Just My Rambling

As a mom to a preschooler, I am always on a lookout for fun educational toys. So I was very glad when I was given the opportunity to review the Toddler Tote by Lauri. The Toddler Tote comes with 3 animal-shaped puzzles, 4 mini and 1 large geometric-shaped puzzles, 2 mini pegboards and 7 Tall-Stacker pegs. The puzzles are all made from crepe rubber and washable. It also comes with its own 9” carrying case complete with a handle, thus making it easier for my little girl to carry with her all over the house. It is also great for travelling.

My little girl loves the bright and bold colors of all the pieces. She likes the puzzles but her favorite are the Tall-Stacker pegs.

If you are looking for a gift for toddlers this Christmas, this is a great gift. It helps to develop their fine motor skills while teaching them about colors and shapes. The best part is that if any of the pieces are missing which happens very often with toddlers, Lauri will replace them!! The Toddler Tote is currently available at MNC toys.

When we first received Nana Star a couple of weeks ago, Lil’ C was so excited to see her and since then, they have been inseparable. Nana Star is like her little shadow now. She has been all over the house, the town and even on our recent vacation!!

Nana Star came to us along with a book and a CD. This book is about a little girl who found a lost baby star. The baby star wanted her Nana and so the little girl took on the responsibility of taking care of the baby star. That’s how she became Nana Star. Together, they embarked on a magical journey to bring baby star home. The CD has an audio version of the book and also a song. I can’t even begin to count how many times we have played and replayed the CD over and over again. Lil’ C just loves it.

One interesting fact about the Nana Star series is that all the Nana Star stories have a mistake in them. This was done on purpose because Nana Star believes that we all make mistakes in life and we can create something beautiful even with those mistakes.

The magic of Nana Star is brought to us by 4 generations of a family. Elizabeth Owens, the grandmother, is the creator of Nana Star. Her daughter, Linda Saker is the illustrator while her granddaughters, Elizabeth Sills and Elena Patrice are the writers and publishers of the book. Elizabeth Owens created Nana Star, Moonman and other friends out of love for her grandson who lived far away. She hoped that her grandson would have a sense of love and belonging wherever he went.

If you are looking for a great children’s gift, Nana Star is one that you need to check out. I am sure that your child will love her as much as mine does.

My little girl loves books. In fact, I always have one of her books along with me wherever I go especially when we eat out. That way I will get to eat in peace while she keeps herself busy with her book. Needless to say, both of us were very happy when we received 2 new books from Cedar Valley Publishing. The 2 books we received were “Let’s Get Ready For Kindergarten” and Let’s Get Ready for 1st Grade”

When I first flip through the books, I really love the fact that the books are very colorful. Kids love colors, so that is a major plus for the books. I also love the fact that you can write on the pages with a dry erase marker and then erase it easily with a tissue. That means Lil’ C can redo the activities in the books as many times as she likes.

Lil’ C is 3 ½ years old. So the “Let’s Get Ready for Kindergarten” book is more appropriate for her. The topics in this book emphasize on early childhood skills such as alphabets and letters, colors, numbers 0-20, money, name, address and much more. Lil’ C is familiar with some of the contents but not all. We have been learning about money at home, so the topic on recognizing the different coins came in very handy for us.

The “Let’s Get Ready for First Grade” book is a little advanced for Lil’ C but she has already started to show interest in some of the content like the punctuation and compound words. She even liked the section on solar system especially since we just came back from a visit to the Flight Museum where she learned a lot about space. The topics in this book emphasize on the pre-first grade skills.

Both of these books have received numerous awards including winners of the 2008 Best You Can Be Award for Books in Education. So if you are interested in good books, go check out these books today. You can see sample pages on their website. If you purchase books from Cedar Valley Publishing, 10% of profits will be donated to charitable organizations.

Look what I found!! Freeze-dried rambutan!! I came across this while doing my grocery shopping at Trader Joe’s a few days ago. I’ve seen freeze-dried mango and I know there’s freeze dried durian but this is the 1st time I’ve seen rambutan. Unfortunately I didn’t buy it so I don’t know how it taste. Anyone else tried it? Is it like the real thing?

A few years ago, we got a real tree for Christmas and we loved it. The fresh scent of the tree is so nice. Last 2 years, we didn’t get a tree because we were out of the country. This Christmas, we’ll be staying put, so we decided to get a live tree again this year. Instead of buying the tree from those temporary tree stalls, we thought we should at least experience cutting our own tree once. After all they do have lots of Christmas tree farms here so off to the tree farm we went.

At the Christmas tree farm, we were given a saw and then we were off on our own to choose our tree.  There were different varieties of trees.

The difference between the varieties are the needles. This is the Douglas Fir, I think. The needles are thin and pretty soft.

This is the Fraser Fir. The needles are shorter and stubbier. We ended up choosing Fraser Fir because it doesn’t bend easily since the needles are firmer. So when we hang the ornaments, the branches doesn’t droop so much from the weight of the ornament. 

After a long search, we finally found our tree!! The right height, right width, looks symmetrical, full bodied etc…. Saw…saw…saw….DH doing all the hard work.

TIMBER!!!!!

Tree’s all netted up and secured on the top of our car. Time to go…….

I’ve heard a lot about corn maze but never hay maze. We were at an October Festival last week and that’s where we found this hay maze.

It’s just like the corn maze except much shorter. I guess it’s more for the younger kids. Anyway, the kids had so much fun wandering around the maze and getting lost. Lil’ C was enjoying herself so much that we had a hard time getting her to leave. Why didn’t I ever had this much fun when I was young?? :P 

For the past 6 years, we were living in Florida. Weatherwise, FL is more like Malaysia - all tropical! No fall leaves or snow. I really missed all that but now we get to enjoy it once again. Even though we have mostly pine trees here which means they don’t change color, we still get to see some changing of colors. I’m not fussy, just a little will keep me happy! hehe…

Summer’s never complete without a trip to a local farmer’s market. I guess the farmer’s market is closest thing to a wet market in Malaysia except there’s no meat for sale. Local farmers & vendors setup stalls in a common area & start selling their wares. I love going to the farmer’s market ‘cos there’s always interesting things to see especially the arts & crafts. Usually those are all homemade & unique & cannot be found in a regular store.

Here’s one near my house. Each vendor has their own tent. Look at the onions!

Flowers anyone?

I love these carrots with the head still attached.  They look so pretty!

Lots of varieties of tomatoes. . .
 

You can get plants & herbs too. Those bunches hanging from the tent are dried lavender. They smell so good.

Not forgetting the fruits. Donut peaches & plout, anyone?

I was at the farmers market (will blog about this later) when I saw these cars!! Aren’t they cute???? Don’t they look like toy cars? 

This one is my favorite! It is only a one-seater & it’s an electric vehicle. It only has 3 wheels!! I think it can drive up to 40 miles before you have to charge it again.

This one is a pick-up truck.

These cars are suppose to be environmental friendly. I would love to have one of these but right now maybe because it’s new, the price is still kinda high. : (  Oh, this is not a sponsored post. : )