Eileen Chua

DEALY World Tour Contest 2011

2011-05-06T23:36:00.002+08:00

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Universal Studio Singapore

2011-03-03T23:12:00.000+08:00

A FUN FUN FUN DAY!!!!

15 January 2011

Alex's 1st Birthday Celebration

2010-11-21T22:34:00.000+08:00

Alex is one! Family feast as all the grandparents got together to celebrate for him.

Alex's first birthday cake!

Alex doing his traditional choice of what are presume significant items towards his future...

Alex picked the calculator ----> pen ----> ruler

A huge present from Zhi Jun...

Alex all busy with tearing the wrapping apart....

Everyone getting busy with getting the toy all good and going for Alex

Alex's first pair of shoes from his grandpa!

Let's party and EAT!

Everyone trying to crack their brains on how to get Alex into their arms!

Happy day!

Finally, my fruitful 20 months of studies...

2010-11-20T22:11:00.000+08:00

Yes, I have officially graduated, with a Diploma in Employment Relations.

20 months of studies, late nights' sleep from lessons and rushing out projects, time really flies.

Believe me, it was tough, and especially having to carry a baby around for 9 months to attend night lessons... I wonder how I managed, but of course, there's Patrick whom's always there to fetch me after each lessons.

Thankful that I have someone who does care for me to drive long distances and wait for me each time to fetch me home.

Honestly, everything's worth it. Today's graduation day, and I got my certificate and a Philips Book Award for being the best in my intake. Sweet toppings to the award is a S$1000 cheque!!! Alright, studying does pay, I actually do get "paid" for it.

Our Beloved Number 4 - Alex Ng

2010-11-20T22:03:00.000+08:00

Yes, Alex is turning ONE! He's going to be 1 years old in 4 days' time.

How our baby number 4 has grown, from a tiny little baby to a bubbly crawling and baby talking toddler.

Let's take a fast look at how he's grown!

Formula One Singapore 2010

2010-11-20T21:48:00.000+08:00

Visited the Formula One Singapore 2010, the kids are all excited and so are the adults.

The noise from the passing participating cars are really "ear-blasting", but still, it's all good fun and experiences!

Christopher all geared up and ready to go!

My mum's first participation at the event, crowds filling up as the race gets all heated up.

First Day in Dubai... 25th July 2010

2010-07-25T14:25:00.007+08:00

First trip to Dubai, it was a 7 hours long flight, all was good. Except for the hotel pickup which did not arrive when my flight touched down at 2:10am. I waited for like 30 minutes as I called in between to check. The hotel could not get hold of the driver and I had to take a taxi myself, turns out quite alright with the starting meter fare from AED 20, jumping to AED 71 as I reached my apartment. I checked in at the reception, it was a pretty new property Radisson Blu at Marina operating for 2 years plus. I reached the hotel at 4 plus, the unit I got is big... There's the kitchen with washing machine/dryer, oven, utensils, living room, bedroom, 2 bathroom, and even a balcony. How nice if Patrick and my 4 boys can be here, they will love the big space.

It's really hot here, I can feel big differences as I felt the heat as I step out onto the balcony from my air condition room. I don't think anyone would want to go out walking on the street in this heat. But I can see construction workers hard at work around the various sites around the place I am staying at... wow, imagine working in such heat...

Bryan's Sports Day

2010-06-26T22:40:00.004+08:00

Bryan's First Sports Day

(NTUC Childcare)

A hot sunny day @ Woodlands Stadium, Bryan starting his first game

The boys with their teacher

Bryan's first gold medal, worth it for all the sweats in exchange

My four boys, a grown up old man and three young kids....

Leaving Metso......

2010-06-25T22:47:00.008+08:00

A bad day, 25 June 2010

My last day of work in Metso Paper, a big happy family I have grown attached to. The guys, the ladies, and Lay Peng, someone whom I have grown so so sttached to that we are so sisters now. Three years, I was with Metso Paper for the shortest period as compared to all the seniors there. But it was a fulfilling 3 years where good memories are born. All the "good mornings", the lunches, the "I need your listening" ears moments, the nicknames we had for funny characters around us. My sis and I have grown so attached, this kind of one in a lifetime friend, how many people have had the luck to own one? My ever so accommodating, understanding, patient, generous, kind, and everything perfect sis, it was a relationship which I hope would last forever. Leaving Metso has been a tough tough decision.

Then there are the guys, let's start with Bjorn Olausson, the tall handsome boss of Metso Paper. He was a kind, soft spoken gentleman to everyone. Totally no "air" about him and ever so welcoming you into his room guy.

