Sunday, August 31, 2014

Jay's New Junior Golf Cart from Amazon

Date:  Aug 31, 2014

Jay Jay going to play a lot of golf on the golf course from now on.

This is Jay Jay teeing off from hole #2 @ 9 hole Millennium Course.  He is enjoying every moment of it!

So, I need to buy a small junior golf cart / trolley for him.  Instead of him carrying the bag and exhaust his energy.

However, I have search thru quite a number of golf shop here in Singapore and they do not carry any golf trolley for kids.

So, the only solution I had is to order it via Amazon.

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7 days later, the goods came.  It is very easy to assemble it.

It is very light.

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The brand is called Young Gun Junior Golf Cart (They don’t call it Trolley in US).

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The handle can be extended.  The wheels can be folded up into very small too.  This is after everything is unfolded.

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Just nice.

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It is quite convenient.  So, I don’t have to waste too much energy to carry my bag.

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Today is the first time Jay Jay uses this bag.  He likes it a lot.  Better than him carrying the bag.

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Swimming - Let The Kids Take Their Own Sweet Time

Date:  Aug 31, 2014

First of all, Happy Birthday Malaysia!

Kay Kay has start learning swimming about 1 year ago, where he promise to take uncle Soh’s swimming class just after his birthday.

If you remember reading it on my blog, Kay Kay threw away his milk bottle when he was three (after the birthday).  He no longer wearing diaper to sleep when he turned four.  And we love to associate “grow up” with birthday cake.  HaHaHa.  So, we also make him promise to start learning swimming when he turned four.

Swimming is a life skill that we as a parent wanted him to learn and master.  Because one day, this could save his life.

Regardless of how long it takes, how scared the kid is at the beginning, Kay Kay knew he has to learn how to swim eventually.

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Let’s check out how is he doing.

1.  He is able to walk to the 1st ladder at the 2 meter pool side and swim from there.

2.  He is able to free style with correct swimming strokes.

3.  He is able to change breathe, though still not perfect, but at least he is not afraid of running out of air.

4.  He is able to swim a longer distance.

I am very proud of him having such improvement.

I admit that at the beginning, I was a bit too harsh on him.  Always wonder why Jay Jay can picked up swimming faster than him.

I made a mistake to compare both Jay & Kay.  Luckily, I quickly realise that mistake, and let it go.

I let the coach to do his teaching.  I no longer jump into the pool to teach him.

I realise that there can be ONLY ONE COACH to teach him at the beginning.

We as parent, although we know how to swim, but we are not swimming coach.

We cannot possibly teach the correct swimming skill to our kids.  

Let the professional do the job.

And understand that, it takes time to concur the fear of swimming.

No one is the same when learning swimming.

I know, some of the bright kids of his age has sort of “master” the swimming in shorter time.

But Kay Kay is not them, he will take longer time.  That is the different!

So, “Let it Go” is actually a good song and a reminder to remind parents that not all kids learn the same way learn at the same speed.

And he is also started to learn butterfly swim.  And I am so happy when I see that

1.  He no longer a crying baby at the pool.

2.  He is not afraid of water any more.

3.  He is enjoying himself in the class.

4.  He chit chat and play in the pool with his friends.

Here is the video of the first step of learning butterfly swimming (no hands).  Swim like a fish.

And he loves it!

Some one did a Ice Bucket at the other side of the pool.

So, I suggested to him to do a balance your swim board on your head challenge.

Later during the day.

Jay Jay came back.

Jay Jay: “Kay Kay, how is your swimming?  What did you do today?"

Kay Kay: blah blah blah (talking about the butterfly).

Kay Kay did cry at the end of the class, but not because of scare of swimming…  because

Kay Kay:  “…. Rafael put water in my goggles…"

Jay Jay: “Oh!  Ya, he is very naughty."

Then the two kids went on talking about Rafael.

Kay Kay: “He spit into the pool today."

Daddy: “Ya, I saw it too.  I wanted to call security guard to come and catch him."

Blah blah blah.

It is a good thing to see the two brother talking to each other.

Putting them in a room, staying together from young is indeed a good choice.

FYI.  Both kids never sleep in the parent's room.  We think it is a good way to raise the kid this way.

And we start seeing the result of this.

J & K, the two loving brothers that never see them quarrel.  

 

Saturday, August 30, 2014

Lego Mindstorm Flipping Gymnast

Date:  Aug 30, 2014

Jay Jay has enrolled into the Young Robotics Engineers class @ WondersWork at Liang Court.

