yellows and greens...

We might have taken out the swimming pool again for some splash last Sunday, but since then, the weather had made a turn for the worse with plenty of sudden rain falls, thunder storms and generally gray, cloudy days.
Of course, it also means a lot of opportunity to break out our bits of yellows to play in the rain!

 

We dressed up the Little One, snatched the camera, took the ginormous umbrella (the expensive camera and Mama both need some protection from rain, you know!), and went running to chase some rain outside.

I don't know if you notice, but it seems to this Mama that the kind of rainy days that make Kecil's boat-launching possible often happens on the days when Kecil had decided to wear one of her long, beautiful dresses.
And of course, no boat-launching will be complete without getting down on the ground to release the boat, as well as a general splash around, causing the said dress to get completely drenched, if not muddy as well.
Still, I guess dresses are small price compared to the sheer joy of carefree days under the gentler forces of nature.

I don't have any recollection of me going out to play in the rain myself when I was smaller, but I do hope these days would be one of the many good memories of Kecil's childhood.
Now if Mama can only ensure that all these frolics do not result in any cold/flu/cough, things would be just peachy.
As it is, Kecil just developed a cough over the weekend, which she might have caught from her poor, overworked Daddy. So... we might try to keep ourselves from the rain for the time being.

Until next time, and here's to all kinds of enjoyable weather!

Then & Now

Then....

 Now ...

Zen, streamlined, boy-like, no frills clothing versus beautiful, girly, frilly dresses and pyjama.

The difference between buying out of necessity and buying out of... just a sense of fun, access to sales, cheap but nice clothing....

Thank you again for all the beautiful dresses! (and pyjamas. It's Tinkerbell, by the way)

fashionista

When it comes to the number of clothing owned in this house, this Mama thinks that Kecil would definitely win hands down.
That is despite not having so many numbers of years to accumulate the said clothing articles.
Still, I guess having so many relatives and friends so eager to dress up this Little One helps.
I don't think I have bought any article of clothing for ... months!
Except a few pairs of Minnie Mouse underwear some 2 months back.

The last visit by Tante Rina had come with its usual accompanying loot of clothing articles, which includes:

This beautiful orange Princess dress

A pair of Tinkerbell pyjamas

(which became an instant hit, needless to say)

A Girly white T-shirt (complete with a little girl and her cat illustration)

And of course, not to forget the fun pink pants at the beginning of the post!

We are definitely very grateful for all the gifts. I guess Kecil is also happy to know that she is a source of inspiration for many a shopping trips for many of her Tantes and grandparents.

And despite feeling overwhelmed at times, I guess the clothes couldn't have come at a better time as Kecil quickly outgrows her clothing.

Indeed, most of her new stuff are supposedly for 4-year olds and they FIT.

Not loose, no excess room. They FIT. Nicely, some can even be said to fit snugly. 

Ugh ogh.

Moral of the story?

This Mama does feed the kid. Haha!

Well... anyway, just to say it again, thank you for all the gifts.

We'll definitely try to document the rest which are not yet here for various reasons.

In the meantime, if you still feel like hunting more cute clothing, do go ahead.

Just remember to look for maybe a 5-year old size instead.

Happy Hunting!

Sunday ...

... was not quite really summer anymore.
But at the same time, there was no rain, the sun was shining, albeit sometimes hidden behind some clouds.
So when Kecil broke into the storage and found her deflated pool... Mama really did not have a good reason not to let her swim outside
Not to forget Mama's latest injury that definitely make swimming at the proper pool out of question (no water for the would for a couple more days)

So we went for Daddy and his trusty compressor (mainly used for painting using air-brush)
Managed to get the pool inflated in practically no time as compared to using the borrowed hand-pump the last time we used the pool
Rolled out some mat, filled up the pool, and we were good to go,
Mama watching and swatting the insects, Kecil frolicking in water

T'was a good Sunday.
We do hope that you had a good Sunday too!

Always a lovely sight...

Always make me feel like plopping down on the bed to follow her example.
How about you?

Obsession...

 
Back in the days when we just moved in here, we used to have one hell of a weather, in the form of continuous, non-stop rain and thunderstorms.
Indeed, it was said that the rainfall that year was something of a decade-high.
The point is that the house was cold then. And empty, with most of our stuff not yet around.
So to protect a certain crawling baby, Mama bought an alphabet jigsaw mat, supposedly for the said baby to play ON.
I guess the intention is good enough, even if the implementation was less than brilliant.

You see, instead of sitting ON the said 'carpet', she'd rather sit on the FLOOR and PLAY WITH the carpet!
It made generally a lot of mess everywhere with all the letters scattered everywhere around the house.
Until Tita got fed up and stuff everything into plastic bags and hid them in the cabinet.

The 'carpet' still get some attention from time to time, but especially recently, thanks partly to Daddy and her better motoric skills, we have different uses of the 'carpet'

Instead of boring, 2-D carpet, she (or Daddy or which ever adult currently in residence) made cool, 3-D blocks, or, as she name them... cupcake!

First you made the cubes, then you make any necessary modification, then you stack them to make whatever structure you want to build. Easy and fun, no?
Well... quite, until you become the adult being summoned from all ends of the house to 'help' along.

Still, it's always interesting to see what she come up with.

 Simple stackable structure, a hiding post?

Cupcakes?

Oh, and the best of all:

Baa!

