Sixteen months old: playground, trial at gymboree

We like to take her to an outdoor playground near our house. It has artificial sand too at the edge of the swimming pool. Faith likes to play with water!!

In this month I took her to Giggles at FX for a playdate with my friends Angie and Ibeth and their daughters, Gaby and Kimmy, Celine and Giselle. As usual, she liked the water fountain area where she could play with water. She was a bit upset when I took her to shower (because I was afraid she might get cold playing with water too long in an air-conditioned room). 

Sadly I didn't take any good pictures. I will wait for Angie to share the pics on her camera and maybe update this post. 

I also took her for a trial at Gymboree Cilandak. I thought maybe the class would be good for her to socialize with other kids and to improve her motor skills.

Faith joined level 4 class for 14-24 months. There were three teachers during that class and about ten children accompanied by their mommies/daddies/nannies. The class started with circle time. That time the topic was "top and bottom". The teachers sang and asked the children to follow their movement. 

Afterwards they asked the children to walk and climb around the blocks and slides. Then followed by games where the teacher asked the children to ride some kind of hobbyhorse and shaking it pretending riding a horse, etc and closed with a circle time again. The class duration was about 45 minutes

Maybe we came too late (when the class was about too start), so she didn't have time to familiarize herself. She wasn't interested at the circle time. She liked to play by herself. She was also afraid when the teacher tried to hold her or asked her to join the game. Hehehe.. maybe she was too young and not ready? I think I'll delay enrolling her to any school until she's 2.5-3 years old. 

Anyway here's Gymboree's fee and schedule. They said they will give me 50% off the enrollment fee if I enroll that day. 

Oh ya, she was very sweet sharing her apples with me :) 

Some notes:

I think in this month she started to want to hold her own bottle. She was able to do that before but just chose not to do it. 

She also started to nod/shake her head when asked for something. Sometimes she just nodded at everything we asked though! 

For example: Do you want to go home? *nod*

                     Do you want to stay here? *nod* -_-

Some random thoughts

I keep reminding myself that I need to have at least 2 more posts to bring this blog up to date.
But somehow for the few past nights i overslept after tucking Faith to bed -_-

Here are my random thoughts lately..

• Is God the center of my life? or Faith? If you see my questions below you'll see :( 

• My decision today will affect Faith's future

• Does enrolling your kid to school early make a difference? (my friends enrolled their kids as early as 1 yr old)

• Do I need to push/stimulate her or just wait until she's ready?

• Do I need to worry that she hasn't been able to drink with a straw or her vocabulary isn't much.. (I used to worry that she hasn't walked yet at 14 months old, but she walked at 15 months old.. so maybe because we named her Faith, so we have to walk by faith?? )

• I want to do a lot of things (cooking, baking, reading books, cross-stitching, updating blog ^_^) but have a difficulty in organizing my time. Now I know why some people says "So little time so much to do" 

• Toma is asking for a new baby.. will we be able to love the new baby as much as we love Faith? will the baby be as cute as Faith? what about Faith? isn't she too young to have a younger sister/brother? Sigh, I think I'm not ready yet. 

Anyway, what's yours?

Little ballerina :)

I wanted to post chronologically, but forgot to post this picture in the 12 months entry.
In this picture Faith was actually trying to climb the bed, but somehow her posture was more like a ballerina practicing sidekick (I don't know the ballet term).  

Anyway, I still have to catch up for a couple months to bring this blog up to date. Let see if I have time on the weekend. Happy Friday everyone!

Trip to Puncak, West Java

After family gathering at Pelabuhan Ratu, my office held another gathering to Puncak on 20 - 22 April 2012. This time was only for finance team.

According to Wikipedia, Puncak (English: Peak) is the popular name for the area surrounding the peak of Mt.Gede-Pangrango, located in the Bogor-Cianjur-Sukabumi regencies, West Java, Indonesia. This area is a popular holiday area for the residents of Jakarta, the capital city, and its satellite cities. It has fresh air and mountain scenery (indeed :)).

