JSTDT - Heavy Heavier Heaviest!!

It rained today when I went to Jaina's school to pick her up and we were just talking about the weather. I tried to explain to her the rain was getting heavier and more difficult to look out of the windscreen.

Jaina agreed and said,"Just now, the rain just a bit heavy. Now the rain is more heavy you know."

I thought about letting that error go as she is actually only 3 but I thought again, if I can reason and teach her the concept of intensifiers, why not?

So I said,"Just now, the rain was heavy but now the rain is heavier, not more heavy dear."

Jaina: "huh?"

Teacher-mummy: "You know, if something is more than heavy, we say it is heavier. So someone who is more than tall, we say tallER."

Jaina just stared at me, so I thought we can try seeing the pattern and fill in the blanks.

Teacher-mummy: "So more heavy is heavier. More than tall is taller. What is more than small?"

Jaina: "Tiny"

Teacher-mummy laughs: "True also but more than small is smallER! So what is more than sweet"

Jaina, very seriously quipped: "I cannot eat more sweet you know!!!!"

Mummy burst out laughing but Jaina looked a little crossed. Probably feeling very self-righteous about mummy offering her forbidden snacks. :P

JSTDT - The Importance of TV

I'm a terrible parent.

Most (if not all) parenting books will tell you not to let your child watch too much TV as too much is not good for them. Jaina doesn't REALLY watch a lot of TV but enough to be ranked as one of her favourite pastimes.

So we tried to teach her basic TV social skills, which is not to ask for her Disney Playhouse channel whenever any TV is turned on. We thought that she was doing quite well in this area until my father-in-law (FIL) related this incident to us.

Jaina walked into the bedroom and my FIL was watching his usual golf show. She climbed onto the bed and watched a little of the golf show with him. Then she turned to him and said in a teacher-like tone,"Ye ye. I know your TV show is important. But MY TV show is MORE important you know? You change to my show ok?"

My FIL couldn't stop laughing and OF COURSE, gave in to her.

And we wonder why Jaina LOVES going to stay over with my in-laws.... *sigh*

JSTDT - Happy Teachers' Day

Now with Jaina schooling and all, I realised that I should put in more effort in preparing Jaina to show adequate appreciation for her teachers. As an educator myself, I feel that appreciation should be a daily thing but definitely and especially on Teachers' Day!!

So concerned mum here bought 3 flowers for Jaina's main teachers and planned to dedicate 1 hour that night to prepare Jaina on how she should present the flowers the next day.

So we all sat down on the bed and I took a flower and told Jaina that we will role-play to practise what to say.

Mummy: Ok, pretend that you're Teacher Lilian and I'm you. This is what I will say when I give Teacher Lilian the flower. "Happy Teachers' Day, Teacher Lilian".

Jaina: Thank you! (She really got into her role.)

Mummy (laughs): Now, Mummy is going to be Teacher Lilian and you will be you. What are you to say?

Jaina: Happy Teachers' Day, Teacher Lilian.

Mummy: Clever girl!!

Jaina: You didn't say "Thank you"!

Mummy: Right...Thank You. Ok, now we practise for 小云老师 ok? So you are now 小云老师 and I am you again. I'll say "小云老师，教师节快乐！"

Jaina: Thank you!

Mummy: Er, I don't think 小云老师 will say "Thank you" right?

Jaina (laughs): 谢谢.

Mummy: CLEVER!! So now I'm 小云老师 and you are you. What would you say?

Jaina: 小云老师...er...

Mummy (encouragingly): Yes...? Good...

Jaina: NAH!!

Both Shawn and I burst out laughing!! Jaina laughed too because she knew she did a boo-boo...

I supposed "nah" is a word in the universal language. Oh well, at least the words "小云老师" are said pretty clear.

JSTDT - A True Cinderella

Jaina was introduced to the world of dolls by my MIL. She enjoyed dressing them up, stripping them down and repeating the cycle over and over again.

I must admit my MIL tried her best by NOT buying Jaina Barbie dolls, she just bought some Disney princess dolls instead. Oh well, I can't win all my battles.

