Some More Pictures For Kitty

Each time I spoke to Kitty on the telephone, she'd ask me to post more pictures on my Blog. So, the following pictures are for her benefit..........

Zerlynde Can Read!

Zerlynde is always throwing surprises our way. Two evenings ago, I wrote "Apple" on one of those Doodle pads lying around, and lo and behold, she uttered "apple". So, I wrote "Ball", she said "ball. Then, I wrote "Cat" followed by "Dog", "Elephant", "Fish", "Goose", "Hat", "Ice-cream", "Jump", "Kite", "Moon", "Orange", "Sun", "Strawberry", "Xylophone", "Yo-yo", "Zebra", "Elmo", "Maisy", "Papa", "Mama", "Baby", and so on, all of which she correctly read out.

I tested her further the following day. These are some of the other words she recognises - Airplane, Bear, Circle, Square, Boat, White, Black, Green, Blue, Red, Yellow, Pink, Brown, Owl, Cow, Horse, Egg, Nose, Flower, Nest, Pie, Pig, Umbrella, Sheep and Book. Oh! And also Giraffe and Kangaroo......

The thing is I have never directly taught her how to read these words. She must have picked them up from those educational programmes she watches and from the flash cards and books we so often go through.

I'm once again reminded never to underestimate children. They are indeed miracles.

Pat Barker's Regeneration

I bought this book a while ago having seeing it listed in Carmen Callil & Colm Toibin's The Modern Library, The 200 best novels in English since 1950. But because I thought it's a novel about war (war not being one of my favourite reading subjects), I didn't get round to reading it until a few days ago when I decided to see what made it a prize winner.

Was I pleasantly surprised. This novel is, I must say, one of the best I've read this year. It's not really about war per se, rather it's about how combatants who'd broken down during the First World War were dealt with psychologically. Naturally, readers get to glimpse those moments of horror faced by the combatants in the trenches. An eye-opener!

This being the first of a Trilogy, I am really looking forward to reading The Eye in the Door and The Ghost Road next.

No More Quarrels

There's been this on-going battle over the television at home between grandfather and grandchildren. Grandpa eventually came out with a brilliant solution. Now, with 2 televisions placed side-by-side, all parties concerned can amicably share the same space and at the same time, watch what they respectively want. A win-win! Question is who gets to adjust the volume?

The Mambo Kings Play Songs Of Love

It's taken me months to finish this novel and I finally did last night. While reading, I could actually hear the mambo's playing in the background, that's how splendid Oscar Hijuelo's writing is. Naturally the movie is a must watch, if not for anything else, then for the song "Beautiful Maria Of My Soul" and of course, for Antonio Banderas.

4 X 2 ounces

Only a breastfeeding mother can really understand the joy of seeing those expressed milk accumulating in the freezer :) I think the consumption of green papaya helps (boiled into soup) besides lots of fresh milk and horlicks. There're currently 4 bottles of 2 ounces express milk each in my freezer. And am I so very pleased.

Maisy Puzzle

We have bought various jigsaw puzzles for Zerlynde to sort since she was but still a crawling infant. It's not until lately that she's taken a keen interest in them, thanks to Maisy who sparked her enthusiasm. Every so often, she will ask for her "Maisy Puzzle" which contains 7 pages of 9-piece jigsaw puzzles each.

Not So Alike Afterall

Zuwern's features are naturally more masculine, don't you think?

Precious Moments