A new hairstyle

Brought them for a haircut three weeks ago. Usually, I would give instructions to the stylist - short, thin, high slope for Kai and Yang, and #3 throughout for Yu. This time, I forgot to say when Yu sat down. Instead, the usual stylist at Beauty World asked me whether to keep the top longer than the sides. It just so happened that Yu wanted to be handsome so ok!

Looking good, my boy!

He looks quite chubby too. In fact, I realised he's bigger than his brothers at this age - he's now 27kg, 3kg more than them.

Coz he often stuns our food?

Let's see more of this boy :)

One of his fave activities on free afternoons

Being generally free anyway, he scrolled back 2025 years!

I thought he looks more like a big boy than a baby in this hairstyle. But he can really make baby faces...

Example - cold in the restaurant

My heart melts...

We love McDonald's!

Seriously, what's not to love about it??

For a year or so in upper primary school, I went to Macs quite a lot as my paternal grandmother used to work there and we got a lot of coupons - we had nuggets by the 20s! I remember CY and Yan joining us coz so many coupons...

Later, CY and I went to KFC on our library days... Didn't pick up Macs again until JC - somehow we liked going to Macs at Serene Centre or KAP, and at least once, we had it sitting on the floor at the atrium in Takashimaya. Did we call it Taka square?

And uni when there was this student card that gave me a free bacon burger or sthg when I got a meal. Very useful to save it for another meal!

Then in my 20s, I happened to share french fries with Yan and realised Macs could be a good snack if I didn't fancy a full meal.

The next time I had Macs quite often was when we were staying at Bukit Panjang, no thanks to the outlet right downstairs. Sito would get it - or some other fast food - for dinner/supper after returning home late from work. There were other fast food outlets there but the kids much preferred Macs, be it breakfast or lunch/dinner. 

Now, we still go to Macs for our Saturday breakfast every month or two. We have so many points that Kai and Yu can have as many hashbrowns as they like - we just redeem them one by one :p During term breaks when I seldom cook, Macs is a common dinner request.

The only difference is that Macs is now 10 min away. We also have BK but we seldom have that. And a bit further away, we have Star Vista with a few fast food options. Healthier now? :)

Another reason we like Macs is the ice cream. We used to give them an ice cream treat after dinner elsewhere but now it's less accessible. So sometimes when we're out, we may still have Macs for dessert. Like that day after watching a performance at Esplanade.

Papa took his brothers to the toilet

And it was then that I saw a notice saying that the outlet - at Raffles City - would have its last day on 29 February!

We once had Macs before an outlet closed too - KAP

That was little Kai, on 1 Mar 2014, a few months before Yang joined us, and just before the outlet ceased ops on 14 March. We probably made the trek there purposely.

End of school runs

At least the regular ones. Will still need to send and fetch Yu on days when his brothers do not need to go to school, for maybe another year...

In January, Yang and Yu started going to school on their own. This Monday, we stopped fetching them home.

Still remember when Kai and Yang first came home on their own. I put a GPS watch in Kai's bag. Now, the same watch is in Yang's bag. But I think I should switch it to Yu's bag.

Yang proved himself very capable last year, when he came home on his own after oral exams. One of us was supposed to fetch him from the bus stop downstairs but he was much earlier than expected so he walked back on his own. And when we were crossing the road to the MRT station recently, I saw him look out for cars.

But Yu is another story. While Kai is very focused on his destination and Yang would just follow, Yu likes to jump and run about, and chat with Yang ALL THE TIME. So I'm super scared they will get distracted.

These two when I fetched them on the day I had lunch in their school

I always have to remind them to stay behind the bollards, not just behind the yellow lines. Especially when coming home coz there are so many kids trying to board the bus! Yes, I'm paranoid this way - and many other ways!

Then Yu follows only Kai one day each week, as Yang has CCA on Mondays now that he has changed from badminton to art club. (Kai is peeved that Yu has no CCA - this year, the school didn't open CCAs for P2s - but that's another story.)

