Control

They say S'pore has two seasons: outdoors and indoors. Singapore is close to the equator and is tropical, so it's quite hot and humid most of the time. In many buildings, the air conditioning (or air-con) is set at a temperature so low that you need at least a long sleeve shirt or light sweater to be comfortable inside. There is central air in large buildings, but most apartments and homes have an air-con unit in each room except for bathrooms and storage areas. The units in our home are high up on the wall and have remote controls.

The boys' playroom is about 400 sq. ft., and the air-con unit doesn't cool the entire room always. We bought a 4 ft. tall cylindrical oscillating fan which sits in the corner opposite the unit, so together they get the job done. The fan has its own remote too. When we enter the playroom, we turn on the air-con and fan, and turn them off when we leave. Graeme is clearly becoming more observant lately, because a few days ago after I turned on the air-con and fan, he crawled over to the toy organizer, grabbed the toy Elmo remote control, pointed it toward the fan, and pressed a button. He then pointed it toward the air-con unit and pressed a button. He has since done this every time we go into the playroom. I told Sean we have to be careful with our actions as well as our words in front of the boys from now on. The age of mimicry has begun.

Liam couldn't care less about pointing the remote toward objects. He's obsessed with trying to get on the couch and large chair in the playroom. He will stand in front of the couch and stick his leg on top of the cushion, like some tiny ballet dancer warming up. He then whines once he realizes that he's too short to hoist himself up. Those are the times when being cute and unintentionally funny saves him, and I'll help him up. Once atop the couch, he rolls around and looks over the edge and acts like he's somewhere special.

Both boys are standing better than ever and close to walking. For the past month they would crawl, then straighten their legs like they were doing the downward facing dog yoga pose. Then they would look between their legs and laugh, as if to say, "Look at my hiney!", or continue crawling with straightened legs so they looked like gorillas. Now Liam will stand up from the gorilla, slowly lifting one arm at a time straight out to his sides. Then he'll raise his torso, try not to fall over, and fall over anyway after a few seconds. If I'm close by, he'll lean toward me, falling into my arms. Graeme stands up from the gorilla or from his knees and is slightly steadier than Liam. Today Graeme even took two steps after standing, but I'm not calling it walking yet. It's more stumbling than walking at this point, but it's a start.