大年初二 at the waterfront

First day of the CNY, my mum was grumbling about not having any activities the next day. Since we were also free, I suggested we go out for some fun, away from crowds and noise, to breathe some fresh air!

Ever since we've brought my mum to the Woodlands waterfront, she's been exploring the place. She's very excited about finding a route from her place (at Marsiling) to the waterfront. It would take an adult 30 minutes of walking, one way. She was also very excited about crabs! She said she always see people having good crab catches there and suggested we buy nets and go try catch ourselves some crabs one day. Love the idea!

Hubby and I love a scenic walk! And we really needed to burn off some fats from all the binging. So we were very enthusiastic about walking there, each pushing a stroller with one kid. Of course we weren't going to make the kids walk! Will never reach there!

True enough, the walk was fabulous! Maybe it's because it's CNY, it's so quiet. Being very close to our neighboring country (right next to the causeway) also gave the whole place a rustic 'backyard' feel. We walked past the old deserted checkpoint. Gosh, it looked like the perfect setting for a horror flick. Think 28 Days Later or the latest drama series The Walking Dead. By the way, I love such horror flicks. Ha.

I kept imagining zombies coming out from the empty and eerily quiet corners of the building, with that signature stagger. Should have taken a picture.

We reached the place at 10am. And woah, we saw a lot of crabs!

This is just part of their catch. Further down, one family was having a mini bbq (just a wire rack over some fire) with sausages, balls and the big bucket of crabs they caught. *salivates*

It was super windy. Good for us but the wind made the already sneezy Mandy start to have a runny nose. Uh oh.

The kids complained of hunger they sat on a bench and ate their favorite inari sushi that I made the morning. You know, I'm very proud of this although it didn't take that much effort. Inari is one of their favorite food. And I know going out as a family and eating their favorite food out of their very own lunchboxes, is something like a dream come true for Mandy. She often talked about this 'dream' of hers. I'm glad it's finally being fulfilled.

Yes, kids have simple dreams. It just take a little effort and time for us to make them happy. They actually don't need big and expensive presents. At least that's how I feel. :)

Would you look at Barry's greedy face?

The boy gulped down 4 inari sushis in record timing. Hah.

We continued our walk along this part of the waterfront which we've never been. It's right next to the causeway. Previously, we've only been to where the Skywald is.

Eventually, we settled in a pavilion. Grandma and the kids played a game of football.

 

Then it's lunchtime! My mum prepared kong bak bao (our de rigueur picnic dish) and fried rice! Yummy! The seabreeze and fresh forest air made our lunch all the more enjoyable!

We would have stayed longer if not for the phone call from xiao gu. They're hosting that night! Whoopee. Time to go home, recharge and cheong arrrrrrrrr!

Till the next post!

And we welcome the rabbit

As with previous years, we ate a light breakfast before heading to my mum in law's place. For she always prepare yummy fried nian gao with sweet potato and yam and 糖水 for breakfast. But unlike previous years, she didn't make the pancake that hubby and I so love. Still, she made up for it by preparing EXTRA nian gao! So we could bring home a whole big box of nian gao for breakfast the next day. Shiok!

We reached her place at 10am. After enjoying the yummy food, the kids did their favorite activity. CLIMBING! They love to take the cushions off the sofa and turn it into a climbing frame. Ha.

Lunch was delicious as usual. I ate so much that I joked that I should take off my belt and change my dress to a maternity one. :p

Then, we went to my mum's, mainly to let the kids nap. After that, it was off to my 2nd uncle's place, just a 10 minutes walk away. 

We didn't stay for very long before adjourning back to my mum's for dinner. On the way, the kids had some fun!

They love their rabbit milk candy.

My mum and hubby piggy-backed the kids back. Boy, I was glad to be the bag lady, although unglam.

Since the camera was out, we took the opportunity to click click click away.

 My mum made some wonderful accessories and I want to show you all!

 A rose bracelet. Meant for adults but Mandy likes it.

 Rose brooches.

 And here is a sucky model with a really nice flower necklace.

We were supposed to iron it first. Oops.

It comes in blue too. Will try to model it in a white dress. But minus the face lah. I can't smile into the camera.

My mum has already sold 2 of the flower necklaces! Yay!

Eve of CNY

After their little lion dance costume craft, the kids got very interested in lion dance, especially since I showed them a few Youtube videos of it. So when hubby told me there would be a lion dance performance as part of the CNY celebration at his school, I immediately said the 3 of us would tag along!

Thing is, we all had to wake at 5.30am to make it for the performance at 7+am! Gosh. We did it. But pity the kids. They were soooo tired.