Before going there I had to come to the office for some reporting purposes. Toma and Faith picked me up at the office then we went directly to Pak Chris' (my boss) villa, Puncak Kana. At the office Faith cried a bit when meeting my colleagues (Nella and Ata). It turned out she was thirsty and was calmed right away when given a bottle of milk :) She sat nicely on the car seat for almost the whole trip (thank goodness). 

We arrived at Puncak Kana just in time for dinner. My colleagues and their families were already there.

The next day we wanted to go to Taman Safari, but the road was closed before we reached there. During weekends, to avoid traffic, from 9-11.30 am all vehicles are only allowed to go to the summit (road from the other way, i.e. Puncak to Jakarta, is closed), while from 3-5 pm is the other way around. Since Puncak Kana's location is above Taman Safari, we have to reach Taman Safari before 9am.

We decided to postpone the trip and went back to the villa.
On the way back we decided to stop at Kota Bunga. It used to be a popular destination at Puncak. However nowadays it wasn't as popular. Maybe because the flowers were not maintained as they used to be or they started to charge an entrance fee?

We took Faith to a petting zoo there. The zoo was very small but I think Faith was easy to please :)

Afterwards we went back to the villa. At night we went to De Brasco Outlet to pick up some gifts to my mom, mom in law, faith's nanny, mom's maid. I also bought Faith a Hello Kitty shirt. 

The last day we woke up earlier to be able to reach Taman Safari before the road was closed. However, my friend Mindo and Mul and their families missed it. Luckily they were able to hire a guide to find an alternative route. 

Upon arrival we circled around Kawasan Satwa by car. We fed the animals with carrot (given by Heny as we didn't know that we could feed them hehe). It's amazing that all animals there like carrot? ^_^

Afterward we took pictures in the elephant area and went inside the baby zoo (birds and tigers). 

We also took pictures with a tiger... at first Faith was busy looking at the tiger instead of the camera hehe.. 

Too bad we have to go back home to avoid traffic. Otherwise we would have spend more time to explore other attractions in there. Maybe in another visit?? We'll see :) 

Fifteen months old: walking (yay!), feeding herself using fork

The above pictures were taken at Gandaria City, after Chika's (Toma's college friend) wedding. 

The highlight of this month was Faith started to walk by herself! After about five months holding our hands while walking, she finally had the courage to walk by herself. I actually noticed that at around 13-14 months, although she was holding our hand, she didn't lean on our hand while walking. So she actually could walk if she wanted. But I guess she didn't have the confidence yet. 

Anyway, when she finally had the courage, she could walk very fast and steady. Maybe she's the cautious type? 

She also could feed herself some fruits using fork. She was very proud about it and so were we.

We went to Puncak this month. Will post separately :) 

Family Gathering at Pelabuhan Ratu: 12 hours round-trip by bus!

29 March - 1 Apr 2012

My office held a family gathering at Pelabuhan Ratu, West Java.
At first we were afraid of taking Faith there since the trip took about 6 hours (12 hours round-trip). We were also worried about the mystical tale about the hotel (Nyi Roro Kidul etc).
But we decided to take her there anyway because we didn't want to be apart from her :)

We prayed that everything would be all right, that Faith would enjoy the trip. And yes, Faith turned out to be a lovely baby during the trip! She didn't complain about the long trip there and back home. Not once she cried during the trip. Even I felt a bit of headache as the road there was not straight like a toll road, but it was curvy and rocky.

Faith on the bus, standing and sleeping :) 

Took picture at Lido

The hotel, Inna Samudra Beach, was very old. It was built around the sixties under the direction of our first President, Soekarno. It has a reserved room just for Nyi Roro Kidul.  It was a pity that the hotel was not properly maintained (carpet and wall were dirty, blankets were old, etc..). 

Found an antique phone in the bathroom...

