family portrait

family portrait outting with our playgroups... thanks Amy for the great shots!

Saturday rainy day

in the rain, hitting the downtown mall after getting her H1N1 flu shot

Ming Ming pulled this skirt on herself while I was folding clothes, so we played dressing up...

東方三女俠之一

the cowboy outfit is a bit too big... and the flower pants are just too cool

I drew the cat and Ming Ming added the orange colors. It looks nice isn't it?

in Bright Beginnings

in the morning, before I left her...

ming ming coquine

when i arrived to pick her up..

Ming Ming and Dahlia

Ming Ming and her friend - Dahlia

Penguin's class artwork 1

Penguin's class artwork 2

Ming Ming and Matthew

une lettre de papa

comme ca arrive pas souvent, on la met ici pour que Ming Ming puisse la lire quand elle sera plus grande.
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Bonjour a tous,
Pas de travaux a Charlottesville, l'hiver est arrive la semaine dernière avec des températures qui ont brutalement chutées. Ming Ming porte le manteau offert par Tonton et Tatan a Noël dernier, manteau qui lui va très bien. Ming Ming a commencée la crèche et cela se passe plutôt bien. Elle y mange à midi et y dort deux heures avec ses camarades l'après midi en s'endormant sans problèmes; elle s'accroche cependant a Ting quand celle ci lui dit qu'on va l'emmener a l'école voir Miss Danielle. Elle parle beaucoup mieux Français et Chinois que ses camarades et donc, en père objectif, j'en ai déduit qu'elle était très intelligente et en avance. Les journées à la crèche la fatigue apparemment et elle a pris sa maman par la main Vendredi soir et lui demandant d’aller se coucher…une première. Dimanche, pendant son sommeil, nous lui avons coupée les griffes et les poils de la tête; comme les fauves, il est impensable et impossible de s’essayer à ses taches lorsqu’elle est éveillée (lui nettoyer le nez quand il coule relève déjà de l’exploit). La seule différence finalement d’avec les grands fauves est que nous n’utilisons pas de seringues hypodermiques pour l’endormir mais nous avons recours à une méthode beaucoup plus traditionnelle : coup de whisky dans le biberon. Bref, le résultat de la coupe de cheveux est plutôt bon : une espèce de coupe au bol qui fait qu’elle ressemble c’est selon a une Jeanne d’arc chinoise ou un Danton (chinois encore un fois) avant de passer a la guillotine. Depuis une semaine je participe activement aux taches ménagères ce qui ne m’était pas arrivé depuis bien longtemps : je débarrasse la table et m’occupe de la vaisselle pendant que Ting baigne Ming Ming (j’ai même fait une lessive et plié des vêtements hier). Apres ces taches ménagères, c’est le coucher de Ming Ming (the bedtime routine). Nous lisons maintenant un livre de poésie pour petits : très très bien.
Gros bisous a tous,
Antoine, Ting et Ming Ming

Cold Sunday - how to have fun?

I was telling Antoine that Selina yiyi is probably the only one in the world (after Ming Ming's parents) that would understand all the conversations in MM's videos. But apparently baby language is more difficult to understand (still remember that when Oscar sang "twinkle twinkle little star" to me in the phone, I thought he was singing in Korean!). Ming Ming was not saying "cooking" or "coca", she said "coquine" and "coquin" (naughty in French), and she was trying to distinguish between the masculine and feminine form - "maman coquine" and "papa coquin". This is one of her favorite words now (after "no" and "encore"), she would do sth funny and then say "Ming Ming coquine". She also likes to say "c'est bon" when she really appreciates sth. She is particularly expressive in mealtime, she says "Ming Ming er er /餓餓" (hungry), "Ming Ming bao/飽" (full), "hummmm", "c'est bon", "pour ming ming" (for MM).... And, she woud mix two languages in the same sentences, such as "nai nai/奶奶 encore", "nai nai/奶奶 all gone".

After a week in daycare, her English words is coming alone: happy, okay, truck. hummm, actually I can't think of any other words, maybe she isn't making so much progress in English.

shaking hands with a steadfast friend who does not mind the cold...

out-running papa in a race...

banging on a window to see the tv

eating delicious hot pizza..

and then hot chocolate wtih wipe cream in mama's usual hangout - Mudhouse.

last but no least, a hair-cut by mama while I slept on papa's chest... [she looks like a mushroom from behind]

一早起身搞搞震

Ming Ming, Enzo, and a new tricycle

both big and small kids had fun!
Thank you Elisabeth and Enzo for having us over! It made our papa-less and car-less day much more agreeable.

