The BRAND NEW Piggy Family

The BRAND NEW Piggy Family
The cartoon is by Piggy Daddy who is a full time educator and freelance illustrator. Anyone who needs freelance illustrations, please contact us! :)
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Lilypie Kids Birthday tickers

Sunday, February 24, 2013

A study corner for RaeAnne


Been wanting to buy a proper desk for RaeAnne since last year as she will have her own room. She loves to draw but the picnic table with a hole in the centre is not very suitable for drawing and it's also too low, whereas the crayola art table cum easel is too small. Also, the lighting at the living/dining area is a bit dim.

We went to a few places including Ikea, Courts, Piccolo house and Casa kidi, to look for a suitable study desk. I wanted a space maximising desk with storage so that she can keep her textbooks and other study stuff in future. We finally zoomed in on a Cilek study desk for $300+ at Casa kidi in a sweet pink castle design (her favourite colour) that is not too wide due to space constraint but ok to last until primary school. We got a pink acrylic swivel chair on clearance as well.

Although we ordered it in Dec, the desk took months to come and finally arrived today. She loves the table luckily cos we had no time to bring her to choose. Her CC will start having spelling for K1 kids from July onwards so timing is good. Although she will leave her carefree 'no homework' toddler days soon, hope her new desk will help ease the transition and make studying happier and more fun for her. :)

Monday, February 18, 2013

The Hungry Caterpillar


I have a limau purut or kaffir lime plant, and the lime leaves and juice are often used in tomyam soup. Can't remember when I bought the plant but it was many years ago.

Unfortunately, I never harvested any limes out of the plant. Instead, I 'harvested' many caterpillars. Don't know why they just love lime leaves. I tried spraying pesticide on them but I dun like the idea of 'poisoning' my lime leaves. So, after that, I just get hubby to get rid of it when caterpillars appear.

I hate caterpillars, worms, earthworms and anything that squirms. The fear started when I had to sweep the floor for my dad's old room in our Alexandra flat. Being a hawker, there were boxes of canned and processed food in that room. When I finally sweeping the floor, there were lots of tiny white worms squirming on the floor. I screamed to my dad. Who just matter of factly, told me to sweep into the dustpan and throw away. I wasn't even wearing room slippers at that age so I hated to see them squirming so near my feet. Ee....

Two weeks ago, another caterpillar was happily munching on my lime leaves and making big ugly holes. I was about to get hubby, our seasoned caterpillar catcher, to catch it and throw it away again. But I remembered that my colleague told me it is an excellent way for my daughter to learn about the life cycle of the butterfly if I keep it in a container with holes and feed it with leaves. Then my gal can slowly see how it turns into a butterfly and we can set it free at the end.

Sounds like an easy project to do since I got plenty of lime leaves and 'tapow' containers and it will be a valuable science lesson for RaeAnne. So, I bite back my distaste and fought back my fear for worms. Never knew such a day will come but I actually told hubby to create a home for the only creature that I truly hated. RaeAnne, see how much Mummy loves you. ;P


It was only about 1 cm long when we first caught the caterpillar. Wish I remember to take a picture then. After almost 1 week of devouring my lime leaves, it can eat up to 3-4 leaves in 1 day! The caterpillar grew very fat, long and its colour turned GREEN! Looks like it is true when they say 'You are what you eat'. Obviously, it ate too many lime leaves and took on its colour. Probably for camouflage purposes so that a hungry bird doesn't eat it up. The ingenuity of nature.

RaeAnne wanted to bring the caterpillar to childcare on the Friday before Chinese New Year but I forgot to pack it for her. So, she brought it last Thurs, 1 week later, when school resumed. I thought the CC gals will scream but I was wrong. Every kid, boy or girl, was curious and crowded around RaeAnne and her pet caterpillar. It was as if she brought a lovable kitten or puppy to school. Can't help admiring the innocence of childhood. I think the only one who was squirmish about the caterpillar (besides Me) was RA's CC teacher, Teacher Samantha. A K2 girl even took RaeAnne's caterpillar away to show off to her friends. So, poor Teacher Samantha had to get it back for her. Haha.

The caterpillar turned into a chrysalis last Fri. Googled and found out that it can take up to 2 weeks before a butterfly will emerge from the cocoon (chrysalis). Wow, quite a long wait. Meanwhile, we have removed the container cover and upgraded the caterpillar to a bigger home, our old fish tank. I hope it survives the metamorphosis so that we can finally see what is the colour of the butterfly... ;)

Sunday, February 17, 2013

Colouring and doodles by RaeAnne


RaeAnne was very happy on Wed night. And it's because her art teacher (Globalart) said she did a good job colouring a bird so she will put up her colouring on the wall once it is completed. I thought the bird's colours are nice but blending effect is not very good. But maybe because I can see the different blocks of colours on close up. From far, it does look quite nice.


I like her drawing of the frog that she drew on Wed and the rainbow picture kept in Yeye's file folder even more cos I thought both pictures looked very happy. I also like the cat drawing that she drew for Raelynn cos Mei mei loves cats.




After 5 months of art class, can see that she is more confident in copying a picture and drawing it herself and blending of colours. She will even give art homework to yeye and Mei Mei to do. But it is definitely more important that she enjoys going to art class. Haha.