There was some kind of outbound activities in the second day. Afterwards we could choose few activities such as rafting, flying fox, paintball, etc. Since Faith was too little to join any activities, we were just relaxing by the Citarik river. Took pictures and drank young coconut :) 

 The boy was my colleague's son, Farrel :) 

Notice Faith's expression on the right picture :)

In the evening, we had a door-prize distribution (every employee received one) and I won a 32inch Toshiba LCD TV!! It was the highlight of the trip I guess :) 

I experienced the verse Luke 6:38, "Give and it will be given to you", as a few days before the trip, the TV on Faith's nanny's room was broken. I gave our TV to her. I jokingly said to her that maybe i'd win a new TV from the trip (as I knew that there'd be a door prize). And it came true :) 

No activities on the third day. Just relaxing and went back home. 

We're glad that we decided to take Faith there.

Fourteen months old: weaning, TMII

At fourteen months she was fully weaned from breastfeeding. She drank both formula milk and UHT milk as I was still confused which one were better. (At 15 months however I decided to give her full UHT milk, as I believe that the more natural the form the better). 

We took her to Taman Mini Indonesia Indah . It is a theme park that summarizes the national culture of Indonesia (traditional houses, parks, a miniature of Indonesian archipelago in a lake, museum, cable car, etc.). We took her to ride the cable car, took picture at the children's castle (Istana Anak-Anak) and visited the fresh water museum. To be honest, I was a bit afraid riding the cable car, worried about the safety (the cable car was very old, maybe around twenty to thirty years old?).

Then by the time we arrived at the Giant Golden Conch (Keong Mas), she was asleep in the car seat. But since we were already there, might as well took pictures in front of it hehe..

Overall, I would like to take Faith back to TMII again and visit other parks. In my opinion, TMII is a good destination for children as it offers open space educational recreational parks.

The weather was very hot, so we brought her a yellow hat. She liked to wear it, even at home :) 

Papa's bday trip to Bandung

16 - 17 March 2012

We decided to celebrate Toma's birthday in Bandung. We took that Friday off and went to Bandung early in the morning. Our first destination was Kampung Gajah.

In Kampung Gajah, many of the attractions were not open since it was still considered weekdays. We didn't play anything there. We just took picture, and enjoying the view and the cool temperature. Faith was also practicing her kicks (she was a true copy cat, imitating Toma).

Afterwards we decided to have lunch at Kampung Daun. We ate, enjoyed the relaxing atmosphere there, and off course took more pictures!

Then we went to our hotel, Grand Seriti, settling in, took a shower then off to De'Ranch.

We love the view at De'Ranch. The entrance fee was also cheap and we were given a glass of fresh milk for free. However Faith was too little to enjoy the attractions there. De'Ranch also didn't allow Faith and I to ride the same horse since they said it was not safe. So we only rode the carriage (naik delman).

From De'Ranch we went to Cihampelas Walk to grab a dinner. Faith was asleep on the way back to hotel. Too much itinerary for one day I guess :)

The next day we went to Rumah Mode Factory Outlet, grab some gift from Primarasa, had lunch at Batagor Riri (all typical tourist places) and went home.

Happy birthday papa!

Thirteen months old : sleeping by herself, toothbrush, meal time

My friends said that she has some kind of "naughty" look.. =p
Sleeping arrangement 

She used to share bed with us. It was convenient for me when she was still breastfeeding. However in the morning, a few times she fell of the bed because I already woke up and only lined off the bed with pillows and bolsters :(

I didn't remember exactly at which months she started to sleep by herself. I think it was around thirteen months. What I remembered was one night, I left her just a few seconds in the baby box. She wanted to follow me so she decided to climb off the baby box. I came back a second too late, she already on the top of the handrail and then fell off. Surprisingly she landed face down and was able to support her body using her hands. I immediately picked her up, she cried for only a few seconds, so I guess she wasn't hurt. I knew that God saved her that night.

