Monkeys at the zoo!

Almost every May, I brought out the koi streamers. The boys have no idea what they were about of course. Last year was quite a disaster coz we suddenly had no more grilles. This year, I was better prepared :)

Celebrating our naughty but lovely boys!

They happened to be standing with their own streamer

And this year, 5 May was a Sunday - perfect for an excursion! And I got corporate pass for the zoo! :) With the zoo so near, we started our excursion with two bus rides.

Yu got a shot of him on a bus!

So happy :)

There's a photo of Kai on a bus with Sito, and Yu kept saying it was him, not GeGe! Poor boy. Our kids love taking buses.

Waiting for the next bus at a ulu bus stop

And finally we got to the zoo! It looked like a lovely day, and it turned out quite well really. A little cloudy so it wasn't too hot, and we had only a few drops of rain. Lucky!

Yang had a go at this hopscotch, which looked different from what I remember!

Kai went next...

I love this shot of Yu jumping!!

Kai had a shot like this too; Yang refused :p

Rare occasion when they gawked at animals!

Yu was telling me about some attraction he saw on the zoo guide :)

Yang on top of a big fake snake!

The boys kept whining about ice cream. Luckily we came well prepared. They were so happy to get Porky sticks - though they aren't Porky brand! - and ate as we walked quietly towards the kiddy area.

Found a cotton pod along the way

The first thing was the carousel of course!

Yu even stayed on to watch the beginning of the next round

Yang had gone off ahead for this

Wishing well kind of thing

The rabbits were so soft!

We were just in time for an animal show!

At the end of the show, we got to pat the dogs in the show. Yang was very interested. How interested? Let's see...

Yang sayang-ing the dog

The girl next to him left, he was still there

Another girl joined in, he was still there

The girls left, Yu came along, Yang was still there!

Feeding time!

No boy got kissed this time :p

There seemed to be a clearer boundary now. We were told to stay behind the drain. Yu kept throwing the carrots; think he was afraid to go near. Silly boy :)

Lunch was at KFC. While Sito was getting food, a familiar-looking guy brought a tray of food to the table behind us. During lunch, I heard snippets of the conversation of the family behind, some showbiz thing in Taiwanese accent. Then I realised that that guy was not an acquaintance but I had seen him on TV or something, hoho! Later I recognised his wife. I cannot understand going to the zoo in full makeup but I suppose there are expectations for them!

Kai wanted a photo, which was interesting coz he usually didn't like to keep posing for me!

Monkey Yang refusing to pose properly!

I don't know what he was doing...

Show-and-tell?!

With no disrespect... Is this called 班门弄斧??!

We missed the elephant show which was right after the animal show but some minutes' walk away and we went to feed animals. Yang was a little sad, maybe coz we didn't get to watch the elephant show the last time due to rain.

Playground time! Really like to see them slide down together :)

We stopped by the souvenir shop near the exit and got them a  fluffy toy each. Then we had the much anticipated ice cream - but they had to share a sundae coz I refused to spend $20 on three cones with just one scoop of ice cream each!

Took a taxi home and managed to keep Yu awake! He was going to sleep but I distracted him with photos from our excursion. So I got to nap a little with him at home :p

Kai arranged this for the camera :)

Panda for Kai, elephant for Yang, lion for Yu. I told Kai he must speak only Mandarin to the panda, haha!

A cut on Yu's scalp!

Thursday, 2 May, I was attending to Kai's nosebleeding at the dining table when I heard a thud followed by a wail from Yang's room. I dashed in and found Yang standing near his bed looking down at what I presumed was Yu on the floor between the bed and the window.

I went over and could barely see Yu who was partially hidden by the bed, facing down. I grabbed my little rag doll and got a shock when I brought him upright - blood was streaming down his face from his head! He must have landed on the window kerb! :(

As I placed the crying baby in my arms and shouted for tissue and Sito, the blood flowed into his ears. One of the kids probably brought the tissue box in. I couldn't remember. But I remember seeing fresh blood on every fresh piece of tissue and being scared the bleeding wouldn't stop.

N took over to press on the wound while I changed to get him to a doctor. By then, thankfully the bleeding had stopped and he had also stopped crying.So we thought of going to the GP downstairs as that might be faster than A&E. But both the PD and GP staff said that they would have to refer us to the hospital if he required stitching so we cabbed down to NUH anyway.

Took a picture while waiting for the taxi

Yu dozed off in the taxi. But before that, Sito and I were talking about the possibility of stitches and hence GA! Gosh, my poor little baby. I had to use Japanese to tell Sito I was scared of my young baby undergoing GA, coz I didn't want to scare Yu. A third language is useful!

The triage nurse told us, however, that glue might be another option. GLUE! And even if it were to be stitches, he could be given an injection to go to sleep; that would be like what I had for the miscarriage just before we had Yang. Bottomline - no GA! Woohoo!

Triage nurse bandaged him up - he seemed quite pleased!

He also took pictures of us

Maybe coz it was a head injury, we were called in pretty quickly. The doctor was very nice. Our monkey was also a model patient. He let her examine and touch, and didn't whine until the glueing began, as his hair was tugged to cover the cut. So we were supposed to be glad to learn that the cut wasn't too deep - no skull visible *.* And we learnt of a bruise on the right of his forehead too - oops, missed that...

He dozed off on the taxi home again. We bandaged him up at home without waking him, and put him in bed. I slept with him that night. But somehow, the bandage slipped off. He even found and gave me the sticky tape!

