July 2013 - Annick 14 months, Luca 3 years 2 months

Annick:
- WALKING.  Started with a couple of goes mid-July, decided she'd just go for it July 19 and then a week later was pretty much a walking pro.
- talking talking talking - mimicking and echoing all the time.  Pretty much has the words 'allo', 'thank you' and 'bye bye' and will say 'Luca' when she feels like it.  Amongst the MANY words she has had a go at are: canard, tralalire (adorable!), balloon, pasta, shoes...
- counting!  Loves to say 'one, two three' or 'un, deux, trois' (at least, she's trying to say them)
- her little baby babble is surprisingly tuneful and she loves singing along to things - we don't know where the musical side comes from, certainly not from me or Jason
- clingy when sick and maybe weaning, although it didn't seem like it after Malaysia - but Luca weaned at this age, maybe she will do the same.
- she knows what she wants and she won't stop complaining till she gets it.  Let's you know when she's NOT HAPPY and YOU COULD BE DOING BETTER.

Luca:
- just leaps and bounds in his speech and such imagination
- when you tell him off, he tells you off at the same time: "stop it!  I dun like it!"
- cheeky and getting a bit naughty
- still so attached to the two fingers on his right hand
- learning left and right, la gauche et la droite
- loves to put himself and Annick into stories - he is Charley and Annick is Maisy!
- OBSESSED WITH RUBBISH TRUCKS.  OBSESSED.
- ALSO OBSESSED WITH AIRPLANES.  Makes papa be the conveyor belt for the luggage all day long, then makes him be the pilot so they can fly in the sofa plane.

Nemo sticker time!

This will be the frere et soeur edition - playing really well together, at least, when they're not driving each other crazy.

Playing blocks in the sunny corner!

Still eating like a champion - ate this HUGE plate of rice and beans and silverbeet and probably would have eaten more.

The best thing about little guys growing up is that you can say, "please set the table Luca", turn away, and when you look back - voila!

Luca does painting in his Nemo painting book from Nonno!

"Here Annick, taste!"  Luca cooks in his little kitchen then gets some feedback.

Annick goes for beret, stripey top, but maybe doesn't quite pull it off.

Annick and Luca raid the silly hat box.

Luca and Papa play their favourite game, 'le tapis roulant a l'aeroport'.

Luca makes a library, cleverly stocking it with little boy favourite themes of boats, planes and penguins.

Messing around at Shoppo.

Annick likes her dollies, but otherwise follows Luca's lead and is a bit all about trucks, cars and planes.

Luca has new blue dinosaur shoes!

I take my baby burrito and my little enchilada for burritos.  The little enchilada does not like them.

(Luca used to be the baby burrito, but then, when a new baby burrito turned up, he became the little enchilada, although the last time I asked him, he told me he was "a big fat enchilada", so I don't want to sell him short here.)

But the baby burrito LOVES her baby burrito.

I came in to the room and she was covered in owl stickers.

Luca makes bread with mama!  He made his little loaf all by himself and then ate it all by himself and wouldn't let mama try any.

"That one is an aeroplane and that one is a helicopter!"

One day we read stories together then I had to go and make dinner, so Luca said, "I read this by myself mama" and went to, indeed, read it by himself.

Les shoppeurs.

The return of the toy library BBQ!  Luca makes mama a beautiful BBQ lunch, although she ended up with all the vegetables and he got the sausage and hamburger.

Sharing bark in the park

Singapore

Finally, in Singapore.  Brother and sister hotel power!

Annick in her traditional holiday pose - mouth open, ready for food.  This was a nice piece of dragonfruit that made for a really terrible poop incident later on.

Jason reads the Economist in his business hotel room overlooking a construction site (Luca was chuffed!)

Luca likes to go to pay phones and call Nonna.

Mmmmm, sugar cane!

Ee Kiong koo still has the touch, or at least, doesn't make her cry now.

Luca continues his photographic series, "my relatives at mealtimes through my fingers".  Note artistic orange rubbish truck in foreground.

Banana leaf dinner?  Yes please!

Yay, we meet up with some of the Singapore cousins!

Luca was too tall to travel the metro for free.

By the end of the holiday, Luca was eating well again, possibly because we convinced him that noodles and pasta were pretty much the same thing.

Inside the amazing domed gardens at Marina Bay - this one was a Mediterranean climate, which also encompassed the temperate parts of Australia, California, South Africa and lots of other places.

Annick slept through most of it though.

This was the wet canopy dome with its own waterfall!

Luca's shorts are a bit big for him, but I think he kept making this happen on purpose.

Finally, all tuckered out on the flight home.  What a nice holiday!

What Annick did today

Something she does every day, plus something she will probably do every day from now on, but hadn't done very much at all before!

Malaysia - Melaka

Luca spent the five hour bus journey to Melaka being cheeky.  Annick, despite what you see here, did NOT spend the five hour bus journey peacefully sleeping.

 In Melaka, yet more durian!  The best of the trip, at a plantation.

We stayed at Uncle Thomas and Aunty Josephine's amazing house in Melaka.  Annick had no interest in the grand piano or luxurious rooms or beautiful garden - she just wanted to work out how to get the duck to turn on the water.

But she still had time to eat lots of durian.

We were spoiled and taken out for all sorts of amazing food, including the family's own Japanese restaurant, lots of local treats and a private room in a restaurant that came with a karaoke machine.  Here is Luca singing one of his standards, Phil Collins' 'One More Night'.

Annick took advantage of the frangipani tree.

Luca dips his feet in the pool!

 Luca enjoys some beef noodles YUM.

Luca and Annick and Carol in the swing - Luca was mystified by how the swing somehow knew how to start when he got in, and stop when he wanted to get out.  It must be magic!

Testing out the pool some more.  Maybe we should get in.

La petite princesse.

Annick learned how to walk along pushing the stools around the bench, waving and saying 'bye bye!' as she travelled.

Finally, in the pool!  And they almost didn't get out - if it weren't for some persuasion, they might still be in the pool right now.

Yay!

Luca was very busy providing tea and coffee for everyone else.  Standard cost, "three dollars".  Although mama got a special price of "two sixty".

MORE DURIAN.  Here is Jason learning how to crack one of the pointy buggers open.

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

Sadly we had to leave but were kindly given a lift to Singapore, stopping in JB for this AWESOME INTESTINE BREAKFAST.  Thomas introduced each dish, "here is the big intestine, and this one is the small intestine from near the arsehole, and this one is the female intestine from next to the birth canal..."

Annick enjoyed every kind.

For Nonna, in Toronto

This week Annick learned how to say 'Annick', although apparently we have been pronouncing her name wrong as she says it 'Nannie'.

Meanwhile, for the past week, Luca has been telling us that he wants to go to the airport and go an an aeroplane.  When you ask him where he wants to go, this is what he always tells us: