early christmas present

So, we had our present and currently still busy adjusting our new life with her.

Here I am in the wee hours of the morning, typing with my left hand while nursing the baby (who sleeps soundly during the day!). More posts when possible. :)

Wish you had a wonderful Christmas...

november updates

Last Sunday, we went to Taman Safari. It has been our dream to bring Jove to see the animals and we were so excited when it finally came true with a blast! :)


Jove seemed to enjoy looking at all the animals and feeding them carrots from the car window. We were quite surprised that this little guy had the courage to feed small skinny carrots to those smelly big mouths! He surprised us more when he was willing to pose with a naughty little baby orangutan called Aming and touched the two-month old baby tiger.

Our trip was disturbed by a heavy downpour. We had to take turn walking from shelter to shelter with one umbrella that we brought. Grandpa, grandma, and Jove managed to have a fun ride in the cable car when the rain turned to drizzle. Then we went to feed the leftover carrots to the hungry elephants (they ate 200kg of grass per day, said the trainer). Jove, with his little hand was brave enough to put the carrots on the trunk.

Jove also managed to ride elephant and camel with his aunts, and a pony by himself, after the rain stopped. We went home tired, but happy and satisfied. Jove slept soundly on our way home.

the missing ears

Lately, Jovan often "lost" his ears.

This morning, when I was doing something I couldn't leave, I noticed Jovan was plucking tissues out of the box. He plucked a sheet, threw it on the floor, plucked another one, threw it on the floor, on and on like that till a heap of tissues (about a quarter of the box) was piled next to his feet. I asked him nicely to stop doing that, and he kept doing what he was doing without even glancing at me. He did not hear my voice even when I have started shouting.

He only stopped when I picked him physically, put him to stand near the wall for time-out while I picked the tissues on the floor. Looking at him standing quietly with innocent face, I couldn't get angry for long...

But yeah, that and other similar incidents have made me scrambling to find out the best (and working) method to discipline him nicely.

So far... no luck yet. Any advice? :)

puzzles

Hubby bought a Lightning McQueen 12-piece jigsaw puzzle for Jove a few months ago. He bought it just because Jove liked the picture so much. One day, Jove tried the puzzle and got hooked. Now he have about 7 puzzles and one puzzle book (with 5 puzzles inside) that he regularly do. Like a hobby!


For the 12-piece puzzles, he does not need any help. But for the 30-piece and 48-piece puzzle, we need to help him sort out the side pieces to be done first. After a few tries, usually he would start to remember the places.


Being a firstborn, Jove always surprise us with his interest. I googled about puzzle and children development afterwards, it turned out that puzzles aid children hand-eye coordination and the development of memory. Jove plays with his puzzles daily and just in three or four days he can usually do his puzzle without any help in the initial sorting. He even can place the middle pieces at their correct places out of his memory. It's really fun to see him do the puzzles. :)

the baby in the womb

Jovan surprised me this morning. He showed me this picture:


I asked him what it was. He answered that it was his little baby sister in mama's tummy. The long lines flowing from mama's head was the long hair. Then the little figure at the right side was Jovan.

Naturally, I told my mom about that and the curious grandmother asked him to draw the little baby inside mama's tummy. And draw he did! :)


Oooh, and yes, we're having a baby girl this time. The ob-gyn finally confirmed it when we checked last monday. Daddy was estatic. Jovan is getting a sister.

coloring competition

Our cluster in Alam Sutera, Kirana, always have a bazaar in August to celebrate Indonesia's independence day. This year, they had a coloring and drawing competitions for kids. We did not register Jovan to join because he was way too small for the competition. The youngest age range is 4-5 years old for coloring. But when we saw Jovan looked interested, we asked him whether he wanted to join. He said he wanted to! So we paid Rp. 15,000.- and Jovan took part in his first competition.

He did his piece seriously. At first, I thought he would draw a car or something on that page because he never colored any picture before. He usually just drew and colored his own drawing. But apparently, he understood that he only had to color the picture.

He sat there for, well, maybe 10 or 15 minutes, until he was satisfied with his work.

Then he just got up when he considered his artwork done.

I think the dad, the uncle, the grandpa, or the aunts who came by once in a while took part in telling him to color the cloud blue or to use red for the flag. But, at least everything was done by him. Nobody expected him to win but we did enjoy one of the best moments. :)

inspirations

Some people have always been a source for inspiration for me. One of them is my dear cousin, Cik Ing, who just started an inspiring blog to share her family's life stories. I've always looked up to her since as long as I can remember. I spent quite a lot of my childhood being with her (and her wonderful brother and lil sis) in their lovely home full of books and fun activities. :)

She just sent me an article about finding (and living) your heart's calling. Something I've been struggling with for years. Maybe I should share that in a separate post. For now, I'm just going to let what I've read sink in to add some courage to my soul.