Fresh bandage in the morning; he asked to remove it within minutes

Kept him home in case he or his friends scratched the glue off. It was supposed to drop off in a week or so. In the meantime, wash hair gently; we just used water, no soap. I stayed home with him. He was quite a joy when he wasn't asking for video, haha!

Hello, Groot

Happened to be aircon servicing day so he had fun watching the men use the noisy vacuum. We then left the house to buy bread etc while N cleaned up. I wanted to work during his nap time but ended up sleeping with him! Kai woke me, of course...

Day 2 - seems like a perfectly fine baby though it seemed to be itchy

Day 3 - a little red but everything was dry and hard to the touch

He still seems quite conscious about touching his wound. Sometimes he would just say itchy and asked me to blow - coz I blew at it the first time he complained of itch. Well, good that he's not touching it!

As for the cause.... Well, Yu said it was Yang who pushed him. Yang admitted it when I asked him the next day. I took away his video privileges for the rest of the week. Sito said a caning was waiting. Yang was sad :(

I probed further on Saturday on the bus to/from music class - he said they were knights and he pushed Yu. So it seemed like it was an accident during play. So he managed to escape the cane. But I had to talk to him twice about no more playing knights on the bed!! And no pushing!!

Bake day!

Two Mondays ago, or was it three? Anyway, 22 April, Kai brought his little bites home. When I asked him why, he said he still had Wang Wang left from recess. How many did he buy? He got all funny-nervous and sheepish, and after pulling a promise out of me that I would not scold him for buying that, he cheekily took out an empty bag.

HE FINISHED THE WHOLE BAG!

There were some 10 packs inside, though later he said he had seven of eight packs. Anyway, everything was gone. And then he kept the empty bag...?!

So I decided on the spot to not give him pocket money anymore. Anyway, he had been buying only milo and spicy chips etc kind of food for recess. So for the rest of the week, he brought homemade stuff to school. It was lucky we had some flapjacks and chocolate cake at home from the previous weekend bake. But he didn't like the chocolate cake.

Anyway, I thought he should have something savoury for recess and not sweet stuff all the time, so I decided to bake that very Sunday!

But first, I made pancakes for breakfast!

Pretty ugly, but so fluffy! Kai asked for this coz they did some pancakes in school a couple of weeks back. But he had only a few mouthfuls. Yu wasted two pancakes. Yang didn't take any. Sito had one so it was me for the rest!!

Kai's pancake - so nice, so unwanted

And that afternoon, the baking started - sausage rolls, bacon/ham and cheese scrolls, flapjacks. I prepared everything to pop into the oven all at once. It took quite a while!

Just waiting for the oven to heat up now

The scrolls looked good! But the dough was too thick and hard...

I learnt that puff pastry and filo pastry are different, hoho!

I packed the sausage rolls for Kai the next day - he loved it! But by Thursday, he stopped liking it *.* I didn't give him the scrolls coz they were too hard. I made the same dough again last Saturday but used it as pizza crust - thin and yummy!

Melted cheese and ham mini pizzas!

Looks like I'll be baking a lot :))

May Day out

Istana? Chinese/Japanese Garden? West Coast Park? Decided on the last one coz there were more things to do!

Sand play! For like two minutes...!

Yu on zipline!

Kai had the most momentum but still needed Papa for the last mile

Forgot to take a picture of Yang on the zipline :( He was the first to do it while I was alone with him and Yu so I was busy watching Yu on a raised platform, oops...

Kai got stuck!

Yang couldn't go any further

My babies are still quite little after all.. Sometimes I feel like they are growing all too fast...

So happy to be on a swing and not afraid of falling off!

Yang was so happy he could fit into this too!

I think my right arm that was pushing Yang is tingling right now... I might suffer tomorrow...

An inclusive merry-go-round!

Decided to head for the coast line, let them look out to the sea with all the boats. But we were there for maybe a minute?! They were all keen to go to Macs and willingly pose for a photo. Yu was still blur blur so Kai kept his head in position!!

Smile!

I remember a shot like this with just Kai years back, when we brought him here to play. Now we are five! :)

We found a table at Macs and parked our scooters outside. Surprisingly, the food came rather quickly though the lines were long. Kai had sausage McMuffin, Yang had the same with egg, Yu had a hashbrown and some bites of sausage and scrambled eggs off a big breakfast we shared. And then we had ice cream!

Yu dozed off almost right after we drove off, and Yang closer to home. Meanwhile, my tummy acted up real bad two junctions away from home! Thankful to still be able to control it and get us safely home.

The parents napped while the boys were playing in the living room :p Somewhere along the way, Yu came in to nap with me. I woke when my 1-hour alarm went off but I was so sleepy I didn't go out to stop the PS3! By the time I got up for good, it was 4 pm! Gave them some tea and woke Yu up at 4.30 pm.

Mayhem ensued! I took the chance to sing, haha!

The boys want my mike too!

Yes, very nice but please go hide already! Kai was already counting to 20!

Headed down for football and more scooter just before dinner. Yu was getting better with his scooter. Both Yang and Yu got their scooter when they turned two while Kai got his at three. Think Yang is the most athletic of them all based on how fast they got the hang of scooting around and badminton.

Yu finally cruising on one leg

Dinner was at the Kowloon cafe downstairs. We have been passing it by every day. Yang and Yu kept pointing to the picture, saying they wanted char siew noodles! And Yu would sound so pathetic, as if I was starving him! The staff were usually pretty amused... I always said we would go with Papa one day. And finally, we went today!! Hope that would change the kids' narrative tomorrow...