Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Sep 2010: The Yammies' 1st trip to Hong Kong!




It was the Yammies' 1st trip to Hong Kong as a family! and also both me and Kayla's 1st (but not papa thou). I was very excited as I have been wanting to go Hong Kong and Disneyland!

Departure Day: We had to wake up at 5am as our flight was scheduled at 8.30 a.m. Thinking we can prepare the last few items before Kayla woke up, but somehow she seemed to know she was going on a trip and she woke up at same time as us, feeling upbeat! Haha. So in the end one of us had to prepare the things while the other one took care of her. As the travel agency arranged a complimentary pick-up cab for us, we were in time for check-in. At the airport, Kayla looked a bit dazed thou cuz I think she was still sleepy.

The taking-off was pretty ok - we made milk for her to drink and shortly after, she fell asleep. It was the later part of the flight that she felt bored that she refused to sit down, and made us had to carry her and walk around the crampy airplane aisles. Sighz. During the landing, we would like her take some water to ease the air pressure in the ears too.

When we reached HK after 4 hours later, it was already noon and we were hungry! Then upon collecting our pram we then realised Cathay has made spoilt one of the pram's handle! Not only we had to rush to lodge report with their counter, we had to collect luggage and check out, and also rushed for the bus who would be sending us to our hotel. Geez.... In the end we had no time to change Kayla's diapers and it overflowed and wet her clothes : ( Then we had to change her while on the bus. Very challenging task!

Around 3pm-tish, we finally reached our hotel - The Mira Hotel @ Nathan Road! The hotel looked so stylish and modern! Then we had to wait at the hotel lobby for another hour, hungrily and tired, as we requested for a King-sized bed and it was not available yet. In the meantime we quickly made cereal for Kayla's post-lunch while Papa went outside to buy some food back for our post-lunch too. He couldn't find anything except nice simple bread and freshly baked egg tart from a bakery shop! Yum yum! It was really nice and satisfying as I really loved to eat bread! By the time we'd settled in our room, bathe everyone and fed Kayla's dinner, it was time for us to go out for dinner.

We went to Harbour City area for dinner and hopefully able to hit some nearby shopping areas. In the end we managed to go an Espirit factory outlet and wu ying liang pin to buy some snacks for colleagues and family.

Next morning we ventured out to search for a recommended HK cafe - The Australian Dairy Co. @ Jordan Street. It was supposingly not far from our hotel, but as we were unfamiliar with the streets, we took a few detours before finding it after more than 1/2 hour! During the journey we would take some photos of the HK streets, old buildings etc. We wolfed down the food as we were both hungry, and gota rushed to meet my HK colleagues in their office @ Queensway.

Kayla created a mini commotion at the HK office and my HK colleagues were crowding round her! She even tried to "take over" my boss's chair in the office! Hahah...We had very nice Shanghainese cuisine for lunch with them, and my boss very generously asked her driver to send us to our next shopping destination - H&M @ Central!

We were so excited when we saw all the children's clothes at the top level of H&M! During midst of selection, our little princess suddenly had the urge to "poo poo". So we had to find a corner at the maternity's section to help her push out the poo poo.. It was a tough time for her and us..haha.. luckily no one chased us out.

HK Disneyland: Next day is HK Disneyland's day!! We managed to take the Mickey Mouse MTR to Tung Chung for some more shopping at Citygate Outlets. There are many branded labels at slashed prices! We shopped mostly at Adidas's shop.

Then we were in time for the Mickey Mouse Disney Parade at 3.30pm. The weather was unbearably sweltering hot! And we had to keep hydrating Kayla and wiping off the sweat from her body. Despite that, she seemed to enjoy the Disney Parade and even waved to the Disney characters! We were also lucky to be able to take picture with Daisy Duck who was happened to be near us. That nite, we went to view the fireworks at 7.30pm! It was great atmosphere especially with the fairytale music playing in the background (but weather was still quite hot thou). We bought a lot of things in the Disneyland merchandise shops and it was really shiok! We only managed to tour some bit of the Disneyland and took 1 ride (The Cinderalla Carousel) as we didn't allocate more time for Disneyland. Nevertheless it was still a good and fruitful trip.

