Birthday ladies

CNY in Cameron Highlands

Once again, over the holidays, we headed to Malaysia by coach from Five Stars Tour. This time we went to Cameron Highlands. We had great reviews from dear auntie Sharol, and it was great to experience the chill and tranquility of the small town.

The views were great, especially in the early morning when the fog is just starting to clear and the first light of the sun peering through the clouds. The farms are picturesque, reminds me of the scenes in watercolour of the japanese animation by studio gibli, of the farmer on his farm. So serene and peaceful, as i take in the fresh cool air...

We were caught in the rain on the first day, but our spirits were not dampened as we heartily tucked into the steamboat dinner as the fog swirled around us. :) And we went to do some light shopping in the rain at the pasar malam.

Papa's friends and kids

Here are some of Papa's good friends and their kids.

Cass in OZ 2

Cass in OZ

First turtleneck

It was very windy last night and grandma put on a turtleneck shirt for Cass. Isn't she lovely?

Trip to ICA

Cass is all dressed up to go to ICA to change the photo in her passport. She will go on a trip with just Grandma soon.

There are many people waiting to apply the new biometrics passports..

We were there from 9am to almost 2 pm, since Mama also went to apply for citizenship.

Fireworks and Happy National Day!

Darling Cass

Cass celebrated her first pre-national day party with her playgroup pals. Mama went to get a national day cake, complete with a picture of the national flag and candles (4 big and 1 small) for its 41st birthday! All the children (combined 2 classes) looked so adorable in the white tops and white bottoms. After the party, the teacher gave each of them a goodie bag, it's the first time Cass had a first taste of a lollipop. :)

Later that evening, Papa, mama and Grandma brought Cass to see the national fireworks display.
The first time Cass saw fireworks display was during the Chinese New Year period. She was too young to appreciate it then and wanted to cry at the loud booms in the sky.

Now that she's older, she was really enjoying herself at the esplanade park. The four teams this year are: Italy, Singapore, New Caledonia and France.

Happy national Day!

Words

It's easy to forget how we piece words to form our sentences, especially when we are in a multi-lingual environment, and most of the time we speak without any prior thinking, literally. Mama's never been educated in the chinese language but tries to speak mandarin to Cass.

Lately Cass has picked up more English from her playgroup that she tries to piece them together when communicating to us. She's fast moving from a single words to double words, now even attempts at whole sentences, never mind the languages.

Here's some examples:

Kai, men peas (Open the door, please)
Me, peas (Excuse me, please)
Sit, 'jie', no more (No seats for me here)

And the campaign going on now is to speak proper Mandarin or English, and not Singlish. :)

Naughty corner early in the morning

Here's Cass sent to the naughty corner for 1 1/2 mins this morning. She's wearing the dress Auntie SK and Uncle Adrian bought for her birthday last year. 'Xie xie, ah yi'. :)

Great-granduncle, great-grand auntie and granduncle

Last week we had a few relatives from Kuching, Sarawak. They were here for a holiday and Cass went along for a 'Duck Tour' and a trip to Sentosa's butterfly and insect kingdom. Uncle Vic managed to get a duck whistle for Cass, although it's only given out to those who answered random quizzes on board. :)

Later on Sunday evening, we all went for a meal, with Great-granduncle, great-grand auntie, grand uncle Ah Hau, including Grandma, Uncle Vic, Uncle Jeff and Auntie Veron.


See how young Cass' grand uncle is?

Cass with Great-Grand uncle and auntie. He is late grandpa's brother.



Grandma and Great-grandauntie.

Grand-uncle and Great-grand uncle.

Weekend fun

On Saturday, we had to meet someone in Holland Village, so we went swimming at the Buona Vista swimming complex. It's an old pool, unlike majority of renovated ones. Cass enjoyed herself tremendously. She's now more in control with the arm floats.

Yesterday, Cass was at the zoo. We went with Uncle Raymond, Auntie Janice and little Colin. We all signed up for the family package, so we can have countless trips to the zoo for the entire year!

We only managed to catch the gibbons and the animal show. Cass loved the sea lion show, but she thought the sea lion was a seal. After a few photos, it was time for lunch and we ate at the 'forest fare'. We were stuck there for a while as it rained and Papa and Uncle Raymond went to get umbrellas from the car.

Later we said our goodbyes and picked up Grandma from the temple. Cass would definitely love going to the zoo again. :)

Goodbye Azizah

Cass' friend, Azizah, has moved out. Her family has been staying next door for more than 7 years.

