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My day was peppered with sms-es, wall-posts and emails, brightening the rainy day. The evening was spent with family over a simple but delicious dinner.

I feel so blessed to have family, friends, a roof over my head and time to pursue interests.
The gift and well-wishes started a week ago, with this from P:

E immediately laid claim on the older version.

She has been practising singing English and Mandarin versions of Happy Birthday, making us enact the entire process from sitting in the prime seat, to lighting the candles, blowing them out, cutting the cake and serving it on serviettes.  As a result, the finale was perfect and she knows exactly what to do:

Candles in candle holders and onto the cake.

I'm "fifteen" because we put out every single candle there is.

E cued us in for the song

Candles out in one breath.

Taking a photo of me, with guidance from J.

And this is the photo she took.

Enjoying the cake.

I'd better be a better blogger to make this more deserving:
www. thisaquarium.com

Miss Spoken

E: Thank you Mommy.
Me: For what?
E: Thank you Mommy for loving me!

Baby No More

One of our first glimpse of her, a long awaited gift.

She completed our family.

At one, she was a bolt of energy.

At two a parcel of joy.

But now she's no longer a baby:

She's three!

And there's something magical about being three - a young girl emerges.

Determined, outspoken, intense. Charming, adorable, loved.

Happy birthday sweetie!

Ribbon Storage

Exactly a year ago, I made these to store my ribbons. Worked wonderfully to display what I have by colour themes but the ribbons have a tendency to tangle and to slip off when they are too short.

In another light-bulb moment, I made a bunch of trinket boxes which worked so well and took up less space.  Each box is made of two strips of cardstock and/or transparency. I made most of them 2" by 2" by 0.5" but the following instructions are so easy to adapt the measurements to other sizes.

A strip of cardstock, two inches wide and a strip of transparency, just a tad narrower than two inches.

Score at 0.5", 2", 0.5", 2", 0.5".

Glue the narrow sections together to form a sleeve.

Slide the transparent sleeve into the cardstock sleeve.

2"x2"x1", 3"x3"x0.5", totally customisable!

Sleeves in colours to match the ribbons.

Happy Birthday Singapore!



We watched the parade on tv and caught glimpses of the flypast and fireworks.
















E didn't manage to keep awake for the finale. She fell asleep while waiting on Daddy's shoulder.