On a lighter note, today we planned to visit the ob-gyn again! Yeah! We've actually planned not to have it once a month (but maybe once every one-and-a-half month, or two months, since I did not have any problem with the first pregnancy), but we usually could not wait to see the lil baby. Haha. The little one has been kicking pretty strongly these past few days, and every kick always brought a smile to my heart.

a cat, a panda, and a colorful drawing

This was Jovan's first attempt to draw a cat.


Then this. My sister thought that the eyes looked like Powerpuff girls' eyes.


Po the Panda, from Kungfu Panda. The panda picture was drawn by him (no addition or reduction or anything from me or anyone else). I was the one who write 'po'.


After months drawing with only one color, Jovan finally started to use more colors.

doc hudson

Jove was addicted to Pixar's CARS. He used to watch the movie everyday (could be twice a day if I let him). Thankfully, the addiction wore off (after a month or so, and I've almost memorized the dialogue). But he is still very fond of one car, Doc Hudson. I don't understand why it is just this one car, but maybe it's about taste.

He often asked me to play whatever short animation of Doc Hudson that I could find in You Tube. Or to find its pictures online. Through Google, I found out a lot about the real Hudson Hornet and its pictures. Jove loved to browse through the pictures. He would just sit there, on my lap, in front of the notebook, and watch the slide show of Hudson Hornets that I found in the internet.

One day, we were in a toy store when he noticed a Hornet among other Hot Wheels cars on the shelves. He asked for it, and we bought it for him. More than a month has passed since then and there has not been a day when he did not play with his beloved Hornet. He called it Doc Hudson and brought it with him almost everywhere. He would ask us to put the car in the fridge/freezer when it became too warm on his hand. Papa and Ama have bought him two other new Hot Wheels car since then, but he liked them less. Doc Hudson is still the best.

I have to say that this fascination amazed me a lot. Even his father do not share as much enthusiasm as him regarding cars. So, where does it come from?

drawing with jovan

Jove still loves to draw. Drawing on his magnetic doodle board is an activity that he ALWAYS does every single day. Lately, he would draw something while he talked, telling some sort of story that went with the drawing he did. Mumble, mumble, draw, draw, then erase. Mumble, draw, draw, then erase. I just need to be fast enough to grab the camera whenever he draw something interesting. I missed quite a lot of interesting drawings that way, but these are some of them. :)

His favorite is drawing a car, with a bear and a deer in front of it (like in the movie Open Season).




A car with two suns.

Train.

A car under the cute sun.

He always draw train with lots of straight lines on top of it. His fascination with trains started when he watched Thomas and going to Bandung by train last July.

One of the rare moment. I actually would like to let him play more with the watercolors if he was not too naughty (he likes to pour the water in the container on purpose!). Natural mess is fine with me, but it takes a lot more cleaning (and patience) if he is making the mess deliberately!

trimming

The first time Jovan sat on his own, usually he sat on my lap.

The whole thing took about 20 minutes. He went cranky once the trimmed hair fell on his neck and got itchy. So the barber-lady had to stop and wait for me to apply baby powder on his body and talk him into sitting down nicely again to finish the cut.

Sigh! My baby is growing up so fast...

fourth prenatal check-up

We visited our ob-gyn this morning for another check-up. My blood pressure was normal and everything was good. We spent about an hour inside the office, mainly trying to find the child's gender (the baby got his/her thighs together, difficult to see the in-between), and chatting with the friendly doc. We are still guessing the gender, but that's not a problem at all. :)

Jovan is still kissing and hugging the bulging tummy about ten times a day. He mostly slept hugging the tummy now, most of the time asking me to expose the tummy. Sweet brother, uh?

My sister said that I wasn't being fair with this baby. In my first pregnancy with Jovan, I would take pictures of my tummy monthly, then wrote down my weight and sometimes the circumference of the tummy. But with this one, I never wrote down my weight and hardly had time to take a proper picture. Hehehe... But during previous pregnancy, my sisters loved to touch the tummy whenever I visited them. Now? Hardly. They're busy chasing Jove around the house. :) So it's really a good thing that Jovan always remembers to kiss and cuddle the little baby.

two!

Dear Jovan,

Happy second birthday, Son! I could not believe that two years have gone by since that miraculous moment when you were born.

