Aricia speaks

She's been trying to irritate us by mimicking her che-che with her constant "So?.............so?..........."

Today, found out that she has other words in her vocabulary. She fell down on the floor and went around announcing to all of us :
"Mummy, I fal"
"Daddy, I fal"
"Ah yet (Aunty Zet), I fel"
Sometimes she adds in "oh oh......"

Remember I mention my girl likes to plaster herself to all the cold freezers in supermarket? She did that today (as usual) and she walked from one side to another. I asked her "is this cold?"
"No! no cold......hot!" - the fridge don't feel cold to the touch at all.

Back at home, she was looking for her toys, she said "find (without the 'd' sound) and then lay down on the floor looking for toy under sofa.

Photos

Cute photos of my lil' girl. Now, she knows how to "pretend to smile" when I bring out a camera.

She looks so innocent huh?

JG Playclub

Brought Aricia for her trial @ JG Playclub in the old Big Splash in the morning.

Prior to her class, she was seen "talking" to one girl. Only thing, she was the only one talking, the other girl was so shy. Then that nosey poker girl bent her legs to see at the girl's mother with her head tilting one side and called "aunty". Called and called again, thank goodness the mother wasn't frustrated with this girl who kept repeating the same thing.

Class started, I found out later that the youngest child in the class is 18 months, that makes my Aricia the second youngest. The class is for 18 months - 4 years. So I personally found it quite difficult to handle the wide age spectrum in a class.
I'm so proud of my girl, teacher Claire said that she did well in class considering it's her first time in class. (This class was only opened this week & second time for the rests of the children, they were rather noisy. Aricia surprisingly didn't make any noise or scream in class-scared of teacher? All she did was to sit on my lap; cling on me but she'll turn her head to look at the teacher.) When they sang the Alphabet Song, she took out the pacifier from her mouth and started singing. Teacher was surprised and said "she's singing?!" while she was still singing the song.
What surprised me further was the fact that she is receptive to instructions. The children had to put glue on a paper and then paste the cut out parts to paste (like jigsaw puzzle) . I know and have confidence she can do it, just that when I do things with her at home she likes to taunt me - she'll throw the things away or when I'm guiding her she'll protest and don't let me teach/touch her etc.. So, I was so surprised that she didn't need me to guide her and she was able to show me where to paste; turning to the right direction.
When it came to painting, she continued dabbing and dabbing the colours. I didn't have to help her, except to stop her from touching her face (she had paint on her face, legs, clothes) It helps that I had been doing painting with her. Just that to make things easy for myself, I've let her do finger painting so those are washable.
After the class, they serve snacks. Aricia was able to do it -with the training she received from home (normally at home, we'll let her take her plate with her snacks from the kitchen to the coffee table. She'll then take the stool -the one that MH gave her- from the open compartment of our coffee table; sit herself down and savour snacks slowly. Then returns the plate to KZ in the kitchen)

As I've explained to hubby, I can do all these at home with her so there's no need. But yet on the other hand I've noticed she needs the social skills + she performs better outside. So I've put her on waitlist. I'd prefer to put her on a Tuesday/Thursday class. They kept asking me to go on the Monday/Wednesday class, but it's gyming day for me. And it wouldn't be nice to ask MH to change day coz' we've already found a comfortable day for the 2 of us. As it is, I felt so guilty about our gym day until I've placed Aricia's name down and in the night I realised my mistake.

Waitlist for Playclub. Checked the price for Chiltern House, surprisingly it's not that ex. Will check out MMI-Katong one day, wanted to do so today but it was difficult to handle Aricia alone.

Extracted from Forum

This article caught my eye.

To be fair to all, ballot Primary 1 places
THE Primary 1 registration exercise will be conducted by various primary schools from June 30 to Aug 28.

Unlike admission to secondary schools, junior colleges, polytechnics or universities, pupils are not selected based on their merit or academic performance. Instead, it is based on personal relationship with the schools. Priority is given to children who have siblings in the school or whose parents have connections with the school in one way or another.

Under the Phase 1 exercise, a child with a sibling in the school is given a place automatically. This is unfair to other children who have no siblings and are eyeing a better primary school. Parents who have secured a better school for their first child are guaranteed all their children will have a place in the school. They may relax and cease to be a volunteer to assist the school.

Under phases 2A (1), 2A (2) and 2B, the selection of a child is based on how parents are related to the school, for example, a child whose parents or siblings had studied there or have joined the alumni association, or whose parents are on the school staff of or have volunteered their services in the school.

This criterion seems to encourage parents to be involved in school activities so as to be accorded priority in the registration exercise for their child. This is unfair to parents who were not in a better school or whose primary schools has closed or who cannot establish a connection with the school, for whatever reason.

A child who has no sibling in the school or whose parents have no relationship with the school is accorded lower priority under Phase 2C.

