Life In France

Flying Again...

2009-11-06T22:57:00.005+01:00

Yup, we are flying back to Singapore again to attend my sister's wedding end of November. 3 times in 2.5 years!!! This is really too much for me. Most of the wives envies me but I am not excited about going back at all. I really hate the flight journey... got to leave home at abt 5am, reach Paris at 8 and wait for connecting flight at 11, then stuck another 12 hrs in the plane. Argghh, this time J will just sent me to Bordeaux Airport only and I am going to do the transit with Shannon... Great! Of cos I can do it myself but I prefer to follow blindly behind J and do nothing...hehehe

J will be joining us in Singapore 2 weeks later as I need to help my sis with some of the wedding preparation and also sending Shannon to some "crash course". She will be 5years old in 5 mths time and she still doesn't know her ABC and Phonics well. It's common for French as they start learning ABC next year but to Singaporean, the kids are expected to know their ABC when they are going to K1 next year!!! Hopefully, she can pick up something and I can start coaching her when we are back in France.

Oh ya, whenever we tell Shannon that we are going back to Singapore, she will make sure that she will be able to come back as she regards France as her HOME. Anyway, we will be flying tomorrow and now I am already looking forward to the date to come back here again... LOL...

Shannon's Class Photos..

2009-11-06T22:51:00.002+01:00

The French Women on the right was the Teacher Olivia and the one on the left is the Class Assistant.

We were given an folders that consists of Shannon's Photo taken in the school 3 weeks ago.

Halloween 2009

2009-10-31T16:49:00.001+01:00

We brought Shannon to Auchan for a free face painting in the afternoon to attend a Halloween gathering at our friend's house. She was so excited when she saw the booth and requested for a purple butterfly to be painted on her face. We taught her how to say "Purple Butterfly" in french and she started to recite "Papillon Violet" when she was queing up for her turn. Hehe

After the face painting, we tried to look for a costume for her because I didn't really see any that fancy me previously. As it was the day of Halloween, all the costumes had almost sold off, thus I decided to go home and dressed her up with whatever we had at home. :P

In the end, I used our Chinese Qipao bought during Chinese New Year. I pinned a few spiders on her clothes, tied a long devil's tail on her waist, put on a devil hairband and messed up her hair. Voila! A Devil in a Chinese Qipao...LOL

After taking some food at the gathering, we brought the kids to neighours' house for Tricks or Treat. The first house visit was a disappointment as the french neighour literally ignore us. However, we continued to look for other neighours and decided to visit our Singaporeans' neighbour instead. Well, after visiting a few houses, we decided to go back as the streets were really dark and quiet. We distributed the sweets to the kids and let the kids played in the garden instead.

Overall, we had great fun that night. This is the first time that I really dress Shannon up for Halloween night and I can see that she enjoyed the night too. ^^

Sleeping By Herself

2009-10-28T10:25:00.004+01:00

We bought this bed for Shannon upon her request sometimes in August. J wanted wean off the co-sleeping and asked her to choose a bed that she love. And she chose the above which cost almost SGD 1 K!!!

I remember the first day she slept on her bed, she actually went up and down the bed for a few times finding excuses of washing hands or need to pee. After about spending 2 hours in her room, she decided to sleep with us and told us that she is too young to sleep by herself. (LOL)

Then J and myself take turns to sleep with her in her bedroom for a few times. After she fell asleep, we would go back to our room but she will definitely joined us in our bed if she woke up in the middle of the night. I am fine with it as I feel that she would definitely wanted to sleep by her own when she grows up so I should treasure this moments. However, we constantly remind her that we would give away her precious bed since she is not sleeping it.

3 days ago, when all of us was about to sleep, she suddenly said that she wanted to sleep in her princess bed. We left her in her room with the door open and the toilet's light shining in her room and went back to our room. And TADA, she successfully fell asleep and even she woke up in the morning to pee, she will go back to her bed and continue to sleep.

Last night, she fell asleep in the living rooms and we have no way to carry her up the bed and thus she slept with us again. She said that she will go back to her bedroom tonight and I hope she mean it.. hehehehe

Sushi & Monopoly

2009-10-24T10:19:00.002+02:00

One of the Sunday, we decided to make some sushi. Shannon tried the sushi she made and began to eat non-stop. ^^

At night, we took out the Monopoly which came with Mcdonald Happy Meal and started playing. It is a simple version of Monopoly which Shannon can understand and she played with us happily. J was the first person who went bankrupt and I was the second, thus Shannon was the millionaire for that game! :P

Baking Cake With Shannon

2009-10-20T10:17:00.000+02:00

* Two Little Sweeties *

2009-10-15T15:33:00.002+02:00

While waiting Irene to buy lunch at McDonald's yesterday, I took some photos of Shannon & Avril...

Seasons Changing = Falling Sick

2009-10-15T13:06:00.006+02:00

After the Lantern Festival Celebration, Shannon had fever that night and the following night. I brought her to the GP on Monday and he said she had throat inflammation. After taking medicine, her fever went away thus I brought her to her first Music Lesson on Wednesday.

The kids can only start learning piano at 5 years old in France. Thus, we can only let them go to elementary course conducted by the private music school. The course fees was 99Euro per year. They will get to know and learn to play with all kinds of musical instruments found in the school. In the later part of the lessons, they will learn about music notes and at the end of the course, the instructor will advise us which musical instrument to let the kids begin with for the next year.

Since her fever never come back after 2 days, I decided to let her go back to her school on Thursday. Well, the moment I brought her back from school, her fever shot up to 40 degrees and we went to see a PD on Friday. PD said she might have lung inflammation and ask me to observe her for another 2 days before he prescribe antibiotics for her. Her cough seems to get worse on Friday and she had high fever once a day for Friday and Saturday. Luckily, her fever didn't come back on Sunday but I decided to bring her to the PD again and this time round, he prescribed the antibiotic. After taking the antibiotic, her cough was under control and fever was gone and she resumed her 2nd lesson for Music on Wednesday and school on Thursday.

2nd Music Lesson

Lantern Festival Celebration 2009

2009-10-06T17:02:00.004+02:00

Last Saturday, we had a Lantern Festival Celebration at my house. We invited 6 other families to join in the fun, every family brought some food to our place for potluck dinner.

Right after dinner, we had riddles for adult to guess prepared by Meizhen & Clara. Everyone went to the lanterns hanging outside and chose a riddle to answer. Well, the riddles were kind of difficult for us.. we had a hard time solving it. For those who solved the riddle, they got a small gift from Meizhen & Clara.

After the riddles, Serene hosted another game called "Deal or No Deal". Everyone had to contribute $5 to enter this game and the player who was picked gets to win a prize of $0.01 to $60 euros. Our professional Serene Leong even bought a set of props for this. I was picked 2 times and won a total of $16. It was fun but unforunately the game could only be played 5 times cuz it had to end as it was getting late. The remaining cash was given to Roy who was luckily picked by the host at the end of the game.

After the games ended, all the kids put on their jacket and carried paper lanterns in the garden. There were no fantasy/electronic lanterns sold over here. All we had were paper lanterns we bought 2 years ago but the kids still enjoyed carrying their lanterns round the house again and again. :)

How was your lantern festival this year? :)

Mooncakes Making

2009-10-05T20:24:00.000+02:00

Last week, we went to Stehpanie house to make some Snowskin Mooncakes. Ingredients were provided by Dawn who just came back from Singapore few weeks ago. It was successful this time as we had the right ingredients and most importantly there was Meizhen Shifu to guide us along this time. :P

Kid Parc & Caterpillars

2009-09-30T15:17:00.003+02:00

Last Sunday, we went to Kid Parc again. It was a beautiful Sunday, not too hot nor too cold. As usual, Shannon enjoyed the rides and when we about to leave, we saw something on J's tyre.

Take a closer look!

It was Caterpillars!!! And when we turned around and look at the tree beside us...

Tons of caterpillar queing to crawl up the tree! J had to use a branch to take off the caterpillars before starting the car. We wouldn't want to transport it back to our garden. -.-"

Baby Danse Resumed

2009-09-30T13:13:00.004+02:00

New school term started and Shannon resumed her dancing lesson as well. The dancing lesson will be on Friday weekly. I picked her up from school at 4:40pm and rushed her to the dancing lesson at 5:15pm. In fact, I have a hard time keeping her awake during the 15 minutes journey. I gave her some biscuits and water to drink in the car to keep her awake but she always almost fall asleep during the last 5 minutes of the journey. Luckily, whenever we reached the dancing school, she will become alert and start enjoying her 1hr session. :P

Swing Swing

2009-09-30T13:01:00.003+02:00

We bought the above Swing for $69 euros at Leroy Merlin Bordeaux last Saturday. It was definitely a good buy as the usual price was $149 euros. J spent about 2-3 hours to fix up the swing and now Shannon had a small playground with swing and slide in our garden!

Back To School

2009-09-17T15:01:00.003+02:00

Summer holidays ended and Shannon went back to her Maternelle (Preschool). She was not enrolled in the same class with Avril and Brayden. They were all separated into different classes.. Avril and Zavier (who joined the same Maternelle this year) got in Moyenne Section, Brayden in Moyenne et Grand Section and poor Shannon got in Petite et Moyenne Section. Funny right? "Sigh"

I was quite perplexed about the arrangement as she will still be stucked in Petite Section for the first half morning session. Well, being a Kiasu Singaporean mummy, I asked J to called the school principal to ask for a transfer to Avril or Brayden's class. To our dismay, our request was rejected as the principal said they will be learning the same thing even though they are in different class.

According to the research I have done, information on French Education is as followed:

The weekly timetable covers 24 hours, with the day organised by the teacher around varied activities and communication exercises. There is generally no specific timetable for lessons, which are left to the discretion of the teacher.

The learning priority at nursery school is language development, which is carried out through four main areas of activity:

Living together;
Physical activity;
Arts and science;
Imagining and feeling.

All pupils in the grande section of nursery school are expected to start learning a modern language, which is continued with vigour when the child continues into primary and secondary education.

However, we were all brought up in Asian KS style and we just can't help comparing what our kids are doing in the 3 different classes. I am still feeling uneasy and fustrated to let my girl continue in the Petite et Moyenne Section but there is nothing that I can do..

Summer ...

2009-09-01T10:54:00.003+02:00

Wow.. it has been weeks that I last updated my blog. August was really a busy month for us.. We had plenty of outings, gathering and Mahjong sessions weekly. Getting really lost where to start... thus I will do a summerize most of them into one post...

I brought Shannon to the Kid Parc for about 3 times in August. Following are some of the photos taken during the outings..

Shannon trying out the new attraction(Flying Saucer) in the parc with Daddy

As the weather was really warm on certain days of the week, we would usually visit our friends who had their swimming pool set up and let the kids enjoyed. Shannon loves swimming so much that she was always the last one to get out of the pool.

Videos on how Shannon trying to swim...

Assumption Day 2009

2009-08-16T21:22:00.004+02:00

It's Assumption Day in France yesterday. As usual, we went to Archacon Beach with a group of friends for the annual Fireworks Display.

