Our four little pandas...

What do you really want?

2012-01-25T21:31:00.008+08:00

Last night the boys and I had an interesting chat before they went to bed. It all started with me asking them if they wanted a baby sister or a baby brother. Oh, don't get me wrong! I am not the least planning for number 5! Though it would be dishonest of me to say that this thought didn't cross my mind. It did many times flash across my mind...especially so during this year being the year of the Dragon.

In fact on the eve of Chinese New Year, I jokingly told PaPa that maybe we should consider a Dragon Boy. He said (stroking Aaron's head) in Chinese, "老鼠也好吗?"

Ok back to my conversation I had with the boys. It went like this:

Me: Boys, would you prefer a Mei Mei (Chinese for "sister") or a Di Di (Chinese for "brother")?

Theodore: I want a Mei Mei!

Joshua: Mei Mei!

Lucas: Mei Mei!

Aaron: No! I want a Di Di!

Me: Theodore, why do you want a Mei Mei?

Theodore: Because I have (courting the brothers) eh...1,2,3 I have 3 brothers already!

Me: Joshua? Why Mei Mei?

Joshua: I like Mei Mei!

Me: Lucas, why do you want Mei Mei?

Lucas: I love Mei Mei!

Me: Aaron, why do you want Di Di?

Aaron: I don't like Mei Mei!

Theodore: If you have another baby, then I have to sit in front of the car.

Me: Why do you have to sit in front?

Theodore: The baby sit in my seat, Joshua sits in his seat, Lucas sits in his seat and Aaron sits in his seat. TiTa (our helper) sits in the middle.

Me: Then, where should I sit if Pa Pa is driving?

Theodore: Oh! Ah! I sit on Mummy's lap!

Aaron: I also want to sit on Mummy's lap!

Me: If we have another baby, we will change to a bigger car

Theodore: Alphad?

Me: Yes, Alphad!

Theodore: Yeah! Lucas, Mummy said we will change car to Alphad!

Lucas: Yeah! Alphad!

Theodore: Mummy, I will help you take care of Mei Mei because I am the Kor Kor (Chinese for "big brother)

Me: That's very sweet! But you can also help me take care of Di Di.

Theodore: No! Di Di will fight! Mei Mei cannot fight because boys cannot fight with girls. (pointing at Lucas) Huh, Lucas? Remember boys cannot fight with girls!

Me: Ok, Theodore.

Theodore: Oh Guys! We must pray for Mummy to have a Mei Mei!

Me: Huh? No need! This kind of prayer cannot anyhow pray.

Theodore: Why?

Me: Because I want a baby but I don't think I have the energy to look after

Theodore: I will help you look after!

Me: No so easy. Need to feed her milk and put her to sleep

Theodore: I will feed her. I help you! (Getting frustrated) MUMMY! You tell me ok! Do you really want a baby or not??

Me: I really don't know. Eh..can I discuss with PaPa first? This kind of thing must involve PaPa. Let's talk about this another time

Theodore: Huh! (folding his arms)

I am very pleased with Theodore because he is always so thoughtful and considerate. As for me, it is still question mark!!

Yeo family reflections for 2011

2012-01-03T19:10:00.000+08:00

Note: This post is written by the man of the household, PaPa.

The year started with Aaron's brush with Kawasaki Disease, which is supposedly a rare autoimmune disease. The fact that it was diagnosed at Day 9 is already a blessing, thanks to the astute doctors at KinderClinic, as the symptoms are quite typical and permanent damage to the heart can take place after Day 10. The treatment involved a series of transfusions and a night stay at the hospital. As I spent the nights with Aaron at Gleneagles Hospital, I could not help but think but to a similar stay with the triplets, when they were hospitalized for bronchiolitis. Thankfully, the treatment for Aaron went smoothly and he was relatively cheerful throughout the stay! Aaron also started pre-nursery this year and thankfully did not cry at all!

Joshua (for now) is our most academically inclined child – he concentrates well in his reading and writing. His slow physical growth continues to be a source of concern for us though – as he is still the smallest of the 3 triplets despite his large appetite…we always wonder where does all the food he eats disappear to? He also won an award during vacation bible school for the bible verse challenge.

Lucas was discharged from speech therapy this year and has shown improvement in his speech. We pray that he will continue to grow in confidence in his speech. We are also very conscious that as the 2nd triplet, he is really the "middle child", so we will need to show more attention to him in this area.

Theodore continues to mature as the designated oldest brother of the gang of 4. Thankfully, his emotionally nature is such that he cares for other people's feelings which does help in his sense of responsibility. He has also performed well in his swimming and cycling (now on 2 wheels) but we pray that he will be more diligent in his academics and/or we will be able to find a better way to interest him in academic related activities. In school, he surprised us all by winning the Gold Medal for Chinese (Joshua & Lucas received Bronze Medals). He has also started roller blading classes and has impressed us by his persistence in literally picking himself up and trying again.

The boys also started their piano lessons late this year, thanks to Hwee Ling, who lent us her piano. Thank God for a wonderful teacher who is also our neighbour!

This year, we also had our first driving trip since we got back from America 2 years ago. We went on our first church camp in Malacca. It was a great time learning God's words and fellowshipping with our brothers and sisters in Christ. Our new helper, Davina, whom we are very thankful for, also had a chance to meet new friends from her home country.

Elsa had (what seems to be) a successful bunion operation for her left foot. We pray that her foot will continue to heal well and the bunion and discomfort never returns.

Chris managed to spend the last several months in Singapore and we pray that he will continue to be able to spend more time in Singapore with the family.

Finally, we are also very thankful for having the opportunity to serve more with our church discipleship group, with Elsa leading the children's program and Chris starting to serve as a bible study leader.

Have a blessed 2012 everyone!

Celebrating the winter solstice festive

2011-12-22T21:49:00.004+08:00

The winter solstice festival( 冬至 - Dōngzhi; literally "the Extreme of Winter")is an important event celebrated by Chinese around late December and happened before the Chinese New Year.

If mymum did not mention to me that today was the THE DAY, I would have missed it. She was also the one who did the previous celebration with the boys.

So this morning I went to the supermarket and got a packet of glutinous rice flour to make

tangyuan (湯圓) glutinous rice balls, which symbolize reunion. Traditionally, they are made in bright pink. But my kids love them in blue! We stuffed them with blocked sugar and cooked them in gingery syrup.

Aaron did not manage to make a rice ball. This was because he was so obsessive to get a perfect round ball that he kept rolling the same one till it dried up..and eventually cracked into pieces!

The boys, on the other hand, managed to finish rolling their allocated dough.

Here's the finished products where I added some white to the blue:

By the time the tangyuan were cooked, it was almost bedtime.But I managed to sneak a rice ball only to Theodore just before he brushed his teeth.

Next year we have to do it earlier so that the all the boys could have a taste of their sweet labor and more importantly a truly reunion where we feast together.

Recycling broken toys

2011-12-20T15:54:00.006+08:00

Friends who visit our place always wonder what this art piece was.

This canvas piece was made last year with the the help of the boys. The boys selected the toys from the pile of broken toys that I kept away. Then I glued them on the canvas and had it painted in YELLOW acrylic. I chose the color because I was in the midst of teaching Aaron the primary colors. Sad to say, I never got around to do the RED and the BLUE. This could be one of my resolution for 2012 - to finish my unfinished business for 2011!

My good friend, Annabelle had a strange idea. She wanted to do the same but with broken arms and legs from her daughters' Barbie Dolls' collections! She told me when she got home, her daughter, Phobe wanted to break all her toys just so she could make a similar art piece.

My project

2011-12-17T15:39:00.003+08:00

I finally found the time to do this art piece even since I read it years ago over at some arts blog.

This was made from melted oil pastels. I got the boys to select the bright colors and stick them on canvas with a double sided tape placed at the edge of the canvas.

Then I melted the oil pastels using heat from the hair dryer. Some oil pastels melted faster than others - which I later found out I got mixed up with crayons! I reckoned that crayons took a while to melt due to its content. Anyway, this was quickly resolved by replacing them with oil pastels.

PaPa quite not approving of this as some "toxic" was emitted in the air - you know the burning smell of wax. I continued the activity only when the boys went to bed and went I am done with my reading. That set me to 11.30pm! When I was done, it was almost 1am, I doubt I will do this again. Its just too time consuming and who knows, possible damage to my lungs?

Mini art exhibition

2011-12-05T21:31:00.005+08:00

This evening I had some time to myself and finally decided to clean up the documents, paintings, files that the boys received from schools. I threw out some assignments that no longer relevant and also sorted they art works.

Since we had empty walls in the house (we still have not getting our act together to put up our family pictures! Ok, I am waiting for Ikea sale to get the photo frames.), I decided to put up their paintings that they had done over the 1 year.

I could not put up all as they were simply too many. But I will try to rotate them when I have the time. Can you guess who painted which pictures?

Our First Christmas Tree!

2011-12-03T21:47:00.003+08:00

So we had moved to our own place since April 2010 and we never had a Christmas Tree to call our own (except that tiny tree we had in Evanston!). The storage of another big item just put me off.

Anyway, upon the advise of our dear friend, Rachel, we decided to get a tree this year. We got a tree from Carrefour's sale and dressed it up this evening.

Ornaments were courtesy from Rachel and some of them are crafts pieces made by the triplets during their vacation bible school at Kay Poh church. We also put up 2 pine cones that the boys picked up when we were in Evanston. This were recently painted in gold for their school Christmas celebration.

Well since the Christmasy atmosphere is in the air, I thought it would be nice to complement with an advent calendar. So couple of nights ago I made an advent calendar and slip of papers were placed in the envelopes.

The boys would take turn to open the envelope, something that they look forward to every morning. Today activity was "Decorate Christmas Tree"!

I also borrowed an advent storybook from the library to read to them every night. It was about a baby bear following the bright star and meeting interesting characters who were also following the star. The boys had a great time reciting the characters that we read before. At the end of each chapter, the mother bear would give some biblical advise to

the baby bear. It is indeed a rare find from our local library!

Halloween crafts and Jack O Lantern

2011-11-27T22:40:00.003+08:00

This afternoon I got the kids to take out the Halloween crafts that we received from Chole's birthday's goody bags.

This was followed by a simple Halloween snack made of bat sandwiches.

I did not spend as much time on the snacks as I did last year and the year before.

Couple of days back, I made a trip to the supermarket and got us a small pumpkin. I was amazed the number of pumpkin that Cold Storage brought in for this festive. I got Aaron to take a picture since he never got the chance to visit a pumpkin festive like the triplets did in America.

Yesterday afternoon PaPa took out the craving tool that we were given to us by Adeela when we were living in Evanston.

Unfortunately, we craved it too early and by the time it was Halloween, the Jack O Lantern was covered with mould!

Such was the humid weather in Singapore! Next year we would crave it the night before Halloween and put it in the fridge.

Happy Halloween 2011

2011-10-31T22:50:00.007+08:00

We were deciding if we should continue our annual Halloween treat and tricking at Woodlands or venture to new places closer to us - Holland Road estate or join Annabelle and kids at Pandan Valley apartments.

In order to made an informed decision, yesterday I got PaPa to drive us around at Holland Road which was just a stone away from my in law's place. We only managed to see 3 decorated houses. A check with a friend who stayed there confirmed our findings. She said that the decorated houses were grossly less as compared to last year. Probably a sign of a slow down economy. So we decided to head to Woodlands on the actual day.

It was pouring in the afternoon. Fortunately, the sky cleared up in the evening and we made our way to Woodlands at 630pm. It helped that we stayed 15 mins drive from the venue. We had a hard time finding a parking space as the roads nearest to the estate were very packed.

We ended up parking at the public housing parking lots.

It was pretty dark by the time we got there. I was surprised that the estate was filled with so many people on a weekday.

The kids were mainly from the American International School. Woodlands Grove was the area highly concentrated with American families because of the location of the school.

This year the boys dressed up as Super Heros and a Dragon.

I would love Aaron to dress as Superman but being the willful child, he wanted his way. Children of their pre-school age were the most welcome of all. We had extra candies per child for this age group. Probably the older kids were less courteous? I saw some older kids literally snatched the candies from the pot without even greeting the hosts or saying the least "trick or treat".

Here's one of the boys' bag filled with candies.

We did not cover the entire estate as it was getting dark and definitely way passed their bedtime. But the cheeky boys had some time entertaining us with their scary teeth!

Fearing death

2011-10-06T19:45:00.002+08:00

I am a sinner but made righteous by the blood of Christ. I know I will be with my Savior if I die. I should have no fear. Yet, I fear death knocking on my door when I was wheeled into the operation theatre. Why? Because I am living in a fallen where I cannot let go the idols in my life - my children and my husband. I know God will still love me despite me feeling this way.

I was feeling very apprehensive weeks prior to my bunion surgery. I tried to have lunch with my busy husband but in the end we settled for a family dinner at home. We hardly have a sit down family dinner during the weekday. Sad huh?

The night before my surgery, the boys said a prayer each for me. It was very heartening. I told them that I would be away for a night at the hospital. They showered me with they kisses. So generous they were! Theodore even made PaPa kissed me. I said, "Be good. Listen to God and obey your PaPa." I don't know if that would be my parting words if the day comes.

At the hospital admission center, I told PaPa, "I don't want to die. Can I don't donate my organs (joking)". PaPa gave me this "what-are-you-talking-about-silly-woman look". I just smiled.

I reminded him to stay alert with phone calls in case the hospital called him for emergency.

Thankfully, the operation went well. I realize as I grow older I do not like to go for operation unlike my younger days. Including this bunion surgery, I had a total of 8 surgeries under GA! That's a lot considering that I am 40 year old!

I should remind myself to treasure all the moments I have with my children and my family. I seriously think I take them for granted.

Actually death can occur any time. It doesn't have to be on the operation table. Am I ready? I don't think so. Though at times, I can be very light hearted and say, "What is there to be afraid of? Death is the beginning of heavenly life". But truly, deep down, I am not ready. Perhaps I should pen down my last words. I definitely needs lots of prayers.

An army theme birthday celebration for the boys!

2011-09-12T18:11:00.018+08:00

This morning we celebrated the 4 boys' birthdays. 4 days late for the triplets - Theodore, Lucas and Joshua,who turned 5 and 2 days early for Aaron who turned 3.

