The Tanglin Tree

Yes, I'm alive, and no, my fingers did not rot and fall off. My excuse dear friends, for totally falling out of the  blogosphere, starts with "work" and ends with "crap". Whoops, I just meant "work".

Sigh. It's been pretty crazy since April. I've hardly had time to go to the toilet, let alone blog! Mornings are spent leaping out of bed (late, no less), sterilising pump parts and bottles, deciding on an outfit, getting dressed, changing mind about outfit, getting dressed (again), feeding DS, packing bags (mine and DN's), getting DN dressed, sending him to school and then myself to school before class starts. Nights are spent harvesting my pumpkins on Farmville in Facebook preparing for the next day's class. 

I hope things will be better in this new school term. :) It probably will - I've moved the Facebook app on my iPhone to the last page and have sworn off Facebook. It's the damn farming that's been a pure waste of time! Wish me luck... and will power.

So many things have happened since my last post about the kiddos - DN outgrowing his milk allergy (woot!), DS sprouting teeth, DN's trip to the theatre where he spent 40 minutes sitting ON THE FLOOR and DS's transformation from baby to toilet brush. Yes, toilet brush. But more about that later this week. (Haven't downloaded the photos yet, haha!)

Today, I want to blog about the fun time we had meeting up with Sophie when she came back from New Zealand for a holiday. Sophie and DN have been hanging out since they were 8 months old and have gone to the zoo, the botanic gardens and even the theatre together. A whole bunch of us decided to meet up for breakfast at The Tanglin Tree one Sunday morning. DN had a swell time that day, playing with Jovann, Clarence and Sophie.

The Tanglin Tree has a pretty nice tree house out front and after about half an hour, we had to admit defeat and release the children into the sun... where they stayed for the next whole hour.

Jovann, Sophie and Clarence were thrilled with the water pit. There were also water and sand toys for the kids to play with. DN steered clear because he didn't want to get wet. He can be quite mak nenek (a grandmother) sometimes!

So while everyone else was splashing around, he entertained himself with the slides.

When we finally managed to drag the kiddos in, they headed for the books. Please don't ask me why I have such a stupid look on my face.

Sophie and DN, May 2010

DN and Sophie, March 2007

Can you say "par-teh"?

The September 2006 "babies" had their annual Christmas party (this is their 3rd) a few days before Christmas and it was a BLAST! In every sense of the word. From the word "go", the tots were literally blasting all over the place at supersonic speed. Seriously. It was like someone shot them out of cannons. Who fed them sugar??!

There was much planning that went into the party - location, food, decorations, goodie bags and entertainment. We were worried the kids would get bored with nothing to do in the function room, so there were games and a storytelling-cum-drama session. Well, we needn't have bothered because all they needed was a long table to run around. And around. And around. And around.

And around!

But we did the storytelling-cum-drama session anyway, and the kids LOVED it! I would post the video here, but I don't think I want to crush PF's macho image. (He was Goldilocks, wahahaha!).

On the menu : Roasted chicken, Angel hair pasta in tomato sauce, Shepherd's pie, Salad (for good bowel movements!)

 

Sweet treats include : Mini doughnuts, Gingerbread men, Log cake (not in pic), Fruits (again, for good bowel movements)

The goodie bags! Inside was a candy can pen, a snowman cup, a colouring booklet and sweets.

No Christmas is complete without a tree and presents right? Well, that's what I told PF after suggesting we bring our tree to the function room. He gave me a "my wife is bonkers" look. So I gave him my "I gave birth to two of your children... without epidural" look (and tirade!). 

The tree went in the car.

Aunty Krist surprised everyone by secretly getting one of those face painters for the party. Arianne's getting a butterfly here.

And Jovann is getting a spiderman one here. I thought DN would be keen on getting a "tattoo" too, but he refused. Does this mean I don't have to worry about him and tattoos in 16 years' time?

