so he spits it all out in a very cute fashion! I wonder who taught babies to be so smart as to do this?!

Josiah - 6 months old

Josiah is now 6 months old and we have started him on solids 1 week ago! He's eating really well now and enjoys his food! Janelle simply LOVES to feed him too!

At 6 months of age, Josiah is 67cm long and 7.3kg. He has been turning over both ways (ie. front-to-back and vice versa) and can roll all round the living room now! Recently, he has also learned to "crawl" (or rather, wriggle) backwards, which is pretty amusing. He can also sit up more steadily now, though still not completely stable.

He can babble "daa daaa deee" so it sounds like "daddy" - to Royston's ultimate delight! He has also been putting everything in his mouth and chewing on things, but still has no teeth yet. 

Josiah is still ever-so-cheerful and good-natured and charms everyone - especially us!

Why 5-years-old is such a charming age

This conversation took place when 5-year-old Janelle found out that I had to stay home to take care of the 3 of them, while Royston went out with a friend to another friend's house at 8pm for a time of fun and fellowship.

Janelle: "Mummy, you can go out too. You can leave us at home and go out."

Me: "Then who will take care of you all and put you all to bed??"

Janelle (earnestly): "Me! I will put mei-mei and di-di to bed. I will help mei-mei brush her teeth, and when she's gone to the toilet I'll clean her bottom for her. Then I'll put on her nappy and read her a story and we'll go to bed."

Me: "Really?? Then how about di-di?"

Janelle: "Yes I'll put di-di to bed too!"

*pause*

"But if he's hungry, I'll feed him cow's milk!"

Me: ???!!?!?!

Janelle (still thinking out loud): "Oh, but I don't know how to switch on the alarm."

(because we turn on the house alarm every night before we go to bed)

Awwww....I thought that was awfully sweet of Janelle to make such an offer. I was honestly very tempted to take up the offer so that I could go out! And she was serious about taking care of her siblings so that she could free me to go out!! Gosh, such a child-like simplistic view of life. Perhaps that's what I need