My Little Valentine...

Quite some time back, I shared my personal feeling about bringing up a boy with my sister, and I remember I told her something like this: "Handling Renzo sometimes, is like handling a lover of mine, but a mini version!" LOL..

Why did I say so? Well can you imagine your 2½ year old boy doing all these small, sweet gestures to you?

Renzo often kisses me really hard on my lips and giggles non-stop after that.

Every time he watches this story of "a lost Baby Blue Bird crying for mummy" from his Dora DVD, he crawls towards me and hides his head under my arms, calls me in the exact same tone as Baby Blue Bird, "mamá, mamá (that's Mummy in Spanish)" with teary eyes.

He loves to hold my face close to his and rub his forehead against mine before he goes to sleep every night..

When he wants to get food, knowing that we do not allow him to snack often, he always looks right into my eyes with a super cheeky smile, blinks his eyes a few times and questions "Mummy Mummy, you know, the yogurt is in the fridge, okie?!" Oh yeah boy I know you want to open the fridge and grab your yogurt and you know it's hard for me to say NO after seeing such an interesting expression on your face!!

He tells everyone that he ONLY loves MUMMY (AND.. black pigeon), I told Win jokingly, "not bad, Mummy is ranked at the same level as pigeon in Renzo's heart!", and Win responded pretty seriously, "of course, the rest of us are not even as good as pigeon to this little boy!".. LOL..

When we were at the shopping center last Saturday, he grabbed a dress on the shelf and told us, "It's so pretty! Renzo buy for mummy!!"; then at a later time while we were strolling around, he pointed at a big poster outside a jewelery shop and said, "Mummy I buy for you, it's Diamond!!"..

Last night, Renzo suddenly gave me a big hug and said "Marry me, marry me!?". I was totally stunned and asked him "What did you say Renzo?". He then repeated, "Marry mummy!". "Who wants to marry mummy?" I questioned, "Renzo!!" he burst into laughter although I am sure he doesn't really understand what he was saying, and it's just a coincidence that he used the word "marry" since no one has ever taught him the meaning of it, at least to our best knowledge.

How not to fall in love with this little sweetheart, 我的小情人!!

P/S: I told Win I must blog about all these as a proof, so that one day when Renzo grows up and finds his true love, he will believe he's ever brought such "romantic" memories to another lady, his mummy!

The Legendary "Terrible Twos"

Legend has it, that in every child, there lies a little monster who is awaiting to be unleashed at the tender age of two (or earlier in some cases). This transformation turns the lovable little kid into a tyrant with the knack for throwing temper tantrums and shows signs of physical aggression.

Well, the legend is true to certain extend. Renzo, much to my inevitable fear, has entered the stage known in the parenting world as the "Terrible Twos" and quite aptly named if you asked me. Basically he has reached a point in his physical and mental development that he is at the crossroads where he is taking in as much input as he is giving output (though not always understood by the people around him). Plenty of cognitive and linguistic advances right now (which is the fun and pleasant part) and be able to describe things or events that are not in his immediately surroundings and is able to express his desires, most noticeably his request to go to his cousin's place to play with her Thomas Train set which happens to be a collection almost three times Renzo's.

Now if I haven't mentioned earlier, do note that the "Terrible Twos" stage usually happens at the age of two, give and take a couple of months. Renzo has been for the past few months, become a little boy who is bossing us adults around. With commands like "Daddy don't come out, Daddy go sleep" to "Mummy go kitchen open fridge. Renzo want orange juice" to the simpler "I don't want 爷爷~!", which interestingly ticked off my dad on numerous occasions. Failing to comply to his wishes would end up having him collapse onto the floor wailing or in extreme cases, wails accompanied by flailing legs and punches. (which again ticks my dad off at times).

A few memorable cases include:
1) Crying and refusing me when I pass him his milk bottle and insist on having Mummy giving the bottle to him (which he happily took and gulped down)
2) Requesting for my help to assemble his toy for him because he failed to do so himself and when I managed to do it, he frustratedly cried and swing his little arms and knocked over his toys.
3) Requesting for grapes and then refusing to eat them because Mummy painstakingly removed the skin
4) Crying and refusing to eat his char siew bao because we split it open into halves after he complained that it was too hot
...
and the list goes on...

My patience with Renzo runs thin but somehow Mummy's never seems to wear off. It is from her that I understand that as parents, we should understand that Renzo isn't trying to be defiant or rebellious but merely trying to express himself with his limited linguistic capability and when he can't get his message through, he gets frustrated and thus the tantrums. Despite this knowledge, I still find myself unable to coax and soothe this little boy the way Mummy does. While Mummy smiles and baby-talks her way into getting Renzo to calm down after his tantrums, I can only bite myself (yes Buddy, that is how i got my ulcer) in a desperate attempt to not unleash my fury.