As we were early, we had a walk on the beach and took some photos with the sand scuptures we saw at the beach.

At about 7pm, we took our dinner at one of the restaurant along the beach. This was the second time we had visited this restaurant. I always wanted to go back for their food but was really disappointed this time. The food was served within 10 minutes after we placed our order which means it was kind of pre-cooked.

After dinner, we spent another 2 hours on the beach waiting for the nightfall. The kids enjoyed themselves running around and playing with the sand.. Finally at 1030pm, the fireworks started...

The show ended about 15-20minutes later and we could see that everyone stood up immediately and headed back to their car. As usual, we only managed to reached home 1 hour later due to the heavy traffic.

My Little Helper

2009-08-15T14:34:00.002+02:00

Bigger House means MORE Housework!!! Luckily, I have a little helper...

P.S: - She is not mopping the floor but WETTING it instead. hehehe

Our New House

2009-08-10T13:39:00.004+02:00

Finally, we are more or less settled down in our new house. Well, still messy and more things to be done. :P

J had kind of impressed his friends with his carpentry work done in the house. As there are no built-in cabinet in the house, he had to DIY 3 cabinets with a budget. We do not want to spend too much as we might only be living here for another 2 years. I kind of love my kitchen he had done up for me too. Shannon love the new house too as she has ample space to run around. At the same time, J bought her a "princess bed" to start training her to sleep in her own room.

Overall, all of us love our new house ^_^

Amar Circus

2009-08-09T15:09:00.000+02:00

2 Weeks ago, we went to a Amar Circus held at Parc De Exposition La Teste. We heard from friends that this troupe has been in this field since 1924. The show is about 2.5 hrs and I love the "magic show" where the pocessors change their costumes at a glance! Take a look at the video I have uploaded and you will understand.

One of the show perform by the Acrobatic from China, Sichuan

Tiger Show

Our precious

Photos taken on that day

Some Backgrounds on Amar Circus
For its 85th anniversary, Amar circus, 1 st prize french national circus is on tour with his new show: Best Of.

With all of the acrobatic Chinese province of Sichuan as the guest of honor.

A show of more than two hours to find out among other international artists such as Christina Roy with a sail number air Beltram Duo with dual wheel air Lumei Duo, processors that change their costumes at a glance without forgetting the choreography
Arabian horses and ponies in Argentina and African elephants and very expected and Siberian tigers ovation presented by John Falck

Happy Birthday Singapore

2009-08-09T14:08:00.002+02:00

Today is Singapore 44th Birthday. J's company had celebrated this big day in advance on 31 July 2009. There was a serious of games and competitions going on. As for the kids, there were coloring contest and J had signed Shannon up. Well, she didn't win any prize from her coloring but 3 cheers for her for finishing her artwork. ^_^

Finally Moved

2009-07-16T00:59:00.004+02:00

We finally moved to a new house on 14 July 2009!!!

On 13 July, we went to the new house to sign the Tenancy Agreement. The moment I stepped into that house, it reminded me of the Disco Pub. Yes, the whole house smelled like Tobacco!!! I believed that the previous tednant smoke in the house all day long that actually created such a strong Tobacco smell. I am wondering whether there is any Air Freshener that can be spray on the wallpaper.

After signing the Tenancy Agreement, we rushed down to Archacon to collect the Truck we rented for the next day... We had a quick dinner kindly prepared by Irene and went back to the new house to wash the floor while Shannon stayed with her. Initially we planned to move some of our stuff over in the evening but was canceled due to bad weather. We spent about 2-3 hours washing the floor and windows and “scooping” the water out of the house. Well, there isn't a single drainage point in house except for the bathtub. We only picked Shannon up at 11pm and went back to bathe and sleep.

On 14th July, Jason’s friends arrived at 930am to help us to move. It was a challenge for them because we had tons of things to move! Our plan was actually to move the big items like the furniture and packed boxes. However, they are really kind enough to make 5 trips to and fro and they moved EVERYTHING to the new house. We really owe them a dinner as they have been a great help to us. Thanks to Eddie, Chew, Dan, Kent & Derrick!!

We are still cleaning, unpacking and setting up our new home. There will be no internet connection up for at least 14 days from now. I am now using Jason HTC to connect to the internet. My hands and legs are aching like hell and to make it worse, I couldn’t have a good night sleep since last Saturday due to night coughing. The skin on my fingers started to cracked one by one due to the all the cleaning. I have to plaster it on day time and put tons of hand crème before sleep.

I would like to specially thank Irene. She helped me to take care of Shannon’s needs during this period which kept a huge load off mind. I am really glad to have met all these new friends since 2 years ago which made life here more memorable. ^_^

OLD HOUSE @ Gujan Mestras

NEW HOUSE @ GUJAN MEYRAN

Recovering And Moving

2009-07-12T23:38:00.006+02:00

I hope/think Shannon had recover from the Viral Fever!!

Shannon woke up with a high fever at 40.5 degrees yesterday morning but after the fever subsided, it never came back till now. (crossed my fingers) However, I felt sick when I woke up on Friday morning and I believed that I had caught her cough virus. The symptoms are almost the same as sometimes I really coughed till I puked. I wanted to see a doctor on Saturday morning and only realised that no clinic open on weekends. :( The doctor from the hospital prescribed a cough medicine that she only requires to drink at night. I researched from the website that this medicine is to curb the itchiness in the throat and prevent puking. Thus, I "kapok" some her cough medicine and was feeling much better today.

In fact, this is wrong timing to be sick as we are busy packing and cleaning to move to another house tomorrow. The thought of moving to a bigger house with an extra room had been there since last year. We have been looking around and viewing houses since February but to invalid as either J or me didn't like the house. Last month, when we went to Laforet to check on a house, the agent suggested another house to us. We immediately went to see the exterior of the house and this time both of us love it.

Well, it reminded me when J asked me last year whether I want to move to a bigger house and my answer was:

" donwan lah, need to top up the rent leh (Our rental fees are paid by the company to a certain limit) ... unless it's a HOUSE, a standalone house that is surrounded by gardens, not terrace nor Semi D and no double storey. "

And yes, it's a house we are moving to!! A house that is surrounded by gardens. A house that come with 3 bedrooms, one enclosed kitchen, one garage and one big living cum dining area. The house is about 104msq with 400msq garden. It's about 10 minutes drive to Shannon's school. Well, we have to top up a bit but I think it is worth it as we really have no chance staying in such a house when we go back Singapore..... :P

Viral Fever - Day 5

2009-07-10T16:19:00.004+02:00

This morning, she woke up with slight fever at about 38.6 degrees. This is the first time that her fever had lasted so long. After giving her fever medicine, her fever slightly subsided to 37.5 degrees. She looked much better despite of her poor appetite.

Yesterday, I was thinking of bringing her to see the PD for the 2nd time. I am worried that it was more than a viral fever. I am worried that she had UTI as her urine looked very yellowish. I am afraid that the febrile fits will hit again and moreover her cough is getting from bad to worse. She complains about the pain in her throat and had refused to drink her milk for the past 2 days. I called the PD at 11am but the clinic was closed or not yet opened. I talked to one of my friends and realised that the PD will just do a prescription for us to go to the pharmacy to get a bottle for urine and than bring it to the Lab after urine samples are collected. I called J and we decided that we would bring her to the hospital if her fever is still high in the evening.

Last night, she was grouchy after waking up from her afternoon nap. She was coughing non-stop and she was running a high fever of 39.7 degrees. I fed her with some fever medicine and took her for a shower to cool down the temp before we headed to the Hospital. As usual, fever subsided slightly by the time the doctor sees her. I hate this kind of scenario; it makes us looked like super kancheong parent who loves to visit the A&E. Shannon was behaving so active that no one believed that she was a sick child. Communication is another big problem, we told the doctor that our French was bad and she started to talk to Shannon. And Shannon went Oui Oui Oui (yes) when the doctor was pressing her body asking her whether it was painful. @_@

The doctor went out after checking her and came back half an hour later asking us to bring her for Chest X-Ray. After X-Ray, we waited for another half an hour for her blood test. They gave her Entonox to use. While she was happily breathing in and out using the Entonox, the nurses were drawing her blood. I can see she jerked her hand slightly when the needle was poked inside and she nodded her head when I asked her whether it was painful. I am surprised and proud of her cuz she didn't tear for the whole procedure but that's most probably due to the Entonox she was using.

After the blood test, the I.V value was left on her hand in case they need it later. After 15 minutes, Shannon started to cry saying that her injection site was painful and she wanted to go home. She wanted to be carried and she fell asleep after coaxing her for another 30 minutes. We waited for another hour before the doctor came back with the result. She tried to speak to us in English but we had a hard time understanding it. She asked us to continue with the fever medicines; stop the cough and throat medicine. She prescribed us another type of cough medicine which only use ONCE at night and Nasal Spray to be used twice a day. We couldn't understand her at all when we asked about the test result for the X-ray, urine and blood. We assumed that everything was alright since she let us home. The nurses came and took out the I.V. value and Shannon was crying in tears this time. She was running a high fever at 39.3 degrees when we left the Hospital.

Although it was a relieved that she was only having a Viral Fever after so many tests but I still couldn't help feeling guilty of having my dear girl to go thru all the tests. She could have skipped the entire test if we waited for another day or 2. :(

Fever Attack

2009-07-07T15:29:00.005+02:00

Shannon was having fever since Monday 5am. Her fever subsided after a dose of Advil but came back fiercely last evening and went up and down till now. I had brewed some "Ling Yang" but she refused to drink it. We had to monitor her to make sure that her fever is below 39 degrees because of the fear of febrile fits. We sponged her last night at 11pm and made sure her fever was at 38 degree before we went back to sleep. I woke up at 3am and 8am to feed her with fever medicine keeping her fever below 39 degrees.

This morning, I brought her to see a PD and was prescribed more Doliprane and Advil together with a medicine for her throat inflammation and cough medicine. According to the PD, she is having a Viral Fever that will continue for a few more days thus he didn't prescribe any antibiotic for her throat inflammation. I brewed some Barley water but dare not give her too much as elderly said it will create phlegm if she is coughing. Her fever rose to 39 degrees this afternoon and I sponged her again and managed to get down below 38 degrees. However, it came back 3 hours later and I had to coax her to take a shower. After the shower, her temp went down below 38 degrees. I was relieved slightly but her fever came back at 38.5 degrees half an hour later. I gave her another dose of fever medicine and pray that her fever will goes away soon.

Her fever seems to be really bad this time. She looks much more lethargic, her appetite is poor, she complains about coldness more and she feels tired and sleepy after a while. Probably, the weather had caused her sickness. 1 week ago, it was so hot and warm everyday and now it rains almost everyday. I really hope she will recover soon as we are now busy packing and cleaning to move into our new rented house next Monday. "sigh"

Gala de Gymnastic 2009

2009-06-30T18:15:00.004+02:00

Her Gym school had a small celebration cum performance last Saturday.