And yes, he is now using Lego Mindstorm EV3 to program his robots.

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Below is the info of the Robotics class he is attending.

NewImage  

Young Robotics Engineers (Age 8 & above)

This program is suitable for children aged 8 and above. Students will build more advanced robotics projects using Lego Mindstorm NXT2.0, Lego Mindstorm EV3 (age 10 & above, completed at least 8 lessons of Nxt2.0) robot kits. 

WondersWork:  http://www.wonderswork.com.sg/programs.php 

 

Let’s check out what he designed this week.

He needs to build & program a flipping Gymnast.

Teacher Enzo is explaining to him, why his gymnast cannot flip properly, because of the strength of the robot’s leg is too weak.  So, he has to think of a way to properly understand how a gymnast will need to do to flip a few times.

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This is his Flipping Gymnast. 

I also get to see his coding.  HaHaHaHa… Keep on cut and paste so to do the flipping.  So, I can see his code become so long.

Nice try Jay Jay!  hahahaha

Later, I think teacher Enzo corrected him so that he uses a “loop” to repeat the flipping action.

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OK.  Let’s see it!

I like this project!

 

 Now, let’s look at the Slow Motion.  Kind of cool!

Some friends ask me, why I keep sending my son to this course for so long.

Here is my thoughts...

1)  To let Jay have 2 hours during weekend to play with toys he love, i.e. Lego.

2)  Lego is building block.  It is imagination that is needed to build and design the robot.  Although there are a instruction pages to follow, but most of the time, Jay Jay likes to do it differently and have a lot of excuses and reasons.

3)  The programming is done on a Windows laptop.  So, this is the only way to let Jay Jay get in touch more with a Windows operating system.  As my home is completely Apple  Mac friendly.  Yeap!  Have not been using Windows for a long time.  I found that Jay Jay is quite well verse on operating a Windows OS.  And at home, he also know how to operate a iMac computer.

4)  He learned about math, and physics in this class.   All these are necessary to design the robot’s movement.

5)  He can play with his friends too.

6)  He can socialise with more classmates here.

7)  So far I see that 98% of the project are new project.  The design of the course is actually quit good.

8)  It make Jay focus, and think.

 

Happy Anniversary!

Date:  Aug 29, 2014

Time flies.

It feels like it was yesterday, when we had our wedding dinner here at Prima Tower Restaurant.

But when you blink your eyes, you found that 14 years had passed.  ROM was two years before that.


It very nice to have them around us during the anniversary dinner.

We are so happy to see J & K has grown so much.  A bit regret why they are not so much older than today.  But, don't worry, we are still young, so, many many fun days ahead of us with J & K.

That's the life in Singapore.  

The first few years, you spent a lot of time and do a lot of hard work to live better.

We are lucky to remember that we can't live in a two person world forever.  Thanks to the Tsunami trip in Phuket that make us realize that the world can be a better place if you have one or two or more in the two person world.

And that is why two lovely kids has come into our live.


Life is like building Lego.  It is fun, and it takes some time, and we never get tired building it.

Once you have the kids, it is your responsible to make your live better, make their live better.


Time flies.  Time flies.  

Happy Anniversary!




Friday, August 29, 2014

Portable Battery Pack - UNU Ultrapak Tour

Date:  Aug 29, 2014

As a consumer, I got “con” into buying this.

Why?

It is a PORTABLE Battery Pack.

I bought it from Amazon.

Amazon:  http://www.amazon.com/UNU-Ultrapak-10000mAh-External-Charging/dp/B00K8I4D2A

It says “Up to 8x Faster Recharge Rate”.

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It also says that “15 minutes of charge gives you all-day lasting power”.

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It says “features the most advanced charging technology in the world”.

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How did they do it?

Let’s find out now.

Here is the unboxing.

Did you see the charging cable?

Yup!  It is NOT a USB charging cable.

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The input is a DC 12V/2.5A.

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That is the secret!  

They use the 12V/2.5A charger to charger the battery.  That is why it can fill in the power so fast.

So, this is definitely much faster than the USB method.  I am not sure if it is 8x times faster, but it is definitely faster.

They also did not lie about 15minutes gives a full-day of power to the iPhone.

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So, by using the 12V/2.5A charger, it takes only 21 minutes to charge another 31% of the 10,000mAh capacity?

But is this the world’s most advanced charging technology?  Felt like being cheated.  HaHaHa

Of course not!  This is old.  And it is just that EVERY ONE using the USB charger to charge the battery pack.

