boys will be boys

Jove's pose when watching soccer or car race on TV. He can sit still and watch quietly for several minutes longer than if he watches or does anything else.

His favorite toys are cars, trucks, buldozers, helicopters, airplanes, ... you get the idea. And he has shown this keen interest on those things since he was about six months old! By twelve months, before he could walk, he could differentiate car, truck, and bus on the road. He'll say tar, tak, and bas (all rhymes with car) while pointing at correctly said vehicle.

I've read in some books that a child liked his/her gender related toys (boys like cars, and girls like dolls) just because the parents exposed him/her to those toys more. But I don't agree. I did gave Jovan some of my old dolls to play, showed him flowers and other girly things, but he didn't seem to be interested.

play grass

Grandpa put Jovan on the green grass one Saturday afternoon. Jove loves it! He would touch the grass, the dirts of the earth, and he would not be picked up by anyone.

zombie day

I didn't sleep a wink last night. Getting excited doing things for the new project and suddenly the dawn has come before I realized it. And as you can guess, I was half dead at half past seven in the morning when Jove woke up.

By the kindness of my sister and her boyfriend, I could catch a few hours of sleep in the afternoon. And the highlight of the day came after that. I got a call from a dear old friend in Melbourne! (Miss you heaps too, Fel.) She is a talented jewellery designer and you can check her design in her online shop, Flou.

unspoken love

I uploaded the pictures from last May's trip to Singapore, Semarang and Salatiga in the web albums (link at the sidebar).

A few weeks after that trip, I found out something that made my eyes watery from my mom and sisters.

Whenever we stayed in our grandparents' house in Semarang, my father, husband, son, and I usually slept in the guest's room (which was my childhood bedroom). Mom and my two sisters would be sleeping with grandma, and my youngest sister will sleep in a spare bed in grandpa's room. Grandpa sleeps in the room connected to grandma's room. They have slept in separate rooms for about 10 years, I guess.

Anyway, grandpa is a stern person and his relationship with grandma was not romantic or sweet... in short, I could not see them as a couple that could fall in love and got married in the first place. At one time, I knew that grandpa and grandma stopped talking to each other for some months (or maybe years).

And one day while my mom, sisters, and I were chatting about them, I found out that every night after everyone was asleep, grandpa would walk over to grandma's room to check on everybody. He would go to each bed and straighten the blanket, check the airconditioning, then went back to sleep.

Now that my grandma stays in another town, mom wondered how grandpa must have felt when he woke up in the middle of the night and checked the other room.

But I thanked God I had the chance to know this sweet habit of him, checking on grandma every night. That's how grandpa expressed his love.

Miss them so much. Hope we can have another trip there in the middle of this month.

as he walks

Jovan started to walk on his own yesterday. He is pretty careful in his learning to walk. Mom said that all of her four daughters (me and my sisters) were daring enough to walk/run from one point to another when we were still unable to walk properly. Jove actually took his sweet time to master his steps and refused to practice walking on his own previously.

Yesterday night, at my in-law's, I witnessed my little cherub walking into the room, all on his own, from the door where his father was standing. With a wide, big, cheerful smile on his face, he toddled into my embrace, on his own, not holding on anything or anyone.

Boy, I couldn't even describe how my feelings were at that point. Happy, excited, proud, yet I felt some sort of fleeting sadness. Soon, he will let go of my hand (and refused to be held) when he walks and runs in this big big world.

Do you, mothers, feel the same?

one sunny sunday

We were invited to swim in one aunt's condominium one Sunday morning. Jovan had a lot of fun with one great aunt, three aunts, one uncle, two cousins (and their two babysitters), daddy, mommy, cold clear water, bowls of spaghetti, slices of yummy bread, sweet ice cocktail, and a basketful of peanuts.

Actually posted on 31/07/07

ONE year old celebration

If we were to have three sons... it would take ages to have a proper family picture. Hee hee. All of them just could not sit still.

Serpong, Tangerang - 1 July 2007