Very spoiled

This was my day...

-Two hour sleep in.
-Attending coffee morning by myself (I could enjoy the coffee and conversation without rocking or feeding Luca).
-Girls dinner out.
-An hour and a half massage at Zen Spa.
-Both boys fast asleep when I came home.

All thanks to my wonderful husband - thank you honey : ) I feel very spoiled and relaxed.

Zumba

Since I had Luca I have done only very small amounts of exercise. But today I went to a new exercise class - Zumba! It is a very popular exercise all over the world. It is a Latin-inspired dance (mixture of hip-hop, samba, salsa, merengue etc) fitness program. Even here in Brunei it is taking off!!

Guess who the instructor was?



Tadddaaa it's my neighbour Boel!
(She did her instructing license training in Sweden during the summer break)

It was very hard work but I really really enjoyed it. I've already bought a ticket for the Zumba Master Class (full on zumba for 90min!) which will be held in a weeks time. I hope I can take as many classes as possible and master more moves and steps before then - wish me luck!

Monkey supermarket

I went to Monkey Supasave this afternoon while the boys were having a nap.

The carpark was quite full today so I had to park my car in the one close to the jungle. When I came out of the supermarket full of goodies I saw this car with monkeys (before I got my iphone out there were 4 of them!) jumping up and down on top of it. Well this is why the supermarket is called monkey supasave!



Can you see a monkey on top of the car?

Lucky it wasn't my car, I would have had trouble loading my stuff (I had lots of fruits and veges incuding bananas!).

Peace Day

Last week at school the students celebrated International Day of Peace. On this day the students were allowed to wear casual clothes to school. The older kids had more events at school but for the little ones not much was happening (I thought).

But this morning I saw this displayed in front of Oliver's classroom.



Wonderful work from the Unicorn teachers and students.



Here is Oliver's piece - nice and neat (he still puts things in lines...)

And very artistically painted dove:



Well done Oliver!

Look at me!

It is just amazing how much Oliver is absorbing from his nursery class. His language is improving day by day and he is enjoying all the classroom activities.

A few weeks ago if I gave him a piece of paper and crayons he would have just drawn lines and odd circles but now with loud voice, he says "Look at me! Look at me mummy!" and draws lots of nice circles. And tells me "circles!"





I know it is just a little thing, but I am very emotional every time he does something new with his big smiles : )

First day at ASA

The school offers a great variety of ASA (after school activities). You name it, they have it! Hip hop dancing, scrapbooking, lego, photography, animation, football, just endless activities are offered.

There is one activity available to the very little ones - swimming. I enrolled Oliver in this as we no longer go to the swimming lessons in the morning.

Yesterday was his first lesson. It is a very small class so far (the teacher told us there might be more coming later in the term) - only two of them and a teacher! Great ratio ha!?



It was the first time Oliver went to a lesson without me or Matthew, so a little bit hesitant but in the end he had a good time (I think). The class is only 30min so by the time he got used to the water and the teacher a bit it was time to get out - and of course he wanted to play more! There will be another class tomorrow I hope we can see more smiles from him : )

Story time with daddy

Oliver loves reading with Matthew. When Oliver picks a book, sometimes it turns out to be a mission for Matthew!





Matthew sometimes changes a story though, "A mouse took a stroll through the deep dark wood..." but Oliver straight away knew it wasn't The Gruffalo book they were reading. "Funny" he says with a big smile.

A whole new world

Luca can now not only roll over, he can push himself up! No longer staring at the ceiling - A whole new world around him.



(yes, his hair keeps growing - might need a hair cut soon?)

Passing down

It is great to have the same sex children. I hardly need to buy anything new for Luca (poor baby...), he can wear everything Oliver has grown out of!

These tiki socks were one of my favourites but when I bought them for Oliver, he was already in his growth spurt and only wore them twice or so.

But Luca can wear them now!



Can you see Luca's lovely fat rolls on his leg? It won't be long before he'll grow out of these socks.

Which team to support?

