The last milestone update on Little YT was when he was 16 months. I have been wanting to update this quarterly but time just slips me by and Alas! 6 months had passed! In 2 months time, he is going to turn 2 years old, the big TERRIBLE TWOS!!!
Little YT is progressing leaps and bounds in terms of his understanding of speech, agility, balance and mind. He is no longer easy to please, does not take “no” for an answer and wants everything his way! Sounds like the terrible twos has come early for him.
Physical Development
I simply love the way he walks with his diaper sweeping left and right and body forward with head over heels. He is able to run fast and although he balances well on a ball, he is often off balance when he gets too excited and speeds off like a wind up toy. His motor skills are very good. He can pick up small dirt on the floor with pincers grip. He can stick on his duckie soft toy on the smooth cabinet wall by its rubber stick disc and then pulling it off a dozen times. He can eat by himself and insists on feeding himself. It gets messy at meal times and can get really terrible when he tilts the soup spoon at a wrong angle. Usually half of the soup is on his shirt, but I do not mind, because I am so used to the mess now and am happy to clean up for him knowing he is getting better at it everyday. His weight seems to be slowing down and he is still weighing at 12kg. He can walk up and down the stairs very steadily. Recently, he could climb up a bouncy slide on his own without much help. Not too easy if you consider the shakiness along with many jumping kids on the same bouncy slide.
Eating and Sleep
He is STILL waking up in the middle of the night for one milk feed on half the nights. One experiment we have done is for me to sleep in the kids’ room and leaving Little YT to sleep with his dad. We have done this many many times and each time it has the same results, i.e. he does not wake up for middle of the night feed and is able to sleep through till 7 or 8am without me in the room! The only reason we can think of is that he smells me in the room and it does not help that I am already sleeping furthest away from him as much as my room space allows. I am secretly happy though that he is so sensitive to my presence in the room and he probably wakes up for comfort. And it has to be me who makes the milk and me to stay beside him till he finishes his milk. It is a nice feeling to be needed and I am not complaining.
He eats what we eat on the dining table. That makes it easy especially when we go out. Recently, he stopped eating much and only wanted rice and nothing else! He was super picky and ate much lesser. That worried me even though I know such behaviour is mostly temporary and does not last long. And as I am typing this, just today, he is back to his usual appetite! He finished his half boiled egg and a bowl of cereal for breakfast, finished a bowl of rice mixed with meat and vegetables for lunch, and ate spaghetti for dinner! I am so happy that the phase is over and I am crossing my fingers that this will stay.
My toddler is not afraid of chili! He is able to handle spicy noodles even though I need to shove theΒ water in his mouth immediately after each spoon feed. He is like his sister who can handle spicy Otah (spicy barbecued fish meat in banana leaves) at one and a half years old.
He does not like straw cups and he loves to drink from an open top cup. He loves soup. All kinds of soup. He still puts things in his mouth when he wants to show his mischievous self to you.
Speech
Little YT can understand most of what we tell him now. He is good in saying βζδΈθ¦β (means I don’t want) which is also his longest “sentence”. He can call Papa, Mama, Jie Jie (sister), Gor Gor (brother), Po (ε© Grandma), η·η· (Grandpa), θ°’θ°’ (Thank you), Bye, Bird Bird. He can understand instructions and follow through correctly. At such an age, he is able to form habits too. He can put his shoes back on the shoe rack each time he comes home. He knows he has to throw used tissue into the dustbin (the used tissue comes from his constant pulling of tissue paper from the tissue box).
Social
We saw him pushing another same age toddler away when another kid came along to play beside him. The funny thing was we saw the other toddler retaliated and pushed him back and then Little YT pushed again. Although we were secretly proud that he was no pushover, we still had to tell him that his behaviour was not right. He is still wary of strangers and when he meets people whom he does not like, he shuts his eyes tight and hides behind us. He can be a bully to his older brother. He pulls him out of his chair and likes to target him with whatever long objects he has on hand. He does not target the sister so much maybe because she really dotes on him greatly. The older brother likes to play rough with him, no wonder he does the same to him. Human instinct.