Too fast too furious! Couldn't get a proper pic of Reubern on the bike!

 

But Mr Camwhore obliged, every time!

DN : I detect hints of mature oak and, erm, fennel(!). This red has a racy streak and yet, subtle nutty undertones. Easy on the palate. Hmmm... a 1972?

Arianne : Aiyoh, just bottoms up!!

DN : You mean, like this?

DN, Jovann, Reubern, Clarice, Arianne, Rochelle

Not in pic : Sophie (We miss you!)

The party was great fun. A bit crazy because of all the headless-chicken-running-around the kids were doing, but great fun nonetheless. And you know what they say about having too much fun and nightmares right? DN woke up crying in the middle of the night that night and I caught him saying, "Snowman! Snowman! I don't want the snowman!"

ps : Raffle Wednesday coming up soon! ;) Stay tuned...

A Hotel (un)Adventure

PF had a voucher for a free night's stay in a hotel so we packed the family up and headed off for an adventure. Humph, except for the 45 minutes we spent in the pool, there wasn't much adventure in our little getaway. There's nothing to do in a hotel! And we weren't in town, so there was no chance of getting out to do a little shopping. It was a bit of a let down.

As we were getting ready to check out, DN pottered about the room, looking for things to do. He was very contented sitting in the drawers.



After checking out, we went to Centrepoint, had breakfast at Long John Silver's and shopped at Robinsons. DN likes Bob The Builder, but there are hardly any BTB toys. (PHEW!)







Later that afternoon, we met Sophie, Arianne and Jovann at Fidgets. It was quite different from the first time we brought DN there.

It was a madhouse! There were little bodies running, jumping and hurtling everywhere. CRAZY! After 5 minutes in the war zone 'big kids' playground, we admitted defeat and retreated to the 'little kids' playground.

If you want to go to Fidgets, go at 5pm. It empties at 5pm and it's almost immediate. One minute you can hear fighting, screaming and crying, and then, suddenly, silence. Bliss!

Brenda's theory is that the expat housewives have to go home to prepare dinner. Yay! And that's when the Singaporeans have the whole 'big kids' playground to themselves, and proceed to playplayplay until 6.15pm and make the Fidgets staff wait for them to close up. Oops, did I just say that?

All zoo-ed out! (Part 2)

On Day 2, we went to the zoo with Sam, WP + Jovann and Ling + Sophie (and her pink parasol). The first thing we did was feed the kangaroos at the Australian Outback enclosure. Highly recommended! $5 is a small price to pay to feed the kangaroos, pet the kangaroos and hold hands with the kangaroos! (Yes, you read right. See pic below.) Oh, I absolutely loved it. The kangaroo that we fed was called Lola and she had the softest fur. It reminded me of a kangaroo fur pouch my mom had yonks ago. Oops. Yes, Lola felt like a bag. -_-

We also saw a wallaby. Wallabies are smaller than kangaroos, have shorter ears and (very) dangly... erm... spherical private bits. Oops.

Next, we headed towards the pony rides ($4 per child). Unfortunately, none of the kiddos wanted to sit on Buddy the pony. The keeper was really really nice. He allowed us to pet Buddy and get up close, hoping that the kids would lose their inhibitions, but no dice. I bet Buddy was relieved, haha. Thank goodness I didn't say, "Can I have a go then?" because not long after, I overheard him telling someone else, "The pony ride is only for kids. No adults." PHEW! If I'd sat on Buddy, I'd probably have to pay for his chiropractor bills. For life.

We had lunch after and after that, we decided to check out the elephant rides ($4 per child, $8 per adult). Jovann was so excited because he loves elephants. I wasn't so keen because I was forced to sit on an elephant when I was little and I hated it. In those days, you literally sat ON the elephant. And Babar's not exactly a Mexican Hairless Dog. I swear I had chafing.

