Nadine - Lost 1 front teeth

Nadine lost one of her front teeth last week. She's a bit conscious of it, so we keep telling her that she looks really cute "bo-gay". Now she seems ok with it.

She's losing teeth really fast and early. But they seem to be growing back pretty fast too.

Sibling conversation

The kids had this conversation in the car this morning, on the way to church:

Nadine: Aaron, when you're 4, you will go to Children Church

Aaron: Where's Children Church?

Nadine: It's where I go every Sunday. You send me there!

Aaron: Why do you go to Children Church?

Nadine: To worship God

Silence, and end of conversation, and I'm so pleased!

Semester 1 results for 2014

Aaron's Sem 1 report for his very first year in school

And Nadine's Term 2 report for K1

Story-telling by the kids

We had story time last Friday night. But instead of me reading stories to them, I decided to make them tell me stories!

Aaron's story is a typical boy story, with cars, trucks, good guy and bad guy. We think it's quite an achievement for a boy his age to be able to tell a coherent story like that! So proud of him!

Nadine's story was more drama. She was waving the little blanket at the start, and I'd wanted her to stop doing that coz I thought it was distracting. Then she told me the blanket's the "waves". And she began to tell her story. I thought it was going to be something that she'd make up. Was surprised that she was trying to tell her story of Jonah! Or what she could remember of it!

I've never told her the story of Jonah. So she must have learnt it in Children's Church. Well done to Children's Church for teaching her well, even though she didn't remember the key lesson that Jonah learnt. But that's enough for now.

Nadine's drawing of the family room

Nadine's 2D "panoramic" drawing of our family room.

I'm actually quite amazed that she managed to capture so many different aspects of the family room!

Aaron at play

In 2 more months, Aaron will turn 3.

He is extremely imaginative and creative, and a lot of fun to watch when he's at play. He'll make up all kinds of funny scenarios, and use different things as props, and when his toy cars are "talking" to each other, his voices them differently too! Too bad I haven't been able to video him in action.

Like his big sister, he is also a very confident little kid. Yesterday, at Toys R Us, he actually went up to a little girl who was playing a showcase tablet, and said to her, "afterwards can I have my turn?"  8-0

Fun at the beach

We brought the kids to the beach on Vesak Day. This is actually the very first time that we'd ever brought the kids to a beach in Singapore! And they thoroughly enjoyed it, even though it was a very hot day.

Initially, they were both very cautious, and didn't dare to walk near the water. They just played with the sand looked at the sea from afar.

But slowly, they became braver, and started to test the waters.

And they eventually went on to roll around in the sand and seawater, totally enjoying themselves!

What a wonderfully fun and cheap way to entertain the kids!

LSK Sports Day 2014

Nadine participated in her school Sports Day yesterday.

I love the creativity and purposefulness of LSK teachers. There is a lesson to be learnt in all the activities that they plan, including Sports Day.

This year, the theme is "Love Never Fails". All children are paired up, and are taught to help each other to succeed in their tasks. The aim of their games is not to win, but to accomplish the tasks, and help each other to become better at those tasks. What a wonderful lesson!

Here's Nadine's class item: they have to "cross the river", making sure that they don't drop in and get bitten by the crocodiles; save a bunny, hop on the hop-scotch and count to 10 while balancing on 1 leg; feed the hippo; hug each other to bring a balloon to another basket; and finally take a photo.

Could see that Nadine was absolutely confident and had no "stage-fright" at all. In fact, she couldn't seem to stop moving!

Here's their final parade, at the end of all the class activities.

The principal kept reminding the parents that the children are at different levels of development and capabilities. What's most important, is to celebrate every level of success they achieve.

We certainly celebrate and thank God for Nadine's confidence and excellent motor skills!

Cool de Sac

We tried a new indoor playground today - Cool de Sac, at Suntec City.

It has a tree house for climbing; a play area with slides, tunnels and balls; an area for art and craft; a lego bricks section; a dress up and photo-taking area; and even a "backstage" area for face-painting. What's best - it has a restaurant that serves a decent variety of food and drinks!

