Amber - My front tooth

7yrs 1 month old

Her front tooth has sprouted but mummy is concerned over the other front tooth, the one that was yanked out in a fall almost 6 years ago

I've heard from another blogger mom or read somewhere that if a tooth was lost prematurely, the permanent tooth may take some time to sprout, usually delayed.

All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth, my TWO front teeth !

Entering Standard 1

A milestone. My baby has entered Standard 1.
Getting a desirable school, closer to home wasn't a problem. In fact, I have a better network with other moms living around our home and we car pool.

She enjoys going to school with her best buddy and hubs and I enjoy listening to chitter chatter of 7yr olds (much better than our local radio station)





 I was with her for the first few days. I've promised her 3 days but after a day, I started sneaking out. After a week, parents were not allowed to the classrooms anymore.

She was initially nervous and afraid of her new school, no thanks to me, who has been terrifying her with harsh disciplines of a chinese primary school but her first day of school went by without a hitch.

We are proud of her and hope she will make the best out of her schooling years at a Chinese medium primary.

The year that was at Lai Meng

Yesterday was an emotional day for Amber. She graduated from Tadika Lai Meng. Parents of 6 yr olds were invited to join the graduation ceremony along with performance from the kids.

Her initial days at Lai Meng was tough. Her Mandarin was weak and it didn't help that she's placed in a class with 80% non Chinese speaking students. We were worried more for the grasp of Mandarin language than other academic subjects. We eventually engaged a tutor for her and she has improved tremendously.

Looking back, her initial days : 

   

First day at school

First day at school with papa on the playground.

10 months ++ and she is a more confident, independent child. She now does her homework on her own (with a little nudge and threat, not quite there yet but we are definitely getting there) and I will sit in to do revisions with her when exam is near. Teacher commented is a 'OK' student, not to worry too much about and only to improve on her ability to follow instructions (yes, we're still working on it.. for 6 years !!)

She graduated yesterday and was given a prize for second best student in class. We were laughing our socks off  gleaming with pride :) :) . Her class may not be the creme of the crop but we think it's a job well done for the teachers, tutor and her.

With her 'yuen chang' - kindie principal.

I have no regrets switching her to Lai Meng kindy from her previous kindy. Lai Meng has provided a very conducive study, play and grow environment with very caring teachers, carers and principal. The slideshow yesterday on the years activities - Chinese New Year, Class trip, Childrens Day, Mooncake Festival, Sports Day brought tears to many parents and kids, it hit us that goodbye is now and what a great year it was. 

Amber was in tears and wiped away her tears with her teddy bear. 

She had a pep talk with her father at night, asking if she could go back to Tadika for a visit.. well... of course dear Amber, I'm sure the teachers felt sad having to depart with the kids too.

One year on.. and my girl has grown and matured..  *sniffs*

Toothless, nevertheless :D

What Happened at Kidzania

 Earlier on I blogged about Amber going to Kidzania with her enrichment class.

Here's what she came home with :

Reached home around 2.30pm and I guessed they didn't do much. I was told you need to spend at least 6 hours at Kidzania (god forbid, how to stand 6 hours there ?)

The teacher assigned a girl, in her early teens to look after Amber and another kid.. much to the girls annoyance :(  .. but she did anyway.

She was given some Kidzania money to start off with and our little missy went to the tattoo station, choosing an elaborate butterfly, taking up a lot of her allocated Kidzania hours.

They had lunch at Kidzania but she didn't take much of it. She came home, screaming "HUNGRY"...

Her response on Kidzania ?

- no good !!
... and she sulked


I probed further.. apparently, tattoo was all she did ! They wasted too much time queuing up and listening to instructions and I do think she's still too young to read the map and understand the whole concept of Kidzania.

She's been bugging me to go again I'm planning to ponteng one fine day to make a trip Kidzania.

Rewards

Sometime last year, we implemented a reward system for Amber's good behaviour. She'll get stars for finishing her meals, completing her homework.  I drew out a chart for her to accumulate her stars. I get her to draw and color the stars too.








Her rewards are always material stuffs that I deem as extras and luxuries that she has to work for. It can be a cartoon rubber stamp, art puncher, sniff-fruity erasor, liquid paper, Ben 10 ruler or even a box of water color. She likes all things craft and artsy.

She wanted a multi colored blink pen. She had one, given by my friend who came visiting from Singapore but it was spoilt very soon upon using.

