Miss Clumsy's Little Accidents

I was mopping the floor and Clement was surfing the net for his Christmas present (a GPS is the perfect Xmas present for Clement because he cannot remember routes and I cannot read maps at all).

Then we heard a loud "plop" and then Jaimie's cry. We rushed over to see what happened and we saw Jaimie lying on the floor face down. Apparently she was getting down from our bed but she missed a step on the little stool which we put beside the bed. Her lips were bleeding quite badly but after the bleeding has stopped, we were relieved to see that it wasn't a very deep cut.

Just when she had stopped crying and playing on her own again, and when Clement was still reading up on the GPS while I was visiting the BayB Supplies Forum, we heard another loud "plop" and Jaimie's cry again.

"Oh no!" I rushed over to see what happed and what I saw made me bursted out laughing. Jaimie fell into her toy basket! I had no idea what she was trying to do and how did she fall into such an awkard position. In her tears and cries, she asked me to help her out of the basket but I ran to reach for my camera first. How can I not capture a Kodak moment like this?

Activity Sticker Books for Jaimie

My best friend, HappyPig, gave Jaimie this Kumon activity book quite some time back. I only did the activities with Jaimie a few days ago.

This was quite a good activity book because the activities were very structured. However, only about 1/4 of the book used stickers. For the rest of the activities, it was suggested that the parent cut out the shapes and let the child uses glue to stick them on. It was 脱裤放屁to me. It was also something I did not enjoy doing. I hated craft work. After doing a few more cut and paste, I decided to keep the book until Jaimie can use scissors and glue on her own.

When I spoke with HappyPig about the usage of scissors today, she mentioned that it was a good training for fine motor skills and good training of the little muscles on the hand. I told her I was more concerned about Jaimie hurting herself (I know there are paper scissors which only cut paper and nothing else) and my curtains. When is it a good time to let the little one start handling scissors? I will need to find out more information.

Before I am able to gather more information, I will stick with sticker books. I borrowed HappyPig's Popular discount card and bought most of the activity sticker books on the shelves suitable for young children like Jaimie. The prices of the books vary from $3.90- $12. I spent $88+ on this stash. Jaimie and I completed one book ($5.90!) within half an hour this evening. It is quite expensive if we view it in dollars and cents but it is worth the money because Jaimie was having so much fun sticking on the stickers on the relevant boxes. Anyhow,the time spent doing the activities with her is better than leaving her to watch television on her own while I do my own stuff.

A Day Of Fauna and Flora

We just wanted to bring Jaimie to the Choa Chu Kang Park playground in the morning but when we were along KJE, it started to rain. Clement made a turn into Old Choa Chu Kang Road and we went to the Farm Mart. Unfortunately, the farm mart only opens at 10am. Since we were an hour early, we decided to drive further down to QianHu Fish farm instead. Jaimie was making a fuss about not being able to feed the animals in the Farm Mart. She was appeased only after we bought her some fish food to feed the terrapins and the koi in QianHu.



Since we were already in the rural area of Singapore, we drove further down to Hay Dairies so that the princess can get to feed the goats.
The weather looked good when we left Hay Dairies so we drove to our original destination, Choa Chu Kang Park. Jaimie had fun in the playground.

In the evening, we met YS and Seraphine and went to Henderson Waves together. These are some ways to bring your little ones to walk the bridge:

(1) Hold hands.
(2) Piggy back.
(3) Carry by the arm.
(4) Carry on the shoulder.
(5) ...

It's a very tiring day for all of us!!

朋友

I showed Jae this video clip of RR singing Emil Chou's "朋友" just before her bedtime a while ago. She went all giggly when she recognised her real-life 朋友 whom she recently went on a cycling trip with appearing on Youtube.



Perhaps she has had one giggle too many. Now mommy is having a hard time cajoling the little one to sleep. Oh-oh.....

My Art Portfolio

My teacher gave me a file to bring home to my mommy and papa. It has all the artwork and worksheets I did in school for the past 5 mths from May-Sept.
My teacher even recorded my weight and height and kept it in the file. Currently I am standing at 86cm and weigh 12kg.

Here's some of my worksheets compiled into a book. I learn Math, English and Chinese in school.

I do not quite believe in boundaries. I love to explore what is beyond and I express my thoughts through colouring.

However, with supervision and help from my teachers, I am not allowed to express my thoughts freely but to conform to the normal way of colouring.Mommy and papa were very proud and happy to see the craft work I had done in school. They had seen Rain mei-mei, Cherrlyn mei-mei, Vincent gor-gor, Nikita jie-jie and many of my friends' craftwork. Finally, I have something to showcase my talent too. Well, obviously, it is not possible if not for the help of my teachers.

