While Hubby was busy with his buddy's wedding activities on Saturday, I was preoccupied with kids 1 through 4. Solomon was running a high temperature, Annie had Taekwondo and music classes which she had to be ferried to and fro from, and Claire and Eva were participating in their kindergarten's Open Day.
At their kindy open day, there were various activities going on in the individual classrooms:
stamping with banana stems and carved potatoes...
learning about magnets via 'fishing'...
instilling environmental awareness by recycling paper...
computer aided learning... Annie hung around awhile because her Taekwondo class started later and was being held just around the corner in an adjoining block. Solomon was left at home with Sidekick to get some rest.
Here they volunteered to be interviewed! They'd do anything for candy! :)
A wee little 4 year old boy sang while playing the ukulele! If I am not mistaken, he has two older brothers who are also super talented with the guitar. He couldn't even pronounce his 'L' sound yet, so he was going,"Yu ya ya yu ya ya yu ya yu ya yay..." Too cute...
Then Eva participated in a telematch game where she had to run to a toy house and pick out her name from a bunch of paper gingerbread men cut-outs and run back and tag her teammate.
Claire's year did a dance to the 'Shalalalala' song.
They have all been practicing for months for this special occasion and everyone of them did extremely well! That day, the school was full of parents with cameras snapping away and you could see their faces beaming with pride!
Another of Hubby's friends, Leo and Angelia, got married on Saturday. Hubby gets really happy when one of his friends get married, cos we married young compared to our peers and he's had to wait a long time since our wedding to attend any of his friends' weddings! His peers (men seem to marry later) are only now getting married or expecting their first child, while Hubby and I are celebrating our 10th anniversary come this December!
Attending someone else wedding is so much more fun than attending our own! Our wedding was so stressful and tiring (especially on the facial muscles), that we were so relieved when everything came to an end after the long months of preparation. I think majestic 8 course Chinese dinners where almost the whole town is invited is staged more for the benefit of our parents, rather than our own! Never mind, we'll torture our kids when it's their time to get married! :)
So anyway, happy Hubby + wedding dinner alcohol = mabuk.
Here are the top 3 ways to tell when Hubby has had one to many:
3. the headlock - he will show his affection (which is overflowing when he's tipsy) with a loving headlock. (yes, my head is also not spared)
2. the Japanese water torture - except he uses Chivas Regal
1. the 100% guaranteed way to tell he's gone... the hands in the air! :)
Well, back to the wedding...
So there's this Chinese custom, where the groom knocks on the door of the home of the bride, on the morning of the wedding, to seek permission to enter and claim his bride. The 'sisters' of the bride will then subject the groom and his 'brothers' to some form of mild 'torture' or humiliation or tests to earn entry. Hubby was part of the entourage... luckily the ladies were gentle on them!
they had to apply lipstick and put on pink girlie hairbands...
he had to do push-ups cos the groom answered a question wrong...
everyone had to dance...
Hubby drank pure lime juice...(notice all the 'pretty boys' at the back!)
another ate noodles with chilli padi...
and the groom waxed his leg!
after all that hard work, and then searching for the key, he finally got to his beloved :)
For the rest of the day, they had the Chinese tea ceremony at both parents' homes, a wedding mass at church and lunch.
Then came the grand finale, the dinner at The Hilton:
a lot of their old schoolmates travelled home for this joyous occasion.
all the boys singing their St. Joseph's school rally on stage! (after 'a few' drinks...)
Not when you're accompanied by these four cheeky monkeys!
So, Hubby came back last week for Kung Kung's birthday and was supposed to bring us to the beach the following day for a two-night stay. Unfortunately, he had to fly back to Bintulu the next morning for an unexpected meeting!
That meant I had to bring the kids myself. I couldn't cancel the trip, because the kids had been looking forward to it for ages, and furthermore, I had already paid for it.
The beach is less than an hour's drive from town. I drove the kids up and we stayed at a front row chalet which was absolutely wonderful, because the beach was right in front of the room. I could keep an eye on the kids at the beach from a lounge chair right outside our door.
Hubby luckily managed to come back on the second night of our stay and took a taxi from the airport right up to the resort! Cousins Allyson and Michelle also joined us cos their Mummy and Daddy went off to climb Mount Kinabalu for the second time!
I took loads of photos on the first day since I was bored without Hubby around. Luckily I did, because it was nice and sunny and the pics turned out really well. The other two days that we were there was rainy and overcast.
The kids had a blast building sandcastles, digging holes and basically just flinging sand around...
Climbing coconut trees...
Playing at the surf...
Playing at the pool...
And of course, catching tiny fish!
Solomon especially enjoyed himself, while Eva still didn't like getting dirty much and sometimes preferred to stay in the room watching t.v.! :)
Well, everyone had a great time, and went home happier.... and a few shades darker.
We celebrated Kung Kung Paul's real 70th birthday last Wednesday. I say 'real' because last year Hubby wanted to do a big celebration for his 70th birthday, but when he found out it was actually only his 69th birthday, he still wanted to go ahead as planned and decided we would celebrate his Chinese 70th birthday then! (Chinese age is a year ahead of 'western' age.)