It is understood the Primary 1 registration exercise cannot be based on the child's academic performance since this is not available. However, it does not seem fair to use personal relationship as a basis.

The Ministry of Education should consider moving away from this. Instead, a balloting system may be used to allocate places.

Goh Kian Huat

****************************************************************
Latest comments
Stupid suggestion.
Posted by: Prokinetic at Tue Jun 24 21:05:48 SGT 2008
#7, #19-#20
hmm... where in the letter does it mention distance to school? The letter was against relationship as a factor in determining school placement nia.
Posted by: lobo_respawned at Tue Jun 24 19:10:03 SGT 2008
wow, each child in a different school, different school uniform, different text books (some), different sports days, different meet-the-parent days ........

siow liao!
Posted by: kenaspammed at Tue Jun 24 18:08:35 SGT 2008
for people who suggest phase 1 by balloting, i hope they have a dozen children and tikam tikam into 12 different primary schools evenly spread all over singapore for them...then they will understand it is very "fair"

balloting is gambling, not meritocracy
Posted by: kenaspammed at Tue Jun 24 18:05:42 SGT 2008
#17
in this case, the poor(er) people does earn some monies when they sell off their properties to the stupidly rich people. No harm done. :P
Posted by: lobo_respawned at Tue Jun 24 12:23:42 SGT 2008
Warning: An

****************************************************************************
I think he probably is sore over the whole thing coz' he wants to put child in good school but can't.

Athena / Study matters

Over the weekend, I brought out one blocks game for her to play. I tried a different method this time, used the stopwatch to test her timing in fixing up the blocks according to the picture given. It got her all worked up; she tried to move fast and she was 'kalang kabok' - hee! Torturing my daughter.
Seeing how slow she was then to take out the blocks from the box to place them, I taught her the "see; think ahead; take" actions. It is really fun, all I did was to flip the card over and she has to glance & quickly take out the number of yellow blocks; as she's doing that to look at the number of red blocks and take them out etc.. and she was having so much fun with the game. I call it the 赌神 training. Dunno, maybe I was hoping to trigger off her mind to be very active. She's so ah-nia.

Today, I went through with her Long Vowels a (a-e, ai, ay) for her phonics. I find Letterland's Phonics really good, it taught me ways to see and read the words.
For a-e (eg. words like gate, made), the story goes like this : the e is the magic e where it can make the vowel infront says its name. So the word 'gate' reads as "Geh (g) A (a) te (t).
Words like ai has a story too, Vowels Out Walking. When two vowels man are out walking, the first man does the talking; the first man says his name. So 'ai' is read as 'a'. Interesting huh? There's alot of nice comments about Zoo Phonics too, but I'm not going to complicate matter for myself, I shall stick to one.
From now till end of year, I've combined her phonics with card games and interactive games on the lappie. Frankly speaking, she has no problem reading. Infact, I'm very pleased with her reading ability.

After her phonics, and a quick revision of her piano - where thankfully she played beautiful music so it ended fast, I brought out RGPS P1 paper to let her try. I left her alone to do the paper for 40 mins and I marked, she scored 80% for that paper. Well done!
Oh yes! One question she made a silly mistake - a tadpole becomes a goat?? I remember I have it bookmarked in my lappie, found it : Click here. Looks like I gotta print this out fast to teach her now.

Needs to be pushed
Hubby a week ago commented this after I kept complaining about me having to ask her to practise piano. "ask her to practise the piano on her own lah!"
"If only it was that easy! Ai yah, don't talk about piano! Basic thing on brushing teeth, she needs to be pushed; reminded; nagged. You think she'll practise the piano?"

Earlier on, they were showing SuperKids and this 10yr-old girl is so smart and ........her parents didn't have to push her or her elder sister. Call me suay! I have to keep pushing my children until I fall into my own grave.

Aricia

She doesn't talk but screams now, very noisy where ever she goes attracting alot of attention the wrong way.
KZ was relating to me once she was screaming in public, the patrons in the restaurant kept turning around to find out where the sound come from.. and nobody saw her (coz' too small). One lady nearby was using body language asking her friend where the sound is coming from; her friend kept winking her eyes in Aricia's direction. Hee!

Mimicking her sister, when she cries she don't understand what she was mumbling. But we thought we heard her "waaah.........ah............sorwe mee mee...............sorwe mee mee............."
sorwe - sorry
mee mee - mummy
Guess where she learnt this from? Her sister! Obviously when che-che gets punished, che-che will cry "sorry mummy.."

When you tell her "goodnight", she uses one hand to cover one eye and snore.

She likes to do things her way, even when I try to guide her hand to do some writing - she screams and pull it away - retaliating. How? Sometimes I feel that yes, she's learning whatever I'm teaching her but simple task of following my instructions or guidance she's refusing. Argh!

