A Visit To The Pulau Ubins

We went on a trip to the Pulau Ubins in the early afternoon.....

.... and in the evening, we proceeded to Gong Gong and Po Po's place for a big bowl of 汤圆 as today is the Winter Solstice Festival. :)

X'mas Party 2009

We mummies had an early potluck X'mas party at Auntie Ethel's place today. Each of us brought some food items and we all had a great feast at the party. Auntie Ethel had also prepared an agar agar cake meant as a birthday cake to celebrate Auntie Serena's coming birthday.

The kids had an exchange of X'mas presents and they all looked so pleased holding onto their presents.

Earlier on Heidi had a little accident when she fell over and ended up with a small bump on her head. As expected, she wailed loudly and was cranky for a good half hour. This grouchy girl's mood only got much better during the gift exchanging session.

And finally, our group pic!

Lollipops Creative Fun Dough Holiday Workshop

Salt Dough Recipe

2 tablespoon of flour

1.5 tablespoons of water

1 tablespoon of salt

1 tablespoon of oil

This dough can be air/sun dried for a few days. Alternatively, you can dry it in the oven at 20 deg celsius for 2-3 hrs. When the dough is dry, you can paint it with water colour and varnish.

Jurong Bird Park

Ye Ye and Nai Nai brought me and Heidi to the Jurong Bird Park this afternoon and it was Heidi's first visit to the Bird Park.

It was an enjoyable outing on a rather hot afternoon. Our next family outing with the grandparents? Ye Ye suggested visiting Pulau Ubin next week and Daddy is very likely to join us too! :)

Genting Trip 7th Dec - 9th Dec 2009

Heidi had lots of fun on the many kiddie rides in the indoor and outdoor amusement parks. No pics were taken in the outdoor amusement park cos Mummy was very occupied somewhere else (no prizes for guessing where she was at. :D)

Overall, we were glad our girl had enjoyed the trip very much. A few more pics of us on the last night in the hotel room! :)

Thomas & Friends Live On Stage

We caught the Thomas & Friends Live On Stage show this afternoon at the Singapore Indoor Stadium with the great company of Auntie Angeline, Melanie and Joshua!

A Popiah Gathering

A few of us mummies gathered around at Auntie Shirley's place today for some popiah, pizza and "hong zhao ji".

The popiah filling, pizza and "hong zhao ji" were all specially homemade by Auntie Shirley and they certainly tasted as good as they looked.

I polished off 4 rolls of popiah and a bowl of "hong zhao ji". Thanks to Auntie Serena and Auntie Gina for helping to make the popiah rolls. :D

Happy mummies!

Ian with Heidi playing pillion passenger.

Our kids were also busy playing among themselves with the many toys that Julian and Janelle own. Thanks to Auntie Shirley for the invitation to your place. It was really nice to gather around with the mummies once again. :)

Skating Fun!

When Daddy told us that there is an ice skating session at Velocity and that he has seen young children having fun on the skating rink, we thought it would be a great idea for Heidi to spend the afternoon there.

We needed to spend a minimum of $60 to get a pass for a 30 minute ice skating session and after hurriedly purchasing Pediasure from the Cold Storage and exchanging the receipt for the pass at the information counter, we quickly brought Heidi to the staff to put on the gloves and skate blades so that we could make it to the last skating session of the day at 4.30pm.

A pic with the pretty skater who is from Australia.

Putting on the skate blades and getting ready.

On the skating rink!

Heidi had so much fun on the skating rink. There were even "snowflakes" falling from above. We were glad that she had enjoyed the skating session.

Skating Fun! from Heidi on Vimeo.

And afterwards there was a performance by the professional skaters themselves.

One more pic with the pretty skater after the performance.

We were about to leave Velocity when I caught sight of Elvin Ng, an actor from Mediacorp. :)

Last Day Of School 2009

Today is the last day of school at The Enrichment Classroom. I bought a cake, specially written with the words "Thank You" for Teacher Siti, Teacher Vanessa and Heidi's classmates. For the past 20 months in school, the teachers and classmates have been wonderful with Heidi and I'm sure she will miss them lots.

Looking back my blog on Heidi's first day of school, I can't help feeling again that my girl has learnt and grown so much since. Next year, Heidi will be attending nursery class in another school, the Christian Gospel Mission Kindergarten where she will meet new teachers and classmates. I will have to get ready for her Orientation Day which takes place this Saturday.

We'll see you around, friends!

Meet Koko

I adopted this little cutie from Auntie Angeline whose hamsters had just given birth to a second new brood. She is from the first brood and named Koko by Auntie Angeline after one of the train characters from Chugginton, this little rodent is extremely friendly and gentle.

