Friday, May 28, 2010

First Encounter with the Sticky Licky Lolly





His very first experience.

It's all written on his face. Oh what delight! Pure sweetness. Utter joy of the normally-forbidden-sticky lolly.

Given by a girl in school.

In the past, he would automatically said 'Yuck!' when offered one. In the recent months, a different reaction surfaced. One of curiosity and wonderment. Perhaps because most of his classmates love lollipops! And some kids would come to school with bags of them to distribute to friends after school days (and I am not referring to party bags!). Urgh!!!!

I have always explained to my boys why candies are bad for us and why we should treat our bodies well and eat only the good things. If I want to give my boys sweet treats, I would pick chocolates and ice-cream over the zero-goodness-and-teeth-decaying candies anytime!

M, being the precocious one, understands easily and would tell us he wants to feed his body only healthy food, except for the occasional treats. For the longest time, he would just refuse sweets without even tasting them first.

But the day he tasted the first soft candy in school (this new kindy which he joined last Aug), he is no longer so sure anymore! Haha!

Thankfully, he is still so innocent and honest enough to bring home every lolly he gets in school and asks me politely if he can try it.

I know such days may be numbered. So while it lasts, mummy shall have the final say.


Wednesday, May 26, 2010

Mad About Books

One afternoon, I came into the room to find an arrangement on the floor. Both boys were sitting together, one reading Harry Potter and the other a book called 'Cool Facts'.




A few weeks ago, E bought Charlotte's Web to read to Chipsy since he is so crazy about pigs. Marcus picked it up one day after school and read about 100 pages in a single sitting. 

My little bookworm fights us on most nights about bedtime. 

He tries hard to drag it out, so that he can draw for another minute or read one more page. After we stop reading to him, he carries on by himself till his eyes can't take it anymore.


Tsk tsk tsk... BAD habit to lie down and read! 

Tuesday, May 25, 2010

Overflowing Inspiration

Most days, both boys will draw together. Either sitting side by side on the floor or table or at separate tables.

They have no shortage of ideas. The most common lament is the lack of time to translate all ideas onto papers in one sitting.

Here is a recap of recent productions by both boys.

My 3.5 years old's most recent Wall.E!!  I LOVE LOVE LOVE this! 


See his previous Wall.E sketch, drawn the day he watched the film for the first time.

He enjoys creating Lego models, just like his older brother. Here is a Lego plane he built, followed by a drawing of the same plane.

I like the way he shows the propeller spinning... 

A plane in trouble, with smoke coming out of its propeller... 

A gigantic top-heavy truck that can balance its load on small wheels. He drew a small vehicle by its side to show contrast and relativity in size. Hee.. I thought that is smart of him to pick this tip up from Marcus' drawings.  

The rest were drawn by my 5.5 years old. He is no longer satisfied drawing 2-dimensional objects. So we are seeing lots of 3-D drawings from him now! 




I think I only managed to draw 3-d when I was a teenager! It was amazing that he mastered it so soon, so naturally we are very excited and pleased for him. 

For daddy, a plane that is moving towards him. 

This drawing (below) shows the interior of the plane.


This fighter plane shoots! 


Awesomely cute helicopter!!  

Air Force ONE, inspired by the film '2012'.

Monday, May 24, 2010

3-Dimensional Drawings


Above: by Marcus. 

Inspired by his big brother, my 3.5 y.o. is determined to have a go too! After a night of trying, he isn't far off now..  :> 


Friday, May 21, 2010

Craft: Making a Bunny Collage

Boys slogged over an hour on this craft.


I always like the fact that we have two versions of most crafts since both boys like to do their crafts together.


I provided some basic instructions and we talked about the general idea before leaving them with the materials to get started.

There was some tracing of palm prints, cutting, drawing, tearing and collage. 

While they were working on their creations, I slogged over emails and lesson plans. When they were done, I hopped over to take quick photos. 

We only realised that something is missing after I've taken photos of the crafts. Haha!

Thursday, May 20, 2010

JO.E and JOE



Inspired by Wall.E, which my boys adore big time, my 5.5-year-old drew this strip one afternoon.

I love his sense of humor! See the 'nutssss' part that he added. Hee hee.. 

Check out his other comic strip here.

Tuesday, May 18, 2010

A Week of Singlish

There are many issues that bug me about our local preschools. One of which is the standard of English spoken by the preschool teachers.

While I understand the reasons for the far-from-ideal standard we get in most local preschools, it is hard to accept when my 3-year-old comes home uttering Singlish.

Early this year, a few months after he started attending the nursery school, he came home asking for 'wo-der' (water). I nearly fell off my chair.

In the same week, we heard more Singlish in his conversations with us. I was disturbed. E was visibly annoyed.