What a blessing to have all of them born in the same month! One cake for 4 of them and 1 planning to do! I wonder how long can I do this collective affair. So far none asked for his owncake and own theme. Phew! Even the kids who were invited were puzzled with only 1 candle for the birthday boys. Perhaps next birthday I shall have 6 candles for a photo shot and 4 candles for another shot and 1 candle for the birthday song! Hahaha....

Anyway, it was easy to get them to agree on one theme - army. Boys being boys, they lovemilitary stuff. Of course they have different opinions - from "Zoo" to "Super heros" to"Transportation" but it was easier to get consensus. This theme got the boys all of them excited! And so were the guests!

And yes, we settled the theme a year ahead! We ordered most of the items from USA at the beginning of this year as a friend was moving back to Singapore. Thanks Joe! Your help meant a lot to the boys!

An hour before the guests arrived, we setup an Enlistment Office where the recruits had to report

for duty.

We had our friend, Sergeant Low to assist in giving out the camouflage helmets, hats and face painting.

PaPa aka Captain Yeo also got himself organized! Here's his plan.

Note the RTU at the end. I figured out later that it meant "Return to Unit" which he meant "return to the function room for lunch".

The first activity was a briefing from Caption Yeo on the secret mission - to rescue General Bear Bear and his troops.

Before the mission took place, the recruits had to undergo training in grenade throwing.We got them to queue up and took turns to throw the bean bags.

After the intensive training, the boys were sent off on the mission.

They had a great time running around the park in search of the captives. Recruit Wesly found the General behind the tree!

And the rest found the toy army soldiers hidden on the ground near the trees.

At the end, all the recruits were rewarded with key chains and meals at the mess.

We decorated the walls with our national flag, cut outs from army magazines, and camouflage banner. Mini national flags and poles were placed on the kids tables.

The recruits' lunch were packed in boxes as in food rationing.Unfortunately, they preferred to eat our catered food.

Next, we had the hitting of the army pinata!

This was filled with flag erasers, planes, army soldiers and candies. Then in good pinata fashion, a scrabble for the goodies.

The highlight of the celebration was THE CAKE. It took us a while to decide on the design of the cake and the cake shop. Finally we settled with My Fat Lady Cake Shop

It was a mistake to collect the cake the night before. The cake did not stay hold very well so this morning when I moved the cake, an arm came off. I was too lazy to fix it so I gobbled it down! I reckoned that an injured soldier is more realistic! Lesson learnt - get the cake delivered!

It was great fun and I was glad the kids and even the adults enjoyed it! We could be visiting this theme again when the boys were older. A real obstacle course and a mud pit would be ideal. Here are pictures of the Lord's army! :)

Happy birthday, my dear boys!

The army boot camp birthday invites

2011-09-10T16:48:00.007+08:00

I was glad I managed to find a free online application that allow me to do an army theme birthday invite!

Here is a copy of the invitation. Do bear with the advertisements as I still have not decided if I should pay for the full version without the ads. I cannot decide as I am not sure how I can cancel the paid version after the free 14 days trial! Hahaha....

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National Day Activities @ Home

2011-08-09T00:11:00.023+08:00

9 August is our nation's 46th birthday!

The boys have been coming home from school singing the national anthem and also all the celebrating songs such as "Count on me

Singapore", "Home" Just couple of days back, Theodore

asked me the meaning of "Majulah Singapura". Sad to say, I have no idea! So I decided to teach them the meaning of our national anthem and also the national flag.

We started talking about the flag 2 weeks back. They are able to tell me what the symbols stand

for but they do not know what is the meaning. I have attempted to explain to them but I think they probably understand only 50% of it. Its a good start nonetheless, and I do intend to do this every year until they fully understand the meanings. For those who is interested, here are the

meanings:

Red - Universal brotherhood and equality of men

White - Everlasting purity and Virtue

Crescent - Young nation

5 stars - Democracy, peace, progress, justice and equality

This morning we did some flag painting painted and pasted the moon and the stars while

THEe meaning of our national anthme

We round up the morning by learning the meaning of the national anthem.

They got 3 phases right which was an achievement! Because I probably can do only 2! Another exercise that I will continue to do for August 2012!

FEK Book Parade 2011

2011-05-27T22:31:00.001+08:00

Its the time of the year again! The time to get their costumes ready for the book characters

parade in school. This has always been a challenge for me coz the school asked that the materials be made from recycled materials. I don't have the luxury of time to collect boxes etc so I just "recycled" the boys old clothes.

Since we had been reading many Dr Seuss' books lately, I decided to dress them as Dr Seuss, Thing 1 and Thing 2 and I added Aaron as Thing 3.

The costumes were easy to do as I just dyed their white PJs in black and red. Working on Dr Seuss, I superglued white felt on the shirt and pants. The tough part was to make the hat. I used a paper plate as the base and the top was made from rolled up vanguard sheet. The red lines were created with several strips of red tapes. It was a challenge to balancing the tall hat on Theodore's small head. So I had to stuff newspaper in the hat to stop it from falling. His red bow was made with crepe papers. The tail was made with a black stocking stuffed with newspaper. I wrapped the tip of the tail with white felt.

I made some hats from felt and stick blue pom pom around the hat frame. That was easy if not for all the lose blue stuff that started flying all over the room.

The boys loved the costumes! They had a fun time with the friends in school.

Theodore was invited by the the principal, Mrs Ang, to talk about his character.

All in all, it was a fun event! Next year, I will try to use recycled materials. After all, it will be the triplets' final year in school.

Winter Solstice Festival

2011-02-17T22:46:00.001+08:00

My mother came over to my place today to play with the boys. She decided to make Tangyuan with the boys post nap as the winter solstice festival was round the corner.

She would not be free on the actual day as she would be busy making the tangyuan with my nieces and cooking a storm.

She was a bit annoyed that the boys wanted to do blue rice balls. Anyway, I managed to convince her that it ok as it was the process of making (thus family reunion) rather than the end products.

Here are some of their fun moments:

Jesus dies for me

2011-02-01T12:28:00.000+08:00

The boys associated the letter "T" with Jesus dying on the cross. Last year when I showed them a small letter "t" and asked them what sound it was, they went "Jesus died on the cross"!

Last week they played with their tubes construction set and started to chant this (See video). I am glad they are on the right track in their spiritual walk with God. We will continue to pray for them to strengthen their knowledge about God.

ex SQ-MCD annual Christmas Dinner

2011-01-05T23:18:00.013+08:00

Following my blogpost yesterday, I guess it didn't help that Chris Ng's had the dream kitchen that I always wanted. I loved his Miele's oven and all his kitchen utensils! The Kitchen Aid mixer, the professional craving board, the Made-in-Japan craving knief and the Le Creuset pot! And I haven't got the chance to open all his kitchen cabinets doors yet. I told Chris Ng, all these possession defined a domestic goddness and I am far from it!

I had the chance to see this dream kitchen as I was invited (and finally able to made it after a few years of disappearance!) to his place for a ex SQ MCD's (Marketing , Communication and Development) annual Christmas Dinner over at his new place at Joo Chiat. I am privileged to be invited as I was not from MCD.

We started the night with the most juicy and tender turkey.

Its so good that even the breast meat was eaten up in a flash! The host credited this to the $7000 oven! I need Chris Ng to invite Chris Yeo over for a meal!

The sausage and bread stuffings was excellent.

I loved the bacon sausage rolls and crusty potatoes fried in duck fat! Yummy!

We had a very alcoholic tiramisu coz after just two mouthful, I could see the ceiling fan spinning faster and faster!

We finished the evening with the freshest chocolate souffle. The host did it on the spot with the Kitchen Aid mixer, of course!

And did I tell you Chris Ng had a real Christmas Tree and a robotic vacuum cleaner!

Did I also tell you that my secret ambitious is to like Martha Steward?Hahahaha...

This will probably be the last photo we took at his place as Chris' place was announced for en bloc!

Identity Crisis

2011-01-04T23:20:00.000+08:00

My friend, Eileen, thinks that I have an identity problem or rather a crush on another man who shared the first name as PaPa!

Certainly no crush here! I think it is just very ME! I am a Blur Queen.

The problem with me is that I was caught many times referring Chris Ng (an ex colleague of us - PaPa and I were from the same company) as my spouse instead of Chris Yeo, which is PaPa's name.

Well you probably ask, why the confusion?. For a start, I knew both Chris almost the same time as we were all involved in the same company's project. Many official emails were exchanged between me and the two men over the project. They were also from the same division and they sat pretty near each other. They were always referred with the first name plus last name to avoid all confusion.

The first "identity" challenge happened when I wrote a personal email (fortunately no uncensored stuff!) to Chris Ng instead of Chris Yeo. PaPa and I kept our dates low profile and there I was, the blur one, who addressed the email to another person. Chris Ng replied "Er..I don't wakeboard. I think this email is meant for Chris Yeo?" Chris Ng was the first person in SIA who knew we were dating He was nice not to CNN it. I found out from Chris Ng later on that it was common for him to receive many emails meant for Chris Yeo. He simply forward the email to Chris Yeo. Chris Ng indeed is a gentleman coz he did not forward my email to Chris Yeo. It would be too embarrassing!

The second incident happened at my in laws' place when we were newly married. I was busy cleaning the dishes and PaPa was standing next to me. So I went "Chris Ng, can you help to dry the dishes." There was this "horror" written all over PaPa's face and he went, "Why don't you ask Chris Ng to come and help?" Fortunately, PaPa's wasn't angry coz he knew I was as blur as a sotong.

The third incident was when I accidentally tagged PaPa's picture as Chris Ng in Facebook. For some strange reason I could not untag it. So I had to email Chris Ng and asked him to untag himself!

The next incident (and I hope it is the last!) was also the most embarrassing one. I was out with Eileen tonight and we met Mee Chee, an ex colleague of ours. Eileen told Mee Chee that my husband was Chris. As Eileen could not remember Chris' last name, she asked me, "What is your husband's surname?" and I went, "Chris Ng". Her immediate reaction was of shock and disbelief! I was so embarrassed that I wished I had a hole to hide. Next thing, I found myself defending my mistake to Mee Chee. At the background, were "reprimands" from Eileen. You see the blur queen just had dinner with Eileen and Chris Ng a week before this. Maybe I just not good with names!

I told PaPa about this. The cool man just laughed it off and gave me this Well-Am-I-Not-Surprised look.

Lessons learnt from these episodes:

a) Create a nickname for husband in the email system;

b) Buy a dish washer, is safer;

c) No husband pictures on facebook;

d) Remember your children's surname.

2010 Reflections

2010-12-31T23:29:00.025+08:00

Note: This entry was written by a guest blogger aka PaPa.

2010 was a year of transition and settling down for our family.

The year started with myself being staffed on my first overseas project in Bangkok (after having spent the past 5 months in Singapore) - a trend which has not been broken yet - which means that I have been working Mon to Thu in various SEA countries since Feb this year. This is something that we are still grappling with on and off.

We also moved out of my parent's house to our new 3 bedroom condo. It was good to have our own place again as the living arrangements required for our large family are very specific to make things as convenient and child safe as possible.

The advantages of extended family help soon came into play and we took our a vacation to Bali with just Aaron - it was certainly refreshing to have just one child with us!

Elsa and I also took our first vacation as a couple since she was admitted to hospital at 22 weeks with the triplets - so that's about over 4.5 years ago!

The Triplets
It amazes me how rapidly the triplets have grown into their own unique personalities.
Theodore with his curly locks, sharp memory, physical presence, love of sweets and constant chatter.

Theodore - always bossing your brothers around

Lucas with his sorrowful eyes, love of meat, appreciation of music and sports and distinct cries of pure joy when happy.

Lucas and his squeal of delight

Joshua with his baby like desire for attention, eye for detail and puzzles, surprisingly loud voice and similarly large appetite but with strangely little results to show for.

Joshua - always the baby among the triplets

I am not sure if every parent experiences this but every time I look at each one of them I still see flashes of them when they were first born - each about 1kg only and lying helplessly in the NICU!

I still cannot believe how we made it through that period - with Elsa warded due to post natal complications and the babies in NICU - how we first saw them in the NICU as a couple soon after the delivery...moments of despair and yet fresh moments of hope as well when it was Lucas who produced the first smile for us through his incubator. I recall visiting babies and mother every morning and evening before and after work and praying fervently to God to bring us through this time.

Theodore - smallest at birth ~950g...but now the tallest and heaviest! God and His miracles!

Lucas - the first one to be discharged from NICU! But notice how small he was just before discharge!

Joshua in his incubator - heart rate and oxygen levels constanly monitored

And now, the triplets are constantly jumping around, though every time Theodore coughs, it brings back flashes of past wheezing episodes when he was much younger.

Theodore (aka Do-Dore as he has now called himself), Lucas (Luke) and Joshua (Joshua), Mummy and Daddy are so proud of all that you have accomplished so far and love you very very much!

Typical photo and mood: 2 happy (or at least content) and 1 slightly disgruntled

Aaron
The addition of Aaron did complicate our schedule with the triplets and thus took some getting used to - but he has brought us so much joy and needless to say, he is super super spoilt! It does not help that he is indeed extremely cute and adorable (a biased opinion of course) and he loves fooling around to get everyone's laughter and attention. Aaron - our strong willed, long haired (born thus so), fussy, loud voice, picky dresser, wild child - you are the perfect addition to our family and make it ever so complete! Mummy, Daddy and the triplets love you very much!

Aaron - love the long locks!

Looking Ahead
The biggest change will be the boys attending K1 and Aaron probably going for N1 later in the year. We pray that God will continue to watch over the boys as they grow up to be good Christians in spirituality, character and knowledge. We also pray for the relationship between Elsa and myself to grow ever stronger and also in terms of spirituality.

One of the rare family photos with all members AND looking in the same direction

Day out with Joshua @ the zoo

2010-12-22T22:59:00.018+08:00

PaPa used to go on one on one dates with the boys back in Evanston. I never joined him as I was always staying back to helped with the kids. Back in Singapore, I did one on one with the boys but not with PaPa as he is always away.

So now that PaPa took 2 weeks off this week, I suggested one on one sessions with the boys, with both parents present. Hence, for the past few days, PaPa had been

asking the kids where the want to go. So there were a few suggestions and strangely, my mother in law's house was one of the frequently asked

destination to "visit".

We kicked off the first session with our third boy, Joshua.

He loves animals and obviously zoo was his top most must visit place. So we headed for the zoo after his doctor's appointment. The rest of the boys did not know that we took off to the zoo as they had the impression that we went to the doctor for the entire morning.