The next day I immediately changed her sleeping arrangement. The baby box should be retired. She also couldn't share bed with us anymore as the risk of falling down is high. So I took a mattress to her room and put it on the floor. That way she could climb down the mattress by herself. Starting that day she slept in her own room (the room has a connecting door to our room). I accompanied her for the first few days. Then after that she sleeps by herself.

So now, our night routine is tucking her into bed. Tucking means pretending to sleep with her in her bed :) Then after she is asleep, we'll move to our room or watching tv or browsing hehehe. Sometimes we fall asleep too and wake up at 2am or more.. hehehe..
In the morning she would walk to our room (or go outside to the living room if I didn't close the door). No crying whatsoever. We are very proud of her. 

Toothbrush

She didn't want me to brush her teeth! I tried many ways: brush my teeth in front of her, let her watch Barney video about brushing teeth, let her brush our teeth so we could brush hers, buy her a new toothbrush. Sometimes it works sometimes it doesn't. I'm a bit worried since she still sleeps with a bottle.
(I'm still worried now that she's already 17 months old and we have gone to a dentist that said her teeth were okay, no tooth decay, etc.) :(

Eating

Since I started her to eat rice, meal time took approximately one hour :(
Maybe she was still adjusting with the texture, or maybe the portion was too much for her. We also have to distract her with toys etc. Maybe it was my fault not to train her to sit at highchair since she started eating solid. I just followed her nanny’s way to feed her. My mom said that I used to be like her when I was at her age. Hey, apparently an apple doesn't fall far from the tree!

What important for me was what she ate, the nutrition, the texture.
I hope I can improve this.

Anyway, this month we went to Bandung and Zio’s 1st bday party. Zio is my colleague’s at PwC (Meza) son. He was a month younger than Faith. Faith just woke up when we arrived at his house. She sat in the pool full of balls nicely and played with the balls. 

Twelve months old : CNY

This month was the chinese new year month. 

We didn't really celebrate CNY though. We only went to Toma's mom house and had dinner. Toma's mom bought Faith a pair of little cheongsam and gave her an angpao. She was more interested in car keys than the angpao though hihihi..

We also went to Living World, Alam Sutra in search for an open air park. The park was a bit small, but Faith had fun walking around it. 

Does she look like Toma in this picture below?

I didn't remember the exact date, but during this month we visited my friend Angie who just gave birth to her second daughter, Kimmy. It was nice to have a small reunion with my ex-colleagues at work and their kids. Faith didn't play with the kids yet. I think in this age children still play individually. Maybe later if we have another "kumpul bocah" session, the kids can play together.

At twelve months Faith liked to point her finger to an object and said "Apa itu?" repeatedly.

Sadly, I didn't have the chance to capture it in video :(

She started to eat rice and had a bit of sugar and salt in her food. I also let her try many food. She especially liked fruits, all kinds of fruit. Here are the list of fruits that she has tried: orange, papaya, banana, grapes, dragon fruit, mango, pear, apple, watermelon, melon, duku, longan.

Handmade Tutu

Upon reading this post at The Urban Mama, I was inspired to make Faith a handmade tutu.
Here goes..  (the pictures were taken at new year 2012 when she was 11 months)

Video: Birthday clip

Here's a short clip for Faith's first birthday. Hopefully this one can be uploaded successfully

First year family pictures

I'm missing the first, second, fifth (replaced by 4.5 hehe), seventh and tenth month...
I guess we should take more family pictures :)

First birthday

Time does have wings!
On Faith's first birthday, we decided only to throw a small gathering with immediate family (us, my dad, my bro, mba Yanti and mba Sinah) at our house. Simple handmade decoration, a cake, and nasi tumpeng. My mom couldn't attend since she was in Korea at that time (but she took picture the next day). Due to distance, mom in law also can't attend, but we brought the cake and everything to her house later on.
My mom also gave out a lunch box package of nasi kuning (yellow fragrant rice) to her employees.
Oh ya, I ordered the cake from my friend Liza. If you'd like to order, please visit her website. 

