Life of a yummy baby ... and now there are 2!!!!!

This morning, Morgan was pointing to his teddy saying "oh-oh" when it fell down the stairs. He said it again when his toy clock fell off the sofa. Then he went to his room and knocked down a block of bricks while calling out "oh-oh!" He went on like this all afternoon. I almost went crazy! Afterwards I heard a slam of the cupboard door and a soft 'thud' on the kitchen floor, followed by subtle sounds of dripping liquid. Before I could check what the noise was - I heard a little voice saying "oh-oh" behind the kitchen bar. I looked over and saw a pair of big brown eyes, staring at a pool of half-spilt milk on the floor, with this oh-so innocent face!

He pointed at the mess and said "oh-oh" in which I replied resignedly, "I know!"

飛鷹三姝 方文琳 裘海正 伊能靜 有我.有你 MV

It's amazing when I think about what a baby at less than 1.5 years old could do. After the stage of weaning, crawling and learning to walk, we've also noticed that Morgan's baby-babble has progressed to a comprehensible pattern of one-word speeches in the last 3 months. His favourite Mandarin words are 花 hua (flower) and 马 ma (horse) where he inevitably shouts out to you when he sees one on a book or picture or on the street. To add onto the list, there's also 鸭 ya (duck), 猫 mao (cat), 狗 gou (dog) and 蛇 she (snake) whose sounds of those animals he could also identify.

But his current favourite has got to be 谢谢 xie xie (thank you). Although he doesn't say it all that clearly, he says it to anyone who offers him anything. Let's hope he'll continue to be this polite throughout his life!!!!

At first we had some contemplation about what language to speak to him first and who should speak what. We also wondered if it was confusing for Morgan to learn about the same things in 2 or 3 different languages at the same time. At the moment, he could point up to 8 different parts of the head and the body in Welsh and Mandarin. At first he always mixed up 'troed' (leg) and 'trwyn' (nose) but very soon later he got them right. And then he learnt that the stomach in Mandarin is called 肚 子 du zi. So whenever I mentioned rabbit which is 兔 子 tu zi, he would point to his stomach! Yet he had hardly any trouble understanding the word bola as being 'stomach' in welsh. And we haven't even got to the bit where a word "iâr "(pronounced as ya) is 'hen' in Welsh and could mean 'duck' in Mandarin. That would be fun huh!

I guess the really important thing is that he's learning to say lots - even if its just gibberish! Besides I think his vocabulary is amazing considering his age. After all I reckon his Mandarin would surpass his daddy in a years' time! Daddy - what say you?

It was FUN DAY at daddy's workplace last Sunday. It was a bit of a picnic and day out for families. We had sausage, burgers, beer for lunch and Morgan got his cute little face painted for free! It is funny to see how the adults seem to enjoy the day out more than their kids when you see grannys jumping madly in bouncy castles with their grandchildren, adults having a go at Sumo-wrestling and big kids on these 80s-popular bucking bronco. Remember these big bull-machines that you sit on with style and while its turning round and round, you find yourself trying to balance sitting and waving your other hand about uncontrollably until it throws you off, remember now?!!!!

I've been desperately trying to clear our garden which is now overgrown with weeds and grass. So I happily heap up IKEA bagfuls of garden waste by the side, ready to be disposed of by my dear husband in the evenings. But as soon as Morgan saw me working in the garden, he also helped to pull out the weeds and grass (which was really sweet!) but at the same time he nearly emptied my garden bags by taking the overgrown stuff OUT and strewning them all over the place. It was all a very good ateempt ;)

The weather is SO not on for us this year. We are all trying to enjoy the last fine days of British summer before its like gone forever... for the rest of the year (in silent anguish)! In times like these, I feel totally envious of everyone else I know living in the tropics! sigh, sigh sigh ....

This summer we have many friends who came and went, moved and stayed. I'm just been going through my social calendar trying to organise time to write/ call / text / email / skype to get in touch with ALL new and old friends, here and abroad. It'll probably take me months to
go through everybody!


Just last weekend we joined Aunty Ann on a health-running spree in Swinnerton. The last time I ran like this was like a long time ago, in college! Although it wasn't a competition, daddy and Morgan decided to come and cheer mummy on which was very nice of them. To find the trail we had to run around looking for spots marked with funny white blobs and flowers. Tell you what, it certainly felt more like a wild-goose chase! We started from the pub car-park at 1pm and half an hour later, we found that we had run past 2 fields, through some people's gardens and round a park and landed back at the starting point! Very ingenius don't you think!

After weeks and weeks of teething, he has finally grown 4 rather big ones on the lower jaw ; canines and premolars. These ones hurt terribly as we have had several bad nights of him waking up crying. Despite this, we are also getting him into a wonderful bedtime routine. So it's dinner, a short walk, a warm bath, 2 or 3 or even 10 bedtime-stories, a few fuss-less good night kisses and then to sleep! I cannot say enough how excellent he's been. *beams*