Today is the start of a new term (Term 3 to be exact), Rayner is excited because he knows right after Term 3, there will be another week’s school holiday then come Term 4 will be his super long school holidays and after that he will be in PRIMARY 2. I have no why he is in such a hurry to go primary 2…..
Today started off well, no nonsense from him when I dropped him off at the day care centre (means he didn’t cry). Reminded him to give the guard at the school gate the declaration form before going into the school, reminded him what bus he needs to take and which stop he needs to alight because KS mummy is worried he has forgotten everything during the 1 month school holidays.
School re-opening also means my shiok and leisure life over liao, it’s back to rush routine again…..thank goodness to the weekly pilates class I am taking every saturday, I cannot imagine how much more tired I will be without my pilates classes.
At home these days, whenever we are free, we will be reinforcing sight words reading with RayAnne.
I have printed these sight words out on plain in simple boxes and circles, the little one will cut them out and stick them on small cards and we would flashing these days every now and then. Sometimes she remembers them, but sometimes she just couldn’t remember the words but we will keep trying. She enjoys cutting them out and pasting them on the cards more than trying to remember how to pronounce the words……
These days, I feel that the Rays are growing apart and very much learning and leading their own lives especially since they are now in different schools, they have different friends and teachers. Boys being boys, they are usually not that emotionally attached to anyone except MUMMY but RayAnne being the girl, has always had her brother or us in her thoughts. One classic example, when Rayner has 2 sweets, he would eat both the sweets and only when asked to share with his sister, he will give her one sweet. RayAnne on the other hand is different. One day, she came back from school holding 2 sweets. The minute she stepped into the house, she went running to her brother asking him which sweet he wants. She is ever ready to share her sweets even without us asking her to share. It turns out her brother didn’t want (this boy doesn’t likes sweets) the sweet so she turned to me and offered me the sweet instead (mummy’s 2nd choice) but I too didn’t want the sweet and asked her to keep both the sweet for herself.
As you all know, we do not have a maid neither do we stay very near (walking distance I meant) my parents or David’s parents so having either side of the parents as back up to pick up the kids can be almost be considered a definite NO NO. 6 months has since past but I am still trying to work out the timing portion and thank goodness I have a job which is pretty fixed when it comes to working hours.
Now that Rayner is in the afternoon session which he will still be when he attends primary 2 next year, our timing will be pretty fixed and routine say for the next 1.5 years. Only when RayAnne goes into primary 1 in year 2011, she will be in the afternoon session but Rayner will already be in the morning session then my major headache will start but we shall handle that when it comes. We will tackle one problem at a time, right now, every morning, David will bring RayAnne down to the car park to fetch the car while I will walk Rayner to the student care centre which is now by the way downstairs our home. After that, we will both send RayAnne to her childcare centre which is about 5 mins away. Then after dropping our princess off, David will drop me off at Mandy’s place where I will hitch a ride to work everyday. That solves most of my transport and timing problem. There there is the going home part. 5.30pm on the dot, you will see me leaving my office to catch the Jurong East train home and if nothing goes wrong, by 6.15pm I should reach Yew Tee and it takes me 10 minutes to walk home. Rayner’s school bus will reach the waiting point sometime around 6.50pm and RayAnne’s school bus will reach our place sometime around 7.00pm.
I usually still have time to go home and change into home clothes and slippers before walking to Rayner’s bus waiting point. After fetching Rayner, we usually have to wait another good 15 mins downstairs at our place for RayAnne’s bus to come. Childcare bus operators tend to drive more slowly and careful because they are ferrying much younger children as compared to the giant bus Rayner is taking. And our Uncle Teo is a very fatherly figure who is very cautious when ferrying the kids around. The longest we ever waited downstairs was 30 mins. And when it rains, he will drive even slower. Instead of letting Rayner wait with me downstairs the whole entire time, I have decided to make better use of the time so I tried out something new, something I have never done before. Right after fetching Rayner, we go straight home instead of proceeding to RayAnne’s bus waiting point. Once home, he will go about and do his routine like bathing, watching TV/DVD or playing his PSP all ALONE at home while I trottle downstairs and wait for RayAnne.
