Farewell!

Back dated post.

Last Friday marked the last day of school year 09, Charlotte's school organized a farewell party for the children and some of us were invited. I didn't plan to attend initially as the party will start at 3.3opm but it was a rather busy workweek for me. However, my laptop started to playing tricks on me around 3.00pm, the virus scan and patch update had required me to restart my machine repeatedly. What made it worst was I had "blue screen" every time I restart my machine. I gave up after the 4th time and I decided to join the farewell party at Charlotte's school instead. It was 3.50pm when I left office.

When I arrived at the school, I saw the children were all wearing balloon hats and gathered at the hall. There were food ready to be served as well and I was told that the children will have performance too! I ran towards my house and grabbed my camera and headed to the school again just in time for the opening.

There were song presentations, with sign language and appreciation token presentation to the volunteers and parents whom contributed to the school, participated in the activities and helped out throughout the year. No discrimination, no playing favorites, everybody gets to participate, give and receive.

I received a token of appreciation too, and a nice warm hug from this boy! (I think he was a bit shy to hug a stranger )

Then it was food! Those were all from the volunteers and parents contributed (I went empty handed, shame on me). Some older kids were asked to help serving, the younger ones gets to eat first. Teachers, parents, and volunteers were all there assisting the children as necessarily without being asked. I was really impressed and pleased to see everyone practise the values that they taught, it was shown in action!

I was just talking to some friends a couple weeks back about what a pity that Charlotte's school don't organize year end concert like all the other kindergartens or daycare centers do. (They don't encourage birthday party at school either) After this event, I found what the school did was rather meaningful, in just a short 1.5hour session, no fancy costumes, no adult make-ups, no additional cost incurred and yet all of us gained some kind of values and learning from that session. Simple, yet successful!

Lastly, the school had a set of "graduation souvenir" for all the 6 years old children. It was all handmade, paperscrap, with pictures and diary inside this box! It was made with heart and love!

Another Birthday Party

On the actual day, we planned for a dinner at MIL's place to celebrate Charlotte's birthday. Her school passed us a tea set and Charlotte was requested to present tea to us as a token of appreciation. Charlotte kept asking for the tea ceremony when we took back the tea set, but we had to wait for Pat to come home and I wanted her to present to the grandparents first then only us.

She was asked to kneel in front of us when presenting the tea, and say "爸爸﹐感恩﹗媽媽﹐感恩” (thank you daddy! thank you mommy!"

Though we thought it was a bit too traditional and too much to ask from the lil one, it was a rather good teaching and reminder to the younger generations (even to adults) to be respectful and grateful to our parents and elderly. My in laws were very pleased with this presentation too!

Then of course, another birthday cake for the lil princess...

Happy 4 years old my dear!

An Early Celebration

Every year we celebrate Charlotte's birthday twice, and she's been having 2 birthday cakes (except her 1st birthday).

We first had an early celebration last Sunday with my parents (the plan was to have it together with the in laws but they were down in KL). First we went to collect Charlotte's first birthday cake. She didn't pay any attention to the when it was collected because she was very engaged with the new game cartridge that I bought her as birthday present for the Leapster game set. When I bought the game set, I didn't buy any game cartridges because the set came with 2 games. Then I found a very good deal of those cartridges online recently and I bought 3. I only gave her 1 as her birthday present, the other 2 I will keep for better use in the future.

She was so engrossed with the game (6 games in 1 cartridge, not bad!) and her first response was "no" when I asked if she want to take a peek at her birthday cake. But shortly after she realized that I was hold on to a big box on my lap, she requested to check out the cake. She was really thrilled when she found out the it was a 3D princess cake that I got for her! I guessed she only imagined it would be like those she got last year. After that, she asked to take a peek every 5min! *Fainted*

We got the hotel slightly early and the buffet hasn't started, so took a nice slow walk and enjoyed the beautiful scenery at the garden by the beach. Took some nice pictures with the birthday girl.

She must be feeling bored to be the center of focus, she requested the camera and started to instruct everybody to be at the position for her in return. Some of the nice shots she took...

We headed for a great dinner, everyone enjoyed the buffet and that's including Charlotte! I am thankful that those "picky eater" days are almost over!

Then it was the birthday song and birthday cake. You officially announced that you are 4 years old! (Indeed! She told all her school teachers, friends and everyone that asked her before this day that she was 3 years old!).

Happy Birthday Sweetie!

More stories to follow...

Innocent!

While taking Charlotte and my new maid out last Friday...

Charlotte: mommy, what is a Malay?
Me: Malay ah? Like Izah in your ballet class, she is a Malay loh! *can Malay learn ballet? I don't know but her mother is wearing "tudung", I assume she is a Malay la*
Charlotte: Oh! Then me leh?
Me: You are a Chinese. *Almost fainted that she didn't know that*
Me (continue): Dashana in your school? She is an Indian.
Charlotte: I am a Chinese ah? Auntie (maid) leh?
Me: Auntie ah? *Lost* Auntie is a Filipino.
Charlotte (turned to Auntie): You are a Filipino ah?
Auntie: Yes :)

Charlotte: You come from Philippines ah?
Auntie: Yes, come here for 2 years.
Charlotte: 2 years then only go home ah?
Auntie: Yes. Philippines is very hot *I don't know why she thought of that suddenly*
Charlotte: Very hot ah? Philippines no air cond ah?
Auntie: No, no air cond
Charlotte: Then turn on fan la!

LOL!

"My chest got knock knock sound!"

Last night, Charlotte told me that her chest was making some knocking sound. I didn't know what she meant because I was in the washroom when she told me this and I ran out thinking what's wrong with her.

She pointed to her left chest and told me "mommy, here, got knock knock sound. why?". I still didn't know what she meant until she pulled my hand and put on her chest. I only realized that she was referring to her heart beat! Somehow, we got into some joke and play before that (it was bed time) and her heart beat was rising due to excitement.

I told her that it is her heart, and it is good sign that it is beating. It is not good when it stops, and she said "when stop means die ah?". I asked her to feel mine, but she didn't feel it (maybe I have to much fats that's why, ha!) and I asked her to put her ear on my chest instead. She said "yes, yes, got the knock knock sound too! like mine!".

Another discovery!