Behind the ears!

I am a terrible mother!!!! I just realized, by accident, that I have to wash behind Lucas' ears!!!!! Since my baby has got big ears :) he has accumulated quite a lot of dirt behind his ears! And I just noticed it today! It didn't help that I am growing his hair long, so his hair has covered his ears and also all the dirt. Luckily Lucas made a huge mess and had paint all over his face and ears that I'd noticed behind his ears. Come to think about it, I don't wash behind my ears either.....

How much is enough?

I am talking about the amount of food to feed Lucas - I worry about him getting enough nutrition. Yesterday, Lucas had his milk & cereal bottle for breakfast + 1 breakfast cookie. At 1130 I gave him a bowl of baby cereal + mashed fruit. After his nap, he takes a bottle of milk at 2pm. He tasted a little of what I made for lunch - tuna, mozarella, olives and rice salad. For snacktime, Lucas has a piece of krisproll, a cookie and a square of Milka chocolate. After his bath, he has a bowl of cereal mixed with potato and ham for dinner at 6 pm. When we have dinner an hour later, Lucas takes a few strands of pasta with tomato sauce (w/o the meat). A bottle of milk before bed. Sometimes I forego the cereal at 1130 and give him pasta instead if we are having pasta for lunch. But Lucas doesn't really like the minced meat so its basically just pasta and tomato sauce. He is beginning to eat quite a bit of pasta, not just the few mouthfuls like before, if he is hungry. I normally give him a wedge of cheese for protein since the pasta is mainly carbs. And then I add cereal to his next bottle feed.

I have tried to increase the food amount and decrease the food amount but everytime Lucas finishes the food anyway. If I decrease the amount he doesn't ask for more. If I increase, he just eats them anyway.

When Hugo was with us, he said that Lucas is fat - but all babies are supposed to be chubby, right? Lucas is growing really fast and he's tall for his age. There were a few times I had to remind Hugo and Fred that Lucas is not even 2 years old yet!
Anyway what does Hugo know, right? He's a 12 year old who is so skinny you can see his ribs sticking out when he's shirtless. This 12 year old is so scared of putting on weight he's actually watching what he eats. Apparently his mom is the same, she's so skinny she's a size 0. Typical french, so worried about weight. And Fred is also the same, always looking at himself in the mirror and sucking in his non existent tummy. So I guess I am not surprised that Hugo is like that. Its kinda freaky to see his sharp shoulder blade when he's shirtless. He's so skinny everytime I see him, I can't help but ask him if he's been eating.

Talking about diets - the french even have diet water! And diet infusions, and diet drinks, and the pharmacies have windows full of diet products. These people are OBSESSED with being thin. My MIL is considered fat - I really find that hard to believe.

Anyway, Lucas' new word - "there" He likes to point at something he wants, and he will come take my hand and point and say "there".
Today he also said "Baa..." when he was looking at some lamb and sheep on TV!

L'Occitane

Something new - I tried out L'occitane's Immortelle Essential Water for Face (15 euro, 20% off - if I didn't convert, its actually not bad) for the past month. I had exactly 3 spots on my face the past month and was hardpressed to find any hydrogen peroxide for my acne - apparently the pharmacists that we went to have never heard of using hydrogen peroxide for spots and calamine lotion for rash. They had absolutely no idea what I was talking about (but then, this is Tarbes... and they have never heard of Shu Uemura either....)
Anyway, back to the Immortelle Essential Wayer - its fantastic, BTW. I had 3 spots and normally would need months before the scars will fade off but daily use of the essential face water has lightened the spots remarkably! And my skin is no longer dry, but that could also be because I am combining use of the essential water with L'Occitane Ultra Rich Foaming Cleanser with 6% Shea Butter (14 euro with 20% off)

I decided to try out L'Occitane when I could not get any Shu Uemura products here in Tarbes. They only sell it in Sephora, Paris. Also, I found out that while Sephora Paris will send the products to me, its much much cheaper to buy Shu Uemura from Malaysia... The High Performance Balancing Cleansing Oil is 83 euro! (In KL, its RM260) So I will bide my time and wait til I get back to KL...

