New school-Julia Gabriel

Have heard a lot of good reviews about this school...So we also signed up Jared for their bilingual playclub without a trial or visit to the sites, very daring huh? hehe.

The beginning of big and more mistake??? Duzz..

This week's class started with Mandarin session first . Had a puzzling first half hour..We were sitting in the studio doing nothing, and the chinese teacher are not teaching? Took their own sweet time to ask around getting the kiddo's chinese name....So Jared played with the toys..occasionally standby the window and wowed at the big playground outside. He also sit by teacher's keyboard..and started playing away with the keyboard.

After a long wait, finally teachers starts the class..but Jared has got bored in the room..soon after he was wailing in the class. In fact, it was so bad that he didnt get to do the handicraft while the rest of kids would go home with their dragon. Then it was story telling time, he couldn't concentrate and keep pointing to the doors. When it was snack time, he only took half of the small piece of honeydew and 1 bite of cheese. The rest of items, Jared arranged nicely on the table...*Headache*.

Then the 2nd English session started. Teachers was playing guitar and sing at the same time. Similarly, Jared was wailing and trying to get out of the class throughout...He started to enjoy when teacher said its playground time. There were so many different cars to play with.
The last session of the class is singing time. Jared was clinging to me through out..and started yelling "回家"!...

Overall, we felt so sorry to force Jared to school. But I must say I enjoy the live music the teacher prepared, it make the class so lively. Hopefully Jared would show some improvement in the next few weeks...if not probaly, he will be the 1st to drop out the class liao...

Zoo again??

I mentioned previously the kiasu me will make sure that we visit the zoo regularly. Ha..here we comes again! Early in the morning we taught Jared to say "Zoo" when asked where are you going?

But this round was a short trip, main purpose is to tire out Jared so that he could get a good afternoon nap before starting school at Julia Gabriel in the evening.

We saw the zebra, lion and giraffe, also took the tram to the children's playground. There was nobody when we reached there...I tried to put Jared to play at the water pool, but he refused, After a bit of warm up here and there (basically I need to demo walking around in the pool), he then finally dares to step into the pool and walking around. But blur me forgot to bring changing clothes and towels. So Jared go home with only his diapers on..hehe.. We'll definitely be going to the children's pool again..The water are so cold..So fun to walk in it.

p/s Free tram ride is only available to friends of zoo during weekdays..that's another reason we usually tried to squeeze zoo trip on Fri. Can't imagine we need to walk through the zoo..hehe..

What's up??

What's up ah yi?? I'm very busy one..

I'm busy learning and doing self improvement...Just a few weeks you don't see me, I could count 1, 2, 3, 5 6 chibu.. Smart boh?

Thanks for your hard rock t shirt..but don't buy me anymore, it's my 4th piece, after Tokyo, Yokohama, San Francisco and finally Berlin is it?? I'll probaly only be able to wear it when I'm 4 or 5 yr old since I'm always slim..unlike both you and mummy..pui pui..hehe..

-Jared-

Update as of 19mth Day2 (20 Jun 07)

Q: How old are you?
A: 1 year old

So happy..I've been trying to teach Jared this since he turned 1 year old. But he always refused to listen. But then again when question being asked too often eg. What's your name? How does the cow sounds? etc He will refused to ans again..

19 mth old!

Achievements:

-Wean off sarong
Biggest achievement over the month definitely!!...Finally I could keep away with the bulky sarong stand and make way for other stuff..hehe..Kee Ping has been eyeing on a table and stool set from Ikea, so that Jared could do some art & craft there. Also need to move out the ball house he received as 1st year Birthday pressie from my uni pals... (Pai seh, Agnes, will make good use of the pressie soon). Cos everytime we take it out ..the 100 balls ended every where in the house, make me headache leh.

-Learning to count
Can follow the display in the lift and count 1 to 9 pretty well. Coz we stayed on the 9th floor at Whampoa.
But if count items, sure to forget the no. 2.. So he'll sound like this..
1 Tree, 3 Tree
1 cloud, 3 cloud or 1,3,4,5 etc

Recognise numbers up and can say up to 19 when read from flash cards.

-Describe things
Says "Big moon" for full moon
Says "Red car"

-Say out loud words he know without being asked
Since the past mth, when he see something he knew, he will say out loud..we don't need to ask what's this and that anymore. Sometimes you'll find him showing off words he knows around as he loves to be complimented..and even will yell " yehhhhh" and clap hands for himself when others commented he's a smart boy.

-Know a lot more chinese words..
He could say 拉极桶 and link it to "Pong" sound...so if we leave the house with big plastic bag, he will think we want to go to the rubbish shoot and keep saying "拉极桶 Pong"

Nope, we didn't manage to let him say "Daddy/Mummy 抱我"..but he could now say 抱我,抱我,抱我,抱我,抱我,抱我..until you get so irritated and have to carry him..hehe..

-Request "sweet sweet" from neighbours
Jared have the habit to ask for "sweet sweet" from 1 or 2 neighbour..Then the neighbour will give him a rocher in return..So pai seh!

-Look Pui Pui on weekdays and skinny on weekend
Since very very young, ie. 3mth old Jared already has this problem..He'll look pui pui with round tummy and big butt on weekdays..but when we bring him home on our off days, he'll look very skinny the next morning when he wake up..Strange huh? We used to get stressed out..and won't dare to bring him home if that Sat need to bring him for jab as they will measure his weight and height there. Now we heck care liao, sometimes I felt he look better on weekend when he's skinny..heheh..