I scoured all stationery shops in Klang Valley looking for the same pen and Aunty Annie even gave her a box of metallic pens, which she's still using till today. I finally found the same pen at Sogo.

I'd like her to know that mummy will go all ends to look for something she wants dearly but I do expect her to work for it.

You Call My Mother ah.....

We started her on Mandarin tuition recently. We felt she's not getting enough from her kindie and since both hubs and me are not Mandarin educated, we were put on red alert when we saw the Standard 1 KSSR revision books.

I got in touch with her previous kindie teacher and was lucky she has time slot to tutor Amber on Mandarin to prepare her for Standard 1

The first few weeks went well, she started from basics, mainly words she has learnt before. Then, it got harder with weekly ting xie, reading and writing.
She started complaining to teacher that she's tried and she has 'A LOT' of homework from school and abacus, and no time for Mandarin.

I gathered this from her Mandarin teacher who gives me weekly reviews :

I don't want to learn Mandarin
I know English and Bahasa enough already.
You tell my mother , I don't want to learn already.
Teacher : OK ! I will tell your mother. I will call her
You have her number ?
Teacher : Yes, I have
Never mind, I give you again, this is the number.. you call and tell her I don't want to learn Mandarin already !!

*** teacher zips mouth  - flabbergasted !! ***

Luckily Teacher persevered and held on, not calling me. The following day.. she was happy and dandy, no complains.. she even told teacher.. bye bye teacher !  See you next week !!

One thing I learn - never take her complains seriously !

Ups and Downs of a 6 Year Old - with Aunty P

Only 6 and already having emotional swings.

She came home today, grouchy and complaining of Aunty P. . Aunty P sends her home from school everyday. Yesterday Aunty P sounded her for opening the car door on her own without waiting for Aunty P. She was already not happy with the incident.

Today, she and her friend, M, shared some nice smelling sniff stuff in the car. They 'share' but Aunty P grabbed away from them.

It must have been something dangerous or formidable in the car. Aunty P has strict rules. No food, no drinks, no pencils or pens in the car.

Aunty P took away their stuff and Amber and her friend M, was upset. 2 upsetting girls vs 1 aunty.


Amber told Aunty P, if you take away our things, THEN YOU MUST GIVE US A PRESENT !!!



Once in a while, I'll check on her anecdotes with Aunty P. Always gaduh but ever so funny. Once in a while I'll check with Aunty P and hear her version too.  I'm sure her car rules are meant well for the girls safety.

The Concert - A little goes a long way

Amber's kindy concert was held almost nearing end term. This year, she danced Korean pop - Sorry Sorry by Super Junior. 

Excited, she was, as I am. Woke up early, showered and applied powder over her body to make her more comfortable as  her costume is the itchy, pokey type. She pestered for makeup and I applied some lip gloss on her or else we'll never hear the end of it and never leave home.

 

The kids had to go to school first and leave for the concert venue by bus whilst us parents made our way there. 

When I saw little fart at the venue, I was surprised with her matured Korean pop look :

A little makeup goes a long way.

Teacher Jo, the principal gave a speech and  part of her speech is a gentle reminder to us, parents.

Love your children more .. 

and love is spelled as T-I-M-E !!

This concert is the last for Amber, she will not be graduating from the kinder next year. We have changed her to a chinese syllabus based kinder.

We've made many good friends from her kinder and we'll keep in touch with some of the teachers.

Adios Kinder D and we'll miss you !

My Little Helper

When I took this photo.. I was half dreaming of her baking a whole cake.. beating the butter, knocking in the eggs and such... With her egg allergy back, baking will take a back seat. She wants to help me as much as I want her to BUT.. baking your cake, wafting the aroma and NOT being able to eat, is cruel eh ?

I let her do little stuff like here.. doing the finishing touch on my tiramisu

 

She loves kitchen work, this girl will make a good kitchen helper/wife/baker !

One day.. one fine day..

Allergy Update

Amber had her allergy checked 2 weeks ago. I suspected something amiss when skin between her toes started itching and cracking.

Readings :

Dairy -0

Dust mites -5

Colorings - 0

Latexx - 0 

Candida - 0

Eggs - 0 

My heart sank. I freaked. I felt cheated. I don't care much about the dust mite allergy. I cannot eliminate dust mites.. they're like.. everywhere and hello??? I can't walk around with a vacuum cleaner but I did put in 200% to make sure she abstain from eggs ! Edgy eggs ! I hate E-G-G !! Just short of 6 months to complete the whole allergy cycle, she had to come into contact with eggs. The poor girl has to start all over again, another couple of months or two to total elimination , no trace of eggs in her body and another 12 months countdown before we can introduce eggs to her.

there goes.. the dream of baking her a proper birthday cake with eggs, butter and all

there goes ... our longing to bake together... cookies, cakes and such.

