Rui's birthday party at Labrador Park

We celebrated Rui's 6th birthday at Labrador Park. Despite our initial apprehension due to the unpredictable weather, it was perfect weather that day. Sunny, but not too hot and no rain at all.

The theme was Yellow (Rui's fave colour). Everyone (yes everyone!) turned up dressed in that hue. Thanks for being so sporting!

We started with the usual makan session. Food included fried bee hoon, fried rice and chicken wings prepared by Auntie Yayu as well as various dim sum items from a stall in the market.

The kids were then treated to a round of carnival games. They tried their hand at "Fishing Game", "Toss the Ring Game" and "Toss the Ball in the hole Game". At each successful attempt, they collected token coins with which they can swap for prizes. Thanks Aunt Winnie for preparing the token coins!

The party ended with the cake cutting , of course!

Parent-Teacher Meet

We went for the girls' Parent-Teacher Meet yesterday.

The glowing reports given by the teachers were the best birthday presents I could ever receive. No diamonds or pearls can up that.

About Rui -
1. She's doing well academically. She can do better in her hanyu pinyin with more practice but she's generally very interested to learn new things.

2. She gets along very well with her peers and doesn't choose her friends. She doesn't insist on being the leader aka she's not bossy.

3. The teacher asked if Rui is attending any speech and drama class and I said no. She then commented that Rui can usually improvise in her performance without instructions from the teacher. I told her I was the same when I was younger.

4. She has her own mind and will ask when she needs help, without any fear. She also has her own system of doing things and is systematic in approaching her school work and problems.

5. She's K-poh, which means she will ask what the adults are talking about even though it doesn't concern her. That's from me again.

6. She loves art and craft and can complete her craft work with minimal guidance.

7. She is usually one of the first to finish her work and she will help friends who are slower.

About Yan -
1. The teachers said that Yan is among the best students in her class.

2. She is serious about her work and will strive to complete her work without much facilitation. Even when she is presented with easier alternatives, she will choose to do the harder way on her own. She'll even ask for more work!

3. Even though she's on half day programme, the English teacher ropes her in on speech and drama programmes and character for life programmes as she doesn't want Yan to miss out. She's going to act as the wife in the Purple Turnip, a skit put up by the N2 class this Friday.

4. She's able to communicate with the Chinese teacher almost entirely in Mandarin. She's able to learn all her chinese songs and repeat them.

5. She has her own mind on things and has strong self-reliant skills.

I hope I don't sound like I am boasting but I am very proud of my 2 girls indeed!

Home made mobile

While we were out buying cakes from K Ki (driven by a sudden craving to eat good cakes), Rui and Aunt Yayu made a mobile using wooden chopsticks, twine and plastic animals won at a recent carnival that we went to, and hung it to the ceiling light in Rui's room. What a great way to recycle!

O mio babbino caro

One of Aunt E's friend has a daughter who is a really gifted soprano singer. She's undergoing voice coaching and has won a prize at a recent competition singing this famous opera piece "O mio babbino caro". She's only 9!

She was "forced" to perform for us the night we had barbeque and we were all touched by her performance. Aunt F even shedded tears!

After that night, that piece of music was just ringing in my ears constantly. I searched youtube and found this version, which I thought was the best one. Many others have sung this piece, but Sissel's version appealed to me most.

So here it is. Take a listen.

Community Club

We are CC-converts (Community Club converts).

I am taking pop guitar class at a nearby CC while Rui is taking her art classes there. The fees are very reasonable. Guitar classes cost me $80 for 10 sessions while art classes are at $50 for 12 lessons.

Rui just attended her first art class this afternoon. I thought her artwork was amazing! She described the entire process to me and even I was enthralled.

First the teacher helped her with the outline of the potatoes.
Next she had to choose the hairstyle, hat, limbs and facial expressions that she wanted and she had to draw them. (I guess that means the teacher had drawn on the board several options to choose from).
She then had to colour and outline the picture.

She enjoyed herself tremendously and even said to us that other bigger jie-jies took a look at her picture and commented that it was very nice. She scored 80/100 for the first piece of work!

We made it!

Finally got the letter in the mail!

我爱全世界

蕊在睡前常会说：“我爱爸爸，我爱妈妈，我爱全世界。”

我觉得最后一句，特别有意思。

她之所以会爱全世界，应该是因为她现在过得很开心，很满足于现状，才会觉得世界如此美好，她才如此爱世界。

这也间接告诉我，身为父母的我们，做对了一些什么。

我感到欣慰。

DIY Art II

We attempted another art and craft work yesterday afternoon with Hay and Yu. We went to Art Friend to get the necessary.

We bought
1. 4 wooden spoons (these will be the body of the puppet we are making)
2. Felt material (these will make the clothing)

We also got some wool from Aunt XF. These will form the hair.

The rest are sourced from our kitchen and existing art accessories at home, like beans, pasta, paints.

Making the puppets was a little challenging for the kids. The adults had to help along the way. The kids had fun nevertheless, dabbling with the paints, messing up the table, sticking decorative accessories on the puppets.