You know she's just proven to us that she's thinking beyond her age. And to think that KZ was tricked by a girl of her size (no pun intended). They were in KZ's bedroom and Aricia asked her for water, KZ opened the door and that girl ran out of the room; came to me; hugged me tight and refused to drink any water. Goash! She already knew how to find way to run out of the room.

Teeth :
I lost tracked of the dates her molars were out. Noticed now she is drooling and a cuspid is growing.

Updates

Didn't let Athena go to school on Friday, there were 3 cases of HFMD and 1 case of Chickenpox. Apparently the teacher told me it's the children from the younger class, but I found out later (much to my displeasure) that one of the HFMD case is in Athena's class. At the same time when mom told me the news, she informed that there's 4 cases now. Sigh........anyway they won't be doing anything in school so I pulled her out on both days : Thursday and Friday - she only went to school on Wednesday that week.

Friday
Since she kept complaining that I haven't brought her "to Aricia's school for soooo long" I thought I'd bring her out with me so that KZ can try to finish her work. Aricia didn't concentrate in class, kept asking me to carry her to sleep; when I did she sits up. Acted very tired in class, but the moment sensei opens the door -- that girl ran out and called "che-che...." and gave her a Barney sticker she kept for her (aww........so sweet!)
Brought them out to Isetan Scotts and Borders. Aricia kept throwing books on the floor. Goash! I scolded her to no avail (very difficult to 管教 that girl) It was a short 2 hour but tiring time with the 2 kids. I surrender

Saturday
Packed off some toys in their room into the storeroom. And I found some forgotten toys in the storeroom box. Threw away some and kept 3 sets of masak masak toys - doctor's kit, ironing board set & cleaning aids set. Can you believe it, I only opened the doctor's kit this year which was given to che-che on her 4th BD party. I opened the ironing board set that MH gave (also from 4th BD party) quite some time back - last year (hee!) and there is another set of similar game which I didn't open and will bring it over to mom's place on Monday
Hmm......I thought these masak masak sets can help in my pretend-play. Showed Aricia how to sweep the floor, she mimicked. After some time she surprised me by pretending to throw the rubbish from the sweep pan into our bin -plastic bag - in the kitchen. She remembered!
Okay, I promise never to buy them anymore toys. I'm trying to declutter my place, can't wait for Aricia to grow up faster so that she can quickly use them and I will sell them away.

Sunday
I suddenly remembered the compound chocolates I have and decided to try them. All the while, I've been using those Cadbury confectionery type of chocolates to bluff the children. Proper way is to use compound chocolates but alas! forgot I threw away the white ones coz' they turned yellow - due to heat from the fridge top- so I couldn't paint. In the end, I ended up just doing the melt and mould process. I needed to see the outcome too anyway.
Forgot to take the pictures until much later when I was trying to take them out. Only left with the Mickey Mouse & Friends mold. The back is smoother this time, but I just don't understand why the chocolates didn't have that shiny look. Tastes better though. I didn't put it in the fridge to harden the chocolate, I let it harden with room temperature as I was worried about the melting. Anyway, I should try that one day to see if it melts if I left it outside.

Strawberry Shortcakes' and Precious Moments' chocolates

After the frustrating few times in making her play this song Gavotte, Flemish Dance and Pretty Bouquet properly - she finally did it today! Beautiful!! Must buy 4D!
Okay, I'm rather particular in the way she plays. Not suppose to slam the keys (which is why decided that we really needed a piano instead of relying on the electone). And the touch, + the feel for the song. Perhaps that's why Peggy says I'm too strict with her? But then again, she's suppose to play in that way what! If I don't enforce at home, she plays wrongly in class - also get scolding from Peggy. Aiyoh 这么难做 人

Dinner - woah! dunno why hubby decided to go all the way to Thomson for our dinner. After my dinner, I brought Aricia for a walk so that KZ can have her meal, I was brought back to my childhood when I went into this shop - biscuitKING. Wah... I want this, I want that. There is even the preserved olive tidbit where you have 3 rolled into a triangle. Dunno if you know what I'm talking about. Immediately, it reminded me of my PAP days in Siglap. (Yup! My habit of snacking started since young, which explains why I'm FAT!) And there is Tora - the chocolate ball which tasted nice at that time but now with Ferrero and all the 'heavenly chocolaty sins', it's rated last. But oh well.
Hubby tempted the older greedy girl with roti prata, she was already full but still asked for it. In the end, we finished it. Aricia was making too much noise in the restaurant, screaming. And a funny thing happened just as we were about to leave the place. She was making far too much noise and our attempts to keep her quiet was unsuccessful. Just then she let out another big scream, and the guy behind us; next to us and the staffs all went "Ssshh". LOL. Geez! I'm going to have alot of things to talk to her for her 5 mins suggestion leh!