It was very enjoyable to go out alone with one child.

The day was very peaceful (and less noisy!) as no one to fight to talk first and we didn't have to say "one at a time", or "wait for your turn to talk" etc! I must say, PaPa and I had a great time at the zoo. For the first time, we can really talked about the animals without being interrupted! It really felt good for once, I was not doing "crowd control"! Also we managed to take more pictures!

We had breakfast at Ah Meng Restaurant. And for the first time, Joshua ate toast with butter with butter and a soft boiled egg! PaPa got Joshua a packet of Chocolate Panda Biscuits, which he proudly talked about it! Then we headed for the Splash Show which was a first time for all of us. Joshua had a great time sitting on PaPa's lap (and sucking his thumb) throughout the show.

After the show, Joshua requested to see turtles. So we brought him there. We also found out the difference among a tortoise, a turtle and a terrapin.

An information that is always there but I never get the chance to read them when I have all the kids with me! How I understand how it feels like to have only one kid!

We also found out that Joshua could read map! For every enclosure we passed by, he would ask for the map, open it up, and got one of us to hold it wide for him and he would point where we were and where he would like to end up next. Again something that he would not have a chance to do if his brothers were around.

We ended the morning with a photos taken for just the three of us.

We could see that Joshua was very pleased to have us to himself. He was very happy and never cried as easily as he does when he is with his brothers. And throughout the entire morning, he did not ask for his brothers at all! However, when we were back home, I asked him if he would do the zoo visit again with or without his brothers. He replied, "With brothers!" Well, I guess deep down he still misses the bond with his 3 brothers!

During bedtime reading I accidentally pointed out a picture of an animal in the book and commented that Joshua saw this at the zoo in the morning. I said this thinking that the rest of the boys would not pick it up since they had not figure out what the concept of "today", "tomorrow" etc. Our quick Theodore went, "Joshua at the zoo not doctor?" I went, "Is it? Who said that?" Theodore pointed to me and said, "You said it!" And I quickly changed the subject and asked if he would like to go to the zoo or SAFRA Jurong. He was so excited in talking about the Kids Amaze at SAFRA Jurong that he didnt ask about Joshua's zoo incident. Phew!

We cant wait for the next boy'e exclusive date with us! Stayed tuned for more!

Shake your body!

2010-12-21T23:26:00.004+08:00

We were confined to home for the past few days as the boys were not feeling well. So I had to think of new activities to entertain them. It then dawn on me that I bought a fantastic board game, called Cranium Hullabaloo, from USA last year and packed in our storage!

Hence, last night, I took a ladder and hurt for the game which was packed high up in the cabinet. I got PaPa to fixed it up.

This afternoon, the boys had a ball of time, dancing away! Check out Theodore cute way of shaking his bump and Aaron's trying his best to imitate his brothers by spreading his legs to reach the color mats!

This game is similar to Twister. The only difference is that it comes with a device that reads out instructions. The only fall back is that the volume is very soft despite switching to the maximum. Or maybe it is just the boys making so much noise that they drowned the recording. PaPa had to literally repeat the instruction to the boys in his thunderous voice!

Playdate with our church group

2010-12-15T12:11:00.003+08:00

Yesterday the Laus, the Yeos, the Chens came over for a swim date. I also invited a new found friend, Evelyn, whom I met at the ARPC woman's conference to join us as well. She had a two year old son, Nate, and she also attends our friend Sarah's discipleship group. And she also knows Ruth!

The kids had a great time at the pool and we stayed there for more than an hour! The triplets love to play with En. I think it has to do with them liking to play with older kid. It was great catching up with gals as the kids swim, we found time to chat!

After the swim, all of us proceeded to my place for lunch. The adults had Mee Hoon Kueh, nicely done up by Julie and the kids got to make their own

pizzas. As the pizzas needed some baking time, the hungry children were munching on Yu Tiao bought by Aunty Christina. It must had been years since I last ate these oily dough sticks. It felt good to indulge in local delicacy! After the main, the kids were treated to Haagen Dazs mini cup ice-cream, sponsored by Aunty Christina!

We finished the playdate with a doodling session on my wall!

The entire wall was covered by the plastic wrap so kids could use washable markers to draw. I am glad they had a great time!

Triplets' first experience at a wedding reception

2010-12-13T22:40:00.000+08:00

This morning I headed for a good friend, Hazel's wedding reception with the boys. This was this first live encounter that the boys had with a bride and a groom. Other times were pictures of me and PaPa or from magazines.

What amazed me was the words that came out from the boys after the reception. While we were leaving for home, Theodore who was holding some a bunch of flowers said, "Mummy, next time when you get marry, I give you this (lifting his hand to show me his bunch of flowers) ok?" And that I replied, "Who will I be marrying?" Theodore shouted, "PaPa!" Well, at least he got the idea that PaPa and I were a pair. "I am already married. I don't need to get married again." Joshua said, "But we are not there! I want to go!"

Well, it has been on my mind for years to renew our wedding vows at our 10 year anniversary, witness by our sons. Perhaps, I should seriously considered it!

More blog on Hazel's wedding when I received the pictures!

Art @ Home

2010-11-29T23:43:00.001+08:00

Now that we have our apartment, it is easy for me to conduct frequent painting sessions with the boys without the worry of messing up my in law's place.

Our first session was making a card and painting some stones for Father's Day.

Another time, Aaron joined us in doing crayon doodling

and collage works.

Only recently that I introduced coffee filter spraying

and poster painting to Aaron.

All the boys had difficulties in handling the spray bottles so it was quite a task for them. Aaron lost his patience and quickly moved on to poster painting which he enjoyed very much.

I still need to master the art of handling coffee filters. This was my second attempt and the filters looked washed out! Back to the drawing board again!

Unlike his brothers, Aaron didnt enjoy marble painting. This is because the carton box was too huge for him to handle. In fact, the carton box is too huge for the paper that getting the marbles

hidden was pretty frustrating!

I think shoes boxes are definitely a better option!

These are their master pieces in one sitting!

Master Pieces from the Wall

2010-11-22T23:10:00.004+08:00

Ever since they had a go to draw on the wall, the boys had been coming up with interesting pictures. Below are some of their creations:

Theodore's electric pudding.

Seriously, I have no idea where he learnt the word "electric". In our household, "Pudding" means "Jell-O Alien". In Monster vs Alien, a Jell-O Alien was featured as one of the main leads. PaPa had gave it a nickname "Pudding".

In this picture, Theodore was drawing several persons being swallowed by the "electric pudding". I asked him why he drew the people without their hands and legs. And he answered, "They are standing straight so cannot see the hands and legs!". And as if not enough, he followed his comment with an action of him standing very straight with his hands at the side and his feet together, straight as a rod! Good and valid explanation from a 4 year old!

The picture below was drew by Joshua and he called it, "The Triplets".

Indeed the triplets are now aware that they are labelled as triplets as people around they had referred them as so. They properly had to leave with this for the rest of their life. Their identities are being part of each other!

Joshua also drew a picture of 4 monsters in a truck! At first I thought he was drawing his brothers and him!

Below is Lucas' version of "Pudding", the one-eyed alien.

I didnt take any of Aaron's pictures as it was scribbling all over the wall, in the attempt to destroy his brothers' master pieces!

SSO Baby Prom Concert 2010

2010-11-18T23:11:00.006+08:00

Today was our first experience for the most acclaimed SSO Baby Prom Concert. It is a concert for the young audience.

I had high expectation of the pre-concert festivities, thinking that the kids would get to touch the musical instruments. It was just balloon shaping and instant photography!

Anyway, the concert was delightful and PaPa said this money was well spent compared to the several plays that we went to.

The boys were very excited throughout the performance. I was pleased that they went on the stage during the last finale. They were apprehensive at first but nonetheless happy that they have a close encounter with the instruments. I thought that the kids would be given a chance to touch the instrument or even play with it. Well, I was wrong! Anyway, it was a great introduction on classical music to the boys.

At the end of the concert, Joshua and Lucas told me they wanted to learn violin. I am not ready to bring them as I think that they were too young. Teacher Alice, who was a violin teacher, mentioned that the good age is 6 years old and in a group setting. When they turn8, then kids should move on to individual lessons. I am more keen to send them for piano but have not gotten around to do it.

Theodore, on the other hand, was more interested in big stuff such as...the drums and the trumpets!

We missed out on Aaron as I miscalculated the number of tickets! So he stayed at home with Julie and his empty seat was used to placed my bag!!! Grrr...

Wall Drawings

2010-11-16T23:22:00.010+08:00

The boys had been doodling the living room walls and poor Julie and me had been busy scrubbing the marks off. To solve the problem, I got them to doodle on the kitchen glass door which they used to do at our old house. Needless to say, there were a lot of bickering as the door was too narrow to have enough standing space for the artists.

So this afternoon, I went to the book store and got a roll of plastic wrap. This was used to cover one of the living room walls.

And after that, they had to do the cleaning up!

This had kept them busy for the entire day!

The beauty of Chinese Progressive Readers

2010-11-02T18:44:00.001+08:00

My good friend, Hwee Keng, introduced me these Sage Formula readers quite sometime ago. I did not manage to get them from Popular Bookstore as they were out of print. So I got my dear friend, Steven from Hong Kong to bring them back for me a few months back.

Here's a lengthy video of Theodore learning his first basic book in early November. He recognized some characters as they were taught in his weekly Berries class.

Lucas and Joshua could also read this book with minimum guidance. Unfortunately, their video clips had me screaming in the background!

The books are now back in Popular Bookstore! And they come in a Intermediate and Advance stages as well!

Aaron - the boss!

2010-11-02T13:11:00.002+08:00

Baby Aaron is getting smarter each day. Not only is he speaking in sentences, he also picks up new words very fast. He also imitates everyone's behaviour as well...including mine!

Check out this video where he gave his 3 brothers a "scolding" when they left their seats during dinner time.

Well, now you know how I discipline the kids....

Halloween @ Selanting & Woodlands

2010-10-31T23:50:00.004+08:00

Last week we invited some friends and their kids to come over for an advance Halloween party

at our place.

We had the "ghost" sandwiches and the sausage fingers like we did last year.

And not forgetting my infamous eye ball! This year I added a monster pizza for each child.

Here are pictures of the kids happily eating away, though most of them stay away from the fingers!

After the meal, the kids got to do some coloring and of course free play while the adults had a free talk by a NuSkin specialist on NuSkin anti-aging products!

We continue our Halloween celebration this week with a trip to Woodlands estate where

almost every household were nicely done up.

We got there just in time and I was able to take a picture with the boys before the crowd started to swell.

We did treat or tricking only for a few streets as we did not want to venture too late and

get into a traffic jam. The boys met some interesting character along the way

Happy Children's Day

2010-10-02T14:14:00.001+08:00

The boys had a day off from school yesterday as it was Children's Day! So I invited the triplets' best friend, Wesley and his family over for a simple celebration.

They came over for pizza lunch and the kids got to do they own pizzas, a simple activity that

I learnt from my cell group mate, Hwee Ling! The boys had a great time! After lunch, we had the kids set in a row and we sang "Happy birthday to Children!".

Of course, this was accompanied by blowing of the candles where each kid had a chocolate cupcake to himself. They were too full to have the cake so I set them off to the playroom as I needed to prepare for the next activity, cookies decoration!

Finally, I had the chance to use the cookies cutters that I bought from an Australian website.

The decorations were leftover from the boys' september birthday celebration. The kids, except Aaron, loved doing this activity. Aaron was busy gobbling the cookies.

After this hearty dessert, the kids were treated to story time which was the last activity of the day! It told me a day to plan this story time as I needed to act it out and also to make the props! It was based on a book entitled, "The Old Lady who swallowed a Fly". The props were from our existing toy collection and I simply tape them with velcro tape. Then I prepared a blue apron, pasted with velcro tape. This apron represented my stomach.

Everyone were laughing none stop when I walked up from my room! I worn a very old specs and hunch my back and walked really slow (sorry I forgot to take a video!). I also wore a blue apron to represent my stomach.

So when the story calls for me to swallow a fly, I will pretend to put the fly in my mouth and then stick it to my "stomach" which was pasted with lots of velco.

The first line of the story went like this: There was a Old Lady who swallowed a fly, I don't know she swallowed a fly, perhaps she will died. I replaced the word "died" with "cry". The second line: She swallowed a spider, that catch the fly, I dont know why she swallowed a fly. Perhaps she will cry.

The children had a great time helping me shallowed the animals...by sticking them to my apron.

Well, I was glad the VIPs enjoyed themselves! Happy Children's Day!

Heavenly Chat

2010-08-18T22:56:00.000+08:00

For the past few months, for some strange reasons, I had been discussing about me getting old and leaving the family for heaven.

This started with Theodore asking me, "When do we go heaven, Mummy?" when we prayed for our friend, Ruth, in finding comfort in the Lord as she grieved for her Dad. My answer Theodore was, "It is when we grow old and die, we will go heaven and see Jesus." The triplets know the concept of "old" but I am pretty sure they do not know what is "death".

PaPa wasn't that please when he knew I was talking about this death thing. That was because Joshua was once caught saying, "Mama and Gong Gong is (he is still not sure of his grammar) old persons. They will die. And see Jesus." PaPa was worried how our parents would react to the word "die" as traditionally for us Chinese, it is a taboo to use the word "die" especially referred to the death of love ones. To me, death is a natural consequence. It is a step to a new beginning.

Anyway two weeks ago when Joshua mentioned about me being old, Lucas had this sad look written on his innocent face. I asked him, "Lucas, why are you so sad?" He replied, "I don't want Mummy to grow old. I want Mummy to hold Lucas' hand and see Jesus together." I just said, "Ok. I will try to do that. I love you, Lucas."

Tonight, when I put the boys to sleep, suddenly Theodore broke the silence and said,
"I love you Mummy. When you grow old and die, I will see you in Heaven." That is so heart warming coming from a 3 year old! Lucas pointed to himself and said, "When I grow old, I see Mummy in Heaven".

All these chats just reminded me how short life can be and how all the more I should be more patient (and stop the yelling!) and treasure every single moments with them...

Building his first train

2010-07-28T08:17:00.002+08:00

I love to see Baby Aaron concentrating on his activity.

I am amazed at his flexibility! Perhaps, I should send him to gymnastics!