The first time…
Little YT traveled on an air plane for the first time at 21 months to Taiwan. He was easy for the whole trip as long as he was well-fed and slept whenever he needed to.
Little YT appeared for the first time in print advertorial on Royal Caribbean Cruise magazine featuring my interview on our cruise experience. He did appear on the magazine although his face was hidden asΒ he was sleeping in the baby sling. It is our first too! It’s kind of exciting and we even saw this on TV showing this page of the magazine. I am glad that we have this for momento keepsake.
Recently, he is able to sit through an entire meal of Korean barbecue with us without kicking much of a fuss. It is his first time eating table barbecue food and first time with Korean cuisine. I am gradually taking him to places which we think he may not sit through. The next one is probably a cinema. I cannot imagine him sitting through a cinema movie, but we will have to try. It seems unfair that the siblings are deprived of a movie treat because of their little brother and unfair to ask the grandparents to help out during their rest days from looking after him.
His first time touching sand.
My life at this moment…
My life now is more relaxed than a few months back. Mainly because I have learnt to take things easier and steal more time for myself. I am nevertheless still having lack of sleep and it seems like I will never have enough of it.
As for blogging, I have decided to blog less often after a madness of posting 5 blog posts within a week during a super busy period last month. It is also because of this tight blogging schedule, I have decided to take up less advertorial posts and regain my love of blogging mainly because I want to share my parental experience and document my kids’ progress. At the same time, I am still struggling with how much I want to share about my kids online with the imminent danger in the internet world. It’s contradicting and I am not able to come to a comfortable state yet.
What makes it worse is a recent incident and comment from a close friend.
She told me in Chinese Fengshui context: sharing too much of happiness of your family around in the internet like posting happy photos on facebook, blogs, etc, might take away one’s happiness in real life. To translate in English of a Chinese proverb, it means that even the gods get jealous of your happiness that they will balance your life with less of that.
Sounds scary isn’t it, that is, if you believe in it.
As there are never perfect moments in parenthood, I am indeed facing some issues that I find this saying somehow seems to be true. Although, I do not really post much happiness photos on facebook, I do post quite a lot in my blog. After I heard about this, I start to have thoughts of making my blog private and disappear in the public eyes. However, I feel a responsibility over my readers and fellow bloggers whom I have built up a relationship over this past year. So, for now, I will still blog for passion till the day I decided to call it quits.
No matter you are a reader reading this or a blogger who understands how I feel,Β what do you think about sharing personal life to everyone? I really want to hear your thoughts.
I would really appreciate if you do leave a comment here to help meΒ think this through.
I am glad you decided to continue to blog and update me on your kids. I completely disagree with the proverb, I believe that the Universe will give you what you want, and if you show happy, you will attract happy. If you show joy, you are attracting joy to your life.
Also, like me, you don’t just post the happy family, you show your journey and your struggles, you have shown me that you are very REAL and that you and your kids have bad days, too!
There was a post that went viral (I’m told, I never saw it) about how he was not going to post any more happy pictures on his FB because he felt it was making others jealous. OR he hated when other people posted happy pictures because it made him jealous or made him doubt that that family was that happy all of the time.
And I think that is ridiculous. We are what we are, and those that are being fake, well they get found out. But if you are being honest – and yes, I will continue to post happy pictures all over the place, then I think things are good! π
I’m stepping off my soap box now!
But I really am glad you are going to continue to blog! π
I like your belief about showing happy and attract happy, showing joy and attract joy! This helps to negate the proverb that seems to bug me recently.
I do agree to some extent of the viral post philosophy of causing jealousy to others and seeing ownself life as miserable. Humans do get easily influenced by social media in negative ways. Some people feel sad that their lives are in no way so happy as compared to those posting happy pictures. I am embarrassed to admit I am one of them sometimes even though I perfectly know that these exact people do not post anything negative even though their lives may be less happy than they seem to appear. I just can’t help but “believe” they are as happy as the photos are showing and they are indeed so happy offline. In fact, I am happy for them. Seeing such pictures do affect me especially when I am on the down side of life at that moment.
