tell me about it

Goodness. This is a real blow to me knowing I have colleagues in other schools with such atrocious English. Haaaack.

Taken from the New Paper.

You will be penalised for making grammatical errors in your English exam paper, but what if your English teacher makes such errors in setting the paper?

That’s what happened at a neighbourhood school in the west, where errors were found in a Secondary 3 Express English examination paper.

Students were given the following instructions when asked to write a speech:

“The speech is intended to serve as an encourage and inspiration for your fellow schoolmates. Write a speech to clearly sharing your success story and what advice would you offer to your school mates.”

The school’s principal has acknowledged that the English teacher made a mistake.

I lifted this post verbatim from Daniel Heaf’s website; I absolutely love ‘Where the Wild Things are’. It was a library book staple when I was growing up and I’m definitely buying a copy for my own bookshelf when little ones come. And this guy, Daniel? Props. This is a true work of art!

Where the Wild Things are in stone, originally uploaded by Daniel Heaf.

We've been in our new place for about 9 months now. Most of the boxes are unpacked, we've done endless amounts of DIY and we thought it about time we treated ourselves to a moving in present. 

We wanted something for the wall, something that says something about the people that live there. Something that represents our brand new little family.

We have tonnes of photos on the wall already and portraits seems a little too stuffy and old fashioned so in the end we decided on a stone relief carved by our wonderfully talented friend Simon Ings. Together we chose a scene from Where The Wild Things are but had India included. From left to right above it's supposed to be India, me, Aldous and Amanda hanging from the the trees. We're all having a rumpus!

Where the Wild Things Are was my favorite book as a child. It was the first book I gave to India and Aldous has a fresh copy waiting for him on the shelf in his room.  I dreamt of making mischief and sailing off to be crowned king of the wild forest. Now I get to get to take my whole family with me.

 

As you can see Simon has the most amazing talent and we worked so hard to bring each tiny leaf to life. But he's not limited to Wild Things.his contemporary work is beautiful and often exhibited at London's Oblong Gallery.

I am utterly bewildered by the huuuuuuuuge selection of wedding photos I am suddenly deluged with!

I am freezing! FREEZING. What a change from before :/ It’s down to 1 degree here and we had hailstones yesterday. Hailbloodystones! Tiny ones, but nonetheless ridiculously exciting if not for the fact that I’m shivering all the time and I don’t dare t go pee because your bare butt hitting an icy toilet seat is really not conducive to one’s wellbeing. Though a bursting bladder probably isn’t either :/

And there’s a terribly bad smell like a baby puked up two weeks’ worth of food in the room, and we can’t find the source of the baby puke. So we’ve endured the last few days with a stinky room. I’ve been spraying perfume all over. It’s really bad. Luckily the toilet here is quite nice. Actually all I require from the toilet is to be clean and to have really hot water and they’ve fulfilled both requirements, phew. The toilets in Yunnan were really terrible – this is fine.

Nanjing Massacre Museum tomorrow – I think that’s going to be very interesting.

I be hot and sweaty and gross in school :( Man these classrooms are sweltering. I don’t know how my students stand the heat, in their uniforms all day long. No wonder they’re always begging me to let them take off their ties. Lucky for me I’ve been acquiescing – now I know how they suffer! It’s broiling in here and I’m in a lined dress.

Oooooh I hear thunder. Please rain please!

Anyway I’m in school for meet-the-parents session. Ha – I’ve been the student, cowering in fear of what my teacher might tell my parents; now I’m the teacher, delivering the good and bad news to parents. One day hopefully I’ll be the parent being grumpy at having to attend these things.

So if the student hates it, and the teacher hates it, and the parent hates it…why do we have these things?

It’s going to be a late night. It’s only supposed to end past 7pm. Sniffle.

A reminder of mortality today. We’d gone for a free health screening a couple of weeks ago – civil servant entitlement apparently. Nothing more than a quick blood pressure test and drawing of a three small vials of blood for some basic tests. Blood sugar levels etc. I opted for an extra test for cervical cancer. So anyhoo my colleague got a call today from the medical people and apparently out of a normal 5 for cancer markers, her stomach area registered a 5.6. And she’s really young, really sporty, and has two sons. She’s going in for a checkup to see – they said it could possibly just be an infection. But it’s so scary. I really hope she’ll be okay.

Off to Nanjing tomorrow. I haven’t packed nor have I changed money. Gyarrrrrh.

Off to Nanjing in a couple of weeks for a school trip. It’ll be moderately cool (right now temps are at 24deg C, but they are likely to drop 5-10 degrees in the next two weeks – brrr) and it’s something I really need – to get away from the heat of Singapore. Is it just me or is it bloody sweltering here while the rest of the world (bar Australia, I suppose) is happily throwing snowballs at each other? Bah. I actually miss the freeziness of Europe’s winter. At least I could sip lovely hot spiced ciders all day long. Here I’m just sitting under the fan in an air-conditioned room stark naked sipping iced Fuji Apple.

