look, mommy,

an airplane!

Pointing to a small craft up in the blue sky, that was the first thing that came out of Kristin's mouth when we got off the car this morning.

Funny thing that both my children started out with "airplane" instead of the English way "aeroplane". The three syllables are probably too difficult for Kristin right now. Certainly, it isn't an influence of the American preschool.

Being the second one, Kristin has been quite an imitative learner. Bryan and Mommy have been putting up little finger puppet shows on Saturday mornings, and this girl has quietly picked up a few stories on her own. Here's a clip that tells us how:





Kristin's been pretty busy the whole morning. She was mumbling alot of stuff to herself and going around naming items like this one belongs to korkor and this one belongs to meimei. But it's just mainly pointing to something and saying korkor, meimei all the time.

daycare for Kristin

Actually, I missed this one: Taking a photo of Kristin's first day in school... not exactly, just a quasi-first day. That's why I had reservations to really take a photo and have it marked as her first day of school. Actually, we've been leaving her at the creche in church every Sunday morning and she's been with me to the childcare centre at the gym before. So this wasn't exactly the first time she's been left alone either.

It probably was more significant to her. She must be thinking now: I can finally do all the fun things Bryan gets to do in school. I wonder how things will be like tomorrow. She'll be thinking why she isn't going for daycare anymore.

joke of the week...

"Bryan, please stop jumping up and down like a monkey."
"I'm not a monkey. Meimei is more like a monkey."
"Why do you say that?"
"That's because she likes to eat bananas!"

Haha... that's a pretty good argument, don't you think?

Here is a footage on why Bryan thinks his sister is a little monkey:





Monkey see, monkey do?

marvellicious monday lunch...

Top five marvellicious reasons because
1) no kids!
2) wonderful steaks, tender and succulent!
3)great wine!
4)beautiful sunny weather with blue skies!
5) no kids... that would have made anything palatable enough for me!

It's a special treat from the company today. An annual fund that looks after the welfare - to be precise, the tummy of course -of the staff and at the same time enough to allow spouses to join in on a more relaxed context.
At first, we thought of extending Bryan's school hours till 3pm so that Mommy and Kristin could join in the fun feast. Then Mommy thought, hmmm, why don't we also leave Kristin at the daycare from noon to 3pm so that Mommy can truly have a decent meal? Yeah! Finally, for the very first time, Alan and I dined in one of the finer restaurants here without kids!!!

And we finally got our sizziling steaks after a really, really long time... Piping hot food with children around? Those of you with kids will know... no way! Most of the time, we'll be quickly gobbling down cold dishes and chasing after the kids once they're done with their meals. For someone who loves his food served piping hot like me... tough luck for the next four, five years still, perhaps??? Hopefully by then, the kids would have learnt good table manners and Alan and I can finally enjoy a reasonable meal dining out with them.

By the time I was back in school to pick both the kids up, Kristin had enjoyed herself so much that she refused to leave... hmmm, maybe an occasional lunch without kids will do both Mommy and children good.

Imagine this is gonna be my new routine come fall this year when Kristin also starts school daily from 9am to 2pm! Hey, kids, Mommy will have so much energy to deal with you when school is done and you'll be asking for naps willingly... haha!

lazy Sunday afternoon...

It wasn't the smell of spring in the air that got us excited about the temperature yesterday afternoon while we went out for our walk. It was the smell of barbecued meat! Yeah, finally, the weather has got warm enough today for a great outdoor gathering... We still haven't used our barbecue pit from last year. Maybe we should have a BBQ soon.

I've been wanting to get shots of cherry blossoms here. Saw rows and rows of them in Ditmarstrasse, but alas! No camera with me. Anyway, last Saturday was quite a gloomy one. We didn't missed anything there if you see these beautiful ones along the Bockenheimer Landstasse.

Daddy finally had a chance to play with us at our favourite playground. And yesterday's sand was just perfect to build sandtowers! Look at our happy Bunny Bryan, hopping - actually, demolishing one after the other.

naming body parts

When I change Kristin out of her pyjamas every morning, I always play a tickling game with her. It's a good trick to keep her still and at the same time, she learns to identify her body parts.

