Happy birthday to Sito dear! :)

My husband turned 38! We've entered the two months a year when we're the same age! :)

Celebrated with Korean army hotpot on Friday

Saturday dinner was with the kids

(I had Sito's chawanmushi and whatever the kids didn't want from their kids' meals!)

Cake on Sunday, the actual day

Took a bus to dinner at MBS. It was a long bus ride but the kids enjoyed it - we were sitting on the upper deck of a double-decker bus, no less!

Two of the sweetest faces I know

(The other two were in front)

Papa and son looking at Christmas decor

Our birthdays are now an excuse for the kids to blow out candles, to eat cake and for us to leave BP for date night :p Many years to come, dear :)

Yu's potty training

The potty books were out earlier this time coz we have a nice space for books. Yu enjoyed reading the one where the boy went to buy underwear. For a while, he wore his brothers' underwear over his diapers. Once he wore just the underwear but it was too big for him!

When I bought Yang's first underwear, I kept a few for Yu - I wanted their first underwear to be cute so that they would enjoy wearing them and be motivated to wean off the diaper. Since Yu was interested, I took them out to wash.

Proudly wearing his new underwear on 16 Nov

Look, small bum! :p

He loves his underwear a lot - police car, choo choo! He would go dig into drawers to find underwear to wear. Recently he also wanted to wear underwear at night but gosh, not yet, baby!

His night pee is less now but he doesn't wake to pee. In the evening, he still often poops in his diaper. In fact, he pooped into his underwear once!!

Day time, he's pretty good. He was dry whole of last weekend in the day,  wearing underwear or a dry diaper, with no accidents!

He is also very good in school. In fact, he started going to the toilet regularly in school before we started at home coz he saw his older PG friends use the toilet. Yesterday, Yu's teacher told me that he asked to go to the toilet but just as he was pulling down his pants, he paused, made a face and then looked like he was going to cry - coz he peed into his diaper! So poor thing! And so hilarious too!

But my little baby is becoming a big boy indeed :) With some luck, he might say bye bye to diapers earlier than his brothers! My helper was confused though - many diapers left, so sayang! *.* I think we will get through our current stock, some of which was left over from Yang two years ago! But I shall not buy in bulk anymore - no more next child to save for!

My one and only medal

I was never in sports. I never made it to my first netball practice before I had to drop out to accommodate Japanese class in sec 1. I don't think I had ever participated in sports meets. Even if I had, it would probably be making up the numbers, the way I did for canoeing in JC. So I never had a medal.

On Tuesday, 27 Nov 2018, I received my first medal, thanks to the nomination of my bosses.

It came with a bear!

 Source: M

Sito was with me at the ceremony

Source: M 

The medal, the bear, flowers from M and a scarf

In other news, my part-time application was not approved. It wasn't exactly rejected coz it was still possible in another division albeit later. I was advised to telecommute and work flexibly for a couple of months and assess thereafter. So, still hanging on! I would have to think about how to maximise my 50 days of leave next year haha!

Day out with Kai

Kai started talking about skyscrapers some time ago and wanted to see them. When we were at the Flyer, he said the skyscrapers weren't scraping the sky. I promised to bring him to the city. Finally, we made the trip today. Did some last-minute research in the morning and finally left the house past 8.30 am.

On the Downtown Line to Downtown

So tall I couldn't capture them

But no, they still weren't scraping the sky. Not literally anyway. I couldn't tell if Kai was disappointed but we continued walking.

"Is the water deep?"

"Is the water up to here (hand to head)?"

Went into the Fullerton Bay Hotel to get to another park of the water edge

Going to the water-taxi stop

And we took the boat for one stop - $6 per pax

I didn't feel like taking the boat coz that would take us to MBS but I really wanted to bring Kai to the Merlion and the civic district. The boy wanted what was in front of him so...

Looking out of the boat

Ended up at the Art-Science Museum. We didn't go for the exhibits but there was a free VR walk so we did that. In fact, Kai did it twice!

Look out for the mouse deer!

Seed planting at the end

"It's so hot!" - all the way down Helix Bridge!

Got him a Pororo drink

And there was a Poli exhibit in Marina Square!

Got him a $2 old-school toy - blowing hoops onto sticks in water!

