Double Birthday Celebration

Decided to do a combined early birthday celebration for RA and RL at Elfa today. RL's bd is next Tues, 2 Dec while RA's 22 Jan next year. But since it's RA's last year at Elfa and a lot of her K2 friends are withdrawing from cc today, it's a birthday cum mini farewell party.

Raelynn has been having a runny nose and slight cough since Monday. Last night the poor gal woke up to cry cos her nose was blocked despite us giving fedac. So in the end, we brought her to see the doctor in the morning so that she can get better since we don't want to cancel the school party.

Luckily the meds and the nap after helped her so after she woke up, we rushed to get the cake from Bengawan Solo, get the candles and inflate the helium balloons. I bought the helium balloons and goodie bags cheap from taobao. But never expect the helium air per balloon to cost as much as $9 each. But we were rushing to the cc, no time to shop and compare. So lesson learnt. :P

What is the theme for the party this year? What else can it be? Frozen of course. I think the gals probably ate more than 5 frozen cakes from their friends' parties this year already, Lol.
But luckily their classmates didn't mind. The cake was 3kg but the kids nearly finished it. Maybe because it was chocolate cake or maybe because it was tea break time. Anyway, I am glad we don't need to lug the cake back. Just a small portion for Ils to try. :)

Another Milestone for RA - P1 Orientation

Today is RA's P1 Orientation. She reported to the hall at 145pm. When the teacher brought her and her classmates to the classroom and the school tour, mummies and daddies stayed behind to listen to the Principal's speech and watch the various video clips and presentations. RA said she watched a video story, did some colouring in class, and went on the tour of the school.

Today, we found out that recess time for P1 kids is 9am. Lessons end at 130pm. Add another 15 mins for flag lowering, dismissal and walking home, the earliest she can eat lunch is 145pm. Some of the single session schools give a 15mins snack break at 12 o clock for the students to eat something light in the classroom. But Poi Ching does not have this practice. All along they were operating on double sessions.

So myself and another parent gave our feedback but the P said it's fine. They can pack some biscuits in their bags. But if the teacher does not give them an official snack time, the kid will not dare to take the biscuits out of their bags to eat. I think more than 4 hours is too long for 6/7 years old to go without food. Duh.

After the P1 Orientation 2 hr programme ended, the few of us whose kids are in the same class formed a whatsapp chat group. There were 4 gals and 1 boy. Coincidentally, all the gals went to Crestar Ballet before.

Our conclusion is that we cannot give the kids a full bf since they need to eat again at 9am and they need to eat a lot. If not, they cannot last till 2pm for those who stay further away from school. No wonder kids grow skinny after starting primary school. :(

RA's Graduation Ceremony

Today is RA's K2 Graduation Ceremony. She took a long time to memorise the thank you speech in both English and Mandarin but she finally did it. And she delivered the speech beautifully with the rest of her classmates at ITE East College hall today. She walked down the stairs to the stage waving to everyone with the other graduands but it was the furthest from my seat and I was trying to figure out the zoom function of my new camera so I missed it. Shucks!

After she walked to receive her certificate, she threw her mortar board up in the air but made sure it was close enough so that she can retrieve it back easily. She memorised her Speech and Drama item - I love colours and could even tell me that some of her classmates missed our parts. No wonder it sounded messy to me. She practised her dance moves and did everything beautifully not missing any steps. In short, she was great today and I am proud of her as always.

I imagined myself crying at her graduation since I did that for previous years' cc concerts even when she was not the one graduating. Lol. I did cry. But only a little when they played the graduation montage. The rest of the time, I was busy trying to capture the moments, record or take photos of her graduation ceremony so that she can see it without having to wait 1 month for the official dvd.

But seeing all the cute little toddlers turn into K2 graduating children make me feel sad somehow. Where did all the time go? How did my little baby grow up so fast?

Even though I quit my job to be a full time SAHM to spend more time with her when she was 13 months. I was only really a SAHM for 2 years because after that I tried out property, then teaching and now finally back at my ex company for a part time position.

She went to childcare when she was almost 3 years old. I picked Elfa because it has good Chinese foundation and I need her to have a good foundation since we intend to send to the nearest primary school which is a SAP school. Elfa has a half day programme for PN1, PN2. But from Nursery, there were only full day programmes. So she spent 8 hrs daily for N, K1 and K2 except weekends and public holidays. Add all that up, she really spent most of her formative years at Elfa.

Although I feel guilty because I feel I didn't spend enough time with her. What consoles me is that she made good friends at Elfa and she has two best friends who practically grow up with her at CC - Caleigh Au and Calyesta Tan.

Yesterday, the teacher got the kids to do appreciation cards for their best friends. And yes, my quiet gal received only 2 cards but they were from these two friends so they do treat RA as their best friend too. There were petty squabbles before and these are the same two gals who hurt her last year when they say "Don't want to be your friend", "Need to know the secret password for you to be my friend". She forgives and forgets and still treats them as her best friends.

RA is sad that her two best friends are withdrawing from CC after today's concert and they are not going to the same school as her. I hope she will always remember her friends and the fun times she had though I know that she will make new friends in primary school.



Tomorrow is another milestone for her. Her P1 orientation. She is lucky that one of her CC classmates (Jan08 baby) will be in the same class as her at Poi Ching. Her ballet classmate is also in the same class as she is also a Jan08 baby. Primary school will be another 6 years of her life. She will grow from a child to a teenager by the end of that 6 years. We are not withdrawing from cc yet since hb still has to work. School hols for him doesn't start until 2nd week of Dec. That's 3 weeks from now. And we've got a short couple trip in mid Dec. When we return, maybe we will try and let her skip school to give her a break. Unless she wants to go back to Elfa cc to play with her friends. :)

Thanks to all her teachers and friends at Elfa that made the past 4 years of her life so fun and memorable!