Heidi was delighted to have a small pet to play with and wasn't afraid at all to hold her. I had to watch and remind her at times to handle Koko very gently to prevent hurting the small animal.

Thanks to Auntie Angeline for Koko and also for driving me around just to get the cage, hamster food and accessories.

Oh, Auntie Angeline may also give us another baby hamster from the second brood when they are old enough to leave their mother so that Koko would have company. I already have a name in mind for the new hamster - Krunch. :D

Holiday Programs

The information for the holiday program from Heidi's playgroup school is finally out.

9 days Paper Plate Craft With Music & Movement - specially designed for independent toddlers 2.5yrs to 4 yrs of age.

During these 9 days, the children will be creating craft work with paper plates. An animal? Decorators? Stationary container? Yes, and top it up with the Music & Movement fun to start off each exciting session. Have fun.

Letter Wall Pouch
Fishes Fishes In The Sea
The Beetle In The Garden
Shakers In The Music Room
My Little Handbag
Flower Mobile
Slithering Snake
Jellyfish In The Ocean
Yellow Duckling

Other programs in line for the holidays -

Lollipops Magic Mixture Creative Fun Dough class organised by the Community Club (Thanks to Auntie Angeline for sharing the information!)

Thomas & Friends Live On Stage "A Circus Comes To Town" in December

A short getaway to Genting, Malaysia (Finally, Daddy is able to squeeeeeeze out a few days from his busy work schedule. Heidi will have fun in the amusement parks, Daddy can enjoy the cool weather while I go have my favourite game of roulette! Now everyone is happy. :D)

Thank God It's Friday!

With nothing much to do on Daddy's off day today, we decided to just bring Heidi for a dip in the pool at Ye Ye's place to spend the afternoon.

Daddy and daughter spent some time in the water while I took the chance to sneak off to Parkway Parade to do some retail therapy. I happily spent 3 good hours of shopping time before heading back with my aching feet to Ye Ye's place to give Heidi her dinner.

And later on, Daddy brought us to this hip and casual dining place called 15 Minutes Cafe to settle our own dinner which is located at the Lasalle College of the Arts. I really like the atmosphere of this cafe which occupies a large space with its vast high ceilings. Makes a pretty good chill-out place too.

We enjoyed our dinner of fish and chips, vongole pasta and margherita pizza. Prices were decently priced too. Next time (I told Daddy we will be back!) I will try their tapas and desserts.

The staff were dressed up in scary outfits and their faces made ghoulish looking for the coming Halloween. Some of the desserts were even made according to the Halloween theme.

After we had our tummies filled, we watched a performance which took place just outside the cafe. Heidi enjoyed watching the dance so much that she refused to leave until the performance was over.

Nursery Rhymes

"Hickory Dickory Dock" from Heidi on Vimeo.

"Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" from Heidi on Vimeo.

"Hey Diddle Diddle" from Heidi on Vimeo.

Yakult Factory Visit

When I received a note from the playgroup school 2 weeks ago that it would be bringing the students to the Yakult factory for their next excursion trip, I signed Heidi and myself up almost immediately. Daddy couldn't join us as he had reservist training.

And this morning, we set off for Yakult factory.

When we reached the entrance of the factory, we saw Yakult in many different bottle packaging sold in other countries.

We were then brought and seated in a room where the lady guide there introduced and explained to us the history, the benefits of taking Yakults etc. From there we learned about Lactobacillus Casei Shirota Strain (named after the founder Dr Minoru Shirota), a bacteria which multiply once every 17 minutes and that there are about 10 billion of such bacteria in just 1 bottle of Yakult. We even got to see these"live" bacteria under a microscope shown through the projection screen.

After the "little lesson" on Yakult, we watched a slide presentation and an animated cartoon show (while sipping bottles of free yakult) :D

We then had a tour around the factory. No photos were allowed so we had to keep our cameras. We got to view the rooms where they grow and cultivate the bacteria. We also saw the manufacturing plant in operation - how they make the bottles by plastic injection moulding and the packing, filling and sealing procedures of Yakult. Heidi was very fascinated as she watched the little bottles moving very fast down a conveyor belt in a row.

After the factory tour, most of us bought Yakult at a cheaper price to bring home. This tour was indeed an enriching and educational one. I'm not sure if the young kids know or understand what was really going on, but we adults definitely have learnt a lot of interesting facts about the good bacteria in our bodies and gained a better understanding of Yakult.

"Go Hazel's House"

Whenever we go visit Po Po, Heidi would always request to go to Hazel's house to play with the many toys that Hazel has.

And whenever Heidi makes these requests (Auntie Adrina would kindly allow Heidi into her house), I would hesitate because I don't call my girl "Hurricane Heidi" for nothing - I am just afraid she would create a big mess at the place!

