Croup

Last night, the little boy scare the hell out of my life !!


Before he went to bed, I already heard some phlegmy sound from him and got a hunch that he might have a cough pretty soon.

Before I knew it, he woke from his sleep at 11.30 pm, trying to cough out something as if there is something stuck in his throat.

His coughs were hoarse and sounded like dog's barking. He seems to be having breathing difficulties, at the same time, breaking out into cold sweat and crying non stop. Immediately, I suspected it could be croup as I have read up on the signs and symptoms before.

Best part was, Xav always coincidently, chose the occasions to fall sick either on public holidays or when the daddy is on duty at work !!

Off we went in a cab straight to KKH. Luckily, it's not very crowded. We didn't have to wait for long before our turn came. The doc then diagnose that Xav got croup. Think I can be a doc ?? Heeee ...

Croup is the viral infection of the vocal cords and voice box. Children who got this would have a tight, low pitched, "barking" cough.

Doc said that fever and cold will come in together as well. He was given the steroids to reduce the swelling of the airway so that he could breathe better. But we have to stay there for observations for two hours.... Thank god, nothing too serious.

Here's the same old active Xav while waiting for the two hours to be up.


Watching pink panther to pass his time while I am sitting in one corner, trying to catch some sleep as well as occasionally making sure that he was still around.

The poor boy kept saying bye bye to the doc and nurses when they were taking his blood pressure for fear that needles might appear!

Reach home about 3.30am... And I'm seriously dead beat!! We both slept till 9 am this morning.. Think I got to admit that I'm "old" !! Just one late night and it felt like years since I have taken a nice sleep !! Get well soon, little one !

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Act 3 Academy

On wed, I brought Xav for a Speech & Drama trial class @ Act 3 International.

This is one of the enrichment classes which I would be signing him up since he is no longer in childcare.

We arrived there much earlier than the class commencement time as I'm trying to figure out where the place is.

My independant little boy made his way up himself by the three long flight of stairs while I can conveniently carry his diaper bag on one hand and his pram in the other. Thank you Xav !

There he is exploring around the premises while waiting for the class to start.

In the waiting room...

During the class, there is alot of music and movement involvement. The teachers are child friendly, expressive as well as interactive !

Personally, I feel that Xav enjoys every part of the music and movement as he observed how the teachers did it and joined in with his actions thereafter.

Story for that day was "The tortise and the hare". All actions, songs, crafts and movement were related to the story.

Here's Teacher April drawing happy face on Xav's palm.

Mr Happy meets Mr Sad !

This two little faces have a song behind them!

And this is the pair of hare's ears that I assisted Xav to do during the crafts session.

The class includes story telling session which can actually trains the child concentration to sit down and listen to the story.

Here's the normally super active Xav, sitting down and concentrating on the story telling. He was a bit restless at the start of it. But eventually, he sat throughout the whole session !! Great job, Xav !

After the class, took his lunch and brought him to Iluma for lunch with Andy and Theresa. Look at Xavier !! He must be thinking, oh mine, is this whole bowl of "ice-shim" gonna be mine !!

Confirm !!!! Hahahaha !!

But mummy says no.. I can only take a little bit bit..

Anyway, I have signed up Xav for the remaining term. Shall see if he really likes it from here as one session is insufficient to deduce whether if he likes or don't.

Hopefully he enjoys it. I believe in the long run, speech and drama would be able to train the child to be more confident amd creative in their problem solving skills as well as in their language development.

Colourful fishcake

Yet another idea from wokking mum, this recipe is quite easy. Most suitable for toddlers who do not like greens.

It is actually mixture of carrot and brocolli with fish paste and egg !


Supposed to be minced spinach, but I only had brocolli with me so I substitute the spinach with it.


No seasoning needed as the fish paste already have salt content.

Just steam on high heat till cooked. And this is Xavier's meal an a bowl of soup to go with.


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Music & Movement

During these 22 months, Xav did not go for any music enrichment classes as I feel that the daily sing-a-long sessions should be sufficient for him at this age. Not until the age of 4, then will I send him to take up one instument for his extra enrichment.

But still subjects to his likes and dislikes for music. Now, he hums to familiar music or songs that he knew.


I'm proud of him ! He knows majority of the nursery rhymes and songs ! And Yes even mandarin songs !

In a way, I trained his memory by the lyrics. Everyday, we will have a short singing sessions through his favourite karaoke sing-a-long discs.

Here's one of Xav with Edna watching the karaoke sing-a-long disc.


Through out the day, when I'm cooking, hanging my laundry or during his playtime, I will tend to sing him and stopped at the 2nd last word of every sentence. From there, he will fill in the blanks and yes, he can do it, even when at times, I stopped in the mid of the sentence to see if he knows the word. Even if he does not know how to pronouce the word, he will make a sound or a tune to fit in.

There are some songs which you can incorporate actions into them ! And Xav always like to dance to "Ring-a-ring O Roses" and "If you are happy".

This is the list of songs and rhymes Xav has learnt and always sing together with me. Be it just humming the familiar tunes or filling in the blanks, here goes the list:

1. You're my sunshine
2. Over the rainbow
3. The wheels on the bus
4. Hey Diddle, Diddle
5. Humpty Dumpty
6. Hickery Dickery Dock
7. Head, shoulders, Knees and toes
8. Little Miss Muffet
9. Sing your way home
10. Twinkle, Twinkle lil' Stars (In both Eng and Mandarin)
11. Head, Shoulders, knees and toes (He's trying to learn the actions !! It's quite hilarious when you see him attempting to do it. )
12. Row, row, row your boat
13. Little Bo-Peep
14. Old Mother Hubbard
15. Miss Polly
16. Ten Little Indians
17. Ten fat sausages (Xav will go "pop" and "bang" at himself !)
18. 小白船
19. 好宝宝
20. 泥娃娃
21. 小蜜蜂
22. 大象
23. 丑小鸭
24.红青蜓 by 小虎队

Quite an achievement for Xav!

Think it be even better if I can go and refresh my knowledge on the guitar chords and retune the guitar. Wouldn't it be more fun if we could sing along with the accompany of guitar strums !





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Xavier @ 22 months old

Two more months to hit 2 years old!! Come to think of it, it's like pretty fast ! Can Xav not grow up so fast !

He loves bathing and somehow associates the shower with rain.

He will keep on saying "raining" in delight and had his fun under the shower.


And yes praises is what they want at this stage! I will give him
praises after he did what I instructed him to.

For instance, I get him wear the Santa's hat after showing him how it looked like on my head. This sparked off an interest in him


and he wore it on his head. Afterwich, I praised him by saying that he nice he looks and he be walking away happily.



Normally, he doesn't like anything to be on his head.

This is my little Santa !



Xavier's learnt his alphabets but not fully though.

These are the majority which he knows the vowels, recognises the letters and can read them out;

A,B,C,D,E,F,G,H,I,J,K,O,S,T,X & Z

We have been singing the ABC song together almost everyday.

Some ways which he learns:
1. Casual singing
2. Thru IPhone ( I loaded one ABC song which pictures "Gracie" from wheels on the bus. Thanks Caca)
3. Alphabets fridge magnets (only 2 dollars from Daiso)



4. Phonics book and CD (Ants on the apple by Tishy Bruce)



Here's Xav enjoying the song as well as learning the vowels of the words.




5. Another way he learnt is from magazines. When I'm browsing, sometimes I will point out the letters to him and he will read out if he knows.

For numbers, he can count from 1 to 20 with me intervally. I goes 1, he goes 2, I goes 3 and he goes 4 ... All the way to 20 though he doesn't know how to really pronounce from 13 to 15 as well as 17.

He can even count the steps as he is climbing up the stairs !

Another way he learnt the numbers is in the lift ! It makes a good exposure to numbers though as it ascends or descends to different floors.

For food and fruits, he can name me some of the common items like: rice, bread, cake, egg, apple, nana (banana).

And I got a surprise from him saying "ice shim" when he caught me eating the mac waffle cone. I was thinking, how did he know when i have never show him one before!

He will tell me that he is full by either patting his tummy and says "Full full". He knows "drink" and "eat" as well. So much easier than before, at least when he is thirsty he knows how to indicate by saying " duink duink ".

Sometimes, he tends to disturb me by saying "sleep" and went lying down on the bed.

He learns to blink his eyes too when we says "blink"!

We taught him how not to get jealous of Edna and to love her more instead. Here's Xav showing his brotherly love ! Sometims a peck on her cheeks or gave her big warm hugs

Helps Jo to pat Edna when she is crying or wants to sleep

But he does get a bit jealous of the attention Edna is getting from the grandparents.

Hence, whatever Edna is doing, he would want to do it too !

Now he is more expressive, he knows how to say Yes & No but more often than not, he will shake his head if he doesn't want.

He got his favourite cartoons ! Doreamon and Thomas and friends! This is the suit which Jo bought for him !


And the Thomas and friends Dvd managed to make him sit down and have his haircut as compared to the last time, he almost tore down the whole building with his cries.




Xav learns how to address yiyi, uncle, aunty, daddy, mammy (mummy), kng kng (gong gong), mah mah (grandmother).


Shall continue this on the next post. Too much to update !! This shows how much he has been learning ?! I'm so excited !!

Art frenzy

Decided not to grab the art supplies from Beacon as it is way too inconvenient especially when I have no transport.

Ended up, I signed up as Art Friend's member to buy the paints for Xavier. The price is comparable to Beacon ! Could be even cheaper ! Since I be getting the supplies often so why not !

Bought these Tempera washable paints. But only the primary colours though as I intended to teach Xav other secondary colours by mixing the primary colours together.


Here's the piggy and his paints !


And I got some drawing blocks for him as well.

And today, I taught him Letter A, though he recognises Letter A as well as some other alphabets.

I drew a big apple and the Alphabet A with big and small case on the paper for him to colour.



He had fun !


The nicely coloured portion is done by mummy incase if you all got a shock that Xav can colour within lines. Am still trying to teach him though.


Xav can even use both hands to colour ! Hahaha... ...


We ended up having a colourful apple !

Later in the evening, while waiting for his dinner, I gave him some wet paint to play with.


It was quite obvious that he likes to dip his finger into the wet paint as compared to the color pencils.

Here's Xav painting with care. I keep emphasizing him to paint within the apple. Hahahah......








And I got a polka dot "A" for Xav!


Thank you for reading and if you would like to stay tune for future updates, do follow me on Facebook, Pinterest and Instagram !

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