Hail!

A couple of months ago, we had a freakish storm with the largest hail stones I have seen. Our suburb was one of the worst hit. Unfortunately our car was caught without cover and all I could do was look on as it got pummeled by golf ball-sized hailstones.

Wow. The bigger hailstones were about 3 cm across.

Poor car.

We were lucky that none of the windows were broken but nearly all the car panels were damaged. So many cars were damaged that day (last I heard, there were upwards of 60,000 cars damaged), that our car is booked for repairs in September!

Oh, and our sky light was also broken. We were lucky that nothing else was damaged. I know one person that had their house destroyed when the hailstones broke the roof tiles. Their house will have to be completely rebuilt.

By the way, Christian took this shot

From Elaine and Paul

These photos are from Elaine’s Facebook. They first few are from my birthday in August last year, the watergun is from Christmas, and the big family shots are from Chinese New Year a few months ago. Many thanks to Elaine and Paul for the photos.

Happy Birthday Hug.

Yummy cake.

Happy drunk.

I love Ah Kong and Ah Ma

Oooh. What’s that!

What comes out of that?

Eureka!

Make my day.

It’s nice to have an extended family.

Happy kids with red packets.

Christian and grandpa

Christian spends one day a week at my parents.

Grandpa is planning to teach Christian how to play golf.

This is not quite the right way…

Rewards are important!

How to put socks on.

How to go for a walk (and he has a big hat to fill).

Wrestling with cousin Bethany

Food rewards (again)

Down time with Grandpa.

How to wash the Grandpa’s car.

Contemplation.

All modern kids expect to see their photos immediately. Remember the old days when we took photos hoping that in a couple of weeks, the photos would turn out alright?

Hug.

More rewards.

Hanging out with Nala at home.

Cheeky smile.

Start them young!

Well, maybe not this one.

How to serve dinner.

Learning to appreciate music.

How to was a car using a watergun.

How to clean the floor after being naughty and spilling a drink on purpose.

He better learn this one well!

Cleaning windows (He loved this lesson too).

Relaxing just like mum

The last 3 months…

Cool at the beach.

Path of destruction.

Great day at the beach.

Christian has an obsession with fire fighters and fire engines. It began with the kid’s show “Fireman Sam” and has branched out from there. One day, there was a house fire near by and he got to see fire engines and fire fighters in action.

It was his best day.

I think that’s where he got his love of  ladders too.

Andree got into the act with a fire engine cake.

And we got him a battery-powered fire engine ride-on.

Don’t forget the hat.

No one will be surprised if Christian grows up to be a fireman.

By the way, he can say “fire extinguisher”. He’s only two!

Cheeky monkey

Lazy rainy day with dad.

With the women in his life.

A rare day when he was enjoying his food.

Hey! Where’s the water?!

Happy days with granddad.

Although granddad makes him work hard

Christian the builder.

This was first day of school childcare.

Christian, Chantal, fingerpaint and muffins.

Chantal came over to visit us and to bake muffins. But first, there was fingerpainting.

Red turned out to be Christian’s favourite colour.

It spells “FISH”.

It’s an unwritten code that you must make colourful handprints when playing with fingerpaints.

Hands up Christian!

When they got cleaned up, we finally got around to making muffins. Yummy!

Haircut

Christian does not sit still. Understatement. It has made giving him a haircut almost impossible, so Claudie took him to a shop called “Candy” which specialised in giving kids a haircut (isn’t it amazing how specialised our society is now). He sat completely still. Maybe he was in shock!

Before we get to the photos about the haircut, this is Christian’s and Philip’s new sand pit/clam at his grandparents! Don’t they look happy!

“Candy” is set up well. There are aeroplanes and cars to sit in, colourful smocks, toys and TVs to distract them. I can’t believe he sat so still.

Christian is a handsome spunky kid!

Relaxing (with his feet up, no less) in the car on the way home.

Reading with Christian.

One of Christian’s great loves is reading with others. Christian’s grasp of language and image recognition constantly amazes us.

Reading with Bethany.

 

 

You talkin’ at me? Well, I’m the only one here. (in his best Robert De Niro voice)

Absolutely enthralled…

 

 This photo is from Mourad’s birthday. Christian is only interested in the doggie

A photo of me! (by my brother Paul: http://www.thiaphotography.com/).

Back by popular demand!

Yes, I’ve been slack. I would be interested in any statistics on how long, on average, do blogs last before they get neglected. I have no real excuses except laziness, tiredness, and perhaps the computer game Fallout 3. Certainly, Christian’s increasing exuberance makes night time, after he goes to sleep, a time for collapse rather than construction. Anyway, the blog is back by popular demand (at least for the moment).

Indeed, this blog’s usefulness in documenting Christian’s life has increased. In the last few months, Christian’s grasp of language, his mobility and independence has been nothing short of amazing. For instance, he has gone from single words to comprehensible sentences remarkably quickly. Claudie and I often look at each other in amazement and amusement at how that little brain works. His comments and observations are precious.

 

“How are you today? Good? My shirt is fancier than yours!”

Contemplative Christian.

Loving Christian.

Recently, Rita, Claudie’s cousin, got married. Claudie bought from eBay a complete suit for Christian for the occasion.

Probably our best family shot.

He was so adorable!

Clothes really maketh the man (or boy in this case). Certainly, it’s easy to think that Christian was older than the 18 months that he really was at that time.

Produce

We think so much about Christian that we sometimes forget to think about ourselves. Occasionally, Christian goes to bed early and we get a little time to ourselves. This time, we were prepared for it!

Yummy stuff.

Cheers!

Ahh. Relaxation time.

This weekend, we went as a clan (there was an even dozen of us) to the Collingwood Children’s Farm, where Christian finally met all those animals that he knows the sounds of. Moooooo!

Cluck cluck!

It was a really nice and sunny day.

Shopping with grandparents

You know, grandchildren get spoilt by their grandparents, but isn’t that what grandparents are for?

Question: What happens when you buy a chocolate bunny for a toddler?

Answer: He figures out how to unwrap it in less than a minute and makes a mess!

They haven’t even moved from the car park yet (you can see the trolleys in the background)!

Busily chewing on the ears.

Not surprisingly, he looks happy.

The other grandparents took him shopping and let him run free in Toys ‘R Us. As you can see, he will attempt to escape and climb even if he doesn’t need to.

Drinking and driving.

This toy looks good…

He was very patient while granddad had some fun putting it together.

Well, reasonably patient.

Growing up

Our boy is no longer a baby. He’s a toddler! Over the last couple of weeks, he has learnt to express himself with words (with a little bit of interpretation by us!). He’s using three languages too – English, French and Arabic (unfortunately, not much Chinese), as well as his own invented words.

A mixture of photos:

Deciding what kind of garden he would like to have… One with lots of water and stones!

You can fill watercans with other things than water.

And stones!

Trying to turn on the tap with telekinesis. He’s hopeful.

Uncle Rafik teaching him that you can learn about the world without using Google.

Sometimes, you don’t need expensive toys to keep him occupied (but more toys is always better!)

He’s got a bit of growing still to do.

The magnetic attraction of the mighty television.

Of course, this picture will be shown at his 21st birthday. Every child must have one of these photos hidden in their albums!