Third and Fourth Teeth

Maya has four teeth! Her two middle top ones just pierced through (and she likes grinding them against her two bottom teeth - fun). One more looks like it should be out soon too.

Annual Galette Party

This year, like the previous years, we had a fete des rois party at our place (actually we sort of had two this year because we had an extra galette left after our first party and then invited a few neighbors the next evening for galette).

Our bakers went to work again this year creating three beautiful and yummy galettes (2 almond and one chocolate).

Noah with the pre-baked version

the final product...

We had 9 kids and 7 adults over for crown making and galette... lots of fun (so much so that we almost did not take any pictures).

Maya and Noah's friend from school had a great time together... 

Making silly faces!

Eyes

Our kids have both had eyes that changed up to a year and even beyond in Noah's case. Below is a picture of  Noah's eyes at 7 months and a picture of Maya's eyes around 10 and a half months. Can you tell which is which? 

Noah's eyes underwent a major change shortly after this picture was taken and became greenish/hazel - Maya's eyes are still blue-ish at almost one... to be continued...

ANSWER: Maya is the first picture and Noah is the second.

Addendum to Waiting for Big Brother Noah

This morning, Maya woke up after Noah had already left for school. The first thing she did after drinking her milk was to look around for Noah while signing wildly "brother Noah", "brother Noah" (the sign we taught her is a simplification of the ASL sign for brother). 

Waiting for Big Brother Noah

This afternoon, a bit before Noah was due, Maya started doing her sign for big brother Noah. 

This was Maya doing her big brother Noah sign yesterday

(fist goes from head to open hand)

I explained that he would be back soon but was at school now. She was not having it. She walked to the front door and stood there signing brother brother brother. She LOVES her big brother :)

Free the Rabbit

It seems like everyday Maya does something new often a small new thing... but they are adding up - a new sign (she now does big brother Noah) or a new combination of signs (more food, Noah walk, Lhasa/cat food, maman food (maman feeds me)) or a new understanding (yesterday I showed her pairs of memory cards ex elephant and cat or dog and horse and asked her to show me the elephant or the cat... and she got it right everything single time, or getting the ball when asked or not touching the garbage can when asked or pointing to the flower in the book when asked) or a new activity (signing walk and going to the shoe rack and to get her shoes or playing grimaces - I do a silly face then she does then I do or... freeing the rabbit). 

Maya has a doudou rabbit that she really loves and that helps her fall asleep (thank you Suza :)) but never leaves her bed. The other day, Maya decided it was time to free rabbit. She walked over to her crib and tugged and tugged and tugged on rabbit till she was able to pull rabbit through the bars. She then walked around the apartment happily holding on to rabbit (I did not get pictures of her pulling on rabbit but here she is walking around with rabbit).

Maya with free rabbit

Showing Eleonor that she has rabbit

Funny girlie

New shoes and new skills

Our little Maya is growing up... she now has a pair of big girl shoes. Seth was in the US last week and brought back some shoes for Maya... Not much choice in her tiny tiny size but we found something that fits and seems comfortable. She was a bit apprehensive at first but after a little bit, was off.

Our little girl in her big girl shoes - no more slipper shoes

Also new, Maya started pointing at things last week. She points so I can tell her the name of the designated object or points at something she wants and a few times, she pointed to a flower in a book when I asked her "ou est la fleur". 

She also is doing her signs more and has added two new signs - mouse and slide. Mouse does not seem very useful but somehow there are lots of mice in the books we read her hence the mouse sign. She signs "cat" and "food" in the evening to tell me she wants to go feed Lhasa with me. Or "bath" when it's time for her bath. She also signs "cat" when she wants to go home (abode of Lhasa the cat) or slide when she wants to go down the slide. It's so much fun watching all of it slowly coalescing.

She has been removing a cover I put on her or me when playing peekaboo for quite a while but she just started hiding herself with a burp cloth and peeking out with a huge grin when I ask where is Maya.

Finally, Maya has started accompanying her "singing" with some "drumming". She stands by a door or wall or table and drums with her hands and then tries to hum jingle bells or some other tune. She is so proud as she looks up at me. Hopefully, I can catch it on video sometime soon...

Teething Maya

Maya seems to be in the throws of teething today. She was chewing on everything she could put her hands on but luckily decided that an actual teether worked decently as, well, a teether.

