Trip to Pulau Ubin

Take this chance to update on the boys. Josiah is now 103cm at 15.3kg. Joshua is 93cm at 13.8kg.

They are pretty talkative nowadays. Josiah is more confident expressing himself right now. What he says never fails to surprise us. He is pretty well behaved and know quite well over right and wrong when we teach him. He can be snappy at times however. As for Joshua, his character can be quite strong headed. He whines a bit more and always wants to win. He can be the one who refuse to listen to me at times.

They are still not quite good eaters. We still need to scoop and feed them quite often as their speed are simply too slow and I don't have the patience. They are diaper free in the day but Joshua still have wet diapers in the morning. Both are quite accurate with numbers to 20 but still confused with 6 and 9. Alphabets wise still not that reliable. Sometimes just feel that the "I can Read" program is a waste of money. Always feel that they are there just to do their colouring.

We went out quite often during weekends and one of it is our trip to Pulau Ubin recently. Just some of the recent photos...

Quiet Times (2)

Its been a really long time I last logged in here. Its only my 4th post since my last quiet times in Dubai when I was travelling to Monaco last September. I'm now in Rio De Janiero, getting ready for my 14 hours flight to Dubai and another 7+ hours back to Singapore. I really hate this journey but think its good to take this chance to update about the boys again.

Both boys are almost diaper free in the day. I'm confident that they can be totally free now except that we need to discuss with the teachers on how to transit that they do not wear it during their nap time. As for the night, they are creating quite a havoc for me and Felin. Both of them do not want to wear them before sleeping and we need to wait till they are sound asleep before we can put them on. If we are not careful and fall asleep with them, they may urinate on the bed at around 1 to 2am in the morning. If they are to wake up around 3am to 4am and realised that they are on diaper, they will remove them and urinate on the bed around 5am. Their resistence of diaper is driving us crazy and making us super duper tired and sleepy the next day. We are still in midst of night training them to be diaper free and hope success will be around the corner. Josiah seems to be relatively succesful at the moment.

Joshua has been quite well behaved lately and like colouring on his colouring book. He is able to focus on specific task for longer period. He is generally quieter and not as adventurous as Josiah.

Josiah is more friendly but is starting to develop his character. He sometimes may do certain thing to attract attention such as running around and jumping on the sofa, etc...

They still love to whine and cry for the smallest thing and I had found a little strategy to counter this.
1) Carry them to a quiet corner, either balcony or door.
2) Force them to sit and let them continue to cry as long as they wanted
3) Repeat many times "Once you stop crying, let me know". "After you cry, Daddy will talk"
4) Once they stop, ask for reason of the cry.
5) Try to explain why he can choose not to cry over that small item.
6) After explaining, ask if he understand and if he nod his head, I'll send them back to room.

I found this method quite useful as they are already clear of what I demands.

We are at Satay by the Bay / Marina Barage one of the National Day Rehearsal Saturday and both of them kept shouting "Satay Satay" that kept the stall owners happy. Its one of the many weekends that always kept us busy. Its getting fun going out with them as they are able to walk longer distance nowadays.

Good-Bye my long serving Belta. You official last day of service is on 30th Aug 2018. You had served me well since December 2010 and you had sent my boys to all the nice places in Singapore and the monthly trip to Malaysia. Felin say we must take a picture of her with the boys and here we are... Thank you and hope to update about them again soon...

The Chatty Boys

The boys are getting very chatty nowadays. Their conversation can really make us smile everyday. Josiah is able to speak sentences but somehow need guessing work over what he speaks. He is an explorer and always on the move. He don't normally able to focus long enough to finish a task but understands what is happening around him. He is brave the took up physical challenges like climbing high playgrounds and jumping in the bouncing castles, etc... Really love this cute little boy...

Joshua is a keen observer with relatively good language abilities. His pronounciation is clear and he is able to use quite a range of words. He loves music and drawing and able to describe what he drawn. He has quite a good imagination as well. However he is less keen in taking up physical challenges and always cling to mummy. He can also be a bit stubborn and slow to apologies when in the wrong. Will need a longer time to teach him as he need to be explained if he refuses doing certain tasks.

Both are well potty trained during the day and we are still trying to night potty train them. The night training aren't really showing success but Josiah is more receptive to pee during the night when we bring him to the toliet and Joshua is very resistant.

Okay. Till here.

Joshua - 90cm & 12.1kg
Josiah - 98cm & 14.3kg...

Chinese New Year 2018

Its the part of the year the boys have been looking forward. Both of them have been watching videos on Lion Dances, Fire Crackers and Fireworks all year round and asking me about Fire Crackers at my Sister in Law's house. They are finally able to see all these by themselves and not through Television or Youtube this year.

We had a very good gathering this year and they managed to see Fire Crackers and Fireworks in Malaysia. We had a good bonding time during this period and even went swimming together.