As usual, the kids didn't take well to the uncles, aunties. gor gors and jie jies who gushed over how cute they were, who talked to them and tried to take pictures of them. Barry even wore a scowl whenever anybody went near him. Mandy was better, she just kept still and kept quiet. Previously, she would have cried. Ha. That's my kids. If they are comfortable with you, they can be the craziest bunch with non-stop laughing and funny actions and games. BUT, they are only comfortable with their papa, mama, mama (mil) and popo. Yap, still only the 4 of us. Ha. Nobody, except the 4 of us, has seen how they really play.

My mum is quite exasperated that they freeze in front of others because she wants others to see how fun the kids can be. They are really fun to be with. Especially the boy. He has so many tricks up his sleeves. Hubby and I have long gotten used to others thinking that our kids (and us, who are very much like them) are the most boring people in the world. Ha.

Brought them up to the stage to see the lion heads. They were very happy.

They waited for a really long time for the show to start. Until Mandy was so tired she nearly fell asleep. She said she waited for so long but the dance was so short! :p

Then, we went to the school garden, away from the crowd and noise. I know that's what my girl needed because she was looking all moody and tired. She's kind of like me. :)

After that, we went for lao yu sheng for the staff. Then, since it was early, we trooped off to my mum's.

Over there, we chilled and had lunch before heading home to nap.

Master shifu watches the TV, balloon in hand.

In the evening, we had 盆菜 from Tunglok and other yummy dishes for reunion dinner. The 盆菜 (a treat from Jennifer. Thank you!) was delicious!

Aiyah, shouldn't blog about food so late at night. I'm getting hungry. *grumbles*

交通工具 - 船

This is the final part of our CL homelearning on transportation. Previously, we had done this and this.

To get them interested, we started off with some fun that I knew they love. We had avocado milkshake for snack that day. As I was washing dishes, I saw the avocado skin and an idea struck me! We could use them as boats! Haha.

They were so thrilled! Mandy was beaming with joy and Barry was trying his best to sink the Lego boy, wreck his boat and make the water as dirty as possible. As usual. At least this time, he didn't pour water all over himself and the floor.

We did a collage craft.

Mandy was having a flu when she did this. She couldn't manage to finish the collage for the sea. No wonder too because she was taking such pains to find the perfect blue piece to fit in perfectly. She didn't want to see any white gaps and tried her best not to let the papers overlap. She was particular even about the shade of blue. I know because she was mumbling while sticking "Ok, there's dark blue here already. Here? Have. Stick here then."

OMG, looking at her do a collage can make me want to tear out my hair. But yet, I'm very proud of her. Such patience. A pity she couldn't finish it. I was on the verge of asking her to 'anyhow stick' so that she could finish it. But that would be wrong right?

She did the sea on the left side of the boat. As you can see from the right, I'm not as patient as her.
 
Barry? He did everything (with lots of help) BUT the sea. You would have notice that the sea collage is the bulk of the project. Hah.

They also did this:

Both coloured. On hindsight, marker pens are such a mistake! Should have stuck to colour pencils.

By sticking time, Barry had lost interest. Mandy said the name of each vehicle in chinese before sticking them in the right bubble. She insisted there was no place for the train because trains don't go on roads. So I drew tracks for her.

I also let them stick stickers of vehicles in their sticker books, but only after saying the name of it in chinese correctly. The boy gave up afte a couple of stickers. The girl, after many repetitions, now know the names of the vehicles pretty well! YAY!

She also learnt to recognise a few more chinese words:  车, 飞, 机, 船

My aim was for her to learn more words but I was pretty slack. Oops.

East coast with mum

This time, we brought along our new Ezy Roller and my mum! Hehe. Mandy wanted to show her how she cycles.

The weather was not as fantastic as our previous outing in December. It's starting to get hot! But thanks to the trees, we had shade most of the time.

Started off with cycling for the kids. Barry insisted on trying. He could 'cycle' by himself for a while. But his feet only moved back and forth, and not one full round. We tried to teach him the right way and he got confused and gave up. Hehe.

He went on the Ezy roller instead.

They took turns. Here's how the roller works:

Barry's legs are nearly too short. He can manage it but not fast. They like the roller very much and we like that it's fuss free for us, except the bringing out part since we don't drive. We found out 3Wheels rents out Ezy Rollers at East Coast! So we don't have to bring it there next time. The kids love to roller around our estate though. :)

After that, we went for hotcakes while waiting for our turn to rent the big carriage!

It was worth the 1+hour's wait and the $40 rental. Hubby and I got to cycle! He super gian cycling. Haha. My mum got to sweat it out a bit too and she liked that. The kids loved the wind and were giggling throughout, until it got hot. Haha.

Then we had a feast at TungLok seafood restaurant again. They ran out of Peking Duck so we ordered the chilli crab yet again. This time, the crab was delicious! Sweet and succulent. Even my mum ate quite a bit. As usual, the girl feasted on chee cheong fun and they boy ate a bit of everything, except the crab of course.

