Ace Festival - The Gingerbread Man

The June school holiday is here! And coinciding this holiday are the many activities, performances and workshops available for kids. Of which, ACE! Festival 2009 had put up a series of performances for kids of all ages. And we brought Ning to watch one of the performances: The Gingerbread Man.

It was quite an entertaining show especially the part where they talked about ginger spice and the introduction of 'Spice Girls' to it.

There was an art painting booth outside the Alliance Francaise theatre and at Ning's insistence, I agreed to let her try out the clay and wood painting. I must say she's quite good at it and was totally concentrated to doing her painting and blow-drying her work of art. She proudly brought back her art pieces and got Papa to hang up the eggplant wood art for her.

Here are some pictures I took. The Gingerbread Man show will run till end of this week at Alliance. So if you're interested, you can get the tickets at any Sistic outlets. It is suitable for children from 3years old and above.

The other exciting upcoming June performance is 'The Little Big Club Live in Concert' at the EXPO where 14 of the kids' favourite character including Barney, Bob the Builder will perform. Tickets are selling fast, I heard. So hurry down to Sistic ASAP.

Another Many Trips to the Zoo

Ever since the new Rainforest KidzWorld opened in the zoo during the December holidays, we had been frequent visitors. And I found out from my friends and colleagues that we're not alone!! In fact, we bring the kids there every other month. This year alone, we've been there 4 times that WF decided we should sign up for 'Friends of the Zoo' membership.

The zoo did some improvement works to their exhibits too. Plus revamped their animal shows. So we still get to see new things.

We've been to this Rainforest thingy so many times that we're quite sick of eating KFC (while the kids are at play). Nevertheless, its always fun seeing them enjoying themselves so much for that 2 hours.

Botanic Gardens Music Festival

On a regular basis, the various orchestra/bands (SSO, SCO etc) will play at the Shaw Foundation Symphony stage in the evening. So the previous Sunday evening, we went to the Singapore Botanic Gardens to watch the SSO's performance. We thought it'll be a good time to spend the Sunday evening doing picnic and to let the kids enjoy some music.

Mine mine... you'll never expect the kind of crowd at the Botanic Gardens. The performance starts at 6pm and we reached there like 5.30pm. It is already IMPOSSIBLE to get a car park lot. And the entire road is so jammed that there're traffic marshalls stationing around.

And to get a nice spot on the green lawn is another challenge. You'll think 20% of the population were there before you. Nevertheless, we're still lucky enough to get a shady spot with a good view since we only need a space for four.

The pieces that the SSO played were the familiar and comtemporary pieces like extracts from Fantasia, Chicago etc. We even heard a familiar piece that was played in the Little Einsteins programme! So it wouldn't be a bore to laze on the green lawn and enjoy the music and atmosphere. You'll like it, I am sure.

Because of the parking and crowd, we're thinking if we should attend such events again in future. Nevertheless, a piece of good news: Yo-Yo Ma is coming to town to perform in the 09/10 season. So do buy your tickets early.

Public Transport Day

I mentioned in my blog that we were considering if we should bring the kids out for a bus/MRT ride. Well, we really did that last Saturday. Taking bus 158 to Aljunied station to Boon Lay and then back home after lunching in Jurong Point.

We had this idea because Ning keep asking me why she never takes school bus to school like other kids. And that her school always take them for bus rides when they go for excursions/library visits.

I can only say, my two kids are really very lucky and fortunate that there is always mummy and grandma fetching them to and from school. And everywhere they go, they're so "sheltered" by the family car. So you can imagine their excitement when we waited for the bus at the bus stop and then later hop onto the MRT.

Of course, we get curious glances when I was taking pictures of them at the bus stop and inside the train. And at one point, we were happily singing the "wheels on the bus" song that other passengers were so amused.

Here are some photos I took. Thanks to Thomas the Train series. Now we call double decker buses Bulgy Bus and single decks Bertie Bus. MRT is called Spencer...

When it rains on a Saturday...

We'll bring the kids for some indoor activities. Usually its to some indoor play area like Bambini or Fidgets.

There isn't much things to do except to entertain and play with them in the play area which can be rather back-breaking. Imagine climbing over the steps and ladders with height less than a meter tall. Its like doing some NS obstacle course. I try to leave all these to the ex-PTI WF while I sit there and stoned. Haha...