When Summer starts in France means all school and ECA will end. School and ECA will only resume in September and what are going to do with the kids for the coming 2 months? :P

Gala De Chambrelent 2009

2009-06-30T17:21:00.005+02:00

Last Friday, Shannon's school had a celebration which was held annually a week before the school closes for Summer Holidays. As usual, we sent them to school in the morning for some games organised by the school, then we picked them around 1pm and sent them back at around 3pm for the event which we were invited to join in. During the gala, the kids had a series of performances. They sing and dance together! The school had done a great job by combining different grades students to dance and sing together. Below are some of the videos taken on that day.

Video 2

They actually learned a few English songs from the school. The Rainbow Song, How's the weather, Head & Shoulders, Knees & Toes are some of them. Few days ago, Shannon actually started to sing "The Rainbow Song" which really impressed J and myself.

It was really fun to watch the kids perform. They looked so innocent and cute when they dance and most importantly, they seems to enjoy it! ^_^

Agnes, their teacher cum School Principal will be retiring this year. The kids sang her a farewell song in the following video and we brought a Swarosvki Necklace for her which she puts it on during the gala.

Talking about gifts, the culture here is really different from Singapore. If I am not wrong, Singapore Teachers are not allow to receive gift (over a certain amount) from the students. Over here, we are expected to get it for the teachers as an appreciation gift at the end of every school term!

Annual Dance Performance 2009

2009-06-22T16:11:00.000+02:00

At last, Shannon had her first ever Dance Performace at L'Olympia last Saturday after practicing for 4 months. We arrived L'Olympia at 730pm and the queue to the theatre had already started. I got J to queue up as the tickets were free-seating while I brought Shannon to the backstage. The helper changed her into her first costume and I snapped some photos before I joined J.

The performance started at 9pm. After watching for about half an hour, it was finally Shannon's & Avril's group to perform. ^^ I got kind of emotional at one moment that I feel like tearing to see my baby's first performance... ;p

She looked so smiley and proud when she made her entrance. The moment she spotted me among the seated audience, she looked so excited and was slightly distracted and I got to remind her using my hand gestures to get her to continue with the dance. ^^

This was her second dance. Though it was a short one but we still could see that she was really enjoying the performance. The kids were all so cute but could be better if they faced the audience more often.. hehehehe.. they were actually constantly looked at the instructor who was hiding behind the stage dancing with them.

Snapshots captured from the videos.

I am really really proud of her! This baby dance group was supposed to start at 4.5 years old but the instructor allowed us to enrol them at 3.5 years old. In fact, she only practice for 4 months which was less than 16 times becuz of the HFMD quarantine last October and we went back Singapore for almost 4 months after the quarantine. I believe she will do so much better for the dance performance next year.

Her dancing classes ceased as the Summer holiday arrived. We will be enrolling her for modern dance and ballet dance this coming September. The dancing fees over here is much cheaper as compared to Singapore. How I wish I could stay here for a longer period of time. :P

The following are some photos taken during the Performance and a video of the Finale Dance of the night.

The Dancing Instructor who did all the choreography for the 3 hours performance.

Father's Day Celebration

2009-06-22T13:38:00.005+02:00

We had a Small Father Day's Celebration yesterday. In fact, it was a surprise for all the fathers.. Well, thanks to our friend, Serene who came out with this idea! We had a potluck lunch and everyone of us had prepare a gift for the fathers. We had some fun games during the gathering too. The first was getting the kids to recognise their own father's voice. And the second game was getting fathers to act out what animals for mummies & their kids to guess. We really had fun yesterday!

In fact this game is for daddies to act out what is the animal and the kids will guess. But in the end I was the one who was guessing..hahahaha

Kudos to you!

Guess who is your father by listening. We had a good laugh over this game as the kids couldn't really differentiate the voice of their fathers...

I would really like to thank Serene for her effort to think of all the games for the families and the kids. We really had a great time! ^_^

Busy Weeks Ahead

2009-06-15T18:04:00.009+02:00

It's coming to the end of Spring which means Summer holiday is here for the kids.

Shannon will be having her 2 months summer holiday 2 weeks later. This applies to her extra curriculum activities like dancing and gym class. But before it ends, there will be performance for her gym and dancing class. For the coming Wednesday, she will have a rehearsal for their dance at the L'Olympia Archacon and their performance will on the night of Saturday, 20 June 09. Her gym performance will be on 27 June in The Sport and the Leisures at Le Teich. Next Friday, her maternal school will have a small celebration to end the year and starts of summer holiday.

When her holiday starts, we will probably be busy packing to get ready to move to another house in Mid July.

Learning to Swim

2009-06-15T17:42:00.005+02:00

Yesterday, daddies brought their kids to the indoor swimming pool while we mummies went to Vide Grenier to grab some cheap stuff.

According to J, there is no kids pool and Shannon refused to go into the pool as she was scared. J nearly lost his patience and asked her to wait for him while he swim and finally she agree to let J carry her into the pool. Although a float was tied around her waist but the moment she was in the deep pool, she refuse to let go J.

However, when it was time to get out the pool, she refused and continuing swimming... Hmmm... Maybe we should enrol her to a swimming lesson since she loves it?

Coca Cola

2009-06-15T17:21:00.004+02:00

Most of the kids love Coca-Cola, what about yours?

Shannon never like Coca-Cola even though we let her tried her first sip when she was 1 year old. In fact, I am happy that she doesn't like it as once they love it, they will never stop drinking it.

The main reason that she doesn't really like to drink Coca-Cola is simply because she is a picky eater and she is not adventurous in food... like me. -.-" I never liked to force Shannon to eat the food that she detest. In my opinion, the more you force her to eat, the more she will resent in future. I prefer her to pick up the "liking" herself. However, sometimes I will just cheat and put some tiny bits of vegetables which is essential in her diet and she will just eat it with other dishes.

Last week, she surprised us by asking to taste my coca-cola at McDonald's. I let her tried and she went non-stop....

Brush Teeth

2009-06-15T16:40:00.005+02:00

Shannon started brushing her teeth since she was about 2 and half years old. However she refuses to use tooth paste. Everytime when we try to put some tooth paste on her toothbrush and get her to brush, she will induce vomit and cry. I was quite lenient for the first half year as I thought she will gradually accept it.

We did try to change different type of toothpaste favor but she still induced vomit everytime we asked her to use toothpaste. We told her that all her friends were using toothpaste and all the uncles and aunties will also encourage her to brush her teeth with toothpaste.

When I was about to post this post up asking for opinions, she suddenly let me brush her teeth with toothpaste! From last week till now, she happily brushed her teeth twice a day with toothpaste. After brushing her teeth, she will always come to me proudly and ask me to smell her minty mouth. I am really happy and proud that she had accepted finally the taste of the toothpaste.

Peep

2009-06-08T16:28:00.008+02:00

Last Friday, I took some photos and videos during her dancing class. I think Shannon was looking into the big mirror while doing all her dance steps below..

Well, but during her dancing class, she started to be mischievous again. If you look carefully in the video, she was trying to be funny while doing the dancing moves. She was unable to concentrate during the lesson as well. They are having a performance on 20 June 09 at L'Olympia Archacon, hopefully everything goes well and I can't wait to see my girl on the stage... ^^

Looking at her dance moves, I feel like transferring her to Judo class instead... @_@

Cazaux Airshow 2009

2009-06-08T16:11:00.005+02:00

We went to Cazaux Airshow 2009 on Saturday. In fact, I am not too keen but J wanted to bring Shannon there. We slowly strolled from one end to the other end and at the same time watching the fighter plane flying in the sky doing their acrobatic flying. The most spectacular airshow was done by French AF Patrouille de France .

Bon Fête Maman

2009-06-08T15:36:00.003+02:00

Yesterday was a Mothers' Day in France. Shannon actually did some mothers' day present for me from Clapotis and her school. However, she didn't really gave it to me but kept for herself instead. LOL

Long Weekend....

2009-06-02T14:55:00.004+02:00

This was what we have done for the long weekend...

Saturday, 30 May 2009

We went to Lye Kim Hup in Bordeaux and bought some chinese vegetables, fishballs and fishcakes and we proceeded to L'Entrecote for Lunch. Frankly speaking, I missed eating the Entrecote here but was reluctant to come as the queue was always very long. But eventually we came and this is our 3rd time.

After lunch, the waitress offered the kids a lollipop and we saw the following...

Then, we went to Ikea and left the kids with the "balls" for 45 minutes while we shopped...

After Ikea, we went to Auchan Supermarket to get some bbq food for Sunday and went home to prepare...

Sunday, 31 May 2009

We woke up early to prepare the bbq for the night. Cleaned up the house and garden a bit and had one round of mahjong with Irene and Chew before the guests came. LOL ..It was a small BBQ gathering among a few families. We had a great night chit-chatting away and the kids playing together. The only regret is that I forgot to whip out my camera for some photo-taking...hehehehe

Monday, 1 June 2009

Holiday in France - Whit Monday or Pentecost Monday (also known as Monday of the Holy Spirit) is the holiday celebrated the day after Pentecost, a movable feast in the Christian calendar)

Strike A Pose, Shannon!

We went to the beach with some friends in the morning since it was a sunny day. J finally pumped up a "boat" which was passed over from his friend 2 years ago. Initially, we thought it was a small boat but in the end it was really a long boat. Anyway, we brought it to the beach and the guys and the kids had fun with it.

We didn't stay for long as the water was still too cold for the kids. We went for lunch @ McDonald's and let the kids play for another hour in the Indoor playground before all of us headed home.

Kid Parc Again!

2009-05-27T14:39:00.004+02:00

Yep.. We went Kid Parc again on Wednesday. In France, the kids only go to school for 4 days a week and Wednesday is not a school day. Since we couldn't book any slot for them in the crèche, we decided to bring them to kid parc instead.

As usual, the kids had a great time and I managed to capture some nice photos for my dear girl.

I said strike a pose and she lifted up her dress....@_@

She claimed that she was a mermaid when she was lying in the pool of colourful balls .. =.='

Rice Dumpling

2009-05-26T14:29:00.001+02:00

I went to Serene's place to learn to make rice dumpling from her mum. I only wrapped 4 of them which took me about 45 minutes and I gave up....I even brought the 4 of them back to cook at my home in case all the ingredient drop out from the leaves during the cooking. Hehehe...luckily, all were "well-wrapped" and the end result looks like ....

Hahaha.. I guessed I really don't have the talent to do it. However, the rice dumplings still taste very yummy despite of the look.

Kudos to Serene's Mum!! ^^

Exposition D'Art

2009-05-14T21:23:00.002+02:00

There was an Art & Craft Exposition in the school on 14 May 2008. The Exposition displays the arts and craft done by the kids for the past 8 months. Shannon had only a few pieces of masterpiece as she was in Singapore for 3 months.

J even rushed down immediately after work just to have a look at her precious daughter's masterpiece. ^^

Window Arts

2009-05-12T16:07:00.003+02:00

Since Avril was at our house last Sunday, I decided to let the girls do some art and craft. I took out the paint art we bought from Creative Art Corner @ Causeway Point few months ago and they started their work.

Finished Projects proudly presented by the girls!

We Knew Our Baby Shannon Is Growing Up When....

2009-05-11T14:17:00.001+02:00

She insisted to take the boat ride ALL BY HERSELF!