This morning was nothing less the usual routine. But I was pleasantly surprised that she was going through the body parts with me. She had a little Ernie doll with me. Pointing to Ernie's nose, she went "nose"! And then she went on with eyes, ears, mouth. And when I pointed at Ernie's hand and said "hand". She went on and pointed to her legs and said "leg" and subsequently her right knee and then left knee and said "knee, knee"! Wow! I guess I didn't expect her to respond in such a way. So I quickly seized the opportunity to squeeze her cheeks and said "cheeks"! I think one of these days she'll be surprising me again. :)

It's also a joy to watch how she plays with a doll. She will wave the arm of the doll and say "hello" or "bye". Or she will stretch out the doll's hand and pretend to do a hi 5 with the doll. Or she will give the doll a peck on the cheek or a tight squeeze. It all comes naturally. I certainly don't see Bryan showing such affection to a doll. So it's true that women do tend to be a bit more emotional, hmmm.

how's it like being a mom?

I was dumbfounded by a question posed at me almost 4 years back: How is it like being a mom? To be precise, it was when Bryan was one month old.

I really had no idea how to answer that question then. I had nothing in my mind except that breastfeeding was indeed a tough decision to live with. The first four weeks were marked with insecurity of whether I had latched the baby on correctly and if the baby had enough to drink. I didn't know how time passed coz there seemed no end to breastfeeding and there wasn't much sleep to talk about. For the first time in my life, I wasn't functioning normally, i.e. my mind could be thinking about something and my mouth would be uttering total nonsense.

So that much went through my mind when the question came along. But I didn't really dwell on the early troubles of breastfeeding. I smiled and said, "I'm still learning how to be a mom." Only that much sense came out of my mouth that morning.

Four years have lapsed since that question was first posed at me, and I won't say I can asnwer the question well yet. I'm still learning how to be a mom each day. A good one. A responsible one. Sometimes, it backfires and I become a not-so-nice one who screams and yells at my children. And believe me, the learning curve was great when I suddenly switched from a full time working mom to one toddler with help from grandparents and a maid to a stay at home mom with a baby and a toddler to care for, minus all the help. Luckily, my mom helped a lot during the transition period. Yeah - so great is a mom's love. It never ends even when your child is thirty-something and even when your child herself is a mom too. That's one thing about being mom... Will I ever be that kind of mom one day when the situation calls for it?

at the bookstore...

I intended to just quickly pop by at the huge departmental store in the city centre to look for some exercise books to practise writing with Bryan. It turned out that the store does not carry the ones I was looking for.

So the short trip became even briefer and Kristin still wasn't anywhere near the LaLa-land yet. In the end, I decided to drop by Hugendubel - a huge bookstore, something between Borders and Kinokuniya. I didn't really have the luxury to roam in a bookstore until now... And I was pleasantly surprised by the collection on English children's books offered there. Finally, I get to browse the books. So far, I have been ordering books left and right off the Internet. It didn't take me long to spend about 60 Euros on a few board books for Kristin and some Richard Scarry's titles for Bryan. Kristin totally enjoyed the experience of picking up books and struggling to get up a sofa to read them. She was just trying to look at some books and asked to be read to as usual.

We had loads of fun, but Kristin only fell asleep at quarter to one, way past her morning nap. And while I quickly got home to gobble down my lunch, she had hers on the go when we were off again at 1.35pm to pick Bryan up.

Actually, earlier this week, I have already placed an order with amazon.de, amounting to about 50 Euros, and another order of 150 USD on books from Scholastic. Gee, quite a lot spent over just one week :P

Kristin is 19 months old!

Two years ago during this period, I was pregnant with Kristin, working and at the same time, a mother to another toddler. But I couldn't find energy then to really marvel at the little achievements that Bryan made.

I'm certainly thankful that I get to spend as much time as the day can afford right now with both of them. It's really a joy to watch a child grow, and looking back, I'm already finding that the memory is faint for I can't even remember exactly how big Kristin was in my arms on Day 1. Yeah, the records show 3050gramms and 47 cm. But how did that feel in my arms then? Try as I might to recall... I can't! Babies do grow quickly. And children will grow up even faster.

a little kitchen top concert & other performances...

This impromptu concert took place on the 23rd May 2006 in the kitchen of our cosy home. Audience included a flown in guest of honour from Singapore - grandpa and other in-house fans like grandma, Daddy, Mommy and Baby Kristin. Bryan then was about 33.5 months old.

It's alright if you can't exactly understand what he's trying to sing. Coz he's putting many tunes and beats together and jumbling up the words a lot. The performance became much audible in the later part when he finally decided to stick to the song, "Praise the Lord, Hallelujah!"

