The most wonderful time of the year!

I don't fancy rain all that much - many times, I have to carry three foldable brollies in my bag! But the cool weather has been really nice :) Not to mention that it's the time for feasting!

But, 今年的平安夜很不平安... I was opening or closing the oven when I spotted a black thing crawling across the cabinet door right under the oven. It was a teenage roach! It turned the corner facing the fridge and last I saw it, it was at the bottom of the kitchen cabinet. 

We moved the fridge but there was nothing. Sito discovered a gap between kitchen cabinet and concrete base - the size of the gap varied across the length of our kitchen, some 5m. We guessed the roach might have come up from the drain pipe, which is hidden in between. 

So he put putty all over starting from the far side from where the roach disappeared. By the time he got to the oven side, he discovered a huge hole. Not sure if it was meant for oven ventilation but we sealed it anyway. Then I realised that if that was a ventilation hole and the roach went in there, it could probably exit from the front of the oven where there is also a gap??! 

Nightmare... 

I found two little black dots on the drawer ledge under the oven. Later, I learnt that roach poop looks like that :((((( I cleaned up madly....

Thankfully, no sightings so far...

Anyway, after an hour, we got back on track for dinner prep. I had already baked my meatballs right after making pizza for the kids' lunch. Sito started preparing glaze for the ham and baking it. I made roasted vege and meatball spaghetti, all the while watching out for something black and moving... I was so scared it might come out of the oven when it started heating up! But nope...

Glazing the ham

Nth glazing - spot the vege waiting in the wings

The finished product!

Chef also cuts ham for us

Kids had roasted broccoli with meathball spaghetti and ham

The ham was very nicely glazed; our glaze was yummier than the original flavour. With 3kg ham, we had lots of leftover - lunch for all of us the next day, plus maybe three servings for fried rice in the coming weeks! We also had enough leftover vege for lunch the next day. There's still a tub of frozen meatball sauce in the freezer, enough for all of us next week! 

We started and finished later than usual so no chance for log cake until Christmas day. We bought it from Ikea. It was made by Secret Recipe.

Kai didn't eat it; Yang and Yu ended up not liking it

And I destroyed the cake while cutting it!

We realised it was not the usual swiss roll type but with three layers of biscuit, cream and cake staked up into a log shape. But it was very yummy... Sito and I had a lot, and then we finished the rest over two nights :p With no Chateraise or Swee Heng or Proofer downstairs this year, we had only this one log cake! Or should I add "so far"? :p

Must have KFC on Christmas!

And there was a bucket! I loved it so much haha! Unfortunately it was cardboard and oily so I didn't keep it..

After Christmas feasting, we had our year-end buffet to send off 2023 and get ready for the new (school) year. We started this last year at Makan@Jen since the kids enjoy getting their own food and drinks. Yesterday, we went to Atrium at Holiday Inn.

Sito called it the "glass hotel". It would probably be very cheery in the day but it was raining when we got there and turned dark soon after... 

I was so misled by the weather app on my phone that I deleted it just now and added the NEA widget instead! Luckily for the MRT connection, we only had to brave the rain with one umbrella across one traffic light. Sito went to and fro a few times and when it was my turn, a kind lady ferried me across.

The glass was visible above these blinds

Anyway, that was taken when Yu was waiting to start dessert. The kids ate mostly prata as they didn't like the satay which came with sauce on *.* Kai took some chicken rice. We gave them some other meat to try. Then they had enough. Sito and I tried more food and found the local selection better. Sashimi was ok but the sushi rice was a tad hard.

Yang chose fruits after a serving of ice cream - so healthy!

Kai had too many servings of ice cream; Papa was having ice kacang

Kai and Yu had ice kacang too but minus the kacang haha! Yu dropped his first bowl on his way back to the table. I heard a crash and hoped it wasn't my kid but I turned around and saw Yu standing there looking down and helpless. So poor thing! 

I went over quickly and he hugged me, maybe one drop of tear came down... The staff were very nice about it and told him it was fine. He was still scared. Later, I asked him and he said he was scared about stepping on the "glass". I think he also felt scared of being scolded but he didn't say... 

