The Goh Family

Timmy's tantrums

2007-04-17T14:39:00.001+01:00

We've realised from some time ago that Timmy is a little bit more temperamental than Matty. He's also more prone to throwing tantrums when he doesn't get what he wants or is just frustrated with life in general. I had always thought this was an issue that we'd have to deal with when he reached the "terrible twos". However, he's clearly very advanced in this area cos he's been doing it for months and months!

Here's an example from when he started walking a couple of months ago. This is one of those "keep for posterity and use to embarrass them when they grow up" kind of videos =)

Heehee, did you notice his "ballroom dancing" walking style?

Haha, broadband is up!!

2007-03-25T10:51:00.000+01:00

Hurrah, hurrah, our broadband is up and running! After living on dial-up for a month, the speed boost is definitely appreciated. Anyhow, I thought I'd put up some recent photos of the kids for those of you who haven't already seen them recently.

Here's Timmy, who's now very adept at walking around the house showing off by walking around AND carrying a bag (yes, it looks huge but it's empty so it's not in the least heavy). He loves transporting things from one place to another and as a result we've found shoes, toys and all manner of stuff residing in places where they really shouldn't be..

And this is Matty in his new school celebrating his 4th birthday. He's quite settled in now and has a whole host of friends who are no doubt as keen about cars as he is! Interestingly enough, in his old school in London, whenever asked to name his friends he'd always name the girls but here in S'pore he always names the boys. Err.. S'porean girls not very appealing to him maybe?? =P

Anyhow, praise God that the kids seem to have adapted well to life back in S'pore. They don't seem to mind the heat at all and prefer the food as well. Our new helper, Mel has also settled in nicely and gets along with the kids, which is a huge load off our minds. It's also good to be back in our church, ARPC, and to catch up with old friends and our DG as well. All in all, a very smooth relocation I think..

I'll be going back to work in a week's time so that will be another big change. Will keep you posted (although not that regularly) on what's going on in our lives. Ta for now!

Home again, home again..

2007-03-03T23:29:00.000Z

Yes, we're back! It's been a hectic 2 weeks since we arrived. Every day has been occupied by meeting up with various folks or sorting out some errand or other. The good news is, we're a lot more settled now than when we first came back. All our stuff has been shipped back safely and more or less put away, Matthew has settled in to a couple of days at school and seems to enjoy it, our new domestic helper has arrived and seems nice.. Not bad at all for just 2 weeks!

The bad news is, our broadband won't be set up till the end of the month so I can't post up any pictures until then. When there's time (and more bandwidth), I'll put up some pics of Matty at school celebrating his birthday. Oh, and Timmy has grown his first tooth and started walking too! So, more to come later....

Small spaces

2007-02-15T10:53:00.000Z

Okay, okay, I won't close down the blog. But with me going back to work after we get back to Singapore, I'm not sure how frequent the posts will be. Maybe once a fortnight or once a month? We'll see how it goes...

In less than 24 hours we'll be on our way home. We've now moved out of our apartment and are staying in a serviced apartment. It feels a little like we're on holiday and I think we're all quite looking forward to getting home real soon!

I thought I'd put up some pictures of the kids which I took in the last couple of weeks. For some reason, kids get fascincated by the strangest things. Recently, they've been quite keen on small spaces. Timmy in particular enjoyed climbing into the bottom cupboard of our computer table. He fits in quite snugly and can happily play there for ages!

And then Matty not to be outdone decided to have his own little private hidey hole under the table. Well, private for all of 2 minutes, until his little brother realised where he was and promptly crawled in with him! The two of them stayed there for a good 15 mins, giggling (or rather cackling) together and tossing things in and out. They are really quite cute together sometimes =)

Timmy in his hidey hole

The kids under the table

Going home..

2007-02-06T21:33:00.000Z

Yes, 3 years has gone by really quickly and now it's almost time for us to go home to Singapore for good. In our last month here we've tried to catch up with some friends here whom we won't see for some time. The photo here was taken with the Mungeams, Luke's guardians from his Sevenoaks days. We went to visit them over the New Year weekend and had a lovely time there.

While it's sad to leave, we're also looking forward to seeing all the friends and relatives at home again. Haha, now that we're going back, perhaps there won't be any huge need to keep up with this blog anymore.. After all, those of you in S'pore will be seeing a lot more of us!

The beautiful Alps

2007-01-08T12:01:00.000Z

We went to Germany for a week just before Christmas and it was a wonderful holiday! We saw more snow than we've ever seen in our lives -- Matty got to stomp around in it, we threw some snowballs at Luke and it was very very cold!

One of the highlights was taking the cable car up to the top of the Tegelberg. It was really very serene and beautiful up there, as you can see for yourself.. Looks like postcard shots no?

Timmy was snug as a bug in a rug because the nice couple we stayed with lent us their pram and extremely cosy fur bag. All in all, it was definitely a great experience and I'm sure Matty at least will remember his first white Christmas!

Matty's Nativity play

2006-12-11T17:26:00.000Z

Matty's school recently did a Nativity play, and he was chosen to play the part of a shepherd. His one line was "I have brought a sheep", and he was VERY proud of it! Sneakily, the school got the parents to provide the costumes, so here he is carrying a home-made staff and wearing one of my maternity tops! =)

We went to watch the play which was all of 10 minutes long (well, can't really expect much more from 3-4 year olds). The kids were quite cute and all the parents were very proud.

Here's them and their rendition of "Away in a Manger"

Brothers

2006-12-04T21:18:00.000Z

Now that Timmy is getting older, he's starting to be able to interact more with Matty. I think what Matty enjoys most is being able to amuse his little brother by doing silly things. It's not an uncommon sight to see Matty jumping around like a lunatic, or making funny noises, and Timmy cackling away like it's the funniest thing in the world.

Well, I may not always understand the humour, but it is really wonderful to see them doing a bit more things together now! Matty is also a bit less resistant to spending some of his precious play time reading to or playing with Timmy, which is great. I really hope and pray that they will grow up to be good friends...

Matty Walking

2006-11-24T12:48:00.000Z

Timmy is going to be a year old very soon. He's almost exactly the same age as Matty was when we first moved to London and it's interesting to see the similarities and the differences between the two of them. There are still some developmental milestones that I'm waiting for. e.g. Timmy still has no teeth!!

The other major thing which Matty started to do when he was about a year old was to start walking. I was looking thru some of the old video clips I'd taken of Matty and found an amusing one which I just had to put up on the blog. I watched it quite a few times and it was just hilarious.. enjoy!

As you can see, kids are quite resilient to the knocks and bumps of life.. =)

On top of the world

2006-11-13T09:19:00.000Z

Now that our time in London is coming to an end, we have to start doing some of the stuff that we'd like to do before going home. One of the things on this to-do list is going on the London Eye, so on a nice sunny weekend, off we went!

After queueing for about an hour (to buy tickets, and then to get on), we finally "boarded" one of the pods. The view was actually pretty nice from up there, and as you can see, it was a really wonderfully sunny day.

I personally found the view of the other pods & the eye's mechanism a lot more interesting than the view of London..

The boys all had a good time, and I tried not to feel too scared of the height. We stopped moving for a few minutes when we were about 2/3 of the way up and I got a little paranoid about it having broken down and us being stuck up there for hours... But thankfully that didn't happen. Also thought it was very sneaky of British Airways to put their logo prominently on some of the windows for free publicity in millions of photos all around the world!

It's a miracle..

2006-11-04T10:51:00.000Z

It's funny how things turn out. Just 2 days after I put up the last post on Timmy messing up his shelf, I thought I'd try to teach him how to tidy up after himself.