Monday
Ran some errands apart from collecting KZ's work permit.So sian, I have to do it again in January.
Brought Aricia to Athena's Berries school for the first time and that girl (comically) fell down from the cushion just because she was too light. Haha! Poor thing. Nope, she didn't cry at all.
I so bai-wu-long (blur) today, in the evening I passed by Wei Teng's father stall (Wei Teng is Athena's classmate) and bought some otahs from him. Normally people will pack in 5 sticks right, actually he has already packed them in 10s. I was also blind, I was looking at it but my mind kept telling me 5 sticks. As he was closing stall, I bought 2 packs to try to finish the otahs for him. I gave him $5 and he wanted to give me change, I think he was trying to act polite and I was so generous to tell him "never mind, never mind" and waved my hand; actioned like one charitable lady. I walked away.. and then something told me to open up the plastic bag. I stared at the thing, 10 sticks in each pack x 2 = 20 sticks @ 40 cents = $8. !!!!! I found it funny, walked back to him and (what the heck I was thinking!) asked him "1 stick is 40 cents right, 10 sticks in one & there's 2 bags so I gave you too little already right?" I gave him another $10 and wished the floor would open up to swallow me and I get trapped in all the otahs. I wonder what went through his mind, "Athena's mummy so cheap-skate trying to fleece me." Hee! KZ kept laughing at me; but she knew it was unintentional. Now I gotta eat the 20 sticks until I lao-sai.

Ouch! I got bitten!!

How would you feel if you were bitten not by scorpion but by the mouth you're feeding??

Just a day ago, it was during one of my nagging session when out of spite asked " I love you so much, do you feel it?" She shook her head and said "no" - OUCH! That hurts. When pressed further for her reason, she cited "because you always bring mei-mei out." Whatever gave her the impression that I brought her out, goash! I'd love to bring her out more often but that girl is far too ...tiring for me to care when we're out. If she looks at this 'going gai-gai' as a show of love, then she should think and remember how much we have brought her out gai-gai. On the other hand, you're talking about a 6 year-old child here who don't remember what happened in the past and only knows and sees what is happening now. But it does feel hurt and backstabbed by your own daughter. I told her "you don't even know the little things that mummy did for you. Love is not shown by buying you things. I think even if I cut my heart out for you, you wouldn't even feel that is love." And then I think... her personality is definitely not mine; only caring about herself; thinks everyone should treat her good when she don't even reciprocate.

Perhaps you might feel that I'm reading too much into her innocent sentence. Maybe I should share with you what I overheard from the children the other day.
Alexandra and Athena were talking about The Barbie Princess CDs, the children will rattle off the titles they have. My hao-lian daughter will rattle off all the complete titles. Alexandra only had two, and I don't know if she's trying to console herself or what, she ended up saying "wah, so many ah! No need to have so many." But look here, this girl is so easily contented. And the most important thing is 'she didn't have so many things but she obeys her mother. Athena has so many things and she don't obey me.' We've spoilt her??

Ah-muay is 21 months old

The lil' one turned 21 months.

Look at the expression on the big one. Somehow with all the training every month, my ah-muay knows what to do with the candle. And this time round, she snatched the knife from che-che and insisted on cutting the cake herself & took the first bite from the knife. Hee!
She tried to feed herself - very messy and she dropped the cake into her top (as you can see in the 2nd picture, she was looking into her top) a few times

More pontang-ing

Okay, Angeline got me all excited. I was suppose to send Athena to school this week since I can count with my two hands how many days she's been in school this time round (too much of skipping school - our holiday, she sick, we baked etc..) but.... she sms-ed me about Hello Kitty show. Angeline - the can't stay at home mother - always bring Alexandra for such events. For me, if it's something that Athena likes I'll try to bring. If not, I think I can do better with other things than getting myself so stressed out and kan-cheong over the queue and passes.

On Tuesday (17th), I was so surprise to see my ex-team LSS, Nellie. I had been wondering what happened to her, since changing our team we never bump into each other in the aircraft or control centre or mailbox area. So I thought she had left. I'm so glad to bump into her. She joined us and we started chatting. Ahem.. the SQ Mother's League. Now, I have one more mummy to include in now.

I'm not going to say anymore, just read on Athena's blog (I'm too lazy to type)

Hello Kitty Show
Hello Kitty Tea-party
The tea party is a repetition and includes a photo-taking session as well. So we kindda like wasted our money over the first show and photo-taking on Tuesday.
I feel they should have done something different for a tea-party.