She raised both her hands when she was riding ROLLER COASTER! *_*

2 weeks ago, we went to the Kids Parc with our friends again. Well, we bought the season pass so we should make full use of it. Anyway, this time J was with us since it was a Sunday.

I was happy when I saw Shannon enjoying herself under the sun but I am really sad when I looked at myself in the mirror. Although I did put on sunblock SPF50 and wore hats, it didn't stop the sun from further tanning my already-tanned skin.

Le Vide Grenier

2009-05-07T00:12:00.003+02:00

VIDE GRENIER in french means empty attic or car boot sales. In another word, it was "second hand market" held by the local communities in France. Normally when there was Vide Grenier around our area, we wives would meet up and wandered around the area hoping to buy some cheap clothes or toys. This time round, we actually participated in one of the Vide Grenier 2 weeks ago around Irene's place!!!

One day before the Vide Grenier, we ransacked our garage to dig out all the things that we no longer use/need to sell at the Vide Grenier. Well, it was -more or less- giving away our unwanted things because most of the things were priced at 50cents euro - 5 euro. Those bulky item like television and fans can't even fetch a good price. We got rid our 29 inch CRT TV at only 20 euro with my friend chipping in a 14 inch TV!!! *_*"

It was definitely an extra-ordinary Sunday for all of us. In fact, the kids enjoyed more than us running around and playing together.

And yes, we are going do another Vide Grenier on 17th May at Lac Magdelene!! ~~Although I don't really have much things to sell~~ :P

Kid Parc

2009-04-24T21:27:00.004+02:00

Finally, I brought Shannon to the kid parc today with Mai & Brayden. It was a last minute decision made at 12pm after J told me that the weather will not be so good from tomorrow onwards. Well, I was reluctant to go to kids parc for past few weeks due to the pollen season over here. Moreover, Shannon and ourselves were still coughing for the past few weeks.

As usual, the kids enjoyed themselves by moving from one rides/games to another. ^_^

Shannon took about 8 times on this ride.

We left the place about 2.5 hours later. Anyway we had already bought the season pass for the kids parc which allows unlimited entry till the 4 November which means we can go back anytime we want! ^_^

Dancing Practice

2009-04-23T19:14:00.002+02:00

The following photos and video were taken during one of her dancing practice.

I can't wait till June to watch their performance!!!

Unexpected Visitors...

2009-04-18T11:35:00.005+02:00

From 4yr 0mth

YES!!! Mr HEAD LICE and his families visited Shannon's head recently!!! *_*

Yesterday morning, I saw Shannon scratching her head non-stop and I decided to check on her hair. After 5 minutes of searching, I found something crawling in her hair and immediately I caught it and threw it into the basin. ~~*EEeeeeKkkkk*~~ I confirmed it was a head louse via internet and immediately called my mum for help. Well, whatever my mum needed was not available here. I remembered I saw a comb for head lice at Irene's place and immediately drove to her house and borrowed from her.

As it was lunch hour, I couldn't get any anti-lice lotion/shampoo thus I went home and started combing her hair. Gosh, I caught another 3 more head lice in 30 minutes. Thereafter, I drove the car to the pharmacy again and bought shampoo for head lice and started the "therapy" on her immediately after I reached home. While waiting for the shampoo to suffocate the head lice, I started to check on my hair with that comb and sadly I found one in my hair. !@#%&*$%@

After shampooing Shannon's hair, I combed her hair again and caught another 4 dead lice. And its my turn to do the "therapy". I was relieved that not a single head louse was found in my hair after the shampooing which means that the head louse might had "jumped" (due to the static electricity while combing hair) into my hair while I was combing her hair.

Yesterday was quite a torture for Shannon and myself as we were busy entertaining and killing the new invaders for the whole afternoon. Well, I don't know where the head lice came from. Most probably, she caught it from the school as it was quite common here. Looks like I have to brush her hair with the comb for another few more days to confirm that the head lice and nits are cleared.

Flying Wings

2009-04-13T10:31:00.002+02:00

Few weeks ago, there was a Vide Grenier aka 2nd Hand Sales Market around our place. I went there with my friends and bought a Fairy Wings at 5 euros!!! When she put it on for the first time, she was amazed that the wings will flap when she moves.

大家讲华文 Speaking Mandarin

2009-04-13T09:13:00.000+02:00

One of the best things for going back Singapore for 3 months last year was the improvement of her spoken Mandarin. Before we went back, she don't speak Mandarin at all. After going to the childcare for 2 months and staying with my chinese speaking parents, she can actually converse with us in Mandarin now. ^_^

Reciting 小老鼠

Repeating after the speaker. I wonder why she said 物瓜instead of 木瓜.

What?!

2009-04-10T07:36:00.003+02:00

I woke up this morning and realised that her pants were wet!!

Yes!! Shannon wetted the bed!!! -.- ' @#$^&*

She had been potty trained since 2 years old. She NEVER once wetted the bed and I thought I was one of the fortunate mummies who didnt have to clean up pee mess. -.-

Well, she is still sleeping with her wet clothes as she was crying when I picked her up from the floor. Right! She fell down from the bed and luckily she was not hurt as it was kind of slow fall?? I questioned her when I touched her pants and asked ~~scolded~~ her why she wetted her pants and why she never go to the potty. She started to cry and J said let her sleep awhile more before waking up her to change for school!

I am worrying now. Will there be 2nd episode? 3rd episode blah blah blah

Arrrgghhhh, I really hate to clean up the pee mess... :(

Happy Birthday, Avril

2009-04-09T19:29:00.006+02:00

Today is Avril Birthday!!! Happy Birthday to YOU!!!

Actually we went to her birthday celebration which was held last Wednesday. Her grandfather came to France to visit them last mth, therefore they purposely celebrated earlier before he left for Singapore last Saturday. The party has excluded all fathers as it was held on Wednesday whereby the kids have no school on that day.

It was a fabulous party as Uncle (Avril's grandfather) cooked one Singapore dishes that we missed.

Yes!!! HOKKIEN MEE, NGOH HIANG AND HEI CHO

Well, the kids enjoyed so much as there was so many activities going on. After finishing the cakes, they started to dance.

Great Dancer ya! ^_^

Mummy Look!

2009-04-08T20:46:00.000+02:00

Earlier this evening, Shannon asked me to look at her creation.

Shannon: Mummy, Look!
Me: Wow.. What's that?
Shannon: Flower

Shannon is dancing again ^_^

2009-04-04T16:03:00.003+02:00

Well, I don't know what she was dancing about and what kind of dance was that.. It looked like a mixture of ballet, hip hop and break dance. And some moves are just so funny that we couldn't stop laughing..

Carnivals

2009-03-31T20:37:00.004+02:00

Look how she walk!!!

Princess Shannon playing hopscotch!!

Two weeks ago, there was a series of carnivals going on in France. It was some kind of celebration to wards off evils before Easter Day?? I am too sure even though I have searched the internet.@_@

Anyway, Shannon and her friends were asked to dress in Costumes and celebrated the occasion after the school hours. I believed the kids had enjoyed the day with the dancing and food shown on the videos and photos above. :P

Shannon's Tantrums

2009-03-31T15:33:00.002+02:00

This is what Shannon do when she is unhappy...

Happy Birthday, Shannon!!!

2009-03-23T16:57:00.005+01:00

Today, our dear precious Shannon turns 4. As usual, we had a birthday celebration for her and it was held yesterday.

We started preparing the food on Saturday and woke up at 7am yesterday morning to cook the food. J was in charge of the Roasted Pork and Cha Siew while I fried the rice, Bee Hoon, Vegetables and deep fried the fishballs, hotdogs, nuggets, Ngoh Hiang and Longon Jelly. We bought some cold prawns, oysters and Roti Poulet(Grilled Chicken) to complete the buffet. Frankly speaking, we are quite amazed that we did all that ourselves. :P (anyone needs food catering?)

We were quite disappointed when we saw the cake. The decoration of the cake wasn't per our request. We even gave them the picture below and thought that they will do something similar

I had specially purchased the 3 princess topper online to put on the cake as the cake decoration over here are really normal. Luckily, the cake tasted really good so we weren't so pissed off ^_^

Our dearest Shannon was dressed like a princess and looked really happy during the celebration. The following 2 slides are photos taken during the party. Thanks Eddie for being the photographer of the day.

I would also like to thank all our friends for the gifts and for attending, making the party so memorable.

Photos Taken for the past few months

2009-03-17T13:28:00.004+01:00

One sunny saturday, we decided to bring Shannon for a swim at La Teste Indoor swimming pool but only realised that the swimming pool was closed as it was damaged by the storm few months ago. Thus, we went for a Mac Donald Breakfast and met Serene Leong and decided to go for cycling at Archacon.

One fine afternoon, we brought the kids to Macdonald for lunch after their school and Shannon met her first "boyfriend". Initially, the boy was pretending to be a monster chasing the girls around but later turn to kiss them on their cheeks. Avril shoved him off but Shannon allowed him to kiss her on the cheeks. @_@ After that, they started to hold hand and played together. Then the boy brought Shannon to his mummy and told her that they are married. -_-'

Back to Gym Class. This was the first time she attending the gym with her friends. And we parent sat outside and chat for an hour...LOL

Back to her Dancing Class. Shannon was really happy to wear her Ballerina Costumes. I hope she can catch up all the dancing steps before the performance in June.

Hehehe.. This "Lou Hay" photo should be up long time ago...

Au Revoir, Serene

2009-03-13T19:27:00.003+01:00

Today, Damian, Baby Daylen and Serene went back Singapore for good. We first met on the plane and later she told me that I am her secondary schoolmates. She remembered me as I was one of the Prefects in the school. (That was like more than 10 years ago!!!) :P I don't have any idea who she was as she was 2 years old younger than me. Hehe

Well, the world is so small or we called it Yuan Fen? We even stayed harmony together in one house for the first few months. All the kids love her as she is always smiley and she is also one of the most patience mummies.

Anyway, we had organized a Farewell dinner for her last week. I believe all the ladies had really enjoyed that night. WHY? Because all the kids stayed at home with their Daddy and thus we really had a GREAT night chatting, eating peacefully!!!

We are going to miss you, Serene. I bet Shannon will be missing Baby Daylen too.. Hmmm.. Maybe you will change your mind and come back again at the end of the year? hehehehe Anyway, see you back in Singapore soon.

Photos Taken In Singapore

2009-03-13T13:19:00.000+01:00

Dinner with Gong Gong's Family in Jurong Hill Top Japanese Restaurant.

Meeting up with Johnny, Lily & Asher who returned back to Singapore for good.

Photos of J & Cousins

A Family Photo with Uncles, Aunties & Cousins

Reunion Dinner in Imperior Treasure Restaurant at Great World City.

Grandma's aka Shannon's Great Grandma's Birthday

The First Day of Chinese New Year

A Walk at Chinatown

A Reunion Dinner in Yan Ting Restaurant @ St. Regis Hotel. This savoury dinner cost SG$2000!!

A Long Waiting Reunion between Shannon & Daddy.