And as you can see, voila, mission accomplished! He's now pretty good at putting his small toys into a larger box or container. Hurrah!! =)

Messing up stuff

2006-10-26T12:01:00.000+01:00

All neat and tidy..

.. the messer upper at work..

...and then leaving the scene of the crime!

Timmy is very into messing up his bookshelf. As you can see, he's got quite a lot of books, which we try to stack neatly on his own personal shelf. I sometimes bring him over there to try to read a book to him, but barely 3 pages into it, he'll start struggling to get to the shelf. Once he manages to wriggle free, he'll proceed to toss the books off the shelf onto the floor, only contented when most of them are randomly scattered..

As you can tell from the video, he even has pretty strict criteria on how far is far enough... And if he spots you trying to tidy the books up while he's playing with something else, he'll quickly crawl over and mess up the shelf in the midst of your best efforts to put the books back.. It's the same with his box of toys. His favourite past time seems to be creating chaos out of order!

I can hardly wait till he's old enough to tidy up after himself! Hmm.. or maybe I'll settle for him being old enough to stop throwing his books and toys all over the place for now..

Going to school

2006-10-10T10:59:00.000+01:00

Matty is a proper big boy now. He goes to school in a school uniform! The good thing about having a temperate climate is you can have really nice looking uniforms. Smart, preppy ones.. He's wearing his school's winter uniform in the picture above -- grey cord trousers, white polo T and a red sweatshirt. Looks nice ya?

Of course the downside of living in a posh area and going to a posh-ish school is the cost of the uniforms! I shall not provide numbers but suffice it to say that each item of his uniform costs more than what I'd pay for my own clothes... Oh well, at least we get to take pictures of him looking smart =)

Daddy the strong..

2006-09-23T15:26:00.000+01:00

L's always been quite taken with my brother's ability to hoist 3 kids up in his arms and swing them around [but said brother is an ex-rugby player, and dear hubby of mine's pursuits tend to be more of the indoor sort] Having said that, L can carry very heavy weights on his shoulders for long distances (must be all the army training), which is very handy when it comes to bringing Timmy out in his sling.

He also occasionally hoists Matty up on his shoulders but Matty is very uncooperatively ticklish. So after just a few seconds he'll squirm, laugh, pull out some of L's hair and beg to be let down. All very unsatisfying for L...

Arts and culture? Pah!

2006-09-09T21:19:00.002+01:00

I'm not much of an artsy person, but I do occasionally enjoy strolling around in museums. Luke likes looking at paintings, but I am partial to Greek-type sculptures, like the one below for example...

During our recent trip, I thought it might be nice to introduce our kids to the idea of visiting museums so we spent a day at the Musee de Beaux Arts. Unfortunately, Timmy spent most of his time looking like this:

And what Matty most enjoyed was stomping around in the quiet hallways (despite my best efforts to shush him), and "pretending to be like that man" (see photos below)

Sigh, so much for that bright idea....

My trip to Lille

2006-08-29T23:41:00.001+01:00

Daddy, mummy, Timmy and I had a really nice holiday in Lille last week.

Instead of flying there in an aeroplane, we took a special train called the Eurostar. I was really thrilled when mummy told me that the train goes through a tunnel under the water in the sea! When we were in the tunnel, I looked out the window and said "Where's the water, mummy? I don't see any.."

The hotel was nice too. Mummy spent some time taking photos out the window, but I thought it was a lot more fun to fiddle with the TV and dishwasher.

We visited the small zoo they had, where I fell down on my butt in some damp muddy ground. I don't know why mummy was so bothered by the brown patches on my white pants... She also got daddy to stand next to a very fierce pelican who pecked him a couple of times (she pretended she wanted to take a photo of him)

I spent some time relaxing near the fountain while we were waiting for a museum to open...

... but after just a couple of minutes, daddy dragged me over to get me to practice my photo-taking skills. Ha, I got back at him by almost cutting his head off in the picture.

A kind man nearby must have felt sorry for me, sitting on the pavement with the camera. He came over and took a photo for all of us.

I also got to practice making funny faces at the camera. It's much more interesting than the boring old smiles that mummy keeps on trying to make me do.

The week was a lot of fun, but I was glad to go home at the end of it all. I was tired of walking so much every day. And I missed the rest of my toys and books.

We're off to Lille!

2006-08-19T23:04:00.000+01:00

Hurrah hurrah, we're off on holiday tomorrow! This is our first long-ish break since we got back from Singapore so we're really looking forward to it. Our days of backpacking are long gone now but we do still enjoy travelling -- sitting at cafes watching people go by, strolling around in new places, perhaps even the odd museum!

It's a bit easier now that Matty is old enough to "take care of himself" i.e. he can walk and doesn't need a pram, he doesn't need special food, he doesn't need too many extra sets of clothes, diaper changing, etc.. We just have to worry about Timmy!

The other advantage of Matty being older is we can really see his sense of humour developing. He often tries to kid around with us and do funny things. But of course, the funniest things he says tend to be accidental (i.e. when he isn't trying to be funny).

A couple of weeks ago, the subject of younger siblings came up. Matty said he wanted 2 younger sisters (the number and sex changes every time you ask him) and then said "... then one sister can sleep in the guest room, and the other sister can sleep in the guest room, and Timmy can sleep in my room, and I can sleep in my room.." and then he thought for a while and said ".. but then Uncle Gordon and Auntie Elizabeth have nowhere to sleep.." [these were guests due to visit the following week] .

So Mummy the educator decided to teach/remind him that babies don't come instantly, and instead of spoon-feeding him the facts, tried to draw him to reach that conclusion on his own. So, the leading question was "Matty, do you remember when mummy was pregnant with Timmy? Did mummy look different?" [a question that's clearly supposed to remind him of the huge tummy which took a long while to grow to that size]. And his response was "That's right mummy, you looked a little bit like a scary monster"

And the other day when I was giving him his shower, he said "Mummy, when my eyes were closed because of the water I couldn't see clearly and I thought you were a troll.."

I guess the comments clearly show who he thinks is the fierce one in this family...

Funny faces

2006-08-15T11:32:00.000+01:00

Timmy's recently started making funny faces. He's got this one which really reminds me of Calvin (friend of Hobbes) -- see 2nd picture from left at the top. As you can see, I was a little trigger happy that day, especially since he was rather obligingly immobile in the high chair (not that he had much of a choice =) )

Slight dejavu? Yup, Timmy definitely has a very strong resemblance to Matty at that age. There are some differences of course, but you can certainly tell they're brothers. Timmy's hair is getting longer and also has the same fuzzy rambutan look (i.e. standing up and waving in the air). And the same toothless grin!

It's a miracle!!

2006-08-13T22:05:00.000+01:00

Yes, the broadband at home has suddenly decided to work!! Hurrah!! This is no thanks to Orange/Wanadoo (our ISP) who once again has proven just how crappy service can be in the UK. After being promised and assured twice that a new modem would arrive on Friday, the day came and went with no deliveries. And when I called them to politely enquire, I was told that somehow they hadn't processed the order properly and I would have to wait for another 7 working days while they put in a new order [ok, I must confess that at this point, I just lost it and gave the guy quite an earful..]

Anyhow, just when I'd resigned myself to not having access to the outside world for another couple of weeks, and given up even trying to get online, we had some visitors come to stay. One was trying to decide whether to upgrade his computer/ISP and while idly trying to show him how ours doesn't work, it suddenly worked!! I have no idea why/how since we haven't changed a thing since it stopped working a fortnight ago...

We shall just call it a miracle. God really does work in small "unimportant" things too =) Not quite making the lame walk or the blind see, but definitely making a difference to this little life of mine..