*****************************

The thing about having a daughter is that both mother and daughter can go crazy over the same thing. Since we needed a receipt of $30 for the tea-party, I bought them this Sushi game set which I saw 2 days ago. Aha! This is one of the useless buys since this kind of toy is not what I want to test my children's IQ. But oh well........I had a deprived childhood, so I made it up to my children and make them spoilt-brats!
Also, I bought Athena's Hello Kitty sticker refill on Tuesday. Only to find out, after we got back home... that she put it back on the shelf. ?!?!? I have the receipt with me so I called the place up, as usual we get passed from one person to the next. Somehow, I don't know what messaged they passed through to each other, one lady called to tell me "I'm sorry I didn't see the thing that your child left behind." Freak! All I wanted was whether they did any tallying at the end of each day, if there's additional 1 - it's ours and I'd collect it on Thursday. Naturally I was rather displeased with Athena for putting back the thing for me, she could have checked if I had bought it or what. Although it's only $8.90 but .... I can get myself a meal with that amount.

1st Playdate for this hols - OMG!

OMG! Can't believe it, this is the last week of hols and I haven't organized any playdates for Athena.

And so, since Josephine's sms came so timely - saying that Braxton told her he misses Athena - I thought why not get them together. Well, that is if the mother allows him to skip school, his older sister Melia is in P2 so she's in the hols mode. Glad she obliged and off we went to Downtown East.

The children had fun together, read Athena's blog.

The only thing I wanted to say was..at one time in the cafe, Braxton and Athena left the table and sat somewhere else on their own. I thought it looked funny, and they still remain so close after a year or so of separation. Hmm.... preschool sweetheart? Now makes me think, whatever has happened to my Ah Boon.

So the day ended. I am glad that I've finally set a playdate for her this hols.

Day out

It was suppose to be a "less than 2 hours day out" trip to Dr Lee for her follow-up. Bumped into brother outside the clinic, and he asked us if we're interested to join them for lunch with my dad. I was quite hesistant coz' I have so many things to do at home... ultimately I decided to join them.

Lunch is at Feast @ East , food is to my taste. And though I claimed "I don't eat alot and lose out in buffets", I tried to make it up by eye-ing on the dessert area (and made a mess of my already fat figure). Chocolates! Chocolate fountain. Ohh lala... this is smack tasty!

Photos are in my handphone which I haven't tried to upload into my lappie.

Happy Father's Day to all !!

*gasp! I forgot all about it and hubby's not in Sin. Must burn midnight oil to help Athena make a small gift

Organized

Finally finished getting these organized.

Next, need to clear some toys in the children's room, then organize all our holiday photos into albums. Goash! That's alot of work, plus all the flashcards and games that I still need to prepare ............

Factory

Mass produced the pancakes again. This time round, it's Hello Kitty (again) and Pooh.

The children keep coming to the kitchen, trying to pinch the pancakes. Kept chasing them out of the kitchen.

I don't know why my pancakes don't look those nice evenly brown colour pancakes you see in Macs. I did it slowly, sweating out infront of the stove (which is why I'd rather mass produce them)

I tried with my cookie cutter to get the shapes. Very tedious, but must admit the Mickey Mouse head looks nice.

Kitty chan

Athena's dinner
She finished the kamaboko!! Remember what I mentioned before?

See my funny-looking sausage? Suppose to be Hello Kitty

Lesson

Yesterday, I did colours with her. Played a colour song for her, then let her do finger-painting.

She stared intently as I showed her on the easel. Then I guided her lil' fingers into the paint pot and do on an A4 paper. She looked a little blur..but liked it (thankfully she didn't put her fingers into her mouth immediately)

The colour mixing I introduced was yellow + blue = green.


Then since one of the flashcard topic was on classical composers. I played 2 pieces of music, 1 of Bach's piece and another of Mozart's. I think I will continue this for a few days.

Pz. I'm finally so proud of her, she can finally say X, Y, Z. And..... finally she decided to open her golden mouth to tell me the numbers 1 - 5. She is able to tell me "bu" (blue) and "gre" (green)

Mr Piano Man

Mr Piano Man came by to tune the piano. (after all the boo boos.. he went to wrong place, then called me to ask if I've given wrong address, then said "you're staying in unit 481 not 4X1 lah!" to which I replied him "I'm staying here, how can it be wrong unit number??" Actually I think he also quite frustrated in calling me - don't pick up fast. He was angry when I first picked up the phone, one day after coming home. And his words were rather harsh "I've been calling you, call you so many times I need to arrange a date for piano tuning." I explained to him, so that was the first negative impression I've left him. Second time, he called today but I forgot it was on silent mode until half an hour later. He was angry again! Then kept insisting I've given wrong unit number - then did I receive the piano then? - negative impression again!)

It's the first time I'm seeing someone tuning a piano right in my home. Impressive!

See the white colour cloth? It goes down when you step the damper pedal. Oh..
And what was my little girl doing? She tried to walk on the piano covers that are laid on the floor - she thinks she's an acrobat?!

Bentos

Ehh.........it shouldn't be called bentos, coz' technically it's not boxed up. There's a word for it, I just can't seem to recall what's that word. Until I remember it (or ding dong Kayoko's doorbell), I will still call it bento and make adjustments after that.