Today Heidi had fun with Hazel at her place again. She loves to play with the big kitchen set, the drums, the dollhouse and puzzles.

Superband in the making?

Or future chefs?

Thoughtful Auntie Adrina hasn't forgotten Heidi on Children's Day. Thanks again to Auntie Adrina, for the lovely goodie box. :)

Short Hair!

I finally gave in to the hot and humid weather and decided to bring Heidi to have her hair cut short. I told the hairstylist to give her a more "fashionable" hairstyle and he gave her a bob look. She seems happy with her short, sweet and hassle free new look.

"I know I look cute, right?"

Children's Day 2009

Heidi came home today with lots of goodies from her teachers and friends for Children's Day.

And these were what I had baked and prepared yesterday for Heidi's classmates - Rainbow Lollipop Cookies! I hope the kids like them. Happy Children's Day!

Heidi Reads?

"Farm Friends" from Heidi on Vimeo.

"My Bear" from Heidi on Vimeo.

"Guessing Game" from Heidi on Vimeo.

"Ride On" from Heidi on Vimeo.

Heidi's Cosy Corner

Heidi's cosy corner is finally done up!

This girl of mine has a habit of flipping at her books when she wakes up so I placed her bookshelf next to her bed. Am also very pleased to be able to find a daisy flower rug at John Little that matches the decals on the walls.

Thankfully, I have never had problems with getting her to sleep on her own. I just tuck her into bed, give her goodnight kisses, tickle her a bit, say our goodnights and turn off the lights.

Heidi's Henna "Tattoo"

I went for my eyebrow threading session this afternoon with Heidi after her enrichment class.

After I was done, an Indian lady who was doing henna artwork just outside the shop did a small henna tattoo on Heidi just for fun.

All Things Thai

Heidi and I met up with Gong Gong and Po Po this afternoon to visit a Thai bazaar which was set up just outside the Thai Embassy.

Many things from Thailand were sold at the bazaar including handicrafts, apparels, jewellery, accessories, food products, decorative items etc. There were also foodstalls selling all kinds of Thai delicacies. We ordered Thai otahs, beef balls soup and snacks to try and they were very yummy, especially the Thai otahs.

And how could we miss out the hot and spicy tom yum soup?

An Invitation

About a month ago, I received an invitation from a mummy customer from one of my bulk purchases from the Singapore Motherhood Forum to join in their babies' 6 month's bash at a condominium's function room. I was asked to bring along some of the products that I was selling on the forum so that the mummies could buy if they were interested. A few other BP organisers were invited too.

So today after Heidi's phonics class, I whisked her off to Ye Ye and Nai Nai who came to bring her out for an afternoon swim while I went to attend the function by myself.

I thought I would be late but I managed to arrive a while just before their prize presentation started. They had come up with several contests for the babies like the Best Dressed, Best Family Picture and Sweetest Smile and I was given the task of choosing the Best Dressed baby during the event. I even presented the prize to the mummy and the winning baby.

I was quite overwhelmed to see so many babies at the event and I saw some really cute ones too. I mingled around and chatted with the sellers and a few mummies there. It was in all a very fun and enjoyable experience. The whole event was really well organised and set up. Some of the mummies even prepared and surprised with little gifts for the organisers as a token of appreciation for their time and hard work. That was very nice and thoughtful of them I thought. I hope these mummies keep up the good work. The next bash which is their babies' first birthday event would be an even bigger one I guess.

A Leisurely Day

It's Daddy's off day again today.

We went to Tiong Bahru Market and had prawn noodles for lunch. This particular stall that we bought our lunch from had participated in a heartwarming reality program on Channel 8 that helps hawker stall owners that have been failing to make profits from their stalls to bring their food quality, food hygiene and stall presentation to standard. There was a queue and I had to wait a little while for my turn. It was worth joining the queue I thought after tasting the bowl of noodles although Daddy didn't make many comments. The chilli was spicy enough for me and the soup was very flavourful. Nice.

After lunch we went to a cafe at NUS where we had coffee, tea and cake while Heidi enjoyed feeding the koi outside the cafe.

Later on, we went to IKEA to get Heidi a bookshelf. Then we proceeded to Ye Ye, Nai Nai's place where Heidi had her dinner and spent some time with her grandparents while Daddy and I left for East Coast Hawker Centre to have dinner by ourselves. Thereafter, we went back to fetch our girl and it was Home Sweet Home.

Cookie Pops For Teacher's Day 2009

Bought cookie pops for Heidi's teachers this year from a bulk purchase, with Auntie Angeline helping to coordinate the purchase and collection as she was buying them for her kid's teachers too.