Applause, Ladies and Gentlemen! And don't forget to acknowledge the spontaneous background singer too! :)

Sorry no guitar there... more like a capella!
Certainly different from this rock-style, head-banging concert back in Singapore. He was almost 27 months old then.







This one was filmed when he was 2 days short to 18 months. His first electric guitar:

something worth rejoicing...

I think one of the most exciting things about being a Christian parent is whenever your kid begins to ask questions on our Saviour. It is indeed a privilege that God has granted me tonight to enjoy a precious, yet simple and quiet moment with Bryan.

He told me he wanted to go to Heaven as I was praying with him. And I shared with him that in order to do that we have to invite Jesus into our life and ask for Jesus' forgiveness for our sin. My heart leapt with joy when he told me with total simplicity that he wanted to do it then and there.

We said a brief sinner's prayer together. But I really doubt he knew and meant exactly what he repeated after me. But I shall not restrict this to the sheer human understanding of the linguistics. I believe in the power of the Word. I trust in the Lord that He has planted a seed in my little boy's heart tonight. I'm really weeping tears of happiness now.

the c-food...

C is for Cookie and that's good enough for me...yeah!
Remember our dear friend from the Sesame Street? Cookie Monster?

C is also my all time favourite easy-to-cook and yet nutritious one dish!

C is for chicken,

C is for champignons,

C is for carrots,

C is for celeries,

C is for Chinese cabbage,

C is for Canola oil!

Voila! My C-food dish!

staying at home with Kristin...

Being at home with one kid has always been a more relaxing time for me. So far, it has always been a mother-daughter-time. Mommy and daughter had nothing better to do so we tried a new hairdo for Kristin. Nowadays, she allows me to tie her hair... but I still have to do it quickly. And as long as I say she's a pretty girl, she'll not touch her hair anymore. Hmmm, vanity?


I wonder how time would be spent if I were to be staying at home alone with Bryan. Perhaps some real homeschooling? Bryan's theme at school this week is insects. I'm still thinking if I'll join him on his field trip this Thursday. Thing is he'll not behave well when Mommy is around. And worse still, Mommy has to catch Kristin - who will definitely be running wildly behind the bigger ones.


We caught a ladybug today. Erm, actually, I caught it. Bryan's too chicken to even go near the bug. Nonetheless, he's very delighted. He wants to bring it to school tomorrow.

Today's lunch was a simple one. I haven't served Kristin off-the-shelf baby food for a long time. Since we were out most part of the morning, an off-the-shelf menu certainly came in handy and would be definitely more nutritious than the leftovers from yesterday's dinner. Actually, I didn't cook much for Kristin until she became a much better eater at about 15-16 months. I used to give her the baby food jars. I reckon I wouldn't have been able to do a better job at eliminating the fertilizers off the normal vegetables I get from supermarkets. So why don't I just stick to the jars that have gone through strict German quality control for organic baby food?

Here's a clip on how she's enjoying her lunch:





These days, both the kids seem to show a liking for carrots and zucchini with scrambled eggs. They eat it heartily with their rice and porridge or even as a dish on its own. I'm certainly not complaining about this one:

the little drummer...

Check out those nice comfy seats in the background. Forgot to mention that the new Ikea FFM even has different sections in the restaurant: The usual smoking and non-smoking, with kids or without kids, bar-counters or comfortable couches... you have them all!

ikea in FFM

Finally, Frankfurt's got its very own Ikea! Previously, we used to have to drive either 30 min eastwards (on the Autobahn not including the travel time to get out of the city) to Hanau or 30 min westwards to Wallau (yeah, I know what the name sounds like. Wait till you come to Germany and discover places like Aha, heehee!) to get affordable furniture. Or just sometimes for breakfast and then send Bryan off to the playground for free babysitting... haha! Actually, he asks to go there each time. And Ikea's playground is the only thing he has in mind, of course. Why else would he have anything to do with a furniture store?

Last Friday, Mommy was still feeling a bit down with her sore throat. Besides, her sore finger (I sustained a pretty deep cut with my new Justinus kitchen knife the other day) really made cooking a torture. So it was a good excuse to check out the brand new Ikea within Frankfurt itself! Well, not really downtown, still in a suburb, but it took us at most 30 minutes door to door.

Conclusion: New facilities, spacious restaurant - we are definitely going back more often for food and playground, and of course, boosting the economy a little. Ikea always manages to get us to spend more than just on meals. Moreover, there's basement parking! One big criterion when you have both little children and cold weather to consider.

Just can't tell you enough why little children like Ikea. Here's one example: