HFMD

It's been quite a while since I blogged about my dear Kendrick's development. I guess it's the lazy Mommy effect at work! Nevertheless, now that I'm doing so, I'm sad to say that Kendrick is down with HFMD! It started last Friday night when I suddenly noticed the spots on the palms of his hands while brushing teeth for him. I checked his feet too and saw a couple more spots and immediately, I suspected it might be HFMD. That night felt terrible as I was rather worried, so couldn't sleep well either. The next day, we brought him to the PD and she verified it was indeed HFMD. There was nothing much we could do except to let the virus run its course. If he had fever, then just give him fever medicine. He had 1 mouth ulcer at that point of checking, so hopefully it does not get too bad in the next few days.

Generally, I would say Kendrick's situation seem fairly mild. Yes, he has rashes on his hands and feet, but not much fever and he's quite cheerful, playing his toys etc. The only difficult part is for us as Parents to help keep things clean. We had to clean up this toys and also constantly ensure that we wash our hands and keep hygienic if we touch him or the things that he played with. Thankfully, I have some friends who experienced this with their kids, so got some advice from them as well! Gosh...couldn't quite believe that I have to go through this. But with kids, I guess anything can happen?!

Well, I really hope that Kendrick will recover fast... I really long to hug and kiss him and tell him everything's going to be ok! It's so painful to have to restrain some of this closeness for the time being...especially when Kendrick wants to hug me voluntarily.... :(

Kendrick, we'll fight this virus together! Mommy and Daddy love you lots....

Taking the Circle Line to visit The Helix Bridge

We brought Kendrick to take the circle line MRT for the first time so that we could stop by at Promenade station to visit the new Helix Bridge. We sat off in the evening and the weather was really overcast that day. Not very good for pictures, but at least it didn't rain. Kendrick was quite happy and excited to take the MRT as it's something we seldom take. The circle line was was a pleasantly nice journey, not too crowded at the time we took it down and back. So we reached and took a quick walk along the Helix Bridge and checked out the new Marina Bay Sands resort from afar. Haha...guess we'll plan to go there another time :)

Here's some photos we took at the bridge and also Marina Bay Sands resort behind us...

Updates for Apr - May 2010

Time flies, it's already May and Kendrick has been attending his playgroup class for about 5 months now. We just went for a Parent-Teacher session today to find out about his progress. Overall, he seems to have learned a lot academically, but there's certainly room for improvement in terms of some gross motor skills, being more independent, gaining more self-confidence and doing things comfortably even though he is in school. We really hope that we can guide him towards another level of improvement in that aspect!

It's funny when you think back about how he was just a little baby who only made cooing sounds back then....and now he's a energetic toddler who can say so much and make decent conversations with you...my boy ah..Mommy will certainly miss this phase of your life a lot! Admittedly, Kendrick's vocal and speech development has made good progress very early on and like now, he loves to sing, and he can even sing hymms that I've taught him via my hymm book :) He seems interested in spelling words too, perhaps a start towards learning to form words by recognition since they learn phonics in school. Kendrick is always asking us how to spell various words that he knows.

Dabbling in music is also something he seems fairly keen on, given that he sees his Aunt play the piano at her home. Kendrick has improved from just banging his hands on the piano to playing note by note with his fingers. He has even tried to play do-re-mi at times. Well, more dabbling in this and hopefully by 3 or 4, we can start him on learning how to play the piano.

We also started to toilet train him in terms of peeing. I've been wanting to try this out and finally took the plunge to do so gradually. The thing is, he understands a lot that we tell him and so it's just a matter or whether he wants to learn. Hence, we started letting him go diaper-less whenever he is not sleeping. We would remind him that if he needs to pee, to let us know and we will go to his potty. He peed on the floor a few times but I guess we are making some progress. He's been able to control his pee for a few hours and has learnt to say so if he needs to pee and successfully peed in the potty a couple of times!! I was really so happy about it whenever he was successful! I guess we are making small progress indeed...so we will just have to take it slowly and continue to encourage him on :) As for the night training, I think I'll have to hold that back a while more...I imagine that to be a next level of nightmare! Haha...As for the poo poo part, it's also another challenge to get him to sit at the potty. There seems to be a stronger psychological barrier on his part to not want to try that. Hmmm..perhaps we'll make progress once he is fully able to go diaper-less?? Gosh, this phase of training is certainly not easy!! Lots of patience needed indeed!

Till the next update, here are some recent photos we took:

Kendrick at a playground in AMK

We went on a short trip to Penang in early April and here's some photos we took...

We also visited Hort Park in Singapore for the first time. Quite a nice place to walk around. Love this green lawn area too

Hopefully we can make it to the Henderson Waves another time!

Just some updates...

