Lanterns oh Lanterns!

This year, the girls got 6 lanterns to play with. We just got them 2 Disney cartoon types and 2 traditional ones. Since we just have 2 more days left, and they haven't played the traditional ones, Daddy decided to let them light those up last night at Gurney Drive.

But just right before we went, their Chim Po and Chik Gong came by to pass them 2 more modern types lanterns! That's how they ended up with 6 :)

Yes, while waiting for them, we were looking at the moon, and the girls sang the Mr. Moon song.  

It has been awhile since I actually gazed at the moon that long. The moon actually played hide & seek with us! When it got behind the clouds, the kids were anxious, and asked me where did Mr. Moon go? So they continued singing, with the hope that he'll come out to play again. And out he came indeed! What a childish game with the girls, but they certainly enjoyed it :)

Daddy helping them to lit their lanterns

Jie Jie with her dragon lantern while Mei Mei with her fish lantern

At Gurney Drive, we're surprised to see so many people with their lanterns even though it's quite late already. And there're people selling bubble guns too. Looks like the kids were more crazy about bubbles than the moon, coz that's what attracted them the most. They chased the bubbles everywhere (that's how they made new friends too), and ended up we had to carry their lanterns for them!

We've bought a bubble gun each for them, so I bet you can guess what's our plan tonight. Yeah, even though Jie Jie was nice enough to let Mei Mei shot the bubbles, we decided to get them one each.
 
Happy Mid Autumn Festival to all! Remember to eat your mooncakes yeah :)

Little Voices

It has now became their favourite games in the car - to record their singing with my h/p and then replay it again.

Can you guess from the voices who's who?

Listen to this:


And now this....


And now combined... (which was obvious who's the lead, since that was recorded about 4 months ago. You can listen to Mei Mei's solo 5 months ago here)

Little Dancer

Last night, SJ suddenly got the dancing fever. I have no idea what got into her, she just danced non-stop! This is what I managed to capture :)



Oops, Jie Jie wasn't so happy and wanted me to capture her instead!

St. Petersburg Day 3

Gosh, it took me more than 2 months to post about Day 3! Anyway, it's still better late than never, right? Which is good in a way too, because I've finally got my brother's and sister's copies of the photos too. Too bad  my dad's camera dropped and was out of function right on the spot so we had less point of views.

Day 3 fell on a Sunday, so we went to Church. It's not easy to find a Catholic Church there, as most were Orthodox Church. Luckily my elder sister has explored on her own the day before to find the right one, so that we would not be late for Mass on the actual day. One tip on how to differentiate an Orthodox Church from a Catholic one is by looking at its cross.

Orthodox cross is a cross with 3 cross beams and is distinctly different from the other Christian cross. 

The church that we went to - look at its cross on top carefully

Can you see us at the back row on the left side? I chose to sit behind in case the kids made noises.

Halfway thru the Mass, SJ wants to poo poo...

So I took her out, searched for awhile until I saw a restaurant which opened quite early. Unfortunately, she didn't want to do her business. So I took her back in...

The Church from the outside...

Not long later, SJ said she wanted to wee wee. So I had to take her out to find a place again...

And we settled for this - did you see the manhole? 

Well, that's the best I could find AND she's willing to do her little business

After she's done, we went back in. Thank goodness the kids let me stay in there till Mass finished. 

My brother managed to get more shots of the church interior

After Mass, we let them roam around while waiting for the others. Oh, I didn't know that they did have toilets inside the building, I should have asked my younger sister earlier - she was sitting at the front so it's not nice to go all the way up there as this might interrupt the other parishioners.  

After that, we went to our first destination - Peterhof. We took the cruise - see how crowded was the queue.

The schedule and the fare

Nice views from inside the boat...

Getting comfy finally

In the boat, I breastfed SJ, which she remembered for life. Because she would refer to the boat as the place she drank nen nen (I hardly breastfeed her at all during the trip because it's not convenient while walking or when taking the bus/metro since we need to get down quite fast). But when in the boat, I felt that it's ok so I let her drink. I guess she really appreciate that and thus had fond memories of the boat :)

We finally reached our destination - both the kids were still sleeping

If you wonder where's my younger sister and her bf, they haven't joined us yet. They had to settle something regarding their transcripts, so my sis had given instructions to my brother on directions to get there. And I really have to give him the credit for being able to guide us till there, despite him not able to speak Russian. 