My other boss, Mr. Nelson Koh, the one who actually conducted my interview session with Vivien the HR Manager. I still can remember the interview session with the two of them in the little meeting room over in our old Science Park office. Coincidentally, I went for 3 seperated interviews all in Science Park within a week, Metso was one of them. I still remember Vivien the really pleasant HR Manager when I first met her. She is so pleasant, professional and makes oneself feels so at ease. I even noted she felt so motherly. Nelson, he is Mr. Perfect, a guy for details, filing with his own taste and standard, stern, a real gentleman and funny at times. Oh ya, he can be vain too, I still remember him telling us about his colour matching ties at home all properly matched with his row of shirts. Then there's also Nicole, Nelson's wife, a pleasant sweet lady whom's so matching with Mr. Koh. This guy has given me so much as he gave me the opportunity to start with Metso, joining into a nice family, a real good job, and even sending me for studies to further upgrade myself. Though I hardly ever made the effort of talking to him frequently, but still there is a bond between us and this is part of why it took me a long hard time to talk to him about my leaving Metso.

Mr. Murugan Batumalai, a very high "EQ" guy! He is ever so cheerful, funny, friendly and sweet. He carries with him an air of sophistication, his shiny head is also an attraction. Somestime he makes me feels like he's attained enlightenment and oh yes, he is really good with his yoga moves, I am deeply impressed as he showed me once how he can bend over forward to touch his forehead effortlessly against his knees while standing.

Mr. Ang Hock Seng, an uncle who I have grown to understand and love over the years. He has years of experiences in the work field, so too has his rich experiences in life. A very very lucky man with 3 lovely capable smart children with attainment of Honors in education. Mr. Ang would have been so much more happier if he try to relax more with his children. An uncle whom is so fatherly, taking care of me and as we shared little talks frequently.

Mr. Pow Wan Fei, a very very cheerful and simple uncle. He is a compliment with Mr. Ang as they are often the "Ang Pow (Red Packet)" in my dictionary. Mr. Pow, a fatherly figure who frequently makes extra effort to get breakfast for Lay Peng and me on those special mornings. And oh, he's the handyman in our office too, we can always find him coming up with ideas to fix some things that are not working or needs improvements.

My dear sister, I did a good job of keeping myself occupied and going as per normal around the office right till the last day. But I noticed her puffy eyes as the days go by, it was a tough one for me as I had sleepless nights. And today, right till the last moment when Lay Peng gave me a hug, I couldn't control my tears as they came flowing down hard. I could not bear to leave my dear buddy and sister, I had to hug her hard. And Patrick (just like most men), had to tease me about us women being too sentimental.

There's Chitra our IT helpdesk who has been wonderfully patient and helpful. She is frequently called to Metso Paper for help and we really love her. I had to often irresistably tease her whenever she is in our area to help with IT problems.

Mr. Janetud Chawengsrethakul, my Thailand friend, he is quiet, very man and funny too! We like to call him Mr. Thaksin, and he has a weakness for greeneries (plants) as he places pots of them around his room in the office. It was good therapy watering them whenever he is out of town on business trips. A short break away from the computer screen to water the plants really helps soothe the eyes. And he is so into sports especially badmintons, a big fan and a player every Saturday.

Ms. Yip Hwee Lee, one good friend I have had the honour to make, she is working in Metso Automation. A very very lovely friend and my favourite is to often make her laugh till she goes red in the face. It is really funny. She is a sincere and true friend, a rare find. We can share little jokes, complaints and gossips. I will miss all these too.

Ms. Stella Tay and Ms. Teoh Ningen, two friends whom have been parts of my 3 years in Metso. They can sure brighten up your days, Ningen is straight forward and funny, she has been loaning me books on pregnancy to me, giving me cute little baby stuff as I was expecting Alex. Someone sweet, voal and with big growing tummy as she is currently expecting her baby no. 2 (a prince). Stella the soft talking demure lady, she is well maintain with frequent facials and hair treatments which I often tease her about. Funny little talks we have come to share, jokes, and little stories...

Sweet little gifts of love from my dearest sis Lay Peng... She and the Metso Paper guys dig into their secret personal savings to buy me Coach Bag and Sis has been going on mad shopping spree to buy gifts for me from her own pocket!!! Perhaps it is lucky I am going soon or she will be broke before long.

Our finance team as we dine at Triple 3 for my farewell lunch. It is those rare moments when we actually have the chance to snap a photo together. There are Angela and Jane in the front row, with Seetoh Kwee Li and Julie at the back with me. A fun dining experience, and not forgeting Mr. Cheng Ter Chiang too whom adores the Tepanyaki dish of prawns as he went around for repeated servings.

Caught Jane by surprise as she attempts to devour the yummy food!

Been really lazy lately...

2010-05-01T19:55:00.007+08:00

Oh, I have been really neglecting in maintaining my blog page.

There have been many things that popped up and demanded my attention.

Baby Alex was sick, a seriously tiresome one week that sent my maid, Patirck, and I into sleep depriving moments. He was down with fever, running/block nose, loss of appetite, and vomitting like a merlion. We tried western medicine after having sent him to the GP, and even bought the very expensive $60 over per tiny bottle of black bitter powder from a chinese medical hall Eu Ren Sheng... Still, it took quite a while before he's finally recovering.

Christopher and Nicholas had been really mischevious, asking them to study seriously is like getting them to pluck the moon from the sky for me. Also, one of their teacher has been giving me problems, with dishonesty, and a totally result oriented driven mind, she's driving me nuts. I had to talk to her on the phone a few times, and even got the vice principle involved before things actually improved.

