Isaac's hairdo!

I've decided to conduct a poll on Isaac's hair! kekeke... Do you guys prefer his hair short short (like our usa pictures, that short crew cut look)? Or do you like how he looks now, with his hair kinda long on top.

We feel that Isaac looks good with short short hair, but I don't want him to always sport that botak look. So I wanted to grow out his hair.

Also, nowadays, Isaac doesn't want me to cut his hair. So it's very hard for me to trim his hair to keep it short and neat by the sides while letting his hair grow. If we wanna 'force cut' his hair, the easiest would be to crew cut it, coz then I just use the shaving tool to just shave his head.

Dilemma dilemma... hahhaa... so what do YOU think?

Isaac's Two! A Tale of Two Celebrations

We had 2 celebrations for Isaac's birthday again. Had a Tan Family gathering at my parents place, with my uncles, aunties and cousins from my father's side over for a lunch gathering the Sunday before Isaac's birthday, 2nd August 2009.

See this Barney cake - we got from the same bakery that did last year's Spiderman cake. The Spiderman cake was much better coz it had soft chocolate coating, which was very nice. This time round, they said can't have soft chocolate coating coz then they wouldn't be able to draw Barney properly. Ah well. Anyway, Isaac was happy enough with the Barney cake.
Look at him staring at the cake, so much so that he didn't want to look at the camera!
We wanted to get a Thomas the Engine cake for him, but the cake store's drawings of Thomas wasn't very nice. So we thought Barney would do as well. Yes, he's currently "into" Thomas the Engine, Barney, Cars and also, of course, Spiderman. For some reason, he also likes Dora the Explorer, even though we didn't really expose him to that. Isaac did get to wear a Thomas the Engine shirt on that day though.
Isaac was quite stoned throughout the singing of the Happy Birthday song, until the end of the song when he finally realised that it was all meant for him - then he got very high and laughed loudly.
Here's Isaac blowing the candles out :) He sorta knows how to blow, coz sometimes, when we tell him that he has to wait for awhile coz his food is hot, he would imitate us and blow on the food on the spoon, before opening his mouth to eat it.
He was so excited that he quickly plucked out the candle after he had blown, before hubbs could stop him - we were afraid he'd burn his fingers on the hot candle!
See all the cheh chehs hovering around the cake... especially Isabelle! hahaha...
Look at Isaac enjoying his cake. This was actually the first time he's had cake. And so enthusiastically, at that! He's never shown interest before, and so we've not given him any before. But he happily polished off one slice that day, and after that, he would ask for cake now and again. hehehe... see who else was enjoying the cake too...
The girls are so big already huh!? Time really flies... Rebecca (below) is 6 this year, and so next year, would be attending Primary 1 already. Isabelle (above) is 4 this year, and would enter Kindergarten 1 next year.
My dad finally had airconditioning units fitted out in the living room. So, everyone was happily sitting in the living/dining room, no complains about the heat...
Here's Isaac engaged in his favourite activity at my parents place - racing around the living room table on his car with his cheh cheh Isabelle.
They had a mini F1 race going, with them both completing at least 30 laps! vrrrroooommm...
vrrroooom vrroooom!!!
Look who's in the background on the floor?!
It's Dylan! Hahaha... He's very smiley now... Look at him striking a pose!
He was also Yew Yi's good friend that day. hahaha... first time!!! All in all, it was a great gathering for the Tan Family as we hadn't gathered like that since Chinese New Year earlier this year.

pictures above taken on 2nd August 2009

Isaac @ almost 2 years old

Rebecca @ 6 years; Isabelle @ 4 years

Dylan @ four months to 2 years

Next up, on Thursday, 6th August 2009, we had a mini-birthday celebration at my parents-in-laws' home, where we went for dinner at night, after going home to take a nap after spending an entire day at the zoo.

We bought a Thomas the Engine cake from Polar! Thanks to Lili for the tip off! hahaha... Isaac was MOST PLEASED with the cake. "Thomas cake! Thomas cake!" he kept chanting.
Look at him grinning in all the pictures. Isaac is not as tense with just immediate family about. On Sunday, with the rest of Tan Family about, he was not quite himself and would cry and fuss, very unlike his usual self. But when it was just the immediate family, he's less tense and it was much easier to get him to look at the camera, take pix, etc.
He also, now knows how to pose for the camera - to look at the camera and "Say cheese!!!" flashing his cheeky grin. I particularly like this photo below - where we three all have our teeth flashing - we look alike huh?! :p
Isaac's hair is kinda long now. Coz he refuses to let me cut! He's afraid of the vibration of the shaving equipment. I told him I could just use the scissors, which would not have any vibration. But he was just so afraid at the idea of cutting hair that he refused to let me cut his hair. We decided not to traumatise him, and let his hair grow out a bit.
I did managed to trim his fringe with the scissors, without him knowing - hubbs sat him down in the bathtub to bathe him, distracting him with the water, while I sat on the toilet bowl, and fingered his hair, cutting it. Isaac thought I was just running my hands through his hair like I always do, and so didn't realise I was cutting his hair. I didn't dare trim the hair around his ears though, for fear of cutting him - the scissors are very very sharp!
Isaac blowing, and cheering when he managed to blow out the candles.
See the 3 generations of Tan men here...
And here's a preview of how Isaac's hairline will develop over the next 70 years...
Yummy! Isaac loved the cake. He ate his own cake, and asked for more! "More cake! More cake!"
I bought Isaac 2 suits of matching pants and top - one set of Thomas and one set of Barney! He was sooooo pleased and immediately wanted to put on the Thomas set.
Told him to stand straight to pose for me, but he happily went on to jump on the bed.
So all in all, think Isaac had a great time this birthday :) Here's a toast to our happy boy, Isaac!

pictures above taken on 2nd August 2009
Isaac @ almost 2 years old

Isaac's Two @ The Zoo!