Some recap:

• She has eight teeth by the time she was one year old
• She dances every time she hears music
• She still didn't have the courage to walk by herself, but she liked to walk holding our hands
• She can raise her hand when asked "who's having a birthday?" (siapa yang ulang tahun?)
• She started eating rice, although the first week was a challenge.. 
• She can wave bye bye
• Geez, I wished I started this blog earlier so I could remember exactly what she could and couldn't do.., well, anyway, better late than never!!

I wanted to post her birthday video here, but somehow the upload couldn't go through (have tried twice).
Maybe I have to upload it in a separate post?
Update: I'm finally be able to upload the video after re-sizing it (click here)

Eleven months old : "dititah", first trip to the zoo, first Christmas

The 11 months picture above was our favorite. It was taken on a Sunday afternoon after church. The dress was a present from my mom.

At this month she started wanting to walk by holding to our hands ("dititah" - I don't know the English word for this). She could distinguish between our left/right hand. She would positioned our left hand to hold her left hand and our right hand to hold her right hand :) We would hold her from behind (can you imagine?)

First trip to the zoo
We took her to Taman Margasatwa Ragunan (zoo). The zoo was very big, but for some reason the animals were not as many to fill the space. But considering the cheap entry fee (only IDR 5,000/person), it was worth it. It's hard to find an open space recreation in Jakarta.

First Christmas

One month to go before her first birthday :) time flies!

Ten months old : start standing

At ten months old she started learning to stand. But i remembered she still couldn't pull herself to stand without help though. 

After getting back from Singapore trip (here), for some reason my breast milk supply became diminishing. Maybe because she was already drinking formula milk, so sometimes I gave up easily. When breastfeeding, if the supply was low, I'd get the bottle. Sigh. 

She's a happy baby. The picture above was taken in Kimberley's (my friend Jimmy's daughter) 1st b'day party at Burger King, Senayan City. I also loved the picture below. We both smiled at the camera :) 

Video: Another LOL session :)

Faith was around 10 months old at that video.
We used to perform "night entertainment" for her before tucking her to bed :)

Nine months old : crawling, Bali trip, my overseas biz trip

At nine months old she liked to pose like a mermaid/swimsuit model hehehe (see top picture). 

She also mastered the art of crawling :) and liked to point on something (as captured in the second picture). 

I loved my new job, but I had to attend a finance conference on 7-11 Nov 2011 in Singapore. That made me decided to introduce Faith to formula milk since my breast milk stocks won't be enough to cover five days supply. I remembered she refused to drink any formula milk the first try. That made me worried. However after many tries she's getting used to the taste. 

Before going to the conference, we went to Bali!! (4-6 Nov 2011) YAY..

I've booked the ticket just after Faith was born (due to Air Asia's promotion).

We went there with my college friends and their family. 

I was a bit nervous because it was Faith's first experience of flying and going out of town. 

Due to late check in, I sat by myself during Jakarta - Bali trip. Luckily Faith slept right after boarding and slept through the trip. We arrived in Bali safe and sound and enjoyed the trip :) 

Since this was Faith's first trip, I was over prepared. I packed half of large suitcase of her clothes and food. However it turned out my friend packed a lot more for her daughter :) 

On the way home, I noticed that Faith hide under her jacket and then pulled the jacket down as if playing "peek-a-boo". We used to play peek-a-boo with her, but that was the first time when she was the one who's  initiating it. I guess she has grasped the concept of the game :) 

Anyway, back to the conference, I still pumped my breast milk there and stored them in the hotel restaurant's freezer. I brought a lock and lock box that can fit them all and brought back the milk home. 

Toma said that the first night I was away, Faith was crying and humming "mamamamama"... as if looking for me. Toma didn't tell this to me. He didn't want to make me worry. However the next day Faith could sleep without looking for me.