So anyway, we had a lovely dinner at Sarawak club and everyone ate too much as usual!
Solomon seemed to enjoy school, it's activities and surroundings. For the first week, he enjoyed playing with the many toys and singing along with the teachers. He especially loved water play! He would however cry if he realised Sidekick and I were missing! Sidekick still follows him to school and leaves the room when he seems more settled.
Last week was Hari Raya holidays. Solomon's school had classes as usual but he did not attend, as his sisters were all on a whole week of school break.
This week, after the break, he does not seem as keen about school as before. Perhaps the novelty has worn off and he prefers the comfort of home to the new surroundings. This morning he totally refused to wear his school uniform so I just let him go in normal clothes. Sidekick reports that there are a few new students who keep crying and that makes Solomon want to cry as well! Also, one of them is a naughty girl who disturbs Solomon and his school bag and he being timid will just whine to Sidekick! I do think this is his first school bullying!! :)
Today he refused to join the other kids as they sat on the floor playing. He preferred to sit at his desk with all his belongings (bag and bottle) on the table and his arms protectively around them! :)
I just brought Solomon and Claire for their, as usual overdue, immunization jabs this morning. Plus, Eva was sick with cough and fever last night, so we just made it one big happy family outing to our friendly neighbourhood paediatrician! Annie was the only one spared!
They're all supposed to be in school today, but Mummy thought it was a "last-minute-declared" Hari Raya school holiday extension and just found out last night that it only applied to government schools! So, lazy Mummy declared her own, "not-enough-time-to-get-back-into-school-mode" holiday! :)
So anyway, I detest waiting at clinics and also finding parking space at the congested hospital area. I'm also totally lazy, in case you don't already know, so I always try to find parking as close to the main entrance as humanly possible and also do not particularly enjoy poking holes in those meddlesome parking coupons!! This is how I ended up parking on a yellow line *teehee* and getting an RM300 summon!! (yup, my bad, can't complain)
Okay, so where was I? Ya, Solomon's jab. Like his sisters before him, Solomon has, since birth, had vaccination injections almost every month of his wee life! So with 4 kids, and each having a comprehensive schedule of compulsory and optional vaccinations, I would imagine that by now I could fly around the world free if the clinic had a "frequent flyer" program! :)
For the whole 2 years of Little Solomon's life, he has had a total of 20 injections;
one BCG,
three shots for Hepatitis B,
four for Diptheria, Pertusis, Tetanus and Polio,
another four for Hemophilus Influenza,
one for Measles, Mumps and Rubella,
three shots of Japanese Encephalitis vaccine,
one Chicken Pox vaccine
and finally three shots of the newer, pneumococcal vaccine!
*phew*
There are even more optional ones which I did not sign up for, like the Rotavirus vaccine!
Well, Solomon has completed the bulk of vaccinations which will see him through a long healthy life. He had the last JE booster today and does not need to see the doctor with the awful sharp needle (who nevertheless has nifty wooden sticks and cartoon chops in his possession) until he is 5!! Yay! (except of course, for the standard visits for bouts of upper respiratory tract infections which will no doubt surface periodically)
So... no more monthly visits for vaccinations!
Ever... again...!
After 9 years, (albeit 2 years break between Annie & Claire) of constant vaccinations...
Another concert... Annie's ballet school, had their annual reporting concert on Monday night. This is when all the students and teachers perform for parents and the public, to showcase all that they have learned and achieved throughout the year.
Annie has been learning classical ballet with them for 4 years, along with cousin Allyson. They initially took up traditional Chinese dance along with the ballet, but we let them drop the Chinese dance after a year or two because they kept complaining that they wanted to stop dance lessons altogether. So, we made a bargain with them to stop just one.
I believe we have to push them and sometimes even force them to see something through, once they start it. Being so young, they of course do not have much determination or discipline yet and there will be days when they enjoy their extra-curricular activities and days when they'll cry and beg to quit! Sometimes we do feel guilty for forcing them to do something which they do not seem to enjoy. So, I was really happy when Annie told me after the concert that she decided she loved ballet and wanted to continue learning until she was grown-up like her teachers! :)
There were many new students; cute little girls!
Kids no.2, 3 & 4 and cousin Michelle came to cheer their jie jies on!
Annie and Allyson performed in "Kingdom of the Little Birds"
Annie is at the back row, far end, back facing the camera - I couldn't get decent shots of her.
She's at the back row, second from left.
Cousin Allyson was in front, the one kneeling and facing the camera.
This dance was quite impressive, something about egrets in a storm...
Chronicles of a thirty-something mummy of 4. With a shop to manage and an ever-traveling husband, she engages the aid of her trusty Indon helper sidekick and together they bravely face the chaos that is her everyday life!
Supermum has supermummy powers like high speed multi-tasking and 360 degrees x-ray vision. She fights to defend her sanity, struggles in the never-ending battle against impoverishment and strives in the pursuit of happiness!
To infinity and beyond!
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