Last Sunday, we decided to take a walk during Yu's nap time at Mum's place. It has been a while since we walked around HV!
First, we checked out the new mall. Mostly food.
Then, we went out to the small lanes, glanced at our old place, and checked out the pubs and restaurants - not too much changes.
No more carpark between block 12 and the small lane - a lot brighter!
Next, we turned out to the Fosters stretch, and bought some sparklers for the kids and a pair of pants for me.
Time for bubble tea! :p The train station shops are still mostly the same but Unity just shut its doors that week.
Went to the old shopping centre to check out the shops. The old massage place is still there; the newer one is gone.
There used to be a drain where we stood in this pic
The playground with the three slides of different heights has been renovated
And so we ended our little walk around our old neighbourhood where our first matrimonial home was.
We moved more than two years ago. It's nice to live in BP though the house came with various water issues which gave me much grief! Some stuff are also breaking down, like the hob - think it's user fault.
But we're already planning our next move - a big resale flat with no or less balcony space so that we can get more usable space. We researched some places nearer the school - too near, can't afford; near enough, no direct bus. So maybe we will still choose BP.
After discussing it a few weeks ago, I'm actually looking forward to it a lot :)
There was a school closure two Fridays ago for some PSLE thing. So I brought the boys for breakfast at Fun Toast before the younger boys went to school.
Drinking Milo while waiting for food
I didn't ask them to pose but they all did!!
Made them promise to try chee cheong fun before we got there. Not bad, they didn't spit it back out! Think Yu even asked for more. Yang liked the yam bun though - not the best I think...
Bought six Captain Underpants books in full colour for Kai - he was so happy!
I'm also very happy to see him read! I was totally thrilled when he told me a few days ago that he couldn't stop reading! Gosh, he's feeling what I always feel about reading! Hope it lasts though :p
Heart shape with short hands, haha!
The focus is the drying rack, which I gave away after eight years
Been doing a light clean-up of the house to reduce clutter. So now our dry pantry counter has less stuff. But I haven't thought of how to maximise the space yet...
Football time!
He said he had soccer shoes
金箍棒升级版 with gems on both ends by Yu - it's not too clear how many monkey kings we have at home...
Two Sundays ago, we had a period of time when each boy was happily doing his own thing while I was making dinner.
Kai was playing LEGO with Papa
Yu was playing cars in the room
Yang was having a trial class downstairs - look at his lovely painting!
We squeezed into our sofa!
I felt a big lump in Yang's belly last Thursday night so I brought him to the PD the next day. The clinic would allow only one family in the waiting area so we were supposed to wait outside first. Then the nurse called Yang in to weigh in. And this boy went from the weighing machine to the sofa, drawn by the TV! I was left outside, staring at him staring at the TV...!
When I got in and tried to sit next to him, he suddenly told me to sit further away coz social distancing *.*
He recognised the doctor when we got in ("it's the same doctor!") and made himself comfortable, playing with little toys while I spoke with the doctor. When he showed me pictures of poop, Yang got excited and went over to the doctor's side of the table - this one really 自来熟 haha! And when we were leaving, he said bye bye, and suddenly told the doctor that he was there for an injection a long time ago. Indeed he was!
He decided on a big hotdog bun for lunch before his poopoo medicine
That night, Sito and I went out for a good dinner. Then we found that the Don Don Donki at Orchard Central runs 24H. The previous and first time I was there, I really couldn't tell whether it was a Daiso or supermarket. When I saw "24H", I realised what this place was all about - it's a Japanese Mustafa!
A photo for the memories
Last Saturday, we decided to head for Jurong East so that Sito could go to Chevrons to get his army stuff. He went to the mart on his own while I settled the kids downstairs. They watched koi for a while, spoke fish (?!) and dashed about a lot.
At least Kai and Yang tried to speak fish *.*
At one point, I needed the toilet badly and brought Yu into the cubicle with me after telling Kai to stay with Yang on the sofa at the atrium. It took them less than a minute to reach the toilet after me *.*
We were supposed to go to Jem but we ended up at Westgate carpark. Oh well! We walked to Jem and were just nice for dinner at Monster Curry! The kids are familiar with Japanese curry but they didn't eat a lot as usual, sighs.
Sito tried a new bubble tea and ended up with a $9.50 (!) grape juice with cheese topping - but it was money well spent coz all five of us loved it!
Very plain days we have, but very happy we are. Most of the time, heh!
After making some plain rolls, I decided I wanted some hotdog buns. So I used the same recipe and rolled out some strips to wrap around some mini hotdogs.
The result looked like ****
The second attempt was much better - and Kai made the middle one :)
The kids all like the hotdog buns. Even Yang who doesn't like the plain rolls. Um, same dough... I feel like I should just make plain rolls and stuff hotdogs into them just before eating - so much easier!