After lunch, both kids fell asleep almost instantly on the taxi, and continued their nap till 4+ in the evening.

Though my mum was still troubled and exhausted, she chatted animatedly with us, played wildly with the kids and laughed out loud at some instances. I'm glad. :)

Cute little lions ushering in the new year!

Inspired by Crazymommy, I did lion dance costumes with the kids on friday. In fact, she has so many good CNY craft ideas I want to do much more with the goods. Alas, I'm way behind schedule in spring cleaning. Haha. I think I should target ONE room instead of the whole place. I've lived here for...7 years? Or more? I don't think we've ever managed to get our place spring-cleaned in time. Oops.    

Plus, I haven't bought any new clothes for the kids. Not a single piece. Going to survive on Xmas presents. Ha. And they might wear clothes they wore last year. Oh, not Barry. Don't think he can still fit into them. :p

By the way,  Crazymommy is a sahm with 2 kids (with no help) and she's very talented in crafts and super good at multitasking. I learnt a lot from her. :) So if you need craft ideas, go visit her site. She gives lots of links too.

Here's our version of the costume:

We spent more than an hour on these! It was fun but I didn't realise how exhausted I was. OMG, there was so much to do! Crazymommy, how did you do it?

I wanted to let the kids do as much as they could. So I left the choosing of colours, drawing, cutting, sticking to them. Mandy was competent enough to do all that. Barry was not. I knew he wanted to try so I let him. In the end, he made a huge mess, leaving many tiny pieces of paper all over the floor. Glue on the floor, sticky tape on the floor, shreds of crepe paper....cotton wool... I guess that contributed to my day long headache. (Serious, I had a headache after that that lasted till this morning. Ha)

Mandy did everything herself, except for the sticking of eyes and 'tail'. I'm very proud of her. She was actually tired from her slight cold but she said she liked making the costume so she would continue to do it even though she was tired.She toiled over it for over an hour.

Barry was distracted on the way but managed to be involved more than I expected him to be.

Oh, Mandy decorated her lion's tail. She said it's a tree. "These are the leaves falling down. A lot a lot of leaves. It's winter." She also scoffed at my idea of sticking the lion's mane. "NO. Lion's mane not like that what! They fall down at the sides one what!" before she plucked out the crepe paper I stuck on for demonstration and re-stick it her own way. The result is quite funny, looking like 2 ponytails at the side. But well, it's her masterpiece and she's really pleased with it. That's enough. :)

See them dance! Mandy delegated me to the drums. Hehe.

You can see the very unglam me for a brief moment in the video, juggling the drum and bells. Ha. Tempo a bit out at some points. That's because I was distracted ok. My rhythm sense and tempo is my strong point in music hor. :p

Hope we'll find time to do more CNY crafts. :)

Thou shalt not waste

As the kids grow bigger, they begin to imitate the adults more. Mandy, of course, has started 'lecturing' everybody around her for quite some time. She also says things like "See mama! I can colour so well, next time I teach you ok?" She teach me? *rolls eyes*

Now, even Barry says things like that. Once, he said he will teach Mandy how to draw. It made her quite mad. Haha.

The other day, when hubby refused to let them watch a Youtube video on the computer, Mandy said "Only one what papa! C'mon!!". C'mon little girl, do we really talk like that? Yet another time, she exclaimed "Wow! That's cool man!" when she saw something that I've made. Haha.

Recently, she's been preaching about minimising wastage. It started one day when she saw me washing dishes.

Mandy: Mama, what are you doing?

Me: Washing dishes.

Mandy: Why must you use so much water?

Me: Er. Because there's soap. I have to use more water to wash the soap away.

Mandy: But still cannot use so much water you know? Like that is wasting. Next time, we don't have enough water to drink, to bathe, to wash hands... HOW?

Since then, she's been preaching to me and Barry almost everyday. Even Barry is telling me not to waste water. "Don't turn on so big mama! Cannot! Cannot waste water!" he insisted. Then, it'll take forever for him to rinse off the soap on his hands.

But actually, I'm thankful for their reminders. I do use too much water sometimes. Guilty. Hehe.

Yesterday, the girl lashed out at the boy when he took an extra piece of tissue for his perspiration. "BARRY! Cannot take so many tissue! DON'T. WASTE. TISSUE!"

She continued with her tirade and said "You waste then we must cut down so many trees you know? Cut and cut. Next time, the squirrels... and the... birds... cannot go and make their homes on the trees already. HOW?"

Wow, not bad little girl. You can link loss of natural habitats to human wastage. Ha.

So take it from a 4 year old everyone. Thou shalt not waste!