Effectiveness of Renzo's "thinking corner"

Disciplining Renzo is not a tough job anymore, ever since we introduced "thinking corner", the staircase next to my in law's unit for Renzo to reflect on his misbehavior. Renzo has been sent to the "thinking corner" once in a while, when he refuses to admit his mistakes after our reasonable attempts to correct him.

When he throws tantrums for no reason or have unreasonable requests, most of the time we just need to mention the word "thinking corner", he knows what to do immediately and only on rare occasions when he's really out of control, we have to send him there and I do believe it works better than yelling and hitting.

I didn't realize the effectiveness of "thinking corner" until last Sunday, when Renzo talked to me about buying angry bird toy on our way to Toy R Us.

Renzo:
"Mummy, number ONE thing, mummy must get a blue angry bird;
number TWO thing, Renzo must get a black angry bird;
number THREE thing, Daddy must get a red angry bird!!"

I wasn't paying attention to what he said till he asked me: "Mummy, what's the number ONE thing huh?"
I gave him a blunt look, and he continued:
"You FORGET huh??!!!, Let me REPEAT!!"
He went on to repeat his number ONE to number THREE thing again and I had to control really hard not to burst out laughing.

I then repeated what he said and he was extremely excited this time, "Mummy, you are so good! Tick!! I give you a star!!" He's talking like a teacher, again.

I am very sure that he has learned the way how Daddy disciplines him at the thinking corner. Daddy usually talks to him like: "Renzo, there are 3 things you need to remember, first thing...  second thing....and third thing..."

It seems that there are definitely certain things instilled into his mind at the "thinking corner" =) As a reward, he got his BLACK angry bird soft toy, just as he wished!!

Round the world with Renzo?

A few days ago, Renzo shared with me that his classmate Kaleen went to Disneyland in Japan, well that's how interesting topics among toddlers get nowadays in school. It's not just about Hello Kitty or Mickey Mouse anymore, they do share their travel experience and you will be surprised to find out, almost every one of them go for overseas holiday with their parents very frequently. I always believe overseas travel is an eye opener that allows children to experience different ways of life. And the great thing is they won't even realize just how much their little brains are soaking up, all without a book or classroom in sight!

Renzo went to Australia with us in 2008, when he was barely a 3 months old fetus inside my tummy. And at the time we brought him along to Phuket for his 1st year birthday celebration, he couldn't even walk on his own. Last August, he enjoyed a 2 weeks holiday with us in China, it was definitely a tough trip for us as he was trying to cope with a new life without his auntie AyeAye. He gave us all kinds of unreasonable requests from eating up a big icecream cone on his own (that's when he had his first taste of icecream), to opening windows in the plane (yes he meant literally opening the flight window, not just lifting up the blind). For the past one year, we have not been traveling around due to the arrival of our Baby Rynus, but we have been trying our best to arrange for Staycations at local hotel. And it seems that Renzo loves hotel stay even though it's not an overseas travel.

How do we know that?
He remembers which floor we were staying at during our last staycation, and when he commented that my office is NICE, he added, "But, my hotel is NICER, Ritz Carlton Hotel Mummy!!"

Daddy Chan and I decided immediately to keep our Marriott Vacation Club membership, which allows us to stay at more than 2000 hotels under Marriott worldwide (including Renzo's favorite Ritz Carlton of course), after hearing this comment from Renzo. Although we were pondering about selling it off initially since we do not have much time to travel with small kids.

So up next, where should we bring little Renzo to, for a better family bonding experience??

- The States? Most likely I am going there again for business trip next year so the family could tag along, but the 20 hours travel time is still my biggest concern..
- Bali? Our best friend is holding his wedding dinner there next April, but how to "drink, drank & drunk" with little Renzo around??
- Abu Dhabi? Renzo knows that daddy's brother and sister-in-law are there, we could have visited them together with my in laws earlier this year, if I wasn't pregnant with Rynus..
- Phuket, again? The villa under Marriott property is a great place for relaxation, I won't be surprised if Renzo could still remember that place..
- Australia? I have 3 cousins there so for sure we could get some "babysitting service" while enjoying our couple time, but wait, aren't we talking about family trip here? LOL...
- Taiwan? A place Daddy Chan and I both love a lot and maybe Renzo will appreciate the food there??
- HongKong? Well every time we plan to go to HongKong, I get pregnant.. so.. OUT!!


