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Originally posted 2010-10-27 22:13:14. How time flies. Blink (of) an eye, as the Chinese saying goes, and it has already been 3 years since Caitlin started pre-school. And as with tradition with her school, the annual concert is also the … Continue reading
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Originally posted 2008-07-12 03:09:55. . Just wanted to share our little outing this evening…. that almost didn’t happen… Since the Genting trip and getting a thrill from the ferris wheel there, I thought the next mini adventure for the little … Continue reading
Originally posted 2008-04-21 12:15:34.
Hey, what’s this thing I can see before me? 4 on this side, 4 on this other side, and a shorter one each on both sides…?
Originally posted 2010-06-13 13:38:55.
Would you do it?
I took the kids for a swim again this morning. Yesterday’s experience tells me that they enjoy hanging around underneath the simple man-made waterfall at the other end of the pool, where there are two major streams and some trickles like heavy rain falling onto the pool from about 4 feet above water. WIth Caitlin’s cossie that houses the 2 front and back floats on, I could focus most of my attention on Caleb who doesn’t have any floats yet; at the deeper end of the pool of 4.5 feet (?), at the grounds of our condo.
This morning, while enjoying the sensation of water gush-falling onto our heads, I looked around and saw that, in between the plastic grating of the pool’s perimeter drain, were a pair of bird wings sticking out. A pigeon-sized bird too.
Yuck, a dead bird. I thought. Better get out of here soon, alert someone to rid of it before it gets septic and get into the general pool water.
I pointed it to Caitlin, justified that we can’t / shouldn’t stay much longer ‘cos of germs from a dead animal. I also didn’t want to just leave it there. So I thought to leave these 2 kids as brief as I could in the 1.5 feet baby pool, which is actually just next to the waterfall, and try to rid of the carcass myself without leaving them alone too long.
After shifting them there, I soon found a stick at the nearby BBQ pit, and went back to try and fish the carcass out.
As I shifted the gratings to widen the gap for easy access, the bird moved / jerked.
I tried and positioned the stick under its feet, hoping that it would at least make it easy for both of us to lift it out of the water. But that first movement was the only movement I saw. Clearly it was already nearing death.
I can only imagine that it fell into that bit of gap with its wings up and above its body, unable to get up and out. With most of its body submerged in water in all that time; possibly also its head, it is clearly already dying from exhaustion and being in water for so long, for a bird.
It tried to open its eyes but obviously too exhausted; mustering maybe an inhale every second- I don’t think birds breathe that slowly in general.
Pinching one of its wings and supporting the rest of its body on the stick, I fished-lifted it out, and placed it in the shade under some nearby bushes. I thought of putting it under the sun for quick drying, but that may actually make things worse.
At least it wasn’t a decomposing bit of animal polluting the water, I thought, and the kids are kinda safe in the water.
But what about the poor animal?
I personally didn’t and don’t have the heart to put it out of its misery, much less infront of or for the kids’ knowledge. But the poor animal clearly will not make it, and is suffering.
I pointed Caitlin to where the bird lay (under the bushes near the baby pool where they were), and said that it will likely die soon, and pouted my lips at her. She was sad too, but not too much, and remarked that it’s okay, the mummy bird can make more baby birds.
Not much of an animal lover, I see.
But back to the bird- what would you have done about it?
Originally posted 2008-09-16 11:52:09.
Gotta love podcasts!
When I started this blog I was hunting for resources to educate myself on parenting and to also talk about it here- looks like I had my priorities wrong way around!
Anyway, in my search I had found a few podcasts that talk about parenting- these are only audio versions, of peads interviewing child development experts, answering medical related questions, etc. Then I stumbled upon storytelling audio podcasts too, which is something I don’t mind “learning” too to then tell the kids stories at bedtime. Eventually.
I then started looking into the video podcasts too, and found Dora, Sesame Street, and a few others. I started downloading the Sesame Street ones first, and showed them to Caitlin. She loved them!
Though these are only 5 minutes or so each episode, she has since learned that hitting the space bar starts the clip again at the end. This “trick” has freed me to go about my evening routine like shower, and; well, shower. I just leave her to watching – She doesn’t mind watching it over and again.
Hey that sounds like why the tv is called the idiot box…..
Like the tv series each episode has a theme. One could be about newspapers, another is tricycle; lately Caitlin likes to watch the “eat your colours” one repeatedly. I don’t mind these because she does learn something. Like with this episode, while she chants along with the tune of what food is what colour, she is learning that these are good foods to eat (green is for broccolli, red for carrot, etc). The latest episode is on insects. I watched it with her the first time wondering what they’d be talking about. I was reminded myself that the distinctive feature of insects is that they have 6 legs…..
But at the basic of these podcasts, she is learning good English; albeit that of American accent.
This is what I liked most- that she is actually picking up proper English through watching these. I say proper English because here people tend to not speak properly, since it isn’t the mother tongue of most.
So then my question is: Are there any similar Mandarin educational podcasts? I don’t even mind dubbed ones of Sesame Street. I think there may be a few dubbed versions of popular ones already- Thomas and Pocoyo. Kids shows, that is- ‘cos there are Mandarin podcasts but those are tailored for adults wishing to learn the language.
I subscribe to these via iTunes only, meaning there is likely other podcasts not covered in iTunes.
Posted in A father's POV, A toddler's POV, Caitlin the heiress, Education
Originally posted 2009-11-01 18:00:12. Last night was Caitlin’s real experience of Halloween; well, for this Daddee too, actually. Last year’s Halloween in particular (because I can’t remember if 2007′s Halloween left any impression on this then-just under 4 years old), … Continue reading
Originally posted 2008-10-23 18:09:42.
As you know Caitlin enjoys being picked up from school by her favourite human on Earth (ahem).
So since I had the day off work (actually I had taken the whole week off since I have a load of annual leave left), and also that our department had organised a lunch party, I thought to pick Caitlin up from school and head on over to the office party with her in tow, to show her the place where I work.
The party was a combined Raya celebrations as well as farewell for a staff. But little did I know that there was also gonna be performances by my peers. Some singing, some dancing, some fashion show parade.
We arrived about 50 minutes after the party started- Caitlin’s school day only ended 30min after the scheduled start of the party. By then there were thank-you speeches already by my unit head, and soon followed by performances.
The ladies in the unit danced, sang self-written rhymes to tease the farewell staff. Staff were also requested to come “dressed up”, so there were also fashion / catwalk parades. In good sportsmanship, when my peers saw me walking in with Caitlin, I was also requested to parade under the “Daddy with daughter” category. Caitlin wasn’t too appreciative of that, but she obliged since I was holding her hand. We did a walk, I wanted to twirl her but she wasn’t really in the mood, and we walked back to where we were hiding.
Soon after, lunch was served. It was only then that she started coming out of her shell, starting to respond and then started talking to the adults in my office. It was afterwards that I found out that she even volunteered info- that she spoke first instead of just responding, about her day in school, with one of the ladies here…
Hmm I wonder if it was ‘cos food was being served that she opened up….
So now she has seen “Daddee’s office”. Complete with dancing ladies, singing ladies, ladies winning (small) awards for being best-dressed, a big table full of food with tomato rice, not-spicy curry dishes, cakes, “crackers” (she didn’t know they were called papadums), and Playhouse Disney (website) on Daddee’s work laptop.
Talk about misconceptions about the adult working life from an early age!
