I thought we can start school this week. I thought wrong.
We went for a Yamaha lesson on Tuesday night (15 Sept), almost 7 days after Den's operation (read all about her operation here). She was active and seemed to be doing better and better. The redness at the corners of her eyes had almost disappeared. So I did not expect any problem.
Half way through the class, she told me she was dizzy and wanted to go home (that was the first for her, she had never requested to go home since we started Yamaha 1 year and 9 months ago, she used to cry whenever we sang the goodbye song), so I knew she really was not feeling well.
That's the first time she complained of dizziness since the operation, I think maybe it was due to concentrating too long on the keyboard and notes. She practiced piano almost every day at home and did not has any problem. But then she usually only practiced for 5-8 min at a time.
We continued the class until the end but I did not let her play any more songs.
I decided that it was still too early to start school, so there was no school and no worksheet for the whole week.
On Wed, my friend SY and her 1.5 years old boy visited us. So Den had fun playing with him. I also packed up some of Den's old toys and books and sold them to her. That's about the only way I can make Den let go of her old toys...we are saving up all the money from the sales of her old toy and set up a toy fund to buy age-suitable toys for her! Even with that, she refused to let me sell off a few of her toys that I think she had already outgrown.
She is a collector - collect everything under the sun - toys, books, stickers, rocks, plastic bags, boxes, letters, envelopes, stirring spoons, etc, etc! You name it, she has it! Every time anyone wanted to throw away anything, she would ask, "Since you don't need this anymore, can you give it to me?" When you said Yes, she would be so happy that you thought maybe you have given her a diamond instead of just a plastic bag!
The only thing she is giving away willingly is the clothes that she has outgrown... maybe because physically she can't wear them anymore.
On Friday, W&W came over and played. They have not been coming for a while and so they had lots of fun together. We are going to really miss them when we relocated.
Other than that, we did not do much. Just read stories. We started reading Robert N. Munsch's stories collections Munschworks (
I bought Munschworks Grand Treasury (contained munschwork1, 2 & 3) and also Munschworks 4 from Trisha & Sasha when Den was only a few months old because I love the stories! They are so so so silly! They make me laugh and laugh! Of course at that time, Den was too little to understand the stories or to enjoy the humor. Last year when she turn 3.5 years old, she started to love them too.
The stories are just so funny and silly. Some with very subtle messages behind them and some just for the fun of it. We started on the Grand Treasury last year and before we can finish it we got distracted by some other books and forgot to continue. Recently, Borders is selling a lot of Robert N. Munsch's books (single title, around RM23 each, buy 2 free 1), and that reminded us we have not been reading his works for a while.
Just to give you a taste of his story, let me summarize the story that we read last night called Stephenie's ponytail.
Stephenie asked her mom to tie her hair into a ponytail at the back of her head because no one in the school had a ponytail. When her classmate saw her, they shouted," ugly ugly ugly! " She said, "Is my ponytail and I like it!"
The next day, every girl in the class has a ponytail at the back of their head.
Stephenie was very angry and asked her mom to tie a ponytail at the side of her head. The next day, every girl and some boys have a ponytail coming out at the side of their heads.
Stephenie was very very angry and asked her mom to tie a ponytail on top of her head. The next day, every girls and boys have a ponytail on top of their head.
Stephenie was very very very angry and asked her mom to tie a ponytail at the front of her head and cover her eyes. The next day, every girl, boys, and even some teachers have a ponytail at the front of their head and covered their eyes.
Stephenie was so so so angry that she announced she is going to shave her hair and came to school bold the next day. The next day when she reached school, everyone - girls, boys, teachers had all shaved their heads and bold. Stephenie is the only one left with a ponytail coming out at the back of her head.
Den and I laughed none stop throughout the story. I also used the story to remind Den that she needs to be confident with what she has and who she is even if it is very different from others - for example, her glasses. She hated her glasses and think she looks ugly when she wear them. It did not help when all those 'well-meaning' people saw her and said with pity "Ai Yo! So SMALL has to wear glass! So POOR THING!"
But then that's life. We can go through life trying to fit in with everyone and conform to the norm or we dare to be different and be proud of what we have and who we are. Sometimes, when we dare to be different, others will start to follow suit too. A hard lesson for a 4.5 years old though.
Other than stories, she also had lots of free time to draw since there was no worksheet. I was very pleasantly surprised by some of the artworks she came out with:
She draw this parrot in my mom's house on Tuesday before we went to Yamaha without copying from any book! I think it was really great and wanted to show everyone but she refused.She keep saying it was no good and she can do better and refused to let anyone see it except for ST & me.
Hmm...a perfectionist! I don't like it!
The title of this is "EE & Den On Stage". She draw this yesterday when I prepared dinner.
She only shared it with ST & me and refused to let anyone else see it.
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