Camera? Projector? Where did she ever see an old-fashioned camera anyway?
Still... absolutely brilliant!
Here's to more free form, child-like creativity!

A new friend

We recently acquired new neighbor a few houses down, who proceeded with erecting some fence around the backyard.
We found out the tentative reason just a few days earlier, when Kecil started hanging out at the fence after school.
Apparently she found a new friend....

... of the four-legged kind!

It's still early days yet. We have not even met the puppy's owner (Yes, she is still a puppy).
We do hope that we'll get to meet soon so that hopefully Kecil can really make the Puppy a friend.
In the meantime, as Mama kept reminding Kecil, she already HAS a big puppy at home, by the name of Penny. Ha!

In Skool

For various reasons, we like to do our school run early, just so Kecil have more time to settle down in school before proper class starts. It does mean that she has to wait for the rest of the students to arrive and class announced, but I think it's pretty well worth it.

Well, Kecil is not the only one who ended up waiting for classes to start. Most of the time, Mama is also held hostage (by Kecil) to stay around in the playroom and play with her until it's time for Kecil to go into her class.

Still, given more chance to watch Kecil antics (and, hopefully, the way she interacts with the rest of the Skool population), why not?

On a slightly a different note, I guess Kecil is getting very much used to her uniform. Mama's alterations seem to hold up pretty well so far. Oh, and Kecil's uniform was not the only which was altered by the Mamas.

I do hope you all enjoy seeing Kecil in her uniform in 'native' environment aka the Skool.
Until next time!

Two sides of the same coin...

 

I would love to think of Kecil as an eternally happy kid.

But the simple truth is that there are times when she would be quiet, pensive, and sometimes even very shy.

Just like the photos above, such a drastic change of mood, in the space of mere minutes.

For all that, this Mama still hopes for the best,

Still hopes that instead of indicating any mercurial personality, all these simply represents this complex person in her entirety,

This Little Person whom I am so proud to call my daughter

Whom a lot of people are so glad to know and be friends/family with.

Thank you again, Tante Rina, for having managed to capture the expressions so beautifully.

Outside in the rain...

The other day, Tante Rina caught this little Imp playing in the rain gleefully, refusing to wear her raincoat AND taking the umbrella along,
Just her pair of trusty yellow boots and normal clothing,
Running around in the rain.

 The full story was that .... well.. you remember me saying that we have a small depression on the street in front of the house that act like a second water path during rain? Watching all that water rushing by, Mama hit the brilliant idea of playing 'boat' using the water.
So we folded up some magazine paper (hoping that it would be quite water resistant than normal paper) to a boat shape, and sent of the Little One to launch the boat on the water.
Boy, did she ran away with the idea!

Given that it was raining, (and magazine paper is definitely NOT water resistant, DUH!) the paper boat quickly deteriorate to the point that it simply sat in water a lump of wet paper.
So.. Mama went back in, wrestled a cereal box into a rough boat shape, and sent the Kid out again to try it out.
Was pretty successful, but Kecil was getting totally soaked as well.
We called it a day after a while. With difficulty, obviously.
And during shower, we have to cajole her with water in the bathtub to stop her from crying.

The following day, another rainy day, Mama smack her own head for being so stupid
And simply sent Kecil out, after insisting that she put on her raincoat, with a simple, yellow plastic container. DUH!

She still get soaked, even with the raincoat. Must be the rigorous running around.
Well.. we just had to limit her time outside.
Still, it was a cheap, fun entertainment during a rainy day.
Just make sure it was simple rain outside instead of windy thunderstorm with lightning and whatnots.

The rains/storms ended on Sunday.
We highly suspected that the rain/storms went away with Tante Rina.
But that's OK. Kecil might be bored with the boat, and anyway, I am sure we can find all kinds of other things to do in any given weather.
Including Skool!
(Don't forget, we had at least 2 days of Skool canceled thanks to the storms)

So, here's hoping, not necessarily for good weather, but for the ability to make good of whatever weather that comes our way!
Have a great day!

This yellow raincoat...

was bought from the far far away land of Netherlands by Eyang for Daddy back during the time when Daddy was about the size of Kecil nowadays.
After about a total of 5 uses, I suppose either Daddy outgrew the coat, or the coat outlast its use in the hot and dry hometown of Daddy's.
It was lovingly cleaned and kept in the recesses of Eyang's house, waiting just for the right moment for it's second debut in the world.

And it's time did come at last, in the form of a certain cute little one, also known here as Kecil,
Daddy's firstborn, who also happened to be Eyangs' only grandchild for the moment.
So it just seems befitting, that Kecil should 'inherit' Daddy's raincoat

Well... ever since Kecil got the raincoat in May as part of her summer loot, it has certainly suffer through much more use than during its tenure as Daddy's raincoat.
From the first storm, to just simple daily rain, to a holiday in the mountain, complete with a horse ride, the raincoat has definitely proven to be very useful.
With the storms that just past us by last weekend, we actually managed to find yet some other activities that can be done during a rainy day:

... like exploring the backyard with a strange dog in tow...

... ensuring good drainage of the water...

... getting literally ankle-deep in water...

... rolling eyes at Mama for clicking non-stop. Ahem. ...

But of course we did not just stay at the back yard. Too many mosquitoes, not enough space... well.. Kecil apparently does not like the backyard too much during rainy days.
So we went to the front, and had a bit of fun as well:

But maybe we'll cover that in a different post.
In the meantime, any guest as to what Kecil did in front of the house that made her so happy?