Ice Skating Lessons

Recently Jaylin signed up for ice skating lessons and I feel I enjoy it more than Jaylin does. I enjoy watching the intense motivation in her eyes, constantly falling and slipping but she doesn't give up. On her first lesson I thought that was the end of it when a boy grabbed her and pull her down to break his fall. She shed a few tears.....on the back of my mind I can see see it in her eyes that she is done and about to call quits on this activity. To my surprise she looked at me with her sad face wiped her tears with her jacket and tried it again.
That was one proud mommy moment :)

Ice Skating Lessons Video

One of a kind piano stand

Jaylin started piano lesson about a month now, she goes once a week. Before committing in purchasing a piano we will practice on the iPad with a piano keyboard app. That worked well and we will practice strengthening her fingers by tapping on the table pretending to play the piano.

She seems to be enjoying her lessons and the teacher mentioned she is playing well and learning quite fast. The teacher advise me it's about time to either buy her a keyboard or piano soon, the iPad won't be helpful once she begins playing with both hands.

Practicing piano on the iPad





I have been searching daily on kijiji to purchase a preowned keyboard for her. At last I found one for her with 88 keys and touch sensitive. In the meantime we placed it on the fireplace till daddy have time to build her one. Daddy build her a piano stand and Jaylin was quite surprise to see it in the morning.

How to help the community? (from a kindergartner)

This week's topic for show and tell is community. Draw a picture or print off a picture of someone in the community who helps you.
In Jaylin's eyes builders are important people for the community. They help people to build homes to keep them warm and safe.
I loved her drawing and how she explained it to me. From a parents view I expected Jaylin's answer to be a police officer, fire man or paramedics but her answer was very original to me. I love being the listener and let her explain her views to me. It amazes me each and every time!

(Red building on the left is a new house the builders are building, the guy in red is wearing a yellow hard hat because safety come first, the guy in green is the builder giving directions and marking the checklist, the guy inside the orange crane is using the machine to remove rocks, and the last guy I don't remember what was his job)

Learn To Read- Kindergartner

Jaylin started working on Hooked on Phonics at the age of four, whenever she is craving to learn I feed it to her like I'm feeding her brain.....her curiosity. I let her take the lead and I will pick up her cues to what her recent interest are. A while back she was not into fiction books she was eager to learn about animals, science, non-fiction type of books. I will buy/borrow reference books for young readers or head to the library and let her choose what she wants to learn or curious about. I will steer her toward the non-fiction books to see if anything catches her eye but she will quickly tell me "mommy I am done let's go check out and go home".
Hooked on Phonics was a terrific approach for Jaylin at the time so we gave it a try and she was hooked. Each lesson is about 20 mins long and she will watch a DVD for about 5 mins listening and following the pronunciation.  Step two is the workbook and reading a short story with the vocabulary she learned from the lesson. No drama, no tears, no stress it was all smiles because she felt so proud reading like a big kid. Its been close to 6-9 months working on Hooked on Phonics she is comfortable sounding out the letters to read the word. From lesson 1 to current she practiced mainly on words with the letter "a" such as: at, an, am, ad, ag and etc... Maybe we worked on the same workbook too long she is losing interest and does not want to proceed with the lessons. She turned five roughly two weeks ago and developed a mini attitude and thinks she knows it all.

She is not a genius nor a gifted child but at school I don't think it's challenging for her, at home I will introduce her to some science, reading, writing, simple math, arts and crafts. I am not a teacher I don't have a degree in early education I am a stay at home mom trying to keep her busy and maintaining tidy household. Her recent attitude change was driving me crazy, being bossy, not listening, regression," I know it all" kind of attitude......everything is expected and normal for her age. To bust her bubble a bit I had to out smart her and show her she is wrong and prove it to her instead of telling her "because i said so, or I know because I am your mommy" : ) Slowly this devil side of her phased out and she is slowly switching gears and willing to listen to what I have to say or teach her. ( it took me roughly 3 weeks to have her ditch her attitude, boy oh boy did she test her limits with me and pushed my patience to the max)

OK, back to business..... she is able to count and write her numbers up to 100 without assistance, capital and lower case alphabet seems to be consistent now. Reading was the next challenge since she lost interest with Hooked on Phonics I approached her with BOB Books. Its for ages 4 and up Set 1 for Beginning Readers, I didn't look through the books myself yet and grabbed the first book and handed it over to Jaylin to see how far she can go on her own. To my surprise.... she was capable of reading if not all but most of the books in the set. I didn't think she can read the short stories because she mainly work on "a" words. She caught my attention when she slowly sounded out the "i" words along with "o" words. Of course it felt like a milestone to mommy, praising her, clapping and acknowledging job well done pronouncing the words on your own. That boost her confidence so high she didn't want to stop but to keep reading one book after another. Maybe tomorrow she will like to continue with Hooked on Phonics.

