We used to think that Caleb had a chou chou and that was his scratchy pillow and bolster. But subsequently we realised that we were wrong coz he started naming other bolsters as his scratchy bolster and telling us that one was the "scratchy bolster" and another was the "actual scratchy bolster". Yah, we didn't know that bolsters got real and fake ones. And then he started having preferences for bedsheets. I bought him a few sets of colourful bedsheets from Aussino but he refused to sleep on the bed. Instead he preferred to sleep on his pull out bed. And then he told us that he liked the bedsheet on the pullout bed and not the Aussino ones, coz the bedsheet on the pullout bed is scratchy and the Aussino ones are not.
That's when the truth dawned on us. It's not the particular pillow or bolster that he liked. It was the material that he liked and he wants to run his hands to scratch them when he goes to bed. The bedsheet on his pullout bed was bought from one of those neighbourhood stores and after many washes, the material starts to to wear off and form little clumpy balls that look like this.
Yah, so that's his real chou chou. The scratchy material. Hey, it's actually versatile ok. We're not stuck with one stinky pillow or bolster that we have to carry around. As long as the material is scratchy, he's contented. I really dunno whether to laugh or cry coz there was once we actually caught him scratching Sarah's back because the t-shirt that she was wearing was a hand-me-down and the material, though comfy, had the little clumpy balls on them. Aiyah, of course we told him to stop scratching Sarah lah. It's not a nice thing to do right!
Yah, and now onto my daughter. We're not spared from her idiosyncracies either. I'm not sure when it started but she has this thing about wanting to touch our hair, especially mine, when she wants to sleep and her mouth will be doing the rooting action as though she's sucking something, just that, there's nothing in her mouth. She's not much of a thumb sucker so, she appears to be sucking air when she's tired. It's really strange.
I tried to wean her off needing to touch my hair when she wants to go sleep. But did I ever mention that my girl is very persistent? Ya, so when I refused to let her touch my hair, she found her own replacement... her own hair! And not just the hair on her head... but her eye brows and eye lashes too! She must have figured that she better have a backup plan this time round and make it portable too! So... it's now super obvious to us when she wants to sleep coz first her mouth will root, then her left hand will be playing with a clump of hair at the side of head and her right hand will be feeling her right eye brow.
I brought her grocery shopping with me that day and it was her nap time and she actually set in the trolley with her eye brows knitted, both hands raised and touching her hair! I just had to stop in the middle of the aisle there and then and take a photo of her! Ya, talk about needing to carry your chou chou around. My girl's chou chou is permanently stuck to her!
Wah, with it permanently on her, you think she'll ever outgrow this habit? I really hope so, if not, as she gets older, she's going to look super funny every time she's tired.
Ha, I caught her doing her thing again after church today. The pix on top is her usual pose when she wants to go sleep. But sometimes, she'll use both hands to touch both her eye brows and she'll look like she's extremely vexed and really deep in thought. Not the clearest shots from my hp, but well, you get the idea.
Sleep tight everyone! Going to take my beauty sleep...Zzzz...