Yu is kind of fearful of being kidnapped due to two incidents. The first was during a Legoland trip last year. He went to the toilet and I waited for him outside; he no longer wants to go to the ladies with me. Later back at home, he told me that a guy in the toilet asked him where his parents were! I forgot his response - he either said outside or he ran out. Then - ok, my fault - I told him he must not run about in case he got kidnapped coz he's so cute!

The second incident was a couple of months back. They go to the playground downstairs on their own before dinner sometimes. They are supposed to go and return together but these kids like to rush to the lift and be the first to get to the bathroom *.* So once, Yu got into a lift without his brothers. A man was in the lift with him and asked him the same question. He quickly pressed 4 - that lift stops every four floors - and ran down the stairs to find Yang.

Now he's fearful of being kidnapped. Coz he thinks he's so cute, haha!

So on Monday, he was scared that Kai would, as usual, run ahead and leave him alone. We spoke to them in depth on Sunday and made Kai promise not to run off.

Sito also had to make Kai and Yu sit together during a rehearsal

Yang took the watch that day as he would be coming home on his own so I put Kai's phone in Yu's bag in case GeGe ran off and he needed to call us. But I couldn't track Yu. Turned out that the hi!card had been depleted. Strange coz we just topped up the week before for Kai to call us after tuition.

Sito topped it up remotely but within an hour, the value went down by $4! After checking, Sito found that data was very expensive! And somehow the phone eats data while idle. Or maybe coz I was tracking it. Anyway, now we decide to just put the watch in Yu's bag. Kai and Yang are very ok on their own now.

One thing I forgot about was that they sometimes take the train home instead of the bus. When they take the bus, they just need to cross one traffic light downstairs. When they take the train (coz they don't want to wait longer for that one bus home), they have to cross a carpark entrance/exit and a two-way road with a divider - no traffic lights etc.

Wa my heart...

Will have to continue to remind them about road safety. And to take care of each other especially when their hands are full of files!

Lunch at the school canteen

Back in February, I met a friend for lunch - at the kids' school canteen!

She works in the campus so just nice, we had a nice catch-up, and I managed to exchange a book at the bookshop and try the chicken rice the kids eat all the time!

Chose roast chicken, preferred by Kai and Yang. The same stall also sells chicken cutlet so we ordered one to share. The bowl of noodles from another stall belonged to my friend.

For $2, the chicken rice was a good portion and yummy too! There were so many other selections like noodles and even Japanese curry but the kids don't like them or refuse to spend extra to add the curry *.* Sometimes, they complained about long queues but other times, they could queue at two stalls *.* Excuses...

I was so busy looking at food options that I forgot to check out the cashless payment system. They can use their EZ Link student cards to pay but I don't let them unless I forget to give them pocket money, which is rare. Better for them to feel the pain of forking out cash and see for themselves how money is actually spent!

Maybe cockroach at home or confirmed cockroach at work?

Nothing to do with my lizard's tale.

During the six hours in Kiztopia, Sito and I had plenty of time with each other and not much distraction. The kids came only for water and didn't linger much coz couldn't wait to go back to play. Besides checking our phone occasionally and dozing off here and there, we had time to chit chat properly.

And it wasn't like date night chit chat. On date nights, we would walk around so there were distractions - things to see, desserts to decide on, things to buy, discounts to share.

We chatted about working. 

It was kind of fun writing about TFR the other day. In fact, I have another topic to write about - I had that idea when I was working but 1) no time at work, 2) not even my portfolio, 3) colleagues in that portfolio also no time! It has been tricky getting data so I'm hardly started.

Point is, I can totally imagine myself going back to work. I've built up a good reputation at work over close to 20 years. I can do a variety of work. In fact, I also enjoy much of the work I did. While I don't like managing teams, I can. I also don't like all the peripheral things like courses and "CCAs" but ok, I can *.*

But - and it's a big BUT - I can't imagine leaving Sito and the boys. Put Sito aside - every so often, this man will have itchy backside and think about going back to work himself... 

For the boys, to be more accurate, I'll only leave them physically for four hours on school days and more during term breaks. But I know from experience that I will tend to want to settle the kids asap so that I could go back to my laptop - don't know why. So end up I'll feel super frustrated that I'm not focusing 100% on kids or if kids delay bedtime etc.