UGH!!!!

2006-08-11T10:19:00.000+01:00

Sorry for the radio silence for some time. While I am sometimes a little tardy in putting up new posts, this time it's entirely not my fault. My broadband at home has been out of service for the last 2 weeks.. and it's been terrible! You don't realise how much you rely on something until it's gone. No email, no online news, no ebay, no online shopping, no checking out details of events, places, flights, etc.. I'm now holed up in the public library for an hour just to get "re-plugged in"

On the plus side, it's made me really look forward to going back to (hopefully) more efficient Singapore! It's amazing what terrible service and inefficiencies the people in this country put up with. It takes days (if not weeks) to do simple things like open a bank account, get a phone line installed, etc. And when things don't work, it's accepted as part of life (yes, those of you who've had to put up with cancelled/delayed tube services know exactly what I'm talking about).

What kind of ridiculous ISP goes and upgrades you (without asking/informing you) to a faster speed line, which the modem they've given you cannot handle! I thought it was just one of their regular hiccups, until 3 days had gone by without any improvement. After being put on hold for a total of 1 hour and speaking to 6 of their advisors, they've promised me a 2nd new modem which is due to arrive today so hopefully things will be up and running again by the weekend. Based on my experience over the past fortnight, I am a little skeptical...

Hogwarts?

2006-07-22T19:50:00.000+01:00

We were recently at King's Cross Station, on our way to Cambridge. The train was leaving from Platform 10, and guess what we saw on the way there! Yes, Platform 9 3/4!! Heehee, as you can see we took a couple of minutes to snap some pics before rushing off to catch our real train.

I really will miss the Brit humour when we go home... =)

The Cackler

2006-07-03T14:42:00.000+01:00

Timmy's really into laughing, and the smallest, silliest thing can start him off (tapping on the table, saying "cuckoo", etc). I took this clip of him playing with his blocks the other day and as you can see, he just enjoys having a good chuckle... [though I must say it sounds more like a cackle than a chuckle!]

It's not easy taking photos of kids..

2006-06-26T15:25:00.000+01:00

Digital cameras must be THE greatest invention for parents of young kids (well, maybe a close 2nd after disposable diapers..). We tend to snap at least 2 shots of every pose because the chances of someone moving/looking away/grimacing is quite high. Matty's a lot better now that he's learned to stay still and smile (well, what he thinks is a smile anyway). Timmy's a lot more challenging though. Here are a couple of shots of him, just to illustrate my point...

No, mummy, my face and hands are moving!

That's a little better, now it's just my hands..

Yeah, that's the way to do it, mummy. Well done!

Of course there's always the option of taking photos with the flash, since that has a faster shutter speed and hence less "movement". The problem with that though is the face tends to be overexposed, and the kids have this "deer caught in the headlights" kind of look...

What's that blinding bright light??!

Heehee, but you do occasionally get some rather interesting pictures to keep for posterity..

My feet.

2006-06-13T09:07:00.000+01:00

What are you looking at huh?

Babies are so amazingly flexible. Right after I snapped this shot, he proceeded to stuff both his feet into his mouth and chew them happily for a while. In fact, he likes his feet so much that often when sitting up, he'll bend all the way over to put them into his mouth (he then looks like he's just fallen asleep while sitting up and toppled over!)

I guess it goes to show that all kids are different. Matty never had this foot fascination, though he was just as flexible. He just preferred chewing on his books and toys...

Apologies for my tardiness..

2006-06-04T10:07:00.000+01:00

The cousins at the zoo

Matty making his moves,

..and Timmy doing his chewing on anything trick.

Yes, we've been back for a couple of weeks already but I've just been too lazy to do a post. Well, here it is. I've put up some photos of our time back in Singapore. We had a really good time back home. It still felt a bit hectic and rushed, despite our intentions not to pack too many things in. I guess when you're somewhere for just a few weeks, you tend to try and do (and eat) everything you can!!

The boys definitely enjoyed it too (the company, the food, the varied activities), and I think for Matty especially, it's made him more keen to go back for good next year. I'm sure he'll miss his school and friends in London, but there'll be lots of that back home too...

I can sit up!

2006-04-25T09:53:00.000+01:00

It's amazing how quickly kids grow up. Timmy's now almost 5 months old and can pretty much sit up on his own. He's still a little wobbly and has the tendency to overbalance and topple over if he isn't careful. But nowadays he's quite loath to be in any position other than upright. I guess he can see further when he's sitting up (the kay-por boy just wants to know what the rest of us are up to).

Anyhow, we'll be back home in just a few more days so you can see all this for yourself soon! =)

What is it about boys and cars??

2006-04-18T15:42:00.000+01:00

As most of you probably know, Matty is very keen on cars. He's always liked playing with them, building convoys and putting his Playmobil people into them. We've never quite figured out what it is about cars/trains/aeroplanes and pretty much all vehicles which he finds so fascinating.

There are of course some advantages -- it's quite easy to keep him occupied when we go out since there are always some cars around for him to look at. He's recently started to enjoy naming them when we walk past, so we have regular background chatter something along the lines of ".. Peugeot!.. Toyota!.. Renault!.. Mercedes!.. Mercedes!.. BMW!.. Volkswagen!..". Actually, to be a bit more accurate, he tends to run ahead of us and shout out the names, and gets very upset if we name them before he does. His favourite cars are Jaguars so parallel to the shouting out cars' names, he also keeps a running tally of how many Jaguars he's seen so far.

Odd isn't it? Sigh, boys and their toys..

In memory of Ernest

2006-04-11T20:17:00.000+01:00

Most of you who have come to visit us would have had the chance to meet Ernest, our porter. He was an interesting person who always had a friendly word for those he met. Sadly, old age caught up with him and he passed away suddenly last weekend after a stroke. It was a bad shock as we had just seen him a couple of days before that and were making plans for dinner in the near future.

It is a stark reminder close to home of how ephemeral life is, how we are here today and gone tomorrow. Only God our Maker knows the number of our days, and we should treat each day as a precious gift, not leaving till tomorrow things which we would surely regret were they never to come to pass. We'll never really know when we or those we love will be called to meet our Judge..

Ernest, you will be missed by all of us.

My first photo

2006-03-28T19:20:00.000+01:00

While we were in Lisbon, we thought it was time to see if we could put Matty to more use, now that he's 3 years old.. So we tried getting him to take photos for us, with some rather hilarious results!

Matty's very first photo!

Yup, the shot above is the very first one that he took on his own. At first glance it looks like a very nice artistic shot of the beautiful pavements in Lisbon. That is, until you notice the 3 pairs of legs at the top of the photo, all with chopped off bodies...

And then numbers 2, 3, and 4

We tried again the next day, with slightly better results. Well, at least initially... As you can tell from the progression of shots, he still has a bit of a pavement tendency (heavy camera?). It was a bit worrying (for me at least), letting him handle our new digital camera but thankfully he didn't drop it [hmm, maybe my very fierce warnings about cutting off allowances forever worked.. hehe, just kidding lah. Would I do that?]. We shall see how the budding photographer progresses..

Lisbon

2006-03-19T09:58:00.001Z

Marques de Pombal, near where we stayed

Evening view of Lisbon

Parque Eduardo VII, also near the hotel

The old town, looking out onto the river

We just got back from Lisbon late on Thursday night, after spending a week there. It was a good break -- nicely relaxing, warm, yummy food, walks about town... Sounds good eh? Travelling with 2 kids was a bit more challenging, but still managable esp with a very helpful hubby along.

