Candour

I’ve been telling this story to anyone who would listen..

Was putting Calista to bed one night, and sang her “I Wish You Love”..I was feeling quite pleased with myself after completing the song, and was debating whether to sing “Dream a little Dream” or “Fly Me to the Moon” when she went:

“Mama I can’t sleep…”

I tenderly stroked her hair and told her not to worry, “just close your eyes and i’ll sing you another song until you sleep”.

At that point, she interjected and said:

“Mama stop singing. I can’t sleep.”

My bubble immediately burst and I started fuming –_-“

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Another night, it was Christian’s turn to be utterly frank with me. I was thinking of my boss going to his mother’s house for dinner, and thought to ask Christian “Darling, will you still come and have dinner with me when you are 50 and I 75?”

He hemmed and hawed and I expressed surprise at his hesitation, so he blurted “But what if you die already? So old…how about earlier? When you are not so old?

I burst out laughing at how he was perfectly comfortable expressing that thought to me without realising that it’s taboo amongst adults to talk of death.

Christian’s Art

The only art lessons he goes for are holiday programs at Little Artists..think there’s improvement from before though he’s not a Picasso yet.

This is my early Mother’s day present -

I could guess the figure in purple was meant to be me and the figure in blue is him, cos those are our favourite colours. He tells me we were eating brown rice by a stream, surrounded by a road and mountains. Can you tell?

The many faces of Calista

Calista seldom shows her multi-faceted personality to strangers. Perhaps it is still early days yet, but it is certainly a pity that others do not see the many expressions she is capable of, but only see a sullen, silent Calista staring at them.

Here’s a few shots taken in December by some unknown person (not me..perhaps the helper?) which I found in my memory card..

Am I biased mum or do you think these are worthy of making it to the cover of a magazine as well?

Christan’s Year End Concert 2013

Christian’s year end school concert took place on the 22nd of November..the theme that year was on Rainbow Fish and Teacher D picked him to be the narrator of the play! She said he usually talks so loudly in school, but I was appreciative of her giving him a chance to build confidence.

I must admit that I was worried he would have stage fright, but worked hard not to show my worry and infect him with my fear. He did well, memorising most of the script, and performed beyond my expectations!

The play was held at a room at LaSalle, and it was definitely not as ideal as the stage at the Eurasian Association the previous year. There was no mic, and all the parents kept chattering away as my little boy walked up to the front and started his introduction to the story. I felt bad for him, but he bravely went on and enunciated with emotion, just the way we had rehearsed. I was so proud of him my heart felt like it would burst. ^_^

He has certainly come a long way since those days when he would freeze in fear..

P took half day’s leave and an earlier flight to fly back for the concert.. he made it just in time and I knew Christian was happy to see him before the play started..the little things matter so much to children..

Here’s a picture of us milling around while waiting for the play to start..

And a picture of him in costume. Teacher D spent days making the costumes by herself. I was impressed by how professional the costumes were, and how much blood and sweat she poured into making those costumes.. there were so many ‘sea creatures’ which she painstakingly stitched…mermaids, starfish, crabs, jellyfish..I kowtow to her true dedication.a

Back!

I had been on a hiatus from this blog for many many months..mainly because P went to Hong Kong and took the old laptop, leaving me with a new shiny tablet which i hated. Haha..he had good intentions, thinking that the tablet was more portable and I could let the children use it too, but it only had one USB port and it was a pain to transfer photos / backup stuff with. Given my limited time for blogging (10minutes after the children sleep and before the helper sleeps) grappling with all those technical issues was too much of a waste of my time and so I gave up.

P has brought the old laptop back on his own initiative..he says he wanted to “put me out of my misery”. I’m sure he’ll enjoy reading the posts from the tablet, instead.

So here’s the 1st back-post..Pictures from our outdoor photoshoot last year!

We went to the Fort Canning Park and it was rather fun, posing, running around, chasing bubbles..

Calista didn’t smile very much as usual, but we weren’t too bothered by that (especially since i still have some hazy memory of how ‘dao’ i would be in front of strangers, as a child). We did manage to catch a few rare smiles of hers when she was thrown in the air by P or when her brother teased her, so those are precious shots..

It was definitely a good bonding experience and gives us some concrete memories to keep, and act as triggers when we are old and senile, of how life was when we were a young family.

The pictures also made good Christmas presents for P and the MIL, who probably want nothing other than to see the children everyday..

Mandarin

So, I've been trying to speak Mandarin to the children as much as I can, whenever I remember. Christian has reached the stage where he is reading English books really well, but his Mandarin ability lags far behind.

Berries helps somewhat, but I usually do not have much time to revise with him the characters he learns..given that we have less than an hour together each day. One day, I found a rare opportunity to bring out the cards and make a game out of it. I told him the aim of the game is to cover the entire bed with the cards, but he can have the cards only if he reads them out accurately. That silly boy actually bought into the game (I wonder how long this gullibility will last).

I shall try to be more creative and come up with more games like that, seeing how he enjoys the challenge and thrill..