The Gathering of The Mommies

Our next gathering will be next week.

Date : 3 December 2008 (Wed)
Venue : My Place
Time : 12.30 onwards
Lunch : Simple lunch provided - probably rice with a meat dish, a veg dish, some small side dishes, some cake/pastries and drinks.
For whom : Anyone reading this (Please RSVP in the comment box so that I can do a head count and prepare enough food)

You have 3 days to respond, starting from Sunday to Tuesday.

See ya! :)

Love These Pictures

We'll take home-based pictures once a while. I especially like these very much. They're hilarious and fun-natured. In one of the pictures, you can see Reuben's two pearlies! Yes, at about 8 months, his two pearlies sprouted out.

My two lovely lovely children, to God Be The Glory! (^_^)

Phoebe making a funny face and Reuben showing off his pearlies!

Cherish the Time Together

Just about six hours ago, I met my friend who has been away for a long time - six years. When I saw her, I just couldn't help it but hastened my pace to give her a hug. We each were carrying a child in our hand, but we could embrace each other with great smiles on our face. The feeling was sooo good! She is Cherish, my ex-colleague.

Slowly, family by family, we all met up - Lay Choon, Kar Keng, Linah, Cherish and myself. We were all ex-colleagues (except LC). We used to work under the same roof. We were not the best of friends in school. We do not even belong to the same clique. But when we see each other, there is some kind of bond amongst us. The bond of motherhood I guess. We know each other even though we don't meet often. It's a wonderful feeling and I'm very glad that blogging has brought us closer.

The party was supposed to be for little Ethan, but I thought it is more for the mommies, especially Cherish, coz we do not know when we will meet again after she has gone back to US. But now that she's in Singapore, we should grab hold of her and meet up again! :)

It's party time again soon! :)

Chinese Lesson 1

We have been conversing with Phoebe in English. Hence, her spoken English is rather strong. Her vocabulary is expanding each day. Last night, I was taken by surprise when she told me,

"Mommy, I cannot breathe."

She could use the word breathe!! Wow! Fantastic. I don't remember teaching her the word "breathe". She must have picked it up somewhere and somehow.

Although my parents communicate with her in Mandarin, Phoebe is not picking it up fast enough. She can understand what you are saying in Chinese and she can even translate from Chinese to English. However, her spoken Mandarin is atrocious - e.g. grapes, she would call it "bu dao". You'll cringe when you hear that. Her Mandarin has a funny accent in it. My mum said that she's speaking Malaysian Mandarin. But I don't want Phoebe to have Malaysian Mandarin! I want her to be able to communicate in basic Mandarin. And I'm fearful that she might develop a dislike for Chinese in future and that will pose a problem when she goes into the primary school. I have seen too many examples of English-speaking children struggling with Chinese and I hope Phoebe will not fall into this category.

So I decided to sign her up for Chinese Fun Class. Her lesson is once a week, total of $60 lessons for 4 lessons, in Beijing Language Centre. Last Saturday morning at 10.35 a.m., she attended her first Chinese class. They did singing, reciting of poem and a little basic writing. Phoebe enjoyed herself. She was very keen and attentive during lesson. Here're some of the pictures.

After her lesson, which lasted for 1.5 hours, we went to Ajisen for lunch. Phoebe had an aeroplane set for lunch. A little reward for being a good girl in class. :)

With Love From Yi-yi

My sister has a strange temperament. I would call that an artist temperament because she gets mood swings and can be rather temperamental at times. Sometimes, when she woke up in the wrong side of the bed, her mood can be really foul. She'll slam the door and her face can be really smelly :p We adults (including my parents and I) will usually avoid stepping on her toes and get away from her, just in case we get verbal shelling from her.

But the strange thing is that, my children are not afraid of her. It's not that they, or rather, Phoebe, will deliberately antagonise her, but she'll not shun from her on rainy or stormy day. Even more strangely, my sister is never irritated by my kids, both Phoebe and Reuben. No matter how busy she is, how late for work she will be or whichever side of the bed she wakes up in, she'll always allow them to stay in her room for as long as they want or mess up her bed in any manner. She simply loves them and always buy things for them.

This Princess Tiara was a gift from 'Yi-yi' (Phoebe addressed her as that). My sister got it from a friend who could customise tiara for little girls. Phoebe likes it very much and we'll keep very good care of it, hoping that her princess-ship will last for as long as the tiara can last.

Oh Christmas Tree

Yup! Our tree is up! I decided to set up the Christmas tree early, by 17 Nov so that it can be on display for a longer period of time... More mileage so as to make my effort worthwhile! Haha. I deliberately set my tree up at about 11 p.m. when Phoebe and Reuben were asleep. I put my tree up almost every year and everytime, I do it alone. However, this year, I have a lil' helper. She was not sent by the elves or santa claus. She is an angel. When I was about hang the ornaments at 12.15 a.m., I saw Phoebe whining and rubbing her eyes and saying, "So sunny." Haha. She has a cute habit of saying "so sunny" instead of' "so glaring" every time she wakes up from her sleep while I am wide awake doing stuff with the lights turn on.

