Piano lessons for the little boy

The little boy, who is now four and a half years old, seems very keen and interested in musical instruments and I finally got my act together and found him not one but two piano teachers!

Both teacher conducts one-on-one lessons with the little boy.  One comes to the home and is more casual while the other is at a music school, Forte Musicademy and is very strict about techniques, e.g posture, hands and fingers positioning and even the angle of the elbow from keyboard.  During the lesson at the school, due to the fact that they focused so strongly on techniques, class seemed boring for the little one as it is repetitive but it's only 30 minutes so it is still bearable.  There are instances though when he seemed a little tired and spaced out but this is due to the fact that he just finished a whole day of school (leaving home at 7.15am and coming back at 4pm!) 

The lesson at home is a little more casual. The teacher more motherly or rather, grandmotherly! The teacher who comes to our home is my niece's teacher. At the present moment, he seemed ok with both and we will see how he progresses. 

In addition, one is on an electronic piano at home and the other on a baby grand in the school so he gets a feel of different types of piano and I do like the variety.

Here a shot of today's lesson time with his teacher correcting his hand's shape on the keys.  

Maybe one day, he will compose music pieces for his sister to dance to. :)

Dance Appreciation Series @ The Esplanade

Today, I took my aspiring prima ballerina to the Esplanade for the Dance Appreciation Series where the Singapore Dance Theatre (SDT) had a one hour session about The Nutcracker, the show they will be performing this coming December.

Last year we went for the same dance appreciation series on Sleeping Beauty and the girl thoroughly enjoyed herself. These short sessions allowed even the littlest ones to sit through a ballet performance without too much protest. It also gives them and possibly us adults, a better understanding of some of the pantomime gesture, some background to the story and some other details about the performance, e.g the music, the costumes.  At today's session, we saw kids as young as 18-24 months in attendance. 

The fun part for kids is that at the end of the hour preview of The Nutcracker, the audience was allowed to have photos taken with some of the dancers. This was one of the highlights for the girl. 

By coincidence, she wore matching colours with the dancers, white and purple (as per the sugar plum fairy character).

At the end of it, we went to the box office at the Esplanade and bought tickets for the full length dance on 6 December!  There are still very good seats left and if your child (age above 7 years old) is interested in ballet, I totally recommend going for it. There's a 1pm show on the weekends too if 8pm is too late.  Check it out here.

SDT does other dance education series catered to kids too. For more information, check out their website. :)

Four hours on a private yacht

As the husband's birthday is fast approaching, I thought about doing something different and when I found a deal for a yacht rental which included food and BBQ, I made a booking for it immediately.  The husband used to spend a month or so during summer sailing with my inlaws from the age of 4 to 20! And I thought it would be something he would enjoy!  And the kids obviously would too. And sure enough, we were all glad I made the booking!

Yesterday was horribly hot and I was saying that I hoped today would not be that bad.  And guess what, when we woke up at 6am, it was pouring! The husband then told me he prayed for the rain to stop by noon. Lo and behold, the weather was perfect when we started to sail out of the marina.  It was still drizzling as we drove into the carpark at Sentosa Cove Village but stopped immediately after.  The skies were cloudy, with not too much sun.  It was just perfect!  We thanked God for His mighty and gracious blessings upon us and this outing! 

The kids were thrilled! The yacht was a comfortable size for our party of seven. Our family of four plus our helper, a friend and her son. Our friend's husband, unfortunately, could not take time off work. 

And off we went on the boat to Lazarus island. :)

The four of us!

The husband having fun!

The boys !

Husband and his princess.

Us again! 

The boy and I having fun.

The beautiful beach at Lazarus island. The water was clear, the beach was lovely, almost pristine at certain points but there was a problem. The beach stunk!  There was a rotting seaweed smell that was disgusting!  The saving grace was that we do not smell it as strongly when we are closer to the water.   Well, in the end we managed to spend some lovely time close to the water and even inside the water. The girl and our helper swam a little and had a splashing good time!

Kids having fun playing with sand.

After all that time spent by the beach, we went back to the jetty area where we had a lovely meal with food already barbecued for us.  We had a nice relaxing time eating, interrupted on and off by a few island cats hoping that we would feed them! 

And then it was time to head home!

Look at who our our captain is this time! 

Loic the captain getting us back!

We all had a fabulous time.  The company we used was White Sails and the boat was StarGrazer.  Mr. Mutalip, our captain was very friendly and kind.  Our skipper was Roger and they both made the trip extremely enjoyable. We took an extension to cruise the skylines and it was well worth the money too. The view was awesome.  

Finally it was time to say bye to Stargrazer and the crew! Thanks for the good time! 

Hope to be on board the Stargrazer again! :)