Nina ate the whole apple including the skin by herself. She saw her teacher at the Little Gym did that and wanted to do it herself too. And she did.

HURRAY !!!

Last night, Nina surprised me by counting from 1 to 30. She said the last 10 number correctly .. or not quite .. but she’s getting there.

“… … … twenty one .. twenty two .. twenty three .. twenty four .. twenty five .. twenty six .. twenty seven .. twenty eight .. twenty nine .. twenty TEN “

She is 3 years old and is on track to be able to count from 1 to 50 by the time she is 5.

At the Bolliwood restaurant:
We attended a one month celebration of my friend’s baby at the Bolliwood restaurant at Greenbelt 3, Makati. And Nina ate fresh pineapple fruit for the first time. When she saw her mommy brought a plate of pineapple, she told her mommy, “thank you .. thank you … thank you”. 

At home:
“You still have a tattoo”, Nina said to me as soon as she saw that the “tattoo” of goofy was still on my right tummy. She put that on for me last weekend.

And after seeing that I was done with my shower, we had this conversation:

Nina: “Daddy, do  you want to play bowling with me?”

Me: “Yes”

Nina: “Oh, great … I use the green bowling, you use the blue bowling”

She learned how to say “oh great” from the Blue Clue movie.

Nina started her summer class at the Little Gym today. Her mom sent me a text message at 10am this morning:

Nina pinter di sekolah mau ditinggal di gym and gak pake pampers

Her mom didn’t join her at the gym and she didn’t wear diaper either.

8 children in the class, some were from her previous class, called “Superbeast” and some were new. Nina seemed to enjoy her new class after spending some time sitting and observing her new friends and playing by herself at the gym. She joined them playing together after that.

During her previous school term, Nina never wanted to join her friends lining up before entering the classroom after the gym session. And today, her mom was surprised to see Nina lining up together with her friends while entering the classroom. Good improvement.

She was cheerful when her mom picked her up. Nina proudly told her mom, “Nina pinter gak nangis”. And she also told her mom that she was able to tell her teacher when she wanted to go to the restroom. “Nina wee wee sama teacher”, she said.

Nina met her old friends from the previous class: Una, Kohsuke, Aaliya, Elki and she met some new ones, like Drew and Maria.

I was playing with Nina last night on the sofa and she suddenly asked to play Pok Ame Ame, an Indonesian’s children play. It goes like this :

1. we face each other
2. we both clap our hands once
3. we use our right hands to do the hi-five thing
4. we both clap our hands again
5. we use our left hands now to do the hi-five
6. repeat from no 2 above

and while doing this, we sing the song : Pok Ame Ame, Belalang Kupu-Kupu, Siang makan nasi, Kalau malam minum susu. I sang the song last night, but Nina could actually sing this song about a year ago but she sang it like this: Pok Ame Ame, Belalang Tupu-Tupu, Siang makan nasi, Kalau malam, mimi susu.

When I first taught her this about a year ago, she wasn’t able to do the clapping and hi-five things well yet. She wasn’t able to coordinate between using her right hand, left hand and do the clapping. She was always trying to use one hand only.

I video taped this while we were playing last night.

Nina can throw a ball even though not so well coordinated yet.

Nina can put on her Nike sandal by herself. She would position the sandals facing her and the other side against the wall. She would then pushing her feet into the sandals (thus pushing them against the wall which prevent the sandals from moving).

Typhoon Xangsane hit Manila.Nina ate asparagus for the first time today.

Nina had her first lolypop. She got it from her doctor at Magallanes, doctor Vienne, who gave her that to stop her from crying.