We Are Going to Legoland

Since the Ringgit is falling like bird crap, literally; our plans for HK Disneyland is colder 

than Anna Wintour. 

And Hubs being the indulgent father that he is, is still adamant to bring the kids to Legoland instead.
Given the current economic situation, the prices are bonkers but
Tiger was already over the moon about the trip at this point.
He has even decided on the Pirate Room for his stay. 

Pirate. Adventure. Kingdom.

According to Tiger.

 

After a brief discussion, Hubs and I decided to stay at KSL to save some moolah. 

Since the kids are still besotted with dinosaurs, they didn't make a fuss :)

Tiger, who is five isn't a big fan of Lego yet. We have two sets of Lego Duplo and one box of assorted Lego but no one likes them. *shrugs*. Too many other options? Not into building yet? 

In order to get them excited about the trip...we did some random activities pertaining to Legoland
on top of our daily lessons.

The pirate toy sets from ELC and LEGO are crazy expensive, so we make do with this.

RM 27 from Bookxcess.

We are getting thrifty :)

Lucky us, he got a mini Ninja Turtle set from a friend's birthday party. 

He worked on it immediately the next day.

We used some printables from Carisa's Lego Kindergarten Printable Pack 

He didn't complete the whole pack and I don't expect him to,

Just the ones he enjoys, like this cut and paste.

Celebrating their trip in advance like a couple of drunk sailors.

 

And this is the plan I asked for.

A map of legoland and a scary Freddy lookalike pirate.

Will post more pictures after we return :)

April 2015: Farm Animals Week

Our 'homeschool' is back in full swing after Tiger has fully adapted to his life as a kindergartener.

That means no longer crying.

He likes ALL of his teachers. Happy dance

He is able to converse in Chinese now. Break dance

And most importantly, he has a best friend in school. Yay! Twerking

Why do we homeschool when he is already attending kindergarten?

There are many reasons.

Firstly, it has become a routine for us. It's school time after dinner.

It is also MIL's rest and TV time.

We use this time to explore whatever question Tiger asked when I was busy.

"Why is there wind?"

"Why is night dark?"

"Why dinosaurs die?"

I enjoy it, the kids love it. Why the heck not?

In April, the weather was lovely in the evening, so we hung out in the park mostly.

One of the days, Tiger noted a blanket of pink flowers on the ground and we had the best time

tossing and collecting them. 

It is raining so much now in May, my kids are going bonkers.

"Park! Park, park!!" 

I swear they are turning into little icky monsters without outdoor play.

I don't love it personally, but I do it for my sanity.

 My almost three year old.

Can't reach the ground yet?

No problem, I'll just half sit and half slide off .

I know I should trust her but she really pushes all my panic buttons 

=.="

  

 So cute, ain't she? Hehe.

 She walks around with this hat and bag. ALL. THE. TIME.

My little stylo mylo girl.

Hat: A kiosk in Sunway Pyramid

Bag: rm6 from China (gift from Winnie)

Shirt: Uniqlo

Pants: Cotton On

(Haha...fashion blogger in the making :D)

 She doesn't just walk around, acting all cool and cute.

Sometimes, she reads too.

But ONLY if the book has animals or Mickey in it.

This is still one of her favorite book to date.

The others being the four Words, Words, Words books from Grolier.

Lift-the-flap Farm Animals Book: From BookXcess

Dress: H&M

All of her hair accessories are from China.
Winnie buys so much, the people there thought she has a hair clip shop.

She adores this 3D animals magnetic puzzle.

She erms...slices the animals apart and puts them back together thousands of times.

It is quite brutal to watch.
She says stuff like," Cut, haha, cut cut cut!"

 

 3D magnetic farm puzzle: Benho (china brand)

PJs: Only RM16 from Facebook seller. Love it!!

 She also learned some threading that week with this Froebel J2 set.

The only reason she could string so many was to make a snake to drag up and down the stairs.

I'll accept whatever motivation she has, as long as she is cooperating,

 

 Froebel J2: From groupbuy. Currently closed.

Shirt: Guess

Pants: Mothercare

(I am so enjoying this. Feel like a fashion editor already)

Of course, farm means pretend play extravaganza!!

I had grand plans of creating a mini farm plot but no time laaaa.

So, this Farm Shop is close enough la and a more realistic setup.

 

They were sooooo interested for 3-4 days. =.="

Perhaps it was because there were not enough customers. Only kakak and I :p

Dragon is most uncooperative because she dislike sharing anything with Tiger.

 

 Toy cashier from ELC
PJs: Mothercare

 One of the more peaceful days.

Dragon was cheerfully saying "Thank you" to Tiger the whole time.

Only happens once in a blue moon. Will treasure this moment forever.

 

For their printables and play money, I used Twinkl.

We only accept Euros, sorry. 