Anyway, I bought her Disney Cinderella doll some change of clothes and she was happily changing clothes when my MIL suddenly asked,"Jaina, where is Cinderella's other shoe?"

Jaina replied (quite quickly actually),"It's like that one. Cinderella also lost her shoe. Just like the story book."

My MIL cannot control, bursted out laughing!

It's all about your expectations...

Our wedding anniversary is coming up soon and my husband very nicely asked last night how I would like if he planned our anniversary this time round.

I am (of course!!) pleasantly surprised by this sweet thought!! So I said 'YES PLEASE' (ah-bu-dan) and sweetly told him that I am so happy that he offered!!

As the evening went on, I couldn't contain my excitement and asked him what does he have in mind for that special day of our lives!! He just cheekily smiled. I begged him to tell me a little of the plan and he only relented after a while.

He said enthusiastically,"I am thinking... How about flowers and a nice dinner at Al Forno's?"

To this, if I have not known my hubby like I do, I would have thrown a fit!!

But because I have known him for ten years before marrying him for another six, I looked at him and raised one eyebrow, "Wow!!! Great plan leh..."

I couldn't stop snickering after that for some strange reason. I am not disappointed...really. I guess it's all about managing my expectations. For me, the fact that he thought of flowers was very sweet already. :P

So to make my anniversary more exciting, I offered that I will plan the programme from lunch to evening and his job will be from dinner onwards. Somehow I have a feeling that it'll be nice dinner and maybe a movie after that. :P

What can I say about my angels?

If you feel that I have been really biased as I have not blogged about my little-r princess as much, it's factually accurate but nothing to do with how much I love my two princesses.

You see... Princess Jaina is a fiesty little girl...she has the ability to let us experience a large range of colours - all in a single day! 'How so?' you may ask... well she talks non-stop, saying things that make us laugh till our smiles shine like the yellow of day, and then at times she makes us so angry we'd hold our breath till we're blue in the face! And there are also times that she melts our red hearts by the very sweet things she'd say, quite out of the blue (no pun intended)!! Other days, our black faces tell friends that Jaina has about another half hour to say sorry or WWIII will be on her arse!

On the other hand, Shannon is quite the opposite (at least for now). She is really quite quite a wonderful babe! She sleeps around 9pm and has slept thru' since she was about 3 months old. She'll wake about 8 plus in the morning but she doesn't make noise or cry. She'll VERY contentedly play in her cot by herself! She has flipped over just a couple of weeks ago and at 5 months, she'll wake up and flip over, and play with whatever she can find in her bed until one of the useless parent wakes up (usually me) and pick her up. And honestly, when she sees you, the bright smile she gives you will just rob your heart away.

Shannon is going thru a rough patch lately as she is teething and usually after her bottle, she will play for a while before wanting to nap again. Previously, she will just sleep on her own. Now with the terrible gums, she cries quite a bit more. But then again, this is not because she is naughtly, she is just cranky about her teeth! Just imagine you have a whole row of wisdom tooth just pushing their way out, I'd bet you'd do MORE than just cry lor!

I was asking Darth Blinky if we can handle another angel and we are currently undecided on it. While both my princesses are modern day miracles of God working in our lives, I am not sure if I can handle more... :P

JSTDT - Disney On Ice

Jaina has this thing about the Disney's princesses stories so it is a rite of passage for all parents of young children to bring them to the show when the Disney troupe is in town. To think I used to laugh at people who would attend silly shows like these...

Oh well, so as a kiasu parent, I bought my tickets very early and has prepped my little princess on the show. We have read her the Disney fairy tales and she would make use read and read the same stories over and over again... At times, I wonder why we buy so many books when she always asked for the same ones anyway...

Just last week, Jaina was going to start on one of her whines when I decided to distract her with a conversation on the Disney show.

Mummy: (with forced enthusiasm) Where are we going next Mon?

Jaina: (paused as she thought about it) where mummy?

Mummy: (shoulders slumped) The Disney show!! Remember?

Jaina: No which one.

Mummy: The Disney princess show?

Jaina: No which one.

Mummy: The Disney show with the princesses skating one?

Jaina: No which one!