Summer holidays are over

Summer vacation for us is over! The 2 weeks that Fred got off work just passed in a blur! I have to say that I am glad that F has gone back to work tho' and that Hugo is back with his grandparents. It was not easy having to take care of the 3 boys. Taking care of Lucas is my priority, couple that with the other 2 demanding we do this and we go there is almost unbearable and outright irritating as I do not want Lucas to divert from his schedule. As Lucas is the baby and has a regular schedule that he likes to follow, we therefore try to accomodate as much as possible to Lucas. But then since F does not get Hugo so often, he runs himself ragged trying to accomodate an active 12 year old who is used to being busy and doing "stuff" all the time with his mom. So you can imagine the stress! And to make things worst, Fred wanted the family to be together at all times! At the end of the 2 weeks, Fred declared that next holiday he will go away with Hugo for a week, just the 2 of them - thank God!!!!

This vacation, we spent a lot of time outdoors and Lucas has tan lines :)
We were at Grand Aunt Janet's farm, we were at Boudrex where Hugo and Lucas both spent hours in the water, we were at Toulouse, and in between Fred took the boys cycling to the farms and to the horses. The Summer has been really scorching hot, with the sun setting at 10 pm. Yesterday it was rainy and cool for once.

We went to Toulouse last week - Toulouse is 150 kms away and it took us a little over an hour to get there. We arrived early for my appointment so we parked the car and took the metro into the city (4 stops away). Being in Toulouse felt like I was going home! It felt so good to be back in the city! I felt so happy just being in the metro. Needless to say, the happier I was, the joy and excitement of being in a city must have shone out of my face! Fred of course got all stroppy and declared that he will NEVER EVER move to Toulouse and started complaining about city life.
Anyway, he said that if I wanted to move to Toulouse I'd have to do it without him...

At the immigration & integration meeting, I was in a room with 7 others ( 2 Algerians and the rest were dark skinned, and they all spoke fluent French) The woman who did the introduction did it in French. I tried to follow what she was saying but she was talking really fast. At the end of her welcome note I had to interrupt her as she was switching on the video for us to watch. She was abrupt with me but I guess its because she could not speak English at all. She got some other people to help me and they were all really nice! In the end after asking me if I intend to work later and what I wanted to do ( I told her ideally I wanted to work in a Bank doing what I've been doing in KL), I have 250 hours of french lessons signed up, starting in September (as in August, most French people are on vacation). The woman who tested my language ability also arranged for a day of civic training in October as she explained that she needed to get me a translator for the civic training which lasts a whole day.

Lucas will also be starting his creche in September - on Monday mornings at 830 am - 1230 pm and on Thursday afternoons from 130 pm to 530 pm. We went on a tour to the creche. I really didn't expect the area to be so nice. Its a real school with divided rooms for different activities. They also have a sleeping room with cots, and toddler sized toilets for potty training. The bathrooms have got toddler sized showers and a small toddler paddling pool. We are charged by the hour and its not expensive at all as its a government creche. We will pay 1 euro an hour.
If I was a working mom, Lucas would be enrolled full time. They take babies from 3 months old! But since I am not working and places are limited, Lucas only gets 2 slots a week. For a start its great. We were really lucky to get the slots.

