The-Upperroom.com

I am a strawberry!

Then I became chicken little!

Philson wanna be chicken little too!

I am officially on leave! and because of that, I have been bringing the girl for the June holiday programme at Zoophonics. The theme for the 5-day program is Mother Goose Rhymes and for the last 4 days, she has been learning one nursery rhyme after another.

The class is rather interesting with songs, nursery rhymes, art and craft, introducing new things according to the topic that day. The girl is able to focus her attention on the teacher most of the time but I noticed she tends to get bored during story telling time and would like to go to the back of the class to dig for toys she knows that is kept there. Art and craft, snack time and bubbles time at the end of the class are her favourite activities. But I am very perturbed that when she doesn’t get her way, she starts screaming! aiyo! and when other children accidentally knock into her, she makes such a big fuss! Have I got a ngeow ngeow girl on my hands! *blink blink*

Doing art and craft on the first day! Creating a bowl of Peas porridge!

After which the kiddos were given some porridge to taste.

Yummy!

At the end of the class, the toddlers were treated to a bubbles popping time!

Pop pop pop!

Hugging the teacher bye bye!

Trying to feed the mice cheese during the second day when the nursery rhyme of the day is Hickory Dickory dock!

Doing her “walk-about” in the room with a ball she stole from the back of the classroom! aiyo!

The third day was not a very good day for the girl. She had 2 accidents with a very big-sized (18kg) 24-mth old boy in the class. The boy can hardly sit still and spends the better half of the day bull-dozing around the room and it has to be the girl he had a collision with, sending the girl toppling onto the ground with him landing on her. You can imagine how she cried and how she started crying again the moment he enters the room again. I thought I better switch to a class at a different timing, didn’t think it would be a good idea if she start crying the moment she sees him again.

Painting a pig’s mask on the fourth day during art and craft!

Tomorrow is the last day of the class and today after the class we had a good time shopping at ntuc. Ahh! the luxury of being a SAHM, going for grocery shopping at my whim and fancy! hehe!

Going shopping with mummy at ntuc!

Grabbing a phone when mummy was making some enquiries at a bank branch!

Talia loves birds recently, always pointing to the birds outside of the windows when she was fed her meals. We arranged to visit the Jurong Bird Park with some of Jaime’s Dec06 mummies kakis last Sat. However, one of the boy was sick, so the trip was cancelled.

We were up early on Sat morning and I decided to bring the family to Jalan Kayu for prata breakfast and let Talia watch some birds. Jaime didn’t join us for our visit to the Animal Resort last dec. She was happily shopping in Shanghai. So, it’s time for her to meet some geese.

After the yummy prata, we headed for the animal resort. I always love to drive among the various Seletar Farmways. I miss this place. I used to cycle along these farmways during my NS days. The air is always so fresh and feeling the mist on my face as I cycle along was heavenly.

When we alighted from the car, Talia seemed to recognise the place. She walked toward the pond and was greeted by 8-10 geese and 2 goats.

She was overjoyed. Pointing to us as if she was counting the geese.

After 15 mins, we led her away from the geese to meet the goats, but she was not interested. She still insisted on peeping through the woonden fence to watch her goosie friends.

She stood there with her eyes fixated on the geese. Even my camera was not able to distract her focus.

Talia also met a pair of peacock and peahen. She was not too excited about the parrots, because they were making some human noises. The little animals attracted my little zoologist as usual. That same rabbit and a group of guinea pigs have grown in size.

We saw some guppies and koi in the smaller pond. Talia was drawn to the little water falls. She is always attracted to fountains and water falls.

Sometimes, she would study them closely, bend over and focus her eyes on the object for a long period of time. It’s such a joy to see her doing it.

Soon the sun was high up and everyone was thirsty. Talia blew a few french kisses toward the mandarin duck and we waved bye bye to the geese.

Kevin was telling me about this “playground” at botanical gardens which is like super fun! That time he went with Talia Ann and my mil as I was travelling I guess. And now and then he would mention this “playground” again but since I have never been there, it never quite sank in.

One saturday he mentioned the “playground” again and thought he wanted to show me, so we went! and wow! what fun it was! Its not just a “playground”! it’s a big children’s garden with lots of interesting things for kiddos to do inside! I immediately told my Dec06 mummies kakis and one fine saturday evening, a few of us trooped in with our babies. Incidentally, you have to be accompanied by a kiddo before you can be let in and at the entrance of the gardens, there is this kid’s cafe with kid-sized tables and chairs! really cute!

First stop was the suspension bridge. All the kiddos have such fun trying to walk on the swaying bridge!

We then went to the mini water falls. Unfortunately no nice pics of that! but the falls were built in such a way that we can walk behind the falls into a darkened cave-like rock structure so it’s was quite thrilling for the toddlers!

Then we came to his enormous “tree house” playground complete with slides and tunnels, but all the toddlers were too young to be climbing that and playing on the slides.

We proceeded a bit further and came to a log over a little stream! ah! How fun and challenging it was for the little ones to cross the log!

A little ahead was this little kiddy-sized house where the little ones eagerly scrambled inside to look out of the little window to wave to all the parents looking on from outside!

We saved the best for the last! Sand play and to be followed by water play!

