Junko's boys

Ed and Junko were here along with their 2 boy, Jay (age 8) and Jack (age 5), well 4 boys who like each other, its almost like those boy stories that one reads about of a group of young boys on an island or something, well I can say they are very energy sapping. We took them to the zoo (almost outgrown), cycling... that wasn't bad... swimming (couldn't do cos Jack had stubbed his toe and half came off), bowling at the american club (the side bars are cool), phew. Luckily I did get time with Junko to go shopping and we all got a meal in while the boys were playing B-blades at home.



Here are two video shots of the boys who are very energetic. These monkey bars are at the new place we bought. I found a little plot of land that I could start a community garden... :)

Holidays are still not over!

4 more days to go and the kids go back to school!!!! woo hoo... well I have not had much time to come up for air and update this blog. Nate had his rash resurface and alternative eyes swell up, its quite manageable now and fading away, along with a nasty mean looking rash, here are the kids in the "salt cave", a room filled with salt and they pipe in salted air as well which is like being by a beach actually. His rash went down but I kept his appointment with the skin doctor anyway. I need to restart him on the Chinese doctor as the immune booster massages kept him and ike free of illnesses (and in school!!!). Here is Ike trying to make a snow angel.

Here is Edward my cousin's son in his army fatigues. I am grateful that he comes over to play with the boys even if its Mario brothers...

So the conclusion of this holiday with the boys is that I will need to plan the next long stretches alot better... well bubbi is here for CNY! yay!

More KL photos

Hmmm, it was really easy to upload the videos, I think I will try to take more videos! Here are the kids burning paper up to heaven or hell for the ancestors and the family reunion lunch.

We did some clay activities as well and here are some of the thing that we ended up making. Ike likes turtles, snails, sheep and recently lady's fingers cos the little white seeds inside resemble icky fish eyeballs...

And Jake playing football (did I post this already??)

KL dec 2010

The kids had their last day of school on Friday and we decided to skip the Christmas school performance and head to KL instead. We were there for about 6 days... here is nate in a ball over the water, I went with him on the first round, its quite hard to balance inside the ball and it gets quite warm as well.

This is the first time all the cousin's played so well together. We tried to get them to sleep in the same room but that didn't quite work out yet. We had a reunion year end dinner at my granddad's temple in KL and caden and chloe were there too which made managing the boys alot easier.

It is rainy season now in KL so the weather cools down alot. There is alot of break-ins as well in my brother's neighbourhood and luckily his home does not face a slope where people can climb in. They put in gantries last year as there were neighbours robbed as they were gardening outside their home!

Venus the frog

One of the school projects, the kids have to take pictures of their activities with Venus the frog. Although nate really seemed to want to do this project.... when it got to the writing part, he got distracted by his new B Blades and his friend staying over... so short entries for Venus!

Blast from the past....

More Ike pictures

Here is ike in class.... the gardening class mom plucked the sunflowers and the kids got to harvest the seeds. Too bad the seeds didn't develop fully such that we could grow them again. Other mom's teaching the kids to make christmas decorations.

Took the boys to the beach today and at one point we could see the rain come it, it didn't rain very hard where we were. Ike at one point came up and asked... what are lips for... I missed my opportunity to say for kissing, instead I say to keep your saliva in... then he said what is our body for? and I said to come to earth and learn something and with that he ran off into the ocean. I guess you could feed kids anything and they will believe it? We had a little fruit picnic at the beach and its interesting to observe other parents who won't let their kids play in the rain... One more week of school and we head to KL for a few days...

More photo's

Ike's class and their trip to the zoo. Ike likes his small backpack for his field trips.

Venus the frog

This is Venus the frog... he is nate's school project, each child gets Venus for 4 days and has to write about their activities with Venus in a book. Venus has been with Makoh to Japan!! on a horse with Nora and all sorts of other experiences... It lit the candles with the boys for hanukka and is now perched on top of the hanukka presents next to buddha and under the chinese words stuck all over our walls that nate has to learn for his chinese...

Now if I can get a picture of olivia kissing the frog in hopes of a prince or maybe I should find a venus flytrap for the parody...

Gardening classes at CNIS

So I have restarted the gardening classes at CNIS, this time... I have more parental support, I managed to get a few mom's and each will take a class or two during the week and each class has a plot. The plot's will hopefully go back to the classes and hopefully we don't have too much plants dying in this process.

I originally wanted Nate and Ike's classes but so did several mom's from that class so I got P2 and P4. It was nice to hear the appreciation from the teachers and to see the kids enjoy the session though it was rather chaotic at times.

Its always funny to see the kids go ewe when they encounter a worm or when they see me pick veges from the garden and just eat it. The P2 class picked their own young Bak Choy sprouts... not sure if their parents would let them eat it! The P4 class found all sorts of creatures in their plot... from a big hibernating bug to earthworms. Sadly as part of the process, the kids have to pull out some plants and the tomatos were just starting to flower.

I heard from another class that the sunflower seeds got plucked and was an activity for one of the younger classes. I am happy the garden gets used!

Loren and Hanukka presentation at CNIS

Here is Loren making a 20 min presentation in K2 and P1a, nate and ike's class. He prepared a few nights before by looking through youtube's sesame street and hanukka, did one on the macabees and the miracle of the oil. The menorah, kippas, dreidels and our wedding gift of a 1000 year old oil lamp from Israel came in handy for the presentation, the latkes were a hit too.

We had a PTA meeting before that, that was rather discouraging so this presentation with the kids and their attentiveness and interest (ike's googly eyes at dada) made the day alot better. Many kids asked many good questions, I wished I bought enough dreidels for each of them.

Ike's class in preparation for the Hanukkah talk actually did some coloring and printed out the hebrew characters on the dreidel. Loren taught the kids how to play with the dreidel and the kids followed him in the lighting of the candles. Was very nice.

Caterpillar died and teacher reviews

oh so sad, the tiny guy we found when he was a quarter of an inch and made it to about an inch and then he kaputted!

I had the teacher reviews and for ike, he is now confirmed a leftie, he is the only leftie in a class of 20. He is progressing well but lacks the confidence to speak up in show and tell. Maybe cos nate does many things for him he tries to wriggle out of being compared or to do them? He does however veer toward adult company and can talk alot in english (lacking confidence in chinese) and the teachers notice he pulls his arms up to his chest whenever he is nervous.

As for Nate, I have another review today with the homeroom teacher but the review with his chinese teacher was quite good, he is doing well, he likes chinese spelling and to date has had only perfect scores which I need to tell him that making mistakes are good too as you learn alot more there. His handwriting is still rather poor but when it comes to spelling he knows an extra stroke makes the character different so he is very careful and neat there. hmmm.

The boys have picked out their hanukka presents and are counting down... I find pistol and jake often in the boys room, sleeping there at night, since their door isn't closed... sneaky!

Nearing the end of 2010!

I can't believe its year end, the weather gives no clues and its already end november! We brought the caterpillar home over the weekend to observe and boy is that caterpillar a big eater and then a big poo maker. By sunday, its eating capabilities slowed down alot and then it wasn't moving and then furry bits fell off, we thought its head dropped off. We thought it died... but instead it molted to become a bigger. fluffier caterpillar.

If I am successful in uploading a video clip, its of jake playing football with us. Nate is very into his football and loves it, we practice everyday. To think I signed him up for lessons in South Africa and he absolutely hated it. Edward came by today as he was out from camp and he has his head shaven for national service.

Nate has been doing well in both his chinese and english spellings and here are some of ike's drawings. Ike's quite adamant about his favourite things like giraffes, snails, the color green, his pooh bear (soft things) and the gingerbread man.