Outing on 22 August

As hubby couldn't apply leave to celebrate Kieran's actual birthday, together with Yani, we took both boys for lunch at The Central by taking MRT to Clarke Quay.

Knowing that Kieran loves Japanese food and having read a good review in Urban, I decided to scout for Ramen Santouka for its succulent pork cheek at $8 a serving. We were there during the office lunch hours and had to wait for about 15 minutes to be seated. We ordered 2 set meals and pork cheek. Boy, they were so good that we ordered another serving of pork cheek.

Then we took the MRT to Vivocity (the kids and my fav haunt). As usual, we went to the pet shop to see some cute puppies and hamsters. Kieran was pestering me to get him a pair of hamsters but I relented, I told him that he is too young to mind them. We saw a gleaming red Ferrari race car on display and the boys were very excited.

Then we went to Marks & Spencer for some cookies and Gloria Jeans for a cuppa (hot chocolate for my boys) before heading home early to beat the after-office hours office crowd.

It was a fun day with the kids.

I am looking forward to our day out (this time with hubby) on 1 September.

Kieran's celebration part 2

Celebrated at my mom's place on Saturday with his favourite tiramisu cake from Bakerzin. He was a happy boy because he received presents that he has also wanted ...

1. Lego Ferrari truck & car (8153)
2. Lego 3-in-1 Racers
3. Read & Write LeapPad
4. LeapPad Books
5. 3-in-1 Binoculars
6. Red packets
7. Spiderman swimsuit from his Sar-Gu, Sar-Kim & Jamus gor-gor

It was also a special day for Kieran as we managed to catch glimpses of fireworks near my mom's place. Every year, we get to celebrate his birthday accompanied by some fireworks!

Nowadays, Kieran is very much into Lego and I am happy for that. We would pester me to open the box and guide him fix the items. I must say he is pretty good at it now. Whenever there is a promotion for Lego, I would buy him an item or two. But whatever he is playing with, Raeyen will want to get his hands onto it. Yesterday, Raeyen lost Kieran's Lego police car (Kieran was very upset) and we were searching for it high and low. This morning, Yani managed to help us find it, phew!

Kieran is 6!

We celebrated in his Kindy this morning with his classmates.

The vanilla Transformer Bumble Bee was baked by Aunty Dora and the kids (even the teachers) were amazed with the creation. It was a quick and easy celebration with song, cake cutting and the ceremonial goodie bags for all the children.

P1 registration frenzy

We have no affiliation to any schools or clans or churches, we did no volunteer work, we have no "connections", as such we can only register Kieran under Phase 2C (whatever this means).

Maybe we did not do enough... Nevertheless, it's an emotionally tiring exercise as all parents only want the best for their kids within their means. I don't know if our current registration system is the right one but it's %&$#*&!

So now we are unsuccessful at Phase 2C balloting for kids who stay within 1km from school, what is our next "best" alternative? We have to register him at any school that still has vacancies.

I hate to say this... but I DON'T LIKE THE SYSTEM! Period.

To add to my dismay, I wasn't even in town during registration and had to rely on hubby to update me of yesterday's disappointing result. Perhaps GOD has better plans for Kieran. At least I'll be home on National Day morning.

I'm now 17 hours away from the opening of the 29th Olympic Games in Beijing.

My Germany trip

Sunday 27 July

Before my taxi arrived to send me to the airport for my trip to Germany at 9pm, I accompanied hubby to buy his Samsung Omnia from the M1 Shop, which took forever to process his purchase and blah blah... in the end, I had to zoom home to finish packing my luggage at 8pm!

My Lufthansa flight to Frankfurt departed before midnight. It was my first on LH flight and yeah, it's service pales in comparison with SQ.

Headsets, welcome drinks, papers/magazines were not offered (who cares even if it's business class). When I asked for English reads, only TIME or Forbes were available, EVERYTHING else is in German. So, sprechen Sie Deutsch? Nein! So I chose to sleep with ear plugs after washing up.

Monday 28 July

The 45-minute connecting flight from Frankfurt to Nuremberg was worse than Tiger Airways. The seats were small and narrow, service is near non-existent.

Our taxi arrived to pick us to our 13-century old Colmberg castle in Rothenberg, which is another 1 hour ride. The castle is old, nice... because it was a castle, I had to climb the stairs to my tiny room on the 3rd floor. There were old stuff around, animals, treasure chests, even some baby cots with life-like dolls in them, if you asked me, they were freaking me out. Yes, there were also 2 sets of armoured soldiers!!!






We had a medieval dinner in the castle one night and it was very interesting as in the olden days, they only used knife to eat, which we used just that... imagine having only knife for soup?



After a few days' meeting, we went to Rothenburg for a tour. It was a nice place with old architecture (13-15th centuries) and streets.












Friday 1 August

I bought some gummy bears and chocolates from Rothenburg during the tour and on 1 August, we had to take the ICE train (2.5 hours journey) from Nuremburg to Frankfurt as our domestic flight (45 minutes journey) was cancelled due to the strike at Lufthansa. Then onboard my flight from Frankfurt to Singapore, we were told that our meals would be restricted due to the strike, look how "yummy" my breakfast was. The only thing I could finish was the corn bar, the rest (except water) was revolting.


Saturday 2 August

Reached Singapore past 4pm. The moment I got home, I was greeted with warm hugs by my 2 angels. They were curious of what's inside my luggage and were happy they found gummy bears and chocolates.

More photos can be found here.

Nice little touches II

Kieran was eating apple yesterday, Raeyen came and wanted a bite. Kieran said to him, "OK, let gor-gor bite off the skin for you first." because Raeyen doesn't like to eat apple with skin. After skimming off the skin, he let Raeyen bite off one big chunk.

Whenever I was about to get out from the car, Kieran would run out to open my door.... hmm, wonder if that's a gentleman in the making?