Pre-schooler Activities Book

Here are some of the pre-schooler activities books. I have done all these during my pre-school day, be it at home or at the kindy. Tried to find the older version like the one I used to have, but it’s hard to find it these days. All that I found in the bookshop is not as nice as those I have during my pre-school days.

Anyway…here’s it:

Maze

 

Dot To Dot (connect the numbers to reveal the pictures) – Good way to teach young kids the sequence of numbers.

Cut/Tear & Paste Art Book - tearing and cutting is good to refine the kids fine motor skills. (sad to say I haven’t found any as nice as the old days)

Magic Colouring (or whatever you call it) - use a coin to run through the empty space to reveal the pictures. Again can’t find those nice ones as in the old days

 

Magic Painting -  all one needs is a paint brush and water. Just run the brush with a little water over the pictures and it will be filled with colours.

Mystic pencils – use pencil or colour pencils to colour over the empty page in order to reveal the picture. Again, I still haven’t found the good one.

Paper Doll

Kitchen Helper

A chef-to-be in training…. 

  

JS’s FreeStyle Drawing

More of JS’s freestyle drawing

 (it looks like a mountain and sea picture to me)

 So abstract until I don’t know what it is…

Pencil sharpening craft…..

Glued the pencil sharpening at the fish’s tail. Don’t know if my glue is not sticky enough, the sharpening tends to drop off easily, so after JS stick all the sharpening, I use cellophone tape to secure it.

Lui Char Fan 擂茶饭

Lui Char Fan (Thunder Tea Rice)/Sian Char Fan (Salted Tea Rice) is a Hakka dish. Though I’m not a Hakka, I love this dish.

I’ve tried it in Sri Hartamas (one of the Ho Po 河婆 restaurant) many years ago. Didn’t know how to appreciate it. Until last year, I have been introduced to this meal again by my neighbour. A Hakka from Kulai (apparently Kulai is famous for it Lui Char Fan, came out in the newspaper before). The Hakkas usually have this dish at the 7th day of Chinese New Year (人日) and usually will have 7 side accompadiments to go with.

I’ve been craving for it, so I’m going to take my own action to learn how to make it. (Neighbour wanted to teach me, but don’t know when she’s cooking it and give me the lesson). Found this recipe in Kuali.com and also it was in The Woman’s Weekly, modified it a bit to taste more traditional.

It’s basically a vegetarian meal but I have added fried ikan billis and dried shrimps for more taste. The hard work for this meal is the chopping of various veges but it’s good to have once in a while, as it’s good at cleansing the body.

The Ho Po Hakkas have a very traditional dish that goes by the strange name, Thunder Tea Rice (Lui Char Fan in Hakka). The rather unlikely name came about, I suspect, when the dish was interpreted – no doubt by someone with a great sense of humour.

Lui is a Hakka word for the grinding of ingredients, but it also means “thunder”. So herein is room for a “comedy of error.”

As the name implies, it is a rice dish made from various ground ingredients, one of which is tea. Thunder tea (or soup, if you like) is poured on a mould of plain rice and served with a host of side-accompaniments.

Traditionally, the womenfolk use a wooden pestle made from the guava tree to grind her ingredients until powdery in a humongous bowl. The inside of the bowl has a coarse surface to facilitate the grinding.

“Hot water is poured into the bowl to steep the ground ingredients of groundnuts, sesame seeds, peppercorns, Chinese tea leaves, mint leaves, sweet potato leaves and koo let sim leaves. The stock is then brought to a boil,”

It is difficult to buy the grinding bowl except in Malacca and Kulai in Johor. And you would have to shape the wooden pestle yourself from a guava tree trunk – strip off the bark, wash the stick and dry it well before using.

Being rather an elaborate affair, the dish is only served occasionally when friends or relatives come from afar to visit…..(source frm Kuali.com)

Stuffed Sotong

Another “lazy man” dish. Simple to do.

Ingredient

• Sotong (squid)
• Minced pork
• Salt and pepper
• Hua Tiao cooking wine

Method

• Season minced pork with salt and pepper
• Stuff the minced pork into the squid
• Pour sumptious amount of Hua Tiao over squid
• Steam for 10 minutes