anZel/Arden

Archive for September, 2007

P + E

The letter P and E are not our friends for the past 10 days and probably won’t for a long time.

It all starts with the letter p for peanut. According to day care, anZel took and ate a piece of peanut butter sandwich from one of his teachers. He threw up and developed a pretty serious allergic reaction on the date he turned 17 month. When dAd went to pick him up, his face was beet red, his neck was swollen. When dAd asked where he hurt, he pointed at his neck. Enter e for emergency room. We were there until 7 at night. Although anZel charmed all the nurses at the emergency room, we were exhausted.

When I talked to the day care owner after this incident, she asked if I have seen this food allergy before. I said because we knew he is allergic to peanut from blood test, we have ZERO peanuts at home and have no interest in finding out how he would react to it.

On Friday, I received a call from day care around 12:50 pm. The day care owner told me that anZel was turning kind of red after having a piece of “butter” cookie as a snack. She said she only gave him a “butter” cookie. Then he threw up and became red. Since we have the result of anZel blood test, I read every single food label in my shopping cart, including the fine print! With all the processed food, you can’t really believe the 30 points font size words of the manufacturer claims. I could care less if it says “butter” cookie because it could be made of peanut or tree bark. When I arrived, I asked to see the label of where the cookie is made off. She handed me a big tin can with Chinese writings and said, “I gave him these.”

Ten days ago, when it happened for the first time. I chalked it as a live and learn experience. When this happened the second time, I feel like we are dealing with a ticking time bomb…

i hear you!!

After 30 minute-long breakfast this morning, anZel told me “no more”, Bu Yao (don’t want, in Mandarin), and Nm Yew (don’t want, in Cantonese).

poems, counting and nursery rhyme

anZel recited two poems, counted from 1 to 10 and recited a Chinese nursery rhyme in this video…almost got him to sing the “old mcdonald had a farm” song too…

床前明月光 疑是地上霜 举头望明月 低头思故乡

离离原上草，一岁一枯荣。野火烧不尽，春风吹又生。

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

月光光，照地堂。年卅晚，摘檳榔。檳榔香，摘子姜。子姜辣，買菩達。菩達苦，買豬肚。豬肚肥，買牛皮。牛皮薄，買菱角。菱角尖，買馬鞭。馬鞭長，起屋梁。屋梁高，買張刀。刀切菜，買爐蓋。爐蓋圓，買幅田。

baby DVD and videos == no good?

Read this post from Mark Andreessen of Netscape and Opsware fame. The link to the Reuters news doesn’t seem to work but very interesting read..

Recordings that claim to stimulate baby brain development may actually slow vocabulary development in infants if they are overused, U.S. researchers reported on Wednesday.

For every hour per day spent watching baby DVDs and videos, infants aged 8 to 16 months understood an average of six to eight fewer words than babies who did not watch them, Frederick Zimmerman of the University of Washington and colleagues found. …

“The most important fact to come from this study is there is no clear evidence of a benefit coming from baby DVDs and videos, and there is some suggestion of harm,” Zimmerman said in a statement.

“The bottom line is the more a child watches baby DVDs and videos, the bigger the effect. The amount of viewing does matter.”

Zimmerman and colleagues conducted random telephone interviews with more than 1,000 families in Minnesota and Washington with babies and asked detailed questions about television and video viewing.

Parents of the 8- to 16-month-olds were asked how many words like “choo-choo,” “mommy” and “nose” their child understood. …

“The results surprised us, but they make sense. There are only a fixed number of hours that young babies are awake and alert,” said Andrew Meltzoff, a psychologist who worked on the study.

“If the ‘alert time’ is spent in front of DVDs and TV, instead of with people speaking in ‘parentese’– that melodic speech we use with little ones — the babies are not getting the same linguistic experience,” Meltzoff added.

“Parents and caretakers are the baby’s first and best teachers. They instinctively adjust their speech, eye gaze and social signals to support language acquisition. Watching attention-getting DVDs and TV may not be an even swap for warm social human interaction at this age. Old kids may be different, but the youngest babies seem to learn language best from people.”

Dr. Dimitri Christakis, a pediatrician at Seattle Children’s Hospital Research Institute who worked on the study, said parents frequently asked him about the value of such videos.

“The evidence is mounting that they are of no value and may in fact be harmful,” Christakis said.

Español

When I was driving anZel home on Thursday, he kept saying beso and smacking his lips together. I figure it was another new word that he was trying to master. Later I realized it was kiss for Spanish. Here is his first Spanish word.

my 1st real test…

We have been preparing for today for at least three weeks. When feeding times were tough, we kept telling ourselves…only one more week…three more days. And here we are.

anZel got up at his unpredictable hours (between 6:30 to 7:30) at 6:55 am today. We told him that it’s the first day of school. He said “yes”. We have been telling him for several weeks of what he could expect at school. There would be older kids and Miss Stephanie. Because we know of this girl called Kamie. We even told him that he could play with Kamie.

