i’d listed out my wish list for Mothers’ Day to the children the day before – it was either a gold necklace from T&Co. (which they said they didn’t have enough money for, go figure! sheesh), or to go out and leave me in peace at home (which they agreed was easy for them to do).

well, neither wish came true.

so i woke up yesterday to a mug of cold soya bean shoved in my face, with the instruction to drink up, unbrushed teeth and all, from the kids who had the (very Western – thanks, TV shows) idea that mummies MUST be served breakfast in bed on Mothers’ Day. after a series of rolling around on our bed (while i gulped down my cold soya bean), they pushed their daddy off to the kitchen to insist he help them make the rest of my breakfast. within minutes, they shoved a plate of scrambled eggs and turkey bacon strips in my face, still on my bed, teeth still unbrushed. and because the Asian me is not completely enamoured with the idea of crumbs and grease on my bedsheet, and inviting scavenging ants and other insects into my room, i shooed them out, kids, scrambled eggs and turkey bacon strips all, to the dining table, where food should rightly be served.

no chance of precious alone time at home because we brought their oma out to Singtel to cancel her Mio subscription, and thanks to her (very influential and techno-savvy :p) son-in-law, got an iPad for her internet-surfing/Youtube-browsing pleasure. since she refused to let me pay for it, i settled for paying her monthly wifi subscription instead. persuaded her to open up a facebook account, but only because i don’t have one myself so no chance of her adding me as a friend ha ha ha. happy mothers’ day, mom. even *i* don’t own an iPad, sheesh.

well, i did get some cake and ice-cream. mum said she has long stopped enjoying sweet treats like these since her own kids have grown, and i might be on my way there because i can only take a few spoonfuls and prefer to watch (or rather grimace at) the kids devouring them like the deprived little cave children that they are.

and what else DID i get on mothers’ day then?

(no, not a date with Thor. darn.)

i got me a beach holiday in june! hurrahs!

7

  

a clean, scrubbed-up version, found at Kinokuniya. won’t sound the same when samuel l. jackson reads this one aloud, heh.

and here’s someone who *does* use the expression “seriously” very aptly, for a 4-yr-old. so, i should probably have gotten this versh instead. seriously!

ps: i just discovered Prologue @ ion, love the selection and found everything on my list of to-buys when i couldn’t at kino, which i feel is turning too messy and crowded these days. :/

1

  

the P1s officially don’t have any exams, but they have some kind of english and math “assessments” instead, and since we’re clueless as to what to make the boy revise (!), we went through with him the whole slew of spelling words he’d been given from the start of the year, which took up more than this board, and then we kinda gave up three-quarters through, because we ran out of steam. but it turned out that there was no spelling after all, so, (a) phew, and (b) gah! we wasted all that effort. and so much chalk.

i’m so glad penmanship won’t be graded… it won’t, right?? O_O

****

one of the recurring jokes that crop up in our conversations with the kids is about “boyfriends” and “girlfriends”.

the boy can list out who Mummy’s Boyfriends (yes, plural) are..

#1: “Bu-noh!”
(“it’s BO-NO, not Bu-noh. ‘bunuh’ tu ‘kill’. i don’t want to kill him.”)

never mind that he looks a hundred years older now, he’ll always be this 80′s version in my mind.

#2: “The Vampire!”
(refer to the hottie in the middle, not the Cullen-wannabes at the sides.)

never mind that he’d think nothing of ravaging my womb into a bloody mess with his bare teeth (ref: Breaking Dawn), i’ll still forgive him.

#3: “Thor!”
(self-explanatory.)

i demand to know, WHY WAS HE NOT TOPLESS IN THE AVENGERS? WHY? WHY?! *does a Hulk smash* (no, Hulk being topless does NOT do it for me.)

#4: “that one, he sings like *makes deep, throaty voice*”
(i chuckled out loud at this, because i’d only made a passing remark once when a The National song came on during one of our drives, and well, i was surprised the boy actually remembered.)

ILY, MATT!

etc. (the list goes on. will need to introduce ryan gosling to them some day.)

and every time the subject of “boyfriends” crops up, especially when we tease the girl on her potential nuptials to Prince Charming ala Cinderella or Captain America (it would appear that the goody-goody, ‘clean-cut’ types appeal to her), she will do this:

*facepalm*

****

so anyway, we like asking the boy about his classmates, and we have established that there is a Smartest Girl in his class. we tease him that he should make friends with the Smartest Girl in class. because Smart Girls can help him with his schoolwork. and the Smartness can rub off on him. who knows, maybe even improve his penmanship. (hey i can hope, can’t i?) we get updates that Smartest Girl likes giving him little things, e.g. pencil, keychain, food.

M: aniq, when you grow up, you must marry a smart girl. your wife must be smart. then your children will be smart. remember, ok? marry a smart girl! THAT IS ALL.

D: yah, see, like daddy. *snickers*

M (who picks questionable mythical characters/hairy musicians as fantasy love interests): *gives the evil eye*

Boy: ……

M: and auni, when you grow up – marry a rich man. THAT IS ALL.

Boy: you mean like daddy?

M: ……

D: yah, rich what… rich with LURRVVEEEE.