Mummy: (raising voice) The Disney princess on ice show! The one with skating lah!

Jaina: (louder too) No which one!!

Mummy: (shouting already) THE DISNEY PRINCESSES ON ICE SHOW!!! THE ONE WE SAW ON TV ONE!!!

Jaina: (shouting back too) NO WHICH ONE!!!!!!!!

And suddenly it hit me!!!!!! I suddenly understood...

Mummy: Right... No witch one...

Jaina: No witch one. Only got princess.

With that, Jaina settled back down calmly on her car seat and started muttering to herself about the show...

JSTDT – Well Travelled

You know how as parents, you preach good things to your children in the form of half-truths so that they will believe you?

So anyway, Jaina was fussing in the car and I wanted to distract her. So I noticed an old man pushing a hugh pile of carton boxes across the road and pointed it out to Jaina. I told her that the old man was having a hard time pushing the cart because he didn’t eat enough vegetables.

Jaina didn’t looked very convinced so I pushed my theory some more. I said that if Jaina had eaten more veges than she will be strong enough to do many things. Like how Jaina had helped pushed her Tai-ma’s wheelchair the other time we were on vacation.

Jaina was thoughtful and soon launched into her own world of rationale.

Jaina: Jaina eat ALL (which is a lie) her vegetables so Jaina has the strength to push Tai-ma.

Mummy: Yes dear, that’s why you need to eat all your vegetables.

Jaina (on auto mode already): Jaina eat vegetable so Jaina can push Tai-ma to many place…

Mummy: Uh huh…

Jaina: …to Malaysia… to Batam…

Mummy at this point gave Daddy a side-glance. Feeling very impressed that Jaina can list countries.

Jaina: (pause) … Malaysia… Bedok… Malaysia…

Mummy bursted out laughing as I realised she ran out of places!!! But not bad lah, for a 3 year old, she is indeed well travelled. Malaysia, Batam and not forgetting Bedok!! Perhaps this is because I’ve often told her that Bedok is very far away.

JSTDT - IKEA

Ever since Jaina discovered that she doesn't HAVE to do shopping with mummy at Ikea, instead she can go to the Play Room for a hour, she LOVES going to Ikea.

Well, there are two things I have concluded after this incident.

1) Jaina can't read much, unless you call identifying ONLY the letters 'A' and 'B' and 'C' reading lah. But she is great at making connections, a valued Habit of Mind that is taught in many schools.

2) Ikea has wonderful branding. Right down to the colour and font so much so that even Jaina can tell the building is Ikea from a mile away.

So we were driving towards the Ikea building that day and she excitedly pointed out it's Ikea!

Jaina: Mummy! See!! IKEA!!!

Mummy: Wow! (Clearly impressed that Jaina could point out Ikea from so far away) Yah, that's Ikea!

Jaina: I want to go Ikea!!

Mummy: Er...not today darling.

Jaina: Why?

Mummy (wanting to distract her so as to not answer the Qn directly): So how do you spell Ikea?

Jaina: Huh?

Mummy: Mmmm...what letters do you see at the top? It spells Ikea?

Jaina: *silence*

Mummy: How does Ikea sound like? What is the first letter? IKEA...(pronouncing it loudly and slowly for her)

Jaina: First letter?

Mummy: YES!! What's the first letter? (pronounce IKEA loudly and slowly again)

Jaina: E!!

Mummy: Huh?

Then I burst out laughing when I got her logic...

I guess it's not THAT wrong to spell what you hear...

JSTDT - Short Hair

Most may not realise but Jaina's hair has NEVER been cut since her first month's celebration. Thus, to Jaina, her hair is very much her pride and joy. She is extremely fond of her long hair.

We talk about our hair often, especially since I've cut my hair rather short. Just today, we were talking about hair (again).

Jaina: Mummy, my hair is very long you know?

Mummy: Yes, my love...

Jaina: Your hair is very short!

Mummy: Yes yes...

Jaina: Shannon's hair is also very short.

Mummy: That's right.

Jaina declared: Shannon is a boy now.

Mummy: Huh? Why?

