Shan & Ben's Wedding

So the happy day came!  Shan got married!  And a wonderful match in my opinion :)  This was a highly anticipated wedding, and it turned out splendidly.  Stunning bride, gorgeous gown, and the flowers were some of the most beautiful I've seen at any wedding.  It was literally overflowing with flowers at the wedding ceremony, reception and dinner.  Absolutely beautiful orchids!  I wish I could fill my house with all those flowers! 

The zhuang men was great fun.  I mean, how can it not be fun to tekan other people, especially the groomsmen!  We had to get creative to overcome the problem of her house not actually having a gate.  So we created a spider web for the brothers to carry the groom through.  Then they had to show their dancing prowess by following the moves from Beyonce's Single Ladies.  And Ben proved himself by knowing most of the answers to the Q&A we had prepared for him. 

I think it's easier to let pictures capture the wedding then to actually describe it.  So when I get around to uploading them, you can take a look for yourself :)

 

 As an aside, we dressed Asher in a tux we borrowed from Aidan just for fun.  We had a trial session the night before and quickly decided that we should dispense with the bow-tie.  Asher kept pulling it and letting it snap back on himself, so we thought we'd let him go for the "cool-casual" look, open collar and no tie...more for safety than for anything else :) 

I wanna be like Daddy

Ok, time for a break!

Whew, Daddy's work sure is tiring!

Time to go to work!

Always carry tissue, especially if you drool like me.

Or at least have Daddy on hand to wipe it away ;)

Checking out the rain

A little matador

Playing with the fans given out for the ceremony.  Peekaboo!

Oh, and one funny (and gross) thing that happened.  Asher had a MAJOR poo disaster at the luncheon.  As I carried him I could smell something, and my arm felt a bit moist.  Concluded that he had a poo, and went to change him.  Little did I realise what was waiting for me.  Er...without describing every detail, his pants were completely soiled and so were his shoes...  I literally stripped him down and showered him in the basin.  Thank goodness we had extra clothes and sandals!  This is him after the shower :)

Toddler Class

Haven't updated much on Asher's childcare.  He's been transferred to the Toddler Class since he was 18 months old and though the initial transition had its share of hurdles, he now thoroughly enjoys school.  I think it really helps that he had four other friends who transferred at the same time - the largest batch to transfer together I think.  One of them has since left, but he still remembers her and often mentions her name.  Guess they do make friends young! 

He gets more outdoor time now - once a day when the weather is fine - and water play on Wednesday.  Then there's more story time and art, two activities he really enjoys.  But there's still plenty of free play for the kids to just be themselves.  Sometimes I literally have to drag him away from school to go home.  But, it's comforting for me to know that he's having a good time even though I'm unable to be with him.  And he really likes his friends.  At home he sometimes picks up my mobile phone and pretends to call them to ask them to go outdoors or just say hello.  It's very cute to watch :)

And this boy, don't know whether its cos he's generally quite observant, or cos his mummy loves shoes so much, but he can recognise all his friends' shoes when they're on the shoe rack (there are names, but he can't read, I don't think).  I think he really knows which shoe belongs to which friend because when the shoes are sometimes placed in the wrong cubby, he still knows who it belongs to (I have started to recognise them too).  Quite entertaining.

Anyway, just some pics I snapped the other day.

Happy at tea time

Changing tables to sit next to his good friend, Charlotte, who told him "Asher, eat!"

He actually listened!  He didn't want to eat it before when he was sitting at the other table.  Or maybe it was just the sociable thing to do?  Who knows what he's thinking.

Evidence of his snacking

Doing a spontaneous dance

More dancing.  Looks like he was trying to do a grand battement (ballet high kick)!

Milk break at the carpark downstairs

Off to the supermarket for a spot of grocery shopping.  My little helper, or "Captain" as I call him when he's in the trolley.  He likes to help put (or throw) stuff into the trolley.  I find that when he's helped to buy the food (fruit especially), he's more likely to want to eat it.

Underwater World

I was supposed to bring Asher to watch the PLAYtime performance called The Magic Ocean, but didn't manage to get tickets (it's a long story).  I felt bad though, cos I had been building the anticipation for a few weeks by telling Asher about the performance.  And especially that morning itself, I was promising to bring Asher to see lots of fish and sharks and jellyfish.  He kept repeating, "See shark!  See fish! See turtle!" 