We'd generally have a lazy-ish morning in the hotel, only heading out at about 10am after breakfast, feeding the kids, etc. And then get back by about 3 to 4pm for a nap and some bumming. Despite the rather relaxed schedule, we still managed to see quite a few of the sights since we were there for a whole week. It's definitely a pretty city but a little hilly for a pram. Plenty to keep us occupied, and as you can see from the pictures, the weather was great. Sigh, but now we're back in chilly gloomy London again...

And now he's three..

2006-03-06T09:10:00.001Z

Despite our usual habit of not celebrating birthdays, we decided to have a little "do" for Matty's third birthday last Thursday. This was largely prompted by him occasionally bringing back little goodie bags when his other classmates in school had their birthdays [didn't want him to feel left out, now that he's at the age where he's more conscious of stuff like this]. He then started to ask us when his birthday was, and proudly announced to anyone who'd listen that his birthday was in March. So we thought we'd better not leave the day unmarked..

So this is him at school, blowing out the candles on his cool car cake..

And of course, the goodie bag...

We also got him a cake for home (ehehe, Luke & my favourite one since Matty's tastes aren't so discerning yet) and gave him his pressies. Below are a couple of shots of us.

Sigh, I guess we're stuck with this birthday celebration thing, at least until the kids have grown up enough not to be bothered by it...

We match..

2006-02-27T08:55:00.000Z

Look, I match my daddy!

And I match my favourite cushion..

Just a couple of pictures (not so recent, they were taken about a month ago). Things are generally okay here, but the kids are still slightly under the weather with mild colds. Do pray that they'll recover soon and stay healthy! Winter is not a fun time... Thankfully, spring is just around the corner. We also have a trip to Lisbon in 10 days time to look forward to! Hurrah. Hopefully it'll be warmer and we'll all get a good rest then.

Heads up!

2006-02-18T08:20:00.000Z

Heads Up!

Phew, I'm tired...

Just a couple of shots of Timmy on his tummy. He's been getting very chatty lately, cooing and "talking" to us for long stretches on end. Last night he was talking to his mobile for a few minutes. He's also developed a sense of humour and laughs (mouth open and "hahaha") once in a while.

Matty's learning how to stay still, maintain eye contact and talk to him (sounds easy enough, but you have to factor in the rambunctiousness of an almost-3 year old). Well, he tends to sing more than talk. I suppose it's easier to sing than maintain a more or less one sided conversation...

The two brothers.

2006-02-12T19:29:00.000Z

Stoning in front of the TV

At the holiday cottage

Here are some photos of Matty and Timmy. The first one was taken about a month ago, when daddy let them watch TV while I was taking a nap in the morning. The second shot was taken just a few days ago, when we went for a short driving trip. Timmy looks like he's developing into a regular chubby little grub, doesn't he?

Look at that double chin!

2006-01-22T20:08:00.000Z

Do I look chubby and happy?

Phew, before even realising it almost 7 weeks have passed since little Timmy was born. He's been doing really well and steadily putting on weight. In fact, the last time we weighed him using our scales, it looked like he was almost 6kg! (which is almost twice his birth weight) Not sure how accurate the scales are, but he definitely looks really chubby and has a huge double chin (the photo doesn't actually do it justice).

The three boys..

Here's a shot of the 3 boys, taken at the one-month lunch we had some time ago. I think they all look nice and happy =)

One, two, three, four, five..

2006-01-17T18:50:00.000Z

..once I caught a fish alive

Ok, so it wasn't exactly alive.. or caught by Matty. But he was holding it rather gleefully and trying not to fall off the kitchen counter-top at the same time. We got the fish at the Billingsgate market that morning, sashimi-ed it and ate it all up that day. Yummy... it's nice that the confinement is over and I can eat whatever food I want to again. And shower. And go out.

But it was also nice having my parents around to take care of me and things around the house. And have nice food ready whenever I wanted to eat. And no housework to do.. =) Things have stabilised a bit more now and Timmy has settled down into a nice routine and even dropped 1 of his middle of the night feeds. Hurrah! Now we're hoping he'll drop the other one and we can go back to sleeping thru the night like normal human beings..

The not so flattering shots

2006-01-08T21:20:00.000Z

I wonder what they're plotting to do now..

Egads, get away from me mummy, you're giving me a headache!

It's always interesting to think of what might be going thru a baby's head.. All those funny looks they give you -- are there any deeper reasons apart from the "I need to burp" or "I'm hungry" instincts? If only they could talk..

Anyhow, since we all know that newborns look more like prunes than anything else, I decided to put up a few posts of Timmy which don't show him looking alert or smiley (since those are more the exceptions than the rule in reality!). He's still growing steadily chubbier, which is always reassuring..

And then there were four..

2005-12-29T17:34:00.000Z

Wow, look at all the presents under the tree..

I'll take this one, mummy!

It seems like not too long ago when Matty was the size that Timmy is now. What a vast difference it is now with one noisy rambunctious bundle of energy and a smaller squeaky sleepy one. The adjustment has been relatively smooth with little jealousy on Matty's part (so far, thank God!) and Timmy is slowly developing into a marshmallow-man with rounded joints... and mummy is looking more panda-like each day too.

But boy, 2 is definitely a lot more work than 1 cos Luke and I don't even get to take turns to rest! At this point in time, having a 3rd kid doesn't seem like such a smart idea after all... ask us again in a couple of years and we'll see if we've changed our minds..

Twins?

2005-12-21T12:46:00.000Z

I did a post once on how much Matty looks like Luke did as a kid, and after the recent arrival of Timmy, I've resigned myself to living in a house filled with look-alikes [When Matty was born the first thing I said when I saw him was "Oh no, he looks just like Luke!", and when Timmy was born, it was "Oh no, he looks just like Matty!"]

I put together some pictures of Timmy & Matty when he was younger just to take a look at the similarity. Can you guess who's who?

If not for the fact that we're in London now with such different surroundings, I'm sure I'd be going around with a much stronger sense of deja-vu.. It'll be interesting to see whether they still look like twins when they grow older.

[and in case you're wondering, it's M, T, M T clockwise from the top left corner]

More pictures..

2005-12-12T08:17:00.001Z

Here are some more pictures of the latest arrival. It's hard to believe that he's only 6 days old because it sure feels like he's been around for longer. The labour was shorter this time, just 8 hours, and thanks to the wonders of modern medicine it was quite painless.

He seems to be taking well to life and is doing 3-hour cycles now, sometimes staying awake for 2 hours at a go! He's definitely more alert than Matty was at this age (apart from during feed times when trying to keep him awake is like pulling teeth..). He also seems more amenable to going to sleep on his own so that makes life easier for us. All in all, the adjustment to having a new kid seems to be easier this time round. Phew, thank God for that!

He's here!!

2005-12-09T12:33:00.000Z

1 minute old..

No longer just 3!

After a long long wait, Timmy has finally arrived! He was born early on Tuesday morning after giving us false alarms all weekend. Not a huge baby, just 3.15kg but thank God, he's healthy and doing well.

We're now settled back at home quite comfortably, albeit a bit less well rested than usual. So far Matty hasn't shown any signs of jealousy and often goes up to stroke Timmy's head gently so that's another thing to be thankful for. More photos to come when I have more energy...

Fishy business

2005-11-23T22:51:00.000Z

We went to visit the Billingsgate fish market last Saturday. It was the first real WET market that I've seen in the UK, and sold all manner of fish and seafood in bulk. Since it shuts at 9am, we left home at 6am (!!) and braved the cold just to see what they had to offer -- and boy, did they have tons!