A Dinner with Che Che Jonathan & Anna

Daddy's Birthday

2009-02-20T14:06:00.003+01:00

2 nights ago, we celebrated J's Birthday with a couples of friends. It was a simple celebration with "Mee Hun Kuay" for dinner. I got Shannon to bring out the cake to Daddy and she kept saying " Mummy, it is heavy". I am so worried that she will dropped the cake.. hehehe

Gourette

2009-02-20T14:00:00.000+01:00

Last Saturday, we went to Gourette snow mountain with some friends. It was a one day trip thus it was quite rush. We started off at around 7am and reached there about 11am.

Shannon looked super happy and excited when we reached the destination. She immediately started to pick up the snow when we stepped out of the carpark. We stopped her as the snow looked dirty around that area. We walked to the place where we could have some "snow slay". Shannon didn't seem to enjoy this time round and our slay overturned twice as the snow was quite hard and bumpy.

After playing a few round of snow slays, we started to have small snow fights followed by the sliding down the snow from a height.

After about 3 hours, we decided to drive back home. I changed Shannon to dry clothing and gave her a bottle of milk. Within 5 minutes, she dozed off and fell asleep. We went to Cresendor for dinner and reached home at around 8:30pm..

It was a nice trip but it would be even more wonderful if it really "SNOWED"...

Window 7 Beta

2009-02-20T13:10:00.002+01:00

At last, the PC and internet connection are up and running. However, J changed the operating system to Window 7 beta which I have problem uploading the photos properly. It seems that picasa is having problem running on Window 7. I can upload and view the photos but I cannot edit the photos. Once I do editing, the picasa program will hang. Any good recommendation for digital photo organizer?

The uploading part is another hassle; I couldn't rename my photos properly using the window upload program. Although Window 7 beta looks sophiscated but I still prefer Window XP which is more stable.

Updates

2009-02-17T09:58:00.008+01:00

We are still tapping neighbour's internet to keep our msn online since the day we arrived. The technician will be here on Wednesday to check the internet connection. If the problems lies with the wiring outside the house, it will take us even more weeks before we get ourselves permanently connected. I have not uploaded my pictures into the new PC as it was not fully setup. Without pictures, I really don't know what to blog. hehehehe..

Shannon started her Nursery 2 weeks ago. As for myself, I have been doing last minute winter sales shopping which ended last Tuesday. It was just so irresistible as the clothes during sales were really cheap.

Shannon is having her 2 weeks school holidays now. She looks really happy and contented to be back in France. Whenever we go out, she will make sure that we will "GO HOME" after that. Last week, we visited the snow mountain at Gourrette and I believe the kids had a great time playing the the snow and slay. Well, photos will be uploaded when internet and pc is up...

BACK IN FRANCE

2009-02-02T10:40:00.004+01:00

After J arrived, we had been busy having gathering with friends and relatives. We had also been busy buying things back here, thus I did not have time to blog at all.

We arrived back HOME yesterday afternoon and learned from our friends that a big storm or small cyclone happened last week. We saw a lot of trees were uprooted, fallen traffic lights and fallen electrical wires, broken signboards on the journey back from the airport but luckily no one was hurt over here. My friends said some of the fallen trees even hit the house. Some of my friends got affected and had no electricity for 40 hours! They had to go to MacDonald when the night falls and sleep with more clothing as the house heater was down. Some of the bricks had also fallen down from their roof.

When we reached home, our satellite disc had fallen on the roof but luckily never damage the roof. Our garden was in a mess, our garden table, chairs, kids playhouse, slides was blown from one side to the other side of the garden. Our internet connection was down and I am tapping friend's line now. To make things worse on the first day of our arrival, the milk powder cover in one of the luggage broke and spilled all the powder all over the clothes which took up about 2 hours to clean up. I will continue blogging and updating my "back-logs" whenever I have time or connected.

Opps... my French neighbour just knocked on the door and told me that our garage door was blown open and he helped us to close it. He asked me to check whether anything is missing.... *_*

The Reunion

2009-01-22T04:04:00.002+01:00

Finally, J was back yesterday.

We took 1 hour plus MRT ride to fetch J at the airport. Shannon was delighted when she saw him. She ran to him and hugged him really tight and refused to let go and J's eyes were filled with tears too. As for me, after I had got my big hug and big kiss, I was abandoned by both of them for the rest of the day. Hahahaha.. And Shannon transformed herself into a Kuala Bear and stick to her daddy whenever she could.

We reached home at about 7pm and J went to washed up and we went to a friend's gathering which was arranged 1 hour ago. He had brought something really special back for them and all our friends were called up instantly for a meet up. Initially, I was still worried that our friends couldn't make it as it was really a last minutes call up. Luckily, J's face was BIG enough to have all of them gathered or else "something special" will be really wasted. It was a really great and fun filled gathering which ended at 1130pm.

When we reached home, I brought Shannon upstairs for a washed up while J parked the car. After I had cleaned her up, she started to cry for her Daddy even though I told her that he will be back.

That is how much she misses him.

*photos will be uploaded later

2nd Last Weekend In Sin

2009-01-19T16:27:00.006+01:00

Last Saturday, I brought Shannon to the swimming pool with my friends again. After swimming, we went for a Karaoke session at the Safra Club. The last time I went Karaoke was in 2004!!! Singing is one of my favourite past times during my young days. We really had a great time with Renee's and Jac's families.

On Sunday, I stayed at home and helped my parent with some spring cleaning at home. I must help as my mother had been helping me alot when I worked. Seriously, it was not easy as all the things do not belong to me and those who own it are not free to clean it. However, I really couldn’t help it but to try my best tidy it and clean it. At least now the house is more presentable and ready for CNY.

Today, I went for a blood test as my leg was not fully recovered. The pain on my calf didn't really go away and the doctor suggested a blood test. After the blood test, I brought Shannon for a hair cut with XiaoYi.

We reached home at about 3pm and my sister showed me some blisters on her hand and body and we suspected that she was having Chicken Pox. We went back to the doctor with Shannon and she was confirmed having Chicken Pox. After some advice from the doctor, I decided to take the Chicken Pox vaccination with Shannon despite it might be useless now.

Seriously, I never blame anyone except for my luck. I am angry with myself, with my f$%^&@#$ luck. If it happened 1 month earlier or 2 weeks later, things will not be so complicated. It's not a big deal getting Chicken Pox with all the advance medication given now. However, if one of us got it next week, our trip back to France will be delayed. J will have to go back alone and I will need to bring Shannon back on my own next month.

J will be back in Singapore tomorrow evening and I am not excited at all....

Zoo Trip 11 Jan 09

2009-01-14T14:19:00.006+01:00

After the doctor's visit, Shannon's fever subsided the next day. At the same time, my FIL called me and said that he got the Zoo Card. I observed her for 2 more days and decided to bring her to the Zoo on Sunday.

We invited my sis and her friend to join us for the Zoo Trip. I still find that it will be more fun if Shannon's friends are around. However, my sis and her friend had tried their best to entertain her and they had been a great help to me.

As usual, she spent the longest time at the water-playgound and this was the longest time I had spent in the Zoo. We reached the Zoo at 9am and only went home at 6pm.

On Monday, I brought her to the clinic for another urine test to confirm that she had recovered. I told Doctor about her bad habit of only urinating when she was really urgent. He said that this might be the cause of the UTI and asked me to monitor her urine time from now onwards.

THIS WILL BE THE LAST!

2009-01-08T16:57:00.007+01:00

We planned to go to the Zoo today with Mai, Eddie and Brayden but were forced to cancel it as Shannon had a fever this morning.

At about 7am this morning while we were still in bed, her hand unintentionally brushed against me and I realised that her hand was hot. Then I touched her body with my eyes closed and realised that her body feel hot too. I quickly dragged myself up the bed and took a thermometer to measure her temperature and realised that she was running a fever at 38degrees. I woke her up and fed her with some fever medicine. After 15 minutes, she vomited her milk out and went back to sleep.

She woke up at 9am and fell asleep half an hour later. At about 11am, I went and take her temperature and realised her temperature had gone up. I woke her up to feed her with some ibufen thinking that it will help. I told her I might bring her to see a doctor if her fever didn't subside and she told me that she wanted to go HOSPITAL. Then she told me that her leg and throat was painful. I was worried that she had some throat infection or need antibiotic and decided to bring her to doc after her milk. She refused her milk after the first mouth and I started to change her to get ready to go out.

After I had changed her, I was helping her to wear her jacket and suddenly she just fell onto the mattress and start having fits. OMG! It was painful to watch. I had to remain calm as J was not around this time. I laid her on one side, put a small towel on under her mouth, held my tears and kept calling her name. She just laid down there clenching her fist, jerking her body and rolling up her eyes. It lasted for about 3-5minutes but it felt so long. When her fit was finally over, I shifted her a bit and she vomited some fluid out. As usual, she fell right into deep sleep after having fits. While my mum took care of her, I called my family doctor and was asked to bring her to the clinic. After 15 minutes, I called a cab to fetch both of us to the clinic.

While the doctor examined her, she vomited. I brought her to washroom to clean up and back to the doctor's room. He found no redness in her throat or her ears and asked me to try to get her urine for examination. I told Shannon that we can only go home after she pee and she did after about 10 minutes. Immediately, we were asked to go into the room and the doctor changed his prescription on the antibiotic as he said that her urine result has the sign of UTI. I still need to bring her back to take a urine test after she finishes her course of antibiotics.

I brought her to Supermarket to get some cranberry juice which I was told that it was good for cases like that. In the supermarket she vomited again, I cleaned her up and met my neighbour. She took care of her while I went to pay for the cranberry juice. She vomited again in the cab and luckily I had a plastic bag with me. I fed her with antibiotic and cough syrup after I reached home and she fell asleep right after that.

I fed her with fever medicine around 3pm after she woke up and cooked her some porridge then she took a short nap between 4-5pm. She vomited again during dinner time and her fever shot up. I fed her with fever syrup and went to buy the cooling pad for her forehead. Her fever almost fully subsided at around 930pm after I showered her. She asked for milk at about 10pm but refused to drink it after putting into her mouth. She told me she was worried that she will vomit after drinking her milk. ): She feel asleep at about 11pm and I fed her another round of fever syrup at 130am.

Today is 9th January, 21 days away from departure day and 12 days to J's arrival. I haven't had time to bring Shannon to the Zoo and we haven't done any CNY shopping. Finally I squeezed some time to bring her to the Zoo and she fell sick.

Within the next 11 days, we need to

Get some CNY clothing and shoes
Go to the hairdresser
Bring Shannon to the Zoo, Bird Park, Science Center and etc
Need to finished and hand over the work (which left only 7 weekdays)

Seriously, I prefer to do the first 3 things during weekdays because there are a lot of people during weekend during this period. I really hate to squeeze in the shopping centre/MRT/BUS and I hate the long Q at the cashier/taxi stand especially with Shannon along.

Haiz... Anyway, I prayed and hoped that today is the last SWAY issue both of us will encounter. I spent about $110 this week for the medical fees on both of us and if I am not wrong, I have already spent more than $500 on our medical bills for this trip. Well, even the nurse in the clinic also commented that Singapore hongzui (FengShui) is not good for both of us and we should go back asap...hahaha...