Playgroup + Father's day celebration

Thanks to Megan who opened up her house to host a playgroup cum Father's day celebration for our MSN kakis..

The program was very well organised, which includes the welcome good morning song, story telling, bubble and art&craft time. Not sure what happen, Jared just couldn't mix in with the rest..and demand us to carry him all the time and keep saying he "怕" (scared)...Probaly cos there were already a lot of ppl there since we were late.

But towards the art & craft session, he suddenly got warmed up..once Sin Mei put down the water colors, he held my hand asked me to bring him over to the colors..Didn't know he like coloring so much..Big thank you to SM who brought the stuff..This session let us realised the other side of Jared .....guess what, after the session, we chiong to buy the coloring materials ! hehe..

Jared's work

Happy Father's Day to all Daddies..

Baking Time...Cheese and Chive Scone

Finally we can bake again, used the shell points to exchange for a cornell mixer since the previous one was down. Hope this mixer could last us a longer time hehe.

This round we decided to bake some scone..since I loves scone...Tasted my first scone when we were in Australia travelling 5 yrs ago..

Cheese and Chive Scone Recipe

(Extracted from Karen Cheng's blog)

225g (8 oz) self raising flour
50g butter
1 cup cheese
¼ teaspoon of salt
1 tablespoon dried chives
¼ cup of milk to make a soft dough



1. Rub butter into flour.

2. Add salt, cheese, chives and give it a stir.

3. Add milk and mix to make a nice soft dough. If too sticky add more flour.

4. Throw onto floured surface. Knead a bit. Press flat with hands, thickness of 1-2cms. Cut out with a scone cutter. Place on oiled baking try.

5. Bake for 20-25 minutes in 200ºC in microwave oven, or until golden brown.

p/s: Strange, the scones turned out very different as those shown in Karen's webbie. Ours is very "fair"..and I felt that it's a bit too salty too. As we don't have scone cutter, the shape of the scone also turned out odd.

But we loved its taste, out of 12-14 pieces we made...both Kee Ping and me wallop down almost all.. left only 2 for the rest of the family to taste..Wow...Think we only take 2 piece out of 7 we made..for the previous banana walnut muffin..cos more oily and sweet..

Kee Ping felt that a lot of improvement needed, and it's not presentable yet..that's why I wasn't allowed to bake more for the Sat playgroup.. :(

Jared wasn't able to help yet, in fact he hated the mixer sound, and keep saying 怕 and asked me to bring him out of the kitchen..hehe..Probaly we'll get a shape cutter and get him to cut out the shape next round.

New skill- Take pic with a camera!

Some pics taken by Jared on his own!! Pretty artistic huh?

...and finally our talented photographer.. (Taken by me after he finished meddling with the camera)..Judging at the way he is handling the camera..I'm sure new one will be on the way soon..hehe..

Picnic at Upper Pierce Reservoir

Need to make good use of our picnic mat, so an impromptu decision to picnic...Unfortunately the road towards the reservoir were under construction, so didn't get to see monkeys as what we used to see..and of cos didn't have the luck of monkeys joining us for picnic too...hehe..

Weather was breezy as it was about to rain when we reached there. Pretty fun, and Jared loves the green views and also the chwee kuah we ta pau. But he don't like the chai por..would split it out.

We played bubbles too...but soon had to leave as it was raining..

Watering The Plants

How does the animal sound?

Jared was able to make animal sounds after our zoo trips..Probaly cos I sang out loud old MacDonald song when we were there especially in front of the goats, cow and pig..hehehe..

Other than goat, cow, dog, cat that were recorded in the video, he could also do pig, crow, and elephant..But hard to get a chance to properly take video, cos he would snatch my camera instead.

AMK MacDonald and Park

Finally Jared got his 18mth booster jab from the polyclinic, this appointment was changed several time due to him being sick or daddy's work schedule..He is 10.8kg and 80cm and 18.5mth, merely 25percentile...aiyo..

After the jab we went to Ang Mo Kio...There has got a Macdonald with big playground. It's a very nice Mac with it's indoor and outdoor dining area. We went there for breakfast and after that a walk at the nearby park. But the play area doesn't suits kids at Jared's age, cos need to climb up the staircase before can slide down. We do surprise that AMK has got such a big and nice park...except that weather is too hot!!

Playing at the playground with other kid




AMK Park

Evening outing at Vivocity

We went to Vivocity for a evening outing...There Jared had his home cooked dinner and we had ours too, Long John..facing sentosa.

Jared requested this pic cos he like the 10s flashing from the camera's auto taking function. He loves to yell "Yeh" after the 10s. hehe.

Jared had a happy time walking around vivo

We are Friends of Zoo!

Got motivated when I saw Rae's happy video playing at Zoo's children pool...at the same time, also got fed up by the balloting system for zoo pass from my comp...To strike it is probaly as hard as 4D... So finally we stepped into zoo again after 9 mths and got ourselves the Friends of zoo so that we could come anytime we wants and exposed Jared to more outdoor activities.

Frankly speaking, I think we regretted the decision. It was so hot and Jared's response was so-so only probaly due to the hot weather too. Of cos, compared to 9mths ago, it was much a better trip...This round Jared could recognise, Tiger, monkey, elephant, rabbit, snake, cow etc etc...Even demostrated the sound of elephant to us.

But our old bones ache even though we only managed to walk half of the park. Nevertheless the kiasu me, would certainly make the $ spent on Zoo Pass well worth..hehe..See ya soon, my zoo friend!