My next challenge is an apple pie, as requested by Yang. Will need to make some serious shortcrust pastry to do that. So I did a trial..
Sausage rolls with some sleeping in a shortcrust pastry bed
The taste was ok - I taxed the top right one, oops... But I think I need colder butter next time. Or I can try using the stand mixer. I'd be very pleased if it works!
Recently, we started having herbal chicken soup. JY gave me a simple recipe using whole chicken or pork ribs. I chose chicken legs instead - easier to eat. The first time, the kids shared 2.5 legs. The second time, I gave them one leg each - and they finished everything! Tmr will be the third time - looking forward to it!
What surprised me the most was that Yu liked the soup quite a bit :)
Happily bubbling soup in my Snoopy CorningWare
I made a list of soups to cook but I haven't planned it all out yet so I haven't sent it to A. Truth be told, I'd rather be the one to cook the soup!
Our trip to Ikea finally happened. It was drizzling so we thought maybe it might not be too crowded.
We were so wrong.
There was a long queue to get to the escalator, and then another long queue to get into Level 2. Thankfully, we were second in line for the restaurant. The food queue was long but we managed to get our dinner around 5.30 pm, our usual time!
Sito had chicken cutlet
Kai had 2.5 chicken wings and some fried
Yang finished his pasta before attacking two chicken wings
After asking me to remove the wing tip of his chicken wing, he tucked into meatball pasta and finished everything except a handful of pasta! And he gave up on the wing..
Hello from Clan Sito!
If anyone is interested, I had chicken wings and leftover pasta and fries hoho! Sito also fed me some cutlet pieces. This is called mama's meal :p
I left the four of them at the children's rooms and went in search of a shelf at Level 1. Then we went through Level 2 to check out another shelf. This trip around Level 2 took a long time thanks to the boys! So scary to see them climb and touch various fragile things! Gripped their hands super tight as we went through Level 1 - nothing to see, just walk through to the end...
Coz of their behaviour, no ice cream. But it seems like the ice cream machine was not in operation anyway. COVID - it explains many thing; many things except the crowd *.*
They had fun though!
It was almost 8 pm when we got back. But they dozed off just past 9 pm. Guess they were tired.
Now they're playing with money - real and fake coins - on their own, and talking about being good boys, extra good boys and too good boys... Yes, please up your game!
Update 18 Sep 2020
Fixed the shelf on Monday! Now the rice cooker is more accessible. Our new stand mixer also arrived and managed to go into the bottom shelf - happy :)
I didn't have many books at home when I was very young.
When Mother was pregnant with YQ, I found her Chinese pregnancy books and read them over and over again.
My English was kind of non-existent. When I was about five, I followed my grandma to her work place - think she was a cleaner at some office. The boss's daughter was there as well. I remember that incident - there were just two of us in a meeting two. She was dressed very nicely. We were about the same age but she was reading Wizard of Oz while I didn't know what "shoe" meant when Yan asked me on a separate occasion. (But my memory is obviously very good, haha!)
I guess that somewhat spurred me to want to learn English. But by P1, my English still couldn't make it - I didn't understand the teacher but my classmates were starting to open their workbook *.*
Finally, when I was eight, I went to the library for the first time. I remember randomly picking a couple of books and I had difficulty with the protagonist's name of this English book. For the rest of my primary school years, we went to the library every three Saturdays, maxing out the borrowing limit on five cards, i.e. 20 books in total. I didn't like it when YQ borrowed this baby monkey book again and again *.*
Btw, back then, there were long queues to return and borrow books, with the librarian scanning each book with a pen and stamping the due dates. Back home, we used random pens or sticks to pretend to be librarians :p
So I started reading at eight. Mostly fiction. The only non-fiction I remember was about space and astronomy, and brain teasers. Borrowed fewer but thicker books of mystery, crime and romance as I entered secondary school, primarily coz no time. JC was full of Louis Cha. University was when I started on fantasy though second year was almost devoted to Dream of the Red Chamber.
My early working life was spent bawling my eyes out with 张小娴 and re-acquainting myself with authors I read in the previous 10 years. I forgot about books for quite a while coz I was busy with work. Except for Harry Potter whenever they came out. Then I started reading a mixed bag in Evanston. Then it was kiddy books. I found reading apps and read 琼瑶 for the first time while nursing Yu. There was lots of Overdrive around that time too. More recently, I have been reading online novels - just finished the very long 庆余年...
Now for the kids.
I bought kiddy books when I was pregnant with Kai. I was staying in the east when I first came back from Evanston and there was some book fair at Expo. I tried to start them reading early, from infanthood.
