Tehpeng is running into an issue faced by many parents …the lack of virtual storage space for the gazillion pictures we have. Mostly of our little one.

Hands up if you have difficulty finding pictures of yourself and your partner among them.

This was taken by Nat, when he took control of my cam for the first time (nowadays, our gadgets are no longer only ours…).

The iphone has been with me for more than a year and even with the updated versions, I was never tempted.

Like what a younger colleague told me, it gives me street cred (holding the 1st gen iphone means I had it before it hit our shores.huh huh huh).

Hiyah, tehpeng knows me best. Actually, the newer version of the iphone is a tight fit for the cover (which msclover very helpfully shopped for me back then).

But when the 1st gen is slowly showing its ‘age’, I know (or rather tehpeng thinks) it is time for an upgrade.

So, goodbye Gen1. you have served me well. Your 3Gs sibling will serve me faster.

And it even comes with a green cover (of sorts).

Tehpeng :: Any other colours for the cover? Red?

Sales guy :: Brother, Red is Singtel colour leh!

Guess I’ll go green for now…

Seems like the iphone has spoilt me so. Even if I am wanting a slide-out QWERTY keyboard phone (very GG-style. Haha), I don’t think I can get used to it. I mean, typing on actual keys!?

Anyway, the iphone is so intuitive, even Nat knows how to use it. My phone is his entertainment-tool and believe me, he knows how to work it. When i say ‘take picture’ , he will tap the correct icon.

Here are some random snaps taken by him, when we were having tea at Celede Wheelock (mummy was trying to calm her nerves after the near-pickpocket incident, with a nice pot of ginger-peach tea).

And so it’s the last night before tehpeng is home. The first night was abit hard and suddenly the king-sized bed is too empty. Subsequent nights, I was so zonked by work that I was out flat the moment I hit the pillow. Zzzzz.

Though I must say he’s got the short end of the bargain, even if he is overseas and all, as I have Nat with me.

It is strange (and inconvenient..haha) not having him at home. I erm, don’t really know how to work all the remote controls…

When PJ & DC came over with dc-boy last night, I was really quite glad for their company. Nat was tugging at DC a good part of the night to play ball. Guess mummy is not really a ball-person huh.

And I even managed to turn on the BR player for the Jacky Cheung concert. When I very proudly told tehpeng this…

tehpeng :: You know how to turn on? Don’t spoil the player hoh.

And DC-dad speaketh the hdbr-langugage that will surely get tehpeng excited. If only he was around. Surely more of such sessions must be planned.

Anyway, the star of the night is dc-boy. *yawns*…adult convo on how much milk he’s having and his sleep times etc must be boring.

PJ is one of my 3BFFs whom I’ve known since yonks ago. We go way back to those days when we were in our blue uniform, commuting to school and back together and definitely not knowing that our lives will turn out this way. I mean, we have our own next-gen!

So it was really quite surreal with her cradling dc-boy and nat up to some slight mischief of taking his dvds out of the boxes while seated next to me, and us reminiscing about those cantopop concerts we went for.

Can’t wait to see our boys play together.

It was a 4-days-away-from-it-all kind of trip up to Seremban. We had no online connection and nothing to distract us, not even cable.We armed ourselves with reading materials (tehpeng bought 8days for me, cos he knows I like to read up on Star Awards gossip.Heh), DS Lite & PSP (everyone found their inner baking mama & Nat can play Cooking Mama – Chop, slice & stir!) & Gossip Girl season 2 (which I only managed 15 minutes of epi 1). We had the little ones to keep us occupied this time round!

And of course, there’s shopping! After a very memorable shopping day the last trip up, I wanted to explore 1-Utama again. Tehpeng researched the map and configured the GPS the night before and it was a smooth 1-hr drive.

Tehpeng:: Well, if we managed the drive to Desert Hills outlet using Mapquest print-out directions, we should be able to find our way with GPS & a proper map this time.

I was good, only managed 2 Junkfood tees (from FOS) and a pair of flats. Oh and more Skinfood items. Nat has a lot of stash though.  Isn’t that so true of our shopping carts nowadays?

It was the first trip up for Nat and he was all “yay!everyoneishere!let’splayball!goalgoalgoal!” from the moment he wakes till he knocks out for the day. Which, technically speaking, is what happens everyday for him anyway.

So really, for him it’s not where that matters, it’s who is with him that matters.

Tehpeng is out for a wedding dinner and I was looking forward to some me-time surfing random sites when Nat has gone to bed (we “outsource” bedtime to our helper – Nat usually nods off quickly after his bedtime milk…heehee) but as how things always pan out, Nat cried for me. Usually, after a goodnight kiss and prayer by mummy or daddy, Nat will take his bottle and point to the door, signaling to us “ok thats all, night”. But tonight, after I left, he fussed and my helper wasn’t able to calm him down.

lilsnooze (via sms) :: Nat cried for mefor bedtime.

tehpeng :: No la, he cry for papa, cos I’m not at home.

So I plonked him on our bed (which we recently upsized to King, to accommodate his 360deg and more turns when he bunk in with us on weekend nights), put on the trusty Old Macdonald CD and laid down next to him. As I pat him softly in the dark, I can’t help but think of how just a few months back, we had to carry and rock him to sleep and how I started out wanting to be the one to put him to bed every night etc…

In the beginning, I used to nurse him to sleep. I know it’s not recommended by parenting books, but hey, whichever works people! We’ll deal with the weaning later on. Then as we progressed to formula milk we realised the routine of 9pm bedtime has already been set in its place although Nat needed some “dancing” after milk (carrying and swaying him) to lull him to sleep. Again, this is not recommended but hey, really, whatever works!

And just as he turned 1, he weaned himself off this dancing-to-sleep-routine (Thank God!) and progressed to nodding off to sleep flipping around in bed, as long as someone is accompanying him. I mean, just in Oct in Bangkok, I remember carrying and dancing around the hotel room to lull him and in Dec in Melbourne, he was sleeping sandwiched between us.

Well, sandwich is not a true depiction as we are often the one ssqueezed to the sides of the bed.

This is one of his favourite sleeping position – head to mummy, feet to daddy. Haha. As if to assure himself that we are there…

Yes, of course there were nights when he woke through the night. Countless. I remember those 2-3 hours sleep schedule. I insisted on nursing him instead of feeding him off the bottle. I reckon it’s much easier and faster. I wonder how I managed to do that, waking up to his first cry even if he was in the other room, going by how not a light sleeper I am. And the ipod touch was the thing to keep myself awake as I nursed him. I remember there were a few times I’ll jerk awake with a jolt – Where’s Nat!? Only to realise I’ve already placed him back into his cot…

There are still times he will wake crying (as if from a nitemare) and we had to take turns to calm him down and soothe him back to sleep.

I suppose, this is what parenthood is all about – surprising even yourself to what extent you can go to for your child.

I suppose I’ll take Nat’s lead as to when we progress to the next step – sleeping on his own…meanwhile I’ll cherish these times of looking at his sleepyhead in bed.

They really look the most angel-est cutest.

Typing this entry on babysis’ new toy – the macbk.

Wah, how times have changed. My good-O-levels-results reward was a mini compo.

It’s so cool.