But as luck would have it, DN asked to sit on the elephant. (What was wrong with Buddy???) So up we went. And it wasn't bad at all! Ling said DN looked quite shell-shocked the entire time though, haha.
Our last stop was the orang utan free-range enclosure (what an oxymoron) and then we headed back. All three went home to nap. (kids, not the parents)
It was a good day. :)

DN started the day with a hearty breakfast - scrambled eggs on a bed of seaweed, rock melons (he asked for an extra helping), half a bowl of oats, a cup of soya milk and 2 chewy multi-vits.


Sophie and DN were not in the least bit afraid of the kangaroo. It must have been her friendly face. :)





DN and Lola, sharing a "moment".









They were really holding hands, er, paws, er hands!










We caught Lola doing "something" while eating. Hmm. Sophie has agreed to potty train her.








That's Gambir the elephant. She's 19 years old and also not potty-trained. Sophie's going to share some potty tips with her too.





Picture Of The Day --> Lola going, "Hello la! I'm a kangaroo! I'm allowed to pee and poop all over the place!"

All zoo-ed out! (Part 1)

Because I won't get to see DN for about a month o_o, I'm trying to spend as much time as I can with him now before I leave. We went to the zoo twice this week, two days IN A ROW, and I've found my "zoo limit". No way can I do three days in a row because I will look like this.

We went to the zoo with Rina + Rae Ann and Ling + Sophie on Wednesday and my advice to all is this - go on a weekday. We've gone on a weekend and it's bloody awful. Unless you're into masochism and go to Comex AND ENJOY IT, go on a weekday. Please!

The kiddos at the entrance - fresh, dry and fragrant! (but not for long)

We had a wonderful time at the zoo because it was empty. :) We got there in time to catch the Splash Safari Show (featuring penguins, manatees, pelicans and sea lions). After that, we said hello to the elephants and then headed straight to the water playground.

I love manatees. Gentle sea cows who eat sea grass. :)

Funnily, DN is terribly wary of water playgrounds and all its bells and whistles. Here is someone who doesn't think twice about jumping into a deep swimming pool, but won't go near a shower fountain. Every time I tried to take off his t-shirt, he said, "no no no no no". So we sat on the bench for awhile. I was ready to sit there with him and wait for the two girls, but after awhile, he took the swim diaper from me and tried to put in on over his shorts, LOL. I guess he was ready!

DN was the driest of the three. I was pleased as punch when he finally bent down to splash some water. For the longest time, he was walking along the edge of the pool, throwing leaves into it. (?)

Picture Of The Day -->

Ling was theme coordinated! The zoo should give her a pass for her effort.

Duracell Bunny on Speed

DN attended Jovann's birthday party on Sunday. We also attended J's first birthday party last year, and I must say, the Teos really know how to throw a party. It was a "Thomas The Tank Engine Party" so there were Thomas mylar balloons, a Thomas tablecloth, a Thomas phwoarh-phwoarh cake, Thomas goodie bags for all the kids and even Thomas The Tank Engine was playing on the TV while we were there!

WP, I want to be your child!

During the party, DN was playing with all the toys and feasting on fried noodles, cookies, hard-boiled egg dipped in mee siam gravy, chocolate fudge cake and ribena. We also had fun with a "special" Thomas Story Telling session (details akan datang... next post!) and a Happy Helium session. Remember DN's birthday wishes last year? Well, there were 40 helium balloons on the ceiling this time, just waiting to be ingested. It was inevitable. Come to mama!

After laughing ourselves silly (the kiddos weren't very amused though), we decided to do the cultural thing and went downstairs to Ti Deng Long because it was Mid-Autumn Day. WP included a child-safe little lantern (with a little red LED light instead of a candle) in all the goodie bags so everyone was properly equipped. This also meant we could turn off the electric dinosaur lantern with the spinning belly (don't ask) that was belting out "Ai-yee-ai-yee-ai! I'm a little butterfly!" at supersonic speed, and (sadly) sound frequency. Die dinosaur, DIEEEEE!