Kissing animals

2010-07-27T23:50:00.001+08:00

For some strange reason, Baby Aaron prefers to kiss his animals instead of me.; His version of kissing is banging his head against the objects!

I should take some head shots of myself and stick the images on the animals' heads...and see if it works!

Recognizing Chinese Characters

2010-07-25T01:27:00.007+08:00

The boys had been attending Berries @ Pandan Valley since Oct 2009. They are pretty good at recognizing some characters and also the use of Chinese idioms. Unfortuately, the Chinese education falls under Chris' department so I hardly practice the language with them.

This is the second time I put the 3M sticky board up. The first was at our old house in Mount Sinai. Here's a video of Joshua forming Chinese sentences based on my cues. Lucas and Theodore can do that too. I was just too lazy to take all the videos!

Its Activity Time for Baby Aaron!

2010-07-24T22:55:00.020+08:00

The triplets had their share of playing with clothes pegs when they were younger. So now that Aaron is of the appropriate age, I took this activity out since he had mastered some fine motor activities :

(April 2010)

and practical works that I introduced him a while ago.

(May 2010)

This afternoon, Lucas and Theodore were so thrilled to see their "old toys" and insisted on playing. So I made Theodore wore a mask to make it more challenging for him. As for Lucas, he

was my assistant! He helped to hold the paper plate while Baby Aaron squeezed the pegs. (If you are wondering where is Joshua, he is playing his toy on his own in the Play Room!)

I must say Baby Aaron is quite good with this activity. But certainly he needs more guidance to perfect it. He was bored after 10 minutes and decided to try his hand on the puzzle.

The circle was easy for him and so is the square. He had difficulty with rectangle, triangle and Pentagon. Hopefully practice makes perfect!

It dawn on me that I had not introduced Baby Aaron many activities that I used to work with the triplets when they were at his age or even younger. I think I am more relax with Baby Aaron as compared to the triplets. Probably I take for granted that Baby Aaron is a full term baby, amd therefore he will pick his skills up eventually. Time to reflect on my priorities!

A visit from the security guard!

2010-07-22T23:28:00.000+08:00

Our apartment's security guard paid us a surprise visit last weekend! Before I elaborate on this event, I would like you to know that even since we moved in, my heart has weaken..further (I had heart murmur so its already very fragile!). Whenever our door bell rings, my heart will skip a bit. I will go, "Not again!? Must be that neighbour complaining about you boys AGIAN!"

Anyway, here is the interesting story of the security guard's visit. Apparently, a concerned resident from condominium opposite ours, saw our 4 boys climbing on the window grille, screaming for help, and leaping off the ledge and landed on the hard floor (They were doing their spiderman's stunts and landing on mattresses!). She thought the boys were screaming for help (which in fact they were screaming in delight!) as they were abused by the maid while the parents were out working! I was at that time, actually sitting on the floor trying to get them to come down but I was so short that the resident could not see me (or could she think that I was the maid?)

Well, it was good to know that we are in good neigbourhood and they are really genuine neighbours who look out for us.

As I did not take a video of the actual act, I got the boys to stage it again...which they gladly did since now they are banned from doing it! Enjoy!

Musical Chairs

2010-07-16T22:56:00.002+08:00

Last week I was early to pick the triplet up from school and witnessed for the first time the triplets playing the game - Musical Chairs, with their classmates.

Guess what? My boys were the first to be eliminated! I mean there were 3 of them out of a class of 7 students and yet the first to be eliminated was Joshua, followed by Theodore and finally Lucas! Either they were not familiar with the game or they were not competitive (in nature?). Not sure if the latter reason is a good thing in a competitive world we are living in...

Anyway, today I decided to let them play Musical Chairs at home. I myself couldnt even remember when was the last time I played this. Probably in primary school?

Theodore was wanted to control the music and asked to "play the piano". Perhaps the teacher used the piano to play the music rather than pausing the music from the player. Since we had a toy keyboard, we used that instead but the condition was that I controlled the music for the first round and Theodore would do the next, followed by the rest.

The first round was strange coz Theodore refused to rush for the seat and stand around coz he wanted to be eliminated so that he could play the music! The rest followed suit! In the end, it was me and Aaron taking the seats and me forcing one of them to take the last one!

Here's a video of them playing and Joshua doing the music. They loved to control the music so much that they let the music played on and on and took a long time to stop the music! The boys were so dizzy that they started to "faint" and lay down on the floor. Theodore complaint of a headache in this video. Oh yes, and Baby Aaron enjoyed so much that he kept on going in circles even though the music stopped!

Yummy Chocolate!

2010-07-12T22:13:00.005+08:00

The chocolate PaPa got me for my birthday reminded me of my favourite chocolate from France, La Maison du Chocolat! So when I found out that my friend was touring Paris, I immediately sent him an SMS!

There's the chocolate arriving a week after the SMS!

I was so happy to find out that they finally open one in Hong Kong after so many years in Japan which was their first Asia outlet.I am looking forward for the day for it to be in Singapore!. The last time was a more than a year back in Evanston where I got PaPa to buy it during his trip to NYC.

This 28 pieces of previous truffles cost me $38! Expensive taste I must say!

Happy Birthday to me!

2010-06-28T23:02:00.017+08:00

One year wiser and one year closer to heavenly home!

As PaPa would not be around on the actual day (this would probably the first time he was away on my birthday!!), we had to celebrate it 2 days earlier.

I chose my cake from Truffs as I am crazy over chocolate cake and Truffs served the best truffle cake in Singapore.

Priced at $70 for a kg cake, though its pricy, but it was all worth it! We also

picked up a box of truffles as well.

Being a dark chocolate lover, incidentally the 70% honduras dark chocolate was my choice. This is so good! It is so similar to my favourite chocolate from Paris. (Speaking of which, I quickly sms my friend who is in Paris now to grab a box for me!)

This was priced at $20 for only 9 small pieces. So you could imagine my mum's reaction when she heard about the prices!

The boys had a great time singing the birthday song, though their shouting drown off their words.

(Sorry guys, I am not allowed to post our family picture here and in Facebook coz PaPa claimed that he was not properly dressed!)

In the evening, PaPa bought me to Basilico, located at the Regent Hotel, for dinner. The food was great but I did not like the ambience which was too causal for my liking. Fortunately, the service and the food made up for it.

Our appetizer was three huge pieces of yummy bruschetta.

As for main, I had the braised beef cheeks which was super tender and delicious!

PaPa had the sausage ravioli which was one of the signature dishes. Turned out, his tasted better than mine

So thats ended my birthday date. And as for my present, I asked for an iPhone. It is still sitting in its packaging as I had no time to fix it up.

Dairy Farm Trail

2010-06-25T23:55:00.002+08:00

This June holidays period was a great time to catch up with friends and their kids. So when Seri called me last week to arrange a playdate with the boys, I was so thrilled!

The plan was to visit the Dairy Farm Trail at Car Park A after the boys' nap.

Thankfully it was was cool weather as we had a thunder storm in the morning. I also got our neighbour Rita, her husband, Stephen and their son Gavin to join us as I needed their direction to get there even though! The drive was less than 5 mins from our place!

Once we reached there the boys couldnt wait set off immediately!

We did the path trail rather than the grass trail as I was not comfortable that we did not had enough adults to go around. Anyway, it would be challenging to do the forest trail when the number of kids (under the age of 4!) outnumbered the number of adults! Especially so there was high chance that all of them want to be carried!

Oh, yes, Baby Aaron is with us too! He is strapped to the stroller all the time!

Fortunately, the flat road path was not as boring as we thought. Although we did not manage to

spot any monkey (except the 6 monkeys!), the boys enjoyed running around and chasing each other. As for me and Seri, we had a great time catching up and enjoyed the view of the trees and the colorful sky.

I told her to imagine that we were in Yosemite park!

Further down the path, the boys found a small

puddle of water and started digging, which they later explained that they were fishing!

Our journey was worth it when we were rewarded with breathe taking view of the quarry.

The boys were interested in feeding the fish than to admire the beauty of the quarry.

We also took shelter at the hut. Meanwhile the boys decided that biting Seri is more interested than other activity. Seri seems to enjoy it!

Before we left the park, I took some interesting pictures of the sunset with my D3000.

We will definitely be back again to do the challenging trail as well as to explore another trail at Car Park B. Finally, I found a good reason to stay in this area despite my preference to move to my dream home.

Aaron @ work

2010-06-25T13:55:00.001+08:00

I had started Baby Aaron on some "work" since he turned 18 months but did not have the chance to blog about it. I regret to inform that I was not consistent in guiding him or even setting up a structure as I did for the triplets back in USA. I think its all voiced down to laziness on my part!

Anyway, the first activity he did was slotting toothpicks into the toothpick holder. I put some pictures of that but so how could not locate them. He was very good at it. Then the second activity was too simple for him. It was slotting ice cream sticks into insulated mug. Again he did better than I thought. Like his brothers, he also slotted coins into the coin box.

Recently, I started introducing pouring and spooning of beans. He had a lot to learn as he was still spilling beans all over. Thankfully, he did help to clean up.

Lately, Baby Aaron is into water play. He was caught many times, playing water at the sink in the bathroom without supervision. With that in mind, I started introducing spooning of water (instead of pouring of water) to him. It was a big mess. I would hold back this activity and get polish on the beads pouring first then re-introduce this to him.

Counting!

2010-06-25T01:49:00.002+08:00

Lucas has a flair for counting. So this evening, I asked him to try placing his numbers in chronological order. He needed some guidance along the way but I am happy with his progress.

Boys' birthday cake for me

2010-06-22T13:30:00.001+08:00

When I asked Theodore what he would get for me for my birthday. He said "Chocolate cake! Toy chocolate cake!". "Why toy chocolate cake?" I asked. He replied, "So that I can cook for you!" He is such a sweety! Alas he changed his mind now and wanted to get me a princess cake because "you are a girl". As for Lucas, he said, "Chocolate cake because Mummy likes." No answer from Joshua though.

@ Tiong Bahru Park

2010-06-22T12:16:00.007+08:00

The last time we were here was during the first few weeks in Sep 09 where we just moved back from USA and needed to get out and fight the boys' jetlag.

The park was pretty packed at 5pm. Fortunately, the boys were happy to stay together to play with the sand instead of running around.

3 big kids aged 12 and 11 (2 brothers and 1 girl) came over to share the sand toys with the boys. At first they looked pretty decent until I spotted them playing with fire at the playground. I had my first taste of bullies when I witnessed the boys teaching the girl how to pretend lighting a matchstick to intimidate the girls in the park. They were also seen throwing our ball at the children in addition to their pushing, throwing and kicking sand on the victims. I was shocked to hear them communicating in Hokkien vulgarities!

At one point, the 12 year old boy was heard saying, "Sorry no cure. Money can cure!" I am not going to past judgement here but definitely not something I want to instill in my children. That also set me thinking how my children are going to defend themselves in the light of school bullies. I have no idea! But I hope I have an answer to that when they start their formal education.

Anyway, the bullies finally stopped their abuse only when one parent tried to video tape them. I guess the only punishment now is shaming them in the public?

Happy Father's Day!

2010-06-21T12:36:00.014+08:00

We had our Father' s Day celebration with my in laws and my brother in law's family yesterday at the Imperial Treasure Teochew Restaurant. The food was great though I find that they were a bit salty for my liking. After our late lunch, we proceed to my in laws' place to do the traditional cake cutting and photo taking.

Baby Aaron did not join us as he needed his afternoon nap.

As for our own family, the boys gave PaPa a handmade card and some painted rocks (one rock was hand picked by during our recent Sibu trip) this morning.

Then we had a bonding time at West Coast Park and a simple home cooked dinner.

The highlight (for Mummy actually!) was this rich chocolate cake from My Fat Lady. The cake was not as light as Aunty Vicky's, Lana, Jane' station, Awfully Chocolate or Emicake. In fact, I find the fudge a bit chewy and the sponge cake a bit dry. I was told to eat it at room temperature or even microwave it, which I did not do. Here's a video of the boys singing a birthday song to PaPa. Any cake served in the house is always associated with birthdays and blowing of candles.

Anyway, since I got back from USA, I continued my search for the best chocolate cake in Singapore - an on going mission for me as I love chocolate cake (carrot cake being the second choice, cheese cake being the third and black forest being the forth!). Yes, I am a cake person!!

So now you know where Theodore inherit his chocolate craving from!

PaPa, thanks for sharing the load of carrying after the kids despite your busy schedule and limited weekend time in Singapore! We love you! Blessed Father's Day!

First cycling trip @ West Coast Park!

2010-06-21T00:52:00.010+08:00

The boys had not been cycling much since we moved out of my in law's place in April. The last time they cycled was a month ago when we had a playdate with Max and Kyle at Bedok place. So you could imagine how dusty and how flat the bike' tyres were when PaPa took them out this morning!PaPa set up the bike rack (which was buried under our bed for months!), attached the triplets' bikes, dumped Baby Aaron's LikeaBike in the boot and off we headed for West Coast Park.

Oh, one thing I do not like about West Coast Park is that there is no bikes for rental!

Anyway he boys did exceptionally well!

I was surprised that Theodore would pedal with both feet!

Our dear Lucas had no stamina and decided to "walk" his bike after cycling for less than 10 minutes! Baby Aaron was more interested in hanging out instead of practicing on his bike. So poor me had to carry his bike!

I am hoping that Baby Aaron can learn cycling without the training wheel something that I wanted to do for the triplets but did not carry out.

Children's Season at the Singapore Art Museum

2010-06-13T22:20:00.002+08:00

The boys' school organized a trip to the Art Garden just before the school holidays but they did not participate this time round. Reason being that my past experience with the school outings were not very pleasant one. I found that the teachers were more concerned with crowd control (which is not a bad thing) than explaining and interacting with the kids. Given that this is a museum outing which requires some form of explanation, I decided to give this a miss and bring the boys on a separate occasion.

So this morning, we got the boys changed and headed for the Art Garden (which was this year them for the Children' Season) at the Singapore Art Museum., SAM@8Q.

We started off from the top floor and made our way down. The first station was the Funky Forest exhibit. The kids got to discover how their movements would make streams flow and trees grow. If you place a block on the floor, the stream would be block and redirect to somewhere else. And if you stand in front of the projected screen, a tree would grow right at the spot you stand. There was also an indication of weather the tree was doing well or lack of oxygen. And if you direct enough water and sunshine, the trees would bloom!
At the Daisies exhibit, part of the floor featured the images of the daisies. When you step on the flowers will disappear. It attempts to show how human behaviour can harm nature.Next we stepped into the Enchanted Forest where sheep fly and imaginary animals roam freedly. The boys also explore the beautifully illustrated walls.