Anyway, I carried her up and asked if she would like to help mommy to hang all the bears and baubles. She was more than willing. I had thought that she would be a mess-maker but she turned up to be a marvellous and serious helper. If you have a chance to come to my place to look at my tree, you'll notice that all the little bears and baubles are hung at the lower end of the tree. That's because Phoebe is only that tall! She's a BLESSING! :)

Last evening, I caught Reuben trying to pull the baubles down from the tree.

Tsk Tsk Tsk, Reuben, your jie jie has worked very hard to put these up you know... No messing up and these baubles are definitely not edible.

Such a cuttie! :)

Clockwise and Anti-Clockwise

Reuben likes to turn clockwise and anti-clockwise these days. I reckon he was either exploring his directions or just being bored. Sometimes, he'll make 3 turns consecutively and then another 2 turns in the other direction. Reuben never fails to amuse us! :)

The Hungry Caterpillar

Last Sunday was a programme-packed day for Phoebe. She had Sunday school in the morning, Ballet lesson at noon and in the late afternoon, we brought her to Victoria Theatre to watch 'The Hungry Caterpillar'. Basically, she only napped for an hour, instead of the usual two but Phoebe took everything in good stride. She was not cranky and went on with the flow well.

The Hungry Caterpillar was a good puppetry performance. The play covered two other Eric Carle's story - The Little Cloud and The Mixed Up Chameleon. Not only Phoebe, my hubby and I also enjoyed watching the puppets uncovering the story bit by bit. At the end of the puppetry, the three Canadian puppeteers introduced themselves and revealled some of the trade secrets on how the performance was put together. Though the performance was only for an hour, I felt that it's worth the money. As usual, the shoppaholic mommy me browsed through the merchandise sold. I got her two workbooks with reusable stickers and a puzzle.

Knock Knock

I remember that when Phoebe was 7 months old, we signed her up for the KK Best Breastfed Baby's Contest. During her assessment, she was required to knock two pieces of blocks together. However, she was unable to fulfill what was required of her. Hence, she didn't make it through the first round. Reuben is able to knock 2 pieces of blocks together at 8 months old. Somehow, I still feel that Reuben's development is faster than Phoebe's. He already has his two pearlies. Phoebe had her first teeth at 9 months. I wonder if Reuben will be slower linguistically. Anyway, watch the clip on Reuben knocking the two blocks. :)

Reuben Can Crawl

Reuben could sit quite steadily at 5.5 months. At 7.5 months, he could crawl. This video clip was taken this week. He is 8 months plus now. He basically crawls around the whole house and will crawl to the location where the commotion is. In this clip, Phoebe is luring Reuben to go to her by knocking two pieces of blocks.

The More We Get Together

This clip was recorded last week before Phoebe attended her ballet class. Look how happy the two girls are!

Here're other clips of her first ballet class.

Her lesson 2 will be tomorrow. This week flies fast!

What Can Phoebe Do?

I just want to give Phoebe a happy childhood. One that has lots of fun and no stress. In this competitive society, it is very easy to fall into the trap of pressurizing your child(ren) to excel. Sometimes, my hubby will say,

"Oh dear! So and so already knows how to do this but Phoebe doesn't. 'soo sey liao' (meaning, lose out already)"

But my answer is always,

"Don't worry, she has her whole life to learn how to do this and this. It's okie. She'll learn when she's ready."

I remembered previously, Phoebe didn't know her colours and her papa will teach her that everyday using the flash cards. And then, she didn't know her Alphabet and again, her papa will teach her conscientiously. Many people would think that having a teacher as a mother would be an advantage to the child. She will be the main educator to impart knowledge to the child. This is not the case for me. My hubby is fulfilling the role of a teacher at home.

When Phoebe was about 24 months old, she could recognise colours in English and Mandarin. She could also recognise the Alphabet in capital letters. She can say her numbers from 1 to 20 in English and 1 to 10 in Mandarin.

Now that she's 3, she knows her Phonics. She knows the sounds that each letter makes. The next stage will be the learning of letter-blending to form words. She loves to be read to and everyday, we'll read to her. When we read, we'll point to the words so that she'll be able to match the writing with the sound. We'll also examine the pictures in the storybook and discuss about them. She's rather observant and would scrutinise the pictures intently.

Phoebe started talking rather early and her vocabulary widen rather quickly. When I was doing my masters, I had to do a research study on the linguistics development of a child. Naturally, the easiest target would be Phoebe. She was 17 months then. I calculated the total number of words she could articulate - 117 English words. The words were uttered singly or in pairs. I even had to video her saying some of those words.

Just last week, my mum asked me,

"Why don't you teach Phoebe how to write? If she doesn't know how to write, she'll not be able to catch up with her friends."

