Thinking Thursdays: Using little moments

The past few days have been going by in a blur, thanks to the cough that's keeping me up (it got so bad the hubby made me use Junior J's inhaler, and now I understand why he hates it so much... bleh).  In addition, Junior J has been waking up and having these crying episodes every 2 hours or so because of the bug we're having.  He's been inconsolable, going on and on, and patting, singing, rocking all have not been working.  The only thing that calms him down (and gives me a little bit more sleep) has been nursing.  Which means all our night-weaning efforts have been officially flushed down the toilet.  Oh well... at least I still have about two plus months to try to get him to sleep through the night plus sleep on his own before the big tummy is going to get in the way...

Thankfully the little boy's fever broke after we started him on antibiotics, and my mum has been popping by the past few days to babysit for a few hours so that I can catch up on some sleep in the day (but I wish she wouldn't keep telling me stories of how she managed to take care of us while being sick last time, without needing help from anyone... or making comments like "you shouldn't have kids after number 2, since you can't even cope with one child" or "two kids are enough, have more and you won't be able to enjoy life and go for holidays" etc.  :S).  Now I'm just praying we'd get better soon so that life will go back to its normal swing of things, then at least I won't need to bother my mum anymore.

With this bug, little boy has more or less lost any interest in any learning activities (not that I have any good ones planned anyway), and would rather potter around the house.  However, we've been having little learning moments here and there, like the day he decided to take all his bibs and arrange them all over the collapsed wall of his playpen:

Me: Oh, are you setting up a stall to sell these bibs?

Junior J: Yes! (busy arranging the bibs all over)

Me: That's nice!  Is dolphin helping you?

Junior J: Yes!

Me: Could I buy one bib please?

Junior J: Yes!

Me: Do you have any with hippos on them? (he doesn't have any actually)

Junior J: Yes, Mama buy hippo bib for Juju!  (errr... ok)

Me: Oh, but I want to buy a bib from you... Hmmm... how about selling me that dog bib?

Junior J: Ok!  (Passes me the bib)

Me: How much will that be?  5 dollars?

Junior J: Yes, 5 dollars! (I pass him a leftover toll ticket from Taiwan, that looks a little like currency,

and the boy pockets it with pride)  Thank you, Mama!

Me: You're welcome!  Could I have a bag for the bib?  

Junior J: YES! (Runs off, and tries to get his little backpack off the hook for me)

(This is when my mum decides to intervene.)

Mum: Hey, not that bag, hui4 kui1 ben3 de4!  (ie, you'll make a loss, and gives Junior J a plastic bag)

~~~~~~~

At the end of this, I was trying so hard not to laugh out loud, the little boy was so serious throughout the entire "transaction"!

Other than these little "conversations", we've been watching a few videos on Youtube.  I'm not really keen on letting the boy watch TV/videos, but we've been watching short clips of the life cycle of various animals, and little boy has been quite interested.  I particularly like this one, on the Monarch butterfly.  :)

Do help me out here... what activities do you use to keep toddlers occupied, that don't require much preparation?

PS: Thank you for all your lovely well-wishes and prayers!  We've been really touched. :)