I realized that when mapping out an overseas trip with young kids, nearby countries are always favorable due to convenient location and comfortable weather.

And maybe, I should plan a trip to Universal Studios with a night stay at one of the RWS hotels, since not just Renzo, even Daddy and Mummy have not visited USS so far, LOL...

Renzo's trip to the animal farm

Renzo has been hinting me that he wanted to go to the Zoo in recent days with liners like "Daddy, you have to drive the car and bring Renzo to the Zoo. Then Renzo can see the Zebras", while bringing his little chubby hands up to his eyes to make an pair of imaginary binoculars. But despite having a helper to look after Rynus, generally Mummy Chan and myself still prefer not to be out of the house to too long a period of time and even if we do, we are usually pretty near home (able to reach home within 30 minutes).

So as an alternative to satisfy Renzo's craving to see animals, we decided to bring him to the Pasir Ris Kid's Kampong at Pasir Ris Farmway. Not only was it soooo much closer to home, but it is a hell lot cheaper too... (but of course, ducks and fishes compared to tigers and pandas... Zoo wins hands-down).

It was to Pasir Ris White Sands first for a hearty brunch at Pepper Lunch. It being one of the few times that we actually dined at Pepper Lunch, I didn't even know what was on the menu. Spent quite some time there deciding what to eat and ended up with the first item on the menu, something which I usually do when visiting an eatery for the first time.. (on the assumption that the first item is usually a dish that the establishment is most proud of...lol)

After the meal, we headed to the Bus Interchange to catch Bus 88 which would bring us to within 10 minutes walking distance from the animal farm. The journey after getting off the bus wasn't the most pleasurable. The roads, though wide and empty, were strewn with dead snakes that were run over by passing vehicles... we were even 'lucky' enough to come across one that was 'freshly crushed'... the poor reptile in a struggling slither, trying to maneuver in its pathetic state... disheartening sight.

A couple of turns left and right later, rain starting pouring... and all we were armed with was a little foldable brolly in Mummy Chan's bag that would have to shelter us all the way to the farm. Thankfully we made it there in a relatively dry state and when we did, the pouring rain subsided to a drizzle.

We inspected the place a little and spoke to the usher whom advised us that because of the rain, the visit might not be as fun as it would be during sunny afternoons but we could still buy the packets of feeds and let Renzo have some fun feeding the little animals. And so we did. For a mere $3, 2 adults and 1 child gained admission and given 3 neatly packed animal feeds (1 for chicken/ducks, 1 for fish/tortoises and 1 for bunnies/rabbits)

First stop was the over-populated koi pond with hundred of always-hungry fish. Feeding them was pretty fun and it was interesting to see the fish rushing up to the edge of the pond, all eagerly anticipating Renzo's handful of fish feeds to hit the water and they'll rush at them in a frenzied state.

Then there were the ducks (or were they geese?...seems too huge to be ducks) enclosure. Honestly I have no idea how to feed these guys on a rainy day. Their feeding bowl was flooded with muddy water and there was no way I'd let them eat off Renzo's hand, anyway, Renzo was too short to reach over the fence. So in the end, Renzo just throw the corn feed all over the muddy floors and also into the flood bowl, but they (ducks/geese) seem happy enough to gobble the food up anyway... =/

Next came the rabbits and bunnies, which I found more fun as them being mammals, they seems to really have a high level of intelligence and generally look warmer and more huggable than fish and fowls..lol... Many of them perched up against the wire mesh cage, seemingly really crying out for food. But judging from their large sizes, I'd say either there were plenty of visitors or the owners really do feed them well. Renzo gently rolled the food pellets into the funnel and watched as the pellets rolled down into the food bowl in the cages... and into the mouths of the little critters.

Lastly the chicken coop (which we failed to notice on our first round around the feeding area). And housed in it were aggressive roosters and hens. If I understood their language, I'm sure I would have been hearing curses and swears for Renzo not giving them more corn.

