at Vapiano...

Mommy is on strike... she's not going to cook. Errm, just finding an excuse to go out and relax and have an easy pizza-pasta night with the kids.

We've always like dining at Vapiano. They serve freshly prepared pasta and pizzas just like the hawker centre style, i.e. they cook right in front of your eyes. But the restaurant in the city centre is always crowded and smoky. So you imagine our delight now that they've opened up a new branch near our place. Just a 10 minutes walk away from our home. And the crowd is always business... coz like our parents call it, we live in the Shenton Way part of Frankfurt. Get the idea? There are usually less people in the evening and on weekends. And on Sundays, Vapiano's in the Westend Duo Towers is absolutely smashing among families and an even bigger playground for restless kids. :)

Anyway, our kids like Italian food. We don't complain about this one. Dining out always mean either Asian or Italian or fast-food e.g. at Mac's... can't find anything else suitable to feed the kids.

water colour...

I never knew that painting could be done in such a neat manner... just give the children a water colour palette and a little cup of water, coupled with some paint brushes... and there they go having fun, while Mommy has some peace.

a little conversation across the street...

We were walking to the bus-stop, while Ryan was walking home with his babysitter. He just lives opposite the school - lucky boy!

R: Hey Bryan! My aeroplane's wing is broken.
B: Hey Ryan! My aeroplane's small wing is also broken.
(What coincidence! - Bryan's Mommy thought.)
R: Bye, Bryan! I'm going home now. (By then he's reached the doorstep with his babysitter.)
B: Bye, Ryan! Don't forget to fix your aeroplane at home. Ok?

Bryan and Ryan have become pretty good friends these days, although Bryan's best buddy still is Buba. Maybe they like each other loads coz their names begin with the letter B.

Guess what Ryan told me when I was there to pick Bryan up yesterday afternoon?
"Please come later tomorrow to pick Bryan up so that we can play longer together."

"Can Bryan come to my home to play with me?" - "Hmmm, that's a question you should ask your mommy tonight. Will you do that for me, Ryan? If your mommy says yes, then Bryan can go over to your home to play."

Fingers crossed that the-similarity-in-the-names-issue has blown over. Maybe these boys have become big guys now. But there have been obviously less complaints about Bryan's behaviour in school after the Rules were enforced.

good-bye, Yui, sayonara!

Yui is a little pretty Japanese girl in Bryan's class. Today's her last day in Carl Schurz. She'll be moving back to Tokyo with her parents tomorrow. It's a rather sad day in the 3's class and the children all bade their precious friend from the Far East farewell.

I'm not too sure if Bryan really understood the matter of bidding farewell to someone. Last night when I told him he would not see Yui again after today, he quickly told me he wanted to make her a card. Of course, that delighted me coz 1) that was exactly what I had in mind to do with him, 2) he thought of presenting his friend with a little memento.

not bigger, but taller!

"Hey, Bryan! Look at this lamp-post!" exclaimed a boy from the 4's class. "Isn't it big? Bigger than us?"
My son took a look and furrowed his brows. "No, it's taller than us. Not bigger!" And then he let out an exasperated sigh and walked away, shaking his head.

Hahaha! Here's a 3-year-plus correcting his senior.

Well, I'm not gloating over a tiny mistake made by a four-year-plus. I just found Bryan's body language hilarious. It was obvious that he's imitating me. Now, I really have to watch my own body language, especially on the not so good days when I'm upset with the children.

hurrah, Kristin, hurrah!!!

She was already doing this yesterday during dinner. I just thought my potato rice got her so interested to eat so much that she's picking up the spoon herself. But tonight, she sat through dinner all on her own again. And it's great achievement for her coz it's not rice, it's porridge, i.e. more watery than rice. She managed to feed herself with minimal mess. No fanciful spoon. No special bowl. Wow! I'm really impressed coz I still have to spoon feed Bryan now and then. And I always thought it's impossible to get my children to eat on their own. So the problem is just Bryan. He's a picky and slow eater. If I don't pick up the spoon and shove it in for him, he'll find every little excuse not to eat or take forever to finish a meal. But with Kristin, I think she's ready to eat on her own. Now, Mommy will be less worried when she starts school in fall this year.

Check out the video here.

along the Main...

This is long overdue. My cousin came for a visit in spring last year and these were some of the candid shots he took. You probably can tell now that I've finally settled for a collage-making software and am experimenting with some pictures.
I really love this series of photos my cousin took. They just tell the story of the father and son well... except Alan doesn't always wear a suit while out playing with his son.

manicure...

Daddy's always been the one clipping the children's nails. This proves to be an impossible task for me for I can never trim much and the nails will be long again in just two days and the children will begin to scratch scars out of themselves. So this weekly affair has become Daddy's task.

praise the Lord, he prays...

As I went into his room tonight to give Bryan his milk at bedtime, he told me he'd pray.
"Dear God, thank you for this milk. And I want to pray for Kristin too. I pray that she will be better tomorrow. In Jesus' name, Amen!

Praise the Lord that He has burdened Bryan's heart to pray for his sister. And in His time, I'm shown this special brother-sister-love between my children.

