School Trip to Peranakan Museum Singapore

A few weeks back, Caden came back home with a consent form asking if he can join his class for a school excursion to Peranakan Museum. I said okay and he then asked if I can be the parent volunteer for this event. Given that this venue is air-conditioned, I agreed to sign up without much consideration.

Somehow, I became so lucky again, and got selected to be the ONLY 1 Parent volunteer (PV) for his class. So on the last day of this semester, I tagged along with his class to the museum =)

The class was divided into 2 groups and I got paired up with their co-form teacher. She has to brief the students as we moved from gallery to gallery in the Peranakan Museum. We covered all 9 galleries within an hour and a half. I particularly loved the Food & Feasting and Weddings galleries, as they have the exhibits of the nyonyaware porcelain and collection of Peranakan beadwork (which was an essential element of their weddings).

The P4 students are very independent so my role as a PV  on that day was rather simple. I just have to be the last person in the group and ensure that no one got lost from the pack. Caden didn't want to stick to me at all throughout the trip (unlike Ethan) and he was working, chatting with his friends in the group. So I felt that I was like a sole visitor to the museum, admiring the artifacts.

at the food and feasting gallery

super candid shot

Student asking questions along the way

this class is so obedient and earnest!

Although we finished the entire tour in 1.5 hours, I was dead tired after the event because we had to climb up and down the stairs in the museum as we moved from gallery to gallery!

Will I sign up as a Parent Volunteer again next time?? Will only consider if the venue is air-conditioned! Tsk..

Caden's Swimsafer Bronze test - 26th May 2015

Caden has been slotted to take up Swimsafer Bronze test by his swimming coach this Tues night (at 8pm) which was quite a bad timing for us. He was down with fever on Sunday and Monday and only managed to recover on Tuesday morning. So we were rather apprehensive about bringing him for the test and the weather before 8pm was pouring with thunder and lightning!

Somehow,  the thunderstorm didn't hit in Tampines area as we called up the swimming complex to check if pool was closed (our dear coach wasn't responding to our calls or text messages to confirm the test given the weather conditions). Anyways, we went ahead with the test as Caden maintained that he's feeling alright then to attempt it.

It was quite a relaxing experience for him as he has some of his old swimming buddies scheduled in this test as well - Randy, Kelly (Wendy's children) and Renee (Laifong's daughter) plus his ex-swim mates from the 2pm class.

We were there watching the entire process and felt that these kids were really lucky to have passed the test eventually (as some of them didn't perform up to standards!)

At the start of the test, the kids lined up in 2 rows

 

his turn to jump...

 

here he dived!

 

after swimming for 2 laps

 

they moved on to do some life-saving stunts

 

throwing a rope to the victims...

a different method of life-saving skill where you jumped into the water to pass the float

 

Caden partnered with Randy

Randy's turn to 'save' Caden!

Mission accomplished!

Eventually, the tester announced to us (the parents) that all the kids passed this test! (really kelong ah.. hahaaa)

Labour Day - 1 May 2015

As this year's labour day falls on a Friday, we decided to get some treats for the boys. They have been bugging us to bring them watch 'HOME' so we decided to bring them to the cinema for this. The original intent was to watch 'Avengers' but the seats were all rather fully booked so we have to shelve this for a while.

For the first time, they get to watch a movie alone.. we decided to buy only 2 tickets for the boys to watch without our company.. they were happy with this arrangement. They even get to enjoy a box of popcorns by themselves!

After the movie, we brought them for a Chinese themed lunch and also bought them a cup of bubble tea (from Gong Cha) as part of a holiday treat..

At Crystal Jade, Caden enjoyed the wanton noodles and dim sum thoroughly so this is considered his birthday treat!

Ethan was so happy the whole day and jotted down his feelings in this little book which looked like a poem:

I feel happy because I watch movie
I feel happy because I eat popcorn
I feel happy because I drink Gong Cha
I feel happy because I play soccer!





 



I don't know why he wrote 1st number in an opposite direction!

Ethan's first tooth extraction

We always have a lot of issues with Ethan's teeth since young. Besides having a few decays, he had a dead tooth since he was 3 (when his cousin accidentally knocked him down and the nerves were dead since that incident). So finally, this dead tooth became shaky about 2 months back but it didn't fall out naturally after this while.

So bleeding occurred occasionally as he fiddled with this shaky dead tooth once in a while.  We decided that it's time to get this tooth extracted so he won't have any more bleeding occurrences.

But, he cried dearly when his PaPa attempted to pull out using a dental floss... to be honest, if the same approach is applied on me, I would have been terrified as well. I called up the school dentist to make an appointment for an extraction and he was so nervous with my arrangement.

Luckily, the appointment was scheduled to happen after his recess time last week, so I assigned Caden to chaperone his younger brother after they had their food to the dental clinic in school.. I heard from Ethan that Caden just dropped him to the clinic and went off to play with his classmates, so the poor boy was left alone facing his deadly task.

I think it turned out to be painless for him as the dentist applied a gel on his gums before the extraction (I remembered that it was always an injection for me during my time!). He texted me a picture of his toothless selfie once he got home:



The dentist has scheduled him for another visit today to do fillings.. I am sure this time round, it will be painful for him...

Our 10 year old boy

Time flies. Caden has turned 10 years old last week.  It also marks our milestone as being parents for full 10 years!