I want to prepare a nice home environment for them. I want to cook for them, something familiar that they would want to come home to in future. I want to work with them on Mandarin. I want to watch them grow up.

And, just now as I started this post, Sito and I had an animated chat about work too. It just so happened that I bought $80 worth of insect and lizard repellent on Shopee, and told JY. She said we were pathetic - we used to work and had a life instead of talking about non-compliant kids and household problems!

Funny la, but kids and household problems won't go away with work. In fact, if there is a cockroach at home, I must catch and kill. If there is a cockroach at work, everyone will siam and I'll be the gong earnest one that the cockroach will aim for. I'd rather deal with the cockroach at home - Sito can kill; I only need to pick it up to throw. Then we will have a cockroach-free home. The work cockroach will, however, bring its army of emails and whatnots. Meanwhile, cockroaches may still enter my home, wth.

So, I'm thankful that Sito has done the sums and it's ok if I don't go back to work. 

My no-pay leave ended in February but I have extended it for another year - no word from HR so I assumed it had been approved. I expect HR to call me during ranking season when names are brought up... Perhaps that will be time to make a clean break... We shall see.

First trip to Kiztopia

The kids had no school on 1 March every year, thanks to Founder's Day. This year, we decided to try out Kiztopia. 

The ticketing info online wasn't very clear if the ticket with a kid's meal was for unlimited playtime on weekdays so we decided to buy on the spot. As it turned out, 1) it was for unlimited playtime, and 2) the price increased from 1 March, sighs... So we paid $49.40 for each kid. That's $148.20 for three, ouch...

But we were there from 10 am to 4 pm, including a quick lunch. Better than a two-hour movie for $50 for five of us before popcorn?

Major ball pit!

Basketball on trampoline? Sure!

Kai's and Yang's socks were from the now-defunct NERF Action Xperience and Yu' were from Kai's trip to SuperPark a few years back.

They still enjoyed toddler play!

A s l o w moving train...

Yu sat down further in front. Kai decided to go all the way back. Yu wanted to join him but found that there was no space - Kai took up the whole carriage coz he's so big! At first, I was worried that Kai might find it less fun coz on 29 Feb, he said he couldn't understand what his brothers were playing (neither could I!) and asked Papa for a paper to do...!

Lunch at Kith

They all had fish fingers - Yang didn't like it so exchanged with Yu's fries. None of them liked the watermelon juice but thirsty Kai had his and Yang's. Sito took Yu's. I ordered a coffee for myself but it wasn't very nice...

I wouldn't pay the full $14.95 price for the kid's meals. So bought the meal inclusive ticket for an additional $3-ish. Had to fill these kids up. We all had breakfast at the hawker centre in the morning so Sito and I just pecked at their unwanted corn niblets and leftovers - we didn't jump around like the kids... 

Sito and I mostly sat at the benches near the train. The kids came over for water every so often. We took turns to see the kids play and check out the place. The toilets are just outside - slippers are provided so we didn't have to change out of our socks.

Later, we also found a water dispenser in the baby care room on the way to the toilets. Perfect coz the kids ran out of water!

We also had some fun :)

我的大白兔！

We wore our masks coz cold... 

It was 4pm when we left. The kids thought they didn't play enough. Yu wanted to turn back time, haha! But within 10 min of leaving, they got hungry *.*

Found Seoul Garden. If we had been 40 min earlier, we would have saved $35 *.* And then we forgot to use a $10 voucher.. But we enjoyed the dinner :) Sito and I haven't been there in some 20 years!

Concentrating on cooking his teriyaki chicken

Enjoying their meals with different expressions after cooking their own teriyaki chicken

Needless to say, they had their fill of ice cream! When Yu couldn't eat anymore, he offered to get ice cream for his parents - I already had enough but Sito obliged. I took a cup of coffee though. Happy :) But I had to stop at Commonwealth MRT coz tummy ache :p 

Checking out the water wheel on the way to City Hall MRT station

The small monkey is always scratching his back! I think he was the sweatiest baby. His hair was glistening the whole time in Kiztopia!

Anyway, I think we won't go back to Kiztopia any time soon. They can play whole day but the bench isn't that comfy for the parents!