 

 For fine motor and practical life, I created a 'milk' pouring activity from white Crayola paint.

By preparing only one set, they were forced to take turns without any eye poking or hair pulling.

 A 3D book from Enfagrow that provided a backdrop for our mini animals

  

Mini Farm Animals from ELC

 We also used them with this Farmyard Families printable from The Helpful Garden.

There are loads of free Montessori printables there, so please check it out.

 We read lots of farm animals books but my personal favorite was 

the Rabbit Problem by Emily Gravett.

Science

He asked me about plants and animals and why we eat?

So, I thought he was ready for a lesson on Living vs Non-living.

I was right.

It is a breeze to teach a child who is ready to learn.

When they are ready for a topic, they just sponge it up.

Wish someone had told me this when he was one.

They do not sponge up everything you flash to them.

They absorb what they are interested in. Something that strikes their curiosity.

Do not let those moment slip past.

Grab it. Explore. Ask questions. Search for answers.

And learning becomes a natural process. 

For math, he is still doing some simple additions.
I just introduced skip counting by five to him.

For Chinese, I have no idea what he is doing in school.
We just read lots of picture books before bedtime.

In keeping with the farm theme, here's our pitiful effort at farming.

But then again, it grew into a mini kailan :)

He is still not very comfortable with the idea of getting dirty but we are improving.

Mud pie kitchen will have to wait a while.

We got this set of Usborne from Winnie because she unknowingly bought two sets.

*rolls eyes*  I know...she is a true shopaholic.

 Tiger went through it and he was appalled by the number books he already owned.

They remember whatever you say or read to them.

So, don't say things you do not mean and be mindful of the promises you make.

 Our pictures may paint a deceivingly sweet and organized homeschool life, 

but most of the time, someone is crying or yelling, 

someone is blinded by glitter/paint/saliva,

someone lost a finger,

someone's hungry,

someone just wants to yell for no reason.

And I only have 2 kids. *sweat*

 Here's to keeping it real.

We learned about farm animals briefly when Tiger was 14.5 months old. 

You can read about it here

And our visit to Farm In The City here.

There is no part 2 to Farm in The City because I got lazy :p

Read & Play: Three Little Pigs

This was initially a toy centered learning topic but I thought it would be fun to

built different types of houses to go along with the story of

"Three Little Pigs"

Here's the setup:

The toy is actually a picture from my kindergarten graduation concert :)

I've had the picture frame for as long as I can remember.

It's one of the few things that had survived my regular spring cleaning.

The books are a variety of pig-related stories found in our own little library.

But our main book was this one from Usborne

We really enjoyed the simple words and cute illustration.

Tiger especially enjoyed the verse, 

"Not by the hair on my chinny chin chin"

which he still uses to this day :)

Ours came in a set bought during MPH sales

 

I must admit that when I think of pig, the first thing that comes to mind is

bah kut teh and bacon. Terrible, I know.

But I didn't tell Tiger that part about pigs, yet.

Did you know that pigs are very intelligent creatures?

I found out about that in Singapore Zoo when I was 11 or 12 years old.

Go here to learn more about pig awesomeness

So, the houses were obviously the focus of my creative, engineering mind *ahem*

I wanted to use the straw from our broom at first...haha, not very hygienic is it?

Then I thought of straws!

I have lots and lots of them from IKEA.

We tried several methods and this was the easiest, a triangular prism 

 

This is our messing planning process, trying out different materials.

Tiger will imitate my thinking face as he thinks:

 one hand on hip, eyes upwards,  one finger on lips...

"Hmmm, what else can we use?"

My little Mini-Me

Setting up the props.

I didn't purchase mini a mini wolf/pigs.
We already had them in our farm and wild animal set. Lucky me :)

The straw house is the trickiest to setup and easiest to blow down,

He always played the wolf and I, the pigs.

  

 The wooden house made from unifix cubes base, some sticks and spatulas.

It had to be purple.

The pig in the house No. 2

 He huffed and he puffed very, very hard...haha!

Our lego 'brick house'

Genius ain't it? I thought of it and I hinted the idea to Tiger.

When he thinks it's his idea, he takes pride in his work :)

Win-win

We read all the books repeatedly, except Peppa Pig which Dragon girl had refused to share.

My bad for stating it was her present :p

To complement this activiy, we used printables from 3dinosaurs, here.

One of our most successful project to date.

And no, bacon was not discussed at any point.

Pretend play: Camping

I bought a tent and tunnel set ages ago from ToyRus because you know, I wanted the kids to experience camping without the risk of contracting leptospirosis, dengue, etc.

picture from walmart.com

Ours is something like the picture above, just slightly more cheapskate in quality and blue/orange.
The two things I have always wanted to do as a kid (besides going to Disneyland) was camping and flying a kite.