The tulip, sunflower and daisies were meant for the teachers, including Teacher Lydia from the Young Phonics Class and the red and yellow cars were for me and Heidi! :D

These cookie pops looked simple enough to make. Had wanted to bake myself for the teachers but I didn't think I had the time. Maybe I can make some mini cookie pops for Heidi's classmates for Children's Day........

Trial At SkyGym

Warming Up

Jumping, bouncing, climbing, hopping, balancing, swinging, attempting handstands and more, Heidi enjoyed her trial at the SkyGym immensely.

A happy but very exhausted Heidi at the end of the trial. :)

A Picture Of Daddy

Heidi is into painting lately and this evening, she decided to do a picture of Daddy.

This picture is the best so far from the lot that she drew. When I asked her who was in the picture, she happily exclaimed "Daddy!"

When Daddy came home from work, she couldn't wait to show him what she had drawn in the evening. Naturally, Daddy broke into smiles when he saw what his princess has painted of him.

Letter "M" And A New Classmate

The Young Phonics class that Heidi attends is actually a new class (the morning session is full) and she has been the only student so far for the past several weeks. But today, she finally has a new classmate, Foong Rui! Heidi is happy to see she has company and even asked me leave the classroom when I brought her in for the class. The mummy of this soft spoken boy is coincidentally one of the mummies who used to join the July thread of the Singapore Motherhood forum too.

And for today's lesson, they went through the letter "M". A catchy tune they learn to sing today -

"Monkey's munchin' mmm mmm mmm,
Monkey's munchin' mmm mmm mmm,
Monkey's munchin mmm mmm mmm,
Mmm is the sound I hear."

Practicing tracing the letter "M"

Twilight Turtle

When last week Auntie Angeline, mummy of Joshua who is one of Heidi's classmates asked me to go up to their new flat one of these days for a visit, I had been racking my brains on what I should get for them as a housewarming gift.

As Auntie Angeline has been sharing with me on how she has been trying to find affordable and good children furniture to decorate the room of her 2 kids, it came across to me that maybe I should just get a little something for her kids. Then I thought of getting her a Twilight Turtle which had been selling well on the bulk purchase forum.

This Magical Turtle Night Light Twilight Turtle projects a complete starry night sky onto the walls and ceiling of any room from within it's plastic shell. It gently transforms nurseries and bedrooms into a starry sanctuary that is supposed to comfort and calm children. As I personally know one of the bulk purchase seller who sells this product and who stays just across my block, I decided to give her a call to ask if I could view the product. She promised to bring over a Twilight Turtle and a Rainbow Light as well to my place for viewing that night.

When she arrived at my place and brought out the Twilight Turtle, she said to my surprise that this would be a gift for Heidi from herself. I explained to her that I had wanted to buy this from her as a gift for a friend but she insisted on giving the Turtle to us. And as there were limited ready stocks, she would bring over another Twilight Turtle next week which I have decided to get for Auntie Angeline. I thanked her for her very nice gesture.

And who was the happiest of us all? Heidi, of course! She was so fascinated with the "stars and moon" projected on the walls and ceiling that she could not stop gazing up with big smiles on her face. I placed the turtle in the room and turned on its lights again this evening and Heidi even went counting the stars. The pictures taken did not do justice to what was actually seen. When the Twilight Turtle switches on in a dark room, the bedroom immediately transforms into a very pretty starry night sky.

Phonics Class

I enrolled Heidi in Young Phonics Class at MMI a few weeks ago.

Heidi will learn through recognizing the letter sounds and then make a connection between a written symbol (a letter of group of letters) and a specific sound through the montessori trained teacher. Besides these, she will also participate in some craft work and simple activities in relation with the letter learnt for the day.

I am happy to see that Heidi enjoys her enrichment class so far and am pleased that she remembers what has been taught. When she gets home, I would go through what Teacher Lydia has taught her for the lesson from the activity file that she brings back and she has been able to tell me the sounds each letter makes and what she has learnt.

Although I can teach her simple phonics myself at home and she does already know her phonics quite well, I believe the enrichment class will further benefit her more.

Drawing Faces

Heidi is into drawing faces recently and these are some of her latest "creations".

When I asked her "Whose face is this?" (bottom picture), she replied "Barney".

Charlene's Birthday Celebration - Bubble Fun!

We attended Charlene's 3rd birthday party today.

The party's theme was the Princess theme and the party favours, balloons and birthday cake were prepared accordingly to the theme. Auntie Priscilla had also engaged a party entertainer who was dressed to the occasion (like a princess!) for some bubble fun!

Heidi with the other kids had loads of fun trying to form big bubbles with their huge wands. This was great "soapy fun" for the kids I guess as they were happily covered with suds from playing with the bubbles.