It's one of those places that caters to larger scale buyers (so the smallest qty they sell is 2kg of any item), but we went with some friends whom we split the loot with. We bought salmon, crab, red snapper, giant scallops, huge prawns, etc... Doesn't sound very impressive if you live in Singapore, but trust me - seafood (fresh and large stuff esp) is quite a rarity in London, the land where "jumbo king prawns" are just the size of your little finger... All in all, it was quite an interesting excursion, but not something we're likely to do regularly. Nevermind, the stash in the freezer should last us for a while yet =)

Christmas this early?

2005-11-08T09:36:00.000Z

We decided to start setting up for Christmas a little bit earlier this year, since we'll probably be quite busy nearer the time. First to go up was the tree (fiber optics ones are the best - it took just 20 mins to set up!). Now there are 4 pretty huge pressies under the tree, no prizes for guessing whose they are.

As I'm sitting here now, there's Christmas music playing in the background, which is quite pleasant. Sigh.. I do like the feel of this time of the year, and with all the forecasts of a long and cold winter we might even have a white Christmas (for once!).

In many ways, it doesn't really matter whether we celebrate it early or late -- what's important is what we're celebrating, the birth of Jesus! "O Holy night, the stars are brightly shining, it is the night of our dear Saviour's birth.."

Caught in the act

2005-10-26T16:24:00.000+01:00

I took this shot a couple of months ago when someone was having a little snooze (yes, it's quite obvious who's the one snoozing). Matty was just enjoying a little cuddle and his blue cloth, which he's still quite attached to. This is one of those rare occasions where he's happy to just lie/sit down quietly without doing something else -- he must have been tired.. As you can see, he's also still doing the sucking the lower lip thingy. Some things never change.

Picking produce

2005-10-12T08:38:00.000+01:00

One of the things I've been wanting to do for some time is visit one of those pick-your-own produce farms here in the UK. We finally got round to it on our way back from Wales and it was definitely a fun experience. It was already the end of Sept so the crop selection was slightly more limited but there was still plenty for us.

This is us in the spinach patch. I was trying to teach Matty how to pick the younger leaves off at the stem and he was quite a quick learner. [Unlike Daddy who insisted on doing his own harvesting in another corner and half-filled the bag with jaw-exercising older leaves..]

And they had tons of very very yummy raspberries. These ones weren't sour like the ones in the supermarket, but were really fragrant and sweet. Absolutely delicious!

And as you can see, Matty agrees about the raspberries too! He happily scoffed about 10 in the first 3 minutes and was very pleased that there were quite a lot of fruits within his reach. He even started to tell me "We must pick the dark red ones because they are sweet". Hehe, this was after eating a pretty raw greenish one which he definitely didn't like..

I can hardly wait till next summer when all the fruits are in season!

Phew..

2005-10-03T11:29:00.000+01:00

Here are a few more photos of Matty from our Wales trip. It was quite nice driving around cos we managed to visit a few places which were a bit out of the way but tons of fun for him. He did lots of new things like....

... bottle feed some lambs. They could really guzzle their milk fast - a full 260ml milk bottle was emptied in a matter of 30 seconds! I was reminded of how M used to be just the opposite, especially when he was in the baby-stage, and was slightly jealous of how easy the ewes have it when it comes to feeding.

... carry and pet a guinea pig. It was quite a good natured one, and M was pretty gentle with it (apart from trying to poke its eyes once). L almost wanted to promise him one of his own until I hastily stopped him. The last thing I need is another small creature to take care of..

... ride on an old-fashioned steam engine. As you can imagine, this was most thrilling for him and he promptly named it Harvey after one of the engines in the Thomas universe. He had fun watching the puffs of steam, and the engine coupling & uncoupling. And kept on asking when we'd go on the train again.

Phew, no wonder he's all tired out. He was very good in the car, and was always quiet or asleep. Unfortunately, he had this habit of falling asleep 5 mins before we arrived at our destination, which was not so good. Had to do some prodding a few times to keep him awake so that he'd get a proper length nap.

So you see, that's why he enjoys holidays so much...

Our driving trip to Wales

2005-09-26T08:44:00.000+01:00

Haha, this is MY car..

We just got back from our 4-day trip to Wales and it was lovely! Matty was totally thrilled by the car (so much so that he happily sat at the back for 2-hour stretches without so much as a peep..). The country itself feels different from South England, with much hillier and prettier countryside. I think Luke must have gotten a bit bored by my constant pointing out the window and going "So pretty.." while he had to keep his eyes on the road.

Panoramic view of the countryside..

..and us

Instead of the usual B&B accomodation, we tried out a self-catering cottage this time. It was actually really nice, and provided a lot more space than just a regular room. And it was nice being able to cook simple meals and eat at a table, after all the experiences in hotels and B&Bs. I think we'll definitely do this more often. The downside was being based in the same place for our stay there, but there was plenty to do so it wasn't a problem at all.

The steam engine

We visited one of their many steam railways, and had a very pleasant ride with lovely views. No prizes for guessing who was the most thrilled... All in all, it was a good trip. I'll post up some more pics another time.

Humpty dumpty

2005-09-15T09:57:00.000+01:00

Humpty dumpty sat on a wall..

No, we didn't let him fall just for the sake of completing the nursery rhyme. However, he would probably have enjoyed it if we had. He has this thing about falling down - he seems to find it terribly amusing, unless he happens to actually hurt himself. I guess it's just an extension of liking to be bounced when he was a baby.

The little daredevil now likes climbing all over the couch or armchair and doing stunts like jumping up and landing on his butt on the edge of the couch. Boys will be boys..

Embarrassing pictures

2005-09-08T08:34:00.000+01:00

Aahh, which of us has ever made it through childhood without some embarrassing photos of us in the bath? I decided that Matty should be no different =) Luke usually gives him his shower/bath nowadays but on one of the rare occasions when I did, I took the opportunity to capture a few blackmail type pictures for later on in life... After all, you never know when you might need them.

Here he is pouting, as if to say "Mummy, I think you really shouldn't be doing this.. or else I'm going to get cross!"

"Don't say I didn't warn you, Mummy. Now I'm going to have to do some funky kungfu move with my blue boat..."

I'm confused mummy..

2005-09-01T20:22:00.000+01:00

This is Matty all wrapped up in his blue cloths. That was Aunty Karen's doing (Matty had a great time playing with her while she was staying with us) and he came running to me saying "Mummy, I'm little Joseph". I thought he looked rather more like little Mary..

He walked around the house for a good hour dressed in his sarong and and headscarf, even driving his car in that garb! And by the way, that strange grimace on his face is his idea of how to smile at the camera.. We've had some improvement on that by asking him to laugh instead of smile at the camera nowadays.

Inherited hair..

2005-08-22T09:30:00.000+01:00

I never realised that hair type is inherited. That is, until M came along... He not only looks just like L, his hair also behaves the same way. It's quite amusing sometimes when they both wake up in the morning with gravity defying hair that doesn't respond to combing or water.

We were on our way to Cambridge that morning with our 2 latest visitors. The silly boy had tons of fun going on the tube, then the train, then the bus -- and repeating all of that on the way back. It was a really nice day out for all of us. Guess it's always pleasant to go back somewhere familiar and potter around for a day...

The Spoilt Kid..

2005-08-16T20:02:00.000+01:00

Remember I mentioned how much fun Matty had at the amusement park in Stockholm? Well, here are some pictures to prove it...

And these are just a few of those I took before I got bored taking repetitive photos. I think over the span of 2 days he must have had at least 25 rides. And that wasn't all he had =)

As it turned out, he didn't particularly like candy floss (too sticky? too lehceh to eat?). Mummy decided since it was his first real amusement park visit it wouldn't be complete without some candy floss.. I'm sure he'll have fond memories of this trip for some time!