Azizah is 3 months older than Cass, she always come to our gate to 'chit chat'. All's well between the two angels, except that Azizah likes to shriek and that scares Cass off! :) On one occasion, she even pulled Cass' hair, so Cass' reaction was like 'Mai..mai.. mai..' which means 'no..no..no..' in hokkien.

It was so funny that one incident when Azizah had an oversized hair clip right above her ear, and Cass went 'allo.. allo'. She mistook it for a bluetooth ear piece, just like Papa's. Ha ha!!

Time flies!

Cass is now 18months old and has started in the playgroup, DazzKids! She enjoys herself there but can't seem to shake off the anxiety just before going into class. :)

Here is Cass in her Korean dress bought by Veron. 'Xie xie, mu mu'... :)

Cass' surgery

Cass has been having styes on her eyelids for a few months now. Doc's advise is to surgically remove them and inject anti-biotics to them to prevent further growths.

Poor Cass had to be under general anesthetics as she is too young to keep still. Mama's heart ached to see Cass in distress!

Here's Cass checking out the hospital gown and bed before the day surgery.



Here's the little darling with swollen eyes and bandaged arm after the surgery.

Happy New Year!

Darling Cass

It's been almost 3 months since Mama updated Cass' blog. It's been quite hectic for Mama. So many changes, in the home and at work.

Well, it's better late than never, to wish everyone a very Happy New Year 2006 and also a Very Prosperous and Healthy Chinese New Year of the Dog.

Costly trip to the mall

Yesterday, Papa had to attend a wedding lunch so Mama and Cass went to Tanglin Mall to get the back float. The back float is supposedly much better than arm floats as it allows freedom of the arms in the water as well.

After getting the float, Mama had lunch at Don where Cass spilled half the bowl of miso soup onto the tray. Cass was good though, didn't make a fuss but imitated this guy who stood up and waved to the waiter for more rice. It was so funny. Imagine little Cass waved her hand and said 'Rice'. And she gave such a sweet smile after that.. :)

Grandma called to say she's at Uncle Jeff's place, so we took a cab there. The taxi driver was a very nice lady who helped with the stroller. It was later that Mama realised Cass lost one of her sandals. The expensive sandals from Adidas, a gift from Auntie Nonie. Oh dear...

Mines Resort City

Last Saturday, the whole family went on a 3 day 2 nights trip to Mines Resort City and stayed at Palace of the Golden Horses. The place really lives up to its name, with lots of horse motives everywhere, but no horsing around there :) pun intended... cos it was a 5-star hotel and strictly no shorts and singlets allowed.

We went by coach from 5 stars tours, 25 seater and it was a relaxing ride with huge comfortable seats with plenty of legrooms. You could almost lie flat on the reclining seats! Cass had a wonderful time looking out the huge windows on the bus and alternating between Mama, Papa, Grandpa, Grandma and Uncle Vic's laps.

We were well prepared for the trip except for the what-to-do there part, cos Mama wants a break from planning too much. However, old habits die hard, so most of the planning was done for Cass' needs instead. So we had enough warm clothes for the coach, change of clothings for the entire stay including long pants, handkerchiefs, socks, milk bottles, milk powder, cereal, baby food jars, hot water thermos, spoons and of course, diapers. Papa also prepared the MP3 player with Cass' favourite alphabet songs and Mama brought along Cass' favourite bilingual animal book to entertain her along the way.

The coach was full and we were surprised to be the only ones to get off at the Palace of the Golden Horses. Seems like the other people on the bus were headed for the Mines Resort and Spa. Initially Mama wanted to book at this resort instead, as the name has the words, 'resort' and 'spa', so should be quite relaxing, right? Wrong! The little picture of the beach on the brochure is actually a little cornered off pool of water with sand in it beside the lake. Thank goodness we took the palace instead. And like Papa said, how good can a resort be in urban KL? Guess he was right this time round.

At the resort there is a shopping centre and a small theme park which is only open from 5pm to 11pm. We had to take the water taxi to cross the lake from the Palace of the Golden Horses and cruise right into the shopping centre. The canal even has a system (forgot what's it called) like the UK ones to raise/lower the water taxi between the different water levels of the canal.

