The good news…

Did my medical check-up last month, and collected the report two weeks ago – clean bill of health, except for the borderline low iron levels.  Been advised to take more meat (now I’ve got an excuse to bring on the burgers and steaks, NOT!) or multivitamins.

Coincidentally, my company rented a body composition analysis equipment for a month in conjunction with Health @ Work campaign.  My BMI is just touching the upper limit of normal for Asians, so gotta lose some weight, 4kg to be exact.  Sigh!  The weight has been creeping up slowly since I stopped breastfeeding.  Hmm…time for another one so I can breastfeed again?  Haha!  Other than that, my report shows that I’ve got good stamina, good calcium deposition in my bones, and good upper and lower body strength so I've got no complaints.

Star struck

Younger sis managed to get several complimentary tickets to the My Astro on Demand (AOD) Favourites Awards 2011 since mum is a big fan so I made my way to the KL Convention Centre on last Sunday evening with mum and elder sis. We got pretty good seats, about 7 or 8 rows from the front.

This was the first time I attended a show which was recorded for broadcast at a later date, and I found it rather amusing watching how the producer and other crew involved in the production orchestrate the audience clapping and shouting at certain parts of the show, eg. when the stars made their appearance, when the nominated actors/actresses movie clips were shown, etc.

Fourteen HK TVB artistes attended the ceremony, and I totally regretted not lugging my dSLR camera along. Anyway, here are some shots taken with my sis’ 5-year old PNS camera.

 Michael Tse (Tin Wah), Wayne Lai (Siu Cheong), Vincent Wong (Ho Shun)

 Kevin Cheng (Kar Weng), Ron Ng (Cheuk Hei), Raymond Wong (Ho Yin)

 Myolie Wu (Hang Yee), Tavia Yeung (Yi)

 Sharon Chan (Mun Zhi), Kate Tsui (Chi San)

 Michael Tse (Tin Wah) belting out the winning My Favourite Drama Theme Song

The cast from the winning My Favourite Drama Series, Ghetto Justice (怒火街頭) with the two emcees for the night

Psst...the only reason I know all these names is because we are given a program booklet with names of all the nominated stars and drama series :-)

School holidays are here

Yay!  It’s the holidays.  It’s six weeks of not having to rush in the morning, six weeks of sleeping in, six weeks of fun, fun and more fun!

The first activity for the holidays was a colouring competition organized by hubby’s Lions Club at Subang Avenue.  We let Yiu Yiu took part for the fun of it.

It's the first time I attended a colouring competition, and I was amazed at how prepared some of the children were – they even came with a foldable table so that they didn’t have to bend down while colouring.  Hmmm…I should get one for Yiu Yiu, and a proper set of crayons too.

Almost done

We’ve got activities lined up already – a still-life drawing outing organised by her art centre, a full moon party, a birthday party, family holidays and shopping for new uniform, shoes, bag, etc for primary school.  Since I’ll be on leave for most of December, we can plan for more!

Final year-end party

As usual, Yiu Yiu’s kindly organized the year-end party on the last day of school. This year’s theme was “Circus” and she had initially wanted to go as a clown but since we couldn’t find a clown costume for her, she settled for being a magician, a very pretty one (ahem! ahem!).

We bought some roses for her to give to all the teachers in the kindy as a token of appreciation for having taken good care of her the last three years. I should have prepared some special gifts for the few teachers who taught her, but I didn’t...oh well!

With her two favourite teachers, Teacher Esther (4yo class teacher) and Teacher Kathleen (5yo class teacher)

With Teacher Nyin Yin (6yo class teacher) and the principal, Teacher Stephanie

I sent her to kindy in the morning, but instead of leaving when they start eating, I stayed on for the entire party.

Abracadabra!

"We are best friends forever!"

After the children finished eating, Teacher Esther and Teacher Kathleen, dressed as clowns, went on stage to crack some jokes and led the children in some dance movements, followed by games for children of different age groups.
 

 Doing the macarena

School was dismissed at 11am, and that marked the end of a chapter in Yiu Yiu’s life.

Petunia class in the costumes

Pom-pom dance

Was on leave the last few days and had trouble uploading this video with my home connection. Managed to steal some time from lunch to do it today at the office. Enjoy…and please excuse the shaky hands, courtesy of Yiu Yiu’s 大姨姨.

Graduating from kindy

Last Sunday was Yiu Yiu’s kindy graduation and awards ceremony.  The kindy organize a big scale concert cum graduation every two years, alternating it with sports day.  And this year happened to be sports day so the graduation ceremony was done on a much smaller scale, attended only by the 6yo students.

The students were to report to the kindy by 3.30pm, and we were there 10 minutes before, which was a good thing as it started to pour soon after.  The event proper commenced at about 4.30pm with the students marching in by class, all smartly dressed in their graduation robes.  This was followed by the national anthem, and three girls welcoming came up on stage to welcome the parents in English, Malay and Mandarin respectively.

Following speeches by Pastor Daniel Ho and the principal, the children came on stage one by one to receive their awards.  This year, the kindy decided to present each student with an award as an encouragement and to recognize that each child is unique.  Yiu Yiu was awarded the Best Helper in her class.

 

 Each child's name and their award was flashed on the screen as they went on stage

The graduating Petunia class

Performances soon followed, kicking off with a light and easy dance routine to the tune of Rhythm of the Falling Rain.  Yiu Yiu’s class was up next with a pom-pom dance, followed by a percussion ensemble playing Rasa Sayang and finally, a choral speaking about a bear hunt.

