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Thursday 31 July 2014

Blue !

Blue is the color of the sky and sea. It is often associated with depth and stability. It symbolizes trust, loyalty, wisdom, confidence, intelligence, faith, truth, and heaven.
Blue is considered beneficial to the mind and body. It slows human metabolism and produces a calming effect. Blue is strongly associated with tranquility and calmness. In heraldry, blue is used to symbolize piety and sincerity. Source: Colour Wheel Pro

This color is one of trust, honesty and loyalty. It is sincere, reserved and quiet, and doesn't like to make a fuss or draw attention. It hates confrontation, and likes to do things in its own way.
From a color psychology perspective, blue is reliable and responsible. This color exhibits an inner security and confidence. You can rely on it to take control and do the right thing in difficult times. It has a need for order and direction in its life, including its living and work spaces.
This is a color that seeks peace and tranquility above everything else, promoting both physical and mental relaxation. It reduces stress, creating a sense of calmness, relaxation and order - we certainly feel a sense of calm if we lie on our backs and look into a bright blue cloudless sky. It slows the metabolism. The paler the blue the more freedom we feel.
In the meaning of colors, blue relates to one-to-one communication, especially communication using the voice - speaking the truth through verbal self-expression - it is the teacher, the public speaker.
The color blue is idealistic, enhancing self-expression and our ability to communicate our needs and wants. It inspires higher ideals.
Blue's wisdom comes from its higher level of intelligence, a spiritual perspective.
Blue is the color of the spirit, devotion and religious study. It enhances contemplation and prayer. On the other hand, blue's devotion can be to any cause or concept it believes in, including devotion to family or work.

Blue is the helper, the rescuer, the friend in need. It's success is defined by the quality and quantity of its relationships. It is a giver, not a taker. It likes to build strong trusting relationships and becomes deeply hurt if that trust is betrayed.
Blue is conservative and predictable, a safe and non-threatening color, and the most universally liked color of all, probably because it is safe and non-threatening. At the same time blue is persistent and determined to succeed in whichever endeavors it pursues.
Change is difficult for blue. It is inflexible and when faced with a new or different idea, it considers it, analyzes it, thinks it over slowly and then tries to make it fit its own acceptable version of reality.
Blue is nostalgic. It is a color that lives in the past, relating everything in the present and the future to experiences in the past. Source: empower yourself with color psychology 

So perhaps that is why she strives on more tranquil environment and seeks more order in life? I am not really into colour psychology but I am just curious why she likes blue so much as teacher commented that she chooses blue for almost everything when during colouring and I also observes that she is adamant in getting blue items to play if she were to choose, not to mention getting excited when she sees blue ribbons, blue balloons, blue whatever ............oh yes, and she LOVES blueberries. 



I was wondering is it because I watched Smurfs before I gave birth to yx and kept singing the lalalalalala (Sing a happy song) Smurfs song to her in the evenings? zzzzzzz.... 

Wednesday 30 July 2014

Drinking Milk Together

Don't we look cute when we are drinking milk?

This is when we get our 5 mins of peace - when both of them are drinking milk together. zzzz

Word of the Day 1 - Magnet

magnet = 磁铁


Monday 28 July 2014

Fun at Punggol Promenade

Daddy, I wanna use your camera!

嗨!我 头发有没有乱 ?

Come, let's take a photo of ah pek.

Saturday 26 July 2014

Crazy mum

Ok, here is an unglam picture of me .... yx is playing pretend that she is mummy and instructed me to get ready to go school with all the bags she gave me:
  1. 1 pre-loved pink tweety bird bag as a haversack
  2. 1 pre-loved barbie doll pink sling bag on the shoulder
  3. 1 similac green bag to hang on my neck
  4. 1 empty blue plastic bag on the wrist

To top off the look, I need to put on the red hat we bought from Vietnam years ago.

mummy has become "xiao zar boh" already!
Yes, I am the clown in the making....