"Just camp in the garden laaaa," Those were my exact words to hubs while I was paying with a stupid grin. Hubby just walked away. I turned to my son and said "Tiger, we are going camping!!" He gave me a blank look. MIL started her 'buying rubbish' lecture and I turned on selective-deafness mode.

Truth be told, it was quite rubbish :p
The plastic bent after some usual rough play by some kids. So, my advise is, if you are going to buy a play tent, make sure you buy something with reasonably good quality, like a Bazoogi tent/structure.
 The camping out doors part? Haha....forget it.... with the mosquitoes and the sweltering heat in tropical Malaysia....omg!

So after two years, I finally set camp, in my bedroom. No mosquitoes, no bugs, no dirt, no haze, air-conditioned and most importantly, decreased chances of kidnapping and robbery.

Tiger actually slept in the tent :)  

That's his playpen mattress and his stinky baby bolster.

I wanted to tell him ghost stories like people do in the movies but nevermind la, 

in case the ghost in the toilet decides to come back.

So, I told him there are wild boars at night and he nearly cried.

"Where? Where?"

OMG, I am seriously considering the fact he is on the spectrum.

ZERO imagination.

I had to explain that we're actually indoors and there aren't any wild animals,

just pretending, imagining and making up stories.

He wasn't convinced, so I distracted him with a 'campfire'

I made up another story about hunting for animals.

 "There's a rabbit, I am shooting it with my bow and arrow. 

Now I am going to skin it and we are roasting it over the fire.

Here, have some roasted rabbit for supper."

"IT'S DEAD?!? YOU KILLED A RABBIT."

Pretending to chew and bite, "Yeah, it's food, baby. You want some?"

Tiger was visibly disturbed, "No, thank you."

What am I going to do with you, Little Tiger?

Why are you so literal?

It's exasperating.

We need more pretend play.

I googled for play benefits of tents and tunnels and it includes:

Gross motor and coordination practice.

Speech training

Imagination 

Teamwork 

Basically it is another toy. 

Money saving tip:

Just use a large bed sheet over a string and you have a tent.

Picture from google

Picture from pinterest

 Have a wonderful weekend and happy camping!

 

Tiger at 3 years 9 months

School

Besides homeschool, he is still attending Bao Bei for chinese lessons.

He is STILL reading cards from set B.

His slow-mo pace is killing me but I didn't tell him that.

I'll ask casually,"How many cards this week?"

He broke all records last week with one card.

If only you guys could have seen my expression when I found out...

Sigh...paying rm100 per week, okay?

Whenever I insist on reading chinese books, he always pick this set 

of books by Monique Felix. He adores them.

It is a set of 8 wordless books but he insist it is Chinese.

His stories will always be like this,

Once upon a time, a 'lau shu'.....

"lau shu" will be the only Chinese word he uses.

Right now, he is in Disney's Cars mode.

So, I googled and printed out a ton of stuff for him.

Things like tracing and patterning became a breeze.

Always, always follow the child's lead.

Right Brain 

Ever since I yelled at him once for not focusing, he isn't very interested anymore.

Actually his exact words were,"You say Ready Go one more time, I go out"

So, I had to trick him into playing memory games and matching.

Then slowly reintroduce linking memory and mandalas.
Must try harder to not be a shouty parent

Science

I bought a microscope from ELC sales (50 + 10% discount, how to not buy leh?)

He isn't ready to appreciate the beauty of its function but it was

just as useful to watch him explore the apparatus, trying to figure out the parts

I was trying to install the battery, when he told me,

"Come, give me. I fix for you"

Checked with magnifying glass

Use tweezers to pry out the battery

When all else failed, use teeth.

He did this ala telescope

Laugh die me

After a demo by mama, he looked pretty professional....

 

But he still preferred this method in the end...haha!

I told him about collecting nature specimen and such 

after the blardy haze issue has resolved.

So, this is our "manly" adventure bag.

Being a teacher

He sounds like one actually. Rather bossy, like me :)

Dragon is always copying him anyways.

I love this pic cause Dragon was scratching her head in a 

Watcha-talking-about manner

 

 Being a brother

They still fight on a regular basis but ocassionally

they melt my heart, like this moment.

They were just staring at the oil blob thingy quietly, 

in mirroring positions.

Playing doctor.

Took so many videos of him giving injections, taking temperature, etc.

We spent a lot of time playing whatever they wanted. 

Mostly indoors since the haze is killing us but the authorities are too busy

putting on a monkey show for the international press to be bothered.

After MH370, he is not allowed to be pilot.

Work from home la...be a tech whiz/nerd, okay?

Pray for #MH370

I cannot offer anything more than my thoughts and prayers.

I hope they are safe, somewhere.

In the meantime...

Hug your loved ones

Be grateful

Call your parents and tell them you love them, like right now.