The 4 boys with the help of PaPa also succeed in coloring the butterflies and pasted them on the featured wall.

The colorless butterfly is done by Baby Aaron.

The boys also learnt about the plant life-cycle through Floribots, an award winning work featuring over 100 giant robot flowers that 'grow' before our eyes from a bud until they 'bloom' pink and yellow. There are motion sensors around the room and these control the movement of the flowers. The boys stepped on the edge but before long, were told to keep a distance. Well, another reason why PaPa did not like the non-interactive part of this exhibition.

We then moved on to The Moving Image Gallery at Level 2 where movies were screened. We spent quite long there as they kept playing the movies non-stopped and it was tough getting all 4 boys out!

Then we ventured into Walter's Garden, our last stop. It was a creative playground where young children can learn about colours, shapes and develop motor skills through play. Lucas had a great time throwing the "pillows" around.
We had a great time at the museum but before we left the boys just had to give a lasting impression to the security guard (who was fascinated to see triplets)!

Rollerblading

2010-06-06T22:54:00.003+08:00

In line with the Sports theme for this year June holidays, I eagerly signed the boys up a roller blade trial lesson with Skate-With-Us.

The lesson was conducted at the basketball court at Tiong Bahru Area. The van, which carried their gears, was late for an hour! Anyway, it took quite a while to gear up the 3 boys and got them to sit down.

The first thing the instructor taught them was how to fall gracefully! Basically to slide their bodies outwards using the protective gears and not sliding their faces!

Next is how to balance their weight!

And that were the only 2 moves they learnt! No wonder Theodore was wondering why he didnt skate! The instructor thought they were young and therefore needed more attention on these 2 moves before they moved their feets, which I totally agree with her on the age part.

Well, boys, seems like we will re-visit this activity at least a year from now! Hopefully, by then, you can all do this as a family!

Reflections @ Bukit Chandu

2010-05-17T12:53:00.002+08:00

Playseum hosted its second day of Me & My World at Bukit Chandu yesterday.

This is a museum coverted in from an old colonial house that was set amidst the lush greenery of Bukit Chandu off Pasir Panjang Road, and right next to Kent Ridge Park. Apparently, there were some rubber trees around the area. I was tried looking for rubber seeds but none was found except this writing on Rubber History!

We were here mainly for the kids events as the World War II exhibits were too advanced for the our kids.

The boys started out with the spinning columns. They were given chalks to draw random pictures. The objective was to incorporate the kids' creativity into the artist's installation

Here is Lucas' version of an alien!

Another alien drawn by Theodore.

The boys moved on to another station to build their own 3D battlegrounds using recycled materials like cardboard, architectual modelling scraps, dried leaves, twigs and toys. Needless to say they were more interested in using the toys (cars, planes, tankers and army soldiers)!

The boys also did some clay modelling which Joshua claimed he made a giraffe! Unfortunately, I did not have a picture of it.

The gardens of Bukit Chandu was transformed into a children maze after the artist Bee Aye, with the help of children, weaved the multicolored clothes into spider like web!

The installation was created in this manner : the child would choose a color cloth to work on. The artist would tie this cloth to a starting point chosen by the child.

The child would then move around and simply direct the artist how he wanted the cloth to "move" such as moving under this, across this, over that etc. Simply by following the child's movements and directions, the artist would weave a pattern.

This would form part of the installation. Theodore was the only one who participated. Meanwhile, the three boys were running around the compound with PaPa.

The most impressive and popular exhibit was the Sonic Peace Games installation. It was set up to create a mix of sounds using water (!) and touch, thus forming own unique music piece. There was some science element in it as well as the artist set it up using magnetic field. The participant had to placed one hand on the circular metal disk and the other hand touch the bowl of water which I believed had some magnetic element in it. Here is the video:

Memories at Old Ford Factory

2010-05-15T22:11:00.002+08:00

This morning we headed to the Old Ford Factory museum as there would be some children activities. Thankfully, it was very near our place and we were able to make there first thing in the morning and enjoyed the children's activities before the crowd started to stream in.

The boys were given goodies bags which were packed with boxes of crayons, pin buttons with the statement "I love Museum", stickers and stamps on their hands.

The first station was the Construction Zone where kids were given blocks to build the Ford

Factory.

The boys were more interested in throwing the blocks around and climbing over them rather than to build something of of them!

Theodore wanted to do some craft works so I accompanied him to make a colonial hat (with the help of a volunteer of course!)

where the rest of them followed PaPa for a tour of the exhibits. Later on, the boys came and helped Theodore to complete the hat.

On the way to do the painting activity, we had to pass this long drive way at the entrance of the building. There was this World War II Snakes Ladders board game painted on the floor! The boys were so excited that they ran across the board and even trail the snakes down the colorful boxes. This exhibit is called the Syonan Race.

At the backyard, the ViewFinder installation was set up to allow no mess painting for the kids. The boys each had one panel to work on. I love this installation as it was so easy to clean off the paint - simply by throwing water over them and they can dry themselves under the sun!

This is Aaron's first attempt at painting! He got himself so dirty that I decided to strip him and got him to paint in his diapers!

Joshua was so intense when he was doing his painting. He called his master piece "my komodo dragon" because it had so many colors! I have not actively taught them about komodo dragon. He picked it up when I read him the book "Komodo Colours". It is a great book by Wide Eye Early Learning Programme in UK. So Vera if you are reading this post, you know what is your mission?Hahahaha...

Here are the paintings by Theodore and Lucas.

Then we headed to the Syonan Garden where the boys got to plant some corn. It was pretty crowded so we did not get to do much. The boys just scooped some soil into small pots and dump a lot of seeds into the pots!

I was advised by a 7 yr old girl who said that the boys needed to put stones at the the bottom of the pots before they placed the soil! Obviously, that explained why the soil was coming out! Anyway, we decided to call it a day as the weather was warming up and Baby Aaron was screaming his lungs out as he was very tired from all the activities!

Playtime at the Museum!

2010-05-14T11:46:00.000+08:00

The theme for this year International Museum Day was I love Museums - Kids Edition that ran from 14 May - 23 May.

I was very excited about this as there would be more children activities appropriate for the triplets' age. We participated in the Me and My World events organized by Playeum, an non-profit organization, which prides itself as the first children's museum in Singapore. Well, I felt it was more of a virtual museum, unlike the Kohl Children's Museum which we frequent back in Chicago. This is because Playeum did not have a physical structure to call its own. Their exhibits are placed at the commercial museums and areas are craved out to host children's activities. Not my ideal children's museum but it is a good start.

Love Vouchers

2010-01-23T15:27:00.014+08:00

I was doing some spring cleaning 2 days ago and found this self made love vouchers that I gave to PaPa for his birthday in 2003. Sometime to save on cost, I just need to think of creative way to get around it!Hahaha...

Here's the cover page.I was being professional and stated all the terms and conditions for the vouchers!

Note the small print for the breakfast coffee voucher. It stated that only for SIA canteen coffee, how cheapskate I was! Idid not even offer the better coffee from SIA SilverKris!

I told PaPa that he did not redeem his vouchers. He asked if there was a expiration date. Well, that important detail was missed out but too bad for PaP coz he could not redeem coz mobile number had changed! Hahaha...

Lilies for the man

2010-01-22T23:42:00.006+08:00

I got PaPa some lilies the other day. Strange right? Well, that's a reason to this.

It started over a dinner conversation with some friends. We were sharing views on Tiger Woods' affairs. Then the conversation led to how weak men can be. Roy, a lawyer, thought that as man became more successful and powerful in his career, he would develop this sense of entitlement. Karen, Head of Sustainability, disagreed and thought that it voiced down to values and education. Another lawyer agreed that there are man temptations out there and as a married man, he had to consciously fan them off. He said, "How about giving the man a credit for not falling? Like give him a flower to show some appreciation?"

Well, that statement set me thinking. Did I ever give PaPa a stalk of flower. I think I did...during dating time. It's about high time, this great man, who supports the family of 6 get some credit for: taking time off with the kids so that I can do some blogging, fighting office politics out there, fencing off temptations. I did ask PaPa if temptations ever cross his path but all I got from him was a blank look. Well I guess, they are always out there but people and especially husbands do not talk about it. My friend once asked would I do. I said, "He better explain to God first." and with that, they said, "This woman used religion not education, entitlement or values." Yes, I do think that we are living in a fallen world and no 2 persons are perfect. So in our "imperfect" marriage, we need a third party to be involved - actually the words I said to Chris when he proposed 7 years ago. He is none other than our Lord Jesus. I thank Jesus for His grace that our marriage is able to sustain till now and more years to come!

Side Walk Chalking @ Mt Sinai

2010-01-22T13:20:00.010+08:00

For the past two days, I had been getting the boys to do some outdoor activity after waking up from their naps instead of lazing in bed.

So I got out our USA imported Crayola side walk chalks and got them to draw on the pavement just outside our house. This was their second time doing this in Singapore since we got back from USA. The first time they did it was at our own backyard, on the wooden platform.

The boys had a great time! On Day 1, Joshua was painting with different colors on the same spot as he put it, "Mommy, I am making a colorful barn!" And Theodore was just happy drawing lines with his favourite color - grey! Lucas, on the other hand, was happy with drawing circles and standing in them!On Day 2, I leave the boys with the helpers while I cooked dinner. When I came out to check on them, they were drawing the sides of the pavement in alternate colors! Quite a colorful sight and the boys were very proud of their creation! Lucas said, "Mommy! Look! A rainbow!"Joshua was drawing lines and courting them as he went. He got his numbers all mixed up after he hit fifteen.

The bikers!

2009-12-28T23:12:00.008+08:00

The triplets each received a training bicycle for their Christmas presents from Gong Gong and Ma Ma. I was not as thrilled as the boys as I did not like the idea of using training wheels. I wanted the boys to learn balancing first, and paddling later. You will probably this is possible with the bikes from like-a-bike, which we inherited from Max.

Another reason I didnt support the training bicycle as the boys, especially Theodore was not ready. He cycled with only one leg as he had not figured now to paddle and moved with two legs! This was a concern for me as he had an asymmetry issue with his arms and I was afraid that his legs would be affected too! I am nagging PaPa to teach Theodore cycling soon before he developed muscles on one leg only! This according to our physiotherpist, would affect his walking and running in the future! The easy way out was to hide the bicycle but I doubt this would work given how much Theodore loved his new bicycle.

Lucas has not mastered cycling yet. He preference was to push the bicycle around instead of sitting on it. But he had fun joining in the fun. Most of the time, pretending to fix his wheels!

Joshua, on the other hand, had mastered cycling in less than 2 weeks! This was because he was great with padding his Radio Flyer Tricycle so it was just transferring his padding skill to another level! I would probably try removing the training wheel soon after he figured out the use of the brakes!

@ Castle Beach

2009-12-24T23:46:00.015+08:00

This morning, we went to Castle Beach at East Coast Park.

Our intention was to buy the tools from the Castle Beach's office for the boys so that they could build impressive sand castles. Unfortunately, the office was closed. So the boys had to make do with our own sand toys. However, Joshua was more interested in picking up sea shells.

PaPa also had a one to one time with Baby Aaron.

Yes, Baby Aaron had also took a liking for sand!

The boys were fascinated with their new fire engine toy. Theodore treated it as a treasure and
buried it. Lucas was interested in unearthing it. Joshua was interested in damping water over the toy. So you could imagine the tuck of war between the boys!

Fortunately, they had an intelligent PaPa who saved the day! PaPa found a buried coconut and got them to do a digging activity together. Needless to say, they had a great time finding the "big treasure".

Theodore was so thrilled and and ran to me, shouting, "Mummy, I had a big stone!"

I had to correct him that it was a coconut. Eventually, PaPa threw it away as each claimed ownership to the coconut. Anyway, it was time for lunch and I didnt want to carry another bulky item with us.

While waiting for PaPa's news on what food stores were opened for lunch, the boys had their bonding time of digging a tree.

Joshua wanted a bigger tweak so I took a walk with him. I found a long one for him. Theodore, who already had another tweak wanted the long tweak that Joshua had. So he said, "Joshua, you want this one (showing his own shorter twig)? You see, you can dig so much (demonstrating to Joshua how to do the digging of the tree bark)?" Joshua didnt fall for the trick and replied, "NO!" The aggressive Theodore, snatched Joshua's twig and made the poor boy screaming out loud. Well, I had to lecture Theodore and made him gave Joshua's his twig back.

Anyway, on the way for lunch, I saw this complete set of fish bone and took a picture of it.

The triplets were quite gross up.

Christmas Service

2009-12-24T13:45:00.000+08:00

The boys had been practicing the warming song, "Heart to Change to World", for the past few weekends at their Sunday School class. This performance was scheduled for our Christmas Service.

So today being The Day, the performers were encouraged to dress in white tops and dark bottoms. Their only white decent tops were the Polo Ralph shirts that we got from States.The boys were shy so I had to walk them to the stage. As it turned out, I had to stay on the stage with them thoughout the short performance coz they were crying and asking to go home. So for the entire time, I was hiding behind them and trying to stay away from all the limelight. The boys did not sing much, not even the chorus. Only Lucas was doing the gesture of the "heart". Theodore was looking around and Joshua was sucking his thumb on some occasion!

Well, they survived the performance and I am sure they will do better next year when they are older. Good job, guys!

Happy Birthday PaPa!

2009-12-16T23:15:00.002+08:00

Yesterday was PaPa's birthday!

We had a very simple celebration at home with an excellent chocolate fudge cake from Jane's station. Happy blessed 34th birthday, PaPa! May the good Lord bless you with great health, joy and happiness!

Incidentally, we had only own dinner celebration at a Japanese BBQ restaurant at Holland Village. I forgot to bring my cash so in the end PaPa had to pay for his own birthday dinner!

Marina Barrage

2009-11-16T23:31:00.002+08:00

Yesterday we took the kids to Marina Barrage,prided as first reservoir located in the city among the South East Asia countries!

The vision of creating the urban reservoir experience was incubated 20 years ago when MM Lee envisioned damming the Marina Channel to create freshwater reservoir. Now, this colossal architectural masterpiece will serve Singapore as a vital water source, act as a barrier to allevaite flooding in low lying areas of the city.