Stockholm

2005-08-09T13:08:00.000+01:00

We're back! Stockholm was very nice and we happened to catch a few good sunny days. The city is quite interestingly spread out over a few small islands, all of them quite different in character. The old town island (Gamla Stan) had quaintish narrow streets with cobbled stones. The "fun" island (Djurgarden) had amusement parks, open spaces, an open-air museum and various other museums. And the city area (Normaalm) was pretty much like any other city with trains, buses, lots of cars and tons of McDonalds..

We spent most of the time walking/pottering around and brought Matty to the amusement park twice (in 4 days!). He had tons of fun there -- I'll do another post later with some pics of him -- and we had to drag him away quite reluctantly. I think he now understands the concept of a holiday and will probably start bugging us to take more of them (daddy especially).

The huge drumstick (again)

2005-07-31T11:12:00.000+01:00

I can have my drumstick..

... and eat it too!

I remember one of the first posts I did on the blog was a picture of Matty holding 2 huge duck legs and trying to eat them (a bit unsuccessfully since at that time he only had 2 teeth!). Things have changed a lot since then...

A long time ago..

He really looks quite different now - more hair (which stands up just like daddy's), no bib, and a lot more teeth! The recent pictures were obviously not posed, and he managed to finish off half of the drumstick all on his own (and insisted on chewing the bone at the end, just like mummy). It's nice to have a 2 1/2 year old..

Artwork at the tube

2005-07-22T12:11:00.000+01:00

Tube stations didn't use to be a place for suspicion & terror.. I took these pictures on the 4th of July, just before the first incidents happened. I was on the way to meet L for lunch, and while waiting for the train at Gloucester Road, noticed the fairly interesting background.

It's called "The Ten Silhouettes", by David Batchelor, and looks better in real life than in the photos. I tried to do a photostitch in the 2nd pic, but there's obviously some angle distortion.. London is really quite a nice place to be, and they have lots of these cool impromptu/temporary exhibitions all over the place. It's sad that there are those who don't see the beauty, or even try to destroy it...

Sit Ups

2005-07-13T09:23:00.000+01:00

Helping daddy with sit-ups

Matty's turn now..

Once in a while Matty helps daddy with some sit ups. He weighs down his feet and also helps to count how many have been done (or rather confuse Luke's counting). There's lots of balancing and giggling, and then Matty gets a go at it. Having no abdominal muscles to speak of, he cheats of course -- he usually ends up twisting his body & levering off his elbows to get off the ground. And even then, he only manages about 3 before he collapses! It's quite funny to watch.. Of course you'll never catch me doing sit ups =)

We're all ok..

2005-07-08T14:42:00.000+01:00

Yesterday was quite a surreal day. It started off normally enough, until Luke called from work & asked me to turn on the TV to watch the news. Quite confusing to figure out what had really happened - power surges? 6 explosions on the tube? 3 bombs on buses? Then slowly a clearer picture emerged, and it was not a pretty one.

50 deaths doesn't sound like very much compared to hundreds or thousands. But if you think of the impact of just 1 person dear to you dying, the impact starts to hit home.. Thankfully nobody I know was hurt in the blasts, or even directly impacted by it (apart from Luke who took an hour to walk home from work yesterday).

Oddly enough, today doesn't feel that different from any other day. Luke went to work, Matty went to nursery, I picked up some groceries at the supermarket... Guess the return to normalcy is part of the human response to tragedy and disaster. At times like this I am grateful that God is in charge of all things. If it is His will, He will keep us safe through even the worst of events. And if not, then we'll just go to meet Him a little earlier than expected...

My cool train set

2005-07-04T09:17:00.000+01:00

Matty loves setting up his train set. Every couple of days, he'll come with his request "Mummy (or daddy) please set up the tracks and the roads and Thomas and Annie and Clarabel and Bulgy for Matty to play with please mummy" [Aside: Yes, that is his idea of a proper grammatical sentence. One wonders how his little lungs have enough breath to finish such a long convoluted sentence, but then I guess he must inherit some of his dad's genes =) ]

Then mummy the engineer gleefully figures out what huge convoluted tracks she wants to create this time and sets about building them with great gusto! It's actually quite fun and it turns out different every time. In fact, I recently went and bought some "track adaptors" so that I could make more interesting routes for the train. Not that Matty realises or cares - he just wants anything that the train can run on...

After that is all done, Matty gets to run the train on the tracks and stop them at the stations. There's also a small grey road system for the bus to go on (but if you look closely at the top picture, you'll see that he's put one of the train carriages onto the road for the bus to push up the slope -- he always does that for some reason.. odd little boy).

So, if you have kids, you must always get them toys that you don't mind playing with yourself. Makes life a lot more fun...

The Garbage Disposal System

2005-06-24T09:36:00.000+01:00

These are my garbage disposal men. One main contractor who does the real work & one subcontractor who just wants to go along for the thrill of putting on his boots & pressing the lift buttons (oh, and in case you're wondering, the sweater/cape was to make sure he didn't catch a chill in the corridor). It's quite funny to see Matty run to the door and rush to put on his boots every time Luke even mentions taking out the trash...

Hehe, now we just have to continue to con him into thinking that all chores are fun. He already takes great pleasure in bringing things to the kitchen for us, fetching slippers and the like. Who knows, maybe in a few years we can teach him to cook, wash and clean the house.. *mummy twisting hands evilly*

One of my favourite buildings in London..

2005-06-10T09:29:00.000+01:00

I love the Natural History Museum in London. It's across the road from Matty's nursery so I see it quite a lot, but never get sick of it. The building is lovely, and looking at it on a sunny day always makes me marvel just a little..

The displays inside are pretty interesting too, and it's a pity M is a little too young to enjoy it. They have dinosaurs, the human body, mammals & reptiles, etc, and it's actually very informative. Nevermind, we have another year before we go home so maybe he'll grow up enough by then to have some fun out of it. It would be cool if they had something like this back home (but it'd probably look very out of place too!) =)

Matty & his convoy..

2005-05-28T14:15:00.000+01:00

Look at my fleet of cars!

Our little boy is still very much into boy stuff. His fascination with cars & all other moving vehicles is still going strong. Over time (and with much contribution from various people) he has built up quite a large fleet of vehicles of all sizes and colours. Every few days, he'll take out his collection & arrange them into a long snaky convoy, just like the one in the picture above. He isn't too particular about what goes in though - trains, aeroplanes & various carriages are all part of the mix. I personally don't quite understand what the thrill in this is but.. Oh well, whatever makes him happy... =)

When we were away..

2005-05-14T21:37:00.000+01:00

Near the Gendarmenmarkt

Matty at the Brandenburg Gate

We just got back from Berlin on Thursday. All in all, it was quite a good trip. The hotel was nice (you can just see it in the left background of the top photo), we slept a lot, shopped a bit, ate a lot, etc.. It also made me appreciate London weather a bit more because it rained incessantly all the 5 days we were there!

Berlin is quite a strange city, probably due to its history. It's got a mish-mash of very different feels, which somehow just don't seem to blend together in any cohesive way at all. Still, it was very nice being in a foreign country with a different language. Hehe, and it's kinda nice having a kid who still needs an afternoon nap -- gave me an excuse to go back for a nap too! =)

Family photos

2005-05-04T10:36:00.000+01:00

Do re mi...

... and the whole gang

I've been rather lazy with taking photos recently, so I thought I'd post up some older pics which were taken when we were home for Chinese New Year. The 1st photo is Matty with his cousins at the airport. I like the "fake grin" which kids sometimes put on when you ask them to smile (for some reason they seem to think a grimace is a smile!). And the 2nd one is with my family on one of our last dimsum makans when we were at home.