Sito saw and came back with another bowl of ice with syrup for him - it soothed everything and he was all chirpy again :)

The hotel lobby was nicely decorated. We went straight for dinner earlier on and saw it from the glass lift. So we went after dinner.

Probably our last tree this year

A gingerbread house? :)

Yang got his brothers to pretend to warm themselves in front of the "campfire" :)

We got back around 9 pm even though we started dinner just past 5.30 pm! We ate for a long time, Sito and I having a lot of different food while the kids chatted and had dessert :) But no pressure to wash up and sleep so it didn't feel too long..

The kids said it was fun but Yang wished we could reach home earlier :)

Time really flies. It's only two more days to the new year. Yang also thought this P3 year passed very quickly as well, compared to P2! While I'm looking forward to having the kids in school instead of playing games whole day (we kind of stopped giving them work since a couple of weeks back...), I think I'll miss seeing them play so happily every day... Recently, I started on a physical book. I like to sit in the living room to read while they play. So nice :)

I also dread waking up before 6 am but oh well!

Hello again, fire station!

Last Saturday, we went to Alexandra Fire Station. Unlike previously, we had to register for the visit and wait for email confirmation. I had issues with the form some months ago but looks like it's all fixed...

This was our third visit there - we brought Kai in 2014, and both Kai and Yang in 2016, but none of them remembered anything!

So hard to get them up for a picture...

Checking out the heavy hose thing

Papa looks bored, haha!

My little firemen!

One for each :)

Time to hose down a fire broom!

Must use strength

Why so cool, one hand in pocket??

These two had fun playing with water too

Don't remember this sign from last time

Yu really wanted to go on an ambulance. He asked the sergeant who did the tour but was told all ambulances were out and the last one was locked. But before we left, an ambulance came back. He went to ask a paramedic and yeah, he managed to get on an ambulance!

Finally :) 

These two were very interested

May we never ever need an ambulance!

Actually, the kids didn't really listen to the tour explanations, as expected. But luckily there were enough hands-on experiences. Yang and Yu were more interested compared to Kai. Anyway, this is probably the last trip to the fire station for the rest of their childhood!

We had lunch at Ikea. Lucky to get seats coz while we were eating, the food queue extended to outside the restaurant! 

Spent a couple of hours roaming the showrooms and shopping. The kids really enjoyed the showrooms, trying out sofas and beds and fiddling with all the knick knacks they could get their hands on.

Happy to be near this Ikea again. We'll be back for more chicken wings and showroom hopping!

A very busy and full week

We ate so much last week!

Monday, 18 Dec - a la carte buffet at Peach Garden

It looked good and it was good! Sito and I finished up five bowls of chicken / shark fin's soup; Kai and Yang each tried a spoonful of chicken soup. We also had five half-lobsters. Surprisingly, Yang liked the garlic lobster :)

Each kid liked different meats - chicken chop for Kai (and the rest too coz yummy), sweet and sour pork for Yang, and roast pork for Yu. Sito and I had these plus black pepper beef, pork ribs and wasabi prawns. Oh, and a very nice fried soon hock - even Yang said that was yummy!

The staff said the fried rice was for four pax but looking at the size of the serving bowl, we ordered two plus a bowl of fried noodles. Kai had a lot of fried rice and some noodles.

Surprise - Yu can use chopsticks now! Wobbly but ok!

Monkeying around when done with food

Another surprising thing was that Kai liked the lemongrass dessert!

Kai held Yu's hands on the way home 🥰

Tuesday, 19 Dec - hotpot and tea at YX's place

It must be the first time in a long time that we decided on a gathering so quickly. And on a weekday coz YX and Kel were supposed to work from home, um... 

At first I thought we were going to be late. Yu had a baluku for no reason on Sunday night, at the same spot as previous baluku. It subsided to his usual uneven head due to past baluku (😢) on Monday morning, but swelled up at night again. I could only get an appointment at the polyclinic for 11.10 am on Tuesday - so many sick people with fast fingers at 10 pm on Monday night!!!

Sito brought Yu to the doctor so that I could finish up housework at home and bring Kai and Yang to lunch on time. But surprisingly, they were called very quickly and came home in time to shower and rest before we had to set off for lunch!