Here's what we had for lunch...

While the kids had their home-cooked potato porridge...

After lunch, we headed to see Peterhof's Palace and Garden...

Along the way, we stopped to have ice-creams!

And finally, we reached the place

It's so big, that we had to spent the entire afternoon covering the whole garden and palace. 

Before going up the stairs

From the top

The man and lady in costumes would charge people who wanted to take photos with them. There were many of these kind of people around

We then went into the Palace Museum

By then, my sister and her bf had already arrived so we went in together. 

Here's the interior of the museum that my sister managed to take.

After touring the palace museum, we continued to cover the rest of the garden.

A closer view...

That's the end of the trip. We left for home, using the bus this time. After that, it's the familiar scenes that we'll pass thru everyday...

Here's one of the metro station in St. Petersburg

And here's the supermarket that we went to, for cash withdrawal as well as groceries

Here's the famous artist at work

That night, we had dinner at Subway, since we're too tired to cook. So, that's all for Day 3. 

What happened during the long hols

Well, we got an unwelcomed visitor. Yes, again :(

This time, Mei Mei got it first. Her teacher informed me that she was feverish when I picked her up from school. She vomitted a few times. We took her to the paed, but he couldn't find anything wrong with her. Except for one tiny little ulcers at her throat. So he told us to monitor her for suspected HFMD.

Indeed, we noticed more spots appearing on her hands and body the next day. Now I know why I suddenly saw pimples below her nose. At first I thought she was just heaty. So we didn't let her go to school. Naturally, we also dropped Jie Jie at Amah's house that day, with the hope that she's stronger and wouldn't get it.

By the 3rd day, Mei Mei kind of recovered. But we're told that Jie Jie's turn to be feverish! To be safe, we took both girls to the paed. He knew that we didn't want to admit them, so he just gave us some medications. Not specifically for HFMD, but mostly vitamins, something to soak them with, and something to stop the itch, and something to relieve the ulcers. He also prescribed antibiotics (Zithromax) to Mei Mei because the paed felt that her fever was rather too long for normal HFMD (she's still having flu & cough).

Well, this time both girls didn't really suffer. Even though they had spots (Jie Jie was worse), they were still as active as ever, and could even eat! Very unlike those previous times when we had to koala bear them all the time. We didn't even need to take leave this time, as MIL could handle both, since they didn't feel sick at all. I guess it's due to the colostrum and probio that I've been diligently giving them all this while. Yes, I started to give SJ colostrum too when I noticed Jie Jie was much less prone to flu, etc. after she started taking that. Initially I didn't give SJ yet as she's still breastfeeding, so I took it myself in order to boost up my milk's quality. However, she still have flu occasionally, so I decided to try giving her that. And, I find that she's much stonger since then. Besides that, I also gave them g3 juice, but stopped when SJ got bronchitis. Now that they had HFMD again, I tried giving them again. I noticed that their ulcers went off really fast. Maybe that's why they could still eat. Unfortunately, SY's hands were rather badly affected this time. Look at her palms...

 Previously it was not this bad....

So, we're stranded at home during that long Raya weekends. And guess what? Since she's going to have her exams soon, Daddy took this opportunity to do revision with her. I told Daddy that some of my friends wanted to test if their kids learn anything from school at all, thus decided not to do any revision with their kids. So I'm planning to do the same thing too. But Daddy didn't really agree, that's why he revised with her himself :) Looks like this is a good escape for Mommy! I personally think she's still too small, and don't prefer to give her too much pressure. But now that she's absent from school for so long, which means she'll miss the revision with the teachers too, I can understand why Daddy was a bit 'tension'.

Fun time at the Beach

Well, it was not the real beach, but a man-made type. I bet you can guess where this place is :)

Can you guess what we're searching for? 

Yes, we're looking for pines! See Jie Jie in action - aim high, throw and splash!

Oops, where was it? Jie Jie was checking out if she threw it really far...

Now's my turn - First, pick a pine...

Then, aim nicely...

And finally, throw!

That's how we spent our weekend last Saturday!