But having said this, I do enjoy reading happy blogging moments of bloggers like you coupled with good laughs. In blogs, we talked about good and bad, embarrassment and pride. It’s more real than just pictures on facebook with limited caption.
Thanks Kate! I really love you to bits with your wisdom each time I face confusion π
My kids are adults so my situation is quite different I suppose. I am very open about the joy in our lives.
I follow a blog of a Mom with similar aged kids as yours. Her blog is Journeys of the Fabulist. You might find it interesting and helpful.
Thanks Sue for your comments. I know Bronwyn, her blog is fabulous! I found you there π How do your children feel about your sharing of them on the blog? I would like to fast forward to know how my kids feel.
Oh that’s fantastic! So I share very little about my kids on the blog other than generalities. When we did a trip to Jamaica in the spring I asked permission if I included any photos etc. I think that if I had small children I would be sharing stories of their lives. Does that help at all?
Asking for permission is certainly a good and respectful way but my kids are young. However soon they might be feeling uneasy with their childhood sharing which I will have to share less. My dilemma is how to share parental experience on the blog without exposing too much of them. Gotta think how to go about this. Yes, your comments help! Thank you Sue!
Best wishes with all of it. If I can be helpful in any way don’t hesitate to be in touch.
Your three kids look really well developed mentally and physically. About sharing your personal life to everyone, unfortunately I’m a man, so I do not know how to relate emotionally. If it’s me, I will draw a pros and cons table. Give it some value to each item and compare the total.
Thanks Ing chye! I really appreciate your comment from a silent reader hehe! You reminded me of this pros and cons table from my school days. Hey! It always presents me with practical decisions. Really thanks for this!! π
Just wrote something similar to this blog entry too! My struggle is being too real or unreal… and sometimes a dilemma of over-exposing our little ones in the real world. But then thinking we can shield them forever too? hm… in any case, just wanna let you know one of the first few blog entries I read of yours is the detailed one on Yamaha course! I still can remember the struggle you faced learning piano, what you want your children to experience and how you feel Yamaha has such good music to offer! Thanks for sharing in details often; it helps! π
Thanks Evelyn for your comments! I am happy that one blog post sticks to readers’ mind. That’s what a blogger can ask for. You blogs well. Even though we may be in dilemma at many times, we always return to our main purpose of starting a blog. Your documentation of struggles of birth surely help many others facing the same. That in itself is so meaningful!
I like your blog because it is informative and real so it is practical and useful for parents like me with young children. It is also my first time to “hear” about posting happy photos might have bad impact. Life is never a bed of roses, there’ll always be good and bad times. The bad times will pass just like happy hours are not infinite. Follow your maternal instinct and be at peace whatever decision you make.
Thank you Joyce! Such wise words you have here for me and I really appreciate comments from a parent reader who knows how I feel. So right about following maternal instinct and sticking to whatever decision I may make. It is so easy to doubt decisions sometimes and you just wonder if it is a wrong one. Parenting is so challenging, the challenges are endless however solutions are endless too. I appreciate your encouragement and hope to “see” you around on the blog π
Congrats on your interview! You’re a media star now!
On sharing personal life: I think it is a delicate balance.
It’s not just a matter of making others jealous. I do feel a responsibility to provide a more balanced overview for that reason, but also I think about how I’d feel looking back. If I only ever saw the great bits, I would think life had gone backwards, not forwards. Life is never perfect and I want the blog to reflect that. I guess that’s where I can see the wisdom in the Feng Shui proverb π .
I also think if you don’t admit to problems it’s hard to provide practical advice to others who may be going through the same thing so if giving advice is one of your aims then there’s no way around it. Even if you’re trying to solve your own problems you need to admit they exist to tackle them – so if you’re spending your whole time trying to pretend everything’s fine on social media that might not happen and the problem will grow. So Feng Shui wins again on that front.