We corrected him patiently and repeatedly by pronouncing the word properly. We did it gently but firmly.

Sometimes I could hear Marcus telling him that he was speaking bad English. I had to remind Marcus to be gentle with him too. In his attempt to teach his little brother, Marcus would say to him 'now, you repeat after me... it should be like this... ' (this is NOT the way E and I correct little Chip)

After weeks of correcting Chipsy whenever necessary, he seems to realize now. And when he does say 'wo-der' and 'le-der' (letter), it is more out of jest to annoy us before laughing at our reactions.

I know it is inevitable for him to pick up some Singlish and even if he does, it is just a matter of correcting him. But I still don't like it.

I said my share of silent prayers when we decided to send my 3 y.o to this preschool. (Or rather, it was more like my decision since E pretty much left it to me to decide. He is always supportive of my recommendations and reasons when it comes to matters related to kids' education.....)

I see it as a tradeoff - for better exposure to the Chinese language, we sacrifice a little of his spoken English.

At Marcus' age, I am no longer that concerned as he can differentiate between good and bad English. Very often, he would come home to tell me that 'T speaks really bad English today... he said 'why cannot lah?', 'how come you like dat one?' etc... T is one of those kids in school with very distinct Singlish.

Some say, Singlish is a version of English, with its own lingo and unique expressions. Yes, I suppose as long as we speak in grammatically sound sentences, it is alright to flavour our speech with spices of Singlish from time to time.

If speaking some Singlish helps us mingle with the crowds and befriend the kids in school, I think it is fine. But what is important is the ability to switch from Singlish to proper English when we need to.

The effect of Singlish will surely be greater when the boys join the Primary schools with the longer hours spent in school. Sigh.

Saturday, May 15, 2010

Comic Strips: Submarines

Submarines is a current favorite topic. Armed with a fantastic pocket guide of Submarines of the World which serves as his research resource, my 5.5 years old must have produced over a hundred drawings of different designs of submarines in the past few months.

On a typical day, he will spend between 3 and 4 hours on either drawing or reading on his own. 



Above: Reading a book on Ships and Watercraft which I borrowed from the library. 

Then one day, I found these few photos in my camera and absolutely love them! 

It is a series of comic strip that Marcus has created. His very first attempt! They were so simple, yet so cool!  I couldn't stop admiring the details. 





This is the unedited version. In terms of writing, there is certainly room for improvement, especially in the areas like punctuation and grammer. But I am not concerned at all. He will pick it up real fast once I point it out to him, so I have not done much in this department just yet. 

The focus for now is on inspiring creativity, so I am real thrilled to see the development. :> 

Shortly after this, he made another few comic strips. I shall blog about them next week. 

Friday, May 14, 2010

Craft: Hamburger with Recycled Materials

With more ideas than time, this is yet another craft which I have been wanting to make with my boys for at least 15 months.

Finally we did it! It is always good to strike an item off my lengthy to-do list. 

I have always preferred using materials we already have at home for crafts, so after brainstorming for possible resources, both boys happily helped to search the house for suitable materials. 

In the end, we settled for some old newspapers, colored papers and a plastic bottle lid. 


They couldn't stop laughing and admiring the finished product, obviously really pleased with themselves. 

It is a simple craft, but the wrapping is not as easy for little hands. So they used a little help from me. 

My little comical guy who couldn't wait to pose! *.*






Thursday, May 13, 2010

A Tall Tale: Gunsaurus


Marcus wrote this tall tale on Gunsaurus recently. Almost all by himself, except for the word 'skeleton' which he asked me to spell for him.

====
Once upon a time, there was a robot dragon called Gunsaurus that lived on Satarnten.

Gunsaurus was a gigantic, ferocious robot. His head was a tall semi-circle shape and his mouth was made of two long pieces of metal.

He had no nose. His two eyes were the size of beach balls and his eyes could change colors.

He had no claws but he had guns on his arms. His guns were metal pipes that have torpedoes. His teeth were made of rock. His skeleton was made of metal. His tail was made of springs.

His skeleton was made of nuts, bolts and springs. He had two skeletons - an inner skeleton and an exoskeleton.

He had two hearts. He had three brains.

He had nine thousand enemies. He was one of the most famous robots.

He could crush a condo. He could break wullalumps. He could crack the Earth.

His structure was neatly packed in a nice canned body. He was the most formidable robots of all.

I wish I could see him one day.

=====

'Wullalumps' is a name M made up, referring to the aliens on Satarnten, a planet in an imaginery galaxy called Tenway.

Wednesday, May 12, 2010

Never Alone



photos from phuket '09

They are partners everywhere they go!  

Marcus said one day that he is never lonely because he will always have Nicholas with him. 

