Fun Climbing @ Funtopia Courtyard

It's a short holiday week, big guy and I decided to take a day off and bring the duo for some fun time in town, since we only have a day to spare. I have been scouting around for some activities around town.. Kidzania, done that; jungle gym, many times; park & outdoor picnics, done N times; KLCC petroscience, done that; Farm in the city, checked; National science center, yep; Planetarium, that too; spaceship galatica? Yes yes; Aquaria, zoo, KL bird park, butterfly park, done done done done... so where else??

Finally, I stumbled accross a relatively new kids gym in town - Funtopia Courtyard @ SS15, Subang Jaya.

It's an indoor gym that offers lots of activities to burn the energy - climbing, hanging bridge, rope walk, giant slide... However, if your little one has fear of height, you may want to let him / her observe and warm up first before signing up.

The first sight is enough to wow them.

They began with the safety briefing and putting on the safety gears.

Next, the hanging bridge. It's about 3 storey high and can be intimidating for young kids, but both C and E did it with a smile. The last visit to Club Med had prepared them well.

Team work - they had to pull themselves from one end to the other using the "skate board".

The giant slide... For real adrenaline rush. E went first.

Followed by C with a whoosh..

You could repeat this as many rounds as you wish.. The kiddos simply love this!

There's non stop climbing...

More climb...

More climb...

Yup, and more!

Yet another climb!

When the 1 hour period is over, they headed over to this children play area which has no additional charge. Another 30 minutes here and they came out all smiling from cheek to cheek and all covered in sweat. If you have younger toddler who's too young for all the gym activities, this would be just perfect.

We ended the visit with a sumptuous meal at the Notty Nuri restaurant which is located one floor below Funtopia. Yum yum... Their BBQ ribs is no doubt the best in town!

The Location:

Jalan SS 15/4G, SS 15, 

47500 Subang Jaya, Selangor

Operating hour: 10am-10pm

http://funtopiaworld.com/courtyard/

The Fees:

Weekdays: RM24/hour for all activities

Weekends & PH: RM34/hour for all activities 

Annual pass: RM350/year 

Note: 

• minimum height 110cm and minimum weight 20kg (forgotten the maximum weight limit)

• You may opt for single activity too at lower fee, but I honestly don't find its worth it.

• checkout their website for any price change or special promotion.

That's all folks, zooming out for more fun time with my kiddos. Happy holiday!

Cheers,

PH

{Christmas Special} Pop Up Christmas Tree Card

The kiddos are spending home with me this holiday season so I though of doing a series of Christmas crafts with them. Good for bonding and to have some decoration for the home & family too. 

After the Christmas Wreath I made last weekend, I found it is not quite suitable for little ones with the use of hot glue gun (I burnt my fingers few times), I decided to start with activities that are kids-friendly and something that would be fun... So when I told them we are making Pop-Up Christmas Tree card, they got super excited. I have not met a kids who do not like pop-up so far. I insisted they had to call me Teacher PH instead of mommy, they loved the idea! Lol.

We had a good 45 minutes making these cards. From left to right - by Ethan, by teacher PH, by Claire. 

The duo drew, cut, glued and decorated the card all by themselves. I just gave suggestions and jumped in for damage control, e.g. When Claire accidentally squeezed too much glue or could not cut a round Christmas ball. So these cards may not be perfect, but are truly their own artwork. I am emphasize on the kiddo's learning progress than to cheat a perfect outcome.

Ethan and I completed this wrapping paper strips Christmas trip for the card cover. He found the paper stencil punchers so we made some flower & little people punch holes, how cute!

The pop-up Christmas tree with 2D gift box. Noticed the little soldier I added? *smile*

The pop -up Christmas tree as done by Ethan. He dedicated it to Yuky 姐姐, one of my buddies whom we are meeting up for lunch later.

It was a total mess on our dinning table, but we managed to clean up within 10'minutes. The kiddos had been trained to clean up and we have a pretty good team work by now. :)

What you need to make some Christmas cards with your little ones..

• Some colorful papers

• child-friendly scissors 

• artwork glue

• used wrapping papers / ribbons / buttons / washi tapes 

• pencils & market pens

• paper stencil punchers (optional but adds fun to the making)

• cutters (optional, NOT SAFE FOR KIDS)

• old newspapers to protect the work surface

• some creative juice ;-) 

Here's the simple tutorial on how to make the pop-up tree..

Cheers!

Xoxo,

PH

Copyrights © Pui Hua and Fun With Little Ones, 2012 - present. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of any materials/photos within this website without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Pui Hua and Fun With Little Ones with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Volcano Day!

The duo is fascinated over volcano, influenced by the junior encyclopedic that I've been reading with them. Since I'm now having much free time as I had began my career break, I decided to surprise them with a man made volcano... It's so easy & so much fun to make with the kiddos!

What you need:

• an empty bottle (or a kid's cup)

• a large tray (to hold the "larva")

• aluminum foil

• red food coloring 

• Soda powder / soda bicarbonate 

• vinegar - used the cheapest on shelf will do

Psss.... In case you noticed some differences in the pictures below, that's because our first experiment failed. I used baking soda instead of soda powder! Failed experiment gave a learning point too. ;)

First, we setup the volcano with the aluminum foil.