That said, I think when you post about the negative stuff you need to be careful as well. If you post a lot of whining for whining’s sake I think it can really get you down and start to magnify the negative aspects of life in your mind. Plus, it would be a bit of a downer for the reader, too. At the most extreme, I think people can get a sort of Munhausen Syndrome By Internet where they get attention for doom and drama so they start actively looking for it (in a few cases outright inventing it) so they can keep their page views up.
There’s a special concern when writing about other people. I don’t think you should write stuff you wouldn’t say to their face. So with the kids, I don’t mind people hearing that they’re normal kids who have their challenges like all the rest, but I don’t want to put across the idea that they’re bad kids (anyway, they’re not). I think about how they’d feel reading back in the future.
P is old enough to look at my blog from time to time and approve photographs of him on it, and sometimes I read it to him if he wants to hear it. He went through a phase for a few months where he decided he didn’t want his face shown on the blog (not sure if anyone noticed) but he’s back to being ok with it. Although there’s this really cute baby picture he just won’t let me post because he’s too tough. π I use P’s attitude and T’s personality as a guide for what I think she’d approve.
One of my big rules for writing about negative things is that it should be constructive. So it shouldn’t be whining for the sake of whining or sympathy (Munhausen Syndrome by internet – see above) but whining is ok if it’s orientated towards problem-solving or for laughs. I think reading back it’d be good to remember that we had problems but we solved them and/or laughed about it, and even while writing it out it helps change my view on the negative for the better.
But I reserve the right to tweak this as I go along π . Good luck with your decision! As I’ve already told you – I don’t know much about Feng Shui, so you’ll have to sort that one out yourself!
I also want to say I have special reservations blogging about something that is ultimately someone else’s problem. So for example my mother has been sick the past year (she’s fine now – the Japan trip was our Victory Trip!) but I didn’t feel right blogging about it as it’s not really my story to tell and I didn’t feel it was the right avenue to channel my energy on that one. Instead I left her to talk about it in her own way and wrote on my blog about other topics that I hoped would cheer her up. My mum does read my blog but even if she didn’t I’d have a hard time knowing that she *could* if she wanted to/found it by accident/etc.
I have a whole stack of thoughts on blogging for support when you or someone close to you is going through a crisis. There is a place for it and I think some of the rules above apply but it’s a slightly different slant when that’s your purpose. And different again when you’ve really got a commercial blog rather than a hobby – your rights and responsibilities vary in each case.
I am glad your mum is well now. You have so many ideas up your sleeves in indirectly cheering up another person via blogging. I wouldn’t have known how I can cheer up someone this way. But you do cheer up everyone reading your blog and not just your mum π
Your perspective is unique! It got me thinking. I like sharing challenges and happy things. Sharing challenges and putting down into words, like what you said, can sort my thoughts for the better. Sometimes, I even found a solution for it through that. Right now, I am certainly going through the greatest parenthood challenge and I really want to share out my thoughts and seek discussion and solutions. I just need to think how to do that without putting the kids in a bad light. That’s holding me back. If the Fengshui is right, then I should be doing that to right the wrong things. I am too concerned on how the kid will feel. Got to think of a way to document this challenge somehow, also to record for my kids’ future reference.
Just googled up Munhausen Syndrome. Weird behaviour problems in the internet nowadays. Whining is exhausting, be it whiner or receiver. I cannot really remember reading much of whining in any blogs. Most of what I read are more of presenting a problem in a light hearted way or heavy hearted way to fish for some solutions.
My kids have never disagree my sharing of photos on the blog. So reading about P’s disapproval of some photo take me by surprise. This prompts me that I should consult them next time.
Thanks Bronwyn, Just like how Sue recommended your blog, I love to read your perspective and how you would handle such situations. I learnt lots from you and the rest of the commentors here. In SMB group, this topic sparks off some discussion too. It is good to have a community like this to help sort out thoughts.
I think when it comes to kid’s challenges, documenting normal challenge gets more leniency in my book as it doesn’t reflect badly on the child (it’s just something most three/six/eight-year-olds go through).
Airing rarer or unique challenges is harder. If the aim is solutions or support I wonder if it’s better to join a private community, perhaps anonymously. If the aim is to document it for future reference I wonder if it needs to be public.
