Tell Tales

My son told tales on me 2 nights ago.

We were playing in the room after dinner, just before bed time. Mummy was outside the room making milk for the children while I was watching over them. One thing led to another, and I ended up playing with them having a whale of a time with both children laughing and then ended up perspering.

Daddy : Ok, better stop playing already. Otherwise Mummy may scold me for playing with you until you perspire.
Caleb : But I perspire already.
Daddy : Oh.
Caleb (with a straight face) : I go tell Mummy now. (And he went out to Mummy).
Mummy came back later to tell me of their conversation.
Caleb : Mummy, you know, Daddy play with Caleb and Sarah so rough.
Mummy : So?
Caleb : So you scold him...
Mummy : But I heard you laughing, so you must enjoying yourself. So you tell him not to play so rough if you don't like it.
So he came back to the room and the first thing I said to him when he came in was...
Daddy : Tell Tales!
Caleb : Don't talk nonsense!

Yah, that's Caleb at 3 1/2 years old, not only telling tales on his daddy, some more 恶人先告状. Better watch my back and what I say next time :)

Playful Sarah

Sarah has a very playful personality, especially when she's home with people whom she's familiar with. One of her favourite games recently is to make a mad dash on her own from the living room to our bedroom and climb onto her korkor's bed. And as she makes her dash to the bedroom, she'll stop from time to time to check to see if we're watching her. If we are, she'll squeal with delight and increase her speed to climb onto Caleb's bed. There are 2 factors that can increase the fun quotient for her. The first is when Caleb sees her making her 100m sprint and starts panicking and yelling and chasing after her coz he doesn't want her to get on his bed. That definitely sends her crawling even faster and she'll complete it with lots of squealing and saliva flying out of her mouth. The second one is when Caleb's taking his afternoon nap and she's in the living room with one of us. She'll attempt to sneak to the bedroom so that she can look for her korkor to play. It's really fun for her coz on one hand, she can get us to chase her and if we don't catch her in time, she'll achieve her aim of waking her korkor up to play.
Here's a video of her that I took today making her way to the room. This is a rather toned down version of how she usually is. She's crawling slowly here coz she has her toy in her hand and she didn't manage to make it up Caleb's bed coz Daddy scooped her up before she could wake Caleb up from his nap.


And here's another video of her playing with her pillow. Whenever we want her to go to bed and she still wants to play, she'll go into this "Everything is so funny" phase. Ya, she'll just stand around her cot and laugh loudly at nothing. Sometimes she'll throw her pillow/ bolster around and laugh loudly or she'll point around the room and babble non-stop. Really quite different from how she is when she's outside or when she's with unfamiliar people. She doesn't make a SINGLE sound when she's with unfamiliar people. So here's the other side of Sarah that few people get to see.

Concert Performance

Two Fridays ago, was the much awaited concert performed by Caleb and his schoolmates. For the past 2 months, he and his schoolmates have been practicing hard in school and at their concert venue. However when me and Daddy asked Caleb what he'll be performing this year, he had been tight lipped and told us it's a secret and that he wants to surprise us. Of course, we tried to guess and tried to ask him whether he's singing or dancing, or ask him to show us some moves, but he refused to. When Grandpa and Grandma asked him, he told them a little and showed them a few moves but just wouldn't tell Daddy or me. So from Grandpa and Grandma, we gathered that he's doing some dance and he seemed to be doing wind surfing. When my mum picked him up from school, he told her something about 小鸭子, so I gathered that he must be doing some duck song or dance.

Though Caleb was adamant about keeping his performance a secret from Daddy and me, I could tell that he was also anxious to perform for us. He had full dress rehearsals at his concert venue 2 weeks before his actual performance and when we dropped him off for his rehearsal, he kept asking us whether today was the day that we're watching him perform on stage. When we said no, he kept asking us why not? Ha, and when the actual day arrived, he was really very excited that finally we'll get to watch his performance. We were all quite excited to see what he had up has sleeve as well, after being kept in suspense for so long.

His first performance was titled Beach Boys.
Here's what we saw when Caleb's class first appeared on stage. Can you spot him?


A closer look..


All ready to boogie boogie...


Look at the cool dude strumming his guitar by the beach...


Surfing by the beach... Ya, the girls are all swooning...




Shaking his butt...


Swimming in the water and showing off his biceps...


The cool dude revealing his handsome face at the end of the performance


For a glimpse of his full dance, watch this...


And for his 2nd performance, 小鸭子, Caleb came out in a duck suit.


Warming up and fluttering his "wings"...


Quaking like a duck should...


Showing his cute duck butt...


Dancing amongst the other ducks...


Here's his 2nd dance performance...


Don't you think he performed very well? We all did, especially Grandma. She was so proud to see Caleb performing on stage that she actually cried!!! Ya, she's Caleb's number 1 fan.

