National day stay-cation

Another of our stay-cation. We checked into a hotel on National day and spent the day doing nothing but eating and shopping. The kids were glued to the new toy - Nintendo DS lite!

Oversized monkey?

Nicole's huge monkey or is it a chimp?

Toxic plastic toys

Due to the recent saga on MIC toxic plastic toys, I commanded a through spring cleaning exercise, disposing more than 50% of our toys, branded or otherwise. Cheeky Nicole was fast to react. She called me at my office on the following day.

N “ Mummy, you will not be very happy if I tell you something now”
Me “ Yes, what is it about ?”
N “ The phone I am using now is also MIC. Should I throw it away too? “
Me “ Hahaha, very funny!”

Pure laziness.....

N has been complaining of “boredom” again. I suggested that she read some books, play or simply rest but nothing would appease her. Then an idea popped up! Though not my slightest intention to drill her on past years’ exam papers, they have come as a handy tool to keep her occupied in some afternoons. At times, she would oblige (a sign of extreme boredom) while in most cases, she would say a big “NO”.

When I get home, I would mark her paper, with her sitting next to me.

N “ Mummy, I don’t like to answer questions on comprehension because I am too lazy to repeat writing it. Can’t the teacher just check the answers from the passage? I will just number and circle the answers on the passage.”

For a moment, I was totally dumbfounded at her creativity/laziness!. Despite some careless mistakes here and there, Nic has done consistently well in tackling P1 exam papers, scoring between 80% to 98%. Hopefully, by the time she sits for her P1 exams next year, she would be more prepared and less careless :)

An impatient little girl....

N is obviously not a patient Jie jie.


E " Jie Jie, I lost my MRT card"


N " What colour is it? "


E " Oh, I was at the MRT station and the boy at the station gave....."


N " No, never mind that, what colour is it? I will help you find it"


E " The boy at the MRT station gave me the MRT card...."


N " Ethan! I dont care about the boy and the MRT. WHAT COLOUR IS YOUR CARD?"


E " Oh, It is blue"



N " Got it! " (there she went up and down the bed searching for the blue card.....)

Slow Coach

E must be tired of eating whole meal bread with avocado, flaxseed and honey. His teacher politely requested that we pack something different for him as he had taken 1.5 hours to finish his tea break snack while others took only 20minutes eating the food provided at school – white bread with hotdogs! Surely it was more appetizing to the kids!

E “ Mummy, I don’t want to eat bread in school anymore. No more!”

I am very particular about the kids’ food choices and I insist on packing E’s lunches and snacks from home. I must confess that I have not been very attentive to adding variety to E’s snacks for the past 1 week, resulting in him being a super slow coach in consuming his food. Poor baby! I promise to re-plan his menu so that he will have something new in his snack box to look forward to everyday!

Pure innocence...

At times, I would be so tickled by the things kids say and do.

E & N were role-playing. N was the powerful fairy and E was the prince. N was swinging her magic wand all over the place, turning the household objects pink – pink table, pink curtain, pink sofa, pink TV, etc etc

E exclaimed “ Jie Jie, don’t turn me into a pink frog. I am a good boy! ”

How cute and innocent ya….

Reading habit

I tried all I could to cultivate a reading habit in Nic. I bought her various books and I even introduced kiddie magazines to her but she simply showed no interest though she was already able to read at a much younger age.

I did not give up. I got her a small collection of the Rainbow Magic series as she has a liking for princesses and fairies. For 2 months, the books were just sitting on the rack, untouched. One fine day, I requested her to just read 5 pages of any books of her choice. To my greatest surprise, she read the entire book (74 pages) in 2 hours – Jasmine the present fairy! She was able to give me a summary of the book which confirmed her reading effort. Just days ago, I saw her reading the front page of the newspaper which had an article on YOG – her favourite Merly was featured.

I hope she would keep up her interest in reading....... :)

Being Mum

Being a mum is to me, a god gifted holly assignment. Being a mum really changed my perspective of life. Life is no longer just about work and promotion. There is so much more to it. My little ones (not so little anymore) have formed a not so little part of my life. In fact, a large part. Every decision I make, small or big is centered around them, ranging from restaurant choices, holiday destinations to my choice of employment/unemployment. They brought me much joy and contentment which no monetary rewards can compensate.

God has been gracious and generous. He has showered me with an abundance of privileges, be in financial or otherwise. I am counting my blessings everyday and I hope that all of you mums out there are assuming a rewarding role just as I am.

Distinction!

Thinking back (approximately 4 weeks ago), it was indeed a moment of extreme uneasiness for N. There must have been countless number of butterflies in her little tummy. She did a good job in trying to divert her own attention from the unknown by playing with the musical instruments on display, ranging from keyboards, guitars to violins. I tried to help by re-tying her dress ribbons over and over again till it was in the perfect shape and position; and telling her how pretty and cute she looked in her white long dress etc etc.

Soon, her name was called and she looked totally helpless. Within 10 minutes, she was out of that “slaughter room”.

Today, it is a day for celebration!

It came as a total surprise! I wasnt pinning high hope given the amount of time Nicole spent on practising her exam pieces. Nevertheless, she scored a distinction, the least of my expectation! My joy was very vividly displayed the moment I spotted her name listed on the website. I simply couldnt believe my eyes!

To fulfil our promise to her, almost instantaneously, we got her a Nintendo DS Lite! She was absolutely overjoyed! Hopefully, she will be more motivated to work on her grade 2 pieces going forward.

Well done, Nic! You made us proud!

Hazelnut

Chub was awake pretty early, when L and I were having our breakfast before heading for work. He came over and insisted that he be carried on my lap. He smelled hazelnut and wanted to lick the spoon. Seeing that he was still half asleep, with eyes closed, I deliberately disregarded his remark and continued with my bread. What I didnt realise was, his mouth was wide open.

E " Mummy, I want to eat hazelnut. My mouth is open. Put it into my mouth, not on your bread "

How very cute!

Bad decisions?

L and I were again on the same dicussson topic, right before bedtime. He wanted to acquire another property right at this point in time but I disagreed, for an obvious reason - we are riding on an up going train and we don't know when it will turn.

L " I don't see why we should hold back. The interest rate is low....etc etc"

Me " I refuse to talk about it again. Based on your historical track records, the decisions you made were bad decisions. You insisted on selling our first home and you bought Lilifield at the peak without consulting me. "

L " Yaya, the only right thing I did was marrying you! "

Me" That goes without saying. hahaha! Taking away your bad decisions, by my right decisions, we are now sitting on 2 good properties! The only bad decision I made was marrying you"

We both had a good laugh and went to bed. Surely L didnt feel very justified... :)

"Golden Ladybird"

You have no idea how small the ladybirds were....and they certainly fetched a premium price. A real size ladybird chocolate piece for $1.20! Well, I suppose we were paying for the artistic touch....Both E and N simply popped them into their mouth and moved on to other pastry without showering them with much apprreciation....