And there are the stressing times as the two elder boys' mid exams draw near. Patrick is practically stuffing himself with his high blood pressure pills as he teaches them each day.

And third boy Bryan started his viral flu this week, with serious coughing, block nose, sore throat and fever...

Oh boy, are we ever so busy!

But still, there are the happy occassions, with the two older boys Christopher and Nicholas having their birthday this month May! Their birthdays happen to be just a week apart and tomorrow is Nicholas'.

Baby Alex is now always fighting for attention from the whole family. He's stretching out his hands wide and together with his toothless big smile, begging for people to carry him! And oh ya, we have tried giving him some bread bits today, he's really enjoying the solid food.

Gosh, the days of the messy gluey yucky fish smelly porridge are going to be back again as we start to feed Alex with solid food soon.

2010-04-01T15:04:00.007+08:00

Our Family

Patrick and I with our four little boys

Alright, I have been lazy for a long while, no photos, no new blog post, etc

But hey, here's some making up for the long lost times.

Patrick hate photo taking as his excuse is that he's not photogenic.
Alright, I have the same excuse too and hate people taking photos of me.
But taking photos together with our four boys, it's a totally different issue, we love to be with them, it's just so "FAMILY"

Times flies, the nights of waking up to feed our boys when they were babies, now's our fourth boy Alex's turn. But he has been really good as he stuff himself with lots of milk just before felling asleep at 10pm, then he slept through the night without night feeds.

Alex has been really full of surprises, he started to sprout two white tooth on his front lower gum when he's just turning 3 months old. Then he started baby talk and turning from his back onto his stomach. Wow, seems like he can't wait to get up and running with his elder 3 brothers.

Patrick and I bought him a Fisher Price rocking chair at a sale for only S$20! That's really cheap. There's a musical playing to the tune of Itsy Bitsi Spider, with a rabbit moving up and down out of sight from a chimney, and two dangling spider rattles. Alex has started to kick his legs high up at the spiders and attempting to pull at them with his little hands.

Each morning, as Patrick and I woke up for work, Alex will be sure to catch us too.

He will always greet us with a big smile on his face as we greeted him "Good morning".

All the tough waking up at night, and everything, are very very worthwhile as we experience the lovingly sweet innocent smiles from our 4 boys. No matter how mad they can so amazingly make me and Patrick felt.

And one more thing,

after shaving off Alex's hair when he's one month's old...

The hair's finally growing, it sure took a long long 3 months to grow this bit of hair.

Our Pride and Joy - Bryan's Growth Path

2010-04-01T13:54:00.003+08:00

Bryan's 4th Birthday

22nd March 2010

A whopping 2kg cake for the 28 children in Bryan's childcare nursery class

Decorated with cartoon characters, the cake is a hit with the young little boys and girls. Patrick hubby and I prepared cut mangos complete with little baked hotdog rolls for the kids to go along with the celebration.

Everyone had great fun, all the children were excited and started to gather around for the birthday songs. Bryan had fun preparing the little red packs of goodies (sweets / chocolates / jelly cups / cookies) a few days before his birthday. The teachers were wonderfully helpful in helping out with the cakes and all.

Christopher and Nicholas the two elder brothers also had fun as they joined in the celebration with the children at the childcare centre. It is all very priceless to witness the joys of little children.

Within an hour, the cake was all cut up and well distributed with the mangoes and hotdog rolls. Such delightful appetite from the little boys and girls, we are glad to see the teachers enjoying themselves too as Patrick and I go round distributing the food to the other classes' teachers.

HAPPY NEW YEAR 2010

2010-02-19T09:51:00.003+08:00

$$$$$$$$$$$

A very very good start to the new year 2010, I won cold hard cash of S$ 1,000!!!

I have extended my maternity leave and will be going back to work officially on 1st March 2010. In the meantime, I was back to the office on the 4th day of Chinese New Year to visit my beloved colleagues in Metso Paper. It is the so called official first day to start work for many companies. Hubby Patrick and 3rd son Bryan were with me as I went back to the office, misses everyone in Metso Paper so much, especially Lay Peng Sis, Janetud, Pow, Ang, Bjorn, Murugan, Tomas, and Nelson (but pity he's on leave). Of course there's other lovely ones like Hwee Lee!

Sis persuaded me to go for the new year lunch with everyone at Hilton, it's there where I striked the S$ 1,000 in the lucky draw pick! Wow, really a very good strike, thank you to every lucky people there and god for letting me strike!!!!

Patrick hubby was still thinking that I'm pulling his leg when I got home and told him I won $$$$... Luckily I could proved him wrong this time.

Shaving off the hair, how Alex looks without his hair...

2010-01-14T14:40:00.002+08:00

Revealing Alex (Baby Yuan Yuan) without his hair...

The weather has been hot hot hot, Yuan Yuan has been sweating, his hair is often wet with sweat. Finally, I made the decision to bring him to the barber today and have his hair shaved off.