The Marina Barrage did not give us the feeling of visiting a reservoir as it was created with a checklists of hotspots:
a) Marina Bridge
b) Pump House - the gigantic drainage pumps showcased in a glass panel so that we can have good visibilty
c) Solar Park - housed 405 solar panels that generate electricity used for indoor lighting and power points in the Marina Barrage
d) Arts Trail - art pieces located around the barrage
e) Sustainable Singapore Gallery - featuring Singapore's effort and achievements in creating the barrage
f) Green roof - a huge field where frequent kite flying and picnics are hosted.

We loved the Green Roof as there was enough room for the boys to run wild and also for us to put our mat down for a great picnic dinner. This was a great place to see the city skyline. The boys also got the chance to see different kites in action!

There was a water place at the lower level where the boys could enjoy.
We did not visit it as I didnt bring a change of clothes.

We left immediately after dinner as the it started to drizzle. We would definitely visit again!

Running Wild

2009-11-16T13:46:00.000+08:00

After the Swimmy play, we took a walk along Singapore River. The boys were like wild animals let out of cage! They were running around, walked up and down the slopes of the green patches along the river. They got excited with all boats passing them by and started waving frantically to them!
We ended up the morning with a treat at Mcdonald's!

Swimmy was awesome!

2009-11-16T13:36:00.000+08:00

Today we took the triplets to watch Swimmy, Frederick & Inch by Inch at the Victoria Theatre.

Today was the triplets' first theatre experience. The play was entitled Swimmy, Frederick & Inch By Inch, an act by Mermaid Theatre of Nova Scotia. The play was based on the books written by Leo Lionni, which was one of the boys' favourite authors.

This was a 40 minute production by Mermaid Theatre of Nova Scotia which was brought in by Act 3.

At first, was we were worried that the boys would be scared of darkness. Our fears were put to rest as it was a very colorful and interesting play. It was not the usual style of acting. Rather, it was two or three persons presenting the three different stories using well-crafted pupperty style and a narrator at the back scene telling the stories.

Swimmery was presented with shadows. The most colorful and impressive story was Inch by Inch as many animals were introduced. Needless to say, this was the boys' favourite. My take was the classic - Frederick, which was also one of my childhood favourite books.

The boys didnt give us a hard time, aside from wanting to sit on our laps instead of taking their own seats. Fortunately, Lucas was able to sit on his own. This set me thinking if I should get only three seats for our next production to share among 5 of us instead of buying five seats.

What made this a great production too was that there was a FAQ session for the kids. The "actors" would demonstrate their shadows technique and explain in detailed to the audience. The made of the puppets were also explained in details. All in all, it was a superb play! I really hope they would be invited to Singapore again to present "The Hungry Catepillar".

A terrible mistake!

2009-11-13T12:30:00.000+08:00

I made a terrible mistake today. Fortunately, with God's grace, Baby Aaron's life was not threatened!

This started with me giving Baby Aaron's goat formula to replace his usual soy formula. I bought goat milk as supermarket ran out of his usual Stage 2 Similac Soy formula. This turned out to be a grave mistake!

As it turned out, Baby Aaron had an allergic reaction. This was not the usual mild food reaction. It was pretty bad. He was covered with hives from head to toes! I thought giving him a bath would calm the rashes down. It didnt help. In fact, Baby Aaron vomitted during his shower. I instructed Julie to administer a dose of Zytech (antihistamin) and put him to sleep while I put the triplets to sleep. After 35 mins later, I came out and heard Baby Aaron coughing none stop. knew something was terribly wrong so I wanted to call my PD friend Agnes. But I lost her number. I texted some friends for her name but couldnt wait any longer. So I decided to rush down to Kinder Clinic Paragon to see the Allergic Specialist. I could head to the emergency unit at KKH but the road leading there was always full of traffic and would be worst since it was raining heavily.

Anyway, for some reason it did not dawn on me that I should take a cab. Instead, I took my car. So along the way, I tried calling to Baby Aaron, stretching one hand to touch him while the other hand balancing the steering wheel. I was so afraid that he would pass out before we arrived.

Upon reaching the car park, I took him out and ran all the way to the clinic. I told the nurse it was an emergency so Dr Dawn stopped all the patients and attend to Baby Aaron. Baby Aaron had some mild wheezing (read: difficulty breathing, windpipe closing up..), so they gave him a dose of ventolin and a dose of oral steroid!Yes, it was that bad.

Here are some pictures taken by Dr Dawn for her upcoming book on allergy:

Baby Aaron's rashes calmed down significantly after dose of medication

Closed-up of his hives

A more happy child!

I was told that Goat's formula has 50% less protein than Cow's formula. So it was a very very bad substitution for Soy formula! What an ignorant mother, I am!!

Halloween 2009

2009-11-01T22:56:00.041+08:00

The boys had a great time last year celebrating Halloween in Evanston. So now that we are back in Singapore, I wanted to create that mood by starting off with a Halloween lunch. This lunch consisted of a lollipop ghost, an eye, 2 fingers, meat balls, pasta, mashed avocado and bread sticks.
The eye balls were made of hard boiled eyes painted with food colorings.

And the fingers were made of mini sausages and onion slices. The boys were so gross up that they did not take any of the freak food, even though I told them what they were made of. Even Joshua who loved sausages stayed away from them!

We got the boys to take a long nap after lunch as we wanted to conserve energy for Treat or Trick later in the evening.
In Singapore, Halloween celebration is a very big thing at Woodlands. This is because the Singapore American School is located here...for obvious reason, the school's surrounding is populated with American families.
This was our first time here so we decided to get there by 5pm, not knowing when the "party" would start. Well, it was a blessing we got there early because shortly after we arrived, the place was swarmed with cars and finding a parking lot was near impossible!
Here's a picture of the boys sitting quietly in their strollers waiting for their treats! Oh, in case you are wondering why Baby Aaron and Joshua did not have a mask...that's because Baby Aaron hated the tight band around his head and Joshua's head gear was too big for his tiny head!
The main street was relatively quiet at 5.30pm. Crowds streaming in at 6pm but doors of houses were still tightly shut. People were standing directly in front of the houses waiting for the doors to open. Journalists, TV crews and celebrities were also sported. At 6.15pm, the party began! The slight was amazing! Many houses were nicely decorated and even the host families were all dressed up

It was so crowded, it's unbelievable! This was the first house we visited. As we were not residents from here, we donated packets of candies to the host families to show our gratitude. This house was decorated with a corpse lying outside the gate. There were many decorated houses, one or two were really comparable to those we saw back in Evanston. Treat or Trick was so easy here as 90% of the houses participated. In less than an hour, the boys' bags were filled with candies!

We arranged to meet Mabel and Issac as well. Unfortunately, I did not take any pictures of them together. I was very evil and asked her father why he was wearing a horror mask!

The weather did not look good and we left after an hour. Fortunately, we left early as the traffic was building up. It would be terrible if we were stuck in the rain with all the cars dashing out!

Halloween @ Namly

2009-10-26T10:04:00.029+08:00

It has been a very very long time since I last posted. Finally, I find the time (and the discipline!) to start blogging again before I get even lazier (and giving excuses!). Well, I probably will be doing some "cheating" by back dating some past events when I have the time to blog them...

Yesterday, we took the boys to Namly Gardens for the annual Halloween party jointly organized by the Namly resident community and Ulu Pandan community club.
I heard about this from my good friend, Mabel and contacted the organizer to extend the invitation to the Kellogg Alumni. Alas they got back to us too late and there was not enough lead time to inform the alumni members. Hopefully, the alumni will be included for next year event.

We contributed some satay as this was a potluck party. The community also took this opportunity to launch their new playground - the only playground in Singapore that has a sign that said "No Pet allowed".

The launch of the playground and the halloween event was officiated by Mr Christopher DeSouza, a Member of Parliament for Holland-Bukit Timah GRC.Unlike Evanston, the decorated houses were shattered all over. Since we were given a map, we took the route that had more houses.

This year, the boys were supposed to dress as super-heros. Unfortunately, Joshua's batman costume was not ready so he ended up wearing "Roo", his costume for last year Halloween. Theodore left without his mask as he left it behind. Baby Aaron also joined us for the first time. This year the boys (except Baby Aaron of course!) could say "Trick or Treat" though not perfect. They were definitely less fearful than last year.

The houses had simple decorations, except one that had were decorated as a graveyard with smoke and sound effects. Theodore and Baby Aaron were enjoying the scary scene which were unlike Joshua and Lucas, who were asking frantically for us to leave!We did not stay till for the best dress contest as it was Baby Aaron's bedtime. But I was glad that the boys had a great time and we are looking forward to the actual day celebration.

We are Singapore, Singaporeans!

2009-08-10T12:45:00.000+08:00

We were excited that we would be back in Singapore on the first week of August. This meant that we were able to catch the National Day Parade with the kids!

So two months ago I got PaPa to email Mama to get tickets for our family (except Aaron who was too young to attend a lengthy parade). We were thankful that we got V.I.P seats! This was the first time for the boys and my first time on the world's largest floating performance platform at the Marina Bay location. My previous experiences were years ago- once before the kids' arrival; the reminding 2 times were sent by schools - once as part of the singing Singapore flag and another time as volunteers to fill up the seats in the big stadium!

If you notice, we were all dressed in red as this was an requirement written on the tickets. It was really nice see a sea of red! It sure made us (at least for me!) felt patriotic! We were also given 5 goodies bags containing tissues, water, vouchers and party packs. It was a hassle taking 6 bags including our own diaper bag! Next time we would ask them to combine all the stuffs in 2 bags, if possible.

Fortunately the weather was not hot! Otherwise, I am pretty sure we wouldn't be able to survive the entire performance. The boys loved the falling paracutes and of course the fireworks! The story telling and dancing part were not to their liking. In fact, I thought it was boring.

In any case, we had a great night out and would definitely do this as an yearly affair!
Happy Birthday Singapore!

Noah's Playground for Everyone

2009-05-25T03:32:00.001+08:00

This afternoon after the boys got up from their nap we decided to go bring the boys to the park. I told PaPa that we should check out on Lawson Park since it was next to the lake and Lighthouse beach.

Within the park there was a relatively new playground (read clean!) called Noah's Playground for Everyone. This playground was privately funded in memory of Noah Cutter who died at the age of 2.5yrs old. You can read more about him here.

The park was not only kids friendly, it was blind friendly too! Here' a map for the blinds to find out the location of attractions in the playground.

The boys had a great time playing!

Even Baby Aaron got to sit in the swing for a fair bit!

PaPa took care of the triplets while I sat on our beach mat on this big field, just next to the park, with Baby Aaron. There were two families there setting their tents for their BBQ gathering.

This is a very nice and shaddy park. And we get all the breeze from the lake as well. It got a little cold later so I went to the car to get their sweaters. But poor Baby Aaron was so under dressed that I had to wrap him in the sarong and held him against my body.

We stayed like an hour before I called it quit coz I was freezing from the cold chill! Next time we will come prepare with thicker clothes, kite and our picnic basket!

Botanical Garden again!

2009-05-24T11:43:00.027+08:00

The weather was so good that we had to make a trip to the Botanical Garden again! This time we came prepared! We got some food for the boys from burger king, organic grapes and pizzas from Wholefoods and a change of clothes for the boys.

We arrived at 9.40am as I wanted to start the day early, knowing that this being the Memorial Day weekend, it would get crowded later in the day.

I insisted that we made a trip to the Japanese Garden as we never made it that far. On the way to the Japanese Garden, we passed this path that was decorated with big round stones along the sides. The boys were facinated with that as they hadnt seen stones that big.

Theodore created this activity where they tried to balance the tiny peddles on the big stone.

The Japanese Garden was built on a small island separated from the main attractions. We had to cross a small bridge to get there. To be honest, I was pretty scared of the boys falling off the bridge coz the edge was quite low.

I love the Japanese trees! They were well maintained and so tiny. I think the Japanses believe in asymmetry as a balance of elements coz the trees are so well-trimmed. I dont know this represent really...maybe a form of order?

I learnt that path formed an important role in the Japanese Garden. The path set the mind before one enters the garden. The path was laid with stones and stones represent the earth. When stones are small, uneven and of different sizes, the objective was to slow down one's steps so that one can view/appreciate the flowers/plants. When the stones were placed apart, it was to encourage one's to look up and see the trees. It was amazing so much thoughts went into the making of a garden!

Along the way, we also saw stone walls beautifully constructed. The boys couldnt resist the temptation to do a balancing act!

We also came across beautiful, blooming flowers. The boys just had to pull the rope that fenced the flowers. They started to sing "Row Row Row your boat"!Before we leave the "isaland" PaPa got the boys to hold hands so that we can all walk together. Alas, they started playing "Ring around the roses"!

Then it was time for lunch and we headed to our favourite spot which was right across the Bruce Rose Garden's fountain. Needless to say, after lunch we headed for the fountain. We got the boys into their swimming shorts and they were set to go! The boys were so into the fountain that they even climbed onto it. Lucas, being the cautious one, preferred to stay at the edge.A picture of Theodore doing his superman's stunt!I supervised the boys while PaPa had a personal time with Baby Aaron on our beach mat!We left after 45 mins of playing and the boys this time, had a fresh change of clothes!

The boys had some time to play in the field. This is a picture of them starring at the teenage boy who was lying in the grass, limbs apart, getting his picture taken!

Just before we moved off, the boys discovered this giant tree with "holes" and decided to check out if there was an owl there!

Singapore Idol 2009

2009-05-20T12:43:00.000+08:00

Theodore loves to sing! And this hobby of his started 2 months ago.

And like the rest, his favourite song is "Jesus loves me", a song that we played before they sleep since their birth. We kind of stopped playing the song when we were were in USA because the CD player wasnt working.

Enjoy the show by our talented Theodore! The video was taken on April 30, 2009.

Mischief of one kind

2009-05-19T12:00:00.004+08:00

I have since been looking after the 4 boys alone for a week as our nanny quitted on us. More about the drama another time...

Today, I had a drama of another kind..from the triplets of course!

Actually, it was a mistake on my part to re-arranged their beds. I placed them side by side instead of the usual arrangement where the beds were separated. This was done because I wanted them to get used to sleeping next to each other since I would be selling the beds for our move back to Singapore and the boys would be sleeping together on the floor.

