Scratch My Back Please! / Stinky Mommy! / New Words

Ashley loves to have her back scratched and her ears cleaned. She is so mobile and active nowadays that it's very hard to keep her still. However, every time her back gets scratched or her ears get cleaned, she just sits there quietly without any movement enjoying being pampered. So the other day after Daddy scratched Ashley's back, she immediately pointed her fingers to her back and babbled, "hmmmmm! hmmm!!" as if she was saying, "More! More!" and ordered Daddy to scratch her back more.

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Ashley says, "chuuu, chuuu" indicating stinky, and shakes her hands when we change her diapers. She knows the meaning of stinky and the other day Mommy came out of bathroom and saw Ashley looking at me and shaking her hands, and babbling, "chuuuuuu". I can't help to burst out laughing. She's so cute!


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Ashley's new words:

1. 'aaaaappoo" for apple and she points to the picture of an apple.
2. "aaaaashhhh" for Ashley. She can't say Ashley yet.
3. "baooobaooo" for bao bao (chinese for baby)
4. She blows a kiss if I asks her to blow me a kiss in Chinese.

Walking / Ashley's vacabulary / Bib / Hair Clip

Ashley has been cruising around holding on furniture for a while. One morning last week, I was sitting on a chair not far from her toy piano, She first held on to the coffee table, and shifted over to the toy piano. I opened my arms, and she walked 4 steps towards to me without any support. She's going to be able to walk very soon.

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Ashley understands a lot of new words. She loves to read and Mommy always reads The Hare and the Tortoise, and The Very Hungry Caterpillar to Ashley every morning. She now can point to the little duck and the little cat, and says, "Ya Ya" (Chinese for duck), "Mao Mao" (Chinese for cat). She flips the book and points to the hare on every page although she can't say Tu Tu (Chinese for hare/rabbit) yet. She loves to flip through The Very Hungry Caterpillar book. She says, poooouuu, I think it means Apple.

Every time Mommy and the nanny changed her diapers, we used to swing our hands in front of our noses and said, "Chou Chou" (Chinese for stinky). So now a days, when we change her diapers, Ashley swings her hands in front of her nose, and says, "chuuuuu". It's so funny.

Ashley also understands, Gou Gou (Chinese for dog), Qiu Qiu (Chinese for ball), Niu Niu (Chinese for cow) although she can't pronounce them yet.

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Ashley loves to pull her bibs off her neck, sometimes she just plays with them. Recently, after she pulls her bib off, she would try to put them back on and of course she can't work it out exactly yet, so she would just wrap it around her neck in all sort of ways and babbling at the same time. I think she's trying to put the bib on by herself.

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Ashley loves to pull off Mommy's hair clip, plays with it and sucks on it. The other day, after she pulled my hair clip and played with it for a while, she crawls over to my back again, and held the chair clip on my hair clip to my head, and started to babble, I think it means she wanted me to put it back on. So I did, and she crawled away and then crawled back, and repeated the process again. It's very cute.

Learning to Let Go

As a parent, one of the hardest thing to face is probably the fact your child is getting more and more independent. One of hardest thing to learn as a parent is probably learning to let go and realize that your child is an individual person who eventual will grow his/her own wing, fly their own path, make their own mistakes, learn from them, and live their own life.

Since Ashley was born, she had been sleeping in her crib in our room. Initially was because it was easier to take care of her as she woke up every couple hours and we didn't want little baby Ashley to be alone. Secondly, we live in a two bedroom condo, which doesn't give us much room. We basically need a spare bedroom to accommodate visitors. It worked out pretty well and I for sure definitely enjoyed the closeness. However, every now and then at night Ashley often kicks her legs, makes noises, sometime screams here and there, It often wakes Mommy and Daddy. On the other hand, whenever we get up in the middle of night or early morning to use the bathroom, we often wakes up Ashley. We thought of moving Ashley to her own room a while back, but for some reason never actually did it. Maybe subconsciously we didn't want to let go?

Things are getting worse and worse as Daddy travels so frequently lately and often has jet lag to battle with. He often goes to sleep at 2AM, or wakes up at 3 or 4 AM at night, and that just wakes both Ashley and Mommy up. So this Friday night, Daddy woke up at 3AM, and Ashley got woken up, it took her a long time to fall asleep and then she woke up again at 6AM. It was totally a nightmare. Everyone was tired and exhausted. It's time to move her to the other room.

After lunch Saturday, we got rid off the second bed, moved her crib to the other room. Everything happened so fast, it only took a couple of hours. So for the first time, Ashley got to sleep in her own room Saturday afternoon for her nap. We were a bit worried that Ashley might not be able to sleep in the new environment and it might take a couple of days for her to get used to her own room. Surprisingly, she took her nap without any problem. Saturday night she went to sleep within 10 minutes as usual after we put her to sleep. In fact, she slept so well that she woke up at 7:15 AM on Sunday. Sunday she took her naps in her own room without any hiccups. As usual last night, she went straight to sleep in 10 minutes. This morning around 7:20 AM, I heard her making some noise, I jumped up in a conditioned reflex, got her milk ready, went to her room, but she was still sound to sleep. So I just laid quietly on the floor next to her crib waiting for her to wake up. She didn't wake up until 8AM!

I'm surprised but at the same time glad that Ashley made the transition so well. She is truly an amazingly great baby. Honestly, Mommy feels a bit uneasy and lost that my little sweet baby is moving away and making her new step towards independence. Perhaps the same feeling that many Moms feel when their children go away for school or move away to live. But truly, children often do so well without the constant protection of their parents. Parents are usually the ones who couldn't let go and couldn't face the fact that their babies are finally grown up and have to live their own lives. Somehow, children have to take those initial steps, just like babies learning to walk and birds learning to fly. They'll never learn to do it unless actually doing it.

So as a parent, I can only give my child love, support and protection unconditionally when she needs it and learn to let go when the time comes. And this weekend, I learned to let go for the first time.

Home Alone With Ashley 5

Once again, Mommy is home alone with Ashley.

As usual, Ashley and Mommy played, read together in the mornings. After her morning nap and her lunch, Ashley accompanied Mommy to do grocery shopping and run some errands. We went to Ranch 99, Macys on Saturday, and Costco, Whole Foods on Sunday. After her afternoon naps, Mommy and Ashley walked to the pond at the neighbor complex, played and watched duckies On Saturday. And on Sunday, we went to the park. Ashley was all happy and silly. It was a lot of fun.

Then Monday came, Mommy took Ashley to get her first flu shot. By Monday night, Mommy started feeling sick. I just simply burned out of energy by looking after Ashley by myself, and running around all over the places for the last one and half months. Tuesday morning, Ashley started feeling sick too. She has some side effects from the flu shot, sneezing, coughing, stuffy nose, running nose, etc. Although her symptoms seem to be getting better, but she is still not quite 100%. I'm not sure if Mommy has infected Ashley or not. Meanwhile, Mommy is still sick with flu like symptoms.

Concern about the possibility of getting swine flu, Mommy went to the doctor yesterday. Luckily, the doctor said it was not swine flu, just upper respiratory infection.

Poor baby and poor Mommy. Hopefully Ashley gets better soon and hopefully Mommy recovers soon as well. It definitely has been tough with Ashley getting sick twice and Mommy being sick and being alone. What a month!