So after the last bit of corn was dropped onto the floor of the chicken coop, we headed to the lobby and tried to book a cab. But turns out that the rain stopped before we could even confirm a booking. With that, we made our way out and back onto the main roads on foot, with Renzo mischievously jumping into every puddle that he came across. At the bus stop, we realised that there was a direct bus that would bring us directly back home and the first thing that Renzo did upon boarding the bus was to nestle into mummy's cradle and sleep throughout the journey home...

Renzo loves Maths!

A few weeks back, Daddy Chan and I decided to introduce a little more Maths concepts to Renzo. Frequent followers of Renzo's blog definitely know how much Renzo loves alphabets, but in fact, his interest in numbers is just as strong, or even stronger.

Renzo could recognize numbers and count from 1 to 10 when he was 1 year 4 months old. By now, he can count to 100, and understands the concept of hundreds and thousands. He loves to count 2 by 2 to 20, 5 by 5 to 50, and 10 by 10 to 100 in a speed that even I have a little difficulty following. And he has been doing simple addition by counting his fingers for a few months, and randomly, he will ask us 2-5 times a day the similar kind of question, "Mummy and Daddy, THREE plus FOUR equals, what number??"

So, we decided it's time to go a little deeper and teach Renzo how to do addition without counting his fingers. I have to say there's probably no hard-and-fast rule to teach besides practicing repeatedly. So I've bought a Maths sticker book, which Daddy Chan uses to teach Renzo his basic addition. Although Renzo loves the book and asks for it almost everyday, knowing how short children's attention span is, Daddy's home maths tuition wasn't that successful from beginning and all of us just resorted to a much slower pace until the recent two days, magically, we caught Renzo doing his own addition and here are some examples of what he told us:

1 + 1 + 1 + 1 = 4
3 + 3 + 3 = 9
1 + 2 + 0 = 3
5 + 5 = 10
6 + 4 = 10
7 + 3 = 10
8 + 2 = 10
9 + 1 = 10
34 + 0 = 34

I am impressed that he doesn't need to rely much on finger counting, instead, he knows the answers by heart. And if you notice, there are some patterns here and he has somehow grasped the concept of "which 2 numbers add up to 10" and "any number plus zero equals the number", which are the emphasis of Daddy Chan's "home tuition" weeks ago, so our efforts didn't go down the drain, although he's still far from solving maths problems on his own, Renzo is definitely picking up slowly, but steadily!!

Renzo Kor Kor, please love your Rynus Di Di as much as we do

From the very first moment Renzo looked at Rynus in awe, through the baby bassinet in my ward at Thomson Medical Center, it's been exactly 5 months!!

It was pretty tough for Renzo to understand the fact that he has to "share" his daddy and mummy, and all attention on him with his little brother, but it didn't take too long for him to accept the new addition to our family with huge curiosity and enthusiasm.

Being the 2nd child in the family, I have to say honestly speaking, Rynus is already at disadvantage since birth, because no matter how hard we try, there's no way for Rynus to get our full attention like what Renzo was receiving from us in the past 3 years. So as a mummy of the 2 lovely boys, I could only wish that Renzo will love Rynus and dote on him as much as we do.

Renzo said Rynus di di is handsome and cute, BUT.. "second" cute only, because, Renzo kor kor is "first" cute!! But just a few days later, he decided to become the "second' cute in the house and wanted to grow shorter and smaller like a baby, so he could be like Rynus baby and have his mummy back..

Renzo also said Rynus di di's daddy is Renzo's daddy, BUT.. Rynus di di's mummy is - nainai (his grandma), because, mummy (me) is Renzo's mummy!! He even had to highlight to Rynus, "No, don't beat MY mummy, cannot do that huh.." while Rynus accidentally hit my arm with his little hand. But look at the bright side, at least he didn't say Rynus di di's mummy is auntie Jonalyn, LOL..

Siblings are siblings after all. Renzo will kiss and hug Rynus occasionally for no reason, and voluntarily takes care of him when he cries or whines. But it's still a long way to go to build a much stronger bonding between the boys, for that, we have to work harder together for sure!