So that was our Sunday. Until 10pm. -_-

DN was so stimulated that night, he didn't sleep until midnight! He was like a Duracell bunny on speed and 20 cups of coffee. His usual bedtime is 830-9pm, so 12am is insane for him. When we turned the lights off and put him in bed, he got out and started walking around the room and talking to himself. I even tried to be a good role model and lay down on the bed and went, "SNORRRE!" (for real actually, I fell asleep) but to no avail. DN was unstoppable. Until now, I have no idea what time he eventually fell asleep. But I do know what time he woke up. 6am! I know because the first thing he said when he woke up was, "CAKE! CAKE! CAKE! CAKE! CAKE!" For 5 minutes. -_-

Talk about overstimulation! There IS such a thing as "too much fun".

The 3 tots on a lantern jaunt. Can you see the "ai-yee-ai-yee-ai" dinosaur lantern in the background?



The CAKE!

The Big News

Come 21 September, DN updates will be on hold for about a month. I've been hanging on to this piece of news for a long time and I think the time is right to tell everyone that The Ongs will be relocating to the UK for half a year. Yup yup! I will be going back to school (argh, need to get the brain out of storage) and will be at the mercy of professors and assignments, instead of the other way around. -_-

The reason why DN updates will be on hold is because of my sillly husband certain circumstances that involve my husband and the late submission of a dissertation. ("I told you get started in June right!?! See lah!") -_- I'm flying off first (next Sunday) and DN and PF will join me goodness knows when, it's all PF's fault! later. I will miss the little DN terribly. (Note : I didn't mention PF. For a reason.)

I'm sure by now, you must be wondering the following.

• Finished packing?
• Visa done?
• Accomodation sorted?
• Life in order?

1. Finished Packing

Are you kidding me?

2. Visa done?

Hmm... it's 50% done. I applied for it on Monday (and waited 3 hours in the queue... almost strangled myself) and it takes a minimum of 5-7 working days for it to come back. Yes, I am cutting it very fine.

3. Accomodation sorted?

This one, I'm happy to announce - YES! We finally secured a 1-bedroom house at 5pm today. We've been looking for about a month and it's been so tough because the rental market is crazy-hot right now. Flats/houses go just like that. On top of that, many properties don't even want students or children, and we have BOTH. And they all want you to look at the property first, before they'll rent it to you. I'm like, "Yeah thanks. You just made my life much easier." Thank goodness PF's friend was able to drive to Winchester to look at this house for us. There was already a scheduled viewing for Saturday and one at 12pm today. We bull-dozed everyone aside (unapologetically) and squeezed Ian in at 10am. So there. Never mess with a kiasu-kiasi Singaporean.

Awright! I will not be sleeping in a park in Winchester next week.

4. Life in order?

Pretty much so I think. Except for an incident 3 days ago when I broke down and cried into my laptop because every flat/house I called about was taken, I think I'm handling it pretty well. No bald patches (I drop hair when I'm stressed) and I haven't strangled my husband, my polar opposite. Imagine me, with my 8 kan cheong spider legs waving in the air, looking in disbelief at my (cool) cucumber of a husband lying (he says he's not sleeping, just resting with eyes closed) on the living room floor as other more productive people are renting flats left, right and center of us. He never understands why I get so stressed.

This reminds me of that time we missed our 6.45am flight to Chiang Mai because we woke up at 6.35am. My 8 legs were in overdrive and I was crying, googling for Tiger Airways' telephone number and hemorrhaging. My cucumber husband looked at the clock and went back to bed!

I had to keep telling myself, "Yin and Yang. Yin and Yang. Yin and Yang." and "Murder carries a death sentence. Murder carries a death sentence. Murder carries a death sentence."

