Incident 1 - the milk bottle episode
A few days ago, we were all busy and Calista was lying on a mattress on the floor, playing with her milk bottle (she had drunk her fill already and we left her be for a moment). The bottle rolled out of her still-clumsy hands, and onto the floor. I heard a shout of "Meimei's bottle fell down! Meimei's bottle's is on the floor!" whilst in the kitchen, and calmly told Christian to pick it up for her.
He pounced upon the bottle, nudged it towards her, and went 'Nah.'
No reaction from the sister, of course, other than a curious stare. He then tried to put the bottle in her mouth, but was afraid to push too deeply inwards, so she ended licking the tip of the teat. ^_^ I thought it was so cute and rushed to get the camera, but too late..he refused to continue, declaring "i feed meimei already." (i.e. i've done the job, not going to continue.)
Incident 2 - the rescuer
I had some fun at Calista's expense yesterday. I hung a rattle on all five toes while she was seated in the bumbo. She looked so confused when it made a sound as she shook her leg, and then tried hard to concentrate and reach it. I laughed and commented while Christian was around - "look, meimei's trying to get it off her foot!"
He turned around and promptly ran to help her push it off, before offering it to her, and then shoving it in between the seat and her body when he got no response from her. :) This happened twice as naughty mama kept trying to make her reach her toes...
I see that he's absorbed my nagging as well cos when he offered her some blocks the other day, he caught himself and followed on with a 'oh, you cannot have it, wait you eat and then you choke.' he offered his bolster to her yesterday too, and took care to ensure the bolster was not covering her face. :)
P says we nag too much though, and perhaps we should lay off the admonition. He was alone at the beach with Christian yesterday, and handed him a cereal bar with the exhortation that he hold it using the plastic wrapper, and not get his sandy hands on the cereal bar. P then turned around to get Christian's water, and turned back to see Christian's sandy fingers on the cereal bar, with a portion of it dropped on the sand. He launched into a "I told you not to do... why did you do it?? etc etc" Christian looked down and at a corner, and glumly handed the bar back without a word. P felt horrible to see him looking so defeated and said that's worse than if Christian had cried.
We have to walk the tightrope between crushing his self-esteem and inflating his ego..and it's really not easy to know what he needs, and when.
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