Into the 22nd Month...

little General is just that much closer to two. Lately his obsession seems to be Buzz Lightyear from the Toy Story movies. He simply adores him and as such we've had to endure countless hours of watching Toy Story 1, 2 and 3 over and over again. His sudden obsession started about 2 weeks ago, prior to this TV watching was an absolute minimum. He's had his Buzz Lightyear and Woody dolls since Christmas so I really have no clue as to how this fascination with Buzz started.

'NO'
is his answer to everything. It's driving us nuts.

Bintan 25 to 28th March
...was great. It's the most relaxing holiday we've had in ages. Matthew had a great old time playing by the beach or swimming in the pool any chance he got. All that playing meant 3-4 hours of napping every afternoon too which was wonderful for Duncan and I to kick back and relax and do absolutely nothing for a change.

First (professional) Haircut 29th March
I got a call from Matthew modeling agency on Tuesday to ask whether he'd be available today for a photo shoot, to which I'd said yes. So I quick trip to the hairdressers was in order. I wasnt going to chance giving him on of my 'Mummy Specials' and botch the job right before a shoot. Matthew didn't budge or whinge during his haircut but you can tell by the pictures that he wasn't too happy. Here are some before and after shots.

Before/During

After.

The Photo Shoot 31 Mar
went real well. Our day started at 930am on location on the Singapore East Coast Park. First up was make up and styling. Matthew refused to have his eyelashes curled and the stylist only managed to put some gel in his hair.  There were a few 'Nos' thrown about :( The biggest 'Diva' moment was when we all had to wait till Matthew finished his raisins before we could start shooting. The second biggest 'Diva' moment of the morning was when the stylists assistant had to fawn over Matthew with more raisins and gummy bears.

Matthew was paired with a Brazillian model as his faux Mum for the cover of Motherhood Magazine. His faux mum, Nadia was really lovely and great interacting with Matthew, so I think we got some really great pictures and the editors have a few choices to select from for the cover. The assignment was for 4.5 hours but Matthew managed to get his shots over with in less than 2. His agent was super impressed at how quickly Matthew completed his assignment. I'm glad it was over with quickly as jumping out of bushes to elicit a smile and a giggle out of Matthew on cue is tough work. Magazine is out May 2011. Will keep y'all posted.

Poh Poh and Goong Goong
are here. Thank goodness.

Not ready for potty training

we attempted to potty train Matthew a couple of weekends ago without any success. The only success we had was making Matthew afraid of the loo.

Matthew has kinda been showing us he's ready for potty training - telling us when he's done a poo in his nappy and we can tell when he's about to do one. Not so consistent with telling us he needs to do a wee but we'd thought we'd give it a go anyway, as the thought of getting potty training knocked over before the new baby arrives sounded very appealing. During the weekend in question, when Matthew indicated that he was about to do a poo, we'd place him on the potty. The first time he just sat there and looked around, at us and at everything else. So we thought, maybe not this time and keep trying. About 10 mins after we'd put Matthew's diaper back on he indicated that he needed to do a poo again, this time, to preempt us, he ran away from us when we tried to put him on the potty. We eventually managed to get to him in time before he did his business to pop him back on his potty but still no poop and this time very reluctant to even stay seated there. After a few attempts it's escalated to Matthew crying when he needs to poo (before and after) and refuses to sit on the potty. Not a good start at all :( Perhaps we'll leave it for another month before trying again.

Oh yes... for a change, Matthew was the 'bitee' at school. Some other toddler actually bit him so hard on his thumb that it left little red teeth marks and made Matthew cry. Matthew's not a crier, not even for vaccination needles, so it must have really hurt him. Part of me thought, well at least now he knows what it feels like to be bitten but the other part of me felt really awful for him. According to his teacher, it was completely unprovoked, the other child received time out, apologised to Matthew and Matthew graciously accepted his apology and continued playing together. Wish adults could behave the same way. 

Here's a picture of Matthew taken last night practicing his fake smile. His face seems to have changed so much in the last month!

Just a quick note about visitors and travel.
Matthew's Poh Poh and Goong Goong have confirmed that they will be in Singapore for a visit from the 30th Mar to the 6th of April. Looking forward very much to having some family around. Duncan's business trip to Zurich has been postponed so instead, we've decided to take a short vacation to Bintan, Indonesia for 4 days and will be away from the 25th to the 28th of Mar.

School & travel update

As we near the end of Matthew 3rd week of school, here's some of the comments we've received from his teachers. He's attention span is lengthening, Matthew will sit still at his desk for up to 10-15 mins (I've yet to actually see this with my own eyes!). He loves his food which is so true, he's also the only child that will feed himself using cutlery during mealtimes - probably because he's too impatient to wait to be fed. He appears to be showing signs that he may be a lefty, although from my observations at home he uses both left and right hand to draw, including toes and feet to move things around. During his first week at school, he was intrigued by his classmates water bottles and was helping himself to sips from each of them, which his teachers had to put a stop to. Since then Matthew has learned to match each water bottle to it's rightful owner and is his job to hand out the water during breaks. At 19 months old, Matthew is also the youngest child in his class of 7 children. All in all, Matthew seems to be fitting in nicely and enjoy going to school. Over the past 3 days, we've not had any crying when I've dropped him off and this morning he actually smiled when he saw his teacher instead of panicking :)

As mentioned in one of the previous posts, there's much movement over the next few months - Matthew's passport is filling up quickly!

February 8th to 14th  - Duncan will be in Sydney to attend a wedding.
March 12 to 20th - Matthew will be on school holidays and we will most likely spend the week in Zurich with Duncan as he will already be there on a business trip.
April 14th - Aunt Liz and Uncle David visiting from Perth.
May 4th to 20th - Nana & Pop (Chris & Geoff) visiting.
May 8th to 15th - Phuket with Nana & Pop.

The only travel to be confirmed is Poh Poh and Goong Goong's visit at the end of March/early April.