So when I found that the tickets I thought I had were not to be, I was very disappointed, and was thinking of how to not disappoint Asher as well.  Thanks to a great suggestion by a colleague of mine, I decided to bring Asher to the Underwater World!  What a wonderful idea, and I duly thanked my colleague lots the next day.

Asher had a terrific time I think!  And it was more fish than I could have imagined Asher seeing.  Real ones too!  As it was a weekday it was fairly uncrowded, but we got there quite late, around 4pm, so we missed many of the shows already.  Still, we managed to catch the seal show, which he seemed to enjoy.  Not sure if he realises the seals at the underwater world are different from the ones we saw at Philip Island.  I explained the difference between fur seals and seals, but not sure if he really remembers :) 

Asher tried touching the starfish and stingrays at the touchpool, but his arms weren't quite long enough to dip all the way into the water, and I feared that if he leaned in any more, he'd end up as part of the exhibit.  So moved on to look at the other fish on display. 

Then of course there's the famous glass (acrylic?) tunnel enclosure that we went round and round in.  Lots of fishes!  Nurse sharks, leopard sharks, black-tipped sharks, groupers, whiptail stingrays, leopard stingrays, pirahnas, angel fish, etc etc etc! 

Other exhibits included the leafy sea dragon which I liked very much, jelly fish, and fishes found in coral reefs. 

All in all it was an excellent outing, with lots of memories for Asher.  I got the Submarine Value Package which gives you access to the oceanarium for two visits, and a discount voucher for another ticket, which I intend to use for Jon.  I'm sure Asher won't mind going again, and maybe next time, we can bring Baby!  Baby?  Yes, another one of those things I haven't gotten around to writing about yet :)  More info next time.

Checking out the different types of stingrays at the ray feeding area

Seal show

Leafy sea dragons

A whiptail stingray over our heads!

Humongous grouper that doesn't quite look so big here, altho this shot looks like it wants to eat Asher, which...if he was inside I'm not sure won't happen

Funny dugong which liked 'standing' on its head

Pretty jellyfish

Breezy Poliwoggy Day

Brought Asher to Poliwogs at East Coast again for an afternoon runabout.  It was a rainy day and he missed his outdoor time in school, plus it had been a while since we went to the playground cos of the rain, so thought Poliwogs was a much needed treat.  He took an interest in different things this time around, but the one constant was the attraction to all the colourful balls :) 

My favourite part of the outing was after we left Poliwogs though, when we sat on a bench by the sea to enjoy the breeze.  It was so enjoyable we did that again after dinner.  The sea breeze was beautiful, the air cool, and there were plenty of things to look at - boats, ships, airplanes, bodyboard surfers (if that's what they're called).  He just sat on my lap, and we enjoyed the place. 

Dinner was at Waraku, and boy, was it worth it.  Not only did Asher eat quite well (we shared a ten don), the waitresses had time to play with him cos it wasn't too crowded, AND, they gave him a couple of toys!  I had actually thought they were just lending them to us for the duration of dinner, but when I returned them they told me the toys were for Asher to keep!  Asher really likes the digger, but the red robot I've kept away cos it's not really meant for his age now.  But I had some fun playing with it and reliving my childhood haha..it's got two buttons to blow bubbles to push little rings up in the water, and the aim is to try to get the rings onto two 'poles'.  Haven't seen this game in the longest time.  Anyway, I don't really buy a whole lot of toys for Asher, so it was a welcome addition to have another vehicle for him to play with :)  Waraku is super kid friendly, I'll definitely go back again. 

As a side note, it appears Asher likes Lady Gaga.  He was bobbing to her tracks all through dinner haha :)  Looks like she's got all age groups hooked on her music.  I recently heard an elderly person humming one of the songs from her album :)

SAM Art Garden

For one of our afternoon outings I decided to bring Asher to check out the Singapore Art Museum's children's exhibition.  I had asked Asher if he wanted to go to the park (Botanical Gardens) or go see a big white rabbit.  He chose the rabbit, so off we went!