Doctor said it looked like an infection. Later at night I saw some dried blood. When I asked Yu whether he scratched himself, he said he bumped his head near the baluku during dinner on Monday! No wonder I found two bumps on Tuesday morning! I'm afraid the doctor might have overlooked the baluku due to the scratch bump, sighs... Anyway, the baluku is no more so we shall monitor...

Anyway, we got to lunch at YX's on time. The adults caught up over lunch and house tour and tea, while the kids had fun playing board games, hide and seek and even phone/iPad games.

Older boys playing Chinese chess before lunch

Younger boys never finished this game of monopoly!

Happy faces! They were chatting throughout, very cute

Eating cupcake

We had so much food! SF is a really good cook. And she prepared so much for tea as well - cupcakes, ice cream, cakes and fruits. The kids enjoyed pinching grapes and keropok.

Older boys playing weiqi while a song about weiqi was playing

When we left, A even sent us to the bus stop and waved bye. It's nice to see friendship blossom among the next generation :)

Our bus ride was shorter than expected coz the boys wanted macs. We stopped at Serene Centre to grab their dinner. Sito and I couldn't eat! We only had some nuts later at night while watching drama.

I was outside the whole time coz it was too cold inside :p

Wednesday, 20 Dec - Paradise Dynasty

Sito signed the kids up for a workshop at the Apple Store at Orchard. The kids learnt to use Freeform on the iPad to brainstorm and design an invention with cool features to solve a problem.

They were given T-shirts for the workshop

Little vampire!

Lucky I captured this shot coz his tooth dropped later on our way to icecream! Good boy had been teasing the tooth the past few days so it would drop off asap. And it dropped off without blood, yeah! 

But Kai reminded me of a tooth he dropped at AhMa's place, for which he didn't get any fairy money. I thought I did not take it out of my bag and lost it! But I just checked my memorabilia box - found the tooth :) He's just too old for fairy money already!

Anyway, the workshop needed some creativity and speed as well. Kai managed to do it quickly enough while Yang and Yu couldn't be ready in time to present their invention to the group. We got all their work saved via Airdrop though :)

Kai explaining his invention to the facilitator

It was a brain installer for his slow phone, haha! Yang invented a machine to count sheep so that he could fall asleep more quickly, while Yu invented a dentist machine to remove his tooth and give him candy!

Must take picture at the Taka Christmas tree :)

Kids too :)

Dinner was at Paradise Dynasty. As it was very cold, I decided to order a bowl of hot and sour noodles for myself instead of snacking at dim sum and leftovers. My four boys had their usual - ZJM for Sito, plain noodles for the kids plus a pork chop fried rice for Kai. And of course XLB for all. Very full...

But that wasn't all! We took a walk to Centrepoint to check out running shoes for Sito then walked back to get ice cream from a cart outside Ngee Ann City for Sito, Kai and Yu. Yang wanted to try Turkish ice cream. We found the one outside Ngee Ann not as exciting so we went further up to Lucky Plaza.

Yang had a lot of fun!

Thursday, 21 Dec - homecooked fare

Thankfully, no big meals today! I made Taiwanese egg rolls to wrap arabiki for lunch, and a one pot stirfry and soup for dinner.

Friday, 22 Dec - three full meals!

Breakfast was at the hawker centre for the second consecutive week. And again, I offered extra phone time - 20 min if they chose food other than prata and bee hoon, or 10 min if they chose bee hoon like the previous week. All chose wonton noodles :) I knew Yu wouldn't be able to finish his so I didn't order food for myself, or I would have too much food!

Forgot what the kids had for lunch :p But they had to try a tang yuan coz it was winter solstice! 

I boiled 10 tang yuans - five sesame and five peanut butter. Kai and Yu chose sesame while Yang chose peanut. Kai managed to eat his with much drama. Yang spit it out into the toilet bowl along with some vomit, no thanks to Kai talking about puking *.* Yu took maybe an hour before he tried half of it - verdict: normal.

Seriously, these kids are too picky. They refuse to open their minds to new foods! Let them starve when we go on holiday next year...