Present For Shannon, Toy for Mummy

2009-01-06T18:46:00.008+01:00

Last Sunday, I brought Shannon to visit her Grandpa and Grandma.
We took feeder bus followed by MRT and alighted at Tiong Bahru Station. We went to buy a cake for my FIL as his birthday is on 5th Jan. At the same time, I got myself more shoes from PedalWorks. After collecting the AngPao Packet for spending $30, we took a cab to Grandpa's house.

Grandma was not at home and Grandpa was busy spraying new paint for his furnitures because they are moving to a new house in 2 more months. Anyway, my FIL took out a present for Shannon.

Then Shannon started to play with it but I believe this present is too tough for Shannon and I started to help her. However, I couldn't find any "instruction/assemble" details in the box. ~.~ Therefore, I tried to fix it by looking at the pictures on the box.

And TADA... I made it!

Then, we put one AA battery in and it was successful! However, the flaw of this Creative Bricks is the power is not really strong enought to turn all the wheels.

Shannon, The Bully

2009-01-06T18:20:00.005+01:00

Last Saturday, I brought Shannon to the Swimming Pool again. It was the third time we followed Renee to the swimming pool since Joelle is having swimming lesson weekly. Shannon is always very happy and excited when I tell her that we are going to swimming pool. She would "transform" herself into a good girl whenever we tell her that we are not going to the swimming pool if she is naughty. hahaha

Ryan Kor Kor loves her too because whenever Shannon is around, he does not need to swim 20 laps as instructed by his father. After Joelle's swimming lesson, they will play together in the pool for another half an hour before we bring them for a shower. We planned to go for Karaoke Session after dinner but plan was cancelled as Joelle was not feeling well. Therefore, we went home after we had our dinner at Jack's Place.

Ramblings

2009-01-05T16:29:00.010+01:00

Last night, Shannon couldn't sleep well due to coughing. She was having slight cough on Friday night but it was kept under control with some left-over cough syrup. However, the cough became bad after we came back from my FIL's place. I believe that the cough got worse after she ate some prawn crackers and chocolates at my FIL's place. I brought her to see the doctor this morning and I took the chance to ask the doctor for more medicine for the pain on my left calf.

"Sigh"

Life has been kind of "sway" to me since November 08. Stressful work was one of them. Lots of things are new to me and I have to learn and pick up fast but that is not the worse. The worst is that my health has been giving me problems too. I took about 3 weeks to recover from the bad cough in November. After recovering, Shannon fell sick. After she recovered, I sprained my neck and took about few days to recover. When I thought everything is over, I overstrained my left calf which caused me to limp badly on some days. It took about another 2 weeks to get better and insomnia set in due to the work stress last week and caused me to have throat ulcer. Just when the sore throat was getting better, the pain on my left calf came back again. You say sway or not?

However, despite my health issues, I made a point to bring Shannon out during weekends to meet my friends up and sometimes to J's family's gathering. I have been bringing her to the swimming pool (which she loves) with my friends' kids for the past 3 Saturdays. I am still looking for the perfect timing and the perfect company to bring her to the Zoo, Bird Park, and Science Center etc.

As usual, family members had been a great help during these tough periods especially during the pain on my right calf. Well, you have to admit that mother's love is the greatest love of all. Nobody can love you like they do. She helped me to feed Shannon and bathed her when I needed to work late despite the fact that she had been taking care of my niece and cooking for the whole family. She helped me to bring Shannon to childcare even though she had to bring my niece along and my sis helped me to bring her back home to minimize my walking when my calf is painful. I took cab almost everyday for the past 2 weeks as I really do not want to strain it further due to walking. My father had been nagging at me about going out on weekends which he felt I should have rest at home instead.

I dare not visit the Chinese Sinseh for my painful calf as other people, even the doctors said that they might use acupuncture on my calf or poke a needle into some veins and let some blood out. It's a joke right. After going thru 3 full cycles of Fresh IVF which added up about 6 months of self injections and countless of blood drawings and I am still afraid of needles! Sometimes I wonder how did I go thru the past few IVF? However, I seriously need to consider going to Chinese sinseh if my calf doesn't get any better.

Sounds unbelievable on how "sway" I am right. Well, I don't blame you cos you are not the only one who is doubtful about it. One of the reasons for not updating my blog so often for the past few weeks is "there are way too much of grumbling and complaints". In fact, I cried a few times over it because I just felt so helpless about being so "sway". I even got my mum to cook mee sua with 2 hard boil eggs which believed that it will change one's luck. It's just that I haven got time to go down to pray at the GuanYin temples.

Anyway, it's the beginning of 2009, I really hope everything will go smoothly from now onwards. I really want my life to be back to normal asap.

GoodBye 2008 Hello 2009

2009-01-03T17:20:00.003+01:00

Time flies, another year had passed. Shannon and myself spent our last day of 2008 and the very first minutes of 2009 with 2 of my good friends at Pasir Ris Park. The kids enjoyed themselves roller blading, skate scooting while Shannon tried her best chasing the 2 kors kors and 2 jie jie around. In the end, we got Ryan and Kai to buy some bubbles back for her to play instead of chasing them around. AT brought along some food and Brian bought some food back from Changi Village for dinner. We sat on the grass drinking sparkling wine and had a nice chat. We listened to "not so bad" live band as we were just sat beside the pub and waited for the countdown. The kids even danced along with the disco music!

At about 1130pm, we started to bring our kids for a wash up and waited for the countdown. We went home about 30minutes after the countdown and Shannon fell asleep immediately after the car started to move. ^_^

Lastly, Happy New Year to every one and may 2009 bring many opportunities your way to explore every joy of life!

Merry X'Mas

2008-12-25T04:40:00.002+01:00

Tic-Tac Tic-Tac Where are you?

2008-12-19T15:32:00.006+01:00

When I was enjoying my coffee last Sunday morning... I heard Shannon crying beside me, oh oh oh ... mummy.... she pointed to her right nostril. Immediately, I knew she stuffed her tic-tac she was eating earlier into her nose. I looked into her nose and confirmed that the white tic tac was stuck in her right nostril. I tried to calm myself down, walked around the house finding a tweezer and thinking that it could help. I changed my mind when I put the tweezer into her nostril as I am afraid that I would accidentally push the tic-tac further in instead. Therefore, I called the clinic and they asked me to go down since I can still see the tic-tac. While I was changing, I couldn't help but continue to nag ~~scold~~ Shannon on why the hell she wanted to put a tic tac inside her nose. She just kept crying and I just had to scream and asked her to stop before she really sucked the tic-tac further in.

I met my parent at the lift lobby and told them what had happened. They said I should have use my mouth to suck out the tic tac immediately after I found out. I quickly brought her upstairs again and tried to suck her nose directly using my mouth. She cried in pain and I took a look at her nose and realised that the tic-tac was gone. We took a cab directly to the clinic and waited half an hour for her turn. While waiting, I realised that she was breathing thru her mouth instead of her nose. The doctor told me that he couldn't see anything inside her nose and refer her to A&E at KK Hospital. I called my Aunt to cancel the lunch appointment we were supposed to have that day but she had actually arrived at the clinic. We went off together and they said that it was not a good idea to bring her to the A&E as they will probably stick in a tube (scope) into her nose to see whether the sweet is still there. They find that it will be a painful experience for a small kid. They looked at Shannon and find her behaving normally and asked me to join them for lunch and observed her further. Meanwhile, Shannon sneezed once and from then on she started to breath normally. I took their advice as I also do not want Shannon to suffer and followed them to Great World City to lunch together with my MIL & SIL. Shannon was enjoying her favourite porridge and behaved as if nothing had happened. Whenever we asked her where was the tic tac, she would replied that she don't know.

We went to my MIL's apartment at River Valley Road as our initial plan was to meet my BIL and let Shannon play in the children pool. After much pestering from Shannon and some assurance from my MIL, I let her played in the pool for half and hour. However, I couldn't stop worrying and decided to bring her to A&E for a check in the evening time. We waited 2 hours for our turn and the doctor said that they could not see anything in her nose except it was a bit swollen. They asked me to observe her the following day and if there is no secretion coming out from her right nose, the tic tac probably had melted and she will not need to go ENT for another check up.

If you were me, what would you do the next day even though you couldn't see any secretion from her nose?

My decision was not bring her down but at the same time I am worried that she will kenna infection a few days later if the tic tac really got stuck up there. So, I started to call up my friends and asked them for their opinions. I even called my doctor up and he said it was either I act pro-active which meant to go down ENT to confirm whether the tic-tac is still there or listen to the doctor at A&E and deal with the infection if it really comes later.

I chose to be pro-active as infection causes fever and fever sometimes causes Shannon to have febrile fits. We took a cab down to KK and waited about 2 hours for our turn. I really hate the waiting time at KK Hospital; if you couldn't see us at appointed time, why give us an appointment?? I thought I could have see the the doctor at the appointed time since I was 45 minutes earlier to do the registration. I couldn't find any feedback form around for me to complain while I was waiting. Waiting is already a torture but waiting with a kid was even worse.

Anyway, the "specialist" just took a look at her nose and said she couldn't see anything and probably the sweet had dissolve or swallowed by her. When I asked her will the infection arise if the sweet is still stuck there and she just asked me to bring her back only if there is secretion come out from that particular nostril. She said if I am worried, she can give me another appointment one month later. @#$#$ Siao! If Shannon is going to be okay for the next few days, why do I need to come back one month later???? I asked her why she never uses the scope to see her nose and she said no need. Haiz... wasted few hours for a 5 minutes consultation......

Few days had passed, nothing happened and I believed that the tic-tac had dissolved or swallowed by Shannon. When I asked Shannon will she ever stuff anything in her nose again, her answer is NO.

I pray and hope this will be the first and last time...

.

Weekend Outing

2008-12-06T15:22:00.000+01:00

One of the weekends, my friends brought us out. We had a great time or rather Shannon had a great time with the jie jie and ko ko....

Barney & Mr Men SHOW

2008-12-06T13:49:00.000+01:00

Mr Men Show

Barney Show

LOOK AT THE CROWDS!

Shannon only get to watch the above 2 shows on one of the weekend. The crowds was really crazy during weekend and I do not have time to bring her out during weekdays. The adults crowding around the area were all bunch of inconsiderate people. They wouldn't give way to the kids to walk into the viewing area nor letting the kids to stand infront of them to watch the show. I was quite pissed off at a moment and said loudly to Shannon:" Let's go baby, let the adult watch the barney show!!!" @#$%^&

How We Spent Our Saturday Night

2008-11-30T08:50:00.010+01:00

Frankly speaking, I am really lazy to go out on weekends. Everyday, I wake up at 730am, spends about 3 hours travelling to and fro the work place, walks for around 40 minutes (cos Shannon is strolling) to and fro the childcare, reaches home at 7pm and only get to sleep at 12am. Thus, when it comes to Saturday and Sunday, I just want to stay at home to sleep and rest! Another reason might be cuz my cough has not fully recovered which causes me sleepless nights.