I initially felt really bad leaving him ALONE at home but David explained that Rayner has to learn to be independent and it will only be for 10 – 15 mins and I will only be downstairs. The first couple of days I tried leaving him ALONE at home, I was more worried and scared than Rayner. He was like ok lor and he actually enjoys the time alone because he can take his own time showering and after showering, he would be on the sofa playing his PSP (having a whale of a time). And there were so many times, when I came back with RayAnne, he was still in the shower. But I did tell him that if he ever felt scared, he should call me and I will be there to talk to him and never to open the door to strangers or attempt to take the key, open the door and leave the house. He was aware of what he should and should not do. I just hope I am not doing something terribly wrong here. Sometimes I think, am I being too over-protective of the kids especially Rayner because he is a boy and he has to learn to become strong and independent.
I haven’t mentioned that David had recently been to an interview and if everything goes well and smooth as planned. He will start to travel extensively like 70% of the time and each trip will be for about a month to 2 months but when he isn’t travelling, he will be home because there isn’t an office here to house all the engineers, then he can be the house man when he isn’t travelling to take care of me and the kids. And of course the money $$ returns will be really attractively (although we know $$ cannot buy everything but we felt we have to do something while we were still young and save as much as we can for the kids’ future). So so attractive that I can be a tai tai liao but you know me liao, I look nothing like a tai tai, infact, I am so plain looking, you may think I am the taitai, kakia.
LOST TIME with the kids is also another issue David was also worried about when we talked about this job offer but I assured him, his relationship with the kids and me should be strong enough to weather anything, in fact, absense makes the heart fonder and in our case it is very true. Everytime he goes away, the kids miss him alot and when he is back he will always try to do things with them and that usually manages to bring the kids closer to his heart. At least I see him trying…..A for EFFORT…..actually, I hate for him to travel, I really wish he can be here with me to weather anything, be it bringing the kids swimming or going to the zoo or movies but I cannot hold him back. I can see that he is now really not happy in his current job and is dragging his feet to work these days and if he is up to a new challenge, I want to be there for him and support him all the way and the only way I can do that is to take good care the home and kids when he is not around.
What I am trying to say here is that, there will come a time when I will be the only person taking care of the kids while David is working hard overseas to bring back the $$ and mentally I have to be very strong to weather everything. I may even have to fall sick lesser than I usually do since there are no MCs with this new role I am taking up. Am now thinking of ways to make life easier and simplier for myself.
We ever considered moving nearer to my mum so she can do the cooking while me and kids can go back everyday for dinner. She can also help me fetch the kids too but we are now pretty deeply rooted in choa chu kang meaning, school’s all settled and kids have all settled in and are enjoying school and I really hate to make the transition. So that idea is out. My mother in law can’t help much too especially now because she is started to have knee cap problem and is now walking rather awakwardly. If I continue my solo routine, the only problem would be what happens when I fall ill and is too sick to cook and take care of the kids??? All these whys, hows and then???? has left some evidence on my head, I’ve noticed lots and lots of white hair sprouting.
Berjaya Times Square hotels are really some to rave about. They gave us a junior suite and the suite is so huge, the kids were always playing hide and seek whenever we were in the room.
We spent the entire day in Cosmo World and the kids had a whale of time. Cosmo world is a indoor theme park within the Berjaya Times Square. One floor of kiddie rides and another floor of thrill rides.
We wanted to visit the Petronas Twin Tower but…..
all the free tickets for the day were already given out so we decided to see the tower from the outside instead.
We also visited the underwater aquarium.
The was something amazing…..never had we saw real time piranha feeding before……it was a real eye-opener. 10 seconds was all it took for a school of piranhas to finish up their food.
We wanted to visit the Pudu jail house but it was closed (but strangely, it was marked as tourist attraction on the KL map).