Recently Lucas has really been fighting sleep, making nap time and sleep time difficult. Maybe its because his brother is here and he doesn't want to miss out on playing time but he's also been crying and throwing all his toys and pillows from his cot the past 2 days since Hugo left. Lucas has also been pulling on my hand to the bookshelf and then pointing out what he wants from the shelves. No new words so far, it seems that he's gone backwards in the times that Hugo's been here, prefering to sign instead of talk. These days Lucas takes his milk and cereal for breaky ( I mix baby cereal into his milk) when he gets up, and then he takes a biscuit. For lunch at 1130 am, I am mixing his baby cereal with food (salmon & trout with peas, carrots & corn/ macaroni & mixed veges/ rice & chicken - I'm not cooking all these food, we buy the ready toddler foods). His tea time is milk and biscuits and CHOCOLATE (he just discovered chocolate) and for dinner Lucas usually has pasta (spag bol without the meat - somehow he doesn't like the meat) or pizza.

Its a sunny day today - I'm going to take Lucas for a walk to the petit Casino to buy some coffee!

Creche in September!

Good news! We got a call today from the creche we registered Lucas on - and they told us that Lucas can start 2x a week in September! The creche gives priority to working mothers and since I am not one, we had to go on a waiting list for Lucas. This creche that accepted Lucas is not our first choice though, as it is a good 25-30 min walk from here. But the one we wanted has a waiting list so long they actually advised us to register for our 2nd baby instead as when there is a vacancy Lucas would have already started school! (In France, school starts at 3 years - babies would be in school all day from 830 am til 4pm)

hailstorm

I experienced my first hailstorm 2 days ago. Luckily when the storm started Fred had already arrived home with Hugo. The clouds came very fast, and the sky went very dark even though it was only 6pm. There was thunder and then ice pebbles started raining down. Fred quickly went to move the car somewhere shaded, but my MIL wasn't that fast to move hers and her car roof is now dented by the ice. The storm was a fierce one - winds were extremely strong and the ground was soon covered with ice.
Yesterday we went to town to do some grocery shopping and saw the damage done by the storm on cars and also because of the strong winds, the grounds were littered with leaves and debris!
I will post some photos I took soon - don't know how to download from my phone...

Aunt Janet's farm

We spent yesterday at Aunt Janet's farm in Gomer, 20 mins drive away from Tarbes! And it was a real working farm with plough, tractors and all kinds of machinery. Lucas had a wonderful time! He loved the huge dog, Alf. Lucky for him, Alf is totally used to being around kids so he didn't mind Lucas climbing all over him. We had a really good lunch - foie gras, roast chicken, potato gratin, apple and berry crumble. Everything we had for lunch was home grown on the farm!
Janet has pigs, chicken, ducks, goose and even rabbits ( I asked her if the beautiful long haired rabbits are pets... she said she will remember never to serve rabbits whenever I come over....)

Lucas met 2 of his cousins - Laure & Aurore. And we found out that Lucas has 7 cousins on Janet's side, which is great! We will be meeting with them soon I hope, though I think the kids are all older than Lucas. Even Aurore is older but she's smaller in size to Lucas.

Tonight Hugo will be coming over for his summer vacation. Lucas took an extra long nap so he can play with Hugo when Hugo gets here.

Tour De France

Last Sunday, the Tour De France came to Tarbes. My neighborhood was the last 4 km sprint for the day! We were able to catch the cyclists zooming past right here in our backyard!
Like the F1, this was a one time experience. Its more comfortable to watch it on TV, actually.
Unlike the F1, we didn't need to wait for hours since they were coming by past our apartment. We watched most of the race on TV and then took a 2 minute stroll to watch them cycle past. The street from across my balcony was full of cars, parked haphazardly everywhere as people came to cheer the cyclists. Fred, Lucas & I were under the scorching sun for about 20 minutes - that was enough to give me a headache later!

First doctor visit

I had my first visit to the doctor a few days ago. In France there seems to be a lot of paperwork and stringent rules with regards to medication. My doctor is a young man. Its a father & son clinic and I got the son :) He's cute, reminds me of a teddy bear and he speaks English - yay!