Of course, it’s the perfect timing for our van’s A/C to break down, so it did.

Would the sister mail some New York snow here please?

Okay I am Glee! mad and have watched 5 episodes in one night with their songs on repeat ad nauseam when I’m not watching them. My husband (glee!), who provided me with the episodes in the first place, is sort of kinda really regretting it. Hurhur. Especially when I wake him up for dinner by putting “Don’t Stop Believing” on repeat and singing loudly to it.

Me (lustily singing): “FOR A SMILE THEY CAN SHARE THE NIGHT IT GOES ON AND ON AND ON…”

Irate Hubba (rolling around in bed madly smothering his face in the pillow): “IT IS GOING ON AND ON WHY IS THE SAME SONG GOING ON AND ON AND ON?!!??”

Me: SOME WILL WINNN SOME WILL LOSE! SOME CAN ONLY SING THE BLUUUUUUUES!”

Irate Hubba: *weep*

Me: DOOOON’T STOP!

Miserable Hubba: Please stop.

Don’t Stop Believing (originally by Journey; covered by Sam Tsui)

One of my favorite songs of all time in (almost) a cappella – and a guy with an amazing (albeit girly) voice. This arrangement is from my new favorite show Glee (even though I have not watched a single episode yet, haha blush).

Michael Jackson Medley (arr. and performed by Sam Tsui)

Sighhhh happy music face on.

I’m currently doing up a post about my wedding vendors – who I used, how much they cost, an evaluation of their services – but I’m trying to do a full review for that complete with pictures and it’s taking some time, so here’s a wedding post to hold you till that comes out.

I love love love Etsy because I’ve always adored handmade, unique crafts and appreciated people who make beautiful things with their hands (that’s one big reason why I fell for the hubba). Here’s a list of local (Singaporean) vendors on Etsy that handmake things that can add that precious, special touch to your wedding day.

All photos in the post are taken from Etsy and belong to the vendors who create the items pictured in each photo.

1. Wedding cards

Fairylovingcreation creates beautiful wedding cards and assorted paper crafts. You can customize with her or you can pick one of her stock designs. Prices are a tad high – the peony wedding invite pictured above is US$3 per card, and the fan wedding programs are US$4.50 each. But you pay a high price for individual handworked items and I think it’s worth it. Just pray that your guests don’t throw them away!

2. Ring bowls

Lovegrowsbygiving introduces a novel way to display wedding rings, rather than using the traditional pillow. The bowl can be used after the wedding to store keys or jewelry and is really rather lovely with its scrollwork and unglazed finish. Prices start from US$14; the one pictured above is US$24. You can also customize the item to have your names or initials or a specific meaningful quote on the bowl.

3. Ring pillows

To be quite honest I detest the lacey, frothy, pale and fake-flowered concoctions that the jewelry places give with their wedding rings. They’re mass-made, machine-made, and look cheap. For my wedding I made my ring pillow from scratch! But you might not have the time or inclination and thus Karenyee’s amazing handsewn pillows are just the thing for you. Using materials like corded lace and silk ribbon, her pillows come in a myriad of deep jewel-tones. They are unique and look so perfectly put together, they’re sure to add a regal and polished touch to your walk down the aisle.

4. Hair flowers

I got my own set of wedding fleurs from Fleurettejo – one for me, two small ones for my bridesmaid, and two on a hairband for my flowergirl. I absolutely loved the holistic, seamless look that brought our three different outfits together. Jo does beautiful work and also does customizations. Go for the white or ivory ones if you’re traditional, but if you’re a daring bride, let her brightly colorful blooms beautify your hair on your wedding day! She can even do you a matching pair of earrings.

5. Envelope labels, rubber stamps, cards, etc

Zoopri produces all manner of things – customized envelope labels to stick on your wedding invitation envelopes, for example, or if you’re feeling more environmentally friendly you could do a rubber stamp with return address and wedding website instead, which has a lovely charm all to itself. And I’ve always loved Save-The-Dates – though we sent ours out online to save on postage and addressing envelopes. Zoopri has an amazingly comprehensive range of designs, paper goods and services, and you’re sure to find something that will suit you and your wedding theme.

6. Floral arrangements

Strangely enough Zoopri also offers artificial flower arrangements. They’re actually really really pretty and very elegant – and with artificial flowers, you won’t have to worry about delicate transport, or timing to ensure the flowers are in full bloom and won’t wilt halfway through your ceremony. And you get to keep them! These are rather pricey though – the first one above is the cheapest one going for US$65.

Today’s Etsy selections. Lovely color :)