Ming Ming inventing new toys in Elisabeth's house.

Day four

Ming Ming was still sleeping when I arrived at 3pm. All the children have already woke up, and the two teachers were laughing as Ming Ming rolled over her bed and continue to nap. Before she started daycare, I was afraid that she would refuse naptime, but actually she naps even better there than at home.

snack time...

discovery museum is now the third space for Ming Ming : the stop between daycare and home, where we wait for papa Antoine. This is the coolest spot in the museum, the beehive, these are real bees that fly in and out through a plastic tunnel going outside the window.

Day Three

Class photo at 8:45am today. So we headed straight to the preschool after taking papa Antoine to work. There were only three children (out of ten) there. Ming Ming was still a bit anxious but quickly she went to play with the others (keep trying to grap a toy from a boy). I stayed for half an hour until Miss Danielle arrived. The crying was still heartbreaking, but when I stole a look at her outside her classroom door after a few minutes, she has already clamed down and started to play with the others. =)


Ming Ming's painting from yesterday... She was doing this when I arrived, it would surely be more colorful and messier if I arrived a few miuntes later, as she stopped right when she saw me.

when I arrived in the afternoon to pick her up...

the discovery museum

puppet stage in the discovery museum

second day in preschool

Ming Ming is obviously emotionally conflicted. This morning when we took papa Antoine to work, she was all excited about going out and went to put her baby doll into her school bag. I am quite sure that the school bag is associated with the day care as we have never used it before. She was disappointed then that it was only a car ride and we were not really going out to run or play. A few hours later, when we arrived at the day care, she was really happy when she saw the playground, but once we went into her classroom, anxiety hit again. She probably knows that this is the place where I drop her off. She clung to me a little bit, but also wanted to play with the others. She remembers Dahlia (eps Dahlia), Matthew, Haden, and Quentin – the four kids she played with yesterday - and repeats their names (after me) all the way through the car ride to the day care (and Abby and Julian also). It is hard to see her being so conflicted, wanting to play but also want to hold on to me to make sure that I don’t leave. Maybe it is better to say goodbye quickly tomorrow rather than lingering around.

When I told her (after half an hour, when they hit the playground) that I was going to leave and she would stay to play with the others, very precisely, just one sentence and she understood right away, the crying started. I was surprised by the precision of her comprehension. I used to think that their comprehension is vague and general; it requires expression, tone, gesture, and action for meanings to get through. Maybe it takes all of that too, but one sentence and she got it. It is like having a conversation with a grown up. You don’t need to say the same thing over and over again. Anyway, it ended the same way as yesterday, I fled the day care while Ming Ming wailed in the arms of Miss Danielle.

PS: she did really well for her second day, napped for two hours and play with the others just fine. She was doing some painting when I arrived to pick her up. It was funny, she was so concentrated that she did not realize that I was there already. But immediately she waved goodbye and wanted to go home. But the hug was less tight than yesterday.

After day care, we waited for papa Antoine in the central library till 5pm to go home together. 4 to 5pm is father time in the central library, quite some fathers readings to their little one after work. It is a nice scene, dads insteads of mums for a change.

First day in Preschool / 明明第一天上學

outside her preschool.. 小阿小兒郎, 背著書包上學堂..

For Mamie and Papou who are hungry for all the details about Ming Ming's first day in school: Got held up in the car mechanics this morning for 1h30m (the sun visor - fixed), we arrived at Ming Ming's preschool at 11am instead of 10am. I told her that she was going to school and it meant that I would need to drop her off and leave, but she could play with her classmates and her teacher would be very nice with her. She understood it right away and clung to me really tightly. I ended up staying for more than an hour, helping her feeding herself lunch... When I finally firmed up and decided that it was time to leave (12:30), Ming Ming started wailing real bad. I bursted into tears and left quickly, too embarrassed to say goodbye to the daycare manager. It is quite different to leave your child to the grandparents than at the day care.

But Ming Ming did really well. She cried a little bit, slept for one and a half hours, had her snack, and then played outside. When I arrived at 4pm to pick her up, she was in her teacher's hands, with a drop of tear in her face. Miss Danielle told me that she looked for me when she woke up, and when they come outside, she thought I would be there waiting for her. But overall, she did not cry that much, and was more cooperative in napping and diaper changing than at home.

bedtime poems with Papa. They are really cute together. Papa did well these two days: playing with Ming Ming, doing the dishes after dinner, and then bed time stories... It is great to have grandparents' help, but it is also great to have a husband taking up his share of the household chores and parenting tasks.