Rhythm of the Falling Rain, percussion ensemble and choral speaking

All the students then got back on stage to perform two sings – one in Mandarin and one in English, in appreciation of their parents.

At the end of the two songs, Pastor Daniel went up on stage again, and invited everyone to join him in prayers for the children’s future as they begin a new chapter of their lives.  I got really emotional at this point and started tearing.  I was standing on a chair at the back of the auditorium trying to get a good shot of the group at that time, and one little girl among the audience kept staring at me – she must be wondering why this auntie was crying!

Pastor Daniel standing beside Yiu Yiu

With mei-mei 

With some of her friends

 Doing the split

It’s just a few more days before she closes this chapter of her life, and I believe the three years at Tadika Juara Cerdik had done her a world of good, setting the foundation not just for her onwards journey in education, but also positive virtues and values in her life.

Kennedy’s Grill @ Kota Damansara

The restaurant wasn’t that busy when we arrived, and we placed our orders relatively quickly.  While waiting for our foods to arrive, the lady boss gave the kids some colouring papers and crayons to keep them occupied.

Our food came soon after.  Soup of the day was pumpkin soup, and it tasted really good – thick and creamy, but not too rich.  I had the Surf & Turf, which consists of grilled sirloin and king prawn cooked in BBQ sauce, served with a side of buttered vegetables, fries and corn on the cob.  The steak was done medium well, and it was juicy and tender.  It came with a small tub of sauce, which should be the BBQ sauce the meat was cooked in, though it didn’t taste that BBQish to me, and I thought there was a hint of berries.

Other foods we ordered include Sizzling Black Pepper Chicken Chop, Hawaiian Mix, Beef Steak and Seafood Carbonara and Spaghetti Bolognese for the kids.  I had a taste of the Spaghetti Bolognese, which was alright but nothing extraordinary.  The Seafood Carbonara was a better deal – it came with lots of seafood, and the cream sauce isn’t too heavy or cheesy so one doesn’t get too jelak (cloyed).

From top: Pumpkin Soup, Seafood Carbonara and Spaghetti Bolognese 

Clockwise from top left: Sizzling Black Pepper Chicken, Surf & Turf, Beef Steak and Hawaiian Mix 

I love the décor as well, where the walls are adorned with everything Americana.  I’ll make a second visit soon, with the Groupon voucher J

Birthday outing

I reminded Yiu Yiu on Monday night to quickly shower, have her lunch and complete her homework on Tuesday, as I would be taking her out on an outing.  I’ve not really had many mother-daughter outing with her alone, so this was definitely one of the first few, if not the first!  She was so looking forward to it and got herself ready in record time after school.

Our first destination was Megakidz.  We practically had the whole play area to ourselves – there was only a bunch of teenagers and two other young boys.  But Yiu Yiu soon got bored, probably because she was playing alone.

We then went for ice-cream, before going to ToysRUs to let her choose her birthday present.  This is definitely the first time we bought her toys for her birthday!  She chose a Princess theme board game, and I bought her another set of beads toy.  She was thoughtful enough to ask for another set of the beads toy for her mei-mei.  And since we are member of Star Card, we got a RM30 voucher which can be redeemed if we purchase above RM150, so I got them a set of PlayDoh that comes with cutters and moulds for cakes/pastries.

She also got to choose the venue for dinner and I knew she would ask for either McD or KFC, and true enough, we ended up in KFC.  She returned home a very happy girl that day.

Enjoying her KFC treat

Her birthday loot, from us and babysitter's family

Yiu Yiu’s 6th birthday

Yiu Yiu turned six on Tuesday. We asked her some time back and she had said that she didn’t want to celebrate it at school, so in my mind, I thought we’d just have a simple dinner celebration. When I asked her again a week before her birthday, she mentioned that she’d like to invite Victoria and Keon, two of her classmates, for her birthday. And so I thought perhaps we should organize a simple tea party at home. But I had been so busy that I neglected planning for the celebration and left it until the very last minute. And of course due to time constraint, it didn’t materialize. She was a tad disappointed that she couldn’t invite her friends but I made it up by promising that I’ll take her on a mother-daughter outing on her birthday, though it’s exam week!

We planned an early birthday celebration for her last Sunday night. It almost got cancelled coz I had a major meltdown with her just before we were scheduled to leave for dinner, and I ended up an extremely upset mummy and she, bawling in tears. Definitely spoilt the mood for the celebration.

Anyway, we eventually went ahead with dinner with my mum and siblings at Kennedy’s Grill @ Kota Damansara. I was planning to go either to Betty’s Midwest Kitchen or Nambawan when I discovered Kennedy’s Grill on Groupon’s website on Sunday afternoon itself. It looked like a decent restaurant so we decided to give it a try, and I must say, food was pretty good, though I think the portion was a tad too small.

 Mummy and daughter, having kissed and made up

 One for the family

 My two girls

 Oh no Yishen! Please don't touch the cake!

Yiu Yiu requested for the same durian cake I ordered for Yan Yan’s birthday but unfortunately, the baker was away for a few days. After some googling, I managed to order a durian mousse cake from here. It turned out to be such a delight!

The cake was light, the cream in-between the layers of cake was not too sweet nor rich, with lots of durian pulp. Highly recommended for durian lovers. A sweet ending to an eventful night!