9th Queenstown Age Group Chess Championship 2012

We were not expecting much from him for this event as he hasn't been playing well and also lack practising. I did not even bother to bring any camera except for the one that comes with my iPhone. Maybe without pressure or coming back to competitive chess after a long break, he did very well to win 3 1/2 pts out of 5 games, securing the 3rd place! It could also probably be that its only 5 round instead of the usual 6/7 rounds. Final Ranking result here.

 

The competition venue - Queenstown CC

 

His Category. There were supposed to be 14 players in all but 1 didn't turn up, so its 13 players competing.

 

The organizer was clever in motivating the kids to play well by displaying the trophies right in front of the playing area. Nicholas was in love of the big cup but at the same time, likes the tall ones. To him, its the height and size that matter!

Lunch break - Lunch was provided for the participants. A packet of Chicken Rice. His favourite and also save us the hassle of going out to get food. After lunch, took the chance to take a photo with the trophies.

His Game

He won the 1st round. 

He was paired with the Champion - Timothy on the 2nd round. Chances of winning : zero unless the opponent blunder. 

He drew with Mark, a rated player, on the 3rd. Think Mark was not himself that day. 

He went on to win the next 2 rounds. He was paired with Keith for the last round, *faint*. Both of them were "fighting" for the 3rd placing which comes with prize money of $20.00. Nicholas was excited when I told him that. He always envy his sisters getting money for competition and he doesn't. So not sure if it really was the power of money, he went in and gave a beautiful win!

His 3rd Place trophy...He was happy with it as its a "tall" one!

A photo with his friends..Congrats to all the winners. The other 2 boys were playing in the Primary Section. They were very kind to Nicholas and always looking after him.

He was excited and couldn't wait to open the envelope. So when he found nothing in there, he asked "mommy, you said I will get $20. But there is nothing inside. Can u give me the money?" I kept explaining to him that they will send a cheque to him but he still not able to gasp it.

When he got home, he narrated the whole thing (the envelope and the missing money) to his grandparent. They were amused by his acting when he showed them in his exaggerated way how he discovered the envelope was empty. Then he turned to me and said, "mummy, can you give me real $20 and put inside?"

Sigh, so that's it. Took out $20 and put in there. And he took it out and put it in his piggy bank.

He had said he wanted to use the money to buy himself a transformer - Sentinel Prime.  

Learning to Read at 3!

The little one here had not been well and thus was given "medical leave" from school. We had a few wonderful mornings of 1-to-1 time...something being the youngest in the family will hardly get. We spend mornings reading; tracing; playing and spelling! 

Before he was allowed to do any tracing, I made it a point to read to him the instruction. After repeating the same old sentence for a few times, he was able to read by himself...with the help of sight words and memory.  

Dancing

We were at the playground and this cute little rascal started humming and dancing!

His First Time To A Party

 

Its our youngest prince first time attending his friend's birthday party! It was at Shangri-La Rasa Sentosa Resort! There were supposed to be some swimming time before they proceed to the kids' room for games. But it was drizzling and thus the pool was out of bound... so sad.

Nicholas was invited to join the kids' activities but I reminded the girls to decline politely if asked (not nice to make the host pay for more than what they should). So the girls stayed in there in our place to look after the 2 brothers and takes pictures while hubby and I explored around.

The girls said both boys were very well behaved and they enjoyed watching their brothers in action.

Spelling Simple Words

Ryan @ 36months... Happy Birthday!

His birthday cake is still those off-the-shelf one. The only change is it is no longer from Awfully Chocolate but from Swiss Bake (Cold Storage King's Albert Park). It is made of cream puff with a sugar bunny on it (being Easter Day). Well, either the kids were too full or the cake just not to their liking, each only had a small piece and rejected the second helping.

The birthday boy was all ready for photo taking and even joined in to sing his birthday song! So the song was "Ritardando" to match his tempo.

Emotional boy

He cried and cling on to me if I was not the one to fetch him to school.

He cried again when I drop him off in school.

He cried when I read the baby panda story to him... When the baby panda got lost.

He cried when I leave him at home and go out.

His crying can be so pitiful that it pained us hearing it but at the same time amused by his "manja". I was jokingly commenting to hubby that the way he cries is as if I was six feet under already. So I get the chance to hear/see it now instead of waiting till then.

He will says "I love mummy, I want mummy" or "I want you every day." out of the blue. *so sweet*

He will insist on waiting for me to come home to put him in bed. Even when my helper carried him up to his room, he will pace around in the room and grumbled to helper "I don't want you! I want my mummy every day!"

Spelling

His list of spelling words had extended to a long one -
- long, short, tall, big, small,
- one, two, three, four, five,
- apple, banana, car, cat, ball, bell, dog, egg, fish, good, hat, he ... and the list goes on to water and zoo!

A cheeky moment when we taught him to spell "four". He found a way to remember this word by saying "F O you are 4!"  (F.o.u.r. 4)

Reading

When we read him books, he is able to spot these words and say it out. eg. He has a big ball. I will point at the word that he knows and he will say out the alphabet and end with the word, like 'H.E. he' and 'B.I.G. ball.'

He is able to read the common sight words like the, he ... without having to "spell" the word too.

His phonic is also developing very well. Like when I asked him to spell 'sand' he can spell it out with me sounding every alphabets to him even though its a new word to him.

Other areas

When he has difficulty doing, he is not shy to say "I don't know. You teach me." A very good attitude in learning!

When I asked the brother to do his homework (yes, homework in K2! *faint*) this little boy will rush out behind his brother and said "I want to do work too!" Now I wish this positive attitude will lasted all the way to his school years!

He enjoys doing puzzles, hidden pictures, tracing with fingers and spot the difference. Now need to work on his fine motor skill he dislike colouring and writing.

Conversation

When I ask him to do colouring, he sometimes will give me his cheeky reply "I want to be lazy, mummy."

When he did something wrong like hitting his siblings (accidently), he is quick to apologise and if they still "angry", he will tell them and me this "I said 'sorry' already." Its his way of telling them cannot be angry and to avoid scolding from me as he had already apologised.

Happy Easter 2012

 

A Rare Moment

Why rare moment? hahaha...that's because this 2 just don't see "eye to eye". The big one just knows how to irritate the young one and the young one always pushes the old one away. So its very very rare that they get to be so close and smiling.

This was taken when Charmaine took off her pinafore and cheekily put in on for Ryan. Initially, Ryan struggled and whined and then, realised he looks "cute", he cheers up. Charmaine even converted her purse into a little handbag for him!

We find all this amusing but daddy was "RED" when he saw the photos..ops!