Daddy's feeling the pinch already, hearing that I have shaved off all of his dear son's hair, leaving not even a bit.

Homemade Chinese New Year Cookies

2010-01-12T17:56:00.006+08:00

Homemade Chinese New Year Cookies

@ affordable low pricing

Please refer price list below, all guaranteed good taste made from fresh quality ingredients

All cookies are baked by my aunt with years of high order records.

Free delivery to one location for per order of S$40.00 and above.

Time sure flies...

2009-12-30T11:40:00.006+08:00

Baby Alex is officially one month old on 24 December 2009!

Complete with countless loving blessings from many dear ones around our family.

There's our mums, dads, brother, sisters, friends, colleagues, uncles and aunties...

After much discussion, choosing, and split between the decision of our lovely boy's full month gift, Patrick and I finally settled for Sweetest Moment!

The packaging looks really sweet, there's a very personal photo card of Alex which comes within the gift box, complete with sweet treats...

We made trips down to our parents' places with Baby Alex's first day out...

Then there's the trip down to Mummy's office, I bought along the camera but ended up being too occupied to take any photos.

There's my dear sister, Lay Peng, she tried feeding Alex his milk...

There's Nelson, having fun with the 3 older boys, taking their photos...

There's Stella, bringing the 3 older boys to the pantry for their drinks...

Plus many other kind souls in the office, too many to name!!!

Alex is gettng annoyed as mummy kept snapping photos of him...

Though with the flash light turned off, still, he's sensitive to lenses pointing at him.

Soon, the kicks, punches, and frowns followed...

All in all, our fourth child is a gift, our family is all excited to see him growing each day. Still, his vocal proved to be really powerful each time he "asks" for his precious milk.

Born in the year of the ox, mummy feeling craving of milk / diary products constantly throughout the pregnancy... Baby Alex really proved his LOVE for milk as he gobbles down his feeds each time.

Counting down to baby Alex's full month...

2009-12-22T10:58:00.003+08:00

Yes, time really passes, it's just 2 days before baby Alex is going to attain his full month status. The one month of waking up in the middle of the nights for his craving for milk just short of passed. Still, there are many more such days to come, but Patrick and I will be "fighting" on.

Alex has some daily routine stuff which he "strictly" follows, that's kind of astonishing for a little baby. Let's see...

His 3-hours milk supplements, Alex's mouth just starts to open and go from left / right, seeking an outlet to suck milk from.
His daily morning bath, must not be later than 11am, otherwise he will be grumbling and grumbling.
His nappy must not be too wet, otherwise he will be seeking attention till you changed it. Same goes for soiled nappy, he's a cleaniness freak.
His beloved blanket, he grumbles if we changed it for washing.

Such little little things that I have came to realise as I spend each day with him. His 3 elder brothers are already immune to his cries, they slept like the logs each night.

Small enough to hold in our arms... big enough to bring joys to our family... Baby Alex Ng

2009-12-14T12:41:00.004+08:00

As our family grows each day with our new born...

Baby Alex is growing by the day, one more week before his full month birth celebration next week...

Each little smiles baby Alex makes, sent our hearts fluttering, his 3 elder brothers especially like to watch him having his little morning bath each day.

Yes, night time feedings are turning Patrick and me into black eyes pandas...

but the joys Alex brings with him to our family, are all worth the waking up at nights.

Together with warmest wishes and sweet thoughts from our dearest colleagues, friends, and families... Baby Alex is full of blessings.

Our 4th Addition to the Family - Baby Alex

2009-12-04T13:38:00.009+08:00

Our very 4th addition to the family!

Yes, you are right, Patrick and I have got 4 boys

(Okay okay, stop your sniggering...)

Arriving on 24th November 2009, he appeared with a loud voice and much kicks!

Opening one eye to peep around him amid the shining lights around him...

There's loads of warm wishes and congrats from friends, colleagues, relatives, and the grandparents!! Complete with sweet lovely thoughts of gifts too...

Finally, after days of his arrival, Patrick and I have decided on a simple english name for him, ALEX.

We were thinking and thinking of naming him "Ben", the 3 elder brothers are big fans of the cartoon "Ben 10". Then I was telling Patrick about "Alex", since A and E would be the first few alaphets to learn, and "l" plus "x" would be really easy for the baby to learn...

Well, there's many things to consider, "easy to learn" would be one since he's a year end baby so it's like one year late start behind other babies...

Have to disappoint Mr. Pow and Aunt Lay Peng, it's not a baby girl. I told you, Patrick already told me to stop thinking about baby girls dresses. Haha!

Alright, our family is now really complete, there's Christopher, Nicholas, Bryan, and Alex. Noticed how the names just get shorter and shorter...

2009-11-19T09:18:00.004+08:00

Company Event - METSO NIGHT 13 Nov 2009

The Committee behind the scene...