It's been quite a while since I last blogged about Kendrick...Over the last few months since he turned 2, Kendrick continues to amaze us in the way he communicates with us. He speaks pretty well and uses full sentences most of the time. Sometimes talking to him can be quite interesting and funny as kids are just so innocent in what they think and say! Sometimes they just give you the most unexpected answers that are cute yet logical! In school, we were also told by the Principal that he can communicate quite well, just that he's still rather shy and don't always answer questions asked by teachers. But back at home, it's a different story! So chatty in front of family members. Kendrick's favourite song at this point in time is still the ABC song, which he can interestingly 'modify' to make it sound like a rap instead :)

Of course, there are still the challenging aspects of watching him grow up..the growing rebellion streak, the naughtiness to deal with, and the toilet training bit! The last item is the greatest challenge for us now....really don't know how to make him sit at the potty to poo :( He always insist that we go away when he wants to poo and refuse to do it sitting down. He understands the concept of what we are trying to teach him, but he just refuse to learn.... :(

Most recently, Kendrick also fell sick. Somehow, he started having this viral fever that went up and down for about 2.5 days. At one point, it went to a high 39.6 degrees. We immediately brought him to see the doctor and they inserted this thing into his butt to bring down the temperature. We also had to sponge him at home. Thankfully, his fever went down eventually. But as I write this blog now, we seem to see another symptom of something happening...some rashes seem to be appearing on his body, especially starting from the lower part of his body. Being a parent is certainly not easy, you feel joy and stress all at the same time! Just hoping that he will recover fully as soon as possible since he also has cough with phlegm. Thank goodness next week is the school holidays break..hopefully he will get well by the end of the week :|

Till the next update, here are just a few key photos taken in the recent months:

Chinese New Year Eve at home

Chinese New Year Day 1

Chinese New Year Day 2 - lunching gathering

Chinese New Year Day 3 outing

Visit to Universal Studios Singapore!

Attending Great-Grandmother's birthday lunch - Here's Kendrick with his baby cousin, Krel who is being carried by their Ah Gong

On the last day of school for the term, Kendrick has a mini excursion to Hay Dairies Goat Farm with his classmates

Kendrick's 2nd Birthday Celebration with Family

This post comes rather late, but I just want to update on Kendrick's birthday celebration earlier this month. After the mini birthday celebration for him in his playgroup, the same evening we also celebrated Kendrick's birthday by having dinner with our family (my family + Dear's family combined). After the dinner, it was followed by another round of singing Happy Birthday to Kendrick and cake cutting. This time round, our little boy was really happy, smiling the whole time that we were singing to him. When we gamely asked him to close his eyes to make a wish before blowing the candle, he shut his eye for 1 second and opened again! Hehe...Happy Birthday to our darling Kendrick! May you continue to grow up healthy and strong!

Family shot before lighting the candles

Our family + Kendrick's 外婆 外公

Our family + Kendrick's 爷爷奶奶+ Aunts and Uncle

The next day Daddy was able to take leave so we brought Kendrick out for a swim, followed by lunch out

We tried out this Sengkang Swimming complex which was rather cool as it has quite a number of pools, including an indoor Olympic sized one! We played in the children's pool and also the intermediate pool so that Kendrick could try swimming a bit more

Well, although we didn't do a lot, it was still some nice family time that we spent with Kendrick. Hope he enjoyed himself!!

Kendrick's 2nd Birthday Celebration in School

Kendrick started playgroup classes again in January and since today is his birthday, we let him celebrated in school for the first time! We brought him to school at 9am as usual and only rejoined the class at around 10.30am for the cake cutting session. Kendrick was a brave and happy boy as he was willing to sit in front of the class as they sang Happy Birthday song to him :) After that, the teacher helped to cut and cake and asked Kendrick to serve his friends. He did so for everyone then after eating some cake, we also asked Kendrick to give out his goody bags to his friends.

Well, hope that he was happy and enjoyed himself! Mummy and Daddy wish you will continue to be healthy and strong! Grow up well my son! Lots of love, hugs and kisses from Mummy & Daddy!

The goody bags I prepared for Kendrick's class

Mr Smiley in the morning before we leave for school

Before the cake cutting session, the playgroup & workgroup kids all gather round in the room

Kendrick sits in front as the rest sing Happy Birthday to him!

Clapping along too :)

Family shot with 爷爷, 奶奶 and Mummy. Pity Papa could not take leave today to join us...

Kendrick learns to serve others his birthday cake

Kendrick gives out the goody bags to his friends

Back at home and smiling for the camera :)

Happy New Year 2010!

We brought Kendrick for a 1 day 1 night hotel stay at Swissotel The Stamford on New Year's Eve 2009. I guess we wanted to try something different and view the fireworks display from the comfort of our hotel room rather than squeezing with the crowd! So off we went to the hotel that afternoon. After checking in, as the weather looked quite good, we brought Kendrick for some kite flying at the Singapore Flyer area. It was a short but good experience of kite flying, since it's something we've not done in the longest time!

With a late afternoon nap, Kendrick was able to sustain all the way till around 12.30am that night before falling asleep. So he saw the fireworks and was all excited and happy while playing in the hotel room :) The next morning when he woke up, he actually remembered about the fireworks and told us that 'Just now saw fireworks'. Ha Ha. To him, yesterday or whatever that just passed is called 'just now' :P

Well, hope that this new year will a better year. It may be a trying year for us as Kendrick moves into the 'terrible twos' stage, but I'm sure it's also going to be many more fun times to remember as Kendrick progresses to string longer sentences together, say more things that makes lots of sense, and do a lot of actions which surprise us all the time! Hope that we will have enough patience and love and teach him accordingly!

Family shot in the hotel room

We went to the Singapore Flyer and next to it is some open space, which is actually the F1 track. That's where we flew our kite :)

Papa flying the kite. Good job!

Kendrick wants a go too as he tugs as Papa's pants

Kendrick gets a chance to fly the kite

Busy and happily walking all over the track by himself

At night before the countdown began, we took a shot in our hotel room balcony. Marina Bay view behind us

One of the nicer fireworks shot :)