I don't know if this is me being oversensitive or what, but I felt that when I finally got back home from that trip, Faith looked angry/upset to me. She didn't want to look at me for a while :( 

Eight months old : sit by herself :)

The above picture was Faith's first time eating and sitting in a high chair. She enjoyed it back then, but started a few months ago she refused to sit there. Maybe because we don't have any high chair at home so she's not used to it? She still likes to sit on her car seat though. 

Anyway, at this age she mastered to sit by herself from sleeping position to crawling position then sitting position. She also started to crawl, at first using her stomach. 

We also took her to a wedding party. Here's one of the picture hehehe :) 

Oh ya, I finally got a better job (time and location wise)..

God has been good to us :) 

Seven months old : learning to sit

At 7 months she liked to do a "half" sit up. She'd like to sit up from sleeping position, but still couldn't manage to do it. Therefore she would hold her body for about 30 seconds in a 45 degrees position. (can you imagine?)

Her favourite song was "Topi saya bundar" (my round hat). Everytime we sang her this song, she laughed :) especially when on the "bundar" (round) part. 

Six months old : eat eat eat, first tooth

She was getting used to the church. Sometimes she even slept through the sermon and woke up just before we were about to leave :)

She also started to eat twice a day. I followed the advice to wait until 3 days before introducing something new to eat. That way if she had an allergic reaction, I'd know which food was the culprit. Thank God she is not allergic to anything. 

Although there were times that she didn't want to open her mouth *sigh*. It was relatively easy to feed her food.  I used to be all stressed out when she didn't want to eat. Nowadays I'd just wait till she's hungry :)

I also realized that her vitamin, Apialys, played an important role in her appetite. 

Her two teeth erupted this month. No fever or unusual crankiness whatsoever. We're truly blessed. 

Five months old : stranger/new place anxiety, start eating solid

At five months we took Faith to church for child dedication. 

We also started taking Faith to church regularly afterwards. At firsts she cried every time the worship music started. I think she was afraid of the loud sound. As I had to play keyboard, Toma had to take care of her by himself. Thank you hubby for doing this!

Funny story, a lady in the church once told me that at first she and her friends took pity of Toma bringing her baby to the church by himself and wondered where the mom was hihihi :)

We also brought her to meet my college friends at Jack Rabbit. She cried almost through the time. Maybe because we rarely brought her to meet people (we only brought her to Toma's mom - which she cried at first too, and to the mall - no interaction with people). 

I guess she was a sensitive baby :) 

My mom also decided to feed her solid at 5.5 months (although I would like her to have it at 6 months). This happened when I was in the office. She said Faith looked hungry all the time. So I guess it's a valid reason :) Her first meal was brown rice porridge (bubur beras merah). She was still continued to be fully breastfed though. 

I also started to look for other job as I'd like to have more time with Faith. 

Milestone: she mastered to roll over both direction 

Oma's bday

We celebrated Toma's mom 60th bday at Pandan Bistro and then took pictures at home.
Faith slept in the restaurant as if allowing me to eat first. She woke up when I finished eating :)

Video: Ginggangguliguli

Faith started to laugh out loud at around four months.
This is the video that she laughed over Toma's singing Ginggangguliguli :)
Pardon the video's quality, it was taken at night when the light was rather minimal.

Four months old: first time swimming, photo shoot :)

The above pictures were taken at Gandaria City.

She's a happy baby and we're a happy parents :)

Some milestones:

1. She can roll over by herself
2. First time swimming (picture below)
3. First photo shoot (picture below)
4. Liked to laugh out loud (click here to watch)

This is a compilation of Faith's pictures while swimming. Some of them were taken above four months though.

At 4.5 months we took her to my cousin's house (who is a photographer) to be shoot professionally. If you like the photos feel free to contact my cousin at Hoop by Hoptografi

At this month I started going back to work. Lots of time spent in the office's nursery room to make sure Faith can still continue to have breast milk :)
Cheers :)