The lovely grand Balmoral Ballroom of Royal Plaza on Scotts

Our lovely table setting complete with Metso's Event Card

Irressitable lovely sweet treats

Lay Peng and Stella, ladies in black

Finally, our company dinner affair ended wonderfully on 13 November 2009 night, the rain did not dampen the mood at all. Hwee Lee, Lay Peng, Stella and myself reached Royal Plaza on Scotts early to start decorating the place. Our reception area was wonderfully decorated with ribbons, our Metso signboard, lucky draw box, company color theme green / orange balloons, etc. The 3 ladies had "fun" blowing up the balloons while I was excused due to my pregnancy.

Next, we went to Balmoral Room, our very night's ballroom. The hotel staff were hard at work getting the turnover of the room done as there was an event earlier before our night's event. The earlier event's attendees were really kind of a mess, considering the litters on the floor...

The work starts as we busied ourselves around the room trying to ensure everything was in place, the setting up of the stage, the music CDs for the night, the tables for the games, etc. By 6:45pm, the guests were starting to turn up for the pre-cocktail affair by the poolside (*pity it's still raining). Luckily there's a lovely sheltered bar side by the pool for all to linger around on the chairs and tables.

All the staff started filling in for the night, atmosphere was great as everyone started mingling around. By 7:15pm, we proceeded to the ballroom, everyone in anticipation of the night's event to start. I was famished by then, guess baby must be feeling really hungry too...

Everyone started going round the buffet spreads with the accompanying music in the background. A lovely prelude to the games ahead as everyone started building up their energy. the night was successful, people was taking part in the games, mingling around with a glass of wine in one hand. Guys were getting rowdy, but overall everyone was enjoying themselves.

Finally, time for me to catch some breathe, seems like being heavily pregnant does hinder my actions in some way...

A short break to update my blog...

2009-11-17T22:42:00.005+08:00

Busy...
Tired...
Lazy...

There's my very very heavy tummy, work, studies, and project to be done. Been making me really lazy to be doing anything to my blog page.

Baby's been very very active these few days, making me kind of "weighed" down already. Hopefully Baby will be good and stay in for a few more weeks. *crossing my fingers* Won movie tickets recently, and today, Giant Hypermart called to inform I have won a pair of Fei Yu Qing Concert Tickets! I love such stuff, the thrills of winning stuff, big or small.

Neighbour Katherine has given birth to her little princess just over Sunday, the message from her this morning made me feel her joy! Actually coincidentally, both of us are supposed to have the same delivery date in December. Wow! What great coincident, really made me felt so amazed when we realised while talking in the lift.

Rushing on a assignment for my studies, hopefully it will be done well. Kind of stress, being heavily pregnant has kind of made my brain juice dry up. Forgetfulness, the really serious kind! Goodness....

35 Weeks into pregnancy...

2009-11-16T22:16:00.004+08:00

Baby's growing well, the moves, kicks and punches are increasing each day as my tummy gets heavier. Simply feeling easily tired out, very very heavy, and hard to move around.

Yes, it's 35 weeks into my pregnancy, the little bumps are noticingly obvious now as baby stretches inside my tummy. He's been especially active today, making me smile and getting the occassional "Opps" if the kicks / punches get serious. By 35 weeks pregnancy, it's recorded that uterus could expand up to 1,000 times its original volume, reaching just under the human ribs. That explains the breathlessness.

2009-10-06T15:35:00.003+08:00

Time sure flies, it's been like one departure after another of our really homely group in the office. There's the relunctance, the heartache, the painful countdown as someone dear in our office have to leave for greener pasture. Have you ever noticed why the "baddies" seem to linger around so much more longer, while the goody ones seem to leave so soon?

The guy from the corner room whom everyone has grown to love, had to leave our office this month, with greener pasture awaiting him. What a pity, just when we have someone just so sweet, forever treating us to candies that comes in the version of "saltiness" and "sweetness". Someone who would always be telling us happily about his golfing trips over the weekends, to the various golf clubs in town and nearby Indonesia islands. His warm enquiries about how my stomach's doing as he remarked frequently how big it's growing.

There would be some getting use to, as the corner room remains empty for the moment. He's just flown back to Sweden home, I'm looking forward to his return in December for his planned holiday in asia. Hopefully I will be seeing him them...

Back in Action, after a long missing in action

2009-09-22T21:12:00.004+08:00

Oh great, I'm finally back after a long absence...

Been really lazy, perhaps it's to do with my carrying an extra load 24 hours a day, coping with my work, studies, and the family. Patrick hubby has been most supportive, driving me to and fro work, and now even twice a week after I finished my studies. With each day, I can feel the load increasing, baby's been most active. There's the sudden kicks or punches that he would be giving me sometimes, the somersaults he's practising around inside me. My other 3 boys have been most curious and fascinating by all the movements they are feeling when they placed their faces or hands on my tummy. It's 27 weeks into my pregnancy, baby's sense of hearing is really sensitive by now. Maybe that's the reason why he's moving exceptionally a lot during the evenings when he hears all the noises from his 3 older brothers. A horrifying discovery, my weights increased to 6kg, oh my god...