Other than the small letter 'a' and the numbers 1 & 3, Phoebe doesn't know how to write. Is she normal? Is it okie not knowing how to write at 3 years old? I think it's absolutely fine! Phoebe is able to do some simple exercises in the workbooks. She's able to do matching, colouring and some tracing of dotted lines. She's able to doodle and draw simple faces and she's increasingly adding more details each time. She's also able to put glue on pictures and stick them neatly on papers. Phoebe will learn how to write when she's ready.

Last evening, Auntie Nia did not click her seat belt probably and it came lose. Phoebe commented,

"Why did my seat belt come off? Later like 'James and the red car' like that!"

Initially I didn't understand what 'James and the red car' mean. Then I recalled that I had read this story book donkey months ago and the character in the story did not put on his seat belt and he was flung out of the window when an accident occurred. My gosh! My girl had such fantastic memory! And she was able to relate the story to her situation. When I was reading that story book to her, I wasn't sure, at that point of time, if she had understood the story fully and she has proven to me last night that she did!

Kinesthetic intelligence, she definitely has. She's such an active girl and could coordinate her body parts to create actions.

Phoebe loves to sing. Out of mischief, she'll substitute the lyrics with other words. For example, instead of singing "wo ai ni, ai ze ni, jiu siang lao shu ai da mi..." She'll substitute with "wo ai ni, ai ze ni, jiu siang mommy ai Phoebe..." This shows that she must have understood the song in order to be able to substitute with the correct form of words.

Socially, Phoebe is able to make friends easily. Whenever Phoebe reaches her school, her little friends will gather around her excitedly. She's also quite giving, though sometimes she'll demand but she'll never insist.

The only weakest I can see now is her Mandarin development and pronunciation accuracy. My mum always say that Phoebe's Mandarin sounds like the Malaysians', a little funny in accent. But then again, I'm not so worried about that. She'll have her whole life to learn and fine-tune. I'll just read more Chinese story books to her. Maybe I'll enrol her in some fun Chinese class so that she can enjoy the Chinese songs, poem and rhymes.

My main concern for her is still to enjoy her childhood. I hope that she'll find pleasure in everything that she does.

So, at 3, what can Phoebe do? Many many... and lots more to come! (^_^)b

Mommy or Papa?

Who do you think Reuben and Phoebe resemble? Mommy or papa? In my opinion, both of my kids look more like their papa. Why do I say that they resemble papa more?

Phoebe has

1) a big head

2) nice eyes with big pupils and no squint* (Thank God!)

3) a small mouth

4) rosy and chubby cheeks

5) high forehead and 'kok tao' (slightly protruding forehead)

6) straight hair

Reuben has

1) nice eyes with big pupils and no squint* (Thank God too!)

2) small mouth

3) lots of hair with very closely knitted pores (not sure if they're straight or curly)

4) chubby cheeks

5) same face shape

6) high forehead

Examine the photographs closely. Do you agree with me? :)

* I used to have quite a bad squint on my right eye. It was hereditary. It runs in my dad's family. My dad also had a squint but his was very mild, hardly noticeable. I had to undergo an operation to correct it when I was a young adult. When I was conceiving Phoebe and Reuben, we prayed very hard for no squint in the children's eyes. God is good and He answered our prayers! (^_^)

Don't Want, Don't Want

Reuben likes to shake his head mischievously. Nope, I didn't give him any Esctasy. I'm not sure if he was warding off flies or answering my questions with his head shaking gesture. When I persistently asked him the questions, he'll look upwards, seemingly to say, "Mommy give me a break! Stop asking the same question over and over again!" Haha. He looks so cute doing it, sure worth a kodak moment.

Operation Ng-ng

When Reuben started having porridge in his 7th month, his intestines did not adjust well. He switched from a daily intake of 5-6 feeds of milk to 3 feeds. The other feeds were substituted with porridge for lunch and dinner. Despite the fact that his porridge was pretty balanced with fish and spinach, Reuben suffered from constipation. He was unable to poo for about 3-4 days. My mum said that maybe it would help if we let him sit on a potty. So we took out Phoebe's old potty and let Reuben try. Papa tried to create the conducive mood for poo-ing by humming 'ng'. It was not successful. It was only after giving him 3ml of a gentle laxative that his bowels could move. Soon, his intestines were more adjusted with the diet and Reuben did not have the problem of constipation anymore. Phew.

Papa, the poopoo encourager

Phoebe's 1st Ballet Class

Last Sunday was Phoebe's first ballet class. She was very excited. Parents were allowed to sit in to watch the lesson. During lesson, Phoebe was very attentive and serious. When the teacher, Miss Ivy Ng, said jump, she jumped. When Miss Ng said fly, she flew. When Miss Ng said swim, she swam. I was happy that she could take the instructions very well and participated actively. After the class, she was really tired. She took an almost three-hour nap! Excellent! Heehee (^_~)