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OK.  I have a lot of portable batteries.  And 100% of them are given a USB charger.  Those batteries are cheap.  And none of them comes with a DC charger such as this.

For those that is 10,000mAh, usually it takes me hours to charge up to full 100%.  I mean hours, many many hours.  I usually have to let it charge over the night to get 100%.

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Does it charge your iPhone any faster?

Nope.  Because the output is 5V/2.1A + 5V/1A.  So, add up together it’s output is 5V/3.1A of total power.

Since this is standard, so, it will not charge any faster than other portable battery.

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So, the pros and cons of having this…  This is weight 256g.  The dimension is about 2.5 times thicker than iPhone 5S, and it is slightly bigger size of the iPhone 5S dimensions.

Pros

1.  When you need to charge your battery, it takes lesser than 2 hours to charge from 0 to 100%.  That’s fast for a 10,000mAh battery.

2.  It comes with standard 5V/2.1A + 5V/1A.  

 

Cons

1.  When you travel, you certainly don’t want to carry such a big charging adapter.  A USB is much appealing and you can use it with the iPhone charger adapter.   But for 2-3 days, the 10,000mAh is big enough for you to use it without charging it during the trip.

 

I think I will use it.  :)

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Sunday, August 24, 2014

How to Watch EPL on my TV Set Top Box

Date:  Aug 23, 2014

Some friends asked me what is the best App to watch EPL on a big screen TV using the TV set top box, i.e.

1)  Minix NEO X7 - Android

2)  Mibox 3 (小米盒子) - MIUI on Android

3)  10moons (天敏盒子) - YunOS

4)  KOXSNI (嘉视丽盒子) - YunOS

Finally, I slept late tonight, and got a chance to do some research and testing. 

So, and my recommendation is:

     光芒体育 (Guang Mang Ti Yu TV)

My recommendation is to install the Sofa Butler App (沙发管家) and then, from there, you download the 光芒体育 App.  

Screen Shot 2014 08 23 at 11 08 28 pm

Or if you know how to install the App using the USB or SD Card, here are the link to the App.

Android APK:  guangmtiyuTV.xp510.apk

Source:  (http://www.xp510.com/shouji/tvsoft/1776.html)

 

Funny thing is I don’t even watch or follow the soccer match.  Yeap, I don’t watch EPL.  HaHaHaHa...

OK.  What is 光芒体育?

It is an Android APK that comes with these sport channels.

Yes, astro SIPERSPORT 1, 2 & 3.

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So, I tested this App on Aug 23.  And there are 4 matches.

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Astro Supersport Channel #2 is showing Swansea City Vs. Burnley.

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Astro Supersport Channel #1 is showing Southhampton Vs. West Brom.

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And this is Astro Supersport channel #3.  Crystal Palace Vs. West Ham.

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OK.  Let’s take a look at the video clips that I recorded.  Seems very decent.  But sometimes it does give some pixels.  But after running a while, it is very smooth.

So, there are 3 LIVE channels to watch.

There are some reports saying that the App is actually 1-2 minute delay than the actual time.  But I guess that is fine with most of the people.

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So, while blogging this entry, I left it running there and so far, have not heard any freezing.  

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I am using ViewQwest with Freedom VPN and this is my Speed Test while the TV streaming is running.

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Saturday, August 23, 2014

300Mbps or 1Gbps Internet on ViewQwest Fibernet Broadband

Date:  August 23, 2014

*****

Updates:  I found out what went wrong with my Home Network.  The culprit as I suspected is the Sineoji 600Mbps AV2 Homeplug.  Some how it drop the speed between two points from 200Mbps down to this pathetic 15.47Mbps.  Simply resetting it, it regain back to 70Mbps download speed.  I will put the result of troubleshooting at the other blog.   

*****

Today we are going to test to play the TV Streaming when the network download speed is low.

I simply wanted to prove one simple concept.

 

Network Setup

Don’t know why and how?  My network at home has “degraded”.  In my study room, I have a TV connected to my Minix NEO X7 box.  I am using ViewQwest 200Mbps broadband.  But don’t know start from when, it has degraded to below.

Although I am using 200Mbps.  I can get near full speed near my router.  But because I have to bring the Internet into the Network cabling using Homeplug, so, I have to suffer of losing almost 60% of the bandwidth due to power noise from Kitchen to Network cabinet.  And then, from there, it runs thru my CAT6 cable to my study room.

