I'm a full-time mummy

I came across this article which I must definitely share with you guys.

Personally, I don't really feel comfortable with our kiddos using the ring float and either hubby or myself will always be around to hold onto our younger kiddos when we're in the pool. The older ones who can float by themselves (wearing arm floats and they have been taught to hold their breath in the water and keep themselves afloat) will be under our watchful eyes as well.

As for outdoor activities (as per this article), I think there should be more staff or resources to monitor and watch out the children. If you observe in the video, the teacher was preoccupied with another child as the boy drowns. This could've been easily avoided if there are more eyes to watch after the children.

You can watch the video here or by clicking on the image below which will lead you to the source article.

 For your convenience, I have copied the excerpts from the article here:

A three-year-old child in north-west China nearly drowned after he flipped over his rubber ring and was left struggling underwater for at least two minutes. Neither of the two instructors at the children's pool noticed the boy immersed in the water upside down despite standing right next to him. The child was finally removed from the pool after one of the teachers noticed his motionless body. He remains under intensive care in hospital.

The boy was taking part in a swimming lesson at a kindergarten in Zhangjiakou city, Hebei province when the accident happened. Surveillance footage of the horrifying incident shows the boy wearing an inflatable ring playing in the pool among nine other classmates. He then accidentally flips backwards, plunging his head underwater. The boy was seen desperately to stay afloat, wriggling his legs in the air and trying to flip his ring back.

His teacher, who was also in the pool, was seen attending to another student and did not notice the drowning child. It did not occur to the other children who were beside him that something was wrong with their friend. After struggling in vain for about 40 seconds, the child eventually ran out of breath and passed out. He was seen floating motionless at one end of the pool.

Nearly half a minute had passed before the boy was finally discovered by his shocked teachers. When he was lifted out of the water, the little boy was not breathing and his faced had turned purple, according to Hebei Youth Daily. He was immediately taken to hospital where doctors fortunately saved him.

The incident sparked outrage among net users - many of whom are parents themselves. 'The kindergarten should be held responsible for this incident. The child could have died,' one user commented. 'The accident could have caused permanent brain damage to the boy! The teachers' actions are just unacceptable,' another said.

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During our recent family holiday in May 2018, I have decided to ditch the lollipops and iPad which we usually brought along to pacify our kiddos during our 1-2 hours airplane ride. This time, I took the risk of introducing a new activity for our children which is - coloring!

Few days before our trip, I Googled around for free coloring pages worksheets for our children (robot and soldier related for our 9-year-old boy and princess related for our 6.5 and 4.5-years-old girls). I packed 2 cases of color pencils.

Picture below taken as the plane starts taking off and they were so engrossed with their coloring pages. None of the usual fuss of ear blocked, ear pressures etcetc. Win-win!

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Do you know that every Malaysians now, regardless how old or how young need to have their own passport? I remembered I had my first passport when I was around pre-teen age and it was tagged onto my late mum's passport. Meaning, if you opened up her passport, you will see her picture and mine in the passport. But gone are those days... now, like I mentioned earlier, everybody needs to have their own passport.

Just in case you are not familiar with the procedures, I'll just copy paste some quick notes and tips for your reference here:

Applying For A Malaysian Passport For Your Baby

• What to bring along: Your child's Original Birth Certificate (and 1 photocopy), Mother/ Father’s Original IC (and 1 photocopy), RM100 (Validity 5 years)

• Tips: There are certain Immigration centres that has special lanes (for pregnant women, old folks, special needs or handicapped individuals as well as women with infants) I personally opt for the Immigration Department of Malaysia @ Sri Hartamas.

Process to apply for your child's new passport:

•  Get ready all the documents, go straight to the Immigration Department and look for the 1 special counter to get your queue number.
  

• The immigration officer will ask you for your documents and he/she will help you slot and arrange your documents and forms accordingly before passing you a queue number ticket.
  

• If possible, get ready your child's height measurement (there are some height chart around the department where you can use to check your child's height)
  

• Once your number is called, you will pass your documents to the officer in-charge (he/she will also ask for your queue number ticket)
  

• Then get ready your child for passport photo taking right at the counter you are in. If your child is not able to sit up, you will need to prop them up so that their picture can be taken. Make sure facial features are easily seen.
  

• Once done, wait for a while for your number to be called again for you to pay for the passport. You will get back your original IC and child's original birth cert after payment is made.
  

• From that point onwards, you will wait approximately 1 hour to get your child's passport. The officer at Kaunter Serahan might ask for your original IC and child's birth cert for reference again.
  

Now, wait wait wait... I'm NOT done yet! Yes, congrats for your child's new passport!

But wait a minute, do you know that you need to update their passport photo around 2 years?? (or earlier or later depending on their facial features changes)? Do you know or not!!!!????!!!

We found out about this when we brought our 4th kiddo to make his new passport and was told about this passport photo replacement for 2 years down the road. Yikes! We totally were not prepared at all for this, so back at home I checked back our older 3 kiddos' passports and sure enough, our girls face changed already! No more the cute chubby cheeks! And soooooo, we had to go to the Immigration Department again few days later (busy busy busy!!!)

Replacement of Malaysian Passport Photo For Your Baby

• What to bring along: Your child's Original Birth Certificate (and 1 photocopy), Mother/ Father’s Original IC (and 1 photocopy), your child's passport.
  

• Tips: There are certain Immigration centres that has special lanes (for pregnant women, old folks, special needs or handicapped individuals as well as women with infants) I personally opt for the Immigration Department of Malaysia @ Sri Hartamas.

Process to replace your child's passport photo:

• Once you have arrived at the Immigration Department, go look for the Passport Photo kiosk. Your child needs to take his/her passport photo at this kiosk. We paid RM17 each for 4 copies of our girls' passport photos. (meaning for each girl we paid RM17)
  

• Get ready all the documents, go straight to the Immigration Department and look for the 1 special counter to get your queue number.
  

• The immigration officer will ask you for your documents and 2 copies of passport photos and he/she will help you slot and arrange your documents and forms accordingly before passing you a queue number ticket and a form to fill up.
  

• If possible, get ready your child's height measurement (there are some height chart around the department where you can use to check your child's height)
  

• Once your number is called, you will pass your documents to the officer in-charge (he/she will also ask for your queue number ticket)
  

• The immigration officer will help fill up some fields in the form and your child will need to have their right thumb print on the form. Father/mother (the person filling up the form) will also need to have their right thumb print stamped next to their signature.
  

• Wait for a while as the officer pass your documents and form for approval and then you will get back your original IC and child's original birth cert after that. There is NO payment required for this at all.
  

• From that point onwards, you will wait approximately half hour to get your child's passport. The officer at Kaunter Serahan might ask for your original IC and child's birth cert for reference again.

This is how your child's passport looks like after completing the photo replacement process. Your child's passport remains the same (as long as still not expired of course), passport number remains unchanged, just that one of the pages in the passport will have a printed page with a copy of your child's latest passport photo glued, stamped and sealed marked on it to show that there is a recent photograph of the passport bearer which is effective from so and so date.

I hope the above info can help you understand the process better and be more well prepared. Honestly, it is hard for me to find any info on this passport photo replacement for children. Which is why I decided to blog this down so that I can remember what to do next time with our 4th kiddo hahahah...

For other info, you may check out http://www.kln.gov.my/web/ita_rome/passport_renewal

** Note: I have disabled the commenting feature on my blog engine thanks to all the spammers who happily spam my blog every day. If you wish to ask me any questions, you can find me at my Facebook page (I'm there almost every day) or just drop me an email if you wish to maintain some anonymity.