Today, Yu is quite happy to read with me. Yang would pull the longest books for me to read. But since his toddler years, Kai has not shown much interest in books until a couple of weeks ago.
I think he was saying he wished he had Captain Underpants. He was so surprised and happy when I told him to find one at our bookshelf. We bought that a couple of years ago coz we thought he was interested - he mentioned that back in K1.
He read bits of it here and there, and finished it this morning. I think he picked up momentum along the way. That is also the first book of such length that he has completed :)
So today, after his play date, we went to Popular to get him a new one. I think he was trying to avoid the thicker ones *.* But eventually, he decided on one.
Repeat this photo of him browsing for Captain Underpants
A few more weeks ago, I also started getting him to read Charlie and the Chocolate Factory for 10-15 min every evening. He went from resistant to just picking up from where he started. Didn't realise that just that short bit of time each day could be so effective. And when Captain Underpants came around, he didn't need the points as motivation.
I really hope Captain Underpants can lead him into the wonderful world of reading!
I can't remember the last time I met friends. Today, however, Kai had a play
date - good for him, hoho!
I decided to take leave today before the play date invitation. Then two things
came along - the play date and a meeting. And the logistics weren't pretty. I
didn't want A to send Kai coz (1) she would have to send and come back, and
then I would make the same trip, i.e. lots of wasted time; and (2) what if
they couldn't find the place, even on a cab?
So I decided to attend the meeting at Starbucks or Toast Box or something at
Paya Lebar Quarter with Kai sitting next to me with the iPad, before sending
him to the play date slightly late.
As luck would have it, I was informed yesterday afternoon that the meeting got
postponed, woohoo!!
We sent Yang and Yu to B1 and headed to his favourite breakfast. Last time, I
tried their swiss roll - not bad. This time, I tried their muffin - not nice
:(
Kai looks so tiny here, though his hands feel bigger every time I hold them
He played chess on the iPad for a while while I did some shopping online -
it's 9.9! The boys have been singing the PCK Shopee 9.9 song the past couple
of weeks. Sito even recorded Kai singing it! Not posting here coz I was in PJ
pants in the background :p
Give you the original - can learn Singlish too!!
When we got into the car, Kai asked, is this the lady's car? Then I realised
that this was the first time that Kai took Grab car - tall enough not to be
rejected! Not that we have tried before hoho!
And really, my reason (2) came true - driver followed GPS into a wrong road!
And when she found the correct road based on intuition, that road led to a
dead end due to construction! The next time, we finally found the place, and
only coz I spotted the house number that was hidden away from the road *.*
Ok, bye, Kai! :p
My next stop was Daiso at Singpost Centre. Parkway Parade is nearer but I
thought maybe there would be more things over at Paya Lebar...
I was very happy at Daiso :) But it is quite small so I didn't get all that I
wanted. It's ok, I should get going!
This reminded me of Taipei somehow :)
I went to a number of shops and bought a pretty blouse for myself and a pair
of plain pants for Kai, with the latter more ex, hoho!
I was getting really tired but it was not time for pick-up yet! I told both
Kai and his friend's mum that I would be there between 1 pm and 1.30 pm. I
dong-ed until 12.45 pm and hopped into a cab!
When I picked Kai up, he wished I could have fetched him later. Hey, who
wanted me to pick him up at 1 pm?? I think he was at first worried about
whether I could find him - probably coz the last time, he was at a condo
common area which was quite large but that time, A stayed with him; Pre-COVID
:p
Well, can't blame him. From the photos, the small group of boys really had a
lot of fun! They went to the pool, had fried rice, had ice cream and were
playing Nintendo/laptop when I got there.
We took the cab to BPP. Just as we got out of the cab, I realised that he had
worn his shirt inside out! My silly boy!
I think this photo taken at Popular deserves its own post!
Kai happily went to play Nintendo when we got back, while I unpacked my Daiso
stash. Bought a big die coz it's big, haha!
Bought a balance game too!
Then Kai convinced me to play Mega Man.... Gosh, that was hard!! First, my son
is not the best teacher! Second, my hands cannot la... How to jump and shoot
at the same time! And I don't quite remember which button is for what action
*.* I'm now very impressed with how fast Kai does it!
Better to take wefie while he plays
Came out of the shower to find them playing the new toy
I was surprised Yu could manage the little knobs very well and didn't knock over everything!
Kai did not jump around much at bedtime today. Think he must be tired out from his play date. Just as well!
Saturday, 22 Aug 2020, marks the day I made my first yeast bread!
Oh wait, I made hot cross buns back in July hoho! But that didn't go down well with everyone coz it's nothing like in the song...?!