Before his birthday, Caden has been talking about inviting his closer friends over. His intent was for us to organise a birthday party so that his closer classmates could to our place and play Nerf with him. We were not too keen because we don't like to interact with the classmates' parents should they decide to stay in our house during the party.. My ah Lou is not a sociable person so I will have to do most of the talking when situations require me to.. So we managed to convince Caden that we will just get his play buddies to come over on Sunday for a mini-gathering.

Brian's family came over and the boys had great fun playing for almost close to 5 hours playing Nerf, soccer and Beyblades. Caden was very happy that day when his play mates celebrated his birthday for him...

Putting 10 small candles for this round

His BFFs

 

Family Picture



They sang the birthday song for him



Asking him to make a birthday wish

Ethan helped him to blow out the candles

On the night before he slept, he told me that it was the happiest day he had... having so much fun with his brother, Aidan and Elliot on that day (I guess it was priceless to him!). We also got him a new Nerf gun as his birthday gift which he had picked for himself.

On his actual birthday, I went to grab him a mini-personal cake since we did not have a chance to have an eat-out dinner this time round. He was nonetheless happy with this little surprise...

 

With the same mango cake that he likes

another chance to make a wish

I must say, it gets easier to celebrate their birthdays as they get older!

School Trip to Butterfly Lodge

The school has organised a trip to the Butterfly Lodge, Oh'Farms (Oh Chin Huat Hydroponic Farms) near Sembawang road. One of P2 Stellar curriculum topics in this semester is 'A Butterfly is Born' so the purpose of this trip is to bring classroom learning to reality. Ethan pestered me to sign up as a Parent Volunteer for this trip since I am still on school term break. I agreed to sign up as a Parent Volunteer (PV) for this trip without much thought as I felt that I won't be so lucky to be picked by his teacher (hahaa)..

A week before the trip, Ethan came out from school telling me that I was selected to be the PV for the trip to the Butterfly Lodge. I asked him whose parent is going with the class as well and he said only me! I got to know later that there were 5 parents who had signed up and I turned out to lucky one. Only until then, Caden shared with me that we will need to enter into an enclosed area with butterflies flying around freely and one of the butterflies even landed on his head back then!

The day before the trip, Ethan came back from school telling me not to scream the next day at the Butterfly Lodge when I see those butterflies. I was also told not to apply insect repellent since we will be up close and personal with them (oh gosh!)... Obviously, the information downloaded at that point was not going to be very helpful for me..

I couldn't sleep the night before, probably because I got so nervous about confronting the insects (flying ones) and caterpillars, pupa, etc...

So the day came, we left school at 8 am and travelled together in a school bus (it's been ages since I last rode on a school bus, so the feeling was nostalgic).

We were first briefed by Mr. Oh (he should be the owner) on the life cycle of a butterfly (like the eggs come in 3 colours), how caterpillars breathe (through spiracles), what do butterflies eat (only liquid food - nectar).  I learnt that butterflies are important to us as they help to pollinate the flowers, form food for other animals (e.g, birds, lizards, spiders, etc) and the presence of butterflies are good indicators in assessing how healthy/clean the environment is.

After his briefing, he brought out some stick insects to show the class and Ethan was super-excited with them!

E was trying to squeeze to the front to see the stick insect

Always brave enough to hold (weird) insects

Classmates looking on as E took over the insect 2nd time

We were then invited to the enclosure (my most feared area!)

E walking behind Guan Lin and Lucas in the Butterfly Lodge

In the Butterfly Lodge, we could see the stick insects again and Ethan rushed to hold them again:

Offering to hold the stick insect again!!!

There were 2 stick insects on the guide's body

E managed to take over 1 stick insect

Still attracted by the stick insect and didn't observe the butterflies around

Looking at how stick insects camouflaged themselves

I think the trip was educational and informative.. but because weather was extremely hot and humid, and the information downloaded during the briefing at the holding area was quite cramped, the children were mostly not attentive after 10 minutes (including E). We took the school bus back to school at 10.15am so the whole trip was rather short.

I spent some time getting to know some of his classmates during break time and was quite popular with his classmates because I prepared snacks and distributed to his classmates. Some of his classmates were rather cute but some others were actually more rowdy.. so I sorta dropped subtle hints to my boy to ask him to mingle with those whom I really like =p

I will definitely be more selective next time, before I sign myself up as a PV for their outings! This trip is traumatising enough for me! Having said that, the best benefit of being a PV is that I get to take pictures of my child's experiences during the trip, and getting to know his playmates better!

Just a confession to make, on the day of the trip, I pasted a mosquito patch on my T-shirt in hope that maybe the smell will repel the butterflies, although it's supposed to combat against mosquitoes, tsk tsk..

Remembering Mr. Lee Kuan Yew (1923 - 2015)

Undoubtedly one of the saddest day for this young nation, our founding father has passed on today at 3.18am.

As usual, we were woken up by our radio clock this morning at 6 plus and hearing some commentaries on Mr. Lee.. so to our minds, we suspected for the worst news. Ah lou checked the news through social media and confirmed the news. This morning, I watched the live telecast of our Prime Minister delivering a public message to announce the passing of his father and it was done with great composure as he held back his tears.

Thank you, Mr. Lee, for all that you have done for the country.. your wisdom, bravery and legacy will always be well-remembered.