Sarah was very supportive of her korkor Caleb as well. Though it was past her bedtime and she was really very tired, she was still very intrigued by all the dancing and singing on stage and would bob along, point at the children dancing and clap on her own.
Here's my little video of her.


And here's a glimpse of the children from the other performances. As usual they were dressed in colourful costumes and looked really cute.


The concert ended with a finale performance with all the children coming out to dance to the song "Under the Sea".


As you can tell, Caleb was very excited that the performance has finally come to an end.


Here's a short video of the finale. Some of the kids are just looking around for their parents, some of them are wandering around and some, like my son, are very engrossed in completing their final performance.


And here's all the kiasu parents trying to capture their child on stage


And at the end of the whole performance, here's me, the proud Mummy with my son.

Road Directions

Once again, my son continues to amaze me with his sense of directions. We were on our way to meet Yeeyee's family for dinner and were running late. I had to pick Daddy up from the airport before proceeding to the dinner venue. Caleb and Sarah were with me in the car and at the start of the journey, I told Caleb not to disturb me coz I needed to concentrate on driving us to our destination in the shortest time. Obviously that was a very tall order for a talkative boy like him. At the initial leg our our journey, he attempted to talk to me. Then I told him that if he really needed to talk to somebody, he can talk to Sarah. So he started telling Sarah about the buses and the cars outside. He obviously didn't enjoy it coz he'll be babbling away and Sarah didn't give him any responses. Then he decided he needed to pee and started talking to me again, telling me how urgent he was and how he absolutely had to go to the toilet if not he'll pee in his pants. So with me rushing for time, caught in the rush hour jam, a son who was going on and on in the car about how urgent he was, I missed the exit to the airport. I was supposed to exit to PIE next to Tampines SAFRA but I was too preoccupied trying to decide whether I should stop somewhere to let Caleb relief himself. Well, what's done is done, so I decided to move on to the next exit near expo and let Caleb relieve himself. When we finally continued on our now very long journey to the airport, I took the airport exit near expo and then my son said this to me.

Caleb: Mummy, you don't know the way to the airport. Daddy doesn't go to the airport from this way you know. He goes by another way.
Mummy: (stunned for a moment that he could recognise the roads...) Ya, you're very smart huh. Can recognise the roads.
Caleb: Daddy doesn't come by this way you know.... (pauses for a while and then grins at me...) but sometimes, he does. Usually he goes by another way but sometimes he comes by this way.

I was really quite speechless coz we're not near the airport yet. We had just entered the exit to go to the airport and it's not like we go to the airport all the time. And yet he could recognise that this was not the usual route that we use and then he could tell that sometimes, we do come by this way as well.

Haha, and of course I'm extremely thankful that my son has got such good sense of directions coz I'm really BAD with roads. I told Caleb that next time, he can be my road navigator and I wouldn't make any wrong turns anymore.

Conversations with Caleb

Yesterday afternoon, when Caleb woke up from his afternoon nap, we had this little conversation...

Caleb: Mummy, I'm thinking about things.
Mummy: Oh, what are you thinking about?
Caleb: (gives a sly smile) Secret...

After a while, I decided to probe further...
Mummy: Caleb, why don't you tell me your secret?
Caleb: Ok. I'm thinking about going on a holiday.
Mummy: Oh really? So where are you going for your holiday?
Caleb: Kuala Lumpur (grin grin)
Mummy: Oh really? (We're going to KL in a few week's time to attend a cousin's wedding and we mentioned it to him recently. Didn't know he's looking forward to it so much)
Caleb: I think there'll be a swimming pool there you know...
Mummy: Is it? Maybe, maybe not...
Caleb: There is! (The last time we went KL, we brought him to the pool at the hotel. That was a few months back and he still remembers.)
Mummy: We'll see ok. Not all hotels got swimming pool you know. We may not stay at the same hotel.
Caleb: Why Mummy? I like that hotel. It's nice. Let's go stay in that hotel again!
Mummy: we'll see ok?

Ya, at 3 years old, Caleb's constantly making plans and making his preferences known.

And as I was blogging, he started bugging me to play with him and then, his request changed to "I want to watch TV". I told him that we were not going to watch TV.Then, his tone changed into a firm, no-nonsense one. "No, Mummy, I'm going to watch TV!" (Ya, guess who he's imitating.) I returned his firm, no-nonsense tone with, "No, Caleb, we're going to do drawing instead." And when he saw that I was not budging, he started whinning and said," But I don't want to do drawing. It's tiring. I want to do watch TV. It's not so tiring."