Jaina: When Shannon has long hair like me, Shannon will be a girl!

I wonder what does Jaina think of me sometimes...very worrying indeed. :P

JSTDT - Sky-bridge

Jaina's school has a wonderful playground at One-North and the teachers bring them to play there often. As the playground is not next to the childcare block, the teachers will bring the children over using the Sky-bridges to cross the blocks.

Jaina was educating me about the sky-bridges when I picked her up from school one evening.

Jaina (pointing to the sky-bridges): You know what that is?

Mummy (playing along): What is that dear?

Jaina: Sky-Bridge!!

Mummy: Oh? Wow!!

Jaina: You know why we use sky-bridge?

Mummy: No. Why do you use the sky-bridge?

Jaina: Then the cars won't bang the other cars!

Mummy rolled eyes and sniggered...

The world according to a child is really cute lah...

JSTDT - Watermelons

Some of you have heard that Jaina get a bout of Bronchitis (again) but this time round, things are better as she doesn't need to be hospitalised. Just meds and use the nebuliser.

Sunday dinner was at my mom's place and she bought watermelon as dessert. That is one of Jaina's favourite fruits. So natually she asked for one, kbut nowing watermelon will be too cooling for her, I said no.

Not one to forget things, Jaina asked me again in the car (on the way home).

Jaina: Why Jaina cannot eat the watermelon?

Mummy: Because Jaina is coughing.

Jaina: Why?

Mummy: Because watermelon is too cooling, if you eat it, you'll coughing even more.

Jaina: (quiet and thoughtful for a while) "Then we warm the watermelon first, can?"

Mummy : (Speechless....again)

JSTDT - More Mandarin PLS!!

Another incident that is a CLEAR indicator that my money is thrown into the wind when it came to the amount of Mandarin Jaina has picked up.

Jaina wanted to choose her own book for bedtime reading and she went to her bookshelf to find one. Petals had very sweetly bought for Jaina a couple of Chinese storybooks a while back and those books too were in that bookshelf.

Jaina found a book she liked and pulled it out, out dropped one of the Chinese books and it landed face up on the floor. Jaina laughed and loudly exclaimed:"Mummy, one "你好吗" book drop on the floor!"

I don't know to laugh or to cry. Laugh as Jaina is really at times the funniest comic artist in the world, cry because all my GOOD money is wasted...WASTED!!

JSTDT - Mandarin pls!!

Jaina has started school for a couple of months now and part of the reason I've started her on school this early in her life is because of wanting her to pick up some MANDARIN!!

You see, my mum is a very established Chinese teacher whose daughter has failed in her role to BREED Mandarin in Jaina's speech. Thus, I pay other people good money to do that. :P

To check how well my money is spent, I was talking to Jaina about her school, hoping to ask what chinese words she has already learnt.

Me: Jaina, does 小云老师 says "小朋友，你好吗"？

Jaina: *silence*

Me: (not giving up) I'm sure 小云老师 greets everyone "小朋友，你好吗?" right?

Jaina: *silence*

Me: (still pressing on) You know? Like "你好吗?" (me repeating) "你好吗?"

Suddenly Jaina cried,"Not so many words! Only one word "你好吗?"!

Mummy stunned into silence...then burst out laughing....

Chak Yun Leng Shannon Angela

So our little-r princess is baptised!! Her full name is also a mouthful (like her jie jie's) and she may blame us later on in life as she shades the little bubbles that appear on forms for multiple choice questions. :P

Turned out that there is no saint Shannon (like there is also no saint Jaina, maybe there are no saints in the Starwars world) but Father Arro did help us find out the meaning of Shannon. He pulled out this old book and when he located the name 'Shannon', he laughed out loud. For a moment I thought 'siao liao', now we have to rename her liao. Father showed us what he was laughing about and as it turned out, the meaning of 'Shannon' is 'old wise one'. Hee...kinda funny to call someone so young as 'old wise one'. :)

Shannon (like Jaina) slept through the ENTIRE ceremony and only woke up at the end of it. She didn't even wake when Father Arro poured water over her head! This 'heavy-sleeper' gene definitely runs deep with the Chaks. :P