It was so funny to see how gingerly Talia step onto the sand and that wondering expression on her face due to the feel of sand on her bare feet! But she very gamely sat down and began digging vigorously at the sand with the sand toys we brought along!

what better way to get rid of the sand then to wash it all off! The ginggang charged towards the water fountain area and deposited the toddlers at the water. Nathan was over the moon! He charged towards the water fountain and before you could count 1, 2, 3 he was all drenched. Mandy was staring suspiciously at one of the sprouting fountain and i think she stayed rooted there for quite a while. Talia was given a little pail to hold and she was also approaching very cautiously towards the water source but it was not too long before she got all drenched too!

After giving the kiddos about 20 mins to play at the fountain, they were whisked off to change but not before a butt-naked Nathan trying to dash back towards the fountains again! It was hilarious!

It was such a fun adventure that we promise ourselves that we would come again very soon!

My Mum bought Talia Ann a cute baby girl in a box for Christmas. The box is actually a boxy backpack which contain the baby girl, a milk bottle, blanket, pillow and a pacifier.

Talia loves it and started feeding the baby (Mei mei, 妹妹) with the milk bottle without any instrcutions from any of us. She does that during her morning play and in the evening after dinner. She will also put the 妹妹 on the pillow and covers her with the blanket. However, she is not sure what to do with the pacifier, since she doesn’t use one herself. She just swing the pacificer around.

Every night before she goes to bed, we will put 妹妹 to sleep in the box nicely, zip it up and put the box aside.

One of the evening (last month), I noticed that Talia was very busy playing in the living room. I went to take a peep. To my surprise, she was trying to pack herself in the 妹妹 box without knowing that she is a few sizes too large for the box.

She did that for almost 20 minutes, trying hard to find the right position to sit in the box. Yes, the box did not take too long to go out of shape.

After that, she added 妹妹 to the box. I was already laughing hilariously. Can you notice the slight disgust on Talia’s face? She doesn’t like to be laughed at.

When she try to pull both the blanket from under the box and close the plastic cover of the box simultaneously, she fell backwards and almost hit her head. Thank god that I was there to catch her and the playmat absorbed the impact of the fall.

That didn’t stop her for too long. She started the process again and finally managed to fit herself and 妹妹 nicely in the box and cover the lid over part of her head….but of course she was not able to zip up.

Some how after more than an hour of play, she came to the realisation about the relative sizes and gave up trying. To confirm that observation, I monitor her for the next few days. She did not repeat her experimental play, not till this day.

To be frank, I wanted to stop her the moment I saw her sitting in the box and breaking the shape of the box. I controlled my immediate respond and let her play on, knowing that creative experimental play is the best way for her to learn about the world around her. Glad she learned that she is too big for the box and hopefully, she will also learn to think out of the box in times to come.

This is the baby girl all decked out in red during the CNY visiting! That little piggie handbag is for all her angbaos! waha!

Just a few minutes before the Christmas tree enters cold storage again, I decided to take some photos of Talia with Cookie under the tree.

It’s an attempt to replay what I did last Christmas.

Christmas 2006

Christmas 2007

Cookie girl was not too happy with the new arrangement. Just look at her facial expression.

She usually prefers to be be under the tree, so I switched them.

Christmas 2007 (Part II)

Now, Talia seem happier….I’m not sure about cookie girl.

Daddy wonder where is he going to position baby boy next Christmas.

She was excited when she saw the billiard room with all the colourful balls on the tables.

Thanks to the smoking ban in Billiard rooms, we brought her in to join her aunties, uncles, grand aunties & grand uncles for the billiard session.

Talia helping to position the balls…

Maybe, I should play lawn bowling with the balls instead,since the billiard cue is too long for me.” Talia Ann

oooh ooooh! this is like sooo late! Let’s have a fast one then!

The birthday cake! We were deciding between a cake that looks good or a cake that tastes good. There are fancier designs, 3D, tiered cakes you name it! but we were not sure if its going to taste yummy and we decided on a trusted source “The Patissier“.

From feedback, the reviews are fantastic for the cake!

The cupcakes were from Dee, a December mummy! Notice how she used all the sesame street colours as well! So sweet!

The elmo candle! Some guests had a lot of fun trying to find the candle on the cake! Wahaha!

David gor gor admiring our little princess dress!

Talia : “Opps…I think I dropped my crystal shoe…”

I know this is almost 2 weeks late…everybody is asking for Talia’s 1st Birthday party photos.

I managed to find some time to download, resize and then upload some of the photos this morning. Since my dearest wifey spent months searching all over the world for the themed party decorations (yes, she did…mostly purchased via the internet), I must showcase her collection first.

Before that, anybody wanna guess what was the party theme?

Did I hear Sesame Street?

Jaime got some very nice balloons and we rented a helium tank to fill them up. This is the large Elmo ballon, but it flew away after the party. Given the wind conditions of the day, it should land somewhere in Sumatra….LOL

I love these baby Elmos.

We had a large Sesame Street Scene Setter as the back drop for the Sesame Street cake.

Even the party hats, plates and napkins were Sesame Street’s theme. There were specially printed for 1st birthday.

The birthday party was held in a function room next to a lovely swimming pool.

This is a Sesame Street themed party,so instead of a flower center-piece, we had a Sesame Street center-piece for the buffet table.

Creatively designed by her Daddy, Talia’s best friends, Ernie, Big bird, Elmo & Cookie monster were invited to be the models.

I know, I know…those who missed the cake cutting is dying to see the Sesame Street cake….wait lah. Leave some comments and I’ll upload the cake.

To be continued….

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