Kristin's still down with a stomach flu. We are praying that she'll get well soon. She's lost 10% of her weight over the past four days.

stomach flu... again

It's the time of the year again. And we didn't learn our lesson well last year. We fell victims to this virus again. Of course, it started with Bryan first. He's already on his way to recovery after a week of plain porridge and very little milk, while Kristin's bout has just started on Saturday officially.

She had a higher temperature than the kor-kor and the fever was persistent and only subsided on Sunday night. But we sent her to the PD this morning coz she was already losing too much fluid. She couldn't contain anything in her stomach at all... either way, top or down, it came out.
Thank God her body is reacting positively to the electrolyte drinks we've been giving her since this noon. Vomitting has gone down from 5 times yesterday to 2 times today, and diarrhea has gone down from 7 times to 3 times. She weighs merely 8.7 kg now - probably way underweight for her age right now. And to begin with, she's a featherweight baby, only 9.5kg... So she's lost like 10% of her weight. She didn't get much of this stomach flu episode last year coz she was still on breastmilk then. If only I was still breastfeeding her now...

She's never been so quiet and still and feeble... she would just sit on her high chair and stare blankly into the air... this is so unlike her usual chatty and bubbly character. Nothing seemed to interest her until Daddy played her favourite Brainy Baby's Music VCD. That started to spark some life into her. Hopefully, the worst is over. And things will get better from now onwards.

our first reunion dinner on our own...

Actually this is the first year that all four of us are out here spending our very first reunion dinner - just a small immediate family affair of ours.
But nothing to boast about here... sigh coz the kids are stricken with stomach flu. So what's on the menu? Plain white porridge, adults and children alike. Easy to cook. Easy to eat. And for the kids, I hope it's easy for them to sleep at night too.
Sorry, folks. No pictures - plain white porridge isn't all that beyond your imagination, or is it? And we wouldn't want to shock you with the sorry state of our health.

Happy Chinese New Year! 万事如意!

brother and sister...

See the resemblance? Can't you tell they are brother and sister. I can assure you, the thick lips are definitely not from me... hehe.

How I wish everyday was like this one:

the rules...

An incident in school yesterday has made 5 rules out of us!

The class was going for an outside walk. And when the children do their walk, they will hold on to a hoop. They get to choose the hoop they want to hold onto. And one child (Daddy thought it was Ryan) got hold a red hoop first. Bryan saw the red hoop and wrung the hoop out of the child's hands and, of course, this kind of behaviour couldn't be tolerated. So Miss Julie pulled Bryan aside and started talking to him. As expected, he cried before Miss Julie could even talk any sense into him. Recognise this typical snatch-and-go-and-then-cry-when-the-object-is-returned-pattern from any younger child? Yes, he's been observing how meimei gets away with crimes like this and he's doing it in school now. Anyway, cut the long story short, Bryan was made to miss the walk and ended up with a time-out session in the director's office. But the last straw was that he didn't tell us about it at all when he was home. All I could sense from him was that he wanted to go to the playground badly when he got home that afternoon. In the end, Daddy only found out about it when Miss Julie told him the next day.

So when Mommy found out about it, it was punishment and 5 rules henceforth.

The Rules:
1) Always listen to (obey) Daddy and Mommy.
2) We do not fight.
3) We do not snatch.
4) We do not cry for no reason.
5) We share toys and play together.

The rules apply when we're home, outside, anywhere at all times. And in school, he has to listen to his teachers.

We'll see how it goes from here.

By the way, it was Jake and not Ryan. And I'm secretly relieved that the tension between Bryan and Ryan isn't stretched any further than it already is.

amazing sentences that Kristin can say before 18 months...

1. It's hot. - I don't mean she's frivolous about this. She really means it with accuracy.
2. It's cold.
3. Read book, please.
4. A book.
5. Where (is the) book?
6. Put back. (Or even better..) I put (it) back.
7. Clean up.
8. I stand.
9. I sit. (Or more precise...) Up, I sit. (Pointing to her seat at the dining table.)
10. Yes, Ma-ma.
11. Look there.
12. Open this.
13. I draw.
14. More, please.
15. Thank you.
16. I cut.
17. I walk.
18. It's wet.
19. It's mine.
20. It's raining.
21. I poo-poo.
22. 没有了
23. 好吃

and loads more... sometimes, this mommy here just fails to catch up with the documentation. But I think it's more than enough for now. I didn't even record a single word that came out of Bryan's mouth at this stage.

Sorry, son, I was too busy with my work then. I sure did a great disservice to this important milestone of yours. You spoke a lot too. Amongst all unterrances, the most vivid one was "I want to go there." And then you tried to make a hasty exit which was often quickly prevented by your parents.

Anyway, by documentating these sentences doesn't mean to say that my son spoke less than my daughter does at this age, I simply missed out on my time with Bryan. And by doing this, I hope I don't miss out on Kristin's too.

autumn is here...

These shots were taken about one week after the other.

"Mommy, it's autumn now. When will it be winter?"
"When all the leaves from all the trees are on the ground..."
Usually at the end of November, there's always been a little snow. Not a hefty lot, just enough to get you excited over the coming winter. But this year, there's still no sign of snow.