On a positive note, the second part of this "Legend" states that another important fact about the "Terrible Twos" is that it will eventually end... and from a "Terrible Twos Calculator" that I Googled, it calculated that, as of writing, I will only have to endure another 143 day, 23 hours, 25 minutes and 3 seconds before Renzo grows out of this phase...

Quote of the day...
"We Shall Prevail" -Daddy Chan, on conquering the "Terrible Twos"

Wet and Wild time for Renzo

The past few weekends have been pretty "adventurous" and "fruitful" for Renzo as we spent most of our time together outdoor. Usually if you ask Renzo, "Would you like to go to the swimming pool?", 80% of the time he will answer "Nope, go to shopping center, super market!". Well this boy is pretty much an indoor person just like his Daddy and Mummy!

So we decided to let him explore a bit more outdoor activities during the weekends, although honestly speaking, I am not enjoying it much (haha as usual), luckily Win is young and energetic and never have a problem handling Renzo on his own at the playground.

On Feb 18, Saturday, we made our way to Jacob Ballas Children's Garden to have a playdate with the August 2009 mummies, and their kids who are at the exact same age as Renzo. It's also the first time I am meeting the mummies in person after chatting actively online for more than 2 years and the experience was so great! Renzo is the most clingy kid there who refused to play with the rest of them, that made us a little embarrassed especially when we saw a few other kids like Jovia, Sophie, Shayna and Issac having great fun together while their mummies could just stand aside and happily chit chat with each other.

On Feb 25, Saturday, we went to Mandai Zoo with Renzo's godpa Mike and his girlfriend Linda, after receiving free entry ticket from our lovely friend Nicole.
It's the 2nd time we brought Renzo to the zoo and this time round, with a wonderful "tour guide" Linda around (she had internship at the zoo), we managed to see many more animals and Renzo seemed to enjoyed himself a lot more than last time also. We ended the day by bringing Renzo to the waterplay area, and till now, he still says "The elephant in the zoo, splash water, I don't like, I like the slide with water!!". There is this huge elephant head shaped bucket pouring water on those happy kids there, which Renzo didn't dare to come close. But he loves the slides there and can climb up and down non-stop for hours.

On Feb 26, Sunday, we brought Renzo for a trial class at My Gym Tampines for 35 dollars. We didn't sign up the package (S$425 for 10 sessions with complimentary 10 open gym playtime where kids can play at the gym freely) because the class/open gym time doesn't seem to fit to our schedule. What they did in class is quite similar like Josiah Montessori, just that My Gym focuses more on the physical training for the tots. We intended to have Renzo interact more with other kids since he's been shy and pretty "anti-social" even after attending childcare for a year, unfortunately there's not much chance given for interaction in the 1 hour gym session.
The only highlight is that Renzo is afraid of swings (again not to our surprise), and we met this cute little Japanese girl Nicole, who's usually attending Friday afternoon class but happened to be there on that very Sunday evening. Daddy Chan decided straight away NOT to sign up for the class knowing that Renzo can never have chance to meet Nicole during class as we all need to work and don't have the time to bring Renzo there on Fridays. After the 1 hour workout, Renzo slept extremely well that night and we are still puzzling why an one hour playtime at the swimming pool or playground can't do the same trick..

On Mar 04, Sunday, we brought Renzo for his first hair cut at a kid's salon at Tampines 1. It's a new salon just opened for 4 days and they have a DVD player showing all kinds of cartoon movies in front of every seat, as well as some toys for kids to play at the waiting area. So we managed to have Renzo sit still without bribing him with lollipops or Daddy's ipad2!! We were extremely satisfied with the hair cut done although it costs 20 dollars, looking at the salon facilities, it's predictable that they are not going to charge us just 5 bucks anyway. The only concern we have is that right besides the salon, there's this kids' toy shop displaying a big collection of Thomas & Friends trains right at their entrance.
So Renzo got himself a reward that made the hair cut trip 30 dollars more expensive, and we are already worrying about our next visit to this salon (and, the toy shop) in a month time..

Up next, we will be bringing Renzo to Singapore’s first wet-and-dry wildlife-themed rooftop playground at Tampines 1, and there's another 3 nights Ritz Carlton Hotel stay waiting for us in April, I am sure Renzo will enjoy himself to the fullest!!