Next, added the soda powder.

Then, some red coloring.

Now, vinegar... And watch it explodes!

Little C started screaming..

"Volcano!", she yelled.

"Run for your life!!", screamed a villager.

Now, go try it with your little scientist wanna be. It's a simple experiment that cost less than RM5 but the little ones will super love you for it! 

Copyrights © Pui Hua and Fun With Little Ones, 2012 - present. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of any materials/photos within this website without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Pui Hua and Fun With Little Ones with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

{Book Review} Cloudette, the small cumulus with big heart!

Does your kiddo often feel tiny, and that you wish you could encourage them more? This is one cute book that fits a preschooler whom you think need a little encouragement, or just to share laughter over a good read.

Cloudette, by Tom Lichtenheld

Cloudette is a small cloud, much smaller than the average clouds and he often wish he could do something big and important like the rest, such as watering the crop, making waterfall falls, helping at the fire station etc.... But he often got turn down (despite politely) that he's just too small for such big task.

Until... He came across a small pond that has dried up and he thought he could help the tiny froggie... And he DID!

This is how he pushed himself...

He's well liked by every cloud and they gave him really cute nicknames..

This is by far my little girl's favorite book, she just kept on telling the daddy about this book and describing how cute Cloudette is (and not knowing the fact that she too is darn cute! Lol)

What I Like about this Book? 

Little ones often feel little, because of their size and height. Adults may appear like giant next to them and fully able to do things that just seem impossible for them. But seriously, being small doesn't mean they can't help up, they too want to feel big & important. Assign them small task that makes them feel useful, such as setup the dining table, fold a hanky, throw the rubbish etc... and you can read them this cute little book too..

You can find more about Cloudette here on Tom Lichtenheld's homepage www.tomlichtenheld.com

Or read the reviews & buy it here, I got ours through Scholarstic which is only a fraction of the online price shown here..

amazon.com

goodreads.com

Guess what? I even found an audio book on the YouTube, check it out to decide if you like it!

http://youtu.be/cmTi-oleKd4

Now, go go go and get your copy of Clouddete today...

Copyrights © Pui Hua and Fun With Little Ones, 2012 - present. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of any materials/photos within this website without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Pui Hua and Fun With Little Ones with appropriate and specific direction to the original content

{Art & Craft} Clay Fairy Houses

It's our weekend art attack time, or as the duo called it,  Dirty Hands Time, as all of us ended with really dirty fingers & palms covered in paint. Lol, but the duo really loved it.

Here's our artwork of the day.. Instead of the original plan to make a castle, we decided to make some colorful fairy houses. 

Before painting, the naked clay houses, I dried them up in the oven at 120°c for about 30 minutes.

Freshly painted with acrylic paint. Aren't they looking adorable? 

My favorite -- the Tree House, got my inspiration from the hundred acres wood. Little C thought that it looks spooky although she still likes it.

The mushroom house, both kiddos' favorite!

The colorful fairy house, added brick effect on the roof and doors, quite happy with the outcome. I was having beautiful Santorini houses in mind when moulding these. 

Little C was so curios with these tiny houses, taking picture of the houses uninterrupted was quite impossible with her around...

We made some apples & carrot with the left over clay.. Just for fun and these made perfect project for little C, easy to handle with plain colors.

It was an enjoyable & peaceful afternoon, together we completed the painting in 1.5 hours, right before we got ready for the evening fun - the Swiss Dream Circus!

If you would like to do some clay art projects with your kiddos, this post summarized how we started and the tools/materials needed -- Clay Art Project with Little Ones

Keep calm & get creative! 

Copyrights © Pui Hua and Fun With Little Ones, 2012 - present. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of any materials/photos within this website without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Pui Hua and Fun With Little Ones with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Clay Art Project with the Kids, Part 2

Finally, we are done with the clay art project.... (You may refer to part one on how we made the clay pieces here) Well, only some of them are done, but I can't wait to share as the remaining will have to wait till next weekend.

We applied multiple layers of acrylic colors directly onto the clay arts, diluted with a little bit of water. Started with plain color as the base, then slowly apply the different shade of green / red / brown. I let them apply the base coat while I elaborate with more details. What I learnt in my art class when I was 11 came really handy, not bad huh.

A little tree.

The little pea pod, I made this on my little boy's request and its actually my favorite among all.

Strawberries with different shaping technique. I like the first one better where I made the berry and leaf separately.

The acrylic paint we used for this project (this is a beginner set), got them from Popular book store but you can always get them from art supplies shop such as Art Friends, Spotlight or any major stationary shops. 

Acrylic dries up pretty quickly so you may want to squirt only a small amount each time so you don't have to waste them.

I worked on my cake runner, I find that this way allow me to manage easier without getting my fingers too messy (I put a layer of paper over the cake runner so it's easier to cleanup).

That's it, our easy peasy weekend art & craft lesson at home, and the kids are begging me to do this again next week. :)

Keep calm, and craft on

Copyrights © Pui Hua and Fun With Little Ones, 2012 - present. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of any materials/photos within this website without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Pui Hua and Fun With Little Ones with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.