Crawling!

Liem has started crawling! ARGH! He loves electric cables, the dvd player, the remote control, plug points! ARGH! On the other hand, hopefully this means he'll be losing some fat.

Rings

Earlier on, I tried to teach Liem how to play with his blocks but he showed me the way HE was going to play with them. I tried again with these rings: "Liem, you put the biggest ring at the bottom. Then the next biggest one and so on until you have the smallest ring on top". Liem decides instead that it's more fun to wear the rings on his arm and leg. Mummy 0, Liem 2.

Cardboard boxes

Sometimes Liem can be perfectly happy playing with or in cardboard boxes.

Eeeyer...yuck!

I used to freak out whenever Liem touched something dirty.... getting more used to seeing him put his toes, daddy's shoelaces and mummy's slippers in his mouth now. Still freak out a bit but trying to control it. Dirt is supposed to be good for him. Shudder...

Mmm...yummy...

Mmm... yum yum... Liem loves the metal leg of the computer desk.

Family photo

This is a rare family photo... we hardly ever get photos of the three of us together. Thank you, Jones!

What are you looking at?

I never quite know how Liem gets into positions like this.

On the beach

Liem was very serious when he was on the beach. All the new sensations.... cold seawater, sand under his feet, sand in his hands, sand in his mouth...

Fighting already?

Oh dear, are the two cousins at each other's throats already?

Liem and Oliver

What cuties!

Here Liem hasn't learnt to sit up properly. Still leaning forward a lot to balance himself. He sat up straight a couple of days later.

Christmas

These photos are a bit delayed because I was still using film and had to wait a while to get the photos back. I'm trying to go digital from now on...although I find the digital camera takes a while to take the photo after I press the button. This means I often miss the moment, especially with Liem moving around so much and so quickly. I already miss quite a few moments using a film camera.
Anyway, here we have Liem meeting Aunty My Anh, Christmas lunch in Torquay where Liem also met Aunty Mai and cousin Oliver.

The head plow

Liem hasn't quite learnt how to crawl yet. He's trying though...here he is doing the head plow. I think he moves forward maybe about 2 cm. Hahaha!

Sticking his tongue out

For some reason, Liem went through this phase of sticking his tongue out all the time. I didn't encourage him, look who's encouraging him.

Burping rag again

I mentioned previously about how Liem likes to play with his burping rag. Here he is, at it again!

Pillow play

Liem has a lot of toys to play with....brightly coloured ones, soft ones, stacking ones, rattly ones, squeaky ones.... But what he loves to play with is this pillow. It's blue, it's square...it's a pillow...I can't quite see what the attraction is...

Mess

How much mess can one baby make?

"How did he get there AGAIN?"

It must be easier than I think it is for Liem to roll under his chair. He's done it AGAIN!

Blocks

How Mummy tries to teach Liem: "Here, Liem, this is how you play with your blocks. The round blocks go in the round hole, the square blocks go in the square hole, the triangular blocks go in the triangular hole, the star-shaped blocks goes in the star-shaped hole."
How Liem plays with his blocks: Knocks the bucket over spilling all the blocks on the floor. Takes the lid of the bucket, sticks it in his mouth and gives it a good lick. Takes the bucket, gives it a good lick. Takes each block and give them all a good lick and chew.
Mummy 0, Liem 1.

"How did he get there?"

Ever since Liem started rolling about, I've been finding him in all sorts of weird places....under the computer chair, under the table, next to the shoes... Here he managed somehow to get under his little chair! I don't know how he does it!

Drinking water

When we had Liem on formula and the days started to get hot, he would go 3 days without having a poo. The clinic nurse said to give him water to help with that. Sounds pretty easy, "Just give him some water". The first time I gave him water, he drank about 10 mls then refused to drink anymore. The second time I gave him water, he sucked once, then refused to drink. After that I noticed him TASTING whatever I gave him first to make sure it was yummy formula and not horrible water before he would continue to suck. Even my mum tried to give him water and he refused to drink.

Then when he was sick in Geelong and it was 36 degrees or something like that, he finally drank 20 mls of water! Twice! I was so happy because it meant that at least he was getting some extra fluid in him.

We came home to Sydney and it was 45 degrees!!! The unit was a total oven. I drank 6-7 glasses of water and was still thirsty. Liem woke up crying at 4.45 am and I gave him some water. Filled his bottle 1/3 full with water. He drank the lot. Filled it up again to about 1/3 with water and he sucked the lot down. And a third lot. And part of the fourth. I estimate he drank about 270 mls of water!!! At least he's smart enough to drink water when he's thirsty.

Sick

Liem and I fell sick at the same time while we were in Geelong. This is the first time Liem has been sick. We had a really bad night...he was crying intermittently until 12.30am when we gave him a feed. He vacuumed it up and then promptly vomitted it all back on the kitchen floor, grandpa's favourite reclining chair and grandpa's books and magazines that were next to the chair. The intermittent crying continued until 2am when he must have passed out from exhaustion. The next day he seemed to be feeding well at first but then later on in the day, only drank half his usual amount and was looking limp like a lettuce (not his usual Mr Wriggly self). Poor little guy...he looked really small and frail.

Liem totally recovered the next day...while Mummy was still coughing and looking like death. Then Daddy came down with the same bug. Hmmm...this is probably going to be the pattern of things to come....the little germ catcher catches germs, spreads them to mum and dad, gets better while mum and dad continue to be indisposed for much longer. Heeyer...

Oh, Khiem reminded me that Liem's vomit completely missed his burping rag and also got onto Daddy's pajamas!

On the plane

We took Liem for his first plane trip on Christmas eve - we flew to Melbourne to visit Khiem's parents.... First thing to note: prams and strollers have to be checked in as special baggage now. I was told that we would be able to use the pram right up to the gate but this is no longer true. Little Liem is quite heavy to carry around but we managed it (at least Khiem did). On the plane, Liem was a bit fussy...we requested a bassinet but when we put him in it, he just cried so we had to take him out. Khiem then held Liem in his arms, sang and rocked him to sleep! You should have seen my jaw dropped when he fell asleep (Liem is usually Mr Wriggly in my arms!) So that all went very well.

On the way back though, Liem was Mr Fussy all the way. No rocking, singing or pony rides would calm him down. There was no screaming but it was a close thing. Lots of crying, kicking, wriggling. "Why did we have to have the worst baby on the plane?" There was another baby on the other side of the plane who was happily sitting in her bassinet quietly playing games. Finally, Khiem got Liem calm enough by sitting Liem up with his body leaning forward, his head facing up and patting his back. It looked like the world's most uncomfortable position but it worked. And guess what? Liem fell asleep! And he had to stay in that position because when we moved him to a lying down position to make it more comfortable, he woke up and started fussing again. So back to the funny position and back to sleep again! Unfortunately, we were landing at the time so Liem didn't get much more than a 10 minute nap.

People have been asking me whether we are going to Malaysia this year. Before this trip, I was saying, "No, he's still too young, the trip to Malaysia is too long, he can cry for a really long time and I can't take it. We'll see how he does on the trip to Melbourne." Now when people ask me the same question, I say, "NO WAY! YOU MAD, AH?"