To bid us farewell, the Sept moms organised a little "Farewell Ongs" BBQ party. All of DN's favourite things and people were there - satay, his buddies, a playground, satay, ribena and did I mention satay? At one point, he was halfway up the rope ladder leading to the slide when he turned and saw PF sitting nearby with 3 satay sticks. Now if you were a precocious little child who loves slides, and there only 1 more kid just ahead of you, but 2 more queueing up behind you to slide down, what would you do?

Well, let's just say DN loves satay more than he loves slides. He stopped, shouted "PAPA!" (only because he couldn't say "satay"), scrambled down the rope ladder and ran towards his beloved Papa satay. He was seldom without a satay stick that night.

At the end of the night, we were presented with farewell gifts! Awww shucks. :) We each got a scarf and (my fav) a scrapbook of homemade pages from all the moms. Really really nice. DN loves looking through the scrapbook and he asks to "read" it everyday. I know he will miss his little friends terribly while we're over there.

Wait for us, we'll be back real soon. Right-O, cheerio!

DN : "Hee hee hee. While they're not looking, I'll scoff down my 390th satay!"

The scrapbook :)

L-R : Sophie, Clarence, DN, Arianne, Jovann, Clarice, Reubern

DN requested for the scrapbook during breakfast

Movie Date

Ling and I have been shamelessly throwing our respective offspring at the other's offspring (i.e. matchmaking) this entire year. Today, we watched I-Theatre's "Rainbow Fish" with Jovann, Arianne, Reubern, Clarence and Cayden and both of us were at it again.

Sophie sat next to DN during the play and I actually caught them "pak tor-ing". (Success!) Halfway through the show, I saw Sophie lean over and try to rest her head on DN's shoulder. Wahahaha! A little while later, I saw DN's little hand reach out and grope for Sophie's hand in the dark. Aiyoh!

DN : "If I put my hand here, maybe she will hold it."

Sophie : "Not on a first date, buster!"

Sophie : "Okay, maybe just this once."

DN : "Sorry, wait, my butt is itchy."








This was DN's first play/show and I had no inkling of how he would behave. Will he sit through the entire thing? Will he be afraid of the dark? Will he throw a fit and scream the house down? I was prepared for the worst and was ready to sit outside the theatre with DN, waiting for the rest, but it went quite well! The only hitch was when this horribe pong wafted over from DN and I brought him to the toilet because I thought he'd pooped. He didn't. It was just a fart. -_- And we missed part of the octopus's song because of that.

We all trooped over to Taman Serasi for lunch after that and even though we all know better, the optimists in us still insisted on taking group photos WITH kids. Getting 7 of us to look at same camera is already a feat in itself. Throw in 7 very squirmy 2-year olds? o_o

This was the best shot from our camera. The trick is to take 100 shots, haha. ;) And honestly, we were sitting there for a LONG time.

Happy Birthday Der Nen!

Yup, DN is 2 and I must say, this 2nd year has been great fun, way better than his 1st year. I know I'm going to sound as heartless as those hamster mothers who eat their young, but DN in the 1st year was really boring! He couldn't walk or talk and was always drooling and pooping. Okay, strike the 'pooping' because he's still capable of pooping 4x a day if he eats a lot.

The worst thing about his 1st year had to be the nights and the breastfeeding. Now I'm going to sound as heartless as Colin-the-baby-whale's mother, but honestly, I never really got the whole breastfeeding thing. Many moms talk about how wonderful breastfeeding is because of "the bond" with the child, but unless they meant the literal, physical "bonding", sorry, no comprehendo senor. It was embarrassing when DN signed milk in public. This was also usually accompanied with him reaching into my top. It looked like I was raising another Hugh Hefner!

So yeah, I'm liking DN's 2nd year so much more.

• He's more or less sleeping through the night now. ROCK ONNNNN!
• He's moved from signing to talking (a little).
• He pretty much understands everything we say and we can even reason with him.

I guess what I like the best about this year is how his personality has emerged. He's quite a funny chap.

