Drool

–verb (used without object)
1. to water at the mouth, as in anticipation of food; salivate; drivel.
2. to show excessive pleasure or anticipation of pleasure.
3. to talk foolishly.
–noun
4. saliva running down from one's mouth; drivel

Is drooling a milestone? It appears so. Until a week ago, minibeanie had been a dry-chin baby; now, a glistening gleam sits on his chin every so often. This development is probably partly explained by his fist finding his mouth for the first time. And the accompanying lip-smacking sounds would make Colonel Sanders very proud indeed :D Very finger lickin' good!


In his favourite rocker. Quite indispensible for afternoon naps and when I'm in the kitchen and he sits there while I chop, slice & dice. We try to introduce minibeanie to a variety of smells by letting him have a whiff. Le smell du jour was garlic... apparently, he's not a big fan of it judging by the way he wrinkled his nose :D Then again, he must have had it in utero since his mum eats tons of that stuff.

Fast becoming a non-optimum baby...

Hi there, who are you?... Babies are so endearingly silly - they have no idea what the reflection in the mirror means at this age ;)


minibeanie is 2 months & 4 days old

Ah-goo

minibeanie's learning to babble now :) Recently, in one of his playful moments, I swear he said "ah-gooo" in response to my babbling about how cute I thought he was.

A typical conversation goes like this:
me: Now mummy's going to wipe your mouth so that you don't get a rash. We don't want a rash, do we?
mb: [chuckle]
me: It's not nice when it's all red...
mb: ooooh [more chuckle]
me: C'mon, work with mummy, dun move so much (quite redundant actually!)
mb: gooo [chuckle]

minibeanie is 2 months & 1 day old

Cigars & Curry

DH finally had his '10 toes' party tonight. It's a tradition in Finland that when a baby's born, the dad invites his male friends to a party to celebrate a further loss of freedom. No, I'm kidding. It's of course to celebrate his joy at the new addition to the family and what better way than to have a party with sauna & cigars.

Anyhow, I made a Huge pot of chicken curry & a chocolate cake with warm choc sauce for his party. And I know he brought from our collection, champagne, cognac, a French red & a Hungarian dessert wine at the very least.

Not to be outdone, I had a hen party of my own :D 2 girlfriends came over to have a curry lunch but instead of cognac, we had excellent jasmine tea with mooncakes. It was a great way to spend an afternoon.

By the way, to be politically correct, those cigars were made of chocolate.

minibeanie is 1 month, 3 weeks & 6 days old

milestones

Not unlike the corporate world of target setting, every parent is obsessed with milestones. Is the baby turning over according to what the books say? She should be able to say her first word or she has to take her first step by a certain time. But every child is different. So these well-meaning developmental milestones can in fact be highly stressful for an obsessive parent. As for me, I'll like to think of myself as a laissez faire parent. As long as the kid is growing fine, I'm happy.

A week ago, minibeanie appears to have reached a certain milestone - social smiling :) If you wrinkle your face and stretch your mouth from ear to ear, he tends to respond in a like fashion. Oh yes, it also helps if you talk in a high-pitched voice in highly exaggerated tones so that he's engaged. I've become a clown; that's embarrassing.

A sign that minibeanie's more socially aware, his sleeping hours have also changed from the early newborn days (I can't believe he's no longer a "newborn"!!). He's usually wide awake in the morning, all coo-y and wanting to play. This period of wakefulness lasts until the early afternoon when he will nap for a little while. Unfortunately, mornings for me are rather dreadful because I'd be recovering from the night feeds. So much for engaging play when I can hardly peel my eyes open.
minibeanie is 1 month 3weeks & 2 days old

The Christening Ceremony

Here are minibeanie's Finnish godparents, Toni & Naksu. Absent is Marianne, a dear friend from Singapore. (When Marianne learnt that a responsibility of a godparent is to be guardian to the child if something untoward happens to the parents, she promptly wished DH & I a "long and prosperous life" :D )

The ceremony was a solemn yet sweet affair which was conducted by Pastor Timo in both Finnish & English. He touched on the name of Alexander meaning "defender of men"... and that's what I hope he would be.