Both of them are growing really fast and more of their character are gradually shown.
Think they are not that adventerous yet with somehow fear over many things. Like fear of swimming in water, fear of hand dryer in toliet, fear of taking a longer slide, fear of watching firecrackers outside the house, fear of cockroaches, etc... They will just want to hug us tight when they are fearful. I wanted to train them to be more courageous and be willing to take more risk. I feel that they just need a lot of encouragement and we should not protect them for every single thing.

Joshua is getting more humorous and able to make us laugh with his questions and answers. He is very vocal. He can be a bit stubborn and a man of his own ideas. He don't apologise for what he did easily. If he don't feel like doing something like greeting someone he don't know or asking him to pose a photo on a selfie, he will choose to purposely not do it.
As for Josiah, he is a quiet learner and surprise us always. Eg, when a Toyota Vios passed by, he will say "Ye Ye's car". I will like "Wow", he can recognise a Toyota Vios. His speech is still not that clear but somehow improving.
Its also really funny to see both of them talking to each other and looking out for each other but its not easy to handle who to give more attention as both demands for it all the time.

All good things aside, I can't help writing about my various tensions with Felin lately thats affecting my joy as a Father.

One example of the many example will be that she always give me time to read only 1 short book during the night when 1 book takes only 3 minutes at most. I am very annoyed because I can't even have that 3 minutes bedtime story with them. What is the difference between sleeping at 9:30pm or 9:33pm? Why want to restrict so tightly over that 3 minutes?

Due to my 1 book limit, I will choose from my suite of books that I'd purchased for them but will be scolded that I did not read Bible stories for them. I'd told her that maybe we can look for a proper Bible story book that can attact their attention first but I'm accused of not doing my job as a Father to guide them spiritually. Blah Blah Blah, I then refuse to talk too much. The more I talk, the more she angry and she will never say a word of appreciation over what I did. Whatever I do will always seems wrong to her.

Seriously, I feel like just going back office to work and get out of the house whenever we quarreled over such small matters. I feel like I'm just a useless fellow and you are better in everything and might as well let you do everything. I don't know whether a lot of man feel the same and gave up working for the family eventually. All these are just hidden and unknown to the others because everyone will think that we are just a happy family through facebook posts and gatherings, etc...

Happy 2018

Its one of a rare occasion that I decided to log into this blog before I open any other apps or site. Its a regret that there are so many to update about the boys and I always procrastinate as its seem to be a non urgent task.

2017 passed so fast that I haven't accomplish most task that I set out to do at the beginning of the year. I suddenly felt that this blog is no longer just to update about the boys' developments, I am beginning to feel that its an avenue to tell them more about myself in future. I had never really understand about my own Dad as he seldom expressed himself to his children. After my boys' arrival nearly 3 years ago, I felt that I am actually quite similar to my Dad's character, just that he couldn't express himself by words as he is not properly educated.

The boys are growing really well and seemingly happy and jovial most of the time. They are active and love running around the house and going out to explore. Both of them are considerably expressive with Josiah more sociable and Joshua more conscious of his surroundings. They can be very insistent on what they want and exert their "terrible 2" powers. Joshua is more advanced with his speech and language capabilities with Josiah following whatever he speaks. Josiah is generally better with his motor skills and will not hesitate to jump in the bouncing castle whenever the chance comes. He will encourage his brother to be more adventerous and Joshua becoming more daring. He will also take the lead in some situations like cutting hair and sitting on the potty.

Josiah had an operation at NUH in early December for Hydrocele and operation went well. He wasn't really aware what is happening and probably just knew that he can skip school and wear the hospital clothes. The first schedule ops was postponed as he was having some cough on first visit. I was quite cool about all this but did not expect a needle will be poked to him after the operation which resulted him shouting excessively in the hospital to insist the needle to be removed.

Joshua had a bout of fever and a nagging case of constipation which really affect his appetite. We will be visiting the Specialist in the next few weeks. Hopefully he will get better.
Felin always feel that he is smaller in size because he is generally eating lesser. For me, I just think it is genes that he is smaller.

They are not very academically inclined for the moment as the Childcare centre generally teaches them to play, draw and sing. Joshua can recognise numbers and alphabets better than Josiah. Joshua is always confused with 6 and 9 which Josiah seems only able to read 1 to 5. As for Alphabets, Josiah always seems to be playing guessing game with me. He also seems to be problem pronouncing some of the words properly which resulting us misunderstanding him. I always feel that they are quite slow for their age on these as I am already seeing my friend's kids of their age already writing alphabets and able to read 1-100.

I had enrolled them to the Julia Gabriel "I Love Reading" program as well as the Speech and Drama class in their Childcare centre. Hopefully they can be more interested with books and able to focus better in school in future.

On new year eve, I had spent a great day with them at the balcony as we talked beside our Christmas tree till they told me that they are tired. I asked how they feel about their weekend and sang songs to them. Its the type of Father-Sons relationship that I hope I can carry forward when they are older.

Just have to thank God for his blessings in 2017 and hopefully 2018 will just be a better one. For the boys and for the family...