Books: Love Affair with Jane Austen

I admit it. I first fell in love with Jane Austen with the 1995 BBC TV series adaptation of Pride & Prejudice many years ago. Mr Darcy ... swoon!

Occasionally, I would rewatch the DVDs. I've tried to get others to share my love, but it's not everybody's cup of afternoon tea. Surprisingly though, my then-8-year-old enjoyed watching the series with me.

When I was visiting Bath in 2012, I came across the Jane Austen Centre. It's quite a delightful place, with lots of historical facts and trivia, period costumes and backgrounds on Jane's best loved novels.
 

With a renewed interest in her works, I bought two other BBC TV series based on Jane Austen's novels — Mansfield Park and Sense & Sensibility — to watch with my girl. I found the former rather slow-moving, but Sense & Sensibility was a lot of fun (with yummy eye candy too!).

Visit: Life in the Science Centre

The haze was back. With a vengeance. And school was off for the day.

So we had an impromptu visit to our favourite haunt, the National Science Centre.

This round, there was a special counter with the various life stages of the butterfly, which gave us a good close-up of metamorphosis.

There was also a little petting zoo area. Boys were a bit squeamish with the turtle and budgie, but Girl spent a long time cuddling up with the bunny.

It was a quick pitstop, but a welcome relief from the sandstorm out there. I do wish the NSC would ensure all its exhibits are in good working order. At any time, maybe 30% are faulty, which does mar the experience a little.

Experiencs: Lights, Camera, Action

Sometime back in December 2012, there was a small ad posting for talent casting for an Internet-based educational programme (which we had never heard of).

So the Boy and Girl went for the audition. Being camera-shy, they gave mainly monosyllabic answers interspersed with giggles. Tiger Mum was rather disappointed and wrote off all chances of them being cast.

Somehow, four months later, we got a call from the agency telling us to come back for the actual shooting. I couldn't believe it and double checked if it was another round of auditions or the actual shoot itself. It was the latter, and a paid-one at that.

So, am thankful for this new experiences for the kids. They had their make-up session, shoot and playback viewing. They were still nervous, but somehow pulled through. And now they have earned some money for their savings account!

Motor Skills: Slowly coming along ...

The boys don't really enjoy anything to do with the pencil — writing, colouring, drawing.

This was Boy's first attempt at drawing something on his own accord at age 3 (think he was kinda jealous that I kept posting his sister's artwork up on FB). It started out as a Transformer, I believe, that evolved into a peacock :-)

Then one day, 3 years later, he suddenly came to show me a piece of paper with his sketches of  Ultraman! I especially like that this was entirely his own initiative, and upon encouragement, he went on to draw all his other Ultraman figures. Glad he found something he enjoyed drawing. Hopefully there'd be more to come!

School: Typing in Chinese

Girl called me to say she had to type out a homework writing assignment and submit a printed copy.

No sweat, I thought. Just wait till I get home.

But when I got back, I saw that the assignment was all in Chinese. Sentence construction, no less! Pengsan!

I didn't type in Chinese until after graduating from Uni, and not very much since then.

Figured the easiest and fastest way for her to complete her assignment was to use the iPad. That way, she doesn't hold up my computer, and with the touchscreen, there's no need to struggle with a touchpad or mouse yet. The iPad also already has the Chinese keyboard, and she could use han yu pin yin to find the words.

Definitely an interesting experience for both of us :-)

Motor Skills: Moving on Wheels

Have wheels will travel! The kids have been trying their legs out on various types of wheels.

Boy had a skateboard for his birthday and recently got to try out his friend's ripstick. He's still working on getting a feel of it.

During our family holiday in US, we took a skate down Santa Monica beach. The kids learnt inline skating a while ago and haven't been skating much of late, so was quite surprised when they managed to hold their own up and down the crowded paths! Despite falling down a couple of times, they picked themselves up and continued without complaining.

Holidays: Fun in the USA!

We had an awesome vacation time with the extended family at the US of A — 2 weeks in the West Coast.

The kids had a great time, and the kiasu mummy decided to squeeze in as many learning opportunities as possible. After all, with all the money spent, it better be educational!

One of the main things was a travel journal — I scoured the Internet for various activity worksheets, maps and trivia on the places we were visiting and compiled them into a folder. The kids would work on each worksheet daily, sometimes not without complaint. But my hope and prayer is that it'd help them better understand and appreciate their holiday experience and have a momento they can look back on in years to come.

My USA Journal: Write-up about the Golden Gate Bridge

Writing assignments included a letter to their Grandparents

 

Brochures, ticket stubs and other knick-knacks are included