And after a while, my dear son started telling me, "Mummy, I want to go play with Natalie. Later I want you to drive me to Yeeyee's house." We were meeting Yeeyee for dinner so I told him,"Ok, you can go play with Natalie later but we're not going to Yeeyee's house. We're going somewhere else." And my dear son said,"Where? Maybe Ikea?" And then he gives me his grin again as though he had suggested a very fun place to go. When I told him no, he said,"Mummy, Natalie doesn't recognise where Ikea is right?"
This boy of mine, never fails to amuse me with what he's thinking of all the time.

The Soldier Story

Ok, so familee has been doing our fortnightly disappearances and to appease the masses, who obviously are getting upset, I shall BLOG!

So what have we been busy with? Well, for the first two weeks, I've been busy going to sis house EVERYDAY to help out with the kids while she does her confinement. And then, I came down with a bad bout of stomach flu for a week. And then, it was Daddy's turn to come down with flu, and then, well, we all kinda just recovered, so, we've been busy trying to get well.

And during the two weeks that we spent at sis house, Caleb got to play a lot with Nat since Nic was in full day school. Well, Nat is going through her terrible twos now and whilst she looks cute and talks to you in a funny R2D2 voice, she's not one to be trifled with. Yup, I tell my sis that she got to watch this one coz she's got sis all wrapped round her little fingers with her cute side but yet she can be quite a terror when she wants to. So, Caleb can actually play quite well with Nat and Nat really likes him quite a lot and often asks about him. And the both of them will laugh and Nat will follow Caleb and allow him to boss her around a little until... she decides she wants her own way and then, she'll give him a knock on the head or hit him in the eye or poke him or... well, you get the idea. She's into hitting him when she doesn't want to do things his way. And Caleb... well, he's into crying when he gets hit and he'll come and wail at the top of his voice and complain about how Nat hurt him. (Ya, this is sis's headache coz Nat is going through a phase of hitting and biting people. Currently her victims are usually Nic and Caleb and occasionally sis herself)

So this was one of the occasions when Nat and Caleb were playing in Nat's playhouse together and suddenly Nat knocked Caleb on his head with a toy. Obviously he started wailing loudly. We didn't want to make a big fuss about it coz he's a boy right? Got to learn to be tough and not cry at the slightest thing. So when Caleb started crying, Sis tried to not let it escalate so she told him that maybe Nat hit him by accident and quickly got Nat to say sorry to him, which Nat promptly did. And we tried to distract him so that he'll stop dwelling on it and stop crying. And sis remembering that Caleb wants to be a soldier when he grows up, reminded him, "Caleb, you want to be a soldier when you grow up right? You know, a soldier can take a few knocks."He stared at her earnestly and eventually did stop crying.

That night, when I was putting Caleb to bed, all of a sudden he said to me,"Mummy, you know, this afternoon, when Nat Nat hit me, it was not an accident. She did it purposely, you know?" I was a little taken aback that he still remembered and I asked him,"Really? Maybe it's an accident." But he was very adamant. "No, it's not an accident. She knocked me on the head, twice you know? Two Times. It's not an accident!" Sensing that perhaps he felt that his grievances were not addressed, I didn't argue with him but instead reminded him that Nat apologised to him and he should forgive her. And then he said with a smile,"Mummy, a soldier can take a few knocks right? I want to be a soldier when I grow up. I can take a few knocks." I thought he was really quite hilarious.

Anyway, since he's in this phase of wanting to be a soldier, I've added on my list of what a soldier should be like. It comes in handy when he acts up. To date, a soldier can take a few knocks, a little bit of pain and not afraid to step on grass.

Heartbeat of the Father

Caleb work up last night in the middle of the night with a fluster on his face. It may be due to a nightmare, or just discomfort, but my heart went out to him as he looked really flustered, uncomfortable and edgy. It was only after both Gen and I had given him a hug and reassured him that we are there, that he quietened down and went back to sleep.
It left me thinking that if I, even though I didn't know what caused Caleb to feel this way, can be so worried and concerned, let alone our Heavenly Father, who sees and feels our every heartache, our every pain, our every distress. He who loves us so much, wouldn't His heart go out to us even more? When we go to Him in prayer, in anguish, in cries and in frustration, wouldn't He be ever more willing to be there for us?
Surely He loves us too much to just leave us to our own devices. Just as I would surely not have left Caleb to face the night alone, God wouldn't leave us to face the world alone. It's just that sometimes, in our limited capacities, we expect His help to come in certain forms. If Caleb had wanted comfort through ice cream in the middle of the night, I would have surely said no. Likewise, God cares too much for us to care for us to respond to our wants if it's not good for us, He will comfort us in a way which He knows is best for us.
Trust in our loving Father, whose heartbeat for His children, goes so deep that He gave His only Son to die for us on the cross. If there was any doubt that God cares for us, just look at the blood-stained figure of Jesus on the cross. He cares.