Because... I LIKE MUMMY!!

Renzo is getting more and more expressive after he turned 3, and nowadays he could explain things clearly to us even with reasoning, of course not all the time.

So conversation with this little chatterbox can get really funny!

Example 1:
Renzo: "I don't want to go to school!"
Mummy: "Why Renzo?"
Renzo: "Because... I like mummy!"
-_-!
Renzo: "I want to play my toys at home with mummy!"

Example 2:
Renzo: "I don't want to shower!"
Daddy: "Why Renzo?"
Renzo: "Because... I like mummy!"
-_-!
Renzo: "I want Mummy to shower for Renzo!"

Example 3:
Renzo: "I am so scared of the thunder!"
Mummy: "You don't have to feel scared Renzo!"
Renzo: "But, I never scare of thunder already!"
Mummy: "Huh, why suddenly you are not scared then?"
Renzo: "Because... I like mummy!"
-_-!
Renzo: "Mummy will hug hug Renzo, and I will not cry, and I never scare of thunder already!"

Example 4:
Renzo: "I am so worried about you Daddy!"
Daddy: "Why Renzo?"
Renzo: "Because... I like mummy!"
-_-!
Renzo: "I like to talk with mummy, and, Rynus didi likes daddy, but, Rynus didi cannot speak with daddy! I am so worried about you Daddy!"

It seems that as long as he could not provide a valid reason or not sure about the answer to the question, he will tell the whole world that the simple reason is because, he likes his mummy!

Yes mummy's little sweetheart, I LIKE YOU TOO!!!

The Terrible Two that does not end at Terrific Three..

Daddy Chan has blogged about Renzo's "Terrible Twos" and I have mentioned before that maybe it's going to come to an end soon..

The fact is, I was all wrong!!

But with a year of experience observing and interacting with this "terrible" little boy, we somehow figured out his way of doing and interpreting things. Although we could not agree with him on most occasions, we jolly well understand how to get things done in a twisted way (not 100% his way but not 100% our way either), without making Renzo too cranky.

Of course we have to give Renzo some credits, after turning "Terrific Three", he is showing signs of improvement. He does not throw tantrums without any reason, yes he still throws tantrums for sure but but but, there's always a reason, be it valid or invalid. And look at the bright side, he's able to express himself well enough for us to understand what he really wants, so we could address his needs more effectively, and rapidly...

If I have not mentioned anything about how fussy Renzo is when comes to food, yes just like most other kids, he's gone through a long period of "no vegetables" diet, I meant REALLY LONG period, which lasted for almost a whole year. He started off with eating vegetables only in school but not at home, after we enrolled him into full day childcare for a few months last year. Slowly, things got worse and he was even rejecting vegetables in school and became very picky during meal time. Only during these recent weeks, he started to have much better appetite and eat almost everything we offer to him, including all types of vegetables. This must be the greatest improvement I've seen so far. I have no magic solution to his eating problem during the past one year although we've tried almost every method you could think of. All we did was just to wait... wait for Renzo to outgrow this stage on his own.


Luckily Renzo is a big fan of fruits, all kinds of fruits (besides mango, which causes rashes on his skin), he even loves durians!!  And many people questioned how can he be so chubby if he does not eat??!! Well he basically survived on fruits!! If you've seen how he gobbled down 2 big pears, 2 medium apples, 1 banana and a few pieces of papaya in a stretch of 3-4 hours, you will understand what I meant.

Anyway, there are still a hundred and one "Renzo problems" awaiting for us to tackle, we understand that his "Terrible TWO" is not going to end at "Terrific THREE" but we are willing to welcome his "Fabulous Four" to come in less than a year's time!!

First writing exercise at home...

Little Renzo is almost 3 years and 2 months old, and for the past 1 year, he did hit quite a few milestones and I was just running through his progress (especially academic progress) in my mind, and realized that it's time to reinforce on his writing skills.