Went back to the hotel, freshen up before David’s childhood playmate buddy aka uncle Gary came and picked us up for dinner. He was David’s childhood play buddy and all of of us studied in the same secondary school but soon after finished out O levels, he went back to KL to pursue his studies and now after 18 years, he now works in KL and lives in Malacca. His wife and kids are staying in Malacca and he travels up from KL back to Malacca every 2 weeks to be with his family.
We haven’t met up with Gary since Rayner was born and that’s a pretty long time but it’s nice to meet up and catch up with old friends. The feeling is always still there.
This is the kids’ first trip to Malaysia. Yes, they have never even been to JB.
We didn’t opt to drive up on our own, first because we didn’t know our way in Malaysia too well and since it’s a vacation, we may as well leave the driving to others so we took a coach up. Booked our package through Transtar and I have to tell you, their first class luxury coach were really something to rave about. Well, at least the kids were comfy throughout the entire 6 hour journey.
The seats were huge and comfy and could be recline almost completely for you to lie down.
We spent 2 nights in Genting enjoying the cool climate. The kids enjoyed the cool weather too.
Taking it easy the first day we arrived at Genting. Only bought ticket to the indoor & outdoor theme for the next day and we literally spent the whole day running in and out and to and fro the 2 theme parks. But it was pretty disappointing especially for Rayner because as much as he liked and enjoyed the thrill rides, he wasn’t tall enough the ride them all. Most of the had a minimum height requirement of 122cm. So we made the most of whatever rides he was able to ride.
We also visited the Ripley’s Believe it or not gallery
The kids fooling around infront of the funny mirror.
I told them to pretend to prevent the books from falling down but it looks more like they MADE the books toppled…..heehee
The last time I visited Genting was with my parents when I was in my teens and though the place has drastically changed over the long period of time, there really isn’t much to do in Genting.
Soon it was time to leave Genting……we made our way to the bus terminal to catch our transfer to KL.
The boys took care of the luggages whilst the girls strolled and walked behind them. Life is GOOD!
The dingy looking bus counter at the bus terminal and I am not going to deny that the transfer service they offered to fetch us to KL sucked big time. The van was old and the air-con didn’t worked too well and you can imagine how it felt hot and terrible it was when we were in KL. The transfer took us almost 2 hours to arrive at our KL hotel, Berjaya Times Square.
And boy was it hot in KL, no more cool cool breezy air……
heehee…holiday mood here liao so since work all completed up to date and nothing owing to my boss, decided to take the day before our trip off too……..but Daddy couldn’t escape work so we drove Daddy to work today and spent the better half of the morning at the zoo.
By the time we reached the zoo, we were just in time to help the keepers open the zoo…..heehee…we were that early that the zoo wasn’t even opened yet so we had breakfast before starting our journey into the zoo.
Rayner been wanting to catch the elephants taking their bath but we usually miss that because it usually happens everyday at 9am in the morning.
The kids had a fun time feeding the elephants whilst the gentle giants are taking their leisure bath.
It was a pretty messy affair because the gentle giants were splashing water everywhere.
After feeding, still bathing, the elephants will poo….yeah…poo into the same bath water…..and that’s RayAnne showing you how big the elephant’s poo were, as big as a coconut and floating on the water.
See the yellow yellow mass afloat? That’s the poo!
Then silly me suddenly realized I had forgotten to lock the car door…..alamak…..quickly rush back to car park and lock the car before continuing our journey.
Then the children wanted to see the polar bears…… and off to the polar bear enclosure we went.
That’s Inuka the baby polar bear fooling around in the water
That’s Inuka showing off his catch to the audience after his keeper threw him a live bait
Pretty surprised to see the polar bear so near to the display glass, as if she was exhibiting herself for everyone to see…..initially, we thought this smaller sized bear is Inuka (the polar bear born in the Singapore) whilst the bigger sized bear is Sheba the mummy. Turns out, we were wrong, the bigger size bear is Inuka the boy boy polar bear and mummy Sheba is the smaller sized bear.