BLAH !!!!!

I couldn't figure out what she had eaten. We've been very careful at home and she hardly eats out except for very specific food. I Love Yoo's porridge, Nyonya Colours kuih lapis, McDonalds fries and fried chicken and Madam Kwans fried whole leg and nasi bojari. We zoomed down the possibilities to Madam's fried chicken. I've asked the staff before and they've said it's egg free but it's really hard to say. I'm pretty sure McD is strict with their food preparation and when they said no eggs..they mean it. So..we've axed Madam's fried chicken from her list of permissible food.

I feel very much for her. I wished I am bearing the brunt of food allergies and not her. If I could make this Christmas wish come true, I would. 

BAH !!!!!!!!!

Amber's passport

Sometime last month, we brought Amber to Jabatan Imigresen at Putrajaya to apply a passport for her. It was for her first trip out of the country, to Singapore to visit my sis, friends and to do a little shopping.

 

With a passport now, little Missy is asking for more trips abroad. She wants to go Germany to visit Malaika, Australia to visit her friends, Lauren and Owen and to Philippines to visit her kakak's family.

Hang on girl.. slowly eh.. slowly.. Air Asia just increased it's surcharges !

Sigh.. so fast ??

Amber called me 2 minutes ago :

Mummy.. my front teeth is moving..

I bite the mentos wrapper and it's pain.. I can move the teeth.

I was just telling hubs that I noticed her jaw is bigger now.  There's space in between each milk teeth, as in preparing for permanent teeth's arrival. We also noticed a permanent molar sprouting out in her lower jaw.

I told her not to panic and I'll go back and check

Can you not touch so hard ok ? Promise ? I scared pain..

Sigh.. such is the fear of a 5 year old losing her front teeth. Coujple of years ago when she lost her front tooth in a fall, I couldn't wait for her permanent tooth to sprout, giving her a complete set of front teeth. Now, I miss her baby-ness and please don't grow up too fast !!!

'Competition'

Amber's mental arithmetic teacher enrolled her for a district competition. I was skeptical as we've just enrolled her to UCMas 3 months ago and she had to undo what she had do-ed in her abacus program. To cut the long story short, Amber was following some Taiwanese method using only right hand and 3 fingers to manipulate the beads. She (or rather, US!!) found it difficult to manage bigger digits and tends to make mistake easily. We decided to change her to UCMas and was thankful to have met a teacher who understood why Amber kept making mistakes and she was willing to 'undo' what she has learnt and start her all over again. And so, she went... learning abacus all over again, a different method, using both hands and two fingers on each hand, the UCMas approach and which I found to be more systematic and less prone to errors.

Teacher encouraged us to send her for the district competition for exposure. It was a good experience for her, having to compete among the champions and having a feel of how it's like to ready-get set-go upon hearing the starting whistle.

 

Up and early at 8am, her teacher pinned ID sticker on her uniform

   I didn't expect the competition to be such a big event .

Her competition slip and she has to stick on the back of her exam paper. 

 Hubs giving her a good luck high-5 !!!

Pasting the sticker on her exam paper. The girl seated next to her was kind to teach her what to do.

 Jeng ! Jeng ! Jeng ! Competition begins !!!  Parents were allowed to stay along the side of the hall and wait and fidget nervously.

The competition was over in 8 minutes. They had to complete 100 equations (or more.. and I'm not sure but heck, she's only here for the experience).

While waiting for results, we were treated to Magic Show and lucky draws. Amber batch was the last to receive prize and luckily we had our ipad and Sunday papers to keep us occupied.

She didn't win any top prize but only a consolation prize. We were very happy for she completed the competition. Initially we were worried ...

.. that her eyes will be itchy and she'll be crying

..  that her body will be itchy

.. that she'll wanna go 'shee-shee' during competition

.. that she'll feel too cold

.. that her pencils will break

.... we're just like 2 fidgety parents, worrying anything and everything under the sun ! Silly me n silly him !

After a long wait.... it was her turn to receive a consolation prize..

 My little girl, on stage to receive a prize , no big prize but we are sooooo proud of her !