The Five Princesses?

Then the "hunks" joined in.

Happy Birthday To Charlene!

Thanks once again for extending the invitation to us, Auntie Priscilla! :)

An Unexpected Visit To The Dentist

We left the house together this morning, Daddy to work and me bringing Heidi to school.

Daddy was holding onto Heidi's hand and walking along the pavement when she tripped and fell quite hard to the ground. Needless to say, she started to wail badly. I then started ranting at Daddy cos I couldn't understand how he could have allowed her to trip and fall when he was supposed to be holding on to her hand tightly.

We thought she only had some scratches on her knees and there wasn't any visible bleeding at all, so Daddy went off for work while I and Heidi went on our way to school. On the way there, Heidi continued to fuss and still seemed to be very upset over the incident earlier. When we reached school, she got very teary and refused to let me leave the class. The teachers had a hard time with her and she calmed down only after much soothing and pacifying by the teacher.

After class ended, I went to pick Heidi up and we headed for home. After her shower, when I was drying Heidi up with a towel, I examined her mouth and teeth briefly and I thought I spotted one of her two front teeth appearing to protrude out. I got frightened by the thought that her front tooth could have been injured by the fall earlier on in the morning and I immediately sms-ed Daddy who was still at work. Daddy then took the rest of the afternoon off from work and came back home. After Heidi's brief nap, Ye Ye came over to bring us all to the dentist to run a check on Heidi.

At the dentist's, Heidi was very cooperative even though this was her first time visiting a dentist. It definitely helped when I kept telling her to let the "doctor" check her teeth. She even helped to hold onto the mirror when asked to. The dentist checked her two front teeth and told us that indeed one of the front tooth appeared to have been pushed and jutted out which was likely to have been caused by the fall.

An X-ray was an option to see if there were any fractures or internal injury but from her check, the injury wasn't that bad. So we were told just to monitor her tooth. If there were any swells or signs of infection, we would have to bring her back to the dentist. We were also reminded to brush her teeth daily and to bring her to the dentist every 6 months for a routine dental checkup.

Heidi was happy to receive some Lightning Mcqueen stickers from the dentist. We are all happy and very relieved too to know that our dear gal is just fine for at least now.

Haircut

Brought Heidi out to run errands this evening and after some snacks at Macdonalds, I decided to try bringing her to a nearby salon to have her hair trimmed.

Heidi has always refused to step into a hair salon. Her last haircut with a hairdresser (Po Po and myself brought her to a hair salon) was about and a half years ago and it was almost a traumatic experience for her. She was probably frightened by the sound of hairdryers and the sight of a stranger wielding a pair of scissors and trying to get near enough to cut her hair. She got real upset and fussed big time. Since then, I always had difficulties trying to get her to the hair salon to get a proper haircut.

When we were walking to the salon, I told her repeatedly that she would be going to have her hair cut by an Auntie. She went " no, no" several times, but when we reached the salon, she readily stepped in. I cued the hairdresser and she quickly brought out a booster seat to place on the chair for Heidi to sit on. And there were some candy to distract her too. The hairdresser did manage to trim her hair even though she squirmed a little but after some time Heidi started to fuss and the hairdresser had to speed up her job.

Although it was just a short trim (as I still want to tie her hair up with pretty accessories), her hair especially her fringe definitely looks much neater now. At least this was a proper haircut by a professional hairdresser, not by myself who always end up cutting her fringe crooked.

A Seafood Treat At Sing's Kitchen

We arranged and met up with Auntie Serene and Uncle Ben for dinner this evening. They had proposed dinner at a newly opened seafood restaurant that is situated near Lavender Street.

We were embarrassingly late as we had to settle our Princess Heidi's dinner at home before rushing from our home to Kempas Road. Auntie Serene and Uncle Ben had already placed orders prior to our arrival so food arrived very soon when we finally reached the restaurant.

The dishes that were ordered include crispy squids, pumpkin prawns, braised beancurd and not forgetting their specialty - crabs! We tried both the butter crabs and chilli crabs and they were sooooo good!!! I especially love the butter crumbs and definitely enjoyed slurping the flavourful chilli crab sauce. The crabs were fresh and fleshy and I took my time to devour a big crab claw. Even fussy Daddy gave thumbs up on the crab dishes.

With good food and good company, I heartily downed 2 bowls of rice. Was very glad to be able to catch up with our friends and this evening certainly helped to cheer up my otherwise bad day. Thanks again Uncle Ben and Auntie Serene for the wonderful treat. It will be our treat to you guys the next round. :)

Puzzles

I opened up this new box of puzzles for Heidi this evening. There is a total of 20 Play and Spell puzzles. She got the hang of it after a few tries and began to enjoy piecing them together.