And on a separate occasion, Nicholas remarked that he will never be scared because he will always have Marcus to protect and look after him, even if mummy and daddy are not around. 

It is truly a blessing to have siblings. 

I am glad we have more than one. 

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

A Little Lesson on Indulging Kids

Sometimes I do laugh out loud at my kids' abilities to entertain themselves. 

I am sure most kids are like this - finding humour at the most mundane things in life, and discovering joy and wonder in the things that we take for granted. 

Whenever my boys are in a Japanese restaurant, I do like to sit them near the conveyor belt if there is one. It is always fun to see little plates of colorful edible morsels rolling by. 

One day, out of the blue, my little Chip turned into this giggly little hyperactive child who would exclaim 'Toothpaste toothpaste!' whenever this Q00 packet rolled by (picture below) on the conveyor belt before breaking into uncontrollable squeals of laughter. 



He did this for at least ten times in that sitting alone. I did a lot of 'shush' to him, attempting to calm him down a little, as if that was possible. I was more worried about the noise and disturbance he may cause to other diners than actually laughing with him and indulging myself in his moments of silliness with him. 

On hindsight, I realise how much I have changed as a parent. 

As a first-time mum, I lived in my world and was oblivious to bystanders' jaw-dropping expressions as they watched me coo and ahh with my baby. M got away with a lot more than Chipsy's version of 'Toothpaste!' squealing. I was always there laughing with him and indulging him. I haven't done this as much with Chipsy. 

I am glad I reflected and come to this realization though. There's bound to be more of such laughing-at-nothing scenarios in future and I am going to make sure that I am there, right by him, laughing with him and seeing his world through his lens (or at least pretend to be). 

Friday, May 7, 2010

One of His Many Wishes


My 5.5 y.o said the other day at dinner time, 'I wish I have a talking tiger as a friend'.

I paused for a moment, wondering where did that come from. Then the AH-HA moment!

Yes, he is still fascinated with this . Recently, he has also started reading a new series - The Adventures of Tin Tin.

Thursday, May 6, 2010

Albinoni




There was a period of time, over a decade ago, when I would listen to this piece every morning.

It was the first thing I listened to while getting ready for work. And it was also the last sounds I heard before drifting off to dreamland. 

It is so strange listening to it again. What makes it even stranger is how after such a long time, this music can still bring back some bittersweet memories. 


Wednesday, May 5, 2010

Gaming Treat

I always love strategy games. 

So I couldn't resist when I came across Blokus which I eventually introduced to my boys a few months ago. Ever since, it has been their favourite board game. 

When I first showed them the game, I was not expecting little Chip to follow the game rules. It was really more for M to learn to strategize and have fun at the same time. I figured I could let Chip join in without following the rules anyway. 

Needless to say, it came as a pleasant surprise when little Chip could actually understand and follow the rules really well! I mean, REALLY well. 

He could even formulate a simple strategy to block me and M by the time we were done with Round 3. 

Perhaps because Little Chip is really fond of games that produce winner and losers, he is very motivated to play so that he can win. And when he doesn't win, he just cleans up the set very quickly and announces the start of the game again! 

M, on the other hand, is not quite a gallant loser sometimes. I notice that when he realizes he isn't going to win, there are times when he just loses heart and decides he doesn't want to play anymore. 

I am sure most kids (and adults) are like this. Nothing major here - it's just going to take a little more encouragement and nudging on our part to drive home the fact that sometimes enjoying the journey (process) is as important as the reaching the destination (result). 




Tuesday, May 4, 2010

An Odd Soak




He asks for this sometimes. He is obviously way oversized for the tub, but he doesn't seem to mind. 

A few times, I could hear him giggle as he soaked. Being bent and squished up must be fun. 

Monday, May 3, 2010

So My 5.5-Year-Old Says....


.....  I know you and daddy love me so much because both of you always speak so kindly to me. You tell me you love me all the time. You cuddle and kiss me all the time too! 

And mummy makes me the most delicious food and make sure I am warm when I feel cold. So I know you love me so much. And I know I am precious. .... 

Aww... he is always such a sweetie pie with the most saccharin sweet words. 

Just looking through my photo log, I realised I have missed out all these old photos of Lego creations and drawings which M did in the last 3 to 4 months. So here goes... 

Some spaceship, I think.... 

A tank with accompanying equipment....  

Wearing a crown and holding a sword that he made for himself - Marcus the knight! :> 


Inspired by the film 'Des Boot' which he watched with E one day, he promptly produced a whole series of magnificent boats of all shapes, sizes and functions. 

Imperial Star Destroyers! Inspired by Star Wars. 

More inspiration. 

Cloud grabbers! A very strange but interesting idea. The cloud grabbers can grab rain clouds and transport them to places with droughts. So the rain can be more evenly distributed. Hmm... 



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