Back in Blogland! And This Time, With Helmets!

"The Helmet Heads"

Sorry for the long hiatus from the blog. The weeks have flown by in a blur of trips to the park, dealing with toddler tantrums, applauding Jordy's latest antics, hanging out with friends and me working on my CV. Yes thought it was time to update the old resume and my goodness, it was rather surreal trying to find the words again. Have sent it in to my work so they can hopefully see where I can fit in again when I return in February!

Anyway, will upload the bulk of photos to Facebook. But exclusive to the blog are details of Jordy's first ever bicycle ride! We bought him a helmet a week ago and have been hankering to finally put it in action. So yesterday morning, we all left bright and early for East Coast Park, rented our bikes and off we went.

D and I were expecting Jordy to at least kick up a fuss over the helmet and try to remove it, but no, we had none of that. In all honesty, it all went rather seamlessly. We strapped him in the bike seat, put the helmet on, and off we went. Jordy was his usual serious, unflappable self and appeared to enjoy the wind in his face, and seeing all sorts of amazing things that go - from other bicycles, to inline skaters, to scooters, airplanes, ships, and his favourite, the wakeboarders and waterskiiers at the lagoon.

Unflappable, as always.

We cycled for quite a while, then stopped by a bench for a spot of morning tea. Jordy had a wee run around, then back in the seat he went. We cycled back to the rental kiosk, and as I turned around to give father and son a wave, what a sight greeted me. Jordy, eyes closed, head bobbing, just about falling asleep! Haha. No wonder he had such a serious, spacey expression.

Mother and son at morning tea

Thank goodness, we got him out of the bike before he had well and truly started napping, got him in the car, drove home to loud nursery rhyme music, fed and bathed him before he had his long nap.

(Oh and an aside on nursery rhymes, so far D and I have exposed Jordy to all kinds of music. The ipod is usually on when he's awake at home, playing anything from Chet Baker to U2, Crowded House to the Police, Neil Young to Jack Johnson. In the car, it's either BBC, classical music or Flight of the Conchords. But one thing we haven't done is play music targeted at young children, sung by young children. It's the latter that usually gets to me, the precocious voices never fail to cause me goosebumps, not in a good way mind you, more in a fingernails on blackboard kinda way. However, we have made one concession. We bought the CD of nursery rhymes produced by the childcare he is enrolling in in January. All orignal tunes sung in English and Mandarin by the Carpe Diem kids themselves. Apart from some hideous diction, there are one or two tolerable tracks. The Mandarin songs are much better than the English ones. And Jordy seems to enjoy them. Ah well!)

So anyway back to our helmety day. After inaugural family cycling trip, D and Jordy hung out while I met up with J (although we didn't end up meeting till after the event) to go listen to Neil Gaiman talk about Graphic Novels and Fantasy and Lots of Other Amusing Anecdotes. Aside from the crazy queues, I am so happy this event was free (thank you Singapore Writers' Festival) and I have new found respect and admiration (is that possible?) for Mr Gaiman after seeing him interact with fans so graciously and good naturedly. He stayed for well over three hours after the event just to sign autographs! I know this because J and I met up with Jordy and father for afternoon tea at One Fullerton (where Jordy fell on his face while chasing a bird. Another story for another time, but the bruise is still there...) after Neil Gaiman talk, and when we went back to car park after hanging out for ages, he was STILL SITTING IN EXACTLY THE SAME POSITION! Poor, wonderful man.

Then we dropped J off, said our farewells (she's flying back to Kyoto this week. Sob.) and headed to gong gong and mamas house. Where Jordy played in the backyard in nothing but a diaper and his Hussain Bolt-esque Nike running shoes, and had a very retro bath!


All right, off to mum's group in a minute. More updates to come!