We shared lunch at the food court - he said it was good :)

Our next stop was shopping for a school bag. I asked him to pick one. He did. It was ugly so I picked another one to let him try :p Then he couldn't decide between the two. I asked if I could choose for him, and he said yes without hesitation. His mind was probably on the toy!

But this mama picked up two other bags! And fiddled with them all, and got the boy to try again. Finally, I decided on one that is not too boxy and is spacious enough. Then we went back to Poli.

The auntie let him play this for a long time

Then we had a $5 Hokkaido milk soft serve, which he dropped onto the table and picked up to eat!

Got into the taxi at 1.20 pm. And he dozed off

We just relaxed in the afternoon at home until it was time for me to get his brothers for vaccination downstairs. So proud of them both - Yang didn't cry and Yu only whined! Woohoo! Still remember the time when Kai had his meningitis shot - he saw Yang having his and cried out "nononono" when the needle came to his thigh! That 3yo boy is now less than two months to primary school :)

That's him writing on this primary school prep book from MOE

Graduation ceremony and concert

Can't believe it but Kai has graduated from kindergarten!

The school held its first graduation and concert on Friday, 16 November. Only kids from N1 onwards performed so we left Yu in school - we decided that we should be fair to Kai and focus on his graduation rather than have to chase around a tot who could not sit still for 10 minutes.

Took the bus early in the morning as they had to get to the church before 8 am

Yang wanted a "neighbour" to sit with him, not me... Hmmm...

I was ushering the boys along after checking in at the church, when suddenly I realised I was ushering Yang and a random boy! Kai had walked ahead of me! Blur me.

Did some work at home until 9.15 am before making the way down to the church again, this time with Sito and Mum. We had allocated seats coz we have a graduand :)

Congrats to Kai! :))))

The class had two valedictorians - goodness, don't they start young? The boy spoke in English and the girl in Mandarin. And then everyone had a turn at the mike, saying a word that started with a letter related to the school - not sure coz I wasn't listening clearly when my eyes and mind were set on my baby!

When it was Kai's turn, the first thing I noticed was that he had to stoop a little to speak. The second thing was that he said a word that was said earlier. And true enough, he caught himself, said another word and another phrase that we couldn't catch, and ran off giggling! He was so cute! Everyone clapped for him!

A while later, he came back with another word, and everyone clapped again. The other kids, including the valedictorian speeches, didn't get as much applause. Think everyone appreciated a little cute mistake and everyone was very encouraging :)

I loved watching his video but the first time I showed it to Kai, he covered his ears and said embarrassingly, albeit with a smile, that he didn't want to hear himself!

The speeches continued into a Chinese song about graduating from kindergarten. It was such a nice song I was going to cry! Then I think they showed pictures of each graduating kid, and the kids all came from behind to present flowers to their parents. The dam broke - my baby is leaving kindy!

Yellow for Sito; pink for me - selected by chance - with a card on each stalk

And then the concert starts. The enrichment classes went first before the class dances. So Kai and Yang had two dances each due to Chinese speech and drama. But they only got their class dance costumes home; I suppose the enrichment class dance costumes were standard from the enrichment class.

Yang watched his video and stated that he did nothing - coz he was shy, hmm... That's him on the leftmost

Kai explained that his headgear was special coz his costume was special

Yang moved for his class dance - Filipino - though, yeah! (So, is it the Chinese enrichment class??)

Kai doing his Mexican hat dance, which Yu could do apparently!

Just a shot of the brothers coz no space nor hands to do a family shot. And Yu wasn't with us.

Treated them to happy meals and ice cream for lunch

We let Yang eat slowly while Sito and Mum took Kai back so that Sito could leave for work

Yu took a Cornetto from the freezer by himself so he had ice cream too!

The school was closed for the rest of the day so I stayed in with them. Took them three to the playground near the coffeeshop all by myself so that N could clean a bit and get ready to help put them in bed. So proud of myself haha! But couldn't bear to eat out with them on my own so I packed dinner home.

The boys playing with some piano-like keys at the playground

Kai had a fall on our way home and grazed his left knee. He was howling so much! I told him to be brave, eat more especially meat to make skin - oops, psuedo science?! Anyway, that made him start eating his dinner!

"Ok, I'll be brave"

Yes, be brave, my child. There's a whole new world waiting for your out there and you'll soon take the first step towards it! Jia you! :)