Since he turned 2, he has mastered all his alphabets and phonic sounds of single letters, and slowly he grasped a bit of first and last sound concept, and he's able to count from one to hundreds. And in recent months, he started reading along with Daddy, be it by memorizing the words, or by pronouncing with phonic sounds, he is able to read some simple words or sight words such as "at", "you", "are", "the", "and", "cat", "map", "game", "note", etc.. He's pretty good with his first and last sound but not the middle sound yet. Hence I planned to work on his middle sound training from now till he turns 4. But at the same time, I am a little concerned with his handwriting as his coloring work from school is not nicely done most of the time. So from last night, we decided to have Renzo work on his alphabet writing for about 10 - 15 minutes before his bedtime. He has been writing letters and numbers on and off before, especially with his finger on his daddy ipad, but it is just not his daily routine in the past. And let's just face the fact (not the excuse) that boys are slow in their fine motor skill development so being able to hold a pencil and write properly, is just something I never expect Renzo to do at this age.

As it's a very last minute decision, we did not prepare "training materials", like letter tracing books. Well he has quite a few of them but all of them come with colorful pictures which I find quite distracting to certain extend. Hence we used a plain piece of A4 paper for the night, before I could grab any exercise book for Renzo from bookstore on the following day.

We started him with a bit of coloring to get him warmed up and comfortable before we moved on to the actual writing exercise. Renzo was not too excited but definitely did not show any sign of frustration during the entire 15 minutes session. But it did took him quite a while to figure out the fact that he is supposed to "WRITE" but not "DRAW" a letter A.

Renzo's first attempt on his own to write letter A - he almost drew it out.. But considering he's "drawing" from his memory without referring to any example, that's a good try!

Daddy wrote a few "A"s and asked him to follow and these are what we got, apparently he was trying to draw a semi circle..

I drew 5 dots and asked Renzo to link them up to form an "A", thought that's a pretty easy method till I caught him "coloring" that dot -_-!!..

Then I changed my strategy and asked him to link the numbers from 1 to 2, 1 to 3 then 4 to 5, not to my surprise, he has stronger interest in numbers and he managed to follow my instruction much better..

Lastly he wrote this A with correct order of strokes, but just not enough strength.. 

Lastly, Daddy took over the coaching job and asked him to write a few more times till he finally completed the exercise by writing an A in the box on his own..

I looked at Renzo's school work, he has been tracing letters and numbers but there's no real independent writing yet. To me there is a slight difference because tracing is rather easy for kids at this age as long as the could follow the dotted lines. Whereas writing on their own means they really need to memorize how the letter/number looks, and writing the strokes in correct order is quite a challenge to them. Let's just see how much he could improve in the next 10 months, as he will be required to start spelling in school during K1 which is just less than 2 years from now!!

The real challenge begins, now....

On September 25, Tuesday, I brought Renzo to Yamaha Music School for his very first enrichment class - Music Wonderland course for 3 years old toddlers before they could start the real piano lesson around the age of 4.

Okay both Daddy Chan and I did not have the chance to learn how to play piano when we were young, in fact I have totally zero interest in musical instrument. But it's a "No-brainer" decision to send Renzo for piano class as there are just so many benefits of learning it. I deem it as the real challenge to us because we have never sent Renzo for any kind of real enrichment class, basically he just goes to full day childcare on a daily basis. And he used to attend some once a week junior course at "Josiah Montessori" for a few weeks and tried out one session at "My Gym" and that's it. I could not say he enjoys such classes much as his attention span is usually as short as 20-30 minutes and being the "anti-social" kind, ah alrighty I should used the word "introvert" instead, who needs quite a while to warm up, he is just not as attentive and enthusiastic as most other kids in class. Moreover, we have been teaching Renzo on most of his academic stuff such as alphabets, phonics, numbers, colors and shapes, etc at home. We have no idea about how much he could absorb when we expose him to a school environment, to learn something totally new and professional, which both Daddy and Mummy have no knowledge about.

So knowing our son well enough, I've preempted him many times about his piano class (well not the real one yet) for weeks and months. Luckily he is still showing interest whenever we talk about learning to play piano. Indeed my mother is the one who's super into sending Renzo for piano class, after she witnessed his first encounter with piano at a hotel lobby a year ago. And since then, Renzo has been bugging us to get him a piano especially after his every visit to his cousin's house (yes our niece Cherry is learning piano and has a brilliant piano at home that makes Renzo curious and excited every time when he visits her house).

