School

Today, 1st July marks the first day that Ellis goes to school.

We finally made the decision to send Ellis to daycare. Work is demanding more of my time and I can't get much done in the day and take care of her at the same time. I had been trying to do both at the same time and it's pretty crazy, for both of us. I get frustrated trying to rush something out when she's cranky and won't let me work on it. I don't really spend any quality time with her even though she's at home because I'm perpetually trying to do something work related. Ellis is also an active child and I think being confined at home is pretty boring for her.

So we found a school near our place and signed her up. I figure we'll at least give it a go and if it works out, great. If not then we'll figure something else out.

I packed a bunch of stuff for school (water bottle, change of clothes etc etc) and gave Ellis her own bag.

Kisu and I dropped her off in the morning. We went a little ahead of time to give her ample time to get to know the teachers and for them to know her. We stayed a little watching her get familiar with the place and toys - she got distracted playing "masak masak" so we left after about 20 minutes there.

I was a little worried but that soon evaporated when I got home to a quiet house and was able to do my work uninterrupted!

I went back during lunchtime - I walked in to see her quietly sitting with the other kids at the kiddy table spooning her spaghetti bolognaise. It was cute...they were all so well behaved! I had imagined kids hurling food at one another during meal times. Her teacher said she didn't cry, just occasionally asked for "Mama" and "Dada". Didn't cry or fling herself at me when she saw me. She just continued eating!

I was going to stay long enough just to make sure that she was OK - she seemed fine but kept putting her arms out to me to be carried when I wanted to leave. But after a few rounds of pick ups and goodbye kisses she let me go off with a wave and "Bye Bye".

Was back at 2.30 to pick her up for the day after her nap. Was told she didn't nap which didn't surprise me at all. Recently she's not been that easy to put down for a nap, even at home. She ended up drawing with the older kids at the school because she didn't want to sleep.

I felt really terrible when I went to pick her up...she looked kind of sad and forlorn and her face seemed to crumple up when she saw me (although no crying). I don't know if it was because she was tired from all the activity and not napping, but I felt just awful, like I had done something really bad to my baby. So the teacher reported that she was "very OK" for her first day and that she wasn't shy around the other kids, even the older ones.

She seemed just fine by the time we arrived home. She was all jumpy and running around like always. Conked out at 6pm though! Her head and eyelids were drooping and I had to let her have a 30 minute nap.

I'm really, really proud of her for holding up so well. I'm still trying to adjust to not having her around but I do appreciate the time off and time to do work. I hope she grows to love school and look forward to going each day.

the fine art of dining

ellis is already pretty good with eating finger foods as I started giving her food to practise with since she could do a "pincer" hold.

17.11.08

So I thought I'd try to see if I could train her to eat on her own with a spoon. Here's her first time at it:

On came the big bib from aunty jenna - you can see that she was none too happy with me for making me wait for her food to snap a picture.

The verdict? I had to help her along naturally - there was some mess but not too bad considering it was her first attempt at it. I suppose how fast she progresses will correspond to my tolerance level for mess. I'm trying very hard to ignore the inner voice to "clean up!" and focus on letting her learn.

My New Hairdo

Here's Ellis sporting her new do - she had her first haircut ever today!



At Fantastic Sams, Forum. Not that fantastic, really. I just went to Forum 'cos I vaguely recalled a salon that does baby haircuts. I would have gone somewhere else if I had seen it beforehand.

A very worn salon - the entire process was over in a jiffy. There were no fancy kiddy seats with cartoon DVDs and shiny toys to distract. For $17.90 you get a straightfoward cut - me wearing the plastic wrap holding Ellis in my arms, facing me so she wouldn't cry. I wound up with hair all over my face but was thankful she didn't get nicked by the scissors. We saved some of her hair - packed in a red ang pow. It'll go into her special keepsake box. The cut didn't make much of a difference really, just got rid of some of her straggly strands.

Another first - Ellis had her first try at finger food yesterday - she seems to like her veggie cracker. She's gotten quite good at eating it - and I noticed she's added chewing motions to her eating repetoire.