"HOUSE" from Heidi on Vimeo.

"TOMATO" from Heidi on Vimeo.

"LION" from Heidi on Vimeo.

"TIGER" from Heidi on Vimeo.

Audric's Birthday Celebration!

This morning, we attended Audric's 3rd birthday celebration at Toa Payoh Safra. Daddy came along with us too but had to leave halfway through the party for work.

Heidi and all the other kids had a ball of their time at the big playmaze especially at the ball pool.

When it was time to go back to the party room at the upper level for cake cutting, Heidi simply refused to budge and insisted on staying at the playmaze. With Daddy gone for work, I had to drag and carry Heidi back to the party room with her bawling and struggling to break free from my arms. She only calmed down a little after the cake cutting session and later with Auntie Elin helping to carry her around to soothe her, she finally stopped her bad behaviour. Looks like Daddy and I have a lot more disciplining to do with this little young lady.

Heidi with smiley Ian.

Auntie Elin with grouchy Heidi.

Did not manage to take pictures of the birthday boy and more pictures at the playmaze cos we were busy eating away at the party earlier and Daddy couldn't capture good angles at the playmaze as adults were not allowed inside for long.

Nevertheless, we wish Audric a super duper happy 3rd birthday!!

9 Things Women Says....

"Reference materials" for the MEN... :P

1. Fine:This is the word women use to end an argument when they are right and you need to shut up.

2. Five Minutes:If she is getting dressed, this means a half an hour. Five minutes is only five minutes if you have just been given five more minutes to watch the game before helping around the house.

3. Nothing:This is the calm before the storm. This means something, and you should be on your toes. Arguments that begin with Nothing usually end with Fine.

4. Go Ahead:This is a dare, not permission. Do not do It!

5. Loud Sigh:This is not actually a word, but is a non-verbal statement often misunderstood by men. A loud sigh means she thinks you are an idiot and wonders why she is wasting her time standing here and arguing with you about nothing. (Refer back to #3 for the meaning of Nothing.)

6. That’s Okay:This is one of the most dangerous statements a woman can make to a man. That is okay means she wants to think long and hard before deciding how and when you will pay for your mistake.

7. Thanks:A woman is thanking you, do not question or faint. Just say: “You are welcome.”

8. Whatever:Is women’s way of saying …

9. Don’t Worry About It, I Got It:Another dangerous statement, meaning this is something that a woman has told a man to do several times, but is now doing it herself. This will later result in a man asking “What is wrong?” For the woman’s response refer to #3.

Heidi Turns 3! (celebration part 2 & 3)

Today is my baby's actual birthday!! She had another small birthday celebration with her teachers and classmates this morning.

I ordered this jelly agar agar cake from Mrs Chan only 2 days ago on Saturday and luckily she was accommodative enough to squeeze in my order at such short notice. Before I confirm on the design, I got Heidi to go through the catalogue of the many designs of the jelly agar agar cakes and asked her to choose the design she would like.

There are designs of Barney, Mickey and Minnie Mouse, Elmo, Lightning Mcqueen and a few other car designs. There is even a 3D cruiser which I thought Heidi would like. I asked her to quickly to choose a design and she pointed at different pictures on the laptop screen and went "this one, this one." I asked her if she wanted Barney and she said "dowan." I pointed to the 3D cruiser several times and again she went "dowan". This went on for several minutes until I finally settled on Lightning Mcqueen when I noticed that she pointed at the car design several times. She has always loved to watch the cartoon movie "Cars" and Lightning Mcqueen has also been her favourite cartoon character. Besides, this jelly cake would complement the miniature Lightning Mcqueen toy cars which I had bought from my HongKong trip as one of the items of the goodie bags each for her classmates.

Besides the toy cars, I also packed in other goodies like candies, stickers and sticker books.

And in the evening, we met Auntie Wendy and Audric for dinner at Swenson's where we had a complimentary birthday Firehouse ice cream for the birthday girl. And Heidi had fun trying to blow out the candles again.

Happy Happy Birthday, Baby! :D

Venice's Birthday Celebration at Macdonald's

Venice and Heidi share the same birthday on 29th June, and today Venice celebrated her 3rd birthday at King Albert Park Macdonald's.

This is my very first time attending a kid's birthday party at Macdonald's and Heidi's too. I guess she was happy to see some of her friends at the party again and during mealtime, she polished off all the 4 pieces of chicken nuggets and some fries.

Although this was a simple birthday party with simple games coordinated by the staff for the kids, Venice the birthday girl seemed to enjoy the games so much that I could constantly hear her loud chuckling and laughter at the party. Happy Birthday, Venice!

Heidi Turns 3! (celebration part 1)

Heidi had her 3rd year birthday celebration at Fidgets this morning.

