How Luca cries

Maya rarely cried when she was at Luca's age. Almost never. She smiled and smiled, and still smiled. The moment she opened her eyes, the moment before she fell asleep.

Luca definitely has more tears stored in his body. When he wakes up, he usually cries - for your attention only because as soon as you appear he stops crying and he would hand you his pacifier as a way to tell you that he's ready to go out and play. If he is really mad or hurt, he cries loud and hard. His whole body tenses, his eyes tightly shut, tears stream down like raindrops.


This photo was taken after Maya took Luca's water bottle and ran away.

Luca is sick

After a week-long fever/coughing, Maya finally went back to school on Tuesday. When I dropped her at school, her friends, especially Ethan B and Vivian, were really happy to see her back, all screaming with joy, "Maya", "Maya". She was like a star. :)

But now Luca is sick. Actually he started to have a running nose on Sunday, the day after daddy left for Europe. On Tuesday, he was coughing a lot. For two nights, he slept poorly, turning and tossing in his crib, bouncing up and down, shaking the crib frames, crying. Both Maya and Luca slept in his room, too, because as soon as Maya knew I was in Luca's room, she would come over. Once I carried Luca out of the crib, trying to calm him down, but it turned out to be a bad idea. He did stop crying, but instead kicked and crawled around, pulled Maya's hair (Maya, of course, cried.) It was messy. Maya covered herself up with a blanket at some point. Amazingly, she fell asleep. It wasn't until daybreak that Luca drifted into sleep -- and that was when I got a little sleep.

Meanwhile Luca is also teething. Teething always bothers him more than what it did to Maya when she was at his age. His cheeks are red from his saliva. The cream hasn't helped much.

For the past several nights, I gave both kids a bath in the evening, hoping to clear up their noses. It's so intense and exhausting (both the kids love water, so there's always a lot of screaming, splashing, toy throwing, etc) that afterwards I had to sit on the floor in Luca's room to regain my breath.

Luca is much better today and falls asleep fairly fast.  Hopefully he'll have a good night of sleep. And hopefully I'll get a good night of sleep myself.

I think about parenthood and motherhood quite a bit these days, and I have new respect for single parents and parents with kids with special needs. There's certain truth in the saying that there are only two kinds of people in the world: those with kids and those without. Parenthood teaches to be humble -- there's so much you don't know and there're so many other parents who have to do so much more --and to be patient. It also teaches you to be kind and generous to your spouse/partner. A lot of times, it's nobody's fault; you're both trying your best and you're both just tired. So don't get angry because the house is messy or dirty dishes have piled up or toys are everywhere. The kids are safe, happy and healthy, that's the most important.

There were moments that I was frustrated and raised my voice ( I have to admit that I did raise my voice quite a lot this week). There were also moments that I had both of them on my lap, reading and singing to them. Nothing has taught me more than being a mom.

Together

Maya and Luca do fight, but they're also each other's good friend (though maybe not the best friend, yet).


Drink together

Paint together 

Eat together 

play together

Egg hunt

The Asian Mom Meetup Group has organized an egg hunt and pot luck at Houge Park today. Maya and Luca have a lot of fun there. 

At the discovery museum

Since Maya goes to her Swedish school Friday afternoons, I keep her at home in the morning. Most Friday mornings, I take Maya and Luca to the Discovery Museum. It's easy to kill 2 to 3 hours there.
Here are some photos from our most recent trip.

1) This is Luca's favorite game and he loves seeing the ball go way up the tunnel and then slide down the winding path. He's so fond of it that once when a boy his age tried to grab a ball from him, he bit that boy's finger.

See, he still has two balls in his hands even while he's climbing up the dragon.

He likes painting too. But mommy is not sure about it because he gets the paint all over his face and clothes.

This is Maya's favorite game. The wet suit is perfect for it. Luca loves it too. But once when Luca got really wet (he refused to wear the raincoat provided by the museum; it wouldn't have helped anyway.), he came to me and cried because he didn't like to get water into his eyes.

Some photos from a birthday party

Some photos of Maya and her best friends, Vivian and Ethan.


Vivian, Maya and Ethan

Maya looks cool with sunglasses, don't you think?

Going shopping with Maya

On Thursday I take Maya to a toy store to cheer her up. She's allowed to pick one to two toys. As soon as we enter the store she says, Mama, I don't need more toys. We have a lot, too much, at home already. :) Very mature and thoughtful of her. She must have overheard me saying when I was frustrated with the messiness caused by all the toys that we shouldn't buy more toys because we have a lot already. Maya always behaves at toy stores and she's like that too today. She walks from aisle to aisle, plays with some of the toys, then moves on without saying that she wants this or that. She spends more time in front of a big doll house, admiring it, and then says, Mama, we have two doll houses already. We don't need another one.

At the end, she picks a blue shinny tinklebell dress. I offer to buy her another dress, but she says no, only the tinklebell dress. She has a good taste in clothes, I have to admit, because this dress is definitely the prettiest one at the store. I pick a razor schooter for her, which she likes because she's outgrown her current scooter. Before we leave the store she picks a blue ball and several cute trucks for Luca. What a sweet sister.

Maya is sick

Maya has been out of school for five days. She started to have a fever Monday and last night, when we took her temperature, it was 104.2, the highest since she got sick. She's feeling better today and we play at the neighborhood park a little bit. She is still playful but not nearly as much as she usually is. Of course, her appetite has been poor the whole week. The good thing is that she likes drinking water, which is crucial to her because of her kidney problem.

I call the doctor this morning and he says that if Maya still had a fever on Monday, I'd have to take her to the hospital. I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

When we're back from the park in the late afternoon Maya throws a tantrum because she's tired yet she wants to take a walk with me in the park ALONE, WITHOUT LUCA. Well, I tell her, that cannot be done because daddy is away and we cannot leave Luca at home by himself. When it's dinnertime, she's grumpy again, hitting me and screaming, asking for pappa. When she cries, Luca cries, too because he also wants attention. Maya is rarely in such a bad mood, so I guess it's the fault of her sickness and exhaustion. Finally I make her eat some pasta and drink some soy milk. She falls asleep on our bed after watching one episode of Dora. I wake her up to give her medicine (she has no fever) after putting Luca to bed.

Hopefully May will feel better, much better tomorrow.

Visiting Discovery Museum

Since Maya goes to her Swedish school every Friday afternoon, we decide to keep her home Friday mornings.

Today we -- Maya, Luca and mommy - visit the Children's Discovery Museum, while daddy works from home (he rarely works from home.) Maya has been there many times but it's only the second time for Luca. Luca loves playing with any activities involving balls and cannot have enough of them. While playing, he "talks" a lot and gestures a lot, amusing the adults around him and scaring away some small kids. He guards his turf, and though he does share from time to time, he doesn't allow trespassers (kids trying to steal balls from him). Quite a few times, mommy has to take him away from his favorite ball games (of course, he protests) so other kids can play.

Maya runs from room to room, playing with sand, doing the chalk art, making pizzas, driving an ambulance, painting with a golf ball...the only thing she doesn't do is play with water -- mommy promises her that she'll bring a towel and extra clothes for her next time.

Luca plays hard and by 11:30 he's really tired. So tired that when a boy his age tries to grab a ball from him, Luca bites his thumb. Everything happens so fast that neither mommy or that boy's mommy has time to stop him. Mommy apologizes profoundly to that little boy (he cries, of course) and his mommy and examines the clear tooth marks on the boy's thumb. The other mommy is quite angry. But, well, what can you do? A baby is a baby.