Anyway as Daddy happened to have some other commitment, he could not go for the first class with Renzo, so I had the chance to learn with Renzo together in the classroom. I guess I won't have much chances in the future as we agreed that Daddy will accompany him for his every class since obviously, Daddy has way better note reading ability than me.

We paid for his learning materials in school (that's not included in his school fees), a whooping 100 bucks allows us to bring home 2 textbooks, 1 CD, 1 set of stickers and 1 percussion set.

After entering the classroom, we picked a seat at the corner of last row and Renzo got super excited with the keyboard in front of him, as a result I had to remind him again and again to pay close attention to teacher's (Ms Chan) instructions. Frankly speaking the class at this stage is pretty much the same like other music appreciation lessons that encourages kids to sing along and dance around. But the lyrics and rhythms seemed tougher than those usual lullabies we know by heart. I am sure it helps to arouse children's interests in music but I am not that certain about how much Renzo really appreciates music, it seems that he just wanted to play with the piano most of the time during the class. But of course he was having quite a bit of fun together with others in such a conducive environment, at least for a good first half of the class.

On our way home, Renzo told me that he wants to go to his piano class again next week. But when I played the CD attached to his textbook, which has the same songs Ms Chan played during the class, he gave us a big smile with a surprised look at first (must be thinking why am I hearing this again??), but within 5 minutes, he swapped that disc with his alphabet/phonics disc on his own!! Well, we are not expecting a genius pianist anyway so for now, let's just be patient and let him enjoy what he likes I guess... 

An interesting new word

Renzo has learned the word "die" somehow somewhere and has been using it on many occasions during the past few months. I remember the first time I heard about, and tried to understand this word, I was already 6-7 years old. I cried badly together with my sister at one night in our bedroom, and woke up our father to question him what happens after we die one day. After our father reassured us that everything will be fine, we went to bed with a giant question mark in head and till many years later, we were still in doubt about the real meaning of the word "die" and its impact to our life.

But somehow our 3 years old little boy seems to find the word pretty interesting although we have no knowledge about how much he really understands it.

When he saw a bottle dropped into a pail full of water, he said, "The bottle die already, how?" (excuse his grammatical error here please).

When he saw a dead pigeon on the roadside, he asked me, "Why did the pigeon die mummy?"..

And the most interesting conversation he had with me, was when he saw an uncle riding his bicycle towards us, he screamed "Uncle you don't hit (to) me okie?!!!!!! The bicycle is so dangerous! Must be very careful, if not uncle will hit (to) me and I will die already!" After the uncle laughed at him and left, he cheered up immediately and shouted "Mummy, I never die, mummy never die also!!!"...

Well this kid is just so adorable at time, of course annoying at the same time but I shall save the annoying story for my next post...

the "be like that" Renzo

 I can't remember since when, Renzo started to throw all the new words he learned into our daily conversation. It's pretty fun to see him seeking all opportunities just to use those new words in every situation, be it right or wrong..

So we often hear him saying:
"The biscuit drop on the floor, BUT, cannot eat ALREADY.."
"OH MY GOSH!!"
"LATER cannot do this, THEN HOW??"
"You see, it is on my BACKSIDE!"
"It is YOUR TURN mummy!!"
"It is TOO FAR AWAY!!"
"YAH, YAH, YAH..."
"Can not HUH??"

And the word, or I should say phrase he uses most often, is "BE LIKE THAT".. Honestly we have no idea about where he learned it from, but, he's using that almost every minute!!

"Mummy you see, the truck can carry the bus BE LIKE THAT!!"
"The piegon fly into the sky BE LIKE THAT!!"
"Daddy, you don't beat me okay?" - That's when Daddy was angry while he misbehaved..
"Daddy, you don't BE LIKE THAT me okie?" - That's when Daddy was staring at him and couldn't decide what to do with him next..

And he never forget to use his favorite phrase while talking to his little brother..
"I like you my Rynus didi, do you like me?"
No answer from Rynus (we wish he could answer though, LOL), and Renzo continued:
"Why you don't like me? Why you BE LIKE THAT??"

