reviving Elmo

last night it rained so as usual the house blacked out. the kids started shrieking so i pulled the curtains aside so we just stood at the window watching the rain pour (unlike our super special house, the neighbor's house was still brightly lit).

so in the darkness we started singing, taking turns with Dayana, while i held Dinara in my arms, swaying to the songs. after a few renditions i noticed Dinara went all quiet on me. true enough, she fell asleep in my arms.

bliss.

(but never fear, for once the electricity was restored, her battery restored too -_-).

i bought some cikai AA batteries at Tesco the other day with intention of reviving the Singing Elmo that we brought back from Houston last year. Elmo consumes 6 batteries, which is why each time the batteries are dead i'd procrastinate replacing them (because batteries aren't cheapppp!!!!). we have four Elmo's at home, two stuffed ones, two mechanical ones. the older Tickle-Me-Elmo seems to be suffering from calcium malnutrition, once he bends his legs he's unable to get back up again.

back then when we first brought Elmo home, Dayana was too young to appreciate, and Dinara has never seen Elmo in action before. so the kids waited and watched as i took out the screwdriver, unscrewed the battery compartment and replaced the batteries. and then see how they'd react to a talking toy.

clearly Dinara was mesmerized, Dayana got all excited and had all eyes only for Elmo. kedekut summore, tak kasi adik dia tekan2 Elmo, tsk. so i gave her the older Elmo, which was only able to move his arm and say 'that tickles!' then burst into a fit of giggles. Dinara will then pulun try to get Elmo's arm to stop moving. haha. she even knows where to press Elmo to get it to laugh. unfortunately each time she tries to press Elmo's tummy, it'll fall over. haha.

i took a video of the kids and Elmo but i don't oftenly post vids on my blog, i dunno why. i'm still trying to figure out how to upload the vid to iCloud though @_@.

this morning, Dinara found the screwdriver i forgot to keep, and you know what she did? she grabbed Elmo's foot and tried to unscrew the battery compartment, lol (so she does observe what i do, after all). most of the time she doesn't seem bothered to understand what i tell her.

an example of not even bothering to listen to what i say is when i try to teach her the action moves for the 'head and shoulder' song. when we sing 'head and shoulder, knees and toes', she'll put her hands to her head and look as if she's nursing a migraine. hahahahahhaha.

Dinara dances by turning around in circles nonstop until she gets dizzy and plops to the floor.

recently Dayana kept getting me to play 'ring around the roses' with her (i think she watches too much Angelina Ballerina these days), so for fun i asked Dinara to join too. she hasn't gotten the concept except that she would always volunteer to hold hands whenever we go round in circles. lol.

Dayana stole my last piece of kani mayo yesterday. i think she likes it because kani mayo contains crabstick, one of her favorite food.