You woke up counting one to ten while slowly smiling and opening up your eyes yesterday. Then you asked for a strawberry milk. You are a wonderful talker, even I am amazed and often confused on when did you learn to say those sentences. It seemed so easy for you to repeat new words and understand their meanings. Jove dear, our days have become so much more colorful with your jokes, stories, and remarks.

At two, you are still very much fascinated by vehicles. When we passed a cool red Ford pick-up, your eyes widened and you asked me to go nearer to the car. A glimpse to the newspaper that I was reading and you pointed to the small little picture of a car advertisement. You cried with glee and exclaimed that you like it ("Qiang-qiang seneng!!!") when you opened a set of vehicle board books. You spend minutes poring over the pictures of trucks, tractors, helicopter, racing cars, and others. Even in the plant shop that we visited yesterday, you pointed out the wheel in the small wagon that we saw. Having no brother and close nephew, I am truly fascinated by your fascination! :)

Every single day, since you knew that I was pregnant, you never missed cuddling my bulging tummy to greet your baby brother/sister. All of us are amazed by this gesture. You'll be a sweet brother, everyone says.

But for a week or so, you've been very stubborn in doing things your way and you had your tantrums when we did not comply. Gosh! Are you entering your terrible two phase, darling boy? Let's hope the phase will not last long. :)

I don't know what the future will bring to both of us. But I am sure that you will continue to bring your joy and your love to your family and to everyone you're in touch with.

I love you. I love you. I love you.

Mama

one saturday morning

It's a peaceful Saturday morning now. Fresh morning breeze is blowing in from the window. I'm drinking a warm glass of chocolate milk, and life is good.

When I opened my mailbox just now, I received the usual weekly newsletter 'My Pregnancy This Week' from Babycenter. I did not realize that I have entered my second trimester, the golden age of pregnancy! :) It's week 13 now. Time really goes faster for this second pregnancy. I mean, last time, I felt like being in the first trimester forever.

So, that goes the official announcement for this blog. We are currently pregnant and the baby is due in mid December. Would be a busy Christmas for all of us here.

Meanwhile, Jove has already talk in long complete sentences, gives his opinion about things, can describe things, and his drawing improves by a lot (can draw faces now in addition to cars). It is really a blessing to have a child and to be able to watch him grow. I always had difficulties in writing about his growth now, because there are too many things to write and I just don't have the patience to note down those things. Furthermore, it is even more difficult to write down the mixture of feelings watching him grow. Happy, proud, but there is a tinge of sadness too. Most of the time, the little sadness came when he could do something new and needed my assistance less. Ah, I'm just being too sentimental now. :P

Wishing you a blessed weekend. :)

the story of stuff

It has been sometime since I last posted. Today, I just watched The Story of Stuff with Annie Leonard, and would like to share that.

cycling

We have used this for a few months as a replacement for our morning walks.

The red plastic kid-seat was my youngest sister's. Mom used it to carry her around while doing errands (going to the wet market, picking my other sister from school, etc). Dad found it in the store room, cleaned it, repainted the rusty iron, and there! Jovan has a new hobby! Hehe...

When Jove sits on the red seat, his hair will touch my nose. I could smell his hair, kiss his head, and whisper to him the names of the objects that we see.

In the mornings, when the warm rays of the sun touch our backs, we would ride around the blocks. The cool breeze, the morning activities of the neighbors, the wet road, the swaying trees, and Jove's delight. I enjoy every second of our cycling together!

Nowadays, Jove always wants to wear his blue cap while cycling to shade his eyes from the sun (so I could no longer smell his hair). And now, it is he who says everything that we see. The black car that passes, the big dog, the butterfly, the location of our Sunday school, our new home, the trucks, and all other things.

He's changing and growing all the time. Sometimes it's difficult for me to keep up! :)

Chrysiridia rhipheus

Beautiful sunset moth. I actually gasped in awe when I saw the pictures.

The caterpillar and The Very Hungry Caterpillar brought me to Eric Carle's website, and one of the FAQ questions about chrysalis and cocoon prompted me to do a bit of research on butterflies and moths in Wikipedia.

Internet is really cool.

Oh, and I stumbled upon Encyclopedia of Life a few days ago. I've started to bookmarks these kind of sites for the future when inquisitive Jove start asking me questions. Err, but after another thought, why should I bother when I can ask him to google for answers himself?

Caterpillar on the flower

We found this caterpillar two days ago. It was sitting on a leaf in my neighbor's pink flower plant when I took Jove out to breathe in some fresh air.


