Strange Machines

Note the scale.

Feeling crafty today, I decided to make a stuffed liopleurodon for Bear today. It took me surprisingly just under an hour thanks to a very compliant sewing machine who did not today spit out any thread.

Bear loves it and declared that he loves it more than Teddy (which is high praise indeed)! He is hugging it to sleep right now.

Since she turned one, almost overnight Kitten became incredibly attached to me. She would howl if I was out of sight and inconsolable till I picked her up.

I read on Babycenter that this is normal for her age (and vaguely recollect that her brother was the same). Funnily enough, Bear is the same now too.

It is like they are feeding off each other’s emotions. Night time it is a competition: who can nurse more. But I take it in my stride.

Maybe 4 years of night waking has made me immune and/or I’ve learnt to cherish the late night cuddle time with my little ones before they grow up all too fast and I have to start bribing for a cuddle.

But of course she does. She has been comprehending me since she was probably around 4 months old but now at 1 year old she is starting to respond to what I say and ask her.

She’s started waving bye voluntarily when the occasion calls for it.

She can pass me things when asked.

She overhears me telling so and so she can do it and she does.

E.g. Today my Mom told me to watch her as she was climbing up a chair. I told Mom not to worry as she can do it. She never turned to look at us but she paused a second when I said it as if she’d heard. She climbed up, turned herself around, sat down and then clapped and laughed gleefully.

She has also started to imitate words. She doesn’t reproduce them exactly but sometimes they are very close, like the duck I showed her today. She said duck very clearly.

Other times her favourite words are article (probably ah tickle) and book.

She has begun to walk.

Fun days!

There must have been an invite I missed out on cos tonight is apparently a nightwaking party. Every hour the kids would take turns waking. Nurse them each to bed. Sneak off to comp. Howl goes another kid. Sigh. I think I know why my name wasn’t on that list now.

Hubby fixed this $59 unfinished solid pine cupboard from Ikea and Bear and I painted it. I liked the used look but am pondering painting another layer over it to look more finished. We will put a layer of beeswax over it after. That’s as natural as we can get for furniture around here.

Bear draws Bear and Mom. Mom is a baker and Bear is an elf with deer antlers and ears.

It seems like since I became a mom I had to overcome many of my fears in order to be a hero to my children. One of them was getting over my fear of roaches.

I used to flee at the sight of a roach but now I have to arm myself with a newspaper and swat it till it is dead. The spray is only allowed if:

1. The roach is unreachable by newspaper.
2. Can find way quickly to the bedroom.
3. Washable area.

After all that stuff is poisonous to everyone and the environment but I have made peace with myself for using it only one out of 20 roaches if at all after trying virtually every safe and environmental method out there but failed miserably.

I have had to resort to roach poison traps which they bring back to their nests and that has been the only way they can be stopped. That and swatting the live ones.

Last night I had to take out 3, rolled up newspaper in hand. Bear was very proud of me in the morning.

My best friend Shen just gave me a great idea for painting when you have 2 kids. You see, since Kitten was mobile, we stopped all painting activities at home because she would just get into the paint and eat it. So Shen, who has two as well, had a great idea of having her son paint in the shower. The bonus is that Bear would be contained.

It doesn’t feel like I ever sleep at all. Maybe it is because I’d spent the last few nights up doing the migration and every hour running to the bedroom to nurse one or more children back to sleep.

When I finally hit the bed I pass out till one or more kids wake up and the night nursing dance begins again.

When will I sleep again, I don’t know. But it is someday and for now, I wearily sniff my babies’ sweet cheeks and hair and work on enjoying these precious moments.