So I sent the boys off for their afternoon nap, warning them to behave themselves. Then I hopped over to my room to give Aaron his shower. When I was done with Aaron, I heard loud laughters coming from the triplets' room. I bundled Aaron in his towel, held him tight and quickly dashed into their room.

What I saw was shocking! There were poo everywhere - on the carpet, on their bedsheets, bed frames, their shirts, on their hands! Yes, I kid you not! Lucas was so scared that he literally dropped the big piece of poo on Joshua's bed when he saw me! Guilt was written all over his face! Theodore and Lucas was bottomless! Joshua's hand was also covered with poo, evident that he was also bouncing the poo around. There were actually 2 big pieces of poo and 1 small poo...1 on Joshua's bed, the other two was on the carpetted floor! And the bed frames as well! I was so furious though the boys were still laughing away. I told them to stand still (so afraid that they start to touch everywhere...) and I put Aaron down in his crib, with only his towel on.

I gathered all the toxic chemicals, cloth, paper towels, disposable gloves and plastic bags and stormed into their room. Then I sent them to the shower while I changed their sheets, scrubbed down the beds, the drawers, doors, and of course the carpet and in between checked on them just to make sure that they were not drowned. Though I was pretty sure they were drowned in guilt.

While cleaning up their act, I noticed that the changing mat was on the floor. I was pretty sure that was not there when I left the room. On closed observation, I found poo on the mat and realised that the boys actually pulled the mat out and attempted to change their soiled diapers. Alas, they found more interesting stuff to entertain themselves!

Anyway, the boys had a good time showering themselves and of course throwing water on the floor. And when I went in, I saw that my step stool and my pails were in the bathtub and of course the entire bathroom floor was flooded! Another place to scrub down! Grrr...

I quickly dressed them up and sent them to bed - this time arranging the beds back to their original positions. Strange that the boys didnt protest. Probably they knew they did wrong. Anyway, I kept their door open so that aside from drowning in guilt they wont be drowned by the smell of chemicals!

Then I dashed off to Aaron, keeping my fingers' cross that he didnt poo or pee in his bed. Well he didnt! So I dressed and fed him. Then it was time for his nap. As for me, I was back in the bathroom scrubbing the floor, and washing off their soiled bedsheets and shirts. By the time I finished cleaning, had my lunch, washed up the dishes, threw away the poo mess, Aaorn, our short napper got up! What a busy afternoon!

That night before the boys were put to bed, Theodore said, "Dont touch poo poo. Hands dirty." At least he got the picture! On hindsight, maybe I should be calm and took a picture of the dirty scene but I was too angry to see the cuteness of it. I doubt there would be a next time.

Farewell Rachel!

2009-05-17T12:16:00.005+08:00

Our dear Rachel is leaving Evanston for good and heading home on Sunday. So on Wednesday we had dinner with her at her favourite restaurant, Renga Tei. We are also joined with Yenling's mum and Rachel's mum.

Excellent company and food!

Me, Rachel, Emily, Aunty Jennifer, 许妈妈 and Yenling

We are truely blessed to have a great friend - Rachel, who is always feeding us information on cheap/free stuffs and great places to go! We will miss you Rachel!

More take on this posting at Rachel's blog.

Happy 6th year anniversary!

2009-05-17T12:09:00.002+08:00

Tomorrow marked our 6th year anniverary! Oh how time flies! In 4 years time, I would love to renew our wows, with the boys as my page boys and hopefully I can have my long awaited Patek Philippe watch! Hahahaha....

Anyway, this time we headed to a non romatic place as compared to last year as I was craving for my hamachi sashimi. So we went to Renga Tei for a great pigout!

That night, I joking asked PaPa if he believed in the seven year itch. He said the itch is meant for the woman!What??? Well, I am glad that we have a 3rd party in our marriage. And that 3rd party is God who has truely blessed us well and I am thankful for a wonderful marriage, a good husband and wonderful kids.

What itch? Lets hope mine and PaPa's eczema does not flare up next year!

A rare moment of peace!

2009-05-16T10:55:00.002+08:00

This was a rare moment - 4 boys playing along side without fighting over their toys! And Lucas and Thedore shared the same set of toy! I took the opportunity to clean the triplet's room, otherwise I will have to do it over the weekend when PaPa is around...

Hand Prints from the kids!

2009-05-14T10:29:00.001+08:00

Here's a picture of the boys' handprints for Mother's Day! Speaking of which, I need to locate those that they gave me for the previous Mother's Day and my last birthday!

Thanks guys! I love you, forever!

BBQ on Mother's Day

2009-05-13T04:32:00.001+08:00

Our landlord left us this great grill that we wanted to try it at least once before we moved out. So I suggested a Mother's Day cookout for Mother's Day and invite our friends over.

Chris gladly volunteered to plan the menu. Of course, I was chipped in my ideas...like I need my Chinese marinated chicken wings.

We had a wonderful spread of food! Well, aside from the chips n salsa, the excellent cocktail (lime soda with lots of mint leaves aka Blood brothers version!), green salad and mini burgers for the kids (with veggies hidden in the patties), the rest of the food actually spelt heart disease and high cholesterol. They were fatty Korean beef ribs, mushrooms wrapped in bacon (and dipped in honey mustard BBQ sauce), 5-spice baked chicken wings and pork chops. We always over catered. So my vegetable kebabs were not served. We also had watermelon and cake bought by Rachel and Yenling respectively.

The boys made me proud! They glad gave up their table for the girls to dine in! And them sitting on the floor pigging out their burgers! And here is a picture of Theodore with his Jie Jie En. I didnt take many pictures. But you can check out Rachel's blog for more pictures and story.

Thank you PaPa for braving the windy and cold weather to serve us the excellent food!

Happy Mother's Day!

2009-05-11T11:16:00.002+08:00

This is my second Mother's Day spent in USA! This time, we did not have a cake like we do last year. I told PaPa I wanted a cookout celebration with our friends which he gladly obliged!

We also made phone calls to our mothers wishing them a fabulous day. My mother-in-law said that it must be hard on me to take care of 4 boys and made a big sacrifice for since I decided not to work even though going back to Singapore come July. In reply, I said that I wont call it a sacrifice because I truely want to be around with them and these are the golden years that they need the mother to be around. When they are older, they wont need us because they would be preoccuppied with with friends etc. Personally I think that if circumstances allow, a woman should tend the household/kids so that the man can concentrate on his career without worrying how the kids.

Someone once told me this:

Visualise PaPa alone pulling a heavy cart (heavy because they are 5 of us in the cart) up a steep hill (steep because its an uphill task to provide for a big family), bringing us to where his dream is. And my job is to get the boys to sit still and behave themselves so that the cart is at least manageable for the PaPa to pull. And even though I cannot see the other side of the mountain, my role is to believe in PaPa's dream and trust that he will bring us there. And even at times, I just dont see it (I dont get it), I will still continue to believe in him...

Anyway, I leave you mummies out there these bible verses from the King James version. Happy Mother's Day!

Praise of a Good Woman (Proverbs 31:10-31)

10 Who can find a virtuous woman? For her price is far above rubies.
11 The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her, so that he shall have no need of spoil.
12 She will do him good and not evil all the days of her life.

13 She seeketh wool, and flax, and worketh willingly with her hands.

14 She is like the merchants' ships; she bringeth her food from afar.

15 She riseth also while it is yet night, and giveth meat to her household, and a portion to her maidens.

16 She considereth a field, and buyeth it: with the fruit of her hands she planteth a vineyard.

17 She girdeth her loins with strength, and strengtheneth her arms.

18 She perceiveth that her merchandise is good: her candle goeth not out by night. 1

19 She layeth her hands to the spindle, and her hands hold the distaff.

20 She stretcheth out her hand to the poor; yea, she reacheth forth her hands to the needy.

21 She is not afraid of the snow for her household: for all her household are clothed with scarlet. 22 She maketh herself coverings of tapestry; her clothing is silk and purple.

23 Her husband is known in the gates, when he sitteth among the elders of the land.

24 She maketh fine linen, and selleth it; and delivereth girdles unto the merchant.

25 Strength and honour are her clothing; and she shall rejoice in time to come.

26 She openeth her mouth with wisdom; and in her tongue is the law of kindness.

27 She looketh well to the ways of her household, and eateth not the bread of idleness.

28 Her children arise up, and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praiseth her.

29 Many daughters have done virtuously, but thou excellest them all.

30 Favour is deceitful, and beauty is vain: but a woman that feareth the Lord, she shall be praised.

31 Give her of the fruit of her hands; and let her own works praise her in the gates.

Aaron @ 7 months+

2009-05-09T10:39:00.004+08:00

Aaron finally master his crawling just 4 more days before he turned 8 month old! Just 4 days back he was still struggling this steps during his physical therapy session.

It was amazing how he loves to chase after Lucas' red balloon (see video) and also his clothe ball.

Trip to the Botanical Garden

2009-05-04T11:10:00.008+08:00

Its a great day today, so we decided to make a trip to the botanical garden after church service. The first time we were here, it was so cold but today was weather was excellent!

We got our lunch - Subway sanwiches - along the way. Not an ideal lunch for the boys but we had no choice as we couldnt find any other fast food.

Anyway, the moment we arrived, we had our lunch and then headed to the Bruce Rose Garden. There was this giant fountain at the end of the garden. At first the boys were frightened by the giant structure but calmed down after seeing all the kids playing with the water. Then we rolled their pants and sleeves up..thinking that it would help a little.But we were wrong coz they were really drenched! We didnt had a change of clothes for them as we were not prepared at all!Theodore felt so uncomfortable that he insisted of taking his clothes off...but not his socks and shoes!Lucky the weather was warm.

We decided to call it a day as Aaron was getting tired. Unfortuately, I didnt take any flowers picture, except this pathetic one, as the park was pretty crowded. I missed taking a picture of the tulips as they were blooming now...

Our family picture

2009-04-30T12:04:00.003+08:00

The Yeos! A picture taken during our Easter Celebration in church.

I am back!

2009-04-28T11:21:00.003+08:00

Sorry for the long silence...

The stomach flu bug finally hit me! Yes, I was sick for 4 days last week. The first day was the worst as I wasnt able to get out of the bed much. And if I did, there were trips to the bathroom. I didnt eat for two days...surviving only on water. I was very dehydrated despite drinking my fluids. On top of that, I had to breastfeed Aaron. There were few instances where I almost black-out due to low sugar level.

Thank God that was over! During this time, we are very thankful for our friends - Rachel and Adeela who kindly offered to drop off food for us and the boys. We are also thankful for Glaycer who was here to take care of the boys. I am very grateful for having an understanding husband who skipped classes to help out in the household chores.

Missing toys

2009-04-17T12:52:00.006+08:00

I get annoyed when the boys' toys are incomplete. For instance, a missing piece from the puzzle and missing ABC cards or even missing fake coins from their cash register.

I had been hunting high and low for these missing items for a while but to no avail. So one day, I asked Joshua where were the missing ABC cards. He said "there" and proceeded to show me the "place". Well, it turned out to be the vent area that sheltered our fan.

So last week I managed to get PaPa to help removed the dusty vent. The boys were so excited to see the father doing the task that they even wanted to participate. We found some plastic coins, 2 pieces of cards etc. It's amazing how the boys hit there toys. Some of the toys in there belonged to our landlorw. Well, it seems that we are not the only family who had the same problem.

Easter Celebration

2009-04-14T11:39:00.006+08:00

Just like last year, the church organised an egg hunt for the kids before the Sunday service. So the night before I made 3 kid size paper bags out of the recycled grocery bags.

Lucas wasnt feeling good the night before but he looked fine in the morning so we decided to go to church. But I was wrong, coz he was very quiet and later on we found out he was running a fever. Despite this. we had a family picture taken (this will be post later) and craft works for the boys. The craft invloved the cutting and decorating paper plates to make empty tombs. Theodore and Lucas had fun drawing. Of course the assembly of the empty tomb was later done by the church volunteer.

There was story telling but the boys were not really listening. Then it was time for the egg hunt. There were various sessions as the kids were split into various groups based on their age group. The eggs were placed all over the floor. But the boys were not interested to pick up as many eggs as possible. They were picking up one egg at a time and opening them on the spot to check the contents.

Lucas didnt pick at all as he was so tired and was being carried by Chris. We missed our Easter service as Lucas' temperature kept going up and it was better for him to rest at home.

Back home, Lucas and Aaron slept almost immediately. Then I sent PaPa to grocery shopping and get our lunch. Then when Aaron was up, I left the boys alone for a while. It was surprising quiet in the living room. And when I checked on them, this was what I saw

Yes, Theodore took all the candies and unwrapped them! Not to sure if he ate any coz he refused to open his mouth. Anyway, the couch was covered with mashed up peanut butter cups and so were his tiny hands...

Update on the boys' health condition

2009-04-13T12:19:00.000+08:00

The boys had recovered from Herpangina but poor Lucas was sick with a new virus - stomach flu.

The last weekend was very challenging for us coz Lucas and PaPa were taking turns to get sick!

On Saturday morning, PaPa woke up telling me that he wasnt feeling well. He felt nausea and "full" which I thought it was possibly a case of indigestion. So we couldnt make it for the Easter egg hunt at Linden Avenue and opt to stay-in instead. PaPa rested for the entire day while I had to manage the 4 boys alone. A lot of running here and there (between Aaron and the boys) but I was surprised, I was able to gave Aaron his bath and a mid-day bath for the triplets. And also to cook lunch and dinner for them. I even had the time to take my lunch and dinner in peace and still had some time for TV!

Well, I guess when you have no help, you just tough it up (since they are my kids..) but of course alone the way, a child would be left unattended or left crying for a while. I dont think I can do it alone everyday without help....

While I thought it was a good thing PaPa recovered the next day and the boys recovered, our Lucsa kept me up all Saturday night as he vommited all his dinner. Either he got it from PaPa so some new virus. Well, as it turned out, he had stomach flu, super contagious I was told. We are praying that the Lord will protect the 3 boys so that they wont get this virus...

Taking a break

2009-04-03T12:28:00.002+08:00

To our dearest readers, sorry this blog has been so quiet lately...

We have been taking a longer than usual break because the boys are very sick. It started on last weekend when Theodore had a very high fever. We didnt bring him in until Monday. We were told he had Herpangina which had the same virus as the Hand Foot Mouth Disease. Within a day or two, it spreaded to the other boys. I suspect that I am having it as well (though not as serious) as I could feel the discomfort in my throat.