Tonight we were in a unique situation watching the RWC - both of our teams were playing! It was NZ vs Japan. Last time they played in the 1995 RWC the result was Japan 17- NZ 145 (yeah, Japan lost quite badly...) We were sure of who was going to win tonight but hoped the score gap wasn't as bad as in 1995.

We only have All Black tops for the boys so I had to do a little bit of decoration on them:



Oliver got chips in a Japan coloured bowl and a little face paint on his cheek.



Luca with a Japan flag.

We are so impressed how much Oliver is engaged in watching the game. He can hear the commentators (tackle! try!). And his ball control is getting much better too!



Oliver has a little obsession now, when he is in his All Black jersey he has to have his rugby ball. Today he was very proud to show his little brother how to handle the ball and watch the game.





The result? Japan 1 try and NZ lots and lots of tries...

Ukulele

Exhausted

I dropped Oliver at school at 7:40 and picked him up at 11:30 today - First full day for him. Result? A very tired boy in the car...

3 months and 1 week

Luca can roll over! Only took him 3 months and 1 week. Wonder how soon he will start crawling...

Who is your friend?

Matthew talked to Oliver when he was getting ready for school this morning. Three questions:
Are you going to school? - YES!
Are you going to play with your friends? - YES!
Who is your friend? - ME!

Bless him... so cute

Mini me!

We missed the Watson's kids yesterday morning before heading out to school - Oliver was so disappointed... So this morning I made sure he got to see them before getting in the car.



Oliver was so impressed he and Lucas were dressed exactly the same way. Lucas screamed "Oliver is mini me!!"

Stopover visitors

This morning while I was dropping Oliver at school Matthew went to the airport to collect some visitors from New Zealand. Aunty Brenda, Uncle Ted and Ted's sister Elaine are on their way to England. They are just here for the day but it is always nice to have visitors : )



Luca welcomed Aunty Brenda with his big smile.



Luca with his golly (that was made by Aunty Brenda) - they have same amount of hair!!



During this short stay they managed to fit in a lot - a visit to the Empire Hotel, picking up Oliver from school, lunch at the yacht club and a wee snooze to get ready for tonight's flight.

First day at school

Who was more excited!? Us parents or our little boy (not little any more! he started school today!)

It was Oliver's first day at nursery today. We all got up nice and early at 6am which is Oliver's normal wake up time so we didn't really have any issues getting ready. After his breakfast he got his uniform on and boy! he was proud of himself. He came and said to me "Look at me mummy look at me!"





He didn't really like the socks and his new shoes but I told him Lucas (next door) wears the same to school - no problem at all. He changed his mind and he liked them : )



When we got to the school carpark Oliver's little friend Helen was there too. So they walked together all the way down to the nursery (The school changed their security procedures and parking etc so now Oliver has to walk almost 500m to get to his classroom,) or running with excitement I should say.



The entrance of the classroom was nicely decorated - he is in Unicorn class.



Here is our little Unicorn:



This is where he hung his bag:



And he put his water bottle in the basket:



The classroom is huge!



He was very excited about the all the play stations he can play at, and straight away got into the playdough! He was cooking and baking with his little friends and his teacher Ms Jo.



I thought he would cry when I told him goodbye but he was actually quite ok and carried on playing. He might have been too busy with what he was doing and didn't actually comprehend the fact that we were leaving him there. We were advised to come and get him a little bit earlier today as it was his first day. So we went to get him around 11 o'clock. When he saw me he was very excited and wanted to show me all the things he was playing with. He wasn't in a hurry to leave at all. Ms Jo told us he got upset every now and then but he managed to get through the day ok. So I guess it was a success!

While Oliver was at nursery Matthew, Luca and I went out to the Empire for a little celebration for Oliver. We had a cooked breakfast and coffee and a wee walk around. It was very lovely but felt a little odd not to have Oliver with us...





Luca enjoyed 100% full attention from both of us. Yes his hair was up as always!



Hope he will be excited about going to school again tomorrow, our tired boy is deeply asleep now : )

Rugby World Cup 2011

Yes! It's on!!!
The first game was on Friday evening, we watched it next door with some kiwi friends. All 6 kids were dressed in All Blacks clothes and looked so cute. I was too busy watching the game (plus the children were so happy running around and playing), I didn't get any photos.