• He's a "think big" kid when it comes to toys and playing. He has no patience for puzzles and he finds them utterly boring. He won't sit down to figure out a shape sorter, but give him stools and chairs to stack and he'll be there.
• He quite an amiable and sociable fellow. When we meet up with his buddies, he's usually a koala for about 10 minutes, observing the rest. Once he's warmed up though, off he goes, socialising and playing with the rest. He'll wave at uncles and aunties on the street and is always ready to give his trademark (fake) smile.
• He just LOVES to eat. He will never say no to durians, suckling pig, fries, prata and grapes. He's not that fond of nectarines, tofu, cakes and potatoes though.
• He can be quite anal retentive at times. Sometimes he gets strangely fussy and things must be done a certain way. For eg, only I can take off his diaper and only PF can wash his bum. Sometimes (unfortunately for me) it's the other way around. -_-
• He LOVES sports and guitars. Yeah, it's so funny. We've caught him "playing" tennis and volleyball, sprinting, bowling and even doing gymnastics.

We didn't do anything fancy for his birthday this year. We just had a BBQ party for the little gang because they're all turning 2 this month. It's so nice to see how all of them have changed and grown. They're now so comfortable with each other and they know each other's names. Now I can't wait for them to be 3!

The kiddos LOVED the cupcakes! They were all excited when we opened the box and ALL of them wanted to touch the cupcakes. DN kept going, "cake! cake!" for about 45 minutes.


Here he is, opening his presents the morning after the party...


... and playing with the gifts immediately after breakfast.

DN, Sept 2006

DN, Sept 2007

DN, Sept 2008

Happy Birthday DN! We love your trademark smile! :D

Thanks Aunty Dawn, Gong Gong, Aunty Grace, Aunty Brenda, Aunty Wee Ping, Aunty Megan, Aunty Joanne, Aunty Ling and Aunty Carla for all your presents. :)

Animal Resort

Last Saturday, DN and Caryn visited Animal Resort and had a swell time. After a breakfast of prata (DN lurves prata) and thosai at Jalan Kayu, we swung over to Seletar Farmway 5 to meet Caryn and her parents. We got there at 10am and left at 11.30am. That tiny little farm entertained us suitably for 1.5 hours.

DN and Caryn fed the

• goats
• cranes
• fish
• guinea pigs
• rabbits
• chickens
• geese
• turkey and
• cancer bird
  

Yes, cancer bird. It's a farm, not a zoo, so the cages weren't labelled. And us being the city mice that we are, we had no idea what this animal was.

We stood outside his cage for a good 15 minutes, arguing about that long sac hanging off his chin.

Carla : It's a goiter!
PF : It's a cyst!
Noel : It's Ebenezer Scrooge!
Me (thinking) : It's going to eat our children!

We concluded that he smoked too much in his younger days and is paying for it now with that cancerous cyst. We gave him some bread and christianed him "cancer bird". As we left, Caryn said, "Bye cancer bird!" Oops.

The Animal Resort is free for all. You just need to buy feed for the animals - $2 for 3 packets. My advice is, just buy the bread, carrots and fish food. As tasty as they are, the turkey and chickens weren't exciting to feed at all and the rabbits and guinea pigs were too blind to find the food dropped into their cages.

Here's DN feeding the rabbits, but...

... doing this instead! I bet they didn't know what hit them. LOL.

There were 2 goats there. Until Noel (the observant city mouse) pointed it out, the 3 of us never knew that goats have rectangular pupils! Did YOU know?

Looks like Mr Goat needs a pedicure... big time.




When I got this packet of food, I told Carla, "Cool! Pileons! Wonder what they look like."

I think I remember Carla going something like this, "Prrrrthhhh! Wa-hahahaha!" I think she was glad I didn't say anything about "jurkeys".

This was the only decent picture we got of DN & Caryn. Thank goodness for digital cameras.