Sunday ... & Monday

Sunday rolled in last weekend without anything on the cards except for some bad weather. So Kecil settled in at home with Mama and worked on 'things',

which happened to include bathing a certain naughty, smelly dog who sneaked outside for a roll in manure:

Guilty look you said? Mama would say grumpy, for being bathed after all the effort of making herself smelled 'right'. Hummpphh!

Back to Kecil, Mama did have some ideas after watching some arts and crafts show on TV.

Just using some materials on hand:

And after plenty of painting and wrestling:

TADAH!

It's a bit simple, not to mention VERY red.

But sorry, Kiddo. We only have red paint at home. 

Yea yea, Mama should stop simply eye-ing those paints at the store and start buying them so we can put more colors other than red on our projects.

Still, Kecil was pretty happy, and since she was, Mama was happy too.

Came Monday, one of her favorite song got played on TV, so we already got some action with the guitar:

Being a pilot edition, the 'guitar' is still a little 'buggy',

which is, of course, Mama's code to say that it was broken by Tuesday. Ha!

I guess we still need to work on the construction. 

Ah well, we'll try better material and methods next time, if there is indeed a next time.

Until then!

Skool & Mama-made

Mama posted this one more than a year ago, just as Kecil was turning two. The pseudo-banner was made partly as part of celebration, and partly because Mama just read that it benefits young children to be introduced early to their own name just so they can recognize it.

At two years old last year, it was WAY too early.

This year, however, with Kecil already starting on the alphabets in Skool... it's just timely.

So... since the banner was in no way permanent, we had to make a brand new one.

or two... ahem ...

Well... actually the sketches were made first, since Mama used that to also introduced the alphabets that made Kecil's name. Hence the cat, the tree etc.

I am very happy to report that Kecil did manage to recognize ALL the items despite Mama's less than spectacular drawing skills. Ahem.

The Apple and the Butterfly were from Skool. I did mention that Kecil has started on the alphabets in Skool, right?

Kecil made the choice to put them upstairs instead of the usual wall downstairs.

Currently Mama does not have a nice pic of our usual Skool wall, but as usual, it is still growing. We love that wall. On the other hand, at some other corner of the house, we do have a new 'totem'.

A number totem, indeed! Kecil went through the numbers before going through the alphabets. I guess her 8 and 9 are kept in Skool, but we have not had the chance to make our own. Mama and Kecil did make one of the numbers that currently made up our Number Totem. Can you guess which one it was?

This Mama is no way near accomplishing homeschooling. Still, it's always fun (and hopefully educational) to do some crafts with the Little One. This Mama does hope that we will still have a lot, many things to do together in future. In the meantime, I think she likes what Mama did so far.

How about you? Have you done any craft lately? This Mama happens to have a box full of stationary and colored papers, however, you can always start with as simple as cereal boxes and crayons. That was all it took (uhmm.. OK, plus string and a stapler) to make Kecil's banner.

We have a hidden outtake somewhere in this post. Check it out! And do comment below to let me know you love it, in addition to your guess for the Number Totem! Looking forward to hear from you!

New Dress from Mama

The New Dress

A post for a dress? This Mama must be running out of ideas, you said.
But hey! This is a special dress! For one, it was modified from Mama's own clothing.
Two, ha! it's Mama's first try on such modification (DIY handsewing, no less!)

Well... I did write a bit on the 'history' of the 'new' dress here. But if you are not inclined to read such a long, winding story, the paragraph above should be sufficient reason for posting it here.

The reception?
The Little One apparently loves it. Even Daddy looked somewhat in awe. So.. this Mama is happy.
I believe there are still quite a few unused garments at various corners of the house. Now just need to find the inspiration and the time to make something equally awesome. Hahaha!

Here's some pics of the Little One with her new dress:

New dress, new dress!

Perfect for outdoor wear

Not too long

Perfect for running around

It even matches the dog!