Heidi wore a dress bought by myself during our trip to HongKong with a matching hairclip which I bought sometime back and which coincidentally went very well with the design of the dress. She seemed to understand that this party was meant for her as I had been telling her about this celebration for the past few days and this morning she was all smiles and getting all excited when we left our house for Fidgets.

Ye Ye, Nai Nai and Uncle Dan came to attend the party as well and it was also thanks to Uncle Dan who managed to take some nice, good shots of the party. As over 1000 photos were taken, I have to wait for Uncle Dan to give me a soft copy before I select and download the pics into a slideshow for the blog. Meanwhile I makedo-ed with these pictures (mainly of Heidi) which Uncle Dan kindly emailed me last night.

A total of 16 kids were invited with a few of Heidi's ex-classmates and a current classmate. The kids had their fun of freeplay time in the playground area before they were asked to the party room for some party fun, cake-cutting and meal time.

As I felt the kids may be too young to participate in their party games, we just settled for disco dancing and some bubble fun. I was also pleasantly surprised to see Heidi swaying and moving her body to the music. After that, it was cake-cutting time.

This year, I got Heidi's 3rd birthday cake from Awfully Chocolate. No fancy decorations or colourful figurines. Just a simple piped out fairy princess picture (with a number 3 on her magic wand) on a 12.5 inch, very chocolatey cake. I was quite pleased by their service to me and the quality standards Awfully Chocolate set on their cakes which was why I had no regrets getting a bigger cake even though I knew there will be definitely be leftovers after the party. We all sang the birthday song twice and Daddy helped to blow out the 3 candles. Kids' meals were then served and besides the cake, they also had ice cream for dessert.

After which, all the kids then went back to enjoy the big indoor playground while some adjourned to the toddler areas on another side where there are ride-on cars and lower playslides. As they were entitled to unlimited freeplay for the rest of the day, some guests still stayed on even after we left.

These are the party favours which I gave out to the 16 little guests. I bought the cartoon water bottles and stuffed them with candies, gummies, M&Ms, stickers and mini coloured markers. I had wanted to personalize each bottle with their names or hang a little thank you note but there wasn't enough time to source. Put a smile on my face when a few mummies came up to me and said that they liked the idea of these party favours. :)

A big thank you to all who have attended the party and also for your lovely presents. Heidi had enjoyed herself tremendously and we could all see she was one very happy birthday girl at her party today. This may not be the most perfect party but when we see our little ones having fun and enjoying themselves, I guess that's important and all that really matters. :)

My Family!

Make your Stick Figure Family at FreeFlashToys.com

Pooh And Hello Kitty

I baked these butter cookies today with my newly bought cookie cutters from a bulk purchase.

I was thrilled when these cookies came out pretty well and cute. Heidi saw the cookies when they were freshly brought out from the oven and went " I want eat Hello Kitty." And I thought these cookies didn't taste too bad either when Heidi gobbled down a few pieces one after another.

End Of Holiday Program

Today is the last day of the June Holiday program and Heidi came home with these crafts.

As the theme of the holiday program is story fun of The 3 Little Pigs and Goldilocks and The 3 Bears, the children had fun making and dramatizing with the pig headgear and bear mask, moulding clay Teddy and as well as some craft on straw, sticks and bricks.

They got to watch a mini cartoon movie on The 3 Little Pigs too! Heidi was screaming and refused to go on watching when the evil big bad wolf appeared while her classmate Joshua hid behind a table and chairs.

A Mini Photo Shoot Session At School

Last week, Heidi's teachers informed me that their playgroup, The Enrichment Classroom will be opening it's new branch soon (which I knew later that it will be in Jurong West) and that they would need to take pictures of a few students to use as their promotional tools and also in their website. And Heidi was one of the 3 students selected for their mini photo shoot! This shoot session would involve the mummies as well, and the shoot took place after their holiday program class today.

Photos were taken of the children participating in the music and movement, practising of alphabet writing and playing word and number games on the interactive computer touchboard, playing with blocks and solving simple wooden puzzles as well as hand paint printing. We all thoroughly enjoyed the session and Heidi including her other 2 classmates were each given a box of modeling clay as a token.

Teacher Roz kindly emailed me these pics for "preview" when I told her I wanted them for Heidi's blog. :)

In The Pool With The Grandparents

Ye Ye and Nai Nai brought their dearest granddaughter to their pool downstairs for a swim this afternoon and Heidi had an enjoyable day of good bonding time with her grandparents.

Ready for a dip!

Going into the water slowly.

Warming up.

Kick, kick your legs!

Hey, I'm floating on my own!

Now I'm left only with my arm floatbands. This is fun, fun, fun!!!