Anyway, here are some pictures we took when we went to Fidgets. The kids enjoyed themselves so much we had to drag them out after 2 hours of fun. The thing is, the admission price is for the entire day but too bad, we adults are having some backaches that we decided 2 hours is really enough for us.

Sometimes they looked so adorable together...

Yah... especially when they're behaving like best pals instead of arch enemies.

One disturbing the other. Or one snatching the other's toys. Or one complaining/whining about the other. etc etc etc... its never ending.

No wonder my friend was telling me, she's like a referee at home. Managing her 4 kids!!! 5 Will make a basketball team.

Anyway, I found this picture of them sitting on the church's staircase. They looked so innocent.... :-P

Sentosa - The Luge Ride

It'll be Saturday tomorrow. And as usual, WF & I will start to crack our head, thinking hard where to bring the kids out. We're toying the idea of "public transport day" for tomorrow. But I am not sure if we really want to do that... anyway, still thinking.

But first, just sharing one of the outings we did on a Saturday sometime last month - Sentosa Luge.

Its simply just a ride down the 650m track. And the kids will sit with us while we adults drive the carts. Oh, but first you would need to take the chairlift to go up, just like skiing.

It seemed scary at first sight. But when I tried, it was really fun. And subsequent rides (we took three rides that day), we had it like a competition. So you can imagine, we were practically racing downhill.

I didn't have a chance to take any pictures of us riding the cart since its a competition. But I managed to take some pictures prior to the ride, including two where Ning was dancing to some beach music blasting out loud.

Ning's Artwork

Some of you may know, we transfered Ning to a new school beginning this year after a not-so-nice experience at her previous school which she stayed there for only less than 6 months. Not that she was unhappy or what. In fact, she's rather adaptive. It was her parents (that's us) who thought the school could've done better in many aspects given the outrageous school fees they're charging.

Now, she's happy in her new school and learning lots of things. Both WF and I have no complaints about the school (so far lah).

Ning brings home her school work regularly and would usually try to tell us what these were. Sometimes she would insist I take a picture of her work. I realised I've accumulated quite a few and decided I should share it online. Here are some "samples".

We noticed she's beginning to have a hang in drawing. Like drawing a bus (though it was rather out of proportion) and a dentist holding the small mirror tool on his hand etc. Now she's fine-tuning her castle with Papa as the prince and Mama as the princess. It makes us wonder if we should sign her up for some art classes?

Even Zhi knows "Bush" was a "joke"

I had meant to put this up when Obama took over the office as the new US president some months ago. But it kept slipping my mind. And just two weeks ago, it was his 100th day in office.

When Obama took over, there were a lot of jokes and negative comments made about his predecessor, George Bush. About the silly speeches and statements he made during his presidential term. And there was even a Broadway show making fun of him.

Even to Zhi, the mere mention of the word "Bush" can make him laugh. Not that he really knows about George Bush as a person but there was this book we read to him every night that has pictures of the bushes (as in the plants' type). He likes to point to the various diagrams in the book and I'll tell him what these are. Whenever, we come to the bush, he'll laugh so heartily when I pronounced it. Here's a video we managed to capture his kind of "joke".



Bush

Some Updates

I admit haven't been diligent in updating my blog the past 2 weeks. Things were rather "packed" here, with domestic issues as well as work.

The latter is more exciting. I just joined a new department in the poly this semester and am teaching a new marketing module to the year 2 and 3 students. Of course, new module means I have to start all over again on my class preparation. And because its a higher year module, I have to be more diligent in my research and readings. Imagine revisiting Porter's Five Forces and SWOT analysis? Irony is, I haven't been so into reading textbooks & journals when I was a student. Now, those textbooks lies on our workdesk and bedside table!!!

Only downside is, I'm doing three full days per week. So my grading and prep stretches the entire week, even into weekends. And I do my work only when the kids are napping or asleep, after 10pm. So that's why this blog is dormant at the moment.

As for domestic... sigh... I think some of you may know or guess. Anyway, its such an irritating issue that it'll be such a drag to share in the blog. Nevertheless, I want to thank my friends & colleagues who had showed concern, give advise and even prayed for us. Well, like what WF would sometimes say when we become frustrated,"Life would be perfect if this is sorted out." I really hope for the day to come...