Of course some parents document problems to give advice/support for other parents going through the same thing – that’s tricky. It’s not that I disagree but I think you do need to be extra-thoughtful about what you’re writing.
Sometimes I think a time lag makes a difference – stuff can be written and saved at the time and by next year it may not seem a big deal to publish it, or alternatively with a bit of mulling it over it might seem best just to keep it private. I’ve seen bloggers publish stories of their kids from a couple of years back and it seems different because at the end you can say, “Oh but he’s not like that now, of course.” It’s almost like you’re talking about a different person – although it depends on the exact tone/incident, of course.
I agree with the time lag. Your words help greatly you know. In fact, starting with my new series, I think I have found a way to get discussion going without airing embarrassment out there. Will see how it goes π
I wondered if the new series was connected. Yes – talking at one step removed (not listing names and events directly but talking more about the general problem) is a good idea as well. Looking forward to hearing more.
Some wise words you’ve gotten there already.
I agree with Kate, attracting happiness with being happy (noticing happyness in our lives). Then again, what ever you do, you never know what will happen. Like my brother, the most positive and non-stressing person ever was in an accident and got a brain injury a few years back. Since then he’s had cronic head ache. But with his marvellous attitude, he has still found things he enjoys. He has even published a book. So maybe it is also about our own attitude?
But then, I don’t really think the proverb you mention applies to your blog anyway:sure, you show gratitude to your husband and your life, and pride for your children (as you should) but you pick up some less enjoyable topics as well. You kind of need to, if you want to share parental advice. But I believe the topics are also such that most of us parents can relate to. I find it intriguing that we live in different parts of the world and still share the topics. You have a very constructive approach to it though, I like it; you look for solutions. There has been many good advice given by you but also by the people who comment. I believe sharing the experience will add to the good of us all (sorry, not just you π ).
The one thing I think about regarding this sharing about others is, how will my kids react to what is online of them when they are in their delicate teenager years? Then it is easy to ask them about that moment but what about the stuff that has already been fed to the world wide web. Can it be misused by some friends making not so great pranks? I am sure you’ve noticed that there are no faces shown on my blog. It is the agreement of me and my husband, just to keep their privacy until they can speak for themselves on the matter. (But also because of the line of work that I used to do and do nowadays. The chances are slim but since I work with people who are not well, well, somebody might get things twisted…)
I guess my blog is pretty easy though as it is focused on things to do, and my kids come in only second hand, because we try things out together.
I hope you find a way you can keep blogging (and finding enough sleep!)
Tell me the book’s title and author. I will look it up!
The internet danger is real. I am still not able to find a balance on the photographs part. I will choose to believe you on the proverb not applicable to my blog. Haha! As what many here says, there can’t be all happiness and there are down sides in life. I guess the Fengshui is right about that so, not really exactly taking away happiness, but in a way a reminder that life is balanced. I will choose to think this way π
Recently I am facing writer’s block or maybe the parenthood challenges have drained me so much, I feel myself losing the interest in blogging. Mainly because, I have no mood to write about sharing happy stuff and hold back on sharing my challenges for fear that it will cast a negative light on the kids.
Now reading all these, I think I will still share out the challenges ultimately, but will wait till I find a good solution to tackle this first.
Personally, if the blog benefits others through your sharing and it doesn’t compromise your family’s safety, it’ll be great to blog! Perhaps there are stages? I blog what i’m comfortable with and have the peace to do so. Albeit, I still majorly stick to my arty stuffs. So easier for me. Maybe it’s a good thing to take a break and re align your blogging priorities? Having a break or scaling down the frequency would be refreshing your blogger’s perspective? WHatever the case, hope you’ll find the right balance! And still catch you blogging in whatever time you deem good. All the best.
Thanks Angelia! Greatly appreciate your words. Taking a break is a thought that crosses my mind every now and then. I do hope I need not take a long break to find my priorities and blogging direction. π
Oh he is SO ADORABLE!! I hope you do continue your lovely blog and continue to post happy photos of your sweet children. Our kids are happy, nothing wrong with showing it–in my opinion. π