Forgive me for the missing crosses! Mixture too watery!
Also forgive the ugliness; I'm new to this! The recipe is good and the buns were yummy! I kept some in the freezer and microwaved them when I wanted one or two - still great!
I still had some leftover bread flour from July so that Saturday morning, I pulled out this dinner roll recipe. I had an accident and spilled some milk and yeast mixture so I did a random top-up *.* I was afraid the dough wouldn't happen but it did!
I didn't divide or roll them very well :p
Dinner rolls with mostly bread flour - had to top up with plain flour to make three cups :p
Kai and Yu like it :) Yu was ill but still ate it!
The following Saturday, I made one with plain flour. Somehow the dough was stickier. I couldn't tell the difference in taste though.
And last Saturday, I converted the recipe to a tangzhong 汤种 - this page gives a good explanation of how to do that. Again, I couldn't tell the difference in taste. It was supposed to stay fresh longer but I always microwaved the buns as I like the warm anyway. So I guess I'll stick to the easier recipe!
But I'm hoping to get a stand mixer to make the process easier. The kneading doesn't take too long but (1) I get sweaty, (2) I still may not get a good texture after 15 sweaty minutes.
For some weeks now, Yang comes home with two sets of homework every Friday, one for English and one for Chinese. So we spend Saturday mornings doing homework. And his lazy boy doesn't want to complete Chinese writing - instead of tracing 10 我 and writing five, he only wants to trace two and write one *.* Fine, I let him be as long as he does it well. In any case, he can recognise quite a number of Chinese words when we read.
The worst type of homework is, however, handicraft! They are couched as parent-child activity but seriously, I cannot la...
Recently, both Yang and Yu had some activities *.* Very cute to see them do but very tiring to help them with it coz really, I cannot la, handicraft!
Drawing face of Merlion
Water from the Merlion's mouth
Yang and his Merlion!
"I want to put the wheel on..."
Yu and his Yakult car!
So now, I spend more time doing homework with Yang and/or Yu than with Kai! Kai usually doesn't have homework. If he does, it's not a lot, and it's certainly not handicraft! I only need to sit with him to guide him on the instructions, especially for Chinese homework.
Or I can give Kai homework that I like - comprehension! :p I like to see how he understands the passage and explains the answer when marking. I also like to draw with him - just draw, no handicraft. We follow Art for Kids Hub so it's easy and fun - he has even learnt that the most important thing in the process is to have fun, woohoo!
I also like to do a lot of Chinese with him coz really no choice. Recently, I found that his Chinese reading seems to have improved a little. I was quite pleased and quit trying to sign him up for Chinese tuition. That may yet come next year... We shall see..
In the last week of August, I finally decided to refresh Yang's room.
Original wall decal has lost its colours and parts have peeled off
New wall decal!
Two things remain - the bit of wall where the paint dropped off with a plastic sticker to dampen the key to the window grilles (oops :p) and a cute picture of Yang from school!
Made it nice and cozy so that the boys can enjoy bedtime :)
But they don't *.*
All love to watch funny videos or phone videos a bit longer. To do that, they would read to get enough points. Yang and Yu are ok with reading though Yang sometimes gets lazy and decides to play and give up his funny video instead. The term funny video came about coz Kai and I used to watch his videos which were quite funny! But we went on to YouTube at some point; the name remains the same.
Kai needs to be pushed to read. While his brothers read books of two to four points each, Kai reads 15 min of one book to get seven points. We started him with 10 min for five points so he quibbled quite a bit about the 15 min - his maths is good enough, haha! But now he just picks up the book and gets me to set a timer.
Recently, he discovered Captain Underpants and realised we have a copy so sometimes in the afternoon, he may even read it on his own accord. Small step to something more, I hope... I remember I started going to the library at primary two and never looked back!
Kai reads to Yu sometimes, which frees me to read to Yang
Anyway, back to bedtime...
These days, I don't get to lie in with Yu anymore. Coz I need to be fair and they want me to be fair - 10 mins 陪陪时间 for each boy before tucking them in and leaving the room. But they will come out n times to say goodnight, drink water, pee pee.
When they finally stop coming out, Yang and Yu are up chatting or rolling around for a while. Chatting isn't a bad thing but gosh, they need to sleep! When Kai is around, they get pretty rowdy when I'm with them but after that, Kai tends to doze off first.
And Yu has been wanting to drop his nap for some time now. Kai napped the most, dropping his nap in or after K2, followed by Yang who dropped his nap around five. Yu may drop upon turning four - he couldn't wait to turn four!
But we also have a deal that he has to stop coming to me at night at four years old, heh :p
Coz I love my bedtime, and I love it most when I have enough space and blanket!