Anyway, so you can imagine how life had been for the adults! And the amount of cleaning we had to do plus trying to daily. And the extra step to keep Baby Aaron away from the boys.

Do keep us in your prayers and I hope to be back soon to update you on our spring trip and other activities we did prior to this saga! Stay tuned!

Off for our first road trip!

2009-03-23T12:22:00.000+08:00

To my faithful readers, there would not be any postings next week as we would be making a trip to a ski resort 5 hours from our place! Considering that we are going to do meal breaks and restroom breaks, that would easily set us to an 8-hour journey. Do pray for us for a smooth road trip!

Trip to Adler Planetarium

2009-03-20T01:05:00.011+08:00

Tuesday was the last free day at the Adler Planetarium for March 2009. Since it coincided with PaPa's spring break and both of us havent been there, we decided to make a trip there. We also arranged to meet Emily and her children there.

I have always like to admire buildings. The Planetarium was quite a sight inside and outside. I love the beams inside the center. It reminds me of the Louve Musueum.

The Planetarium was not as bad as we thought it was..at least for the adults we got to see and read the history of Man landing on the Moon. However, I would not recommend for toddlers simply the place is not kids-friendly (as warned by our dear friend, Rachel) as we liternally have to carry the kid up to see exhibits since there were not at their eyes' level.

I was facinated with the image of the sun. Since we were not able to look at the sun directly without proper solar viewing device, this was the first time we saw it through a special equipment that the center set up at its roof top. And interestingly, the sun also gives up high pitch sound! The boys also had a chance to see the image.

It was a very warm day and we had a great time outside by the lake! While I was enjoying soaking in the sun, the boys were busy chasing after geese. Before we left, I had to take a picture of the Chicago skyline coz I am not sure when we would set foot in this city again when we leave in July...

Leapfrog Tag Reader Giveaway!

2009-03-15T05:34:00.003+08:00

For those of you in America and love to join in for a leapfrog tag reader giveaway, here's your chance! Check out this website. Closing date is March 23rd. Good luck!

Row Row Row Your Boat

2009-03-14T12:40:00.001+08:00

It was silly of me to get PaPa to buy us a snow sled a month ago, thinking that there would be another chance of heavy snow. It did snow but the snow wasnt enough for sledding! I can forget about using coz we are in spring now!

So we had an alternate use of the sled instead....

Theodore enjoyed his sun tanning while Joshua complaint about not having enough space! Lucas just enjoyed being sandwiched..at least for a while!

Dim Sum Brunch

2009-03-13T13:08:00.007+08:00

Last Saturday, we decended to Chinatown for our first dim sum treat! We reached the Restaurant Phoenix at 1030am. The journey to Chinatown took almost 40 mins and that proved too much for Lucas, who woke up at 6.30am that morning. So he slept through almost the journey.

Anyhow, we got a table almost immediately as the restaurant was fairly empty. We had the usual dim sum items - Siew Mai (which strangely came wrapped with prawns), egg tarts, century egg porridge, veggies wrapped with tofu skin, chicken feet, char siew and chicken buns, sesame balls, "ham sui kok" (minced pork in sticky rice balls) and steamed beancurd rolls. All in all, too much food for all of us!

As with our other outings, we created a stir as the waitresses "surrounded" us to "see" the triplets. PaPa and I had to answer host of questions as well. Questions such as "Is one of them a girl?" (pointing to Joshua), "How is their birth weight?", "Is this a natural pregnancy?" etc. And as always, one waitress would call another and another..at one time, our table was invaded by 4 strangers!

Anyway, the boys enjoyed the MSG laden food. Especially Theodore, who was seen taking 2 items at one time. I had too much food that I suffered from MSG intoxification in the afternoon and needed to rest for hours!

Throughout the entire brunch session, the boys (including Aaron) behaved exceptionally well! They didnt ask to get off the high chairs and didnt bang the utensils on the table. They even won praises from the table next to us. Well, what they didnt know was that the boys were terrible eaters at home!

We stayed for an hour and before we headed for home, I did a 5 min shopping spree at the Chinatown supermarket!

Zoo Trip

2009-03-12T12:50:00.001+08:00

We had great warm days last week. So last Friday we arranged to meet Emily and her kids at the zoo. With the help of Glaycer and Chris to load the boys in the car early, we managed to reach at 9.25am. The timing was great as the crowd had not streamed in yet and I was able to get street parking!

Unfortunately, not much photos taken as I was occupied with strolling and chatting with Aaron!

The boys finally got to see the giraffe in real life. But Joshua, who had a giraffe soft toy as his bedside companion, was frightened by the animal. Well, that showed that I must bring them to the zoo more often.

The boys got to watch the training of the seals and got real excited when the seals dived into the pool. We wanted to catch the pola bears in water but the sun was so nice that they were taking a sunbath instead! Grr...

We had a moment of melt down from our dear Theodore. He got so excited in seeing Janine and Nathan munching away the carrot muffins that he wanted one too. His favourite cheerios and avocado bread didnt interest him. Fortunately, he calmed down after seeing a bird.

Our last stop was at the petting zoo where the boys got to see the barn, dairy cows, goats and chicken. All in all, it was a great and enjoyable day!

Lost Generation

2009-03-06T14:03:00.002+08:00

This video has nothing to do with our family blog. Got this from my friend's blog. It was cleverly written and I would like to share with all of my faithful readers. Enjoy!

The boys have a nanny!

2009-02-28T12:43:00.007+08:00

Our helper, Julie, left us in early February as her visa ran out. So we hired a nanny to help me out with the boys.

We had Glaycer who was a very humble, calm and collected woman. She didnt ask for the usual nanny pay as she had no certificate and profession. So she preferred to be called a babysitter or a helper. Although she didnt have the qualifications, she was great with the kids. Reason being that she was a mother of 3 grown up kids and also she used to run a childcare center in her own home before she decided to be a flight attendant with United Airlines. It was great that we had amcommon interest since I was from an airline before as well!

Glaycer sings and reads to the boys.She has that magic touch that makes the boys want to listen to her. I learnt a lot from her! She speaks very slowly and is always very calm even though there were days that the boys went crazy. She is a Christian herself so reading Christian stories and songs was not an issue. Besides handling the boys, she also helped me with my tonnes of laundry. She was caught cleaning the boys' toliet although it was not in her job scope. Her reason was that Theodore dirtied the toliet with his bleeding and since she had time, she could do the cleaning. She also offered to clean my stove even though it was not her job.

She was the only candidate that came with a children book and read to the boys after the interview. She was also the only one who sang a song to the boys before she left. And the only one who Theodore was comfortable with as he didnt run to me to "save" him from a stranger.

Lets hope everything works up till June. I told Glaycer that she was sent by God. This is because she cancelled on my first round of interview and I ended up hiring another. Then Glaycer called me back and said that she would like to give it a try and come for interview. By then it was too late coz I already hired someone so I rejected her. Then the next day, the nanny came, and as it turned out, it didnt work out. So I frantically placed another ad and called Glaycer to come for interview. A few candidates came but we still selected Glaycer as she was honest and humble. The only candidate that didnt pass her babysitting experience as a nanny experience...

She probably kills me for telling you this: she is 53! She is young at heart yet she has that wisdom from her years of experience of being a mother!

Snow and Ice

2009-02-23T13:40:00.004+08:00

Yesterday it snowed...So I took this got 2 empty Milo jars and filled up one with snow and another for with ice cubes. Labelled the 2 jars and explained to the boys what was in them.
Every now and then I would get the boys to look at the jars and asked them to tell me what they could see. Of course they didnt understand and just starred at the jars and then starring back at me. Anyway, I just kept doing this for a while. Then I attempted to ask them to guess which would melt first, and which would have more/less water. Again, these questions drew empty looks from them.

When the snow and ice almost melted, I shook the jars in front of them to tell them that the snow and ice were gone and turned to water.

Well, they kind of knew that it was water since they went "no more, no more". Well, at least they know the concept of cold coz I kept taking the jars and placed on their cheeks and they would moved away! This science experiment was too profound for them! We would revisit this when they are older...hopefully, we would be at some place with snow! And by then, they would probaby know how to write a list of observations for each jar! My next try would simply get them to freeze a cup of water and then let the ice rest in room temperature...

Swirling with shaving cream

2009-02-23T13:18:00.009+08:00

After the boys had their afternoon snack, I got them to do some art work since we have not done that for quite a while.

First I made sure I had the floor and a table covered with newspaper as I did want what the food colorings to stain the floor. Then I took one three baking trays (including 2 disposable trays) and forks for the boys.

Then I had a go at spraying shaving cream on the baking trays. I sprayed way too much cream! Anyhow, then I gave each boys some food coloring and asked them to squeeze the color into the cream and asked them to use the forks to swirl the cream. Then they started to use more color...it was pretty at first, then they started to swirl longer and the cream turned brown! Especially that of Theodore's as he spent almost 20mins doing that (look how serious he was!)while the other 2 brothers gave up after a mere 10 mins!

The cleaning up was not difficult as I thought it was. The shaving cream was not oily. Now I know why shouldnt substitute it with whipped cream! And the food coloring did stain their hands but it came out after a few wash.

I took Joshua's tray and placed a construction paper over it. The end result was this. I didnt bother to wait for the cream to dry up. I took a picture and threw the paper away. It was a huge mistake! Coz I didnt know I could do more for this activity! I read about this after we did this. Well, there is always next time to refine our activity....

Tricking the boys!

2009-02-20T13:01:00.005+08:00

I got this Fisher Price Oreo cookies matching game for the boys 2 months back and they had been playing with them since. I am pleased that Joshua was able to match all the pieces and this game was meant for 3 year old! Theodore and Lucas were able to match but not the entire set.

Anyway, the boys had not eaten or seen a real oreo cookie before. So I decided to get them oreo cookies for their afternoon snack. The first time they ate the cookies, we didnt trick them. But there were puzzled that the "puzzle game" that they used to play could be eaten. Especially Lucas, he would try to fix the cookie back together after open them apart!

Then yesterday afternoon, I decided to trick them. So I got Glycer to hide the fake cookies in the cookie cabinet. We got the boys seated and we told them we were going to give them cookies. Here are their reactions upon receiving it...

Joshua actually bit on the fake cookies twice, unfortunately, I didnt manage to catch that on tape. While Lucas kind of figure it out just by looking at it!

Then I decided to gave them the fake cookie and the real cookie at the same time...

Well, at least the boys love the real cookies! The boys each has different preference when eating the cookies. Joshua would eat the entire piece. Lucas may eat the entire piece but many times he would open it up and eat the filling and then decide if he would eat the rest. Theodore would open the cookie and only eat the filling while I would have to eat the crust. I wonder if there is a study to relate an individual personality on the his eating habit.

Tic Toc

2009-02-20T12:42:00.004+08:00

The boys used to attend Book Babies, a storytime at the Evanston Public Library when they were less than 2 year old. They love this Tic Toc song that they learnt from Brian, the storyteller.

Enjoy the performance!

Big Stomach!

2009-02-20T12:40:00.003+08:00

The boys picked this up probably from Julie coz we certainly didnt teach them this.

Speech Therapist

2009-02-17T13:45:00.000+08:00

The boys had a new speech therapist since 2 weeks ago. One of the reasons we changed the therapist was because I preferred having the therapist to come to our place instead of us going into her clinic. This is especially so in the hash winter when I had problem getting there. Also I preferred the therpist to come by since I had yet to settled on Julie's departure as well.

Anyway. the second reason we wanted to terminate the previous therapist was because we found her unethical way of handling the billing. She charged our insurance company 3 hours of the work done when she clearly only worked on the three boys in one session for only 1 hour. So she was getting $420 for an hour when she should be charging us $140 instead.

Once when I cancelled a session because our car was buried in the snow, she called back the same evening and she offered us another slot the next day and she said that she could come by to help unearth my car - which was very strange as she refused to come to our place to do the session citing reason that she has many patrons...yet she was able to come by and unearth my min van.

When my case worker called her to enquiry on the billing, she pleded ignorance citing that she didnt do the bills. Then when she was told that I was putting the boys out, she offered to come to our place to conduct one of the session. I didnt trust her coz I actually ask her but she turned me down completely. I guess there are people out there that do their job with less passion and more money driven...perhaps explained why there was little improvement in the boys' speech.

We are pleased to announce that the boys show vast improvements with the need speech therpist and they are no the road being a chatter box!

Killing the romance on Valentine's Day!

2009-02-15T13:50:00.005+08:00

Happy Valentine's Day, everyone!

I am not a great fan of Valentine's Day coz I always think that you dont need a special day to give roses, say the I love yous, send cards, romantic candle light dinner etc. All these, I believe can be done in any ordinary day, in fact, if done on a normal day, not only its economical but also make it even special.

That said, I did receive a bouquet of roses from dear husband and of course it came with a lovely card. I am a very pratical person especially so since both of us are not working now. So my first reaction when I saw the flowers was "Keching! (sound of cash register..) This must cost a lot, I thpught..He shouldnt be spending that money." And when dear husband came home, I thank him for the flowers and then rattling off about the money. I said he should give me a stalk of rose which also served the same purpose, he should give me the money so that I could get some educational stuff for the boys or give me an Amazon.com voucher etc etc. He commented that this was a special day and that I should check with my married friends how many husbands out there actually gave their wives roses. Well, my dear readers, if you are married, do let me know if his remark is true...

As if not enough, I added that if he was bringing in the dough, I wouldnt mind receiving dozens and dozens of roses. Well, dear husband got so upset..and said that I didnt appreciate his affection. Well, its not that I didnt appreciate that. I do. Really, I do. Just that I am being too pratical and thinking that spending this kind of money now is like throwing it away.

Well, fortunately, the roses turn up quite nice. The package came with 2 packs of Flower Food which added to the water would enable the flowers to open up and stay alive for couple of days. I dont get this food in Singapore and all the flowers died after just 2 days!

At least, now I can tell everyone that I received amazing roses in America! Thank you my dear husband, for your kind thoughts. I love you and I really appreciate your love for me and the family. Thank you for being our valentine...forever...

Breakfast on V Day!

2009-02-15T02:13:00.004+08:00

PaPa served the boys their heart-shaped cup cakes on Valentine's Day. The cake didnt turn up nice coz it was filled up too much in the cup cake mould. The pre-mix icing was not that great too. Anyway, the boys had a good time spreading icing on the cake. No sprinkles coz we forgot to get those. Hopefully, next year we wil be more prepared!