But here is Oliver before heading out in his World Cup top and his rugby ball : )



It will be a very entertaining few weeks! Go All Blacks! (and Team Japan of course, but I know we don't have much of a chance...)

Sleepover - Take 2

This time it was Linnea's turn to come and sleepover at Oliver's house. We had Lucas the other day and it was such a success, I couldn't say no when Linnea asked me early this week.

She was so excited - Boel (her mom) told me she had her bags packed since Monday (sleepover was on Sat night).
She arrived with a nicely packed suitcase and a baby buggy.



When she got here she asked me if she could do exactly what Lucas did with Oliver, she must have read my blog post, she wanted to watch a bit of TV, play a little bit and have a nice bedtime story and go to bed.

So that's what we did and a little bit extra.
Oliver hadn't finished his dinner when she arrived so she helped him eat.



They played the movie "Cars" with the train track.



I promised Linnea she could have a bath with Oliver - they both enjoyed it so much!

It was so nice to see the two of them giggling away and excited about the whole experience. When they were both tucked in bed Linnea said with a big smile "This is so lovely! I am liking this sooo much!", bless her!



They snuggled up to each other and went to sleep without a hassle - I just wish they slept in a little bit longer in the morning. They were up nice and early at 6am! Lucky Matthew was at home, I just escaped to the other side of the house and slept for a few more hours : )

It's berry season

Unfortunately not for us humans, these berries are for the birds in our backyard. I think twice a year the tree overhanging Oliver's tree house fruits. During this time we get so many birds hanging around our house.

This morning Oliver and I went up in the house for some bird watching. We could hear them above us but because of the roof we couldn't actually see any from it. But we took our noisy/musical toys out and played some songs with the birds. It was rather nice...

Snack box

Oliver is getting ready to go to nursery from next week (Well... It is already starting for some but as he was born in late May he is in the younger group who are starting the classes one week later). We have been doing lots of adjustments to his everyday routine. Breakfast time, nap time, dinner time etc etc. One of the things I tried today and yesterday was opening and packing away his own snack box (and of course eating!). Apparently he will have two snack times while he is at nursery (he will go from 8am till 11:30).

Oliver already had a cool lunch box that Merryn gave him when he was in NZ in April. I packed his snack box and took it to the yacht club.

He managed to open it himself.



He got some raisins, pasta, apple, grapes and a jam sandwich.



He was very happy eating his "Kiwi" jam sandwich : )



Only a few more days and our little boy will be a big boy and going to school. How exciting!!

Three months already!?

I have heard lots of people say "with your second one everything goes very fast" - YES IT HAS! Luca is already 3 months old today.

We just cannot believe how fast the time flies and the speed he is growing. He is very healthy with his legs and neck very strong. He is almost able to support his neck by himself. And pushing himself up with his legs whenever he gets chance - even when he is feeding. If I put him in the car seat without the seatbelt he tries to turn himself or I should say tries to get out of the car seat. He is very sociable - loves chatting to people and smiling.

I wanted to do something to celebrate this day so we spent the morning at the yacht club. Luca loved his extended no nappy time very much. While he was in a good mood I took some photos. One of my friends gave me a book called Mamarazzi - Every Mom's Guide to Photographing kids when Luca was born and I have been reading the book and learning tips.

Here are some of the photos I took today.



Well this one didn't really come out the way I wanted it. I wanted his little toe to be more in focus... but I thought it is still very cute of him looking at his own toe : )



The hair - everyone comments on his wonderful "mohawk" and it is still growing!



The fresh air put him into a deeeep sleep.



He has a wonderful smile and now he can laugh with sound!



And he love love loves eye contact with people.

I tried to take brothers photos but as you can see Oliver wasn't really helpful today. So this was as good as it got.



Can you see Matthew and Luca squinting the same way?

The toughest months have gone - now it's time to enjoy seeing my boys grow further!