Can she walk yet?

This is the most common question I get from relatives and friends regarding Janine's development. And the answer is....NO :) (Sorry to disappoint you all, folks!) Actually, I'm pretty amused by this question. I even had someone tell me that he heard Janine could walk already! Actually, Janine just turned 8 months old today! Hmm I hardly know of any 8-month-old who walks. Janelle walked slightly before her 1 year old birthday, so I suppose the earliest that Janine would start walking would be somewhere around there too.

Anyway, at 7 months old, Janine could:
- say "ma ma" and "ba ba" (for the record, her first 'word' was "mama"!!! She knows her stuff!)
- crawl forward, or rather, wriggle forward

Now, at 8 months old, Janine can:
- crawl more efficiently round the house
- pull herself to stand

Her favourite word nowadays is "ba ba ba ba", which she will say endlessly. Not to mention, all her loud 'shouts' and strange noises that are a little hard to spell. She's also crawling around the house. And sad to say, now that she has started crawling, she pukes even more  Perhaps it's the crawling position that helps her regurgitate more, so she has dirtied our carpet countless times. But other than that, she's a really cheerful and happy baby who simply loves to give a big wide grin at people whom she's familiar with.

Tomorrow is the start of the spring season, which means we have survived the winter! We hope that with the start of spring, it would mean the girls fall sick less often, as they have been taking turns to fall sick ever since we arrived in Sydney 2 months ago. Thank God for seeing us through this winter season!

First Day at School

Janelle attended her first day at school (aka childcare) last Thursday! We decided to send her to childcare 2 days a week (Tue & Thurs) because she misses attending playgroup in Singapore. She has been saying that she wants to go to Little Pals (the name of her playgroup in S'pore) so we decided to send her to one for her to play and mix with other children.

When we picked her up from school, the teacher was full of praises for Janelle, saying that she was a very well-behaved girl and gave no problems at all. The teacher went into detail on what Janelle did at school and how she behaved, etc. At the end of it, I told Janelle that "mummy is very proud of you" because I was! I was impressed with my little daughter on her behaviour on the first day at school :)

Was just thinking that as a parent, I have so much joy when my child makes me so proud of her. I wonder if our Father in Heaven feels proud of us - His children?

Growing Up in Ozzieland

Janine turns 7 months old in about 4 days' time. She currently weights 8.14kg! And I forgot her length! Just took her measurements at the pharmacy where the nurse on duty did it for me. Am impressed that she's now over 8kg! Didn't realise she was growing so fast as she still feels pretty light to me. Perhaps in comparison to Janelle who's way heavier, Janine seems rather light.

After almost 7 months of regurgitating milk, I am sad to say that Janine STILL regurgitates! *faint*
What happened to my prayers about her stopping her regurgitation when we come to Australia? Besides, now we have no maid to help clean up so I have to clean up the mess, plus we have carpetted flooring - which means the regurgitate remains on the flooring and it's harder to clean. Arrggh. And now that she's started on solids, she regurgitates her solids AND milk.

I asked the doctor over here about her reflux problem, and he told me that 80% of babies who have reflux will stop after about 6 months of age. So seems like Janine is in the unique 20% category of babies who continue with that reflux problem till they're much older.  And the doctor assured us there was nothing to worry about her reflux since she's putting on weight and growing well.

As for Janelle, she is speaking really well and talking a lot more since we got here. She is rather naggy (inherited from either parent) and can speak so well it surprises us sometimes. She'll be attending day-care twice a week from this week onwards. I suppose after another month here, she'll pick up the Aussie accent!

Best Friend

This was a picture Janelle took with her best friend Ariene on the last day of school at Little Pals last term. Don't they just look so cute? :) She will really miss Ariene when we go over to Australia. And on my part as a parent, I also feel sad that my little girl will not be able to play with all her good friends here in Singapore. Well, she probably doesn't realise she'll be going away for a long time, so it's like I'm feeling sad for Janelle on her behalf! How strange!

First Foods

Janine is now 5.5 months old and she had her first taste of solids today! We were contemplating whether to start her on solids now, or wait till we arrive in Sydney on 2 July to start. She'll be 6 months and 2 days old when we reach Sydney, and by then we may be too busy settling down to bother about feeding her, so thought she might as well start now while in Singapore. Besides, she has been showing great interest in our food - drooling and opening her mouth whenever she sees us eat!

It was a successful first attempt at eating her rice cereal from a spoon! In fact, she was so excited she grabbed at the spoon and stuffed it into her mouth and chewed on the spoon! She also managed to swallow the rice cereal pretty well.

Our little girl is growing up fast! She's also 7kg already, and looking extremely well-fed (ie. chubby) despite her still regurgitating milk. She's also really strong and can almost crawl, and can stand for a few seconds with some support. Because of the fact that she keeps turning over and attempting to crawl, she is no longer able to sleep by herself when we put her down on the bed , as she ends up in an activity of flipping over and shaking her butt in an attempt to crawl.

To our dismay, Janine has started shedding hair since she turned 4 months old and she's still shedding hair till now (together with her mummy!). Her head is already looking quite shiny and I think it'll be even more bald as the days go by!

Janelle has been a really loving older sister and the 2 girls really enjoy each other's company. This is a really cute stage that the 2 girls are at, for Janine never fails to laugh and be tickled by Janelle's funny antics and peek-a-boo games, while Janelle loves to shower her little sis with cuddles and kisses.

For me, I shall attempt to update this blog more regularly (just realised that my last entry was 2 months ago!), especially since we'll be going away and people will want to know what's happening to us and our 2 girls.

crying

We love this video of Janine crying! It was taken when she was 2 months old. Think she looks so cute and pitiful crying...haha :)

Janine sucking lips

Janine loves to suck her lips as though she's sucking a pacifier!