Being bullied and they start young..

Not a single parent out there wants or wishes any child being bullied and hurt mentally or physically.
But we can only protect them when they are in our arms but when you let go and send them off to school you only pray they are safe and happy.
Everyday I wait at the bus stop to give that hug and kiss to my little honey the moment she steps off the bus. But today my mommy gut feeling from a far distance viewing the bus I know something is wrong or I will get bad news. My little honey did not jump with joy waving to me I see her hiding in her seat staring outside her window with no smile or affection. That is not my child..... Where is my sunshine?
The moment she stepped off the bus I asked her what's wrong? Her response was it was a very very bad day and I don't want to talk about it!! Tears was in her eyes and of course I pulled her to the side to let the bus pass, then she told me XX hit me and he hit me 3 times? Not over reacting I want to make sure what's going on or what happened?
She doesn't lie to me the good the bad the right the wrong Jaylin tells me everything. She slowly told me what happen and I couldn't believe what I was hearing. I raised Jaylin to always use her words and never her fist. She was minding her own business sitting on her own in front of this boy, he decided to go sit next to her then punched Jaylin in the chest. Jaylin mocked at him and demands him to stop and hitting is not kind. She wanted to move but he blocked her, she yelled stopped again and apparently not loud enough for the bus driver to notice anything. He punched her again and she grabbed his arm and said " you stop that right now" his response was I don't care and I will do it again. The third punch happened again at the chest and I guess it was time for him to get off the bus. As we were still standing on the sidewalk I checked her chest for bruises but luckily nothing. I hugged her ever so tightly and told her you did the right thing but how come you didn't tell the bus driver, she answered me the bus was moving and we are not suppose to change seats. I had nothing to say but to tell her don't worry Mommy will fix this and put an end to it before it happens again to her or anyone else.
I took her to lunch my chest was tight and I couldn't think straight! I let her choose her favorite snack to make her feel better and to ask her how she was feeling and if we should go see the doctor. Not trying to over react we went and had lunch, I texted my sister asking her what I should do. I didn't know what I should do as a parent I wasn't sure if I should go to school or phone someone about this.
My sister told me to report to the school immediately, which I did and was able to speak with the assistant principle. I felt he was sincere and didn't tolerate children being bullied. He assured me he will investigate and will pull the two children aside and have a talk with them. I really hope he is not trying to shoo me away and think I'm one of those annoying parents complaining about something small.
All and all I didn't feel good and I don't ever want to hear Jaylin being hurt. I should tell her to kick that boy's ass!!! She knows what is right and what is wrong and I am so proud of her.

FaceBook Help

I bet many of you is upset and frustrated with Facebook's constant update but you can't blame them because if they don't update their interface it will get dated then slowly people/businesses will stop using Facebook. Many people that uses Facebook is comfortable and doesn't adjust well with change. I was quite upset with the updates myself and slowly feel my News Feed was empty and so quiet, I wonder did my friends unfriend me or how come my friends doesn't update their status or pictures anymore. Facebook's robot or system might think they are smart and automatically categorize who is your "close friends" and set what goes on your news feed. The friends that you comment on the most will surely remain on your news feed, but sometimes there are friends you have that you enjoy reading about them but don't comment or communicate much. I call those silent stalkers wahahah just kidding.

Last night I decide to go through my "Friends List" and do a bit of clean up and categorizing : ) Then I figured out why some of my friends that are close to me no longer on my news feed. Unfortunately there is no shortcut to this....you will have to go to each and every friend of yours to do the clean up or make the necessary changes. Take a look at my pictures for further directions.

Step 1: 

Click on Friends on FaceBook App or Click on All Friends on Computer

 Step 2: 

Click on a friend on your list then go to their page and click on the Friends tab

• If you like to get updates on this particular friend and have them on your news feed, make sure there is a check mark on "get notifications". 
• If you already have them as "close friends" that should have been checked automatically
• You can get a notifications on this friend or have them automatically pop on your news feed. If you check "show in news feed" their update appears. If you check BOTH (get notification & show in news feed) you will get both. Notifications is the "badge" on the op of Facebook page.
• Lets say you don't want to unfriend that particular friend but don't want to get any update from them, uncheck both "get notification & news feed"
• If you don't want that particular friend to see what "you post or your updates" you will categorize them in "acquaintances". Just remember when you post a recent update about yourself make sure you select the type of visibility such as "public, friends only, or friends except acquaintances".

Chinese New Year Fruit Basket

We spent most of the day at home today, while the kiddo was playing with her father I had some time to myself to test/try another Lunar New Year Decor. The fruit basket to hold mini clementines or tangerine is another tradition staple for Chinese New Year.
I didn't film a tutorial or take a step by step pictures of the process. Since new year is already here didnt think it will be relevant:) But if you guys are interested comment below and I will film one.