Archives for August 2011

Tea on Thursdays

August 25, 2011 · By ·

Roibos tea with honey, mooncake pastry for breakfast, arrangement of coral-coloured Carnations and purple Statice

 

Have started a new routine on Thursday mornings; to just relax in the living area for just half an hour, savour a cup of tea and enjoy breakfast, watch the world go by (in this case, watching the hoards of morning traffic go by right outside the window), admire the flowers on my coffee table and take the time to reflect about life the past week.

The mooncake festival is just around the corner, which incidentally falls on September 12, We have just bought our first box of mooncake this year this weekend, and hb is the one that have no problems finishing the whole box within a week. We usually go through at least 2-3 boxes of mooncakes before the actual mooncake festival date approaches. Hb has made a mooncake fan out of Kyle, while I am the one who is not a fan of egg yolks in mooncake and will be happy nibbling on just the mooncake pastry.

It's hard to believe that we are approaching the last quarter of 2011; Kyle is growing up to fast, while hb and I are aging too quickly…

One of the firsts that I have done the last week is to start buying flowers for the home. I always find myself stopping by the florists to look at the flowers each time I do my weekly grocery shopping. I finally found it hard to resist and gave in to the indulgence of buying fresh flowers for the home. Last week, I got yellow geberras, while this week are carnations and statices. I try to rationalise this purchase by telling myself that it is only $10-$14 a week, for flowers that will brighten up and add warmth to the home. The flowers are placed in the vases that I have collected from my mom, who used to do flower arrangement, and have since moved on to other interests. The arrangements that I do are less structured as I like to arrange them in a more natural manner.

I don't really have any favorite types of flowers now. I used to love tulips, but it's only in season once or twice a year and simply too expensive for a simple home arrangement. These days, I will go with colour stories that I want to create for the home; last week was yellow and green and this week is coral, purple and green. I am sure most women love flowers, so what are your favorite kind of flowers?

I will be embarking on a new interest this evening, something which I have always wanted to do, but could not find the courage to explore. I will soon reveal the nature of this activity sometime next week, if everything goes well (fingers crossed)…

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Categorized: Home ·

Preschool pains

August 23, 2011 · By ·

Kyle was in one of his moody moods yesterday, and it was all because his classmate S pinched him twice in school that afternoon. Hb was feeling very protective and told Kyle to defend himself and push S if he tries to pinch him again, and then kick the latter if he attempts again. My respond differed a little from hb's as I told Kyle to say. "No! Don't pinch me!" and not to push or hit the boy, even if the latter attempts to hurt him again and to make sure that he tells the teacher that S was hurting him. I already knew what was the cause behind S's antagonistic behaviour towards Kyle.

Kyle became rather upset over the pinching incident and was all whiny and clingy the whole afternoon. He realised that he was the cause behind S's pinching as he antagonised the latter about a week back. I recalled Kyle mentioned that he sat in the naughty chair in school twice last week for pinching S. And the reason for his misbehaviour? He pinched S as he was frustrated over the lack of response when he asked S to share a toy, but S totally ignored him. So he pinched the latter to see if he could get a response from him. So S responded by 'taking revenge' this week.

He asked me this last week, "Why is it that S does not answer back when I ask him nicely. I said please..and I asked a few times, he said nothing. If he say no, I will play something else." My reply was, "Not all kids know how to respond when someone speaks to them. That's why it is important to always answer when someone asks you a question, and not just ignore them. It is very rude to ignore and not respond. But at the same time, you cannot pinch him just because he did not answer you and you are frustrated with him. If he does not answer you, just walk away and choose something else to play with."

Kyle response to hb and my advise was, "I don't want to fight back." I asked him if he told his teacher about it. His reply was "Yes, but the teacher did not scold him." I assume that the lack of attention to this little wrangle at school could be likely due to the teacher's assumption that Kyle started this and thus deserve this response from S. Better to let them to fight it out amongst themselves, or it could just be that there are just too many kids in the class to address every single issue.

I try not to over-react and highlight this to the teacher at this point. Even though Kyle is only 4, I think it will the best to teach him how to try to manage this with his classmate. I can't be there 24/7 for him, and he needs to start to think how best to manage situations like these with what he has learnt from us. In the meantime, I will monitor the outcome and see how it turns out the next couple of weeks at school.

How will you manage this if this happened to your child in preschool?

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Categorized: Education · Tagged:

In the details – Shared Spaces

August 22, 2011 · By ·

When I read about other people's interior styles on the internet, I start to think about my interior preferences.

10 years ago when hb and I had our first home, we were into dark coloured furnishing as we wanted to have a clean, minimalistic space. The choice of minimalistic furnishing was apt for our lifestyle at that point in time. After staying in a minimalistic home for some time, I realised how much I did not want to live in a cookie cutter space with lots of clultter, but lacked any form of personal touches in aesthetics. So moving into our new space, I wanted to add alot more of my simple touches into the corners of the home.

So what's my personal style for the home in general? I use a neutral base, mainly from our existing furniture that we bought from our first home. One base colour of dark brown wood furniture (all from our minimalist style 10 years ago), then accentuate with happy colours in shades of yellow, mustard, sage. And add a bit of whimsicalness to that, with my fondness for nature-inspired details. All seen through frame pictures, fabric prints and things that I make and plan to make myself.

I have alot more old stuff (some which are hand-me-downs vintage gems from my mom), hardly any new stuff. And I make a point to put away alot that I don't like in cabinets and drawers and only highlight those that I like, so that solves the clutter at home. I am also blessed to have a hb that surrenders to my preferences for the home and he seems quite satisfied with the overall result 😉

The challenge that I encountered with this space is that since this place is rented, I have to work with existing space and fittings. The apartment is relatively clean with little built-ins, except for wardrobes and the landlord's ugly speaker fixtures on the ceiling in the living area.

Imagine having to live with 4 of these eyesores on the ceiling for the next 2 years…

So this is what I did….with a $2 paper lantern from daiso, decoupage and some treasured pieces from my fabric collection.

 

My fondness for nature-inspired details is reflected in my choice of fabric for the lanterns and art prints, which are printed reproductions of original artwork by Etsy artists. All of these picture frames are from Ikea, that previously housed some of my photographic prints of nature from the nature walks that Kyle and I have taken,

I don't have green fingers, so I get easy to maintain, budget house plants from Ikea, so as to introduce more greenery into the living area.

For that bit of fun lighting into the living area, this 'home-made' lamp jar is the first thing I see when I enter the house from the main door. I used a $2 glass jar, christmas lights that I purchased 2 years ago and shells that Kyle collected from our resort holidays a while ago.

I am not one that follows interior trends, as I find that a home needs to reflect the personality of the people living there. Decorating a home takes time and it is important to allow our home to grow along with us and our needs. Most of all, decorating needs heart, it is best to follow one's passions and preferences, and not to simply copy whatever that is seen on the internet, or only select everything from a certain store. Afterall, what makes a house a home? It is all in the details you see, that will add warmth and your own personality into the space that you can call your own.

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Categorized: Craft and Handmades, Home, Inspiration · Tagged:
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