Anyway, presenting : (backdated again!)

11th - Wednesday
It's a cat day. I was lazily preparing HK teabreak snacks for Athena & did a little more for mei-mei.

Very lazy... I dunno why, maybe it's coz' I'm up late every morning so not enough time to do it nicely or...I'm too impatient. Yah yah, che-che asked me "mummy, why no chocolate to draw face??" I'm so lazy, plus not enough Nutella already lah!

I don't know why I decided to prepare this for her breakfast.

It's an-jing ( malay for dog). So I should call this "Raining Cats and Dogs morning" or "The Dog and Cat Fight morning"

woof-ing (oops!) down the noodles

Okay, lunch time I decided to try my best in decorating mei-mei's food.

Nice? It was Kitty meal presented on a Beatrix Potter plate - hee! Take note of the egg. It worked! 成功
In these pictures, you see the smiley face of mei-mei who said "eh mo (elmo) when she saw it. I corrected her and immediately she said "ki ki", less than 3 seconds later she went closer to the plate and went "meow........"

いただきます!

Ps. speaking of which, Hiroe has bought me some stuffs from Japan. Can't wait!

Updates / mumblings

So what happened since my last update on Tuesday?

I kept myself busy with the childrens' things in the night while everyone sleeps.

And so, she did pontang school on Tuesday. I shan't say what we did there, just read their blogs (Athena & Aricia). But I shall tell my story on the skating. Ooh......now I remember she must have watched it from Magic of the Pergasus. So that's why she wants to ice-skate. Let her learn? She had the guidance from a staff there and oh boy! she barely walked a few steps in the rink and almost fell and then got real scared and refused to move. In the end, I decided to try. I haven't skate for a very long time - maybe 9 years? (okay, I can only go forward; cannot stop; cannot go backwards). What a bad decision. It took me 20 minutes to get a hang of it coz' it's really slippery (not ice, synthetic) + haven't skate + the skate really painful - it doesn't fit nicely on my legs. So..what happened?
See for yourself.It didn't look that bad until days later, today where it look so bloodied (I'm not going to show a photo) and mom so kindly offered me a plaster that is coated with 云南白药 - ARGH!! PEE............PEE.......AH...... (mimicking my 2 daughters).
Wah...think I'll skate again? Maybe yes, if it's real ice not synthetic. But it's a good lesson learnt.

Some observations was made on Aricia when she covered her eyes and walked. She was using her innate senses in guiding herself along, mind you she didn't knock on anything at all. And at one point a huge group of teenagers came out from the Marquee, she didn't bang on anyone. Only people banged from her back coz' they can't see this small girl. I don't know if she was just lucky in making her way through blindfolded or what. But prior to leaving the house, I was going crazy in teaching Athena one new piece of music. Until I decided to cover her eyes and ask her to play. Mind you, that girl who likes to 'anyhow press keys wrongly' ended up playing 100% correct. She probably did by hearing, I don't know..but maybe there's a research to this?

I'm going to bring out that ah-soh in me and tell you what I found in NTUC.

Eggs! I haven't been able to do the egg molding for the childrens' meal so far coz they are always so small! I was happy that I found this and will try it.
At home, I took our eggs at home to compare. Yah, big big so I hope will be 成功 the next time I do the egg molding

So I did and it's really 成功.

*******************************************

School hols coming to an end soon, and I haven't even set any playdates. Looks like we gotta miss it this time round again.
And talking about school hols. I can count how many days che-che went to school this month. And......makes it worse when mummy decides to let her pontang school. Wait till the daddy comes home and learn about it (must pa-kak together.) Next week, Monday and Tuesday skip school again. Hee! I have a surprise for her on Tuesday.

The story of the missing letters
We have a case of missing letters, mysteriously all from KKH. Imagine my shock when I saw a letter by DNB, representing KKH (in other words like ah-long coming after us for money) saying that we haven't paid and they're about to paste pig head on our door. Oh my! That is how many months ago? 7-8 months ago? They didn't send us any bill so I thought it was all covered by medisave. I made a phone call to them last week and the lady told me they sent to us 3 times, (3 times??) last one in March, no reply that's why DNB sent letter to us. I kept asking "are you sure you sent to us? Coz' the address is correct and frankly speaking it's her second admission and we received invoice for the first admission. So I don't think it's wrong address? I was thinking I don't think Mr Postman so blur right (although sometimes I do get neighbours' letters in our mailbox) and selective to KKH letters?!?! Anyway, I asked her to send the next one by registered mail to us. She said she'll send by normal mail. One week passed and I called again this Monday. "what? I sent out last Monday." She has no choice but to 'speak to the management first' and then called back, yes they'll send by registered mail to me. The mail finally came on Wednesday.
So now, I'm wondering whatever has happened to all our previous mails?