At the same time, our little boy has never failed to impress us with his creative and imaginative mind.
When I was reading a file with acrobat reader, he saw this on the screen and shouted "OH MY GOSH!! Got hot air balloon!!!!"

And at the MRT station, while standing in front of those fencing doors on the platform, suddenly he said "Mummy you see, that is minus and equals.."

Let's just see what other phrases will he start amazing us with in the up coming months... =)

Renzo my darling, I hope you never need to read this

I am writing this post with full of anger, but tears all over my face at the same time.

Many people have reminded me not to spoil my boy, 慈母多败儿! I thought I am just trying to give Renzo all my love and care. But, at this very moment, I feel that I could be wrong, and there's no way to look back, because, I've already spoiled him.

I don't want to mention all the details about what have happened, I failed to discipline him and he is turning 3 years old in just another month time. If his character has formed and he will continue behaving this way, I dare to say, he will not grow up with good personality next time. Renzo my boy, if you get to read this post one day, that means you've turned to (or rather say I've made you into) someone who is being loved by your mummy, and only your mummy but no one else in this world!! If that day comes, I am wishing that letting him read this post, will at least make him a better person..

I hope I could get this post deleted from Renzo's blog, before he gets to see this!

I still love you as much as before my dear boy, but I am truly hurt....

Renzo's Ladybug Artwork

Renzo came home one day with a slip of paper from the school in the little side pocket in his school bag. It was a slip to inform parents that there is an art-and-craft homework for the little boy and that the theme was "recycle". So basically, we had to take recycled materials and conjure up some fancy mumbo jumbo with the thrash. Nothing too complicated for Daddy Chan. *ROAR*

Within minutes of knowledge of the assignment, I had ideas in my head and it was mostly selection by elimination.

• No, I am not going to make a robot, cos robots are so cliche
• No, I am not going to make a house, because a simple house is just too simple, and a complex house is just to detailed
• No, I am not going to make a car/bus/motorcycle/Lamborghini, because Renzo would probably play with it and destroy it before it even reaches the school. (with exception to the Lamborghini, I might be the one playing with it =) )
• No, I am not going to make something big and bulky as it would be just too much a hassle to even bring it to school

So with those simple guidelines in head, a decision was made. (and yes, the entire thought process above took less than a couple of minutes)

The deadline was 2 weeks away and in my usual nuaster (for the ill-informed, "nua" is hokkien for "slack") fashion, I sat on it for the most parts of it, much to Mummy Chan's disapproval. Mummy would gently remind me that the deadline was due soon and that I should have started on it.

So on the eve of the deadline, I got the materials prepared. And got Renzo to help out... it is HIS assignment afterall. And what will we be making? A Ladybug!

For the benefit of those who wants to know how it was made. I'll list it out step by step.

(Eventually I didn't use any poster color...haha)

Materials
- 1x Red paper
- 1x Round container lid (i used the one from Renzo's milk tin)
- 1x Round plastic lid (must be smaller than the one above and transparent, i used the ones for food packing)
- 1x Glue (i used PVC glue)
- Standard stationery
- optional colored binding wires (i got mine from party shops, used for packing kids goodie bags)

Total time needed: 1 hour (excluding waiting for the glue to dry)

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Step 1
Draw and cut out circles off the red paper for the 2 round lids

 

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Step 2

Cut the transparent lid into halves

(you only need to use 1 lid, i had two cos i know renzo will destroy at least 1 of the half... lol)

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Step 3

Color in on the red paper to make it look like a Ladybug

then

Cut the smaller red paper into halves

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Step 4

Glue the bigger red paper onto the bigger lid 

then

Glue the transparent lids onto the bigger lid at an angle

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Step 5

Glue the small red papers onto the transparent lids at an angle

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And we are complete

I added the binding wire to give it a little bit of color. Wanted to put them as the Ladybugs antennae but somehow couldn't decide on how best to put it on and gave up the idea... =P

And yeah, once dried and all, we slipped it into a small little carrier so that Renzo can bring it to school the next day.