Navy Museum

Here's the second installation of military museum visits: the Singapore Navy Museum. Getting there was quite a hassle and we were almost sabotaged by a very confused soldier who gave us the wrong information. He told us we had to change bus to get to the museum from the naval base. Thankfully, after double checking google maps, I decided to trust my instincts that we had arrived at the correct place and went in via another entrance. The sign for the museum was a very small A4 sized paper at the visitor's gate. I think they really should have made bigger and clearer signages. 

Since it was a restricted area, we had to wait for an escort and went through a security check. It was a 5 min walk from the entrance so I was actually grateful to have someone guide us there. Dragging 4 tired kids around such a large compound lost would really have been no joke. And guess what? Probably due to the inaccessibility of the museum, we TOTALLY had the entire place to ourselves despite it being the school holidays!!!

Aye aye, Captain Jaide!

Watching a short film
on the history of RSN

Exploring morse code

Completed the mission

Carrying a search light

Battle simulation

There were interesting decoration steering wheels at the toilet doors and the kids actually thought they had to turn them to enter. We had a good laugh over that! ROFL I had to tell them to just push the door. 

I found the museum very informative. However, the children were only interested in the more interactive exhibits and grew bored pretty easily. I could not really read everything I was intrigued with because I had a very troublesome Jaide and a clingy Joram to deal with. Looks like it would not be worthwhile for us to go back there again. 

  

Jaide's Graduation Concert

My third child has finally graduated from kindergarten! *applause* I am very glad that Jaide will join the ranks of primary school going children in the family. I believe she truly looks forward this transition, far more than her older siblings did, given her driven personality. She looked soooo adorable in her sparkly pink dress. 

After looking at the costumes of the other performers, I'm happy for her that her class was given the costume that she probably likes the most. It looked absolutely flattering on her too! Watching her dance, I think that she has a rather good sense of rhythm and a certain unique grace to her movements, reinforcing my decision to let her learn ballet come next year. She is the only kid in the family who never fails to join me when I spontaneously dance to any music I hear. Hahaha...

The whole family is there to support Jaide!

Here is Jaide's cute dance performance

Posing in front of
the Christmas tree

Family shot

  

ARMS & SDC

The main theme of this holiday's outings is our country's armed forces. My eldest boy especially looked forward to this series of museum visitations. First up was the Army Museum of Singapore (ARMS). 

Tour guide explaining to the kids

Taking a peek into the army barracks

Enarmoured by the rifle

Although my two older children met the minimum height requirement of 1.2m for the rifle shooting simulation, the person in charge did not allow them to try their hands at it, much to our disappointment. In the end, they could only watch me shoot. My eldest kid took a video of me target-practicing at lane 3.

Posing in front of a tank

Monkeying around outdoors

The sit-up machine

There were also tires and leopard crawl obstacle course where the participants can time themselves. Jaide did pretty well on them. 

After the tour, we adjourned to the Singapore Discovery Center's canteen to have our lunch since it was within walking distance. And off we went to explore the exhibits. We almost had the whole place to ourselves! The children's favourite by far was the battle simulation to educate us on how Singapore's defence units work together. Just nice that there were four of them kids for this game; one controlling the ships, one maneuvering the tanks, one handling the helicopters with yet another "guiding" the attacks at the overwatch panel.

The children enjoyed themselves and asked to return for another trip. I think I shall wait till my husband is able to take leave and join us before we go back there again. He would be better able to answer questions regarding the military and help the children figure out the high tech games. :P

Watching a movie clip
about Singapore

BATTLE SIMULATION!!!

Answering entrepreneurial questions

A tiny ball pit at the special exhibition area

Jaide Is Six!

When her older sister chose to celebrate her birthday with her classmates in school, Jaide told me she wanted to do the same. Knowing that this option is the most expensive one, with party favours for all the classmates and the humongous cake big enough for everyone, I said that she could only do it when she is in K2. True to my word, I gave her what she wanted.

From experience, I realised that getting multiple small gifts to put into the party bag adds up to a lot. Yet, I have not changed in my determination not to succumb to using cheap junk food to pad it up, I figured that getting a single good quality gift for each child would be a better idea. We decided to buy caps in Jaide's classmates' favourite cartoon characters. I made a list of available options and asked her friends each to fill in his/her name beside the one he/she would like. Of course, Jaide got to pick out her pink princess cap too!

All the options chosen by the children

On the actual day, despite it being a school day, I let Jaide miss the morning lessons because she wanted the full princess outfit; a Princess Aurora gown complete with tiara and nail polish. It took me quite a long time to doll her up. After which, I brought my kids out for lunch and Jaide enjoyed a nice mango pudding after her meal. 

Then, it was time for the appointed celebration. The 2kg Sleeping Beauty cake was so big and heavy that I had a hard time carrying it to her school with 4 children in tow! Jaide also handpicked the number 6 and two butterfly candles for her cake. When we reached, her classmates kept asking me why Jaide was so pretty that day, much to the birthday girl's delight. LOL

Jaide's teacher offered to take this
family pic for me. How nice of her!

After the entire class had their fill of the birthday cake, Jaide went about distributing the caps to her friends. For those who were absent for the day, Jaide put the gifts into their cubby holes. She flitted around the classroom in her pink dress like a lovely butterfly. All my hard work was worth it to see her grin from ear to ear the whole time. Blessed birthday, Jaide! May God continue to grow and mature you into a good servant leader.