Amber and her dedicated teacher. She  said Amber needs more time, at least a year, to compete at International Levels. 

We praised and rewarded her with a gift of her choice. She went to Guardians and chose a Lip Ice lip gloss.

Competition is not all about winning first, second or third. Just being there and doing her best, she had already won :D

Allergy Update - 27 August 2011

We went for another follow up visit on 27 August 2011. It's really not necessary to visit Dr Wong so often but hubs, Amber and I are on our toes, all the time and we want to double triple make sure she's clear of her allergies.

We're counting down to 'Butter in February' and we're determined to make it.

My heart beats very fast when Dr Wong tests her allergies. With each test tube that he runs, I'll be praying with all my heart, fingers and toes crossed that she's clear. I don't want her to be bummed down to square one again.

She's clear of her allergies except for house dust mites :

House Dust Mites  -  7
Eggs        - 0
Dairy       - 0
Yeast      - 0
Colorings E110 and E103  - 0


Needless to say, we're happy beyond words, our diligence and her sacrifice paid off ! We forgot to test her for latex but that's not as important as getting her clear of the food allergies. I suspect her reading for house dust mite went up as she has itchy eyes and especially bad on days when she attends reading class. The school is fully carpeted and.. dusty. It's mission impossible to be rid of house dust mites. It's everywhere and I can only do what I can do and she can also only do what she can do. She wears long pants and long sleeves to the reading class to minimize her exposure to dust mites.

Anywayzzz.. the  follow up check gave us reassurance Amber is on track to recovery.


Hip Hip Hurray and 4 months to taste a dollop of creamy salty BUTTER again !!!

Amber does a double Hula

 

The ever hyper Amber surprised us one day with a double hula. Our helper can even hula around her neck but I forbid Amber to follow. I watched in awe.. my little girl doing the hula.. whilst I can't even manage one hoop !

Amber does the hula

Amber loves hula. She's been practising for some time now and she finally got it right.

The single hula (check the background voice... her #1 supporter)

I'm so happy for her. I'm still struggling with the hula. Been picking up hoops more than swinging. :D

How to Shop In Peace

Drop the hubs and kid off at sand art area.

Choose and pay for the biggest and most complicated piece

 Guaranteed peaceful shopping for at least 1 hour !

Chupa Chups

I was paying at a cashier check out and the Chupa Chups caught her attention. I overheard her saying softly to herself :

Ooooooohhhhhhh  Wow !!!!!! Lollipops !!

Poor little kiddo ! She's been off candies and chocolates for  more than a year. Apart from an occasional Mentos mint and chewing gum (only recently too), I do not allow her candies. She's allergic to dairy and certain food colorings and sugar is not good for her as she has candida and we have to limit her sugar intake.

We offered her one and her expression ? Priceless !!!

I chose a cola flavoured Chupa Chups for her. Non-dairy and less coloring. She's just as happy :

She didn't finish the Chupa Chups and I was very happy to chuck it away. Although she likes candies and all kinds of lollies, she's never addicted to candies and I think it's ok to allow her a little luxury once in a while.

A Mother's Touch

I was out this morning for appointments and on the road when Amber called around noon.

Mommy... I don't want to shower. I fell down. A lot of blood. My hands and legs also got !!!

Since I was on the road and not too far from home, I turned back to check on her.

Both knees were bleeding and her elbow was grazed too but not serious.

Strangely this morning.. she showed me some 'surprise' she had in her bag, Disney plasters. She kept some in the bag pocket for emergencies and yes, emergency did happen today. Teacher washed her wound with water and pasted the Disney plaster over her 2 knees.

I checked and there wasn't any sand or debris in the wound and applied Dettol antiseptic to the wound. She cringed in pain but did not cry..

She thanked me..

Thank you very much Mommy !  I love you Mommy ! and gave me a kiss.

When I left for work.. she said again.. I love you the most Mommy !

awwwwwww....


moments like these makes motherhood sooo worthwhile :D

Daddy's Helping Hand

She asked to go a playground where she could climb the ropes. 

We scratched our heads and cannot remember which playground had the ropes and Daddy took us for a long ride and after 2 searches.. we found the playground at Ampang Hilir that has the rope pulley.  That really shows we lazy parents hardly bring her to parks. 

Last Sunday, Daddy took her to the playground and assisted her in her play.

 

climbing up the ropes..

see saw....

and up the monkey bars...

whilst I lazed around.. too lazy to play 

Some  tasks are better handled by fathers :D