After watching the Polar bear show, the kids wanted to see the Cat Country and Reptile Country.
There, we saw big CATS…..LIONS……but the huge cats were too tired to stay awake in the hot humid climate…..they were all snoring away Zzzzzzzzz
After that was the Reptile Country…..It was there, we saw all kinds of reptiles, from small snakes to huge big snake, snapping turtles to gila monsters…..I didn’t even knew there was such thing as a gila monster???
That’s the Gila Monster…..if you even see that, shout GILA GILA…..kekekeke
Don’t worry, the kids are not sitting on a real tortoise. It’s just a bronzed statue of the giant tortoise.
And…..this next thing I saw gave me a shock…..there I was walking and reading the information boards about tortoises and turtles……this came out of nowhere…..
I know, it doesn’t look that real but when it comes out from nowhere and you are concentrating on something else, this can really scare you.
See the fake lizard>????? It’s at the far bottom right corner of the photo above…..
After Reptile Country, RayAnne wanted to see the Giraffe. For some reason, this girl seems to like giraffes.
Then my little girl is complaining that she is hungry…….that god for the free tram stamp on our arms…..we were able to hop on and off trams at any stations we want and like and for as many times as we liked (one of the few perks that comes with the ZOO membership)
With this cute stamp printed on our arms, we hopped on the next tram and made our way to the Kidzworld to grab our lunches. The kids requested for KFC and I got each of them a kids meal to enjoy.
After lunch, we explored around the Kidzworlds because everytime we came, we only played water. In fact, the water play theme playground is the main focus but in actual fact, there were lots more around.
Hidden at the far back of the water playground, is a cable swing, there’s also a mini maze and a dry playground….there’s also a dino walk way.
Rayner had loads of fun swing to and fro but RayAnne had only one go at the swing and she fell. Perhaps boys naturally have better motor skills but it did say it was for kids 6 years and above…..maybe 1 year does make a difference. Mummy heart so pain….wish it was me who fell.
Oh my poor baby had a cut on her leg, she cried when she fell but soon forgotten about the pain after I bought her to ride the merry-go-round.
I felt so much better after seeing her smile after the fall. It was only RayAnne and me on the merry-go-round because korkor didn’t want to ride the merry-go-round, he wanted to ride the pony instead……I am not sure but maybe because Rayner is a Horse baby, he seems to especially enjoy pony/horse rides or anything that has to do with horses, he is interested.
Before the ride, I said korkor is horse and immediately the uncle taking care of the pony said, ah, you are 7 years old, just like the pony, then proceed to bring him an extra round without extra charge. And because RayAnne took the merry-go-round, I didn’t buy the coupon for her to ride the horse but the nice uncle gave her a free ride anyway…..
All good things must come to an end. We hopped on the next tram and made our way to the main entrance.
As promised, Ben & Jerry ice creams for the kiddos.
Ice creams never fails to bring on millions of smiles…..after filling their tummies with ice cream, we made our way home. Got a couple of hours to rest before going to fetch Daddy from work.
Final packing before we depart for Genting/KL tomorrow morning
Yes, we bought the Rays to watch Dora Saves the Snow Princess at Orchard Cineleisure over the weekend. David stumbled upon the Dora movie on the Cathay website and decided to bring the little one. She loves Hello Kitty, Dora, anything to do with the Disney Princesses although she never once mentioned which is her favourite princess, maybe she liked them all. My personal favourite, Ariel the little mermaid.
That little girl even got to take photos with Dora. Didn’t expect to have a photo session with the character so we didn’t bring along our digital camera, the 3.2 megapixel camera phone camera will have the make do. Loads of parents Queued in line with their kiddos to wait for their turns to take photos with Dora. The entire theatre was 90% filled and whenever Dora prompt the kids to follow what she says, the whole theatre would be filled with kids repeating in unison. For once, a movie which no one will be given the LOOK and STARES when kids talk and laugh louderly because it was a kiddie movie……:)
Anyway, early part of the June Holiday, we caught our first movie, Monsters and Alien and mid month, we watched Dora and the last movie for June would be Transformers which opens June 24.