What did she say?

I overheard che-che's conversation with KZ a few days ago when we were outside.

It was something about che-che being very hairy on her back.

Athena replies :" yah lor.......I have alot of hair. I only don't have hair on my koko-pok (her name for private part)" -LOL
Reaction? KZ was disgusted with her reply.

Aricia

Updates on this little naughty girl.

Still small size, everyone comments on it but they find her very dolly-like. And when they hear her scream, they get a shock. Many times we get strangers coming up to us and say "she was the one screaming??" Don't know to feel embarrassed or not.

But besides the fact that she screams with her mouth, she has a really sweet tongue. She's friendlier than che-che and will go up to strangers and look at what they're doing or them (curious girl) and sometimes she'll acknowledge them "ahh...ty (aunty)" or "ye ye". Friends who know me, knows that I have been instilling this virtue on my children. Che-che apparently needs alot of coaxing and sometimes she still stubbornly refuse to call whereas mei-mei knows what she's to do, she acknowledges (and mind you, people do love to be acknowledged so their face beamed with joy when mei-mei do so)
One lady mentioned to KZ, "ai yoh........so sweet tongue, I'm sure her mummy don't bear to beat her." In truth, yes I don't beat my children when they're young not even with Athena coz' they don't know much.

Really cute to see her running after us when we're holding food or drinks in our hands. And she'll start shouting "share! share!" And she'll nod in approval when we ask her "nice?" When we see her holding something and say "share", she immediately pops the food in her mouth. Haha!

Another word she's added to her vocabulary is something very senseless - "ah-ha.......mee mee.......pee pee......... (then bursts out laughing)" Actually I think it was something that she learnt from her che-che who was trying to imitate her.
Original sentence was from mei-mei - "peh..peh" - which means 'pain pain'
Che-che was trying to act childishly, trying to get attention from us will tell us "pee pee ah........" - 'pain pain ah'
In turn, mei mei imitate her che-che, but this time she added some words to the above sentence.

Another thing, as I've said feeding her is a big problem, she protests alot; screams; cries etc... Now, she's learnt to hide herself under the dining table. That's funny!

Updates

I was so lazy to update my blog, so it's late again.

Friday
Athena stayed over at mom's place, so I was able to laze in bed longer while KZ handles Aricia in the morning (goash! I dunno if I can cope when she's on holiday for one month end of the year)
KZ went out with me the whole day coz' I wanted to drop by the fair since will be in the vicinity after her class. (It's getting more and more difficult to handle that girl now, she totally exhausts me.)
Class went okay, she was quite distracted by Jeric and kept looking at him. She enjoyed it when music came on. She's even more happy when sensei played Teddy Bear Song, she was singing ".. bear....... bear......" It's all the early exposure to che-che's CDs.
She lost interest in LM, looking at sensei's cards instead of hers. Thankfully, sensei noticed that and made the 2 children get the sequence from her cards instead of their small cards. She did okay for the rest of her class, blur-ed out at end of class when she wanted me to hug her but went to Junie by mistake and hugged her legs and say "bao bao......." (cannot feel the size difference meh? Mummy's so fat).
At the fair, I bought a few things and I love this and this the most. This helps to prepare Athena to phrase her sentence properly, she's speaking in Singlish!! Well, it's not surprising that she's speaking in such a way when her peers are speaking in such ways. I think I'll need to enrol her in British Council or Morris Allen.
As for this Math item, I think it's more suitable for Primary 1-3 standard?? But being a typical kiasu mom or a overtly-worried mom ( I asked her "what is 100+2? " Her answer is "200" ?!?!) I think I need this to show her the ones, tens, 100s etc...

It was a great surprise to bump into Mel outside the hall, first I noticed Irvin then her and had to see her charming girl who share the same name as my older girl. I felt as if I have known her for long time. Truth is, yes I've been reading her blog for quite a while now.

Brought the children for follow-up with Dr Lee. Athena's doing well, mei-mei's cough is more phlegmy so she's given more medicine to take. Poor girl!

Was so lazy to blog, so I watched a korean show that made me teared. Fell asleep after that.....woah! sometimes it does really feel good just lazing around. But then again I've got 1001 things in my mind that I need to do.

Saturday
If you think I'm crazy buying some books for the children, I'm close to getting an award for being the most kiasu mother. I came across a temporary stall selling those papers from Top schools and ........I BOUGHT THEM. (she'll only be in P1 next year!! Goash! She'll end up crazy instead not me) At home, I was stapling the sets of papers and flipping through RGPS paper. She did well for the first page, then second page she was a little slow with the long sentence but she was able to answer me. She was confused with one question. She stared at all the multiple choice answers and still she couldn't identify what the group of fish word - I taught her 'a school of fish' but in that paper it's 'a shoal of fish'. Instead she mumbled to me "fry". I was surprised that she remembered this word. It was those very casual talk with her, not those sitting down teaching that I told her a baby fish is called a fry.
Umm.. English and Chinese paper okay, Maths I think she'll have some problems. Geez! I have to buck up my job.