We left for Bishan in the afternoon to return and borrow books, and buy school shoes and stuff. Kai had to wear size 41 and Yang 39!!! But I think Yang's feet were not that big... A few days later, I bought 37 online for him - if they are too small, I can keep for Yu. 

Dinner was with WaiPo. Sito was right about there being nuggets and I was wrong about the vege - there were green leafy vegetables instead of lettuce! There was also extra hot Japanese curry but thankfully diluted so it wasn't too spicy for Kai and Yu; Yang passed :p And Yu finished his soup in no time... Why why why won't he drink my soup?!

Showing rubber band magic to WaiPo

There was more food but I shall write separately coz Christmas!

Sweet sweet Yang

Yang is a very sweet boy. He always says he wants to help me around the house, doing things that I would do, and not kiddy stuff. The other day, he told me the bookshelves were very dusty. So I gave him wipes to clean them up.

He also helped me with lunch sometimes, cracking and beating eggs, bringing things for me, putting cheese slices on top of hot buns, etc. 

Here, he's helping to thread a needle for me coz I couldn't see

He didn't manage to do it in the end but it was still so nice that he was willing to help :) I was sewing up his Ultraman soft toy which had many holes...

Sample of a hole - before then after

I love to put him in bed the most coz he would let me hug him properly :) Yu is always wriggling about while Kai is always trying to be funny when it should be peaceful time, sighs...

This boy also tells me often that he likes my (fat) belly and he doesn't want me to die. In fact, he wants me to live to 200yo!! And he wants to keep my ashes when I die, instead of scattering them into the sea as per my request, for two reasons: (1) he doesn't know where to scatter ashes :p, (2) so he can talk to me, awww...

I was thinking the other day that the composite face of Sito and me looked a bit like Yang. Now that I dug it out, actually only the face shape looked like Yang. Maybe it's the fringe - Yang has baby hair at the fringe line when I sweep up his fringe. 

I shall go hug him now :)

Excursion across the Causeway

We had a little excursion across the Causeway last Wednesday, 13 Dec, our second trip via public transport.

A little digression...

The original plan was to go on Tuesday. But I tested positive for COVID on Sunday - I started having a sore throat on the previous Wednesday, 6 Dec, but was ok by end of Thursday. But I started coughing weirdly on Thursday night and felt awful on Friday - I get colds all the time but not coughs. Tested on Friday morning but negative. The cough worsened on Sunday and I tested positive with a faint line. 

I didn't quarantine myself from the boys coz I had been with them all this while. Might as well let us all get it. But strangely, no one caught it. When I tested on Monday afternoon, I was negative! To be safe, we waited one more day in case anyone came down with it but nope. Everyone was fine. 

So off we went on Wednesday!

Waited about an hour to be front of the queue for bus 950 at Woodlands

It was a much faster journey from Bukit Panjang. So we decided to take another bus from elsewhere next time...

Immigration was fast enough but we still got into JB later than expected. Lucky we didn't plan to watch a movie this time.

Lunch was at Sushi House - we had wanted to eat there last time but the staff were "on a rest". We ate so much! The kids liked it there. Yu even gave a ranking of all the curry rice he had before; mine was in the rank but not at the top haha!

Yang: Papa, why do you have lines on the forehead but not Mama?

Awww, poor Papa! We had a good laugh though :)

With Snow King of Mixue before going for the ice cream

We also bought a mango bubble tea which was very yummy! Along the way, we got some underwear for Kai (big bum!), butter cookies, piahs and even snacks from a supermarket. The main activity in the afternoon was of course massage.

Unfortunately, my masseur was not good at all. I don't know if she chatted on the phone or with colleagues but she had no technique and her pressure was not uniform throughout. My feet didn't have the massaged feel after the session, and my back was hurting the next day. So sad... Lucky Sito had a better experience.

Candy in a dispenser for Yu; Yang had the same one too

We thought we couldn't have dinner but the kids wanted to eat so we stopped by KFC before going home. Kind of sad we didn't go for roast!

But glad we left at that time coz we saw many people going into JB and they would likely leave after dinner. Early dinner has its advantage...