Since school starts at 8:30 am, I decided that we should be there early so we could make a smooth transition with the teacher. When we arrived about 25 minutes early, the daycare door was still locked. I felt like one of those idiot who tries too hard…even for my own child’s first day at daycare. When the daycare teacher finally let us in, I had to collect myself. I started crying a bit out of control. First I made a fool of myself for showing up early and now my eyes are swelling up like two ping-pong balls. anZel saw me crying and was wondering what the big deal was. I tried the best I could to be strong.

Once we were in the room, anZel started feeling a bit uneasy. It was like he knew what was going on, that this time is not just a visit. It was like he knew that we will leave without him. He became more clingy and wanted to be held the whole time. When dAd finally got him to sit down to play, I dashed out of there before I made a scene of myself. He never cried before we left.

Throughout the day, I kept wondering how anZel was. Was he crying for me? Was he having his snack? Would he be able to take a nap in a stranger’s house? It would have been easier if he were home. I could call grandma and ask. She would give me every details of the day, including poop texture! My busy day prevented me from calling the daycare to ask.

anZel was the last one to leave today. He was in one of the teacher’s arms sucking in his breathe. He looked relieved to see us. The teachers told us that he cried quite a bit during the day. One of them told us that he is a reasonable child. He wouldn’t fall asleep when all other kids were asleep. So the teacher told him that he needs to be quiet. He sat sobbing but didn’t make a scene. He wouldn’t let the teacher hug him but he didn’t want her to leave his side either.

During the day, I kept thinking about what would anZel think when he cries for me and I wasn’t there for him? I have never thought I would give a part of myself like this. As I watch him fall asleep tonight, I wish he was still part of me physically.

When I look into anZel’s eyes each night this week, there is a certain sadness. His behavior has changed. He cries when he doesn’t get what he wants, which is unusual for him. We used to be able to distract him with toys or stories before, not this week. He also hasn’t slept well for the whole week. One night in particular, he cried for two hours for me. And there is nothing more heartbreaking than hearing his coarse voice after a long day of crying. dAd and I talked about how hard it has been for him…being in an environment which no one understands him (most of the teachers speak English, Mandarin and Spanish and anZel only speaks/understands Cantonese), yet we can’t seem to stop this moving train. We have started daycare for him and we can’t go back. Does he know that going to daycare isn’t a punishment? Will he eventually enjoy going to daycare?

future psychiatric assistance: $100/hr
endless guilt: priceless

minivan family

In our preparation to welcome Miss. Arden Zhen, we emptied the remainder of our bank accounts and purchased a new car and car seat.

First, the big car purchase. Before we went for “car shopping,” beeber and I looked each in the eye and decided that “we will NOT buy a minivan!” There’s nothing wrong with the minivan and the folks who drive them, we are just not a “minivan family!” The other requirement we had was that it has to have 3 rows of seats because we will almost always carry 6 people (dAd, beeber, anZel, Arden, grandma Helen, grandpa Sam) in it.

With that in mind, we got some recommendations from our friends. The one that kept coming up was the Mazda5. It’s supposedly not a minivan AND it has 3 rows of seats!!

We checked it out a couple of times and also checked out the Kia Rondo, which is supposedly the equivalent of the Mazda5. The Rondo was actually shorter than the Mazda5 and the two doors were not sliding doors. It didn’t quite work for us as there would be no room at all to put anything once the 3rd row seat is used.

So after much deliberation and negotiation with the Mazda dealership, we broke down and got the Mazda5 Sport with a 6 CD changer. As we were waiting in the dealership to get all the papers signed, I looked down at the tag that was attached to the key and noticed that it said “Body Style: Van”!!!!!! And as we finished signing the paper with the finance lady, she shoke our hands and said, “Congratulations on your new MPV”!!!!! WTF, she thinks the Mazda5 is the new MPV, a freaking miniVAN!!!

I am forever doooomed…we are now a minivan family!

With a new car, it’s time to get a new car seat for Arden as well. We purchased a Britax Marathon from baby catalog before so we checked them out again. They still have the lowest price around, $209 no shipping (to CA) and no tax!!

anZel reciting 月光光，照地堂

anZel’s almost has this nursery rhyme down…(though one of our friends said that all the noises he makes are the same )

月光光，照地堂。年卅晚，摘檳榔。檳榔香，摘子姜。子姜辣，買菩達。菩達苦，買豬肚。豬肚肥，買牛皮。

牛皮薄，買菱角。菱角尖，買馬鞭。馬鞭長，起屋梁。屋梁高，買張刀。刀切菜，買爐蓋。爐蓋圓，買幅田。

labor day weekend

part 1: the beach

3 purdue families took a trip a bit south of here to a Santa Cruz beach with the kids…

anZel all wet after chasing the waves…

dAd and anZel walking to the restroom…

anZel and the shovels

anZel and April playing on the beach

part 3: the park/farm

anZel riding on the choo-choo train

anZel looking tired…

anZel petting the cow-mommies-to-be..

anZel checking out the sheeps…