It took much longer than expected to get there, and as it turns out, it was the day that the tree fell in front of the Istana, forcing the Orchard road traffic to squeeze into 1 or 2 lanes.  But we got there eventually, and it was well worth it. 

The place was empty cos it was a weekday afternoon, so we had most of the place to ourselves :)  First up, Walter's Garden.  It's filled with lots of green tetrahedron cushions, and Asher had a good time arranging and placing them exactly as he liked.  He was quite particular, this cushion had to sit just so, that cushion had to be at that angle.  This green here, that green there; big one here, small one there.  Touch any of them and he would protest.  Watching him made me think of an installation artist at work haha.  Maybe, maybe?  Next time?  Who knows!

Carefully transporting the cushions to fit into his piece of installation art.  He had arranged all the cushions in the picture below.

Further refinements.  An artist's work is never done ;)

Yes, he had so much fun I literally had to draaagg him away from the place lest we end up only seeing that bit of the exhibition.  Next, the Floribots!  These were very intriguing.  The room was filled with these paper flowers on retractable stems that grew/un-grew (if there's such a thing) in front of your eyes.  Asher was entralled, and stood still watching the flowers in action.  Didn't quite realise that the movements in the room affect how the flowers grew, but apparently there are motion detectors that calibrate the pattern of growth of the Floribots. 

There was a little corner with some origami paper for children to fold their own paper flowers, so we had a go at it.  I folded the paper over, and Asher helped to press down the fold to make the crease.  Here he is with his orange flower, which he clung onto for the rest of the visit :)  This boy really likes flowers.

Actually folding the flower also brought back childhood memories of how we used to fold the 'chatterbox', but anyway. 

We then headed to see the Enchanted Forest.  Half the room was illustrated with colourful pictures of a forest filled with characters from all sorts of fairy tales and nursery rhymes, including an appearance by the Merlion.  My favourite bit?  The dish and the spoon!  Here they were having a picnic, there they were going for a walk in the forest, it was adorable :)

Doing some colouring before we explored the forest

There's my dish and spoon!

Asher then displayed more installation art inclinations.  This is actually one of the things he always enjoys doing when we're at houses with stools - arranging them into some pattern or other :)  Here he goes with the IKEA stools.  The caretakers were quite amused, as was I :)  How fitting to be doing such things in an art museum heh.

Getting ready to jump 'into' the pond :)

But the best exhibits had to be the Funky Forest and Daisies.  I think I can safely say that those were Asher's favourite parts of the visit, and mine too.  There were two interactive media displays that respond to the movements of visitors.  The Funky Forest was the one where if you stood along the edge of the wall, a tree would start to grow in front of the spot you were standing at.  It was fun growing trees, but that wasn't all.  You had to keep them alive!  There was an image of a waterfall flowing down one side of a wall, then becoming a river on the ground.  You had to divert water to the trees to water them so that they would thrive.  How to do that?  It was, for lack of a better word, just so cool!  If you kick the 'river' in the direction of your tree, some water would flow there.  You could permanently divert the river using a 'log' (a cushion) to keep your tree constantly watered. 

How cool is that?  An image of a river that responds to your actions!  If you jumped on the river, there would be a splash and water would 'splash' outwards.  You could kick the water about to create some serious virtual water chaos.  And the most intriguing bit, I really couldn't figure out how it was done.  There didnt appear to be visible sensors around.  The ground and wall were just regular concrete.  How did they do it??

Growing trees

See another tree just starting to sprout from where Asher's standing?  And see how the water was diverted to the fully grown tree!  Amazing!

SPLASH!!

At the other end of the room was Daisies.  It was a bed of white flowers on the ground, but when you ran over them, they disappeared, and after a short while would start to grow back again.  It was fun running all around with Asher trying to make all the flowers disappear, but it was impossible cos the flowers grew back too quickly.  I can't remember whether I heard it or read it there, but apparently the piece was supposed to illustrate how fragile nature is and how easily it is destroyed.  But actually, the sense I got was more of the enduring resiliance of nature.  No matter how much you trample over it, it will grow back again.  It felt hopeful.

But anyway, it was great that it was so empty cos Asher could run from Funky Forest to the Daisies over and over to his hearts content, and I didn't have to follow him so closely.

We said our goodbyes to Walter who was visible from every floor, and headed home for a much needed dinner :)