Previously, may be 1-2 years ago, when I did the text, I can get close to about 90Mbps for both upload and download speed.  

Today, I did the speed test again….

 

Speed Test

What?  my download speed is only 15.47Mbps?????  Why?  The upload speed is 76.44Mbps.  I do not know what happen, but for the past few months, I have not experience the slowness in watching streaming TV.  

I watch a lot of TV and Movies streaming from PPTV or Netflix or others.

This is the first time I did a speedtest in a year or so.   I speed test the network to ViewQwest speedtest server.

I will figure out later what happen to my network, where is the bottleneck and how to fix it.  But now, let’s try to view some direct TV streaming from it and run PPTV streaming on it.  See what is the performance like.

Yesterday, I watch 4 episodes of GTO (Japanese TV series) and 2 episodes of Hero (Japanese TV series) on PPTV on my Network.  Without any buffering.

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 This is the speed test done on my iMac.  As you can see, the download speed quite sucks!

 

Direct TV Streaming

Take note, I have been watching TV for the past few months.  Didn’t know the download speed has degraded so much.  May be is the USB fan?  Or may be my Sineoji has degraded.  I will find out later. 

This is my Minix NEO X7 box.  Running Cloud TV with a subscriptions that I can view Direct TV programs such as HBO, National Geographics, Fox, etc and so on.

So, as you can see, when you change the channel, the load up is very fast.  Almost near to >1000KB/s.

So, with download speed of 15.47Mbps, I am able to watch HD tv streaming without any problem.

 

Test With PPTV Running on Slow Download Speed Network

I am testing it on my Minix Neo X7 box.  So, I run the speed test before I test the PPTV App.

And then, I will run the Speed Test again after I run the PPTV app.  So to show that the result of the slow download speed.

And what its he verdict?  No problem for me to run the PPTV.  

And PPTV is like almost instantly running.  And there is no lagging and no buffering in the middle. 

The first speed test result is 16.23Mbps download, 57.52Mbps upload.

Launching any TV show on PPTV take less than 1 second to load.  And fast forwarding the TV is also takes 1 second to reload to that fast forwarded point.

When playing, seldom you see buffering.  

The spinning indicator always shows very high value, such as 1066kB/s.  

That is what I consider as FAST.

Now, let’s do another speed test.

This time, 15.95 download speed, and 54.60 upload speed.

 

Conclusions

1.  I recently log onto hardware zone forum, and I see a lot of people felt very excited and post their speed test of 300Mbps, 500Mbps, and 800Mbps and so on.  But what does that mean?  Does it mean that having a low <16Mbps network will not run the PPTV well?  Apparently, that is not the case.  I have no idea when my network started to give <16Mbps download speed.  It used to have 90Mbps.  But after 1-2 years, my network has been running without any rebooting of any of my routers or homeplug.  I still watching IPTV streaming every day and I did not notice the slowness.  

2.  A typical PPTV streaming needs a constant 2Mbps to stream.  A Netflix needs 6Mbps to stream.  So, having 16Mbps download speed and 100Mbpos or 600Mbps will not have any significant differences.  As long as your ISP do not throttle your network, and your network is stable at 16Mbps, you still can do a very decent TV streaming.

 

OK.  Now, I need to go and trouble shoot what is wrong with my In-house Internet infrastructure.  Why suddenly drop to <16Mbps download speed.

 

Friday, August 22, 2014

A Frozen Birthday Cake!

Date:  Aug 21, 2014

Yesterday was Kay Kay 5th birthday.  Happy Birthday Kay Kay!

 

The Birthday Song Video

Let’s look at the video clips of the birthday song first.  I like this video and do take notes of the follow two lovely moments...

1.  How sweet for Sofie Bella holding Kay Kay to protect him.

2.  See the “scary look” faces from the kids.  So fun!

 

The Cake 

I know, I know.  It’s a “Frozen” birthday cake.

This cake is designed by Kay Kay this year.  

He told mommy that “I want a Frozen cake!"

“May be we can build an ice castle for Olaf."

“There will be snow flakes."

“I want Elsa and Anna."

“I also want Kristoff & Sven." 

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As Cheryl Shuen cannot bake the Disney characters, we only asked her to bake the Ice Castle.  

(Please note:  Cheryl Shuen cannot bake any copyright cake, so, you have to put those on it after the baking)

And then, I go and buy the Frozen characters from Taobao.

http://detail.tmall.com/item.htm?spm=a230r.1.14.14.Wwg8Ea&id=39068722778&ad_id=&am_id=&cm_id=140105335569ed55e27b&pm_id=

 

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These Frozen characters fits just nicely on the side of the cake.