In the afternoon, we went to watch Kungfu Panda at the new E!Hub. Nice place but it's really crowded. It's more difficult to bring Aricia out now, she was screaming in the restaurant and everyone looked at her. (small size but mighty lungs) I don't understand why, it's difficult feeding her these days. Needless to say, she's making me really exhausted- It's both the fact that she's hyperactive and I'm getting old.

We got back home in the night.
Photo time :-





Then I went into second gear in reorganizing the flashcards from the box in the storeroom to Athena's room. ( I never seem to stop working huh?) Sorted them according to alphabetical order, finished everything at 3+am. Now it looks like a clinic with all the "patients' cards."
Top shelf : flashcards
2nd shelf : flashcards
last shelf : 5 boxes of I Can Read books, Shichida worksheets for 2-5/6 years old, LeapPad cartidges.
I'm not really done with the organising yet. Have to tagged them accordingly and see if there's a need to move anything from the last shelf. Plus the flashcards will increase, by then will have to make way by removing stuffs from last shelf?
Sunday
Morning, KZ saw the flashcards and said to me "mum, next time when you don't want the cards, those Aricia don't need coz' she grow big already.. don't throw away, give me."
In my heart, I went 'huh?' Honestly the topics I do are quite advanced levels so it will lasts us a long time. And I'm not that rich to be throwing away stuffs. I've spent a amount of money here, I bought some and I printed the rests on own. Whatever it is, I will have to sell them away when I'm done, even those handmade cards where the wordings behind are handwritten; may not be as good as those I bought but hey!I've spent my time ; all the late nights + cartridges for printing leh!

Athena suddenly had fever in the evening. Oh no! Viral!

Monday
Her body temperature was down in the night when she slept but this morning, she felt hot. Temperature was 38.9, gave medication and then left the house. I had to meet Marc to settle the insurance stuffs before I can proceed with renewal of work permit.
So much changes in Bugis Junction!
Anyway, I bought more stuffs for Athena. Bought her san zhi jing at the fair. Today I pass by a book store and got the other two for her. These books will last a long long time coz she wouldn't understand the meaning until much later - like in her teens. Hopefully by then the books are still around - ehh.......I mean if the naughty younger girl don't tear up the books.

I chanced upon this book in the store. I had been looking for books like this to teach Athena on Chinese words. It shows how words derived and perhaps it will give her a better understanding and remember how to write the words. Glad I found it!

Berries class - feedback from Guo-lao-shi, she's doing well in class now. She's participating in class alot. And she says she does look sleepy in class at times but when the time comes for study, she pays attention. I've explained that she could be tired becoz' she's in full day childcare and don't nap that much. Her chinese is good, to think that I was so worried about her chinese. But guo-lao-shi still thinks that it's good to continue emphasising on her chinese just in case she might slack in P1 next year especially so when she's going into those ying-siao.

Tuesday
I promised her I'll bring her to E!Hub today. So she's pontang-ing school again. Last one for this week, next week one more time on Monday (going out with Braxton, who used to be in the same childcare as her) and then I think no more pontang-ing of school. Goash! I can't believe that I'm writing this - my child pontang-ing school in my blog for everyone to read.
Hubby flew off this morning and will be away for the next 1 week or more, so I'm launching myself into preparing some materials for Aricia tonight.

For My Information - P1 Registration & more information about school academia

Phases of Primary One Registration Exercise
Phase 2A2

For a child whose parent or sibling has studied in the school of choice; or whose parent is a staff member of the school of choice.

Registration: Thursday 10th July 2008 and Friday 11th July 2008 Announcement of Result: By Tuesday 15th July 2008

******************************

What are the documents required at the time of registration?

At the time of registration, you have to bring original copies of relevant documents.
For Singapore Citizens

If your child is a Singapore Citizen, documents required for registration are:

1. child’s Singapore Birth Certificate
2. child’s immunisation certificate
3. both the parents’ NRIC
4. statutory declaration if it is to be used.
5. if you are registering under Phase 2A(1), Phase 2A(2) or Phase 2B, you need to produce documents to prove your eligibility
6. if the parent authorises another person to register on his behalf, an authorisation letter (44kb .pdf) is required.

******************************

Registration Centre Location where the school will function in 2009

305 Bedok North Road 17 Martia Road S(424821) from January 2009

******************************

Comparing the PSLE. Actually, all I intended to do here was to put my choice of school's PSLE result. But then to prove to hubby on my insistence; I put in the result of the school he said to put her in here for comparison. I am more inclined in looking for the A* - A results.

****************************************

Achievements