Fidgets and Daddy's Advanced Birthday Treat

It's Daddy's off day again today and with no where in mind to go, I suggested we bring Heidi to Fidgets at Turf City.

Fidgets is a large indoor soft play structure for children from 0-10 years, with dedicated baby and toddler play areas and I knew right from the start Heidi would enjoy this place. It was also in a spur of the moment that I decided to hold Heidi's coming birthday party here at this place after checking out the party packages. Daddy did not have much objections, much to my surprise as he has always prefer small family celebrations. After settling the party's deposit and initial details, I was starting to get excited at the thought of sourcing for Heidi's birthday cake and party favours.

After several hours of fun at Fidget (Heidi still refused to leave and we had to try all means of cajoling her before we managed to leave the place), we left for Ye Ye's place where I fed her dinner then left her with her grandparents while me and Daddy went out to have our dinner.

As Daddy's birthday falls next Tuesday, I decided to give him a birthday dinner treat today as he has to work on the Tuesday. Daddy chose to have pizzas and pastas at Pasta Fresca, so there we were enjoying our capellini and spaghetti dish and chomping on magherita pizzas.

Hazel turns 2!

Auntie Adrina was very sweet to invite us to Hazel's advanced birthday party celebration today. (Thanks again to Auntie Adrina for extending the invitation to us!)

Heidi had a great time at the party. She enjoyed playing at the kitchen set and checking out all the other toys in the house. When it was time to sing the birthday song, Heidi was happily clapping her hands away.

Check out the lovely birthday cakes! Another little girl was celebrating her birthday together with Hazel, thus the 2 birthday cakes. The cakes were yummy, even Heidi had some too.

Happy Birthday, Hazel!

Oh, we would like to say our thanks to Auntie Adrina again for getting Heidi this little chair! Now she sits on this chair to read her storybooks, play with her toys as well as watch her favourite DVDs and TV programs. :)

June Holiday Programme 2009

Have just signed Heidi up for the June Holiday Programme at her playgroup school.

The kids will enjoy experiences in art, music and drama in this 8 day holiday programme, allowing them to be expressive, creative and imaginative. There will be story fun with Goldilocks & The 3 Bears and The 3 Little Pigs (Heidi's favourite!). Activities include story telling, mask and head gear making, dramatization with bear games and sensorial fun, modeling clay fun with Teddy and big house building in class.

There will also be the usual music and movement, song and rhyme time. Beargy and Piggy snacks and tasteful "Goldilocks Oat-Porridge" will be served, and the kids will also get to learn mathematical concepts on small, medium and large and enjoy sensorial fun on straws, sticks and bricks.

The programme looks interesting enough to me and I'm sure Heidi will enjoy her June Holiday programme with her classmates. Oh, in view of the recent outbreak of the influenza A virus, the term trip has been cancelled for the benefit of the children and adults. Duh. I think I was more disappointed than the kids when I got the news.

Daddy's Day Off

Today is Daddy's day off and he suggested going to Cathay Building to have pasta lunch at Indulge! Restaurant since it has been some time since we've last been there.

We ordered set lunches; I had sirloin beef while Daddy ordered white clams linguine. Heidi had her lunch earlier on at home before we came out but she still took some spoonfuls of rice. We then ordered another pasta with dory fish cos Daddy felt the portion of his lunch set wasn't quite enough. This was a good pasta dish and we enjoyed the pan fried fish very much.

Heidi got bored soon after. Luckily Daddy brought his laptop along while I had also brought out from home some dvds/vcds. Heidi is into Word World now. I bought her a dvd some time ago to see if she would be interested before I invest into a few others and she loves it and has been watching it everyday since. From this dvd, she learns words like bear, sheep, box, barn, house, bridge etc, just to name some.

After lunch, Heidi went to gaze at some fishes in a pool outside the restaurant. As there was still some time before her naptime, we decided to make a trip down to Qian Hu Fish Farm to see more fishes!

Thereafter we went home for Heidi's naptime while Daddy went back to work for a short while. Later in the night, Daddy came back and brought us out for supper at Lavender Street Hawker Centre. Daddy had pig organ's soup while I had poh piah and cold dessert. Daddy ordered this special egg, cheese and pork floss pancake too. Something different from the usual pancakes and it was tasty!

Ok. I will start dieting. Tomorrow.

Mother's Day!

Heidi brought home this little potpourri ornament for Mother's Day from class.

Daddy brought me for an advanced Mother's Day celebration dim sum lunch yesterday at Turf City. After lunch, we spent a leisurely afternoon watching Heidi have fun at a sheltered playground while we slurped and shared a bowl of icy cold sweet dessert which tasted especially refreshing in the warm and humid weather.