L&C just flew back to Singapore on Monday, and I think M really enjoyed having his uncle & aunt visit. He still talks about Auntie Chris feeding him porridge =)

More shots from Kent

2005-04-26T19:25:00.000+01:00

Me & my daddy

Kid-less!

Thought I'd put up a couple more pictures from our Easter weekend in Kent. Yes, this was soon after we bought our new digital camera so I got lots of pooh-poohing from my sceptical hubby who thought I was taking too many wu-liau shots. I personally think they turned out quite well =)

Things have been getting slightly busier. We're having visitors this week, my brother Lii & sis-in-law Chris, and all of us (especially Matty!) are looking forward to it. We'll be making a short trip this weekend, but the disadvantage of having M grow up is now we have to pay almost full fare for his ticket! To make up for it, we're taking a flight with 1 stop-over so he'll have twice the fun with the plane taking off & landing =)

Me & my car

2005-04-17T16:51:00.000+01:00

Look at me, I'm driving..

One of Matty's favourite past times recently is driving his car around the house. It's quite amusing to watch him because he has this little routine - first he'll put on his cap, then he'll get on the car & drive around, turning the wheel left & right totally haphazardly. After a spin around the hall, he'll then park the car back in its rightful spot, take off his cap and put it on the steering wheel, then come crying triumphantly "Matty parked the car!"

He's also been doing more imaginary playing e.g. announcing he's going to the supermarket, then hiding behind the corner for a little while before running out proclaiming "Welcome home! Matty is back already!". It's quite fun to send him on little "errands" like buying eggs, bread & whatever else comes to mind. You wouldn't believe how long this can keep him occupied for...

Just the other day, he announced that he was going to Robinsons, so I asked "Where?". He said "In Singapore". Dunno whether he has some vague memory of that or if it's totally coincidental =) So I asked him to buy me a present, and when he came back 5 seconds later, I was told that my present was carrots!! Hmm.. He clearly needs to be educated on what good pressies are...

My, how they grow..

2005-04-10T20:01:00.001+01:00

Matty then..

... and now

Just recently Matty started doing some of the tongue-sticking out thing which he used to do a lot when he was 5 months old. I thought I'd take a picture and post it up just for comparison. Heehee, he sure has grown from the chubby marshmallow-like baby he used to be!

He's also starting to say funny things now. The other night in bed, Luke was reading him the story about Solomon and God asking him what he wanted most. So to make it more "interactive", he asked Matty, "Matty, if you could ask for anything from God, what would you ask for?"

After thinking quite seriously for a long while, Matty said "Jellybeans!"... then added "And Smarties!". I couldn't stop laughing for quite a while. Very innocent requests, but very entertaining nonetheless =)

Our Easter Weekend

2005-04-02T18:13:00.000+01:00

Beautiful village church in Tonbridge

Good Friday message..

We spent the Easter weekend in Tonbridge, Kent, with Luke's guardians from his time in Sevenoaks. It was nice to get out of London for a couple of days, and the Mungeams were a really nice English couple so all in all we had a great time.

While Matty was having fun with Auntie Liz at the playground, L & I sneaked off for a walk in the woodland area. We passed a pretty church with an interesting feature in the front garden. A simple wooden cross, ringed with a barbed wire circlet, with a piece of paper pinned onto it saying "Jesus of Nazareth - King of the Jews". So simple, yet such a powerful reminder..

Pass It On

2005-03-22T20:00:00.000Z

What a wondrous time is spring

When all the trees are budding

The birds begin to sing

The flowers start their blooming

That's how it is with God's love
Once you experience it
You spread His love to everyone
You want to pass it on..

Yes, it looks like spring is finally here! One lovely thing about living in a temperate country is seeing the new buds and flowers appear after a long dreary winter. It never fails to give my day a lift, and remind me of God's wonderful creation. Hurrah!

Boy, are we alike or what?

2005-03-14T15:34:00.000Z

Matty?

The real thing..

When we went back to Singapore recently, I dug out some old photos of Luke and was struck by how much Matty looks like him at that age! We showed some of the old pics to Matty, who was totally convinced that it was himself in those pictures. I sure hope the strong "looks like Luke" gene is only passed on to sons..

The Terrible Twos..

2005-03-07T10:51:00.000Z

Look at that!

Now you can see why he's so excited..

It was Matty's birthday last week, but true to form, we didn't have a celebration for him =) Instead, I decided to bake him some Thomas the Tank Engine cupcakes as a treat. I had to use one of those cheater bug mixes to get the sugar plaques with the nice pictures (which was fine since he was a lot more excited about the plaques than the cupcakes!).

Somehow (subconsciously?), turning 2 does seem to be a milestone, as in the past week he has transitioned into the terrible twos.. He threw a few tantrums when he didn't get what he wanted, but after being ignored for a while I think he's realised that it doesn't do him much good. So far he's only done it at home (phew!) and we are hoping that he gets past this phase really fast. Ya, I guess until you see a bad side, you don't always appreciate the good side. We really thank God that Matty's been generally well behaved till now, and hope He'll give us wisdom to go thru the more trying phases... I'm sure there'll be much more to come!

From Bushfires to Snow Storms..

2005-02-25T10:53:00.000Z

I love the warmth and all the cars..

.. but wow, look at all that snow!

We just arrived back in London on Monday, after 4 weeks in Singapore. It was really great to be home (the family, the friends, the food..) and the time just flew by. We expected it to be hot in Singapore, but not the continuous 35 degrees heatwave! And we expected it to be cold in London, but not the 0 degrees snow and sleet!

It has been snowing (in bits and bobs) since we got back and it'll be cold for the next week or so. Matty got his first experience of snow this morning. He was quite thrilled with the snow initially, until he realised it was cold and wet... We went to the park for a short while and it was quite magical with snow falling all around us.

And yet the flowers bloom..

But things are ephemeral and fleeting. Now the sun is out and all the pretty snow has turned to slush. Still, I'm sure the flowers are glad =)

Just to refresh your memories..

2005-01-16T16:18:00.000Z

Boy, didn't I look different..

Hurrah, we're going home on Friday! I was just taking a look at some of our older photos and dug out this one of Matty, which was taken at the serviced apartment during our first week in London. It seems like such a long time ago when he had soft fuzzy hair and a wide toothless grin. Then I realised that this is probably how most of you remember him (and his wormy crawling habits).

Anyhow, be prepared for a new and improved (in a manner of speaking) Matty! He walks (or runs most times), talks and is a lot noisier now. Luke & I haven't changed much though [apart from gaining some weight] =) Laksa, chilli crab, nasi lemak, roti prata here we come!!

The Cheeky Boy

2005-01-10T22:01:00.000Z

Don't I look cheeky?

Matty is really getting quite cheeky these days. A large part of it is the fact that he can talk now, so we have more insight into what's going on in his little head. I now understand why they have so many shows about kids saying the funniest things. Even with his rather limited powers of expression & vocab, the things he says can be quite amusing.

He also enjoys hiding & "ambushing" us, tickling (especially daddy's feet) and is just quite a bundle of entertainment. This is much more fun than when he was very young and our days were centered around feeding, changing, burping, etc.. We're all really looking forward to going home (in less than 2 weeks time!) and catching up with family and friends then. Will probably take a "blog-break" then, but then it is surely better to see us in real life than read about us right? =) See all of you soon!

Pressies..going, going..gone!

2005-01-03T22:15:00.000Z

Pressies..

..going, going..

..gone!