ps. minibeanie's (this name is going to stick ;) Christening gown had been worn by his grandma as well as his dad.

minibeanie is 1 month 3 weeks & 2 days old

Poop

minibeanie is 1 month 2 weeks & 5 days old

Name

minibeanie is now officially Alexander Bernard Lepistö :) Being great fans of Roman history, we were thinking of Julius, Augustus or perhaps Constantine, the first Christian Roman Caesar. Somehow though, they didn't feel right. The added challenge was to have a name that's both Finnish & English. (On that matter, no Finnish name like "Jussi" please...english speakers will end up butchering it by pronouncing it as "juicy") So then, Alexander the Great was inspirational enough, so Alexander it is.

And since he's half Chinese, it's only appropriate to have another name that reflects his heritage. Hence, unofficially minibeanie's Chinese name is 曾彦杰 (Zeng Yan Jie). It means 'moral value'. More importantly, I thought it has a nice ring to it... sounds like the name of a movie star :D

Pictures of the Christening will be uploaded later. In the meantime, here are a few recent pix when we dropped by Elizabeth's new salon at Fabianinkatu. (Thanks Auntie Stella for the nice pix!)



minibeanie is 1 month 2 weeks & 3 days old

Family visit

"minibeanie, say hi to puopuo (grandma in Cantonese)"

4 days ago, my family from Singapore got to see & hold minibeanie at last. It was great to have them see him before he becomes a strapping toddler (I swear minibeanie's growing right before my very eyes... it must be the glow-in-the-dark green mushrooms I ate)

In addition to the mandatory coo-ing and ah-ing, from the adults of course, my family got to see some of the Finnish sights such as the island fortress Suomenlinna where my pram underwent a severe stress test over the cobbled stone streets, arty farty museums (not for my mum though ;), fed a herd of enthusiastic geese at Seurasaari and wiped out the Iittala, & Aarikka stores.... some retail therapy is always a welcome treat for any Singaporean visitor ;)

Then of course there's the Christening ceremony for minibeanie on the coming Monday. Yes, this means that we've chosen a name for the lil' un' at last! This was no mean feat. A council of 12 elders had to meet thrice and an auspicious time had to be selected that involved the full moon before the name was finally agreed on.

My family's visit also means that my larder gets stocked full of lup cheong (chinese sausage), dried shrimps, korean instant noodles that my mum swears by, mooncakes & the piece de resistance, ... frozen durian! My mother-in-law is so going to swoon with the pong of dried shrimps and durian :D

minibeanie is 1 month & 2 weeks old

First visit to a Chinese restaurant

minibeanie is 5 weeks old and that is as long as we've gone not going out for dinner. Going anywhere with a baby is tricky business; the bottle is the centre of the universe - all revolves around it. Hence, we dashed out of the house the moment minibeanie was fed, sufficiently burped and comfortably nestled in the pram. After all, we only had a 2 hour window.

We decided to try a Chinese restaurant that a friend recently recommended. As a general rule, we tend to steer clear of Chinese restaurants in Helsinki believing that the dishes they serve up all have the same gooey gravy with bamboo shoots. And dessert is always fried banana with ice cream. In other words, these restaurants have all pandered to adapt to what the Finns think of as Chinese food. But if a Malaysian Chinese friend had recommended it, it can't be that bad.

Upon entering the restaurant, I asked the owner for his recommendations in Cantonese. That's something I learnt early on. If you want authentic Chinese food, speaking in Cantonese or Mandarin signals that you want the real deal - none of that same goo that's in every dish, please. The owner was straightforward and said that the menu was not for us then. I asked for a vegetable or tofu dish but he said that he had run out of Asian vegetables and the tofu wasn't that fresh. How about mussels in black bean sauce?

We lapped up everything in good time and minibeanie slept blissfully, much to our relief. My mum will be visiting this week - perhaps DH & I can make a dash for the cinema? It sounds too much like the tv series Prison Break :D

minibeanie is 1 month 1 week 1 day old

ps. thanks Joyce for the restaurant tip!