In continuation of the special posts (this is Part 2) done to celebrate Isaac's 2nd birthday... I most guiltily admit that the ppictures you have been seeing the last few posts are kinda outdated as they were from December 2008, almost 8 months back!

So, as a special treat for Isaac's birthday, here are pictures of The Boy on the 6th August 2009 and our day with him :)

Both hubbs and I took leave on the 6th August 2009 - Isaac's birthday. This was the first time ever that hubbs took leave, coz he's now at MOE HQ and so he can. Previously when he was teaching in the school, he can't take leave on school days, no matter what.

So here's how we started the day. Isaac woke up and immediately demanded that a book be read to him. He often does this. Today, he picked out the Dr Seuss' book "Oh, the Places You'll Go!" This was a particularly apt book that he chose for this special day, when he turns a big boy two!

As hubbs read to him, I contemplated that perhaps we should make it a tradition to read this book to our children on each of their birthdays. If you haven't read it, you really should. It's a great book. Here's a link to read it, or watch it read by Harrison Ford in this SuperBowl ad which adapts the contents of this book. Check it out!!! :)
By the way, also check out hubbs' Vanishing (Follicle) Island!!! His Suez Canal is widening by the day, so much so it's as wide as the English Channel already. Hubbs says when the Island vanishes altogether, he will cut botak. Which is fine with me - I rather he is botak than like those olden chinese times shave half the head only!

Next up, we got ready and hurried off to the zoo! I'd managed to wrangle the Zoo Corporate Card from my office for this day, and we could go to the zoo for free! We wanted to go early morning (we got there by 9.30am), so that it's not too hot and perhaps leave by 11 or so. As it turns out, the weather wasn't too hot (which was great!) and we enjoyed ourselves so much that we stayed till almost 4.30 in the afternoon!

At the entrance of the Zoo were the Ben & Jerry cows - Isaac immediately wanted to "Papa, zuo4 niu2" and "Mama, sit cow" - so we promptly sat him on the cow and took pix with him :)
I've been guiltily not taking enough pix (not by my standards!) of late as well, so I was determined to try and take more on this special day.
We brought Isaac's toy car along, the kind he sits on and pushes himself on - but the zoo people said we can't bring it in due to the many slopes in the zoo, so we had to leave it outside. Made poor Isaac cry his heart out to be separated from his beloved car.
So for most of the morning, Isaac was sitting atop hubbs' shoulders, which hubbs finds is an easier and less tiring way for him to carry Isaac who now weighs in at about 11.5kg.
We happened to chance upon the giraffe feeding time, which was quite cool coz the giraffes came up quite close.
More pix of me and Isaac! hehehe... half decent shots too, I must say. Though I am looking, oh alright, I AM fatter than ever. sob sob...
Here we are at the Elephants At Work and At Play show. It's the first time that Isaac has seen elephants in the skin, up close, so he was pretty entranced by them. He also kinda likes elephants, making sure to always point them out in pictures in books when he sees them.
Look how taken he is! Could hardly take his eyes off them.
Here's Isaac at the kiddy corner where they have the ponies and goats in small enclosures where the kids can see them up close.

We hardly have goats in books, more sheep than goats, really. So "goats" were kinda new to Isaac. And since sheep was "yang2", goats became "shan1 yang2" to him. But now he knows that there are sheep and there are goats.
To top off the zoo trip, we brought Isaac to the new KidzWorld in the zoo, for some water play! Look how pleased he is!

As you can see, Isaac's happy just playing with the water in the shallow pool, and water that sprays out of the structures. He loves 'stepping' on water and just splashing about.
There're nice structures at the KidzWorld with water coming out of the structures, plus slides and even a huge 'pail' collecting water, and when it is full, the bell starts ringing, and empty itself over... once the kids hear the bell ringing, they'd gather below the pail, waiting for the big moment! See how much water is accumulated below! For some reason though, Isaac wasn't too interested in the 'waterfall' at all. He paid it no attention. After letting Isaac play with water and sprays for awhile, hubbs decided to bring Isaac to try out the slides. In the beginning, hubbs had to position Isaac by sitting him down at the head of the slide. But after a few tries, Isaac quickly got the hang of sitting down at the head of the slide, and pushing himself off.


Isaac likes to take his time on the slide though. He'd slowly lower himself onto the top of the slide, and think awhile, and wait awhile, before pushing himself off.

There was an occassion though, there was this girl waiting to go on the slide after Isaac. She got so impatient with him for taking so long that, when she checked that hubbs wasn't looking (hubbs just looked away for a split second) she pushed Isaac down the slide! Thankfully Isaac didn't cry.

Hubbs was kinda amused and was laughing as he spoke to the girl, telling her that it was not a nice thing to do to push someone down the slide when they're not ready. But even though he was smiling and half-laughing when he said that - she kinda got 'scared' by his pep talk, and quickly walked off without going down the slide! hahaha...
So Isaac enjoyed his slide rides very much. Kept going round and round, climbing the stairs and sliding down. After awhile, Isaac even tried a different way to go down the slide! He went down feet first still, but tummy down! :) here, take a look!


Look how tall Isaac is! It's also the swim suit he's wearing, I suppose - he's been wearing that since he was 6 months old. Well at that time, the suit came down to his ankles whereas they're now above his knees. We took his height and he was 87cm on his 2nd birthday.
Look at Isaac all tired out at the end of the zoo trip! We finally left the zoo at about 4.30pm. On our way walking out, Isaac fell asleep in the stroller!

All pictures and videos above taken on 6th August 2009!
Isaac @ 2 years old!