Mommy and papa are going to get a big file to keep my masterpieces.

Oh... mommy and papa were tasked by my teachers to wrap my paper file with plastic sheet and decorate it too. As mom's artistic talent is non existent, this will be done by papa.

Hot Wheels @ East Coast on Children's Day

It was Children's Day. I asked Wolfgirl what was her plans on this day and she told me she's going to bring RR for cycling at East Coast Park in the morning. I thought it sounded really good as I had never brought Jaimie for cycling before. So we met up at ECP MacD @9am to bring the children for the bicycle rides. The weather was cool and breezy. A perfect day for outdoor activities!

Wolfgirl took a bicycle with the child seat the at back. I took the one with the child seat in front. It was easier for the cyclist to have the child at the back but I thought it was more fun for Jae to sit in front so I took up the challenge. It was indeed a big challenge because I had to spread my knees on either sides of the child seat when I cycle because the child seat was in the way. Jaimie's hair brushed against my face and it was so ticklish. Hmmm... time to cut her hair? Ok ok... i am just kidding. Relax.

Clement joined us in another bicycle.


I enjoyed the ride with Jaimie very much. It was another personal bonding time with her on the bicycle. I talked to her about the things that was happening in the park (couldn't use my hand to point as I needed both to balance the bicycle, lah), brought her attention to the aeroplanes which flew across the sky, sang songs, told her about traffic rules, let her ring the bicycle bell etc. When I was tired and going slow, or when I was cycling upslope, Jaimie actually said “妈妈，加油加油！”to encourage me!

We took a short break after an hour. Jaimie and RR were so friendly to each other! I love these shots!




We took another break where the sandcastle was (near the hawker centre) on the journey back. Jaimie had her first taste of sugarcane juice. She loved it.

When we returned the bicycle at the kiosk, the attendant asked Jaimie "Are you tired?" I rolled my eyes at him. Harlow, boy! I was the one cycling for 2 hours with this child. You asked HER if she was tired? I was the one who was TIRED, ok?

We headed for lunch at JK Don. The food was average but the company was great. I mean Wolfgirl and RR. And thank you Auntie Angela for the lunch treat and the Children's Day present! So nice of you!
After lunch, Jaimie said she wanted to ride the bicycle again. She said she liked it a lot and wanted me to bring her for cycling again. We'll definitely come again, dear. BUT MOMMY'S LEGS WERE GOING TO GIVE WAY AFTER 2HOURS OF CYCLING TODAY.

The attendant was right. Jaimie was tired.

Hello Again, Kitty

The "Lantern Fantasy 2008" exhibition was held at the Chinese Gardens for an entire month from 28 Aug 08 till 28 Sep 08. It literally spanned across both the Olympics and the Formula 1 events. That was why they cleverly put up lantern displays featuring the various Olympic sports, and also Hello Kitty and her many adorable friends in multicoloured F1 racers.

On each of the Saturdays (and also the first and final Fridays) during this period, there were even fireworks displays. These were actually really small-scale affairs and frankly speaking quite pathetic (especially since it wasn't too long ago that we have been wowed by the spectacle that was the Beijing Olympics opening). Nevertheless, every Saturday, Jaimie would still be thrilled whenever I bring her to the bedroom window at 8:30pm, to gaze across Jurong Lake at the mini pyrotechnics flashing and popping in the darkened skies. At the end of each session, Jae would, without fail, ask that we bring her to see Hello Kitty again.

"要看Hello Kitty! Please..."
"喏。Hello Kitty就在那里啰。"
"要进去！"
"爸爸妈妈不是已经带你进去去看过了吗？"
"要再去看！Please..."
"Ok, ok....如果你乖乖的话，爸爸妈妈就带你去。好吗？"
"好！"

So, when I realised that yesterday was the final day of the lantern exhibition, and that tickets would be sold at half price (!!), I decided to make good of the promises I have made. Nick came by in the afternoon for some jamming (he brought along the PS3 "Rock Band" game, with guitar and mic!), and decided to also come along since his boy Ayden has never visited the Chinese Gardens.

The photos turned out fairly nicely. I attribute this to the lens upgrade I'd gotten recently, when I found that my EFS 18-35mm kit lens had signs of fungal growth - no doubt due to my extended procrastination over the purchase of a proper dry cabinet for my camera equipment. The lens I bought is a second-hand EF 28-135mm lens. This is an ultrasonic lens. with image stabilisation feature. I find that it is working pretty well, delivering faster focus and sharper pics than my previous kit lens. Of course, immediately after procuring the new lens, I also went ahead to get that long overdue dry cabinet to make sure history would not repeat itself.

Alright, enough of talk.