I hope to visit HK Disneyland again, when Kayla is older. And hope she will enjoy more of it in future!

Friday, September 24, 2010

The Toddler Kayla: 13 - 14 months old

My dear girl, at her 13 - 14th months old, has the below developments:

  • Learn to stand without support for few secs
  • Taking 2 walking steps without support
  • Learn to squat


  • Learning abt cause & effect from her certain actions
  • Learn to sway n wriggle body when listen to music
  • Learn to say "No! No!" & waves her hand to signal "No!"
  • Learn to say "Dun wan" & waves her hand to signal 'dun wan"
  • Signals 'thumbs up'  when things are gd!
  • Have her own favourites & dislikes towards people, toys, books & food
  • Learn to hold her own little book

  • Learning to wear & take off the socks & shoes
  • Doing 'ssh' with a finger on her lip (or nose rather)
  • Climbing down from sofa, stimes attempting from bed too!
  • Pat pat her chest & say 怕怕!
  • Sayang her own body parts (e.g. head) whenever she hurts herself
  • Learn to bring the milk bottle away & toward her mouth
  • Likes to waves "Hi" and "bye bye" (and says "bye bye") to people on the streets, in the shops, in the restaurants, in the lifts etc...
  • Learns to call "Aunty" (the maid), and Ah Ma (her maternal grandmother)
For the next 2 months, I have planned to teach her:
  • Drink water from spout 
  • Self-spoon feeding
I know it will be a very messy and high-patience activity, and I hope she will be cooperative and can master them.

On the character developing side, Kayla has been throwing really bad tantrums lately. And she is extremely "bullish"! (very stubborn). Very insistent of getting what she wants. And she is very "fierce" in holding on during fights! That was once she grabbed my hair really tightly when I blocked her access to the tissue box. No matter how hard I hit her backside and warn her to let go in a very stern voice, she still hold on to my hair very firmly and do not intend to back off! Yet I can't pull back cuz its my precious hair in jeopardy leh!!!

I hope along the way, we as her parents can teach her well and she will not grow up to be violent, or become a tantrum-throwing girl. This educating and disciplining path is going to be very challenging for us....

Some photos of her weekends with us!

@ Home


@ NTUC Income Kite Festival 2010


Wednesday, September 1, 2010

The Toddler Kayla: 13th month


Now should start to refer Kayla as "toddler" and no more "baby" liao.

At 13th month, she is becoming more chatty and frequently says a string of "toddler-talk" that we do not understand and yet she is happy yakking away. haha..

She also mastered 2 games that we have bought for her when she was 8th month old.

1) The Stacking Game

She is now quite good with the Stacking Game as her grip becomes firmer along with more practices.

2)  The Sorting Game

She still can't control her finger motor skills very well for odd-shape (e.g. crescent moon shape). And she still can't identify the shapes yet, so we have to guide her to the correct ones and let her try to figure out how to drop the shape into the right hole.

This seems like a simple task for us adults, yet it takes so much time and practice for toddlers to do so. And during the game, we can observe how she reacts and her character patterns. We think she is more of those impatient kind, who wants to hasten results and will throw tantrums or get unhappy when she just can't do it. If she manages to do it well, she seems to display a smug yet contended look. Haaha.. Buay tahan her. So interesting to see her displaying her own characteristics (at the same time reflective of our characteristics! Mostly mine! The 大小姐脾气 comes from me )

Baby's Day Out - My First National Day Party

In August, Kayla also attended her very first National Day event that is specifically for babies! It's called the Baby's Day Out - My First National Day Party (organised by UFamily NTUC)

It was pretty fun to see so many cutie babies clad in their National Day's tee that is provided by the organiser. See Kayla in her own National Day's tee!


There are even "tidbits" especially catered for the kids! Luckily Kayla is big enough to enjoy her own food at her little people event.

We also saw Little Vionn (Wanling's baby) at the baby event! This is where the little people will meet and catch up! haha...


At the event, we also got to take a family photograph at the photo taking booth and can keep the photo as souvenir.