Into the module of Labour Economics for my studies now, I'm kind of dragging my given assignments, I got to be picking on my brains soon and start working on them.

The 3 little boys are still as hyper active and noisy as ever, Bryan the youngest have been noticeably really close to Patrick hubby. Acting cute with his two white front teeth smiling sweetly as he constantly sticks around... Christopher the eldest, as usual has all the uncountable homework to deal with each day. Nicholas is doing kind of a good job being a big brother to Bryan recently.

Guess the election is soon to be here, our district's MP Gan Kim Yong has just visited our home with his group of followers. Questions of how long we have stayed here and whether everything's going well around the neighbourhood and our family. I was telling him things are good and so on...

Finally found time to read TODAY newspaper, after a kind of busy day at work in the office. I was reading and reading, when I came across the Prudential advertisement. Then YIPEEeeee!!! I saw that my name's under the list of winners for a set of ASUS eee notebook. My 3rd set of notebooks won so far this year! Patrick hubby thought I was joking with him initially, but then he checked and realised it's for real. But it's kind of a bother since there's going to be like 4 laptops in our house, maybe we should do away with one for sale....

Finally, the prizes arrived....

2009-08-11T22:55:00.004+08:00

Appetites & Escapades - Travel and Food Trivia Pursuit

I didn't knew that I had won the 1st Prize in the Grand Lucky Draw, seem to be really fated with SPH recently. First the OMY.sg blogging contest, then the National Day feature of our family, and now the lovely prizes. Actually I have been feeling sad for months after being "dry" of winning anything since winning the laptops in April.

After some checking through what I had won, there's...

- Lowe Alpine Bag Blast 30 ($150+)

- Cityscape Coffee Table Book ($80)

- LX90 Sennheiser earphones ($110)

- Nautica Watch ($160)

- A pair of Zweisel 1872 homemade CLUB champagne flutes ($110)

- Dining and travel vouchers

I have already decided to give the earphones to Ms. Teh Chean Pin, she's my lovely little sister. Been rebellious, naughty and occassionally good. Yes, I know about your little tricks of waiting for your mum to sleep as you sneak to the kitchen making your little tea drink. You have got just too much nasty stuff which I have got hold of, hope you have already confirmed you will be at my home during my confinement as something to keep my mouth shut. Otherwise...

National Day 2009 - Our Family's Excursion

2009-08-10T14:35:00.007+08:00

Our family's the lucky winners of Stomp/RazorTV NDP 09 Contest!

I received a email on Friday, 7 August 2009, that my family has been selected to attend the National Day Parade on 9 August 2009, we will be feature on RazorTV and MYPAPER!!! A most overwhelming priceless gift, the 3 boys were buzzing with excitement as I told them the good news.

After some discussion, Journalist Kai Ling from RazorTV confirmed that she will be at my house with her team on 9 August 2009, at 1400 hour. Nervous nervous, our family started some tidying up of the house in anticipation of the visit. Then on Saturday night, Kai Ling confirmed that we will be given 5 more tickets, bringing my total given tickets to 10! Wow, really such wonderful news, my dad, mum, brother, and future sis in law, will all be able to join in the fun! All ten of us are going to take part in the party celebration of Singapore's 44th birthday.

The team was really professional, dedicated, patient, friendly, and yet fun! I was worried they would be freak out with the 3 boys, but luckily they weren't (or at least I think so from the looks of it). Let me introduce you to some of the dedicated SPH staff. We were late as we started off from our home and met with a minor car accident while in Marina Square's carpark. Really felt bad to be making everybody wait at the meeting point.

Reporter from MyPaper, he's quiet, serious in his work and really kind and helpful. We met with a minor car accident as we were at Marina Square, he reserved front row seats for us under the scourching hot sun!! We felt really really bad to be late and making everybody wait.

Kai Ling, the journalist from RazorTV, cheerful, friendly and always taking care of our needs. We got all nervous whenever she started interviewing us camera shy creatures, nevertheless, we still tried our best... hope we weren't too boring though

The dedicated camera lady, pretty, cheerful, warm, and all. The camera sure looks heavy, but she's forever on the go with it, so professional and uncomplaining.

Mr. Kumar, the video man, he's really dedicated and professional. The video recorder looks really heavy, yet, he's always attached to it. A ever so cheerful, warm, friendly man.

Our family had great fun with the SPH team, they were really wonderfully dedicated to their professional. We salute them with deep appreciation, as they were busy throughout the day following us from home till the end of the event.

A huge THANK YOU!

Folks, I be busy for quite a while...

2009-07-23T08:55:00.003+08:00

I'm going to be busy busy busyyyyy.... for quite a while.

Working on my part time study's assignment, 20 long pages of killing essay on something I'm not good at, something I basically hate.

Tracing Historical Development of Trade Unions in Singapore

Going through thick historical reference books at the library makes my eyes hurt, blurrish, and brain burnt. Staring at the years of history from the early years of 1948, is just killing. Eventhough it's a group work, it's kind of like everyone's got to go through the same reading routine before coming out with the draft. Dateline of submission is on 4 August 2009, so I be working hard to get through this "Hell".

