Finally Moved

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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....

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!

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 .. =.='