As you might have noticed in the last post, Matty had tons of presents under the tree this Christmas. He was really excited to dig into his stocking and then open the presents (but we made him wait till after we did our QT in the morning). He tore them open with great gusto, and after opening about 5 of them, got so distracted playing with his new toys that he left the rest of the pressies for another day... But he obviously got round to the rest of them in good time, and until we took the tree down today he was still asking to open more presents!

We had a good Christmas, spending the day quietly at home. And now, before we know it, we're already into the new year. We hope this year will be a time of spiritual and emotional growth for all of us..

It's Christmas

2004-12-24T19:36:00.000Z

Look at all my presents!!

Let's see if I can sneak one off while mummy's not looking..

We and the tree..

Almost before we know it, Christmas is just around the corner again. We decided to put up a tree and start some "family traditions" this year, now that Matty is old enough to understand what's happening. He'll be putting up a stocking tonight, and has been ogling the presents under the tree for some time now. I've also been telling him about the story of Christmas, and why we really celebrate it. Think he understands it as baby Jesus' birthday at the moment, which is a start.

We'll be having a quiet day at home tomorrow and will see if the predictions of snow come true. Doubt there'll be much snow (if any at all) but it'd still be nice to see some falling =) The year has passed by really fast, and we're hoping to spend some time reflecting on all that's happened. God has been really kind to us this year, and gracious in His blessings to us. May we not take it for granted, but really be grateful for all that we have been given.

The Christmas Party

2004-12-17T14:04:00.000Z

Rudolph wannabe

At the party

Matty had a Christmas party at his nursery on Tuesday. It was supposed to be a fancy dress thingy so he went as Rudolph [See Y, who said those reindeer antlers were just for a cheap thrill? They were handy!!]. I took a few pics when I went to pick him up and it looked like they had fun. And the kids looked real cute too, all dressed up [albeit quite conventionally - girls were mostly fairies & boys were spiderman/cowboys]

Vaguely recall some similar pictures of when I was a kid in kindergarten many many years ago. Unfortunately, I can't for the life of me remember the event itself cos I was still quite young. I hope Matty has a better memory than me, otherwise he probably won't remember much (if any) of these 3 years here in London. But at least he'll have tons of photos to remind him of what he did here..

The Thames Path

2004-12-10T11:15:00.000Z

Doesn't he look like an obedient kid?

Well, it's just an act! This is much more like him..

It's nice living in a city which has a river running through it. The Thames has got quite a nice path running next to it which goes past the London Eye, Tate Modern and various other nice spots. Our walks are usually on Sundays after church, but have started to dwindle somewhat with the chilly weather.

Our very active kid loves running ahead (or dawdling behind) and touching all manner of things. He still has a tendency to put things in his mouth so we have to keep an eye on him quite vigilently. I wonder if he'll have as much fun when we go home..

Squirrels in the park

2004-11-30T17:02:00.000Z

Any more nuts?

Matty's turn

One of the blessings of where we stay is the nearby Kensington Gardens. It's good to have a nearby park where Matty can run around and play, and as parks go, this one is really quite nice. One of our favourite spots is the "Flower Walk" which is the haunt of the park squirrels. They are very used to people feeding them nuts and are really tame. They'll come right up to you and take the nuts from your hands, sometimes staying to eat it right next to you!

Matty is slightly scared of them though, and tends to throw the nuts down to them when they're about 2 feet away. [He had a bad encounter with some swans a few months back, when he was held on to the bread he was feeding them just a tad too long and got his hand snapped at. He still tells the story till this day]. Luke is trying to teach him that the squirrel is way smaller than him but he still seems a bit suspicious.. It's interesting to see how the seasons affect animals though - the squirrels have been getting a lot more agressive in the past few weeks, probably trying to eat as much as they can before winter comes. At least I hope it's brought about by the seasonal change -- I much prefer them slightly more demure.

Nursery Days

2004-11-26T16:25:00.000Z

The Wicked Witch of the West

Works of art

Matty started going to nursery in May this year. He took a bit of time to settle down, and the first month was generally marked by tearful goodbyes in the morning and exuberant hellos in the afternoon when I picked him up. After that period, he started to really enjoy it there.

He now spends 3 mornings a week there and always looks forward to going again. In fact, usually by Sunday, after a 2 day absence, he'll start to say "See Bernie again, see friends again" (Bernie is one of his teachers). The education system here seems to agree with him and he has great fun doing painting, collages, watching Thomas (the tank engine) videos and generally mucking around. We get to bring home his works of art too, like the Witch hat he made for Halloween and the countless other paintings & drawings. I set up a little corner to stick some of it up and he's quite proud of it, showing off his masterpieces to visitors who come by. All in all, it's worked out really well and mummy gets 3 mornings off every week too =)

Weeklong driving trip

2004-11-15T13:17:00.000Z

Idyllic Cotswolds village

Lake Windermere

A couple of our friends came to visit (my goodness, a whole month ago!) and we drove up to the Lake District. It was quite a nice trip where we unfortunately confirmed that Matty definitely suffers from motion sickness (bad genes..). I bet WY & Y have never seen that much throw up in one day ever =) But it did get better after the 1st day, after we restricted him to a diet of dry biscuits whenever we needed to drive around.

England has lots of very pretty, quaint villages and lovely countryside which you'll never find in S'pore or M'sia. It was quite a pity that we only had the one week to drive around, but we do have another 2 years to go..

The World Traveller

2004-11-11T10:41:00.000Z

The Colosseum

Roman Forum

One advantage of living in London for a few years is getting to travel around the region a bit while we're here. Matty is going to be a very well travelled boy by the time we go home, though I doubt he'll remember much (if any) of it. We went to Rome for a few days in Oct, and he really enjoyed the plane ride and being in a new place. I don't think he was much impressed by the sights, but more the interesting things at his level (dogs, pigeons, kids, etc). That's what you'd call a different perspective in life I guess...

Greedy Matty

2004-11-10T20:51:00.000Z

A drumstick all to myself..

But why settle for 1 when you can have 2!!

Okay, okay, I confess that these are posed shots (but he did get to take one bite of the duck). Hehe, guess part of the fun of having kids is making them do stuff which they will grow up to regret and be embarrassed by =)

Matty is getting greedier though. He recently recovered from a bout of stomach flu (I think). After 1.5 days of throwing up and eating nothing, he seems to have discovered a new-found appreciation for food now. Makes life a lot easier for me since he's now eating his meals with a lot more gusto, and a lot less coercion. Not satisfied with that, he also keeps on asking us for food while we're having our meals and ends up taking about 5% of my portion. His current favourites are rice and noodles (yes, very Chinese, this boy) but he also likes his veggies like broccoli, corn and courgettes! I am hoping this phase will last for a long long time...

Getting Started

2004-11-05T11:05:00.000Z

I never thought I'd start a blog, but never say never, right... I suppose being a few thousand miles away from most of our family & friends, it's good to have a forum to update people on what's happening in our lives (and what Matty is up to). So voila, here we go.

It's autumn now, and most of the leaves on the trees are going fast. It seems like just a while ago when we first arrived in London and the trees were totally bare. And then there were new buds and leaves, and before we knew it, summer. Those were lovely warm times (though Mr Goh would use quite vastly different adjectives), and now that it's getting chilly and dark at 5pm, I'm reminded of dismal winter days. Still, we can look forward to going home in Jan, so that helps..

We've had a constant stream of visitors since August when my parents came, and Luke's dad is visiting with us now. I think Matty is getting so used to having other people around that he'll have to readjust next month. He still asks after "kong kong", "por por" (grandparents), "Uncle Wai Yew" and "Godma", our most recent visitors. He's definitely going to have a great time when we go home and see everyone again!

Anyway, I will keep this short for now, and hope to put up some recent pictures once I get the hang of this...