Daddy built such nice and complicated airplanes that other kids kept eyeing Aaron's airplanes, and one even asked Daddy to help him build one. When Daddy didn't oblige, the boy complained that Daddy's rude!

Nadine got her first face painting, and was totally pleased with it.

Another great thing about this place - they have many staff walking around, tidying the place, making sure that the kids are ok, and picking up lost kids.

At registration, each child and accompany parents are tagged, and they take the parent's mobile number, so that they can contact the parent if the child is lost and found. Which is what happened to Aaron. And when I went to pick him up, he was happily licking a lollipop which the staff had given him.

That's Aaron, licking his lollipop, not his thumb.

The place even has a mascot!

Cool de Sac is now definitely our favourite indoor playground. There's a lot of fun for both parents and kids, and is also a place that parents can leave the kids to run around while sitting down for a good meal! And after the kids are tired out, they can have some yummy food too!

For what they offer, we'd actually consider them cheap. Kids under 3 pay $13 and 3-12 pay $26, for weekends and public holidays. But it's unlimited play! And we got 15% discount for using Amex card. 2 accompanying parents are allowed in for free. Plus, it's open from 8.30am to 10pm!

The kids were totally in love with the place. And actually, so were we! We'll definitely be back!

Universal Studios Singapore

This is the make-up trip to USS.

First thing that caught the kids' eyes - the huge minion statue.

Being a Monday, the park was not extremely crowded. But there was still a crowd, lots of tourists.

What caught Daddy's eyes - the pretty drum set. 

With both kids still so young, we didn't try any "scary" rides. In fact, we did only rides with maximum waiting time of 5 minutes. The most adrenaline-pumping ride we did was the "Accelerator" which reminded Nadine of the Mad Tea Party ride in Disneyland.

The last time we came, Nadine refused to do the Pteranodon ride. This time, she still needed a bit of convincing before she got on the ride. But once she did so, she totally enjoyed herself.

Here's the ultimate coincidence - we bumped into Mummy's colleague from the Philippines, who is on holiday in Singapore with her family!

Outside the Lost World, was this very realistic velociraptor. Nadine was too scared to take photos with it, but gamely took photos of us with the roaring dinosaur. Aaron held on to Daddy very tightly!

After being out in the hot sun for a while, we went to watch the Shrek 4-D show, to rest our feet and get some air-con comfort!

Then we proceeded to Madagascar. Aaron wanted to do the boat ride, but Nadine kept saying that she did not enjoy it the last time. She could remember that there were some parts that were dark and spooky, and we got a little wet. I was amazed that she could remember all that!

So after the carousel ride, she cleverly said, "ok, we've done the Madagascar ride. We don't need to go on the boat ride already." But no, we went on the boat ride anyway. Had to teach her that it cannot always be what she wants. She has to sometimes give in to others.

And we made sure that we sometimes go with her wishes too. So after the boat ride, Daddy brought Aaron to do the Treasures Hunters ride - another ride that Nadine didn't want to do, coz again, she remembered from her last experience that she was scared by the snakes. I couldn't remember anything.

While she can be whiny and stubborn at times, she can also be very "guai", especially when she's given instructions beforehand.

I'd told her and Aaron at the beginning of the day that they both can buy only 1 item from the park, at the end of the day, before we leave. She didn't bug me to buy anything throughout the day. And when we were at the shops, she did not argue with me about the things that I refused to buy for her - cookies that were too expensive, bracelets that were meant for adults, and coffee mugs that were not suitable for children. Daddy's theory - because we always explain to her our reasons for saying no, and because she's not deprived. Love it when she's so obedient!

Aaron was very "guai" too. The Treasure Hunt ride had a waiting time of 45 mins. Of course Daddy was not going to queue for it in the hot sun. All the more because Aaron was really tired, and was going to doze off anytime. Daddy told him that the wait would be too long, and said we'll come back another time. And Aaron just said "ok" to Daddy. No whining. 

USS is really a very small park, and having been here twice within 7 months, I don't think we'll come back anytime soon. But hopefully when we next come back, the kids will be old enough to go on more exciting rides!