Mayenne's Birthday Party - Number Two

We had another birthday party for Mayenne last Sunday. We invited Angie's relatives plus a few colleagues and friends.

In our previous party, my parents did all the decorations. This time around, we did everything by ourselves. Fortunately, there is a large common area at my mum-in-law's flat, so we used that for our party.

Mayenne wasn't as enthusiastic as last week, maybe she was "kissed" on her face by bugs. Also, she was being carried throughout as the party was held outdoors.

But she soon warmed up to the kids, which was really the best part of the party. Kids are always the centre of attraction, especially when they are cute and adorable.

We bought the cake from the same cake shop, ordering back the Lychee Martini but changed the top tier to another flavour. We chose 'Winnie the Pooh' theme not because Mayenne likes him, but more because of the soft toy on top of the cake and those little figurines that looked rather nice, albeit non-original.

Mayenne got 'saboed' by Grandad.

Immediately after the cake-cutting, we passed the teddy bear soft toy on the cake to Mayenne, and she cuddled it tightly. Within minutes, she dozed off.

For more photos, visit http://photosg.com/v/mayenne-18052008/

Mayenne's Birthday Party - Number One

Mayenne will have 2 official birthday parties. First one was held last Sunday, to coincide with her Lunar birthday.

We started off the day with Mayenne soiling the entire bed, no thanks to her diapers who was so full that it could not contain the poo. So Mummy has to remove all the bedsheets to clean. (Unfortunately, her favourite bolster has to be thrown away because it was deem unwashable)

We went to my Grandma's house where the ancestral tablet is for the ritual blessings. Mayenne had fun picking the "symbolic items", a custom that all toddlers go through which could determine her future career. Mayenne picked the book first because it was conveniently the closest to her.


The celebration continues at my parent's house, where we invited relatives and friends and enjoyed Mayenne's good behaviour and entertainment.

Beautiful and delicious lychee martini cake from Pine Garden.

Who's the happy girl?

Taking a ride on her birthday gift.
But she still prefers going all-fours.
The party ended about 5pm. Mayenne didn't sleep the entire afternoon, and was instantly knocked-out the moment she got in the car.

More photos at http://photosg.com/v/mayenne-11052008/

Hurray for Pocoyo

Every parent with a toddler and who subscribes to StarHub Cable TV's Playhouse Disney Channel will know who Pocoyo is.

It's an adorable digital animation in 6-minute episodes teaching children about values.

The series is conceptualised by a Spain company, but the animation contains strong Japanese anime influences. The characters design is outstanding that even adults love them.

Pocoyo, Loula, Pato, Sleepy Bird (on Pato's beak), and Elly

Pocoyo has won dozens of international awards for its quality, and has sold to over 100 countries around the world, including Japan and Arabia. So you see, it has global reach.

Here's the official blog site that details the journey of creating these lovable characters. http://www.pocoyo.blogs.com/

Pocoyo shows at StarHub Cable TV Channel 34 - Disney Playhouse - on 9am and 8pm daily.

Sometimes... Good Things Should Come To An End

It's rare to hear something profound coming out from me wifey. So if something of that nature is posted on she blog, then it must be quite serious.

You know what they (the wise people) say that you always fail to treasure something until it's gone. I've been struggling with myself on fulfilling my personal goals and meeting my family duties.

I realise that some of my personal goals do not quite complement with my family duties. I tried to find a balance and understanding over the past months, but it looks like it's not developing positively.

At the same time, family time is increasing since Mayenne. Last Wednesday I attended the Shichida Parent Course. The director, Jocelyn Khoo, gave a long and inspiring speech about how the importance of bonding between parent and child will determine the success of the programme for the child. The Shichida Method is not a course only for children, but also a learning journey for the parent. It is a family life-changing commitment, starting from the fundamental emotional attitude towards the child, to finding the right materials to enrich the child's mind.

I appreciate me wifey's understanding over the past 20 months, from the time she got pregnant till this moment when Mayenne is reaching one year old. I thank her for letting me explore and develop my personal goals.

One of my affiliates doing wedding videography recently ended his business to concentrate on his career and family. I too am looking at following his footsteps.

For the regular blog readers, some who are my past clients, a few probably are my current clients who have booked me, would be sad or even worried that I won't be able to fulfill their assignments. For those that I committed, I will definitely do. As for the rest, I might still take on assignments selectively. Definitely will not stop doing assignments altogether, unless I lose the use of my hands.

Well, that's my current plan for now. You never know what will happen in the next 8 months, but at least I know where I am heading - an end.

Piano Spa 4 - TV Commercial

Finally managed to record the TV Commercial of my latest Piano Spa album. The background music they used for the commercial is in CD1 track 2, "Colours".

One More Reason Why I Dumped Friendster

With so much competition on the network community portal, it's no wonder the once-popular Friendster is trying so hard to keep up by introducing new features. But unfortunately, some of the features are flawed and will cost them dearly.

There was one feature called 'Fan Profile'. On one look, I thought it will tag your current Friendster account with this new feature. So I went to add it to my current account.

Ever since I added that, I realised that I am no longer able to view the profiles of my friends whom I've added. They became 'restricted profile'.

So I emailed to Friendster support and this is what they replied.

Please note, if your profile is converted to a Fan Profile we will not be able to switch it back to a regular profile. Fan Profiles are for entities looking to promote themselves to millions of friendster members. Regular profiles are for people that want to keep a network of friends. Please take this into account before submitting this form.

OK so I screwed up. On one action, I have converted my friends to become 'fans' and now I can no longer access to their private information.

Help me here, but I think Facebook has such a feature allowing you to create 'pages' that works just like this 'fan' thingie, except that Facebook lets you create a separate fan profile and not affect your personal profile. I dare not try in Facebook, lest I get the same irreversible result.

So what are my recourse? I could a) Create another Friendster account and add all my friends and photos and profile details all over again; or b) Delete my account; or c) Leave the profile alone and totally give up on Friendster.

I choose c).

So, so long, Friendster. You no longer serve any purpose since I cannot view my dear friends' restricted information.

Social Networking Portals Are Also Doing Networking

It's amazing how social networking portals communicate to one another seamlessly.

Yesterday, I wrote the Madeleine's Photo Story article from my Flickr account, which seamlessly posted to this Blogger site. Within minutes, the same article was imported into Facebook as a Note, and as well as my Multiply site as a blog article.

One action, 3 instances.

Talk about social networking portals doing the networking themselves. Bravo.