Children's Season @ SAM

The Children's Season is an item on my "Things I Die Die Must Do With The Kids" list and we almost missed it! Well, we did missed the one we went to last year at the National Museum but heard from friends that the Art Garden installations at the Singapore Art Museum are way better so earlier this week on my day off, I brought the boys down together with the whole studio :p

Here's a video of what the Art Garden is about in a nutshell.


And yes! It was as fun as it looks! The boys started off by prancing on Walter, the curious colossal bunny. SHHH, we didn't know they were not allowed to touch him as there were no guards around to stop us and you know kids, they were attracted to the big white thing the moment they saw it.


When the museum opened it's doors after a 15 minute wait, we were off to catch the dancing solar flowers installation. There was also an elephant where the kids could decorate with colourful stickers given by the museum staff.






Next came the paper fruits market where we fold and create our choice of 3D paper fruit. Dylan selected an apple and Kay a starfruit. It was terribly tough for us adults to put the fruits together let alone the kids. But finally we got them done, ta-dah! And you could exchange your paper fruit for a real one! But we opted to keep the paper fruits after all that hard work we put in :p






We rushed upstairs to catch the animated shortfilm Lost and Found by Philip Hunt which is about a little boy finding a penguin on his doorstep and his determination to help the penguin find his way back home to the south pole. This magical tale of friendship and loneliness is based on the best-selling picture book by Oliver Jeffers which I am going to buy for Kayden since he enjoyed the film so much :)


Ok, then it was off to the room decorated with toys, sand, artificial grass and styrofoam with walls covered entirely of modular toy train tracks. This was definitely a hit with the boys as they got to build their own tracks and once completed, they were given a battery operated toy train each which would run on the tracks they created. Boys haven I tell you! We were stuck here for the longest time.










This is the Tree of Love which is decorated with papier-mâché animal dolls, created by children and participants from non-profit organisations with the artist. Visitors are invited to add on to the work by penning their hopes, thoughts and feelings on the trees.






Kayden covered the entire giant cake with decors made of fabric in the Mummy Dearest room.




We didn't have time to do the GO! installation as it was past the kiddos' lunch time and somebody was getting extremely grouchy! Don't look like it from these pictures but the end of acceptable behaviour was drawing near :D






So we quickly headed to the colourful room which had big round blocks for the kids to push and colour match to the round circles on the ground. They were busy here for all of 5 minutes :p






And so ends our visit to the Art Garden. We certainly enjoyed the exhibits and interactive installations and can't wait for what they will have lined up for us next year!

Trainspotting

Today marks the end of an 80 year run for the KTM train service into Tanjong Pagar railway station. It is a historic event with reporters, photographers and the man on the street clamoring at the station for one last look, photo or meal before the last train rolls out slightly before midnight. From tomorrow, the service will only be available from the Woodlands station.

Exactly one month before, my friend Ik Hui decided that just for fun we should go for a ride on the train with the kids to Johor Bahru and back! What a swell idea and the boys were pretty stoked about going on their first train ride too (i try to ignore their whining while we got seated onboard about "what's that smell mummy?!").

Here are the pictures taken with my iPhone yet again. Yes, I brought the DSLR but with two kids to mind for, it was just easier shooting with the phone :p

CHOO CHOO!


the 3 adventurers


our seats and ticket


love the reflection of kay


the boys missed their naptime


jaeden chirpy and checking out the onboard brochure


while Ik Hui looks on




two good friends


sharing is caring!








KTM, the end of a good run.

SAM with the iPhone

An excursion with the boys and mummy's entire studio yesterday :p Will update with full blogpost and DSLR pictures soon. All shots taken and edited with my iPhone.

Sultry Siren / Sweet Angel

Ok this post is probably coming at a bad time since I am in the Best Family Blog category of the Singapore Blog Awards so I have to warn you first that this blog post is rated PG :p

After my advertising photography workshop with Geoff Ang, my classmate Tanti and I had a photo session in my studio with the very beautiful Ena to try out different lightings we learnt during the workshop. Here is Ms Ena in two different looks :)





Tanti says Ena looks like Shu Qi (the actress) and yes I think so too! Thank you Tanti for the friendship and Ena for being our lovely model. Look forward to working with you both again soon!