National Day Prelude

Since she kept saying that the Singapore flag (that daddy hang this afternoon) will fall even after we assured that the knots are really tight, I took the opportunity to have a flag making activity. 

Materials:
  1. Ice-cream stick
  2. A4 Paper or Recycled paper 
  3. Pen/pencil 
  4. Colour pencils or markers
  5. Scissors
  6. Glue
  7. Sticky tape

  • Fold the A4 paper into halves 3 times.
  • Cut out the excess paper. (for us we use 2 layers so that it is not so flimsy.)
  • Fold the paper into half slightly to get a line and draw a line across.
  • Draw a moon and five stars.
  • Colour them respectively. 
  • Place the ice-cream stick inside the paper (using the line as a guideline).
  • Glue the paper sides. 
  • Colour the ice-cream stick.
  • Use sticky tape to secure the ice-cream stick and the paper (at the white portion) together if the glue is not strong enough.


sshhhh. Don't disturb me, let me colour the ice-cream stick....


And ta-da! Here it is:

Is my flag nice? 

Let's wave ~ ~

Don't take my face...

hee... nice right?

yeay .... 
Actually, I did most of the work - she only cut the paper, colour the flag (only very faintly and I had to touch up) and ice-cream stick. But she enjoyed the process and that mummy is doing something with her.  In the end, I did another flag cos she just refused to share with yr. Sigh....

I should have also mentioned to her what the moon, stars and colour mean, but er...frankly, I can't remember (opps!). So I only explained the significance for flying the National Flag. heh.

Saturday 19 July 2014

妈妈你为什么没有陪我?

yx have been asking me every other day "妈妈你为什么没有陪我?"
(Why didn't you accompany me?)

ouch.

She is referring to accompany her to sleep at night.

Actually, I did, but every time she was asleep when I went over to her room as I have to ensure that yr is asleep before I go over. In the past, she had undivided attention and now each of us has one to take care at night.

So I have to answer her frankly and explain, "有,妈妈过来了,但你睡着了。你总是睡到乱七八糟,妈妈要帮你换睡姿,还记得吗?"

ok," 睡到乱七八糟" is like totally wrong usage, but that's my best way of putting it across directly that she is sleeping all over the place in awkward positions, so I have to adjust her body. So I explained in English again to ensure that she understood my point.

But she concluded simply, "yr在, 妈妈陪yr, yr不在, 妈妈陪yx", which is also not completely wrong. My dear gal.....*slaps forehead*

Saturday 12 July 2014

yr & yorkshire




I didn't expect yr to cry when the little yorkshire terrier refuse to stay still and ran around. yr was exasperated running after it and then he broke down. I missed his face, hopefully the next time when he sees them, it will stop and wag its tail at yr. haha...




Friday 11 July 2014

OPERATION YX

In case anyone in reading thought this is some military operation, some gaming name or new mathematical equation, it is not. I have come to a point that I have ran out of ideas and I thought this is the best name. So, this operation was conceived by daddy and mummy (actually mostly mummy >.<) who desperately want to solve yx's separation anxiety every morning to childcare.
Background
Yx started her childcare in school on 1 July and her initial performance was documented here and then later here. However, I did not mention about her crying every morning as I thought it would be a passing phase, at most for 3 months but it went on till beginning of January this year and we were so glad that the ordeal of having to see her cry every morning was over. Unfortunately, in February, she reverted to her old habit of crying again. 

The initial 2 months was a combination of crying as soon as we reach the door step of childcare, inside the childcare and occasionally whining. This situation improved slightly after the 3rd month where she no longer needs her comfort toy, aka the bear-bear pillow. The only consolation was that she cried only in the initial part where we have to part with her at the door/gate, and she stopped her nonsense within 15 minutes or less after she stepped into the centre. We did whatever was advised (read execution below), or anything that we thought could help her base on our observations, but to no avail. 