On the 1st day, we went to the shopping centre and had dinner at PuYen vegetarian restaurant and gallery. The shopping centre is quite huge with lots of reject shops and children's boutiques. Mama targetted some shoes which after discount were like less than $10 a pair and bought 2 pairs in diff colours! Mama also bought Cass a few sets of clothes, shoes and socks and wet wipes from the Tenderly brand. Mama likes the cheap and good Tenderly brand from Malaysia, plus they smell good too! Grandma also bought 2 huge bags of tissue packs cos they were RM$1.99 each :)

On the 2nd day, we went to KLCC and had lunch at the Royal Thai Restaurant which also had a vegetarian menu. Cass played 'Sawadikup' with the waitresses while we were busy eating. We didn't get to shop in KLCC and took a cab back to the Mines Wonderland. There we took the train ride to see the white tigers, bengal tigers, sun bear and monkeys. Cass was especially delighted to see a little 'farm' with lots of fluffy bunnies and guinea pigs running about, talking parrots and white peacocks too!

We also took the road tram around the park to see the various gardens with huge lantern structures of coins, 7 wonders of the world and the Admiral Cheng Ho exhibition. We all enjoyed the musical fountain the best! The emcee was great to engage the crowd that we were all singing and clapping along, before the show started. Cass was dancing, clapping and laughing away, clearly enjoying herself throughout! :) It was great to end the day with a water taxi ride across the lake back to the hotel.

On the 3rd day we had to check out by 12 noon, so we all went swimming after breakfast. Cass really loves to swim! She kicks her legs and waves her arms to propel herself in the water. After we checked out, we had lunch at the cantonese restaurant 'Kim Ma' on the hotel grounds.

The little darling was so exhausted that she slept for hours on the coach! :)

Cass' party

Today being a public holiday, Mama decided to hold Cass' birthday party so she can play with the other babies and toddlers too!
Mama would like to thank all the friends and family. Thanks for bringing the kids and all those presents! Mama regrets Papa did not take enough pictures, left out some guests as well :(



Here is Cass, freshly showered with hair neatly combed. She must be thinking today's going to be an exciting day. She keeps smiling and grinning to see the furniture shifted and balloons popping up from under the dining table.



Papa gives Cass a pink balloon. Look.. the balloon is bigger than me :)



Ding-dong! Here comes the cake in a very big box.

One of the first guests, Uncle Adrian and Auntie SK.


Mama's and Papa's friends came to the party with their kids. Auntie June with Terese, Tricia and Jaden.


Here's Nigel, staring at the cake. He's waiting to sing the birthday song and help to blow out the candle.


Cass is so happy to be with these 2 fine gentlemen. Who wouldn't be? ;)



Everyone's ready, let's pose for the camera and start. Happy Birthday to you...Happy Birthday to you.. Happy Birthday to Cassandra... Happy Birthday to you!


As Uncle Leonard says in his blog, the birthday girl or boy always gets emotional. :) That's Auntie Liselle in the corner. (Sorry no proper pics with you..)


Nigel helping to blow out the birthday candle.


Mama's buddies from SIM, Uncle Leonard, Uncle Desmond and Auntie YaLing are here except Auntie Nicole. Here's Uncle Leonard's family: Auntie Celest, Nigel and Shannon.


Very proud parents!


Cass' grandparents and cousin Casey.


Papa's aunt and sister, Grand auntie and Auntie Swee Hia, Casey's mum.


It's hard work being an Australian Idol, says Jaden.


Cass would very much to play with Darilyn, if only she were not so shy. She was clinging to Auntie Doris the whole time. Uncle James had to fetch food for them. Say, Darilyn's birthday should be coming up soon.



Here's Colin, Cass' favourite chum. Colin's only 6 months old, but he's strong. In the corner is Kyran. His one-month old brother, Cayden, was also at the party, but he's sleeping in Auntie Aileen's arms.


Auntie Janice and Uncle Raymond were late, so Colin wasn't present during the birthday song. So were Kyran's. His dad is Uncle Sebastian.


Tricia playing with balloons. On her right is Uncle Raymond, Colin's dad. On the left is Uncle James, Darilyn's dad.

Where is Papa?

Poor Cass misses her papa. She woke up at 5.30am yesterday, called out for her papa while mama went to prepare her milk. Today she woke up at 4.30am, again called out to her papa but no response.

Ask her where's papa and she cocks her head to see if he's in the bathroom. Then she remembers she last waved goodbye to him at the door, so she points to the door and made a little wave. :)

Papa's coming home from Malacca tonight!