BTW this is the last week for voting on the SIngapore Blog Awards. If you haven't voted for me, please if you can spare a moment of your time to do so. I appreciate all your votes and support :)

Save the Colour

Birds have enjoyed a raised level of interest in our lives lately, in particular the angry one who resides in our iPhones :p There was also the recent animated movie Rio which told of the adventures of the last two remaining blue macaws and the mission to get them *ahem* doing the *errrm* so that they will not be the last blue macaws, oh you get the message!

In the real world, birds are also dwindling in numbers as they lose their natural habitats. In a bid to raise awareness of this fact to our children, the Jurong Bird Park has been running the Save The Colour event this month.



To help the kids learn more about bird conservation in a fun way, there was an Origami Village at the park where kids fold paper fishes to release back into the sea, create ice blocks for the penguins, plant some origami flowers and colour butterflies to set free. The boys chose to fold the fishes and colour the butterflies. It was challenging for Dylan to do the origami on his own but he had lots of help from the park staff and Gong Gong. Colouring of the butterflies was a breeze though! Ok, he had a bit of help from Daddy :p





kayden putting some finishing touches to his fish






dylan letting his origami fish go into the "ocean"






our butterflies are ready!


setting the butterflies "free"


the madatory family pix by the waterfall :p gong gong was our photographer


There were also other activities like adding your own origami crane to the Pledge Tree with a written promise by you to do your part for conservation. You can also send your friends and family a free postcard sharing the conservation message! And a hit amongst the kids were of course the air-brushed bird tattoo and bird-face painting stations :)

The month long event may have come to an end but the message on bird conservation to our kids especially, will certainly resonate through our daily activities and actions. Save the colourful birds of our world, save the colour!

Rah Rah video (ok ok, it's a slideshow)!

Sorry for the plug again...we finalists for the Singapore Blog Awards have been ordered told to make a video of our blog to garner votes :p Here's my little video slideshow made with iMovie. It took me way longer and way more effort than expected as it was my first time using this software. Stuff that I could easily do with professional software like Final Cut Pro or Premiere are not possible with iMovie. But please do turn up your speakers, I have edited the video to the piece of soundtrack :) Hope you enjoy it! Please vote for me once a day till 3 July under Best Family Blog category, thank you! :)

xoxo,
maryann

Getting that look

While researching for Dylan's birthday cake on the internet, I was surfing through tens of websites and food blogs. I came across one whose pictures I really love and as I was reading the blog posts, I realised that this blogger WAS FROM SINGAPORE! What the?!?! I scrolled back to look at the photographs on the site again and they were darn good! This can't be shot in Singapore (what terrible light we have) I kept muttering to myself. BUT THEY WERE! And they have that look, I dunno how to describe...the "ang moh" look that's what I would say hahahaha. Anyway, I showed the photos to the girls and they too were impressed. I said we HAVE to try shooting some food and getting THIS LOOK so one afternoon in between shoots, we took some shots of the leftover cupcakes that Audrey from Sugar Pie Gourmet Cakes and Classes made for my photography workshop with Geoff Ang last week (more on this in another post).

So here you go, our virgin attempt at the "ang moh" look kind of food photography wahahahahaha!













How? Do we get a pass? :D

Happy Daddy's Day!

What do you call your father? I call mine Pa, short and curt. My kids call their father Daddy, one syllable longer and slightly more endearing :p But that don't make me love my Pa any less. I gave him a call at almost midnight to wish him and he was asking why I left it so late as I usually remember such things. I guess when you have your own children, there's another father to celebrate for and one thing rolled over another and I only got the chance to call him when the kids have slept. But hey I made it before midnight so it counts :D

Growing up in a broken family, my Pa has always been there for me more so than my mother. My husband is saying the same now about him being around for the kids more so than me, their mother. This makes me sad. I do not want my kids to feel resentment towards me like I do towards my own mother. I want to be the sort of mother I have always dreamt of having, one that can be my best friend and whom I can tell anything to, one that I turn to whenever I am in need and one I hold in high regard over everyone else. It seems that at this juncture, Daddy is this person to Kayden. And I admire this bond that they have built. My husband worries over every little cough that comes out of his mouth, teaches him maths, chinese and english every weeknight, goes for workshops and essentially making sure his daily needs are met. He is a great Daddy :) But don't rest on your laurels Daddy, this Mummy will be catching up soon with my plan to work lesser hours this year on!

Meantime, here's wishing the father of my children a very HAPPY DADDY'S DAY and a very HAPPY PA'S DAY to my Pa! You both are great fathers and thank you for being there.

(The iPhone picture above is a Father's Day art piece Kay did for his Daddy, cute isn't it?)