Daddy wanted to change school or stopped going to childcare initially but after discussion, both options were out:

To change childcare

  1. her own self - she needs to learn how to adapt to changes, be it change of teachers, classmates etc. Changing a new environment does not mean she could cope with it, rather things could backfire. It doesn't solve the root of the problem if she could not accept changes. 
  2. the centre - if she is not learning anything or she displays withdrawal symptoms even after stepping into the classroom, then there could be something wrong with the school (or even her learning abilities) but we have heard her singing, reciting poems etc sometimes at home and we did not teach her those songs at home. We also confirmed with teachers that she picked up quite fast but is shy and reserved at times and will keep herself at arms' length with other children if she is not comfortable with them. She is now more opened after being familiarised with her classmates and she would rattle off names of some of her classmates and tell us what they were doing during lessons. I am actually amazed by her ability to imitate sometimes. 


Analysis - Why did she cry every morning but was alright within minutes after stepping in?

  1. There was an improvement but reverted again in February - change of teachers (one of her favourite teachers quitted and we could sense the loss in her speech "qx 老师头发没有回来了."
  2. She is not feeling secure. (which we are still finding out why if it is true even after 4 months since the reshuffling of teachers, as whatever we promise her, we will keep our promise, thus I think establishing trust is not an issue.)
  3. She prefers her favourite teacher to be the one opening the door and bringing her into the classroom.
  4. She finds it boring in the morning. 
  5. It has become a habitual routine. 

There were 2 occasions where she didn't cry and stopped crying respectively:

  1. She heard there was a story-telling session and she ran to the teacher without hesitation.
  2. She was picked up by her favourite teacher who was on afternoon shift.


Planning 
Every Tue and Fri: Mummy to fetch yx to childcare
The rest of weekdays: Daddy to fetch yx to childcare

However, due to other practical reasons (such as work schedules, business travel, mum's/ in laws' schedule etc...) the above arrangement could not be really "fixed". Anyway, this also indirectly teaches yx to adapt to whoever is fetching.


Execution
OPERATION YX phase I - What we have done from July 2013 till 27 June 2014:

  1. Went to school for 1/2 a day every day for a week although it was supposed to be 3 days only to get her to get used to the environment.
  2. To drop her off quickly and make our departure short and sweet.
  3. Ask her why did she cry in the morning, reason things out with her
  4. Imitate teacher checking her temperature, hands and feet to prepare her 
  5. Gave her pep talk before sleeping
  6. Gifts as reward #
  7. Use alternative reward system such as smiley faces sticker to encourage her
  8. Make video of her saying that she is not going to cry in the morning and then show it to her before going to cc the next day. 
  9. Sing songs, nursery rhymes
OPERATION YX phase II - Started from 30 June 2014 (after meet the parents session on 28 June that we will try the following):

  1. *No pep talk at night (nothing on going to school, only normal story telling, songs and lullaby)
  2. *No showing of video (as it is likely to add stress to her even though she laughed about it when shown to her)
  3. *No mentioning of crying or anything related. (only chat with her what her friends did, what she enjoyed doing)
  4. *No asking of why are you afraid of teacher xx (she kept saying that she is afraid of teacher xx whenever we ask her why she cry in the morning, and after discussion with the teacher xx, we decided not to ask to prevent her from using that as an excuse and also saying just for the sake of saying.)
  5. If she asks "are we going to school today?", just divert the question to some other activity and if she persist, just answer her positively, "oh we are going to play with your friends and teachers." The rule is always make it positive and be excited when answering. 
  6. Continue to drop her off quickly and make it short and sweet. 
  7. Mummy to fetch her daily - if possible.(as daddy felt that she is more "attached" to him. urgh,...is that daddy's excuse? bleh~)
Note:
# We only use the "gift-buying" technique twice and stopped as we did not wish to turn it to a kind of transaction and this will instil wrong moral values to her. In both instances, there wasn't any change in her behaviour as well.
* Done for phase I and disregard for phase II

Result 
It has been 2 weeks since phase II started but it is still too early to say anything. Her reaction has been fluctuating. Let's see how by end of July. 


Any tip/advice from mummies or daddies is greatly appreciated. ={