Girl: *facepalm*

#greatparenting #educationyoucantgetinclassroom

(now, what’s the likelihood someone’ll get me that Thor action hero for Mother’s Day….?)

9

  

been hanging around the YA section, looking for the next fictional ‘dystopian’ society to immerse myself in, still trying to find that same high i got in the world of Panem…

my personal utopia – sun, sand, sea, a good read…

this one, ‘Divergent’, *almost* hits the mark. the second in the trilogy, ‘Insurgent’, was just launched last week. (the author has assured that the last book will NOT be called ‘Detergent’.)

i’m on a YA binge! which is ironic since this is technically my final year as a ‘youth’ or ‘young adult’. which is sad. i should write about a dystopian world where we stop growing after 25 or something. oh wait, wasn’t there a movie about that already…? :p

(ok this is not me. but it could well be!)

from Ryan Gosling Reads Young Adult (ha ha sure he does)

4

  

yeah, more eggs.

1

  

Charlie & Lola, originally uploaded by izadd.

have i mentioned how much she LOVES Charlie & Lola? yes, i’m quite sure i have. i almost wanted to do a Charlie & Lola theme party for her birthday but couldn’t find the stuff in time, so err, maybe next round…? (nooo!)

aaanyway, just found out that there’s a stage production coming to the DBS Arts Centre at the end of the month till june, and i hate to admit it but i was the one who got excited. :p

so, tickets booked, and to the thea-tuh we go!

5

  

my “colleagues” for the day.

3

  

M: so, did you eat up your food today? (referring to his fourth lunch box of the week i’d feebly prepared in the morning.)
B: hmm, not so. i didn’t finish the oranges. and the bread with nutella. because you know why? the nutella was not so nice anymore. it tasted like oranges.
M: then the oranges tasted like… nutella?
B: yahhh. and can i ask you another thing? how come the box, like so difficult to close? i tried to close but cannot. then i asked my teacher to help me.
M: did she laugh?
B: no, why?
M: yah lah, laugh at your silly mother. for the silly food. and the silly lunch box.
B: nooo, she didn’t laugh. why you call yourself silly??
M: *sigh* ya lah, because i’m just not good at this. you know, doing anything with food. i’m not good at a lot of things. (it’d been one of those rough days.)
B: it’s OK. you tried your best.
M: *burst our laughing at his candour*
B: NOW you are silly, laughing at yourself…

(sometimes, i wonder who’s the child and who’s the grown up.)

(plus, what was I thinking putting oranges and bread together in one box?!? #fail)

Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.

15

  

please enlighten me why a bowl of salad costs more than 2 entire mcdonald’s meals or chicken rice sets? ridiculous i tell you.

and yet.

Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.

0

  

the girl was being whiny one evening, insisting her father change the football channel to something else. we tend to ignore these, mostly unreasonable, whiny moments, but on this occasion, her brother got up and placated her, “ok ok, come i got something for you”. he went to the fridge, with her tailing behind, and handed her a piece of chocolate. whine stopped instantly.

“that was easy,” he declared, heading back to the football match on tv with his father.

!!

on another occasion, the girl was being whiny (again), insisting her father stay in her bed that night. (again) we tend to ignore her, mostly unreasonable, whiny requests (tough love, honey), but the next thing we knew, the whines had ceased. her brother had invited her to his bed and they were happily snuggling under the covers.

brother = problem solver.

it’s times like these when the concept of having siblings makes a lot of sense.

Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.

19

  

some time last year, i wrote about shel silverstein’s ‘The Missing Piece Meets The Big O’.

revisiting this book, because over the weekend, we did this.

i’d chucked aside some colored cardboard paper to recycle, knowing that one way to keep the girl occupied is to direct her to “go do some cutting”, and i was busy experimenting with the egg thingy (see previous post) when she came up to me with some shapes, declaring that she’d cut out “the missing piece and the big O”, which i’d dismissed distractedly at the time.

it was only later when i looked properly at her handiwork that i got the idea to take out the book and cut out shapes from each page, with some help from the girl to draw dots for eyes, and then turned it into an interactive storytelling time, with the kids playing out the scenes from each page with the cut-out shapes.

well, at least they’re easier to do than HAND PUPPETS.

“some fit… but could not roll.” (i hear ya.)

2

  

not going to embarrass myself with images of my pathetic attempt at making cute food for the kids, but i was too amused by this egg-mold thingy i found at Daiso.

well ok the egg’s supposed to be star-shaped, but because the egg we had was too small or maybe because i didn’t leave it in long enough in the fridge, it ended up looking more like a fat flower, but whatever! i was still fascinated by the fact that someone actually had the idea to invent such a thing.

had to restrain the kids from first, opening the mold too early, and then, from gobbling it all up. because they simply LOVE hard-boiled eggs, whatever the shape they come in.

3

  

i rarely ever use a proper bookmark, usually using whatever is within my reach – receipts, stubs, cards, whatever bits of paper, and if all else fails, dog-ear the page. and when i find a nice bookmark, i don’t want to use it because i’d only end up losing it. like the receipts, stubs, cards, whatever bits of paper within my reach.

5