This is June has been a particularly happening month for the Rays. RayAnne attended her very first excursion organised by her school. She went to watch a play called “How the Giraffe Got Its Neck” at the Drama Centre Black Box @ National Library.
Rayner’s school put together a holiday camp programme for all their students too. The kids would be bought out of the centre 3 days a week to different places for activities. So far, he’s been on the duck tour, had a ice cream party and horse riding. The school didn’t tell us in detail which day would be what activity and I didn’t probe on, it may be a good idea for him to find out, explore and come back and tell me all about what he has done.
Last week’s theme was Science is Fun, Sports Competition, Card Games, Kampung Games and Duck Tour.
This week’s theme is English Speech & Drama, Sport Competition, Computer Games (Friend or foe) and Play Max
Next week’s theme will be Maths Genius, Sport Competition, Game-Strong Man, Outing and Rock climbing.
I applaud the school for being so proactive to organise such activites for the children. All chidren have loads and bursts of energy and if kept cooped up in the centre the entire month of the school holidays to study and study is a terrible idea and parents can’t possibly take the entire month off just to be with the kids. Bringing the kids out, gives them a chance to off load their endless amount of energy and at the same time explore the surroundings around them.
We will be whisking the kids off to the Malaysia for a short family vacation. This will be the 2nd chop they will collect in their passport. Our plan is to bring them somewhere near every June holiday and somewhere further in December now that we have to follow the school holiday breaks religiously. Given the level of stress our kids go through everyday in school in the current educaton system, hopefully, bringing them out for a breather would do them good and we too need a break from work every now and then so we too can be better parents.
Will update about our Genting/KL trip when we return over the weekend. :)
We started the June Holidays with a trip to the MOVIES……
The kids of course went hysterical, yeah, movie, yeah popcorn, yeah popcorn yeah popcorn (think you get my drift ah)
It was a good movie, we all got a good laugh and I think we all needed it.
We also recently had a PTC session with Rayner’s form teacher. Overall review was, he’s a smart kid but he just doesn’t have the necessary social skills. He has great IQ but little or no EQ. Both David and me didn’t know what to say but at least, the teacher was able to identify his problems areas.
I, for the longest time had doubts about how he is faring in school. It is not the academic part I am particularly concerned about but his social skills and this meet up confirmed my fears. His teacher has no doubt that he is smart but seeing how he interacts with his peers and how well he can focus is school has somehow confirmed her thoughts. She thinks he is thinking so much faster than his peers that he bores easily and when he becomes bored, he becomes playful and talkative. He has to be taught how to focus and learn respect his peers before he can be accepted by his peers again. And this is where we parents come into the picture. Together with the school, we are supposed to work hand in hand to help him overcome this problem. Although the teacher did mentioned that his outspokeness is not necessarily something bad. We just have to learn how to manage him so he can excel to his maximum ability.
No doubt I am very stressed over this issue and am afraid I may fail him and not be able to help to reach his maximum potential. Being the odd one out and being outcast by his peers isn’t something easy for a 7 year old to handle. But neither do I want to stress him nor make him stop being himself. The teacher also mentioned that we have to aware that this is afterall a neighbour school and and expectations can be pretty varied compared to that of branded school.
So much for Rayner, now a little about RayAnne. This time round, she didn’t have any PTC session because she only joined Wharton no more than 3 months. Her PTC will be at the end of the year. But she is happier after quitting SunnyGrove. These days, she is always telling me about stuff and things she did in school and she is always singing and humming at home something she never did when she was in SunnyGrove. I am happy she is happy and she enjoys school so much that she doesn’t want to miss or skip any school.
was something amazing…..never had we saw real time piranha feeding before……it was a real eye-opener. 10 seconds was all it took for a school of piranhas to finish up their food.
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