About teeth and baby stories

The other day, we watched a few clips of fathers tying a string to a stubborn baby tooth and ripping it out by all sorts of methods. After the ultimate method of using a real helicopter, Yang turned to me and asked, “Is it last time they don’t have dentist so..”

I couldn’t even finish hearing him coz I was laughing!! Had to explain to him that baby teeth were easy enough and might not need a dentist. But thinking about it now, maybe it’s due to (US) lack of insurance or (UK) difficulty in getting appointments!

And the clip with the real helicopter mentioned a $100 note from the tooth fairy. That got Kai all excited coz he got a $1 coin per tooth! I couldn’t explain too clearly to him without letting the cat out of the bag for his brothers! Let them have some tooth fairy fun next time too...

I have been looking quite closely at Yang lately, just before I wake him after nap time. Can't believe he is almost six! He still feels like such a baby! I don't remember Kai being so baby at six.

Yang seems more independent. Maybe it's a middle child thing? I try to give him more attention, especially at bed time. While Kai always tries to tickle me at bedtime and Yu tends to roll around, Yang would lie down next to me when it's his turn, quite happy to chat a bit.

Some weeks back, he told me a bedtime story :) Sometimes I ask for bedtime stories :p And I ask for Chinese bedtime stories! Yang is usually willing to indulge me. "Long long time ago, ..."

So that story was about a sheep and a man. He had props - he used my his meh meh and the Ikea bear. So the sheep was taken away by a bad man - can't remember which toy. When the police caught the bad man, they threw him into the river!

Mama: Huh? How can the police do such a thing? They should send him to jail!
Yang: Last time can!
Mama: Oh ok ok...!

Yang used to recite whole short stories from school - in Chinese. When he forgot them, he started telling me his own stories. Typically, such stories ended up in the toilet somehow. I should be glad they weren't just poo poo and pee pee stuff. I don't understand why the kids find toilet jokes hilarious...

But he's a big boy alright. Apart from taking almost two hours to finish his dinner if no one feeds him, he is showing me that he's almost ready to navigate the school system. Doing all these home activities with him, I learnt that he can reason pretty well. He can also do simple maths now. Maybe he's learning a lot from Kai too. Like infinity :p

Though I must say, this, he didn't learn from Kai. For one of his first home activities, he had to write the word "breakfast". I asked him whether he knew how to spell it. He very quickly said he knew! And walked over to the fridge where the timetable was - breakfast was the first thing on the timetable :)

Yang doing work

So what would Kai do when he needs to spell a word? Ask me. I'd tell him to try. He tries - I think he is better than Yang at phonics - and checks with me. Usually I get good tries. But my next step is to get him to try without asking me first.

As for Yu, he's starting to speak really well now - I mean, I can understand almost all he's saying now! :p Looking forward to hearing him speak more Mandarin.

Looking forward to my boys growing well! :)