What a day!

Yesterday Sean had a heck of a good time, playing almost non-stop from morning to night.

It started with Playgroup at Play Center in the morning, followed by lunch at Raju with the mummies and friends. Next, we went to Ikea to hang out since our house was having a black-out the whole day.

We had never dropped Sean off by himself for very long. We thought yesterday was a good day to do it since we were not in any hurry to do anything. We dropped him off at Ikea Smalland, but stayed outside within his sight in front over the glass windows of the ball pits. Once we thought he was occupied, we left.

We didn't go very far, just to make sure that if the call to come and pick him up because he was screaming his guts out, we could be back in a jiffy. We came back to check on him and he was happily watching Spongebob with the rest of the kids. And when we came back later, he came running to us, ready to get out. All in all it only lasted around 30 minutes. But that was a first for Sean being left with total strangers.

After that we went to the Ikea Cafe where Sean ran around and played for a very long time, never sitting still. After shopping for a train set, we went home. When he woke up half an hour, asking to go out. I called Samantha and she invited us to join them at their apartment's swimming pool instead. Now the last time I tried getting Sean into a swimming pool, he screamed and refused to enter the water. So we haven't been to the swimming pool since then.

I thought today was a good day to get him get comfortable near swimming pools and to show him that other kids enjoy being in the water. If he swims, that would be a bonus. It took 10 minutes just to get him to go near the swiming pool. Kai splashed water on Sean and Sean was complaining about his wet swim suit. I thought Oh No! If he complains about wet suit, how was he ever going to enter the pool?

Half an hour later, he went near the edge of the kiddy pool and fell head first! Of course, he was terribly frightened, but I just covered him with a towel and hugged him while we watched Kai and his friend playing in the water. Telling him over and over again it's okay to be wet.

Another half an hour passed, and he got interested to go near the pool again because Kai and his friend were really having a field of a day playing in the water. I went with him, and stood on the shallowest end of the pool and invited him in. So he went in and got a bit bolder, and then slipped and went splashing into the deeper end of the pool! I dived to get him out of water. So since my clothes were wet already, it was time to ditch it and just go into the water.

All the time showing that playing in the water was fun. He didn't swim, but hung onto me while in the water, but he had a great time and eventually let go to be in the water by himself. And after that refused to get out of the water! LOL.....

The process took almost 2 hours. But at least now, he is no longer fearful of the swimming pool, and we can plan to go for swimming lessons. Another first for Sean. On hindsight, it would probably be faster if I just went into the pool right at the beginning. =P

Later we went for dinner. Sean and Kai ran and ran around the restaurant, laughing, crawling under tables, etc. I was chasing them trying to get them sit down over and over again. The restaurant was small and it just wasn't save for them to run around. By the time we came home it was already 10pm, and I was totally bushed! But it looks to me, this is the type of day that satisfy Sean's need of activities.