But, it will be really unfair for Shannon to stay at home rotting with me. Thus, I squeezed out few hours yesterday and brought her out. Since she loves to take MRT, we took a MRT to Causeway Point. After having our dinner, I brought her to Time Zone and let her enjoy the rides and games. The most funniest game was the bowling, I had a fright when I heard the loud "THUD"sound after she bowled ~~THROW~~ the bowling ball. Hahaha... Take a look at the videos I took about half a day to upload due to the slow connections.

We spent about an hour there before we went home.

^_^

2008-11-30T05:23:00.004+01:00

Last Tuesday, we went to Singapore Turf Club hoping to meet one of the cartoon characters in Madagascar. The event was between 5pm-9pm but we only reached there about 810pm as all of us could only make it after work. Well, we didn't get to meet any cartoon character nor getting any balloons (helium) for the kids. One of the reasons was because we were just too lost in the Big Turf Club!! Hahaha...

After walking around for awhile, Shannon kept pestering me to queue up for the kid’s bouncer and we did. We queued about 20 minutes and finally she got to play for 5 minutes and we took about 2 minutes to "catch" her out of the bouncer. I have to "drag" her away and kept on ensuring her that there are other rides to play. We took another 2 more kiddy rides and left the place at 9pm.

Random Slides

2008-11-29T08:06:00.000+01:00

I know Daddy miss Shannon alot, thus I am putting as many photos as I can for him to see.

Last week, we followed Yi-Zhang's car to see the Christmas lighting along Orchard Road.

We met a "bear" during one of our outing...

思潁，妈妈来了

2008-11-29T06:21:00.000+01:00

Mummy outside the window taking photos of Shannon...

思潁，妈妈来了!!!

Shannon jumped up and happily followed Mummy home...

Happy 12th Year Wedding Anniversary!!

2008-11-23T14:59:00.003+01:00

Wooo... Time flies.. we have been married for 12th years!!!! However, this should be the first time in the 12th year that we didn't get to celebrate together. T.T

Oh yes! I got a surprise from my hubby. A Big Bouquet of Flower which I have not received for years... Anyway, it was hijacked by Shannon after receiving it. Hahaha

Happy Anniversary to you, Dar!!!

glitter-graphics.com

Throat Infection

2008-11-22T14:19:00.002+01:00

I brought Shannon to the clinic again this evening as her fever comes and go for the past few days. The doctor said she had throat infection and prescribed medicines like ibufen, parmacetomol, cough, flu and antibiotic. He even gave me 2 "bullet" to stand-by. The doctor said her fever will last at least 2-3 days and I have to keep an eye on her since she had history of febrile fits.

My stiff neck is not getting any better seeing the doctor yesterday and we had already spent about $180 on medical fees for the past 3 days!!!

Sway

2008-11-21T05:00:00.000+01:00

After I had finished typing the previous post, I realised that Shannon was running a fever. I went to the fridge and search for any fever medicine and I was really lucky to find one. I fed her with the medicine and we went to sleep.

Yesterday, she woke up with mild fever and I brought her to see a doctor. Doctor said her throat was slightly red that might have caused the fever. After seeing a doctor, we took a cab down to my office to sign some document which required to be done asap. However, I only get to bring her home at 5pm as there were just too many works that need immediate attention. While we were on the cab, she fell asleep. Her fever gradually climb up to 39.8 and I had to wake her up at 645pm to feed her fever medicine. Her fever subsided slight at the time of 9pm. As she had a late nap, she only fell asleep at around 12am.

This morning, I woke up with STIFF NECK!!! Must be Shannon who had caused it. She loved to squeeze near me when she is sleeping especially in the morning. After breakfast, I took some Chinese pills and I hope that the pain will go away soon. As for Shannon, her fever again climbed up to 39.5 this morning. I fed her medicine immediately after her milk but still her fever is still there at 12pm. I have to keep an eye on her before the next episode of febrile fits strike.

I was really perplexed about my life here. There are so many works to be done in the office. My cough is still not fully recovered yet and now I am having stiff neck! I really need to finished the work here as soon as possible but kept on delayed by my own sickness and now Shannon is having fever. I felt so f^&^%$ sway loh. Another issues is my back, I am having backache on and off especially when I am sitting on the floor. When I sit on the floor awhile and tried to get up to walk, I couldn't straighten my back immediately. I am only in early 30s and my backache strike me like nobody business. I am thinking of going for acupuncture to treat my backache soon. I don't have backache problem before I had Shannon or even during pregnancy and I am getting it now. How my life is going to be with all the constant backache and stiff neck... T.T

Busy ME

2008-11-19T16:10:00.005+01:00

Yup... I am very busy, busy till I have no time or rather no mood to update my blog. I am still helping my MIL with some company dispute issue. Although we had settled the most important part but the ongoing ones are a headache and needs much more time to finish. The whole office was in a mess, all the documents were not properly filed. In other words, we had to re-set up the office again which is much more tedious than setting up a new company. pffffff

I am not sure when I will be back blogging. I have to take a break.. I am really too stressed and too tired to do anything after work. I am even too lazy to bring Shannon out on weekends... Poor baby has to attend childcare everyday from 9am - 7pm and stay at home on weekends. Once awhile, she will still cry to go back "home"which she will describe as "only france", "home where daddy is"... I will just ask her to tell her daddy because I am not in position to say anything or do anything except "work" and "work"... Of cos, I learned alot of things during this period but I still miss the life in France. I am supposed to be enjoying my life now...hahaha

One Word

2008-11-07T16:25:00.003+01:00

TIRED!!!

I am feeling so tired after 4 days of work! The flu bugs had caught me on Tuesday following by a bad cough on Thursday. I went to visit a doctor yesterday and was really shocked to be charged $36 for the consultation and 4 kinds of medicines. Nah.. the medicines given were not any different from my family doctor I used to visit. I took a look at the consultation fees pasted on the table and realised that I was charged higher because I went into the clinic at 9pm. Wah! In another word, if I had gone in 10minutes earlier, I would have been charged cheaper!!!

Anyway, almost all the family members were down with cough and flu. I wanted to sleep earlier since Sunday but always ended up sleeping around 12am. Shannon is still going strong and I hope she doesn't get the virus from any of us.

She cried on Wednesday and Thursday when I left her in the childcare. She told me that she doesn't want to go to school and wanted to change school! But she looked happy and said she love school whenever we picked her up in the evening. The time table stated that the kids should be having indoor/outdoor activies between 520-6pm, drawing between 6-7pm. However, I saw them watching TV everyday when I pick her up around 6-7pm. Would you raise your concern if you were me?

One of My Days

2008-11-05T03:56:00.006+01:00

On normal days, I wake up between 730-745am in the morning, take a light breakfast before making milk for Shannon. At about 8am, I will wake Shannon up, getting her to drink the bottle of milk. After her milk, she will pee and I will help her to clean her face, brush her teeth, change her clothes and tie her hair. This will usually take up about half an hour depending on how co-operative she is. After which, I will change my clothes and do a quick make up before leaving the house.

Then, we will slowly stroll to her childcare centre. Sometimes it takes up to 20 minutes to reach her childcare centre as she walks very slowly. Luckily, I
do not have to reach the office at specific timing. When we almost reach the childcare centre, she will start telling me that she doesn't want to go to school. Today she told me she wants to go to another school. It's only her third day there! She reluctantly followed me to the door and cried for me after I left today.

I will walk for another 5 minutes to the bus-stop to wait for a bus to take me to the MRT station which costs me $0.71. Then I will take a MRT and alight at the 12th station which costs me $1.29. I will THEN need to take another bus and alight at the 8th stop for $0.31 and walk another 15 minutes to the building I am working. Most of the time, I will reach the office around 1030am which means half my morning is gone. :(

Anyway, you see the difference on the transport fees? It is $2.31 for 1.5hr ride on public transport vs $15 for 0.5hr ride taxi fares (off peak)!!!

I will usually ask the office colleague to buy lunch for me and I will just take 15 minutes to eat and start working again. Then I will leave the office at 5pm-520pm in order to pick Shannon up before 7pm. The childcare centres in Singapore will charge $1.00 per minute for being late when picking kids up. Then we will stroll back and reach home about 7pm-720pm.

I will then let Shannon take her dinner with the help of my mum while I go for my shower. After my dinner, I will bring Shannon for a shower although the childcare centre bathed her once in the early afternoon. I realised that the childcare centre did not do a good job showering her. I still can feel dirt at her pee area when I shower her in the evening. Yesterday, I saw red patches which looked like rashes on her body and arm areas as well. Poor girl have to go through all these because I have no time to take care of her in the day.

The rest of the night will be watching tv programmes or reading newspaper or entertaining her. I did try to go to bed at 10pm but she will refuse to be in the room as long as someone is in the living room and we always end up sleeping around 12am.

Sigh, I am missing my life in France again....

First Day of Childcare

2008-11-03T03:28:00.002+01:00

Shannon went to the childcare for the first time today. She didn't fussed when I said bye to her. She followed Yang Lao Shi into the area where the kids are having lesson. I can sense that she is not as happy or excited as she or me wanted.

Time Table for N1

According to them, they provide English, Mandrain, languages, Math, Reading programme that includes Phonics, Hanyu Pin Yin, Montessori Programme, Creative Art & Craft.

I hope she will love and enjoy her time in the childcare centre.

Sunday Morning

2008-11-03T03:04:00.002+01:00

I woke up yesterday and couldn't find Shannon anywhere in the room. I went to the living room and I saw this....

When I asked her why she was sleeping on the floor. She told me she saw a "kaka" sleeping on the floor so she followed. (actually it was a dead housefly on the floor) After awhile, she fell asleep again and woke up 15 minutes later... hehehehe

Singapore Flyer & Marina Barrage

2008-11-02T07:01:00.012+01:00

Yesterday, 3Yi Zhang brought us to Singapore Flyer for a walk. We had Popeyes Chicken and Whipped Potatoes for dinner. Well, we din take the Flyers as I found the price of the ride a bit expensive. Then we saw 2 ladies doing balloon sculptures and we went to queue up. Actually, I love the little bear they twisted for other kids but Shannon insisted on having a flower. Initially, they didn't even want to give one to Elyse as they said it could be dangerous if it burst.

Oh.. Singapore flyer celebrates Halloween!! Actually there is a spooky garden but I din take any photos as Shannon was asleep when we passed by.

We went to Marina Barrage for a walk too. When we reached the place, we saw alot of people queuing up in the car park. Then we realised that Marina Barrage was opened only yesterday!!!

About Marina Barrage

The Marina Barrage is a 350-meter wide dam built across the Marina Channel to keep out seawater, forming Singapore’s first reservoir in the city and 15th reservoir. With the barrage in place, the Marina Basin will turn into a body of freshwater through natural flushing in one two to years. The freshwater will then be treated using advanced membrane technology before consumption.

The Marina Barrage is part of a comprehensive flood control scheme to alleviate flooding in the low-lying areas in the city such as Chinatown, Boat Quay, Jalan Besar and Geylang. During heavy rain, the series of nine crest gates at the dam will be activated to release excess storm water into the sea when the tide is low.