I had a really bad rash from using a new shower gel and the rash had spread all over my chest and tummy area, so I needed to see the doctor so that my rash will clear up in time for when we go to the beach. Somehow, I didn't expect the doctor to ask me to take off my top for him to see the rash (I thought I'd just pull up my shirt a bit...)
Fred thought it was funny that I'd be embarrassed but I was. He said lucky for me I wasn't born with big boobs cos then the doctor would have asked me to take off my bra too!!!!! :P

So while we were at the doctor's my MIL came over to babysit - a first!
I was a bit worried that Lucas would give her a hard time as he hardly sees her and most of the time he sees her very fleetingly. But when we came back 2 hours later, they were happily playing with Lucas' toys. And my MIL said she'd be happy to come babysit again - yay!!!!!

Oh, the creche that we wanted to send Lucas to has a long waiting list :( The director of that creche said that by the time they have a vacancy Lucas would already be in Kindy and we are better off getting on that list for our second baby!
So we are going to look for others, we are already in the waiting list for 2 creche. As Fred will be off from tonight onwards we will go visit a playgroup ( like Kizsports, but run by a few mothers who get together voluntarily)

These days I have been taking Lucas for long walks in the mornings around our place. We walked to the farm nearby to look for horses yesterday and today we walked around the neighbourhood looking (and dreaming) at the beautiful houses with huge gardens :)

Fred says he would like us to buy a piece of land and build our own house - tsk... If we do that I think we will be living in an uncompleted house for years to come! He saw a documentary about this guy who bought a plot of land and built a log cabin with his own bare hands and started dreaming! My husband is really such a dreamer! He can't even manage to put up the DIY furniture a la IKEA - every cabinet is wonky! The doors to the kitchen cabinet, the TV cabinet and the bookshelf do not close properly and he wants to build a house?????!!!!!! LOLs, I think we may end up spending loads of money on the clean up job instead...

Mamma Mia!

Lucas and I have just finished watching Mamma Mia. I absolutely love that movie, this is the 4th time watching it! And this time, Lucas was dancing and trying to sing with the cast! Its so cute to watch!

The next time we watch it I will video Lucas dancing to all the tunes :)

Vacation plans

Counting down the days til Fred gets his summer vacation time!!!! One full day to go. We haven't really made plans yet, cos my appointment at Toulouse is smack in the middle of summer holidays for us :(
I guess when I'm at my appointment the boys will try to amuse themselves in the city.

We are still waiting for news on when and where to pick Hugo - its the same thing every year. His mom will contact Fred at the last minute and tell him where to pick Hugo, normally hundreds of miles away. The pick up will be a whole day affair as fred usually needs to drive a minimum of 3 hours to pick Hugo and drive another 3 hours back here. She always tries to make it as hard and as inconvenient as possible, and even though they would have agreed on Hugo staying with his dad for 2 weeks, something will inadvertently come up and Fred will need to send Hugo somewhere (another few hundred of miles away) for a night or two and then go pick him up again!!!! Well, the good news is starting from next year they will return to France and will be in Cannes, so that's not too far away.

Fred was saying that we could drive to Spain - maybe. I am a bit apprehensive as the drive is a long one and am unsure if Lucas will be OK. He hates being strapped down in the car seat for too long. The drive from Paris to Tarbes last year was HELL! Lucas was screaming when he wasn't asleep and refused to stay in the carseat - I had to hold him in my arms and the 10 hour drive took 13.5 hours as we had to make a few stops along the way to let Lucas out of the car.
I would love to go to Carcassonne and Perpignan though...

Fred's best friend Michel also invited us over to Souston for a visit. We were there last year and Souston is beautiful with numerous lakes and the beach.
We also have a man made beach 30 mins drive away - we will definitely go there. It was really nice last year when we were there too, a bit crowded but Lucas and Hugo had a great time.
Being at the beach in France is an experience - you know you are definitely not in Asia anymore when you are one of the few women who do not go topless! Even the really old aunties in their 60s go topless! And the younger ones play beach volleyball topless as well. And I would be the only person there ogling!

