Megan's Stall

Kenneth had a mega brillant idea one day. 

Buy Megan a stall so that she can start selling her own wares and learn the concept of money... wah.. and that was before the age of two. He found the perfect wooden stall at The Better Toy Shop and it fit into Megan's room nicely. 

Comes with a chalkboard for her to price her wares and plastic wrap to keep the food fresh. What should she sell? At first, everything from mini books Stacey and me bought to sweets and trays of vegetables we can find and buy. 

Bought a wooden crate from Diaso and stocked it up with a vegetable set from Ikea. Ikea sells amazing cabbage, leek, brinjal, carrot, cucumber and mushrooms. 

They also sell a very cool banana, watermelon, oranges, apples and grapes. But there is not enough variety and their numbers are limited. Megan can't keep selling one banana and two oranges. She needs more of each to learn counting. To stock this stall up properly, we turn to the expert hands of mimi. 

Instantly she made a basketful of mangosteen. Oh they look so great, especially the ones what are peeled open. The unpeeled ones, Megan can't tell them apart from tomatos.

And every fruit and vegetable stall needs strawberries for that added touch of brilliance. Good for counting into the large numbers as well, so mimi made 25. 

Kiwis looking great so we need a handful. 

Pears not appealing to me but they are very much in season. 

Cucumbers are so damn neat and crunchy.

Soon, more and more items were added. Bought a grill set so that Megan can BBQ the food and sell them at a higher price (since this is value added service). Somehow adults are very into this grill set but Megan never bothered touching it.

Since we now have main course to serve, mimi threw in some mini burgers and ice cream cones. It was only after a few months that I noticed that the burgers are stackable. I mean you can Velcro the veg, cheese and patty and stack them in whatever order you like. What effort...How did I realise that? Because I am now missing the burger bread. 

So far, the hot favorite of Megan is still the biscuits. Numerous types of biscuits.  Day in day out, she transports them out of the room, back into the room, arrange them in different bowls and containers... "Mine, all mine" she says. Yah they are all yours, we are not fighting for them.

To me, the stall is a huge success. It is now stocked to the brim so I considered this project completed. It wasn't until yesterday when mimi asked me this... " Isn't Megan tired of selling vegetables? She can't be interested to sell the same things forever right? You need to start clearing out all these stuff and start a brand new line of products. Toys are seasonal, they need rotation! "

Huh.... 

"...what is her school teaching now? If they are teaching about ships, cars and buses, you should complement the school by stocking the shelves with vehicles so that you reinforce the learning. Start playing with cars and buses instead of making her sell vegetables all day long..."

Huh.... 

Luckily I checked, this term's theme is all about food and nutrient.... Heng! But no harm getting my mum to start working on vehicles just in case that is next term's theme. 

Finally a blog update

Gee... my last blog was like nth months ago... prove what a crazy year it has been for moi. No time for family, no time for friends, no time to even think about updating my blog for you guys who practically only realise YY is alive from my turtle updates... anyway this baby turtle is no longer baby, now a old turtle... slow and haggard... BUT its ok, I am catching up on my beauty sleep and applying a inch thick of face mask to rejuvenate. 

Ah yes stop making funny faces, Megan... I know you are trying to get my attention. "Daddy, pls get Megan to the playground while I announce to everyone I am plugged in AGAIN!!!".

Dear all, welcome back to baby turtle... as you can see, Megan has grown up. She started to go to a Pre-nursery near our place. Ken and me, as usual, did not do much research before deciding on which school to send her. Our only criteria is that it must be natural ventilated with no recycled aircon air, the rest we went on gut feel. 

School as we all know, is the supermarket of viruses. Within a week, she collected her first chop in her thick virus stamp collection booklet. Way to go my girl! Brace up for wimpy days and sleepless nights, adults!

In truth, I do not know if she enjoys the school coz she crys buckets on the way to school in the morning but comes home laughing and singing. 

We suspect one of the many reasons for her reluctance is fear of the water play sessions in school. Teacher Tina informed us that she will burst out crying when water is being splashed at her. Recently, thanks to Ni Hao Kailan, she learned to verbalise her thoughts.... "Be gentle, don't be rough!". On yah, if I haven't told you yet, Megan really behaves like a girl... wah biang.

Mimi continues knitting and coquetting dresses for sweetie pie. These dresses are to me collectibles but not exactly practical in Spore's weather, so I told mimi to channel her energy making some more toys for her grand daughter instead...

... and she started Megan's craze for balloons. Kudos for attending a balloon sculpting course, kids and balloons are a match in heaven. But uou do know your own daughter is balloon phobic right? Just as long as Megan doesn't start asking me to do all these twisting of highly combustible objects when you are not around, thank you very much...

They say imitation is a great form of learning. The "once in a blue moon" handy man Ken must be so proud to see Megan using her chopstick to tighten the screws of her own chair... 

... crosses her leg when seated ...

Now that we have committed to spending more time with Megan, we started to bring her out to beaches or parks on weekends. Have we not done these before, you asked. Err... not really, weekends were precious sleeping time for us if we were even in spore... But looking forward, we certainly need to open up her world beyond the living room and television. 

Obviously the park and bicycle stunt is not my forte, so I shall concentrate on bringing out her inner creativity by engaging her in art. Which should be easy for moi but Mimi says my approach to art is too serious for a kid, might not help in getting Megan interested or building her confidence in drawing...asked me to recalibrate these sessions to become more free, fun, expressive and dirty...  oh, oh.... the "how" is the question... 

Playing hide and seek is also a great way to pass time away from the TV. Yah anything to take her away from Dora and Ni Hao Kailan. 

On a seperate note, parents who want some "me" time and get their children to shut up should sign up for Starhub TV. The kids channels rank number one in the "money (most) well spent" chart of all times.  

Right... its 11am. I need to be discipline and move on to the next errand of the day... Moby here I come, where is lunch????!!!