Sleeping Habits

Both my kids have got strange sleeping habits.

We used to think that Caleb had a chou chou and that was his scratchy pillow and bolster. But subsequently we realised that we were wrong coz he started naming other bolsters as his scratchy bolster and telling us that one was the "scratchy bolster" and another was the "actual scratchy bolster". Yah, we didn't know that bolsters got real and fake ones. And then he started having preferences for bedsheets. I bought him a few sets of colourful bedsheets from Aussino but he refused to sleep on the bed. Instead he preferred to sleep on his pull out bed. And then he told us that he liked the bedsheet on the pullout bed and not the Aussino ones, coz the bedsheet on the pullout bed is scratchy and the Aussino ones are not.
That's when the truth dawned on us. It's not the particular pillow or bolster that he liked. It was the material that he liked and he wants to run his hands to scratch them when he goes to bed. The bedsheet on his pullout bed was bought from one of those neighbourhood stores and after many washes, the material starts to to wear off and form little clumpy balls that look like this.


Yah, so that's his real chou chou. The scratchy material. Hey, it's actually versatile ok. We're not stuck with one stinky pillow or bolster that we have to carry around. As long as the material is scratchy, he's contented. I really dunno whether to laugh or cry coz there was once we actually caught him scratching Sarah's back because the t-shirt that she was wearing was a hand-me-down and the material, though comfy, had the little clumpy balls on them. Aiyah, of course we told him to stop scratching Sarah lah. It's not a nice thing to do right!

Yah, and now onto my daughter. We're not spared from her idiosyncracies either. I'm not sure when it started but she has this thing about wanting to touch our hair, especially mine, when she wants to sleep and her mouth will be doing the rooting action as though she's sucking something, just that, there's nothing in her mouth. She's not much of a thumb sucker so, she appears to be sucking air when she's tired. It's really strange.
I tried to wean her off needing to touch my hair when she wants to go sleep. But did I ever mention that my girl is very persistent? Ya, so when I refused to let her touch my hair, she found her own replacement... her own hair! And not just the hair on her head... but her eye brows and eye lashes too! She must have figured that she better have a backup plan this time round and make it portable too! So... it's now super obvious to us when she wants to sleep coz first her mouth will root, then her left hand will be playing with a clump of hair at the side of head and her right hand will be feeling her right eye brow.
I brought her grocery shopping with me that day and it was her nap time and she actually set in the trolley with her eye brows knitted, both hands raised and touching her hair! I just had to stop in the middle of the aisle there and then and take a photo of her! Ya, talk about needing to carry your chou chou around. My girl's chou chou is permanently stuck to her!
Wah, with it permanently on her, you think she'll ever outgrow this habit? I really hope so, if not, as she gets older, she's going to look super funny every time she's tired.


Ha, I caught her doing her thing again after church today. The pix on top is her usual pose when she wants to go sleep. But sometimes, she'll use both hands to touch both her eye brows and she'll look like she's extremely vexed and really deep in thought. Not the clearest shots from my hp, but well, you get the idea.


Sleep tight everyone! Going to take my beauty sleep...Zzzz...

Mail for us

Caleb went with me to open our letterbox today and there was this letter addressed to "Caleb's Mum & Dad". I stared at it and was wondering who it was from. Caleb saw me looking at the envelope and immediately said, "It's for you!" And I asked him, "How do you know?" and he said," Coz I mailed it to you. I made something for you and Daddy!"
That was when I remembered Caleb's teacher calling me a little while back to check on our postal code. Apparently he's learning about the different types of occupations and one of the occupations that he learned about was the mailman. He told me that a real mailman went to their school to tell them what he did in his job and they each got to make something for Daddy and Mummy and mail it to them. I thought that was quite a nice touch and a fun way to teach the kids.

Well, Caleb was really excited about the letter. More so than me. And he couldn't wait to open it. I actually told him to wait till Daddy came home so that we could open it together since it's also addressed to him, but he just couldn't. The minute we got home, he tore the envelope open so that he could show me the card that he made. Then he started rattling on about how the mailman would collect the letters, draw lines on the stamps and then drop it into our letterbox for us. Hmm, I think the mailman made a lasting impression on him but I don't think he'll aspire to be one lah. Think the job scope doesn't appeal very much to him.



Btw, last year for a period of time, he had been telling me that he wants to be a pilot when he grows up. Well, he's changed his mind. In recent months, he's decided he wants to be an army soldier when he grows up. I asked him why and he said so that he can carry a gun and shoot the bad guys and protect people. I'm really not sure where he got this influence from. Probably from school I guess. Anyway, with all the army guys I've seen, I wonder whether he'll still be so enthusiastic about being a soldier when it's time for him to go NS. My guess is....probably not... I've really NEVER met any guy who's excited to get enlisted into the spore army.