The Little One's Birthday

Maybe you noticed in the last post's first picture a set of letters for the Little One's name, (see here)
They were actually one of the few things that I made for her birthday
Birthdays might be a huge events for some kids, but given the parents' tendency to forgo huge celebration in favour of something more meaningful, well... we did not do much
In fact, I think the parents still owe her a 'proper' birthday gift.
I know I'm still working on mine,
But hey, we did try to make a special day for her.

Starting with these letters on the wall for the special one.
Mummy is really quite proud of her work over there, especially since they do not cost that much, if at all.
Cardboard from the boxes that came with the new fans that we bough, rough papers (plenty of those around here), some markers (for the outlines) and of course, water color. Voila!

Mmm... at first I wanted to make buntings. I think buntings are pretty traditional for birthdays but after putting the paper on the cardboard... why not just stick them on the wall? So much easier.

For more simple decoration that cost almost nothing?
Well.. the Little One loves balloon, so.. why not give her some? I did have a few left over balloons, result of some traipsing around town way back months ago. Just tie them up together with some scrap yarn (crochet yarn, of course, most accessible and always available while I'm still crocheting), and hang them!

Then of course there's the food!

I actually invited both Ami and Nata to come by sometime in the afternoon, and so I thought of preparing things which are easy to eat. I decided on home made pizza and popcorn. What can be easier but still tasty?

Pizza was a margherita, that's just plain pizza with tomato, basil, garlic and some cheese. I also added some onion for some extra flavour.

Basil from my shrub, of course.

I made my own dough. Apart from the time it takes to rise, I did not take too long or too much effort.  As for the popcorn? Instant microwaved butterlicious popcorn, popped in once the guests arrive to ensure freshness, done in 2 minutes, and was quite a hit too!

There was no cake as such. I did make some cream puffs to serve as 'birthday cake', but then I forgot to buy the candles, and it turned out that the birthday girl did not quite care for them. so.... well.. at least I made the effort.

Lastly, before the arrival of 'birthday guests', I thought of what to give as a thank you present. You know usually when you become guests at any bash you would come home with some party favours? Well... since I did not manage to settle on anything to buy (did buy some jelly, but they were eaten by the Little One), I just decorated 2 spare Ikea frames and wrap them in some paper with, of course, watercolor. Being able to draw some basic shape/design really has its use, haha! Just scroll down to see the pics. I am sorry about the organization, but not being familiar with HTML codes, I don't really have real control over where the pics would appear in relation to what I write. Really, maybe I should include that in the ever growing list of things that I should learn. Hmmm...

My Margherita... nyam nyam

In any case, as it turned out, Ami did not manage to make it that afternoon, so it was more of a playdate between Chitra, Nata and their Moms. But it was quite fun.
Maybe next year we'll do better, with candles and all, haha...

Plated cream puffs

Party favours aka thank you gifts

Birthday Gifts

Added 27 Sept 10:
Through visits to the Little One's 2 friends houses, we learned that the frames are already used to show photos of the Little One with respective friend. So cute. Glad that the frames are used. Mummy is big on 'useful' gifts, you know.

Logic with the Little One

Inspired by something I saw on a blog I visited,
I decided to try my hand again at watercolor, and also come up with something like an alphabet list for the Little One
She does not have any, you see, and I have not found any that strike my fancy,
So I figure something Mummy-made should be fine.

And then I got stuck trying to find words that start with particular alphabet, hmmmm....

I guess I can always try to copy some fancy alphabet list rather than think of my own,
But the again....
In the end, I decided to just start with words that the Little One is already familiar with.
So... here are the three that I've made and scanned, with what the Little One 'read' written as caption of the picture.

Do note, READ the caption!

Baabbuu!

Waawuu!

Ami!

Hmmmmm....

Oh, and by the way, I know I have not used the blog for a long time, but I figure that this is a more effective way to tell THIS particular story. Don't you think? kekekekeke....
As usual, comments are most welcomed.