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Kristoff & Sven.

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Here is Anna & Prince Hans.

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Snow queen Elsa.

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And here is Olaf.

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This year, it is a nice orange flavoured chocolate cake.  The icing not so sweet.  That is why we love Cheryl Shuen’s cake.  Very nice, and the kids love it.

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This year, Cheryl Shuen gave us a fireworks candle.

Nobody knows how to light it up. 

So, we end up calling to Cheryl Shuen and ask.

After confirming it is save to light up, and make sure the kids is 1 meter away from the candle.  Then we light it up.

And Zhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh zhhhhhhhhhhh….

It was fabulous!

The kids love it.  Some kids are scare, especially Kay Kay.  HaHaHaHa.

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There is no candles available at the school.  So no choice, we have to use that fireworks candle.

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Yeap!  I think he likes the cake.

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The Party Begins

His K1 buddies.

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Jay Jay has to go school on that day.  But don’t worry, we will have one family photo with another cake this coming Sunday.

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Ah Gong, Ah Ma are here in Singapore too.  So, they get to join the party too.

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Don’t worry Kay Kay!  I will protect you.  Sofie Bella says.

Kay indeed is a bit worry because he is the one sit closest to the cake with the fireworks candle.

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And Woo-hooooo… The candles lighten up, and the fireworks appears.

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Every one was clapping their hands after that...

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Blow the candle Kay!

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Let’s cut the cake.

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Every one gets a piece of cake.

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And they love to play with the yummy icing too.

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It is very good until you lick you fingers ya!

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OK, girls will get a pink Frozen goodie bags.  He also prepare some for his old buddies in neighbour class too.

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So happy to receive a pink color goodie bag.

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And the boys get a blue Frozen goodie bags.

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The boys love the blue Frozen goodie bags.

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Even teacher also got goodie bags.  Wahahaha

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Thank you Kay Kay for the Goodie bags.

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Thank you Thank You!

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Final Thoughts

Having birthday party seems like a trend in school.

When your kids see other kids having birthday party, deep inside their small little heart, they also wish that they can have a birthday party.

There are two types of parties.  One that you do it in school, and the other is you do it outside the school.

For us, we told the kids very clear that, we only do the birthday party in school.  And for the outside school party, it will come only when they are graduating K2 class.  

That is when, we invited the parents and get to know the parents of our kids’ friends. 

When they go into Primary School, it is important to let them keep in touch with their kindergarden friends. 

These are the friends that they have been buddies since 18 months old.  

These are the friends that they have seen each other almost every day.

So, take Jay Jay for example, he still have his yearly party from various parents.  

And he keep very good contact with all his childhood friends.

It is different from the Primary School friends.  

Of course, when you make a memorable birthday cake, takes lots of pictures and videos.

And remember the birthday party with your kids together by watch all these old video clips.

Remind them how small there were last time.

Remind them the love their parents gave them.

 

Let’s take a look at all his birthday cakes.

Year 2010 - 1 Year Old Birthday Cake

From Cheryl Shuen.

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It was a Disney Lightning McQueen Cake.

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Although Kay Kay is only 1 year old, he already know how to blink his eye and give a good smile.  Here is a picture with 奶奶.

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Year 2011 - 2 Years Old Birthday Cake

From Cheryl Shuen again.

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The cake is a Disney Mickey Mouse Clubhouse theme.  All these Disney characters are his favourites.

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Kay Kay just joined Lorna Whiston Pre-School when he was 18 months old.  These are some of his classmate who are still his classmates today.  It was PG class back then.

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Year 2012 - 3 Years Old Birthday Cake

Again, from Cheryl Shuen.

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This year, the cake is designed by his brother Jay Jay.  And the main character is Gordon, as Gordon is the fastest engine in Sodor.  so, they actually put in light houses, and train tracks and make it like Island of Sodor. 

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Back then, Kay Kay was in N1.

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Year 2013 - 4 Years Old Birthday Cake

From Cheryl Shuen again.

This year, is a year where he visited lots of aquarium and felt in love with the stingrays.  That is why he asked for a stingray cake.

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He was in N2 class, and again, he celebrated his birthday at the school canteen.

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Every year, he always enjoy his cake.  

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Cheryl Shuen

So, got to thanks Cheryl Shuen for baking such delicious cake.

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Here is the info of Cheryl Shuen.

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