Sweet girl

The teether was not enough - she tried to get her finger in her mouth too

Funny face

Still smiling despite the three white buds pushing out

Funny face again

Noah's First Computer Drawing

For my birthday, I got a snazzy new printer which prints in color, prints pictures, scans, copies... I am so excited. So much new fun stuff to do with the kids. I told Noah we could draw a picture on the computer and then print it out and since then he has been asking about 10 times a day whether he can draw his computer picture. So, finally, while Maya was napping the other day, I set him up and showed him how to do a star and chose the color for the outside and inside of the star. I figured we would do a star drawing and then next time we would try other tools. Noah had another idea... he wanted to try it all. I let him of course and....

This was the result!

We printed it out as promised. Since then, Noah has been asking not 10 times but 20 times a  to make another computer drawing!

The End of the Gingerbread Houses

After a week of sitting in what we thought was a "cold dry room", our gingerbread houses (see here for the building of the gingerbread houses: Building our Gingerbread houses ) had deteriorated. 

The sugar windows had completely melted down.

Leaving puddles of yellow on the "snow"

We could not really eat them because we had chosen the gingerbread and icing recipes that were best for building but were not very good to eat and the candy did not seem that appetizing anymore. So, we decided to destroy the houses in style...

Noah getting ready to destroy his house....

So much fun....

Maya getting in on the action with Daddy

Can you even tell which house this one was?

Or this one?

It took a week to build the houses and five minutes to destroy them but Noah (and the rest of us) enjoyed both a lot! Hammering the houses was lots of fun. Bye bye houses - see you maybe next year.

New Year Treats

January 1st was a big day for Maya - the first day of a new year (Happy New Year Everyone) but also.... 

her first little taste of chocolate

AND...her first taste of crepes. The chocolate was not as popular as I would have expected. She seemed to like it but did not really ask for more. She wolfed down her cheese and spinach crepe though. 

First Long Bike Ride

Our new apartment is near a large park with playgrounds and sand and lawns to fly kites and BBQ pits and bike paths. The other day (Dec 28), we took Noah for a bike ride in the park.

He ended up biking the whole length of the park and back (or about 7km).

Noah on his bike...

His first long bike ride! Since then we have gone back for another ride (though a bit shorter this time). He is getting very good and comfortable on the bike (after a short hiatus when we were in the US and moving).

First Visit to Universal Studios Singapore

On December 30, we took Noah and Maya to Universal Studios Singapore. Seth and I took turns doing rides with Noah and staying with Maya. 

Seth and Noah in the "Accelerator" in Sci-Fi City

View of the pier and "New York"

Noah and I in Ancient Egypt's Treasure Hunters ride

Noah driving the car (it had some give between grooves and he loved driving it)

Noah on the dino in the Lost World

Seth and Noah Dino Soaring

Noah and his dino

The castle in Far Far Away

At Noah's request, he and I rode the roller coaster in Far Far Away. 

 He found it a bit scary but liked it.

And Maya got to ride her first carousel

She loved it!

It was pretty crowded during the day so we skipped a few of the popular rides to come back to later. Most of these were the more adventurous rides. We were happily surprised that Noah was allowed to do all but one of the rides in the park (some required 107cm, some less and only one required 122cm (Noah is about 110cm)). Noah asked to do the Transformers ride even after hearing that it was in the dark with shooting and crazy speeds. We were a bit apprehensive but he loved it. He then asked to do the Canopy Flyer below...

He also loved that and then did the Jurassic Park Rapids Adventure. It had one of the tallest height requirements so we thought it was going to be scary/fast but it turned out to be pretty tame (except for when the ride was stopped for five minutes and we were stuck in a small lift with a giant dinosaur about to eat us). 

We were happily surprised at how much Noah loved some of the scarier rides and how Maya is able to sleep with the loudest music playing.  All in all - a great day. 

Piling and Climbing

Maya is a climber. The other day, she was in her parc (playpen) and I found her standing up on top of a pile of toys trying to climb out of the pen. This morning, she was playing on the floor and when I looked back...

She had somehow piled up the books and was standing on top of the pile trying to climb onto the table... (above making her silly face and below - our sweet climber).

And she is only ten months old... fun times ahead!