There's a total of 10 modules throughout the entire 20 months long course. I have only got through 3 of them, the current subject is really not my cup of tea. Hopefully the rest of the 6 would have me going through smoothly and without much hiccups.

Just look, you can see I'm going "green" just by working on this subject alone. Let's just say, I'm not the UNION type of material.

Anything that's popping up in my mind...

2009-07-15T09:47:00.005+08:00

It's a rainy rainy morning, I woke up at 5:45am this morning and noticed that it's started to rain. Strong winds blowing in, fighting its way through the gaps of the windows and from under the door. A tiring day since I got home really late from my study last night, and following a chit chat late into the night with a friend... Patrick hubby and I are just so tired when we got up this morning.

Anyway, we managed to get ourselves washed up and dressed for work, it's still raining as we got into our car. The traffic is really slow as our vehicle drove along, there's a vehicle breakdown, following another incident of vehicles collision. Such things always managed to make themselves happen everytime on rainy days...

Finally, I got to work and Patrick hubby continued on his way to work after dropping me off. The view from my office is simply lovely, dreamy, foggy, and making me all sleepy.

As the time ticks by past the morning peak hours, the traffic on the road started loosening up. Otherwise the road shown would always be jam packed with vehicles.

It's Wednesday! I'm going for a check up this Friday, have most fortunately managed to get a referral from my family doctor, a senior gynae for my pregnancy. Following a painful 2nd pregnancy from a doctor on duty as my gynae wasn't around, it's really unthinkable to be going through the same thing again.

From tracking records, baby's into the 4th month now, still as active and bubbly as usual. Occassional shifting around, ensuring to give me some punches and kicks here and there, perhaps to remind me of the pressence.

Agghhh... the agony as figure starts changing, tummy protutes out, hips and buttock are increasing the width. My beloved high heels are being packed into the shoe boxes, I won't be able to wear them for the next 6 months at least. Even my walking seems clumsy, as my breathing gets heavier, taking long deep breaths...

2009-07-07T17:39:00.004+08:00

Been busy over the weekends, it's Mum's birthday and we decided to have a simple loving meal at home.

The most important ingredient "LOVE" is not forgotten!

Dad and Mum taking a couple photo, they have come a long way, altogether 32 years of marriage down the long long road... raising two kids (my brother and me).

Of cos the party must be complete with a bottle of sweet tasting red wine, top with top quality cheese cake from Bakerzin!

Home cooked to go along, simple, but delicious!

Mum's still camera shy, smiling sweetly...

It's been a wonderful day, with 3 little boys running around the house, adding to the atmosphere. We took loads of photos, and tried out the wonderfully compact Selphy CP780 Photo Printer again on some undeveloped photos of yesteryears...

Turning out wonderfully fast, clear, bright and colourful!

My 3 boys had a fun time going through them with my parents...

To be continued...

I need a new BAG!

2009-07-03T10:38:00.004+08:00

Yes, I seriously need a new bag, something that would be sophisticated and hardy enough to let me carry it in style to work, as well as to private functions. Something that would accommodate all my stuff, my A4 Document File, my diary, my cosmetics, my mobile phone, my purse, etc...

(Yes, that's how much stuff I lugged around everyday)

Then, I came across this soft quilted shoulder bag

Coco Classics Black Soft Quilted Shoulder Bag

at this online shop Alice Wonders selling a variety of bags.

I'm fallying in love with the lovely quote of the bag by the seller

"Take me from your office to the loft scene. Guaranteed style longevity".

Even better, they are holding a promotion contest for readers to get a chance to win a choice handbag from their shop.

Visit Giveaway Contest to find out more and GOOD LUCK!

Flash Backs... The 3 Boys are growing up day by day

2009-06-26T16:45:00.010+08:00

Times passes, before you might even detect it slipping past you. Many a times, hubby and I still wonder what actually gave us the courage to have 3 boys.
(Alright, I suddenly got this feelings to just write it all down.)

Let's take a brief walk down memory lane of how the 3 boys have grown over the years. Through times of joys, happiness and sweet little things from the innocence of a young mind. Coupled with times of bursting blood vessel moments when they turn really mischevious

There's still a long long way to go...

Starting with our Pride and Joy Christopher Ng

(Our Eldest Boy)

The early baby years, nights of sleeplessness, changing soiled diapers and occassional staining of shits on Patrick and my hands...

To the time when he's a bit grown up with capbility to crawl on all fours, teething and dripping saliva all day long. The age when he's just at 2 years plus, learning to walk and getting the occassional bumps as he falls.

Turning 3 years plus, he's walking more steadily now, still teething but the saliva dripping eposide is gone. Hair's growing after a nasty shave from his parents. The terrible stage of attention gaining and times when going to the washroom is simply horrible when he just wants to stick to you at every moment.

Slowing going four, talking and talking non-stop, constant "Why" which drives Patrick and I insane and at loss of words. Rumbling on and on as he found all the vocabs to practise on. Starting off with much baby fats and losing them as he grows.

