The Last Batch

Jayna's:
A symphony of
pink, yellow and white.

Jaide's:
A balance of
yellow, orange and brown.

At the accessories workshop which I conducted during the June school holidays, the CG girls had the opportunity to choose their favourite beads and design their own accessories. The above are the choices made by Jaide and Jayna. Jayna, being the older and more mature one, was allowed to do the beading herself. She was absolutely delighted to wear her own piece of work!

I have always wanted to make an accessorised watch for myself in my favourite colours and style but I never got down to it. I made one out of left-over beads in my secondary school days but the teacher forbade me to wear it since it looked too much like a bracelet. 

I finally went to purchase the necessary material to create one, combining cat's eye beads and Swarovski crystals. The cost price was under $10 and the length fit me perfectly since it was custom-made. I am satisfied by this last bit of work. Due to certain constrains, this would most likely mark the end of my current accessory-making phase. Hopefully, I'll be able to resume some time in the future... *wistful*

4 in a room

Everyone in Lala Land... Zzzz...

Joram has mastered climbing down the bed! Thus, tonight, he has graduated to sleeping with his big brother and sisters. *applause* 

At first, it looked like Joram could sleep right away. Unfortunately, Jaide started talking to him and he suddenly caught a second wind. He began crawling all over the place and even tried pulling Jayna's hair quite a couple of times! It took him another hour before he could settle back down to sleep. It was quite a stressful experience for us parents to constantly keep a lookout and be ever ready to step in and referee the situation. 

Thankfully, at 9pm (half an hour later than normal bedtime), all is well. Perhaps, we should have allowed Joram to fall asleep first before letting the rest of the kids go in... Hmm... It'll probably take a while for everybody to get used to this.

Watch Joram demonstrate his newfound skill!

Powers Combined Again

After our first endeavour, my friend showed me a picture of a piece of rainbow loom artwork with Anna-inspired colours. I got excited again and went to get gold heart-shaped charms. Now, we have two complete sets of Frozen-themed accessories! Yay!

Anna Set

Elsa Set

The girls with their accessories.

Since I have a snowman bead charm anyway, I thought to might-as-well complete an Olaf-inspired bracelet for the brother with the help of my friend. 

Olaf Bracelet

Kale Chips

A successful first try!!!

Last week, I bought lots of green kale from the supermarket at a very discounted price. After trying out stir-frying, stewing and adding them into minestrone soup, I decided to attempt making kale chips. There was a lot of preparation work and cleaning the oily utensils after use was terribly tedious. However, the glee on the faces of the children and the way they thanked me profusely for making 'yummy vegetables' made all the hard work worthwhile. Fresh out of the oven, the chips were really crispy and nice. They were gone in a matter of minutes and if I hadn't kept a small portion for Joshua, there wouldn't have been any left for him when he returns from work!

Leaving the leaves out
to dry after washing

All buttered up!

Right out of the oven. Hmm...

Second Spiritual Birthday

Memory Verses

7th of July is the older two children's spiritual birthday. Two years ago, they accepted Jesus as their personal Saviour and Lord. It has been a wonderful journey watching them grow in their faith. They both have shown much improvement in the weak areas they asked God to help them with since last year's celebration. 

Here's Jayna's reflections:

1) What is one thing that you have learnt about God this past year?

- We can praise God in everything we do.

2) What is one thing that you think have pleased God in your life?

- Helping to take care of the younger siblings and loving the younger sister despite being bullied by her.

3) What are the areas of weakness you want God to help you with?

- To work even harder and do better in school. 

- To be happy with what I have i.e. learn to be content

Celebration at Daily Scoop

Powers Combine!

For my girls

For her girls

I have a CG mate who has been into rainbow loom lately and when I saw a picture somebody posted on Facebook, I got the idea of us combining our different specialties to make these Elsa-inspired bracelets. 

So off we went: I went hunting for suitable snowflake charms while she made the bands. I found the charms from a US-based online shop (since I couldn't seem to find them in Singapore) and it took them weeks to get the goods to me. It arrived a few days ago and now I can finally attach them to her bands. 

Here's the result! I'm sure the girls would love them. They match their Frozen-themed necklaces very well. I am very blessed to have a kindred spirit in this CG friend of mine. Thank you, God! *double grin*

Supermodel Joram

It's time for Joram's turn to have a fashion show!!! *applause* (Click HERE to watch those of his siblings) This one took quite a while to make because I upgraded my Mac and had a lot of teething problems with the transition. It's only now that I've figured out how to use the new version well enough. So here goes...

Transitioning

I have started to let Joram take his nap on his future mattress to get used to it since he is able to crawl up the beds adeptly. As with the older kids, I will promote him to the bedroom to be with his siblings at night when he is able to come down the beds on his own with ease. That day is probably coming very soon. 

Then, I can finally convert the current playpen area to a proper study area. It is rather dangerous for the kids to be doing their work at the glass coffee table and very inconvenient for me when they do it instead at the dining table since it is my workspace. 

Despite still eating baby food with smooth texture and not cruising much, Joram has begun to attempt standing up on his own. This is the first time I have a baby who is too big for the bathtub and yet unable to transit to showering while standing. He is also wearing clothes which the other kids wore when they could already run around. Kinda "schizo"for me... :P

I have mixed feeling towards Joram growing up since he is most likely my last kid. On one hand, I am glad that things will get easier for me as he matures and learns independence. On the other hand, I will sorely miss the baby days of chubby cheeks, toothless grins and small snugly bodies. I am just glad that I have thoroughly savoured these moments while they lasted and have sufficiently captured the memories in photos, videos and blog posts. 

Watch Joram get a kick out of trying to stand by himself!