Pardon me for the long hiatus...comp was down for a period plus super busy with house shifting. From the time we had to vacate the house to the time our new place was ready, it was a good two months gap. During these two months, we put up at my parents' place and although it's a bit far for our usual activities, we are still thankful that there's no need to search for temporary lodgings and paid big rental for it.

Before I share more about my new place, I thought it's good to jot down the little interesting flashback during these times. My parents stay at Yew Tee while our activities centred around Clementi area. Hence, at times, we rather completed all activities before going back home as it can be quite a hassle with the 20-30mins drive. It dawned on me that we have already enjoyed so much convenience with the previous good location and it reminded me so much of "The city mouse and the country mouse".

Morning times
The whole ching gang will leave my parents' place by 645am. Seth, usually in his dreams, would be carried to the car to continue his beauty sleep during the journey to Gor Gor and Jie Jie's school. By the time we reach the kids' school, it will be around 710-715am. We would then proceed to have our breakfast. During that two months, it was a "challenge" thinking which coffee shop/ hawker to go. When we finally nicely settled down, Seth would then blur-ingly wake up knowing it's breakfast time.

In the past, our standard no-frill breakfast would be coffee and bread. For Seth, he would order from the "kitchen",  his fried egg or half boil egg or Cheese or Peanut Butter bread. During these two months, Seth has upped his morning appetite!  Like the usual Ah Pek in coffee shop, he will order the same items without fail - 2 eggs, 1 char siew bao and 1 glass of hot Milo.



IHe can even tell you which coffee shop in Clementi serves the best char siew bao! During these two months, we rotated between few coffee shops / hawkers in Clementi.  And, my breakie during these two months were very flavourful with Dim Sum, Bee Hoon, carrot cake...

Regulars @ Clementi Library
The kids' school and enrichment are centred around Clementi area. Hence, there were times when we rather spent time at Clementi Library waiting for one kid to finish his/ her class before the troupe goes back to Yew Tee. Monday was by far the most tiring day for us. Seth has enrichment at West Coast at 7pm while Shan ended her dance CCA at 6pm. While waiting for Seth to finish his lesson, Shan will cool herself at the Library doing her HW in her messy and sweaty school outfit. At times, I felt so sorry for her as by the time we reached back my parents' place, it would be well after 9pm. She would have to quickly shower and dry her hair before settled for the night. Thankfully, these episodes did not affect her studies and her CA results.

While Shan is having her ballet class on Sat/ Sun, Sky would also be in the library doing HW and reading as well.

Our bed
Thankfully, bedroom at my parent's place was huge enough to contain 5 of us! With two mattresses on the floor and a queen sized bed plus a couple of luggage, that was "home" for us that two months!

All glory to god, we are now happily settling well in the new place for a month already and house has now transformed to our home already. For the first few days in the new place, Seth was very upset and had withdrawal symptoms for his egg and char siew bao! People are really very adaptable creature. He's now back to Peanut Butter bread or egg for breakie!

side note
While hubby was doing unpacking during the initial days of shifting, he texted me, "Why on earth do you need 20 pairs of different length and patterns of shorts when you can live off one luggage for the past two months?!" LOL. Forgive him, he doesn't know the difference between shorts, berms, cullocks...

My Valentino turned 4 this year! With just 2 years shy from primary school education, he's just growing up too fast! Nevertheless, he's still rather babish in every aspects cos after all he's the baby of the house! He's now more talkative though I'm still hesitant if I should do anything to correct his enunciation. 


Had the usual celebration at his CC.

Looking at different blog posts on baking and cooking always inspired me. Really admire those talented mummies who make time to cook and bake for the family. Some even spent time doing exquisite bento for their kids to bring to school. Sadly, my kids would not be one of those who can boast how well their mum cook. They could not crave and ask to have mum's signature dishes since I happily leave the kitchen to my helper. Thank God for my mum who will dominate the kitchen at times to guest cook for us.

However, to leave impression to the kids that I too, can also walk out from the kitchen,  I will do baking with them occasionally (usually only during school holidays) :D And they enjoyed every sessions cos they are the ones practically doing the preparation. Since holiday started, kids had been bugging for some baking and we decided to do it last Sunday evening.

Gor Gor showing the ropes of sieving flour to bro

Thinking that he got more power with the gloves

Decided that the glove gets in the way when mixing the dough

Gor Gor doing the washing for me. Look how serious he is!

Jie Jie buttering the tray and putting the dough

Ta-dah, Nestum Cookies and Nestum Chocolate Chip Cookies

Just nice, Shan had to go back to school for dance practices these two days and she packed the cookies along as snack during break.

Have been searching for a Chinese enrichment for Seth for a while but him being #3, there are many considerations i.e. logistic clash with his bro and sis. I would have happily settled Seth to Berries if not for the fact that there is no vacancy.

By chance, I found that Julia Gabriel has consolidated their Chinese Division and opened ChengZhu Mandarin Centre at Rochester Mall. Both Shan and Sky had attended edudrama class at Julia Gabriel during their pre-schoolers days and even to-date, they still fondly remember their enjoyable time there. I had considered enrolling Seth to Julia Gabriel but there's no perfect timing for us to commit. Not to mention that Shan and Sky still lack of confident to converse in Mandarin, I thought I better give Seth a headstart in Chinese rather than any other type of enrichment.

Seth and Bec were out on a date again. They were a pair of arty farty couple and almost all their dates ended up in a play. Their latest rendezvous was at Fushionpolis Genesis Theatre watching their favorite Eric Carle's puppet play "The Very Hungry Caterpillar", "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See" and "Papa, Can You Get The Moon For Me?"

Coincidentally, Seth's CC was doing "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" book at that time and they were engaging the children in different activities revolving the theme. Seth now knows that the life cycle of caterpillar and insect has 3 body parts namely, head, thorax and abdomen. Hmmm, this was only covered in Science for Shan early this year. Pre-School are getting quite advanced these days.  Ok, I digressed.


Anyway, which kid doesn't love or heard of Eric Carle's stories right? So, Seth was pretty excited when he knew that he was going to see the star caterpillar in person insect.

The puppet play was fascinating. It used vibrant music and black light and the kids (including me) were mesmerised as they saw their all-time favourite stories come alive in front of them.

It was pretty cool that the performers arranged for a Q&A session after the play and children could asked various questions about the play like "How did they move the caterpillar" and "What materials were the bear made of".

The young couple has been going to a number of play together recently. Today, they attended another performance by Playtime! @ Esplanade - Hello Elly. Through ABC song, Elly (the Elephant) went on a trip with the Tree through the forest. 

Both Seth and Bec Bec enjoyed the entertaining and interactive musical performance.

After they had made a big mess of painted the doll house, it's time to play pinata!