As the water in the Marina Basin is unaffected by the tides, its water level will be kept constant all year round. This is ideal for all kinds of recreational activities such as boating, windsurfing, kayaking and dragonboating etc.

We ended the day with tabaos from 24h Kopitiam with our parents at home!

About Work

2008-10-29T11:32:00.003+01:00

This was what Shannon was doing when I brought her to work with me on one of the days. Well.. the above activity lasted for about half an hour. She was quite difficult to handle when I am working. I couldn't concentrate at all as she needed quite some attention.

I am not sure how long I am needed in Singapore. Shannon started to miss her Daddy last week and was crying to go back home in France quite a few times. Although I don't go to work daily but sometimes I have to work at home as well. Thus, I do not have much time to entertain her and I think she feels lonely.

Shannon used to have the sole attention from all the Aunties (my sisters) but now with Elyse around (who's having the most attention) she tries to get attention from them by being naughtier. Sometimes, she even tries to behave like Elyse to get attention as well. Think: Wahhh WAHHHHH *sniff Sniff *point even when she knows how to talk.

I have enrolled her into a full day childcare starting from November. Hopefully, she will feel happier in Singapore while I can concentrate to work for my MIL and get the work done asap.

Frankly, I really HATE the journey to the office from my mum's place. It's either I have to spend $15 on taxi fare (off peak) to reach the office in 20 minutes or spend 2 hours to take bus -> MRT -> bus to get to my workplace.

I really miss my carefree life back in France ...

Long Weekend

2008-10-29T02:52:00.006+01:00

Saturday

We went to Macdonald for breakfast at King's Albert Park. Shannon refused to eat the pancake we have ordered for her. She ate one piece of Hashbrown instead. After breakfast, we took some photos and headed to IMM.

We paid $9.90 for 2 pieces of pictures to be colored. Shannon can do very well for the first time with the flower. The other picture of house was done by Jes...

SUNDAY

Let the photos tell the fun-filled Sunday at East Coast Park! :P

MONDAY

After spending 2 days outside, we decided to stay at home to rest on Monday. I took the chance to update my blog post as well. In the evening time, we were invited for dinner over Jacqueline's place at night with Renee.

What Else Happening??

2008-10-29T01:51:00.006+01:00

Haircut

Shannon's fringe was really long and I decided to bring her for a haircut last week.

Visiting GongGong & MahMah

We gave Gonggong & MahMah a really big surprised last Sunday. We followed JekJek Jon back to his home and appeared in front of him. GongGong and MahMah was really happy to see Shannon. After dinner, Gonggong spent all his time playing with her precious granddaughter.

Surprised! Lao Mah!!

Other than giving GongGong & MahMah a surprised. I brought Shannon to LaoMah (Great Grandma)'s house one of the weekdays last week too. Lao Mah was surprised and happy to see Shannon as well. After having lunch at her place, Shannon played some "imaginative piano music" for LaoMah... ;p

Volcano Dinosuar & Balloon Sculpture

2008-10-28T07:02:00.004+01:00

We bought an Explosive Volcano for Shannon to "play". You have to pour in some water and the volcano will kind of "explode" and erupt. After about an hour of erupting, the small dinosaur appeared and 2 days later, the dinosaur grew bigger. Well.. too bad, it doesn't really amazed Shannon, maybe she is just too young or simply not interested. However, she will take the dinosaur and tell everyone...

YOU/xiaoyi/mummy 看, dinosaur is bigger now!!

Anyway, she is more interested in the Balloon Sculpture. She will helped to pump the balloon and even tried to twist it. I successfully twisted the teddy bear head and flowers. Well, you really need to buy the right ~~expensive~~ balloon to do the twisting and turning. My sisters bought a few packets from different places and most of them burst easily.

Look at how Shannon twisited the balloon without the fear of the balloon brusting.

Kiddy Rides, Sushi & Sunglasses

2008-10-28T05:51:00.004+01:00

Last Thursday, Sanyi and San YiZhang specially brought Shannon out for a MacDonald breakfast after bringing Elyse to a doctor. We ordered a Pancake for Shannon and she only ate a bit. Well, I guessed she preferred dipping her pancake into chocolate syrup then maple syrup.

After Sanyi and San YiZhang left for work, Xiaoyi and we continue to shop at Lot One. We let Shannon took all the kiddy rides we passed by as the kiddy rides in Singapore is cheaper compared to France.

I didn't really bought alot of stuff but Xiaoyi took this chance to shop till she drop. We took our lunch at 2:30pm at Sakae Sushi. Yummy...it has been 2 years since I last had Sakae Sushi. But the bills choked up to $50+++ after adding 7% GST and 10% service charge!!! Wow.. living standard in Sinagpore is getting higher and higher!

Trying on oversized sunglasses @ CottonOn

She will do the above whenever we threaten to leave her behind.

A Big Boo Boo

2008-10-27T18:07:00.004+01:00

Last week, Shannon kenna a really big boo boo. She was running towards the door welcoming Yizhang back when she accidentally knocked onto the edge of the handphone YiZhang was holding. She cried on the top of her lungs at the very moment.

I ran towards her and saw a blueblack bump sticking out below her left eye. We applied some Zambak on her face and Ah Ma immediately boiled one hard-boiled egg to roll on her boo boo. It was a really bad one but was really lucky that it was not hit on her eye instead.

It really break everyone's heart by looking at the boo boo...

Dim Sum @ Great World City

2008-10-27T16:23:00.001+01:00

Last Saturday, Grandma Rosie brought us to Great World City for dim sum lunch with Grand Aunties, JekJek Jon (J's brother) & GF Anna and YiJun & GF Jasmine. JekJek Jon came back from Aussie to tighten his braces over the weekend and thus we got to meet up. JekJek Jon had lost some weight after fixing his braces.

Oh ya, Shannon loves to eat the Porridge with Century Egg & minced meat so that day she had one bowl after another. We spent about 2 - 2.5 hrs having our lunch as one of the grand auntie could only come after work. While waiting, Anna took out her Nintendo DSL for Shannon to play. Well, it really kept her STILL for hours. ;p

After lunch, we went visit The Cosmopolitan located at Kim Seng Road which Grandma Rosie recently bought.

The Cosmopolitan's outstanding architecture was simply breathtaking. It has seven-storey-high lobbies with lush foliage and water vistas surrounding it, creating the 'au natural' feel allows residents to embrace nature in this city. The facilities include a 40-metre lap pool, jacuzzi, children's pool, residents' lounge, foot reflexology path, gym and barbeque areas. Wahhh shiokshiok.

My MIL intends to stay there for half a year before renting the apartment to expatriates. Wah really shiokshiok.

Gathering

2008-10-27T09:02:00.005+01:00

Last Friday evening, my friends invited us to their house for a gathering. I met this group of friends in France. We became very close and we maintain our friendship via msn and occasionally gathering. We had a great night chatting and so were the kids! The 2 older boys were the commanders giving task to all the little girls and boys in their "policeman games"

Oh.. I just realised the 2 "big boys" were not in the photos!! As they grow older, they became camera shy....lol

Most of the kids except Shannon were all made and born in France!!! I was trying very hard that time to join them but only succeeded when all of them were 2 years old... hahahaha

Ah Gong's Birthday

2008-10-21T09:04:00.002+02:00

Last Tuesday was my father's birthday. We bought a cake and had a small celebration for him. As usual, Shannon was delighted to see a cake and happily sang a birthday song to her Ah Gong. On the other hand, Elyse was excited to see the cake and anxiously wanted to get a bite of it. hehehe

These 2 photos are taken only 15 seconds apart. Elyse was crying as she couldn't wait to have the cake. She stopped crying immediately when Ah Gong stuff a piece of chocolate into her mouth.. Wakakaka

Pretty Little Shannon

2008-10-21T08:06:00.003+02:00

These are the photos taken by Jes who hid inside the changing room with her.

Hamper for Elyse

2008-10-15T17:23:00.001+02:00

Last week, we received a hamper for Elyse! My sis submitted a short write-up on her daughter and won a hamper. I tried to find some contest for Shannon to participate but failed as she is either too young or too old or we do not have enough time to finish the whole event.

An Evening Out

2008-10-14T04:37:00.005+02:00

Last night, we went to Lot 1 shopping centre for a walk with Yiyi-s. We went to Ah Kun for some coffee and went for some shopping at NTUC.

After awhile, we went to Kiddie Palace as I wanted to get her a tricycle to ride. The moment I stepped in, I saw a beautiful dress for Shannon and brought it to show her. Her eyes "sparkles" when I showed her the dress and she begun to undress ... hahahaha....

We let her tried a few dresses and decided to get the above as it was only $29.90. I find it cheap and beautiful compared with others. Photos of other dresses was in Xiaoyi's camera. I will upload it soon.

Back In Singapore

2008-10-13T05:01:00.005+02:00

Ooooo..finally we survived thru the 12 hours flight!!!

Saturday was quite a rush morning as the plane from Bordeaux - Paris was delayed for about 1 hr. We checked in immediately at SQ counter when we reached Paris and went for a breakfast at MacDonald. If I have double checked the time, I wouldn't want to take any breakfast at all. J told me it was 1130am when he finished his burger and I have to rush again.

Daddy broke down with tears when he said goodbye at the Departure Area. Shannon gave J a big hug and a big kiss, asking J to take care of himself and drive slowly, and then she dragged my hand and proceeded to the Hall. I brought Shannon to the Boarding Area and heard the announcement on the SQ flight will be delayed for 1 hour. I was like @#$%^&* because we can spend another half an hour with Daddy if I we are informed 10 minutes earlier.

The flight took off 1 hour later and Shannon fell asleep right away. However, she only slept for half and hour and started to watch the kids movies in the plane. We did some coloring, sticker pasting, singing etc on the plane. She managed to sleep another 3 hrs before reaching Singapore. I only managed to watch 2 movies and had some cat nap. The tedious part was bringing her to the toilet because we failed to get the 2 seater seats. We did tried to change to 2 seaters at the check in counter but the staffs are unwilling to help at all. Thus, I tried my best to cut down the toilet visiting by "synchronizing" my pee pee time with her. We went to the toilet for 4 times altogether in the 12 hours flight. Not bad huh! ;p

We reached Singapore at 8am. While I was getting some duty free liquor, I heard some baggage announcement for Shannon Lee. I walked to the baggage area and realized that one of the luggages will be delayed and only arrived on Monday. Luckily, we have bought a travel insurance and thus we will be compensated with some cash ;p

After collecting the luggage, we went for breakfast at the food court at the Airport. Shannon was having good times with her yiyi-s and gugu-s while I was enjoying my fishball noodles. I went to my MIL house in the morning as Shannon's gugu-s are going back to Australia in the evening. After lunch, I went back to my mum's place and unpacked my luggage. I felt so giddy and took a 2 hours nap as well.

After nap, we started to webcam with Daddy. Hmm... Shannon was just too busy for her Daddy. I think Daddy must be sad... hehehe.. Whenever I asked her whether she wants to go home or see daddy, her answer will be

No.. He's too far away... I wan stay Yiyi's house. :S

Anyway, we had an early night on Saturday. Lights was off before 11pm! ;p