Five years plus, still melting our hearts with his big black eyes complete with long lashes. Hugging his favourite pillow around the house, lugging it everywhere and getting sleepless nights if he's without it.

He's turned 7 years of age, the most independent of the 3 boys. Acting as big brother to his two younger siblings and facing bigger pressure now he's gone into Primary One.

________________________________________________

Our Second Pride and Joy, Nicholas Ng Nicholas boy when he's a baby, small and the size of Patrick's palm. Born earlier than the due date, the biggest worries of our 3 boys with risks of premature. Thick black mop of hair when he's born, one year apart from our eldest boy. The days of sleepless nights are back.

The age of 1 year, chinese tradition of shaving off the hair. Anywhere, we found that all babies tend to drop off their baby hair, so it's good to shave all off and let new ones grow.

Slowing going 2 plus to 3 years of age, hair's growing long and shiny smooth. Walking and following his elder brother Christopher around the house. Getting all sticky and tendency to cry.

6 years of age, the parting on the left side of his front hair is still obvious. Distintive look which was with him since his birth, possibly saving him a long of money to be spend on gel in the later ego age.

__________________________________________________

Our 3rd Pride and Joy, Bryan Ng

Bryan at birth and already showing off his "kungfu" pose. First photo taken at the hospital ward on his 2nd day after birth.

His first month and getting comfy at home, curious looks around most of the times, especially with 2 older noisy brothers. Bryan always seems to be impatient about learning to crawl, standing up, and walking. He started to make himself turn onto his stomach, crawling, taking his first stand and so on. Guess it's all the pressure from seeing his two elder brothers running around him, that he wants to follow them along.

Now, Bryan's 3 years old, he's picking up many words and phrases from his two elder brothers, running along with them. Wanting a share in everything, he's also forever "acting cute", and his smile would always cheer the family up. Branded as the "Baby of the Family", being the youngest.

It's still a long way to go before all three of the boys grow up, many more years of ensuring they grow up healthily, excel well in their studies, etc.

The time, the attention, the money, the care, and many more things to come along the way as we grow up with them each day.

A 4th child in on the way, the baby is currently 14 weeks and perhaps about 3 inches long and weighing only an ounce and a half. Into the 2nd trimster of the pregnancy, at least the past weeks of nausea are mostly gone except for the occassional few times.

Strange thing is baby doesn't seems to like me brushing my teeth, everytime I put the paste into my mouth, I felt nausea. But at least I'm improving on my appetite now, better than not being able to take any food on most nights.

This year is the year of the "Cow" in the chinses calendar, and baby sure is behaving like one. I'm into craving for fruits, vegetables, fruit juices, milk, etc. My favourite of fried chicken wings, seafood such as lobster, crayfish and fish, are all making me nausea... I was at Carousel the other night and yet I'm avoiding all the seafood spread there!

CANON Selphy Connections Blog Contest

2009-06-23T14:07:00.011+08:00

VOTE for me!

Finally, the official six bloggers choosen to experience and blog about the new CANON Selphy CP780 photo printer and CANON IXUS 95 IS camera

are fresh out of the oven and awaiting for votes from

their beloved friends and readers...

Following and outing to the Jurong Bird Park and a series of hands on trying out the lovely shocking PINK products, there are 3 sets to be given away.

Simply steps to winning the set would be:

CAST YOUR VOTE

for MY BLOG, the lucky voter picked would win a set of the cute user friendly IXUS 95 camera complete with the Selphy CP780!

Simply click on my entry which is choice No. 1 [Eileen Chua]

and complete your particulars to cast your vote!

Hurry, voting has already started and the last date would be on
22 July 2009 @ 2359 hours sharp.

The Canon Selphy CP780

2009-06-18T10:34:00.008+08:00

The Canon Selphy Portable Printer

(Deliciously Pretty in Bright Pink)

*Alright guys, it does come in silver too, more manly for you

Once upon a time, everyone's camera is those that has a roll of firm inserted in them, they take pictures, developed them and placed the photos in album. The photos are sometimes framed up and placed around the house to reflect wonderful moments.

I forgot when was the first time I got my first digital camera, but it was the time I stopped developing photos, I stopped doing framing and displaying photos at home. Only on the desktop in my computer would you be able to see my family photo as I switched it on.

I love taking photos, especially of my family and friends. The bright goofy smiles on my 3 sons' faces are priceless, their birthdays, their first day at school and much more, are all important moments to capture. Only on the day I brought Selphy CP780 home and tried it out with the kids, then did I know how deprive they have been.

As I tried printing out a few photos from the printer, the 3 of them gathered curiously around it and fight to retrieve the photo as it's printed out. (I'm lucky the printer is so efficient that the photo is instantly ready and doesn't need to be dry like some inkjet printers) I printed out quite a few of the boys' photos, they were very excited and took the photos with them to their room. Over the next few days, I still found them going through the photos happily and telling to each other about where and when the photo was taken. (Only then did I knew how deprived they have been) All the photos I have taