Rain Rain Go Away

This is another one of Tyler's class activities! You can guess what "shoe" they are supposed to be learning about.

They gathered at the local park(the park we go to everyday) and the kids each took turns to stand under an umbrella while the teachers pour water while singing "Rain rain go away". It's actually pretty comical!! Tyler was one of the first few ones who volunteered which i was quite impressed. But he's been quite interested in umbrellas lately.

Tyler and his class at the park with their umbrellas

Tyler and his umbrella

Waiting for his turn, with his pants rolled up!!

Our brave little boy

This is what it looks like

Still smiling..

After he was all done, he of course made his way to the bucket of water and started to play with it! So, i wonder. In a whole class of about 10 kids, why is my kid the only kid interested in playing with water??

All excited about all the water laying around

After being shooed away by his teacher and dragged off by me, he went to the side to wait for the rest of his friends to be done. And this is what my family does for comedy.

haha!

Cody checking out the umbrella too!

P.S. Shoe for the lesson - rain boots!

Cody's foot imprint

Getting foot imprints of his kids are Alan's thing. He wanted to do it for Tyler, after which i swore off doing it! And now, it's Cody's turn. It's REALLY late to get a foot imprint, but as Alan said, better late than never!

Surprisingly, Cody was quite happy to go along with it. I'm not sure whether the clay has been left for too long or it's just too hot here, the clay was really sticky. Took us a few tries before a "good enough" imprint was made.

Happy go lucky Cody

Failed attempt - sticky clay

Cody showing his dirty feet(and big belly)

Our last attempt

P.S. If you're wondering what's up with Cody's dot on his forehead, ask Alan!

Visit Ocean Park - Manila

If not for my friend Pari, i would probably never leave the house. She's got 2 kids of her own and i'm sure she's made of stronger stuff as she is much more willing to take the kids out to battle with traffic, people, noise, cranky kids and stuff! I just want to curl up and go to the park! haha!!

Anyways, so she invited us to join her to go to Ocean Park and just to NOT look like a complete wimp, i said OK. I even got our own taxi to get there!! Woo hoo!!

Ocean Park turned out to be a small aquarium and not nearly as fancy as the one we went to in KL. But it was fun for the kids and it was just nice to be out and doing stuff. It's scary to think that Alan and I who usually are active members of society are becoming home-bodies and the only time we go out is because i demand to be fed in a nice restaurant!! ha!

Tyler checking out the star fish. Didn't want to touch it though

For the record, he actually voluntarily kneeled to have his picture taken with Cody!!

After 3 attempts, my maid successfully takes a picture of me!

While we were there, we saw some divers in one of the bigger tanks. Thanks to "Finding Nemo", Tyler is no longer scared sh*tless when he sees a diver. He is even quite intrigued by them but taking a picture with them is still out of bounds of his comfort zone. He still thinks they are "bad" because they took Nemo away!

Tyler checking out the diver

Tyler following the diver around

A picture with the diver

Tyler and Aarav by the shark tanks.

Oh, and they have a fish spa at the Ocean Park. Of course I had to go try. Pari has done it a few times and did it just to encourage her father in law to give it a try.

Pari, Aarav and her father in law

Me and Cody

Those fishes must really know what they are doing because when i put my feet into the water, they went CRAZY!!! Biggest feast that day and when Pari put hers in, there was hardly any nibbles because she had just gotten a foot spa the day before!! Mine are at the bottom, Pari's in laws at the top, Pari in the middle.

Notice the difference in the number of fishes around our feet.

The boys having a ride in the Jeepney

Aaron's birthday party

My friend Miriam's son, Aaron turned 3 and we were invited to his birthday party! Woo hoo!! It was held at the local Shakey's joint. Alan who's only been saying that he wanted to go to Shakey's for 4 months, was looking forward to it!

So, the first thing i noticed when i got to the venue was, man, that's a lot of man-power for a party, where are all the guests?? Turned out, they were all guests, but because they were all wearing the same scarves(party favors), they looked quite official! ha!

The scarves i was talking about.. ha!

Miriam said - Air-Shakeys!

Cody and Tyler surprisingly kept their scarves on

Special guest - Mr Pizza!!

The birthday boy and his family!

It was a fun party and i actually felt like i was immersed in the local scene. There were some games for the kids and adults and some of them was pretty funny! One of them involved me sitting on a balloon and popping it. Man, did i let my team down! Tyler thought it was hilarious as heck and was laughing and laughing and clapping! So funny!

Is it true?

Tyler says lots of things these days and some of them are pretty funny. I never remember to write it down right away and of course, i never remember them when i'm in front of the computer.

But this one i did remember. I was feeding him his dinner.

Tyler : I no like carrots, Mummy.
Me : Really? When you were a baby, you used to love it! It was your favorite.
Tyler : Hmm.. i'm not a baby anymore, Mummy!
Me : *loss for words..*

Finally baking

After being here for 4 months, i've finally gathered enough courage to light my gas oven to bake some stuff. The lighting part still freaks me out and my maid still claps each time I successfully light it!!

One of the things that is almost on my list every week is bananas and each week i throw half of it away coz in this heat, you can't eat the bananas in time!

So, the only solution to this banana situation is banana bread, which i love. I usually bake a loaf, give half of it to my maid to take home and take a few days to finish the rest.

Banana bread.. yumm...

Cody in the park

While we're in the Philippines, we go to the park nearly everyday because i just want Tyler out of the house and so that he can run around, expending energy and at the same time keep my sanity and house in tact!

So, usually Tyler has the most fun while Cody and I(and our helper) just sit around a relax. But since Cody is a little more steady on his feet, he's been allowed to approach the "fun" area. They are usually full of boisterous, rough kids running around.

Cody at the steps

Cody at the slides. He's not sure he likes it!

Alan survives Typhoon Baysang

Alan had to attend an offsite 3 day meeting in Baras at the Punta de Fabian 'Resort'.  So he and a few others set off on Tuesday for the 90 minute drive south east of the city.

The day seemed pretty normal although there was a lot of wind and rain.  After Dinner all the power stopped so only emergency lights.

I had stayed up late the previous day, so slept well although there was lots of noise !!

Woke up to discover that the conference room was now blocked by a big tree, and that one of the resorts main building had lost its roof.

Turns out that I had survived Typhoon Baysang

So 2 down, and 24 to go !!

Ballet Shoes

For this semester, Tyler's class is learning about shoes. Yes, for the whole semester, their theme is SHOES! Don't ask me how you can do 3-4 months worth of shoe learning. They must be way creative!

Anyways, as always they have little walking trips to go learn more about stuff and for this trip - ballet shoes. I tagged along because it's right next door to our apartment. Not sure ballet is up Tyler's alley.

When i arrived, i found him sitting all the way behind all his classmates. I wonder if he's going to be one of those students who likes sitting in the back(just like his mummy). Got to take note of this going forward.

Tyler at the back of the class.

Look at all the kids paying attention. But Tyler.. and again.. behind all his friends

It was interesting to note that the girls were a lot more attentive and seemed to be able to follow, sing along and do the activities, while the boys were just "uhhhhhh....". The maturity levels really does show!

Third girl from the left - Sage - cutest girl in school!

Tyler not at all interested in the ballet lesson, but he found the dance pole very exciting!!

The boys

The 3 boys enjoying a fountain at Market Market!!

Tyler's first driving lesson

I've always been quite impressed with Tyler's steering skills on a bike and naturally assumed it translated to driving skills in a car. Ha!

We were at Market Market! and they had an outdoor play area for kids and some motorized vehicles for kids to ride on in the form of cars, motorbikes and animals! All of them let loose around a small area with no seat belts or helmets(except the motorbikes), and driven by some little kid. This would never be allowed in the US!!

But i thought, if those Filipino kids can do it, mine can too!!

So, i asked Tyler if he wanted to try it and he said he wanted the motorbike! Alas, he was too short for it, so he reluctantly got into a car. And that's when i realized he didn't really know how to drive!! He was constantly looking somewhere else and the car would just run amok into the crowd or some other kid on a bike. Alan and I, with stroller in hand and camera in another were running around him, shouting for him to turn, grabbing the steering and avoiding other crazy kids! It was quite the scene! haha!!

For once 5 minutes for a ride seemed REALLY long!!!

So, after the nearly disastrous car drive, which he abandoned halfway, he wanted to ride on an animal too, which was equally bad. But we were much prepared this time and Alan walked alongside him while he "drove"

Package from Grandma!

Getting a package from Grandma is always something to get excited about! Even enough to delay bedtime by 1/2 hour!!!

Even though the original package was for Daddy, Grandma packed it full of goodies for the grandkids! Tyler took no time to devour the box the moment it was opened, exclaiming "wow"s and "my presents!!" again and again. Some of the stuff were things we left behind in England and he recognized it and was super psyched to be reunited with it!! :)

He was also super excited about his new toys like Makka Pakka and some Chuggington trains. So happy that he even posed for the camera!! Cody who's used to getting the short end of the stick was happy just to borrow his brother's new spoon and joined in the excitement!!

Yay biscuit and shirt! Oh, spoon too!!

Oooh.. my present!!

Tyler posing with Makka Pakka

Tyler's fake smile hahahaha!!

Tyler's real smile!

Usher

A few weeks ago, my friend, Pari, and I had this conversation:

Pari : Hey, u want to go see Usher?

Me : What's Usher?

Pari : It's not WHAT, it's WHO!!

Me : Ooops.. hehe.. ok..

Pari : *rolling her eyes* (and probably thinking what an idiot i was)

Anyways, in the mean time, i've actually had a chance to see Usher on TV and thought he's pretty good. :)

So, yesterday when Pari texted me to ask me if i was still interested in see Usher, I checked with Alan, who gave me the "GO", I told Pari i was in!! I was really more interested in the night off from the kids!! ha!

After she dropped off her 2 kids at our house under the care of Alan and 2 maids, we practically ran out of the house!! (we were both breastfeeding, so every minute counts!!). After a rather long taxi ride, we arrived at Mall of Asia(2nd biggest mall in Php) and went to look for the concert grounds.

Pari seemed very smooth at this searching and buying tickets stuff, so, i just stood around and watched the pro at work. In minutes, we had our tickets and we made our way to our Bronze area of the concert. It was an outdoor concert ground and looked more like a cheap and cheerful fun fair!(which is never really cheap or cheerful by the way).

We waited and endured thru some warm up bands' performances but after an hour, we were getting a little impatient!! And finally, Usher's turn was up and Pari's expressions were cute like an infatuated puppy! haha! I was in awe of his performance and dance moves! He made me have goose bumps even though he was only 2 mm tall from where i was standing and i can only see him between 2 heads once in a while! (short people should not get bad tickets!!). Fortunately, there were big screens near where we were, so we can still see him tease us silly crowd with his hot abs!! Yowzer..!

Anyways, even though i have only heard 1 song from Usher before that, i really enjoyed the concert and the only regret i had was, i wish i wore some sensible shoes!!

Thanks Pari for enlightening me on this decade's pop star scene!!

Pari and I at the concert

P.S yes, just in case you were wondering, we did leave the concert early to go tend to our babies only to find them asleep and content!!