Oh, one good thing about living in this apartment - the Le Tour cyclists will arrive in Tarbes tomorrow and will be cycling past our place! So being next to the road may not be such a bad thing after all... :P

typical male?

Sigh, my husband is so lun chun!!!! He made an appointment for us to go for an interview with the creche director (and this appointment was made weeks in advance). The appointment is supposed to be tomorrow and he just found out he called the wrong branch for the appointment :(
He called the creche at Lourdes instead, so now we have to make a new appointment with the creche at Tarbes. Who knows how long that's gonna take!

Send him out to buy shower curtain and he comes back with a 45 euro designer shower curtain - he thought the curtain was 4.50 euro and didn't realize until he was at the cashier and she'd already rung up the purchase. Of course then he couldn't tell her he didn't want the shower curtain and took it. I was hopping mad, I tell you. I would have cancelled the purchase but he didn't want to make a fuss!!!! Oh, and did I mention he bought TWO????

Books, TV and vacation time!

I think I may just be one of Amazon's favourite customer :)
Ever since moving to France, I've ordered 26 books from them so far and will be ordering more! I am really impressed with how easy it is to just click and order the books, and the recommended book list from Amazon is great! The books arrive really quick too. The last batch arrived a scant 4 days after I placed my order! And delivery is FREE!

The past 3 days have been rainy and cold! Lucas & I took a brisk walk yesterday to the pharmacie for some allergy pills for me, but other than that we have been staying home. The weather forecast says Thursday will be better weather, but tonight is the Summer night market :( Its like pasar malam at home but has food, clothes, shoes, household stuff etc. Its huge and streets are closed off for this event.
Looks like I will need to give this one a miss and look forward to the one in August instead.

Lucas is eating pasta these days and refuses his cereal except for breakfast. And his new word is CLOCK. He points to the clock on the wall and says "clock" and takes Fred's watch and calls it a "clock".
He has been getting extremely clingy to the point where I can't do much at all since he insists on being held and carried all the time. My reprieve is when the TV is on, so I have to say that Lucas has been watching a whole lot of TV - too much TV really but what can I do?
But I monitor what TV shows he's watching and I find that he's learning through watching Barney, Bob the Builder, Noddy and Pooh series.

We have an interview at the creche this Thursday and will see when we can enrol Lucas into the class so that he will learn how to socialize and get less dependant on the TV. Lucas is such a spirited child he actually needs a lot of outdoor activity time which I am unable to give him right now since the weather sucks. We play hide and seek at home and I chase him around the apartment to tire him out.
Fred will be on Summer vacation from this Sunday and I am looking forward to taking Lucas to the playground and to the beach.

flies!

As the days get longer and hotter, the flies are starting to invade homes in droves!!!! I heard that boiling cinnamon sticks in water helps keep the flies away. But I'd need to keep that pot boiling all day...
One good thing about the flies is it keeps Lucas entertained for a while as he gets occupied trying to chase the flies and touch them and calling them BEE :)

I was happy to find this morning cool and rainy! Its a big change from the past few nights of sweltering heat. I've been keeping the shades on the windows to keep the heat away but still it's been hard to sleep. We cannot open the huge windows in the bedroom as our apartment is next to the road. The windows are double glazed and keep the noise out.

Anyway yesterday we went to buy 2 fans :) so we all slept well and today is rainy so Lucas will again nap well this afternoon.

New word from Lucas - BOB. When he wants to watch Bob the Builder, he says BOB!
And he's fascinated with the new fan we bought and is trying to say FAN.

Its July already!!!! Time really flies. Fred reminded me today is Thursday (in my mind I was still in a time warp and stuck on Tuesday...)
This weekend I am hoping to go to an Asian grocery in Pau. I hope that place has not closed down! And I hope that its got a wide array of Asian food stuff so I can get my cili padi, belacan, cincalok, taufu pok (BKT is NOT the same without the taufu pok!!!!), dark soya sauce...