   

Joram accepted Jesus!

I have asked Joram whether he wanted to invite Jesus into his heart a couple of times over the past one year but he would flash me a cheeky grin and say no. I figured the he saw no need for God in his life and thus I waited upon the Lord for his heart to be ready. 

In the recent weeks, he has been uncharacteristically oversensitive and cried at the drop of the hat even when there seemed to be no clear reason for him to be upset. He could suddenly burst into tears upon being asked an innocent question. I tried being extra gentle with him and gave him lots of affection but it was no use. Joshua also complained to me that he was very whiny and weepy these days and asked me if it were an extremely delayed "terrible twos".

I was puzzled too so I started seeking God for an answer. Last week, it suddenly dawned upon me that he might have become aware of the God-shaped vacuum in his heart. Since Jaide is celebrating her 3rd spiritual birthday soon anyway, I decided to wait a week before asking him the ultimate question again. If he were to say yes, they would be able to share the same spiritual birthday.

Today, I called him into my bedroom after breakfast. I asked him if he knew that he was crying a lot lately and I asked him for a reason. Was it because he was bullied? He shook his head. Was it due to feeling unwell? He replied no. Was it because he felt empty in his heart? Tears started to pool in his eyes and he nodded his head slowly. So when I asked him if he wanted to ask Jesus into his heart to fill it up with love and joy, he agreed readily. 

I explained the gospel using the same Good News material I used with his siblings. I was surprised that it all seemed new to him despite going to church and bible study with us all his life. I guess he heard bits of it here and there but no one has yet to help him piece them together. He kept asking me how to ask Jesus into his life but I did not want to skim over the important concepts since he was unfamiliar with them. After I made sure he understood what I was showing him, I led him through the sinner's prayer. He was thrilled when I guided his hand to write in his commitment card. He kept saying that he was writing to Jesus. 

His very own commitment card and 

spiritual journal for future use

To be fair, I also brought him out to get a cup of ice-blended chocolate to celebrate his new life in Jesus before he went up the school bus. He was smart to ask whether his older brother and sisters had the drink too when they received Christ in the past. LOL Check out his siblings' day of salvation HERE and HERE.

I pray that Joram will gradually allow God to pour into his life so that his cup will overflow with His mercy and grace. May he experience Jesus to the full and know that he will never walk alone again!

Jaide's 3rd Spiritual Birthday

As I looked through my photos and blog, I realised that I had not been consistent with documenting the children's spiritual birthdays. So before Jaide's graduates from my blog, I decided I've got to remember taking photos and writing a post to commemorate the occasion. 

It is nothing elaborate. As with the previous years, I simply had a private session of spiritual evaluation with her using the same three questions, jotted her answers down in her journal and took her out to celebrate with some ice-cream.

I must say that she has improved a lot over the past one year. From someone who used to disobey me at every turn, I can see her honest desire to try listening to my instructions nowadays. She is far less fickle-minded and puts in effort to do her chores without complaint. Even though her careless clumsiness and penchant for mischief are still evident, she is much more loveable than a year ago. 

Praise God for her spiritual growth!

Joshua wanted to take a pic of us

cos we looked so similar. LOL

Saying grace before digging in

  

Transfer of Ownership

2 years ago, my eldest chose to give up on his Chinese. You see, he started failing his Chinese at the beginning of primary two and us parents worked exceedingly hard to help him out. During the day, I supervised his 听写 revision while Joshua drilled him with flash cards and iPhone apps at night before bed almost everyday. We borrowed interesting Chinese comics for him and read them with him. I even did a complete Chinese homeschool curriculum with him during the school holidays. It was a constant struggle in getting him to put in the effort to improve, ending up in much protest and crying from him. 

Eventually, after countless ineffective heart-to-heart talks with him, we decided that our relationship with him is far more important and told him that he will get to choose how much effort he wants to put in for his schoolwork. We will be ready to help him whenever he wants and asks for it. Otherwise, if he is happy with failing the subject, we would not argue with him anymore. After all, the whole year's worth of pushing him only served to improve his grades by a mere 4 marks to marginally pass the exam. Thus, even when he refused to go for the school supplementary classes at primary 3, we did not object to his decision. I figured that if he really can't make it in the education system, I can always pull him out to homeschool, worse comes to worst. 

I never thought that I would have to "let go" in such a heart-breaking manner with my second child too. For all her 8 years of life, I had put in herculean efforts to help manage her eczema. I tried all sorts of creams and supplements no matter how expensive or difficult to administer. I personally cooked and prepared her every meal for a special detox diet. We went gluten-free and dairy-free despite having to spend double the amount on her groceries. I bought truckloads of tights to protect her legs from dust and allergens. The most tedious thing was that I had to nag at her everyday to moisturise, hydrate or even shower to keep her skin clean. 

Yet, she was constantly balking at the dietary restrictions. I am half-deaf from hearing her incessant complaints. She would even lie about having moisturised. So when she started crying the moment we asked her to shower and screamed at us each time we reminded her to moisturise, I decided finally to transfer the ownership of her skin-care entirely to her. She'll get to decide what she wants to eat as with the rest of the children in the family from now on. She can choose whether or not to moisturise or shower.

I can only pray that her condition will not worsen to the point of affecting her daily life. Today marks one of the two most heart-breaking moments in my parenting journey. It is only such moments when I truly understand the father's heart in the parable of the prodigal son.