I took a picture of it this morning. We visited the caterpillar often during the two days. But this afternoon, it was missing. This evening, when we waited for daddy outside, Jove said that the caterpillar was sleeping being cradled by his mother. I was quite disappointed when I found it gone. I was hoping to see its metamorphosis into a beautiful butterfly.

Thanks to you, La, for The Very Hungry Caterpillar. Jove asked me to read the book to him after each visit to the caterpillar.

draw cars!

Jove is always asking us to draw cars and trucks and motorcycle and tractors (and the like) since he could talk. At first, we wasted lots of papers for the drawings and his scribblings. Then when the pen/marker/crayons started roaming to the sofa and the floor, grandpa bought him the magnetic doodle.

Jovan loves to spend a lot of time drawing. At first, just squiggly lines, wriggly circle, well... abstract drawing. Then one day, he started practicing to draw something, like a car. He would start with a horizontal line, then he would add two circles... like the base of the car drawn from the side. After a few days doing that, well, maybe a week or so, he dramatically changed!

One fine day, he surprised us all by really drawing a car!


He'll make a big squarish circle (most of the times in the shape of a van), add two wheels (or more), and a window. If he says it is a taxi, he will add something at the top (for the taxi sign), if it is a jeep, he'll add the extra wheel at the back. Trucks will be bigger with more wheels. Racing cars will be short and flat. It is amazing to watch him draw! :)

Children. Is. Amazing.

busy life

Whew.

I heard something nice from the radio yesterday.

God is fair. Everyone is granted twenty four hours a day. No more. No less.

If some people can be so efficient in managing their time, I should be able to learn to do so.

aspiration

Me: What do you want to be when you grow up?
Jove: A penguin.

That's my one-year-seven-month-and-two-weeks-old boy.

goodbye grandma

I was cleaning up in the new house with hubby and Jove when my youngest sister called hubby's handphone. She was crying and mumbling something about grandma. I took Jove and cycled as fast as I could.

Grandma died that Sunday morning, 20th January 2008.

My parents flew two hours after that. My two sisters followed in the evening. They made it in time to see her before they closed the casket. My sister said that grandma looked peaceful, just like sleeping.

God has called her and end her suffering. Now she is happy, healed, and whole again. But she will be forever missed by her six daughters, six son-in-laws, twenty grand-children (and five grandchildren-in-law -is there such a word?-), six great-grand-children, and a husband.

Hubby, Jove, second sister, father (who flew back to Jakarta on Monday) and I joined the big family on Wednesday morning. It felt weird to head straight to the mortuary from the airport. We met my two sisters, mother, two aunts, and the nurse who took care of grandma there.

The place was quite new, clean, and nice. Grandma's photo smiled at me in front of her casket. She has gone to a better place, I kept telling myself. I should be happy for her. She has lived her 83 years on Earth fully. She has given birth to six wonderful daughter, watched them meet and marry the men of their dreams, hold the twenty grand-children, even attended five of the grand-children's wedding! I still remembered, in awe, when grandma attended my dear cousin's wedding. Wheelchair bound, sick and weak, but she was there for all of us. A selfless strong woman my grandma was.

The days that follow were spent with my dear aunts, uncles, and cousins for the cremation and placing of her ashes in the columbarium.

Thursday morning, we gathered in front of the crematorium. We prayed around her coffin. So many people came to the last service. Some old ladies from Salatiga, including my grandma's 95 year-old sister, sang a sweet song about her meeting with Jesus. It was a beautiful moment. Then the coffin was placed inside the furnace. It was time to pay our last respect. One cousin brought fresh red roses that each of us placed near her coffin. Grandma loved flowers, especially the red roses.

We watched when the fire was lighted. Soon, the furnace was ablaze with burning hot fire. Grandma frail, old, weak body was slowly reduced to ashes. She needed that body no more for she already has a new one up there.

Saturday morning, we gathered there again to collect her ashes. The person-in-charge gave us the ashes inside a cloth pouch doubled with clear plastic together with two prostheses. We were shocked when we hold the prostheses (once planted inside her hips) they were so heavy! Maybe more than a kilogram in total. I could not imagine that all these time, grandma carried those heavy stuff around with her!

We carried her ashes to the columbarium grandpa has built for the family. The big family gathered there for lunch. I wondered if grandma joined us in the gathering, looking at the many people who loved and respected her. Or she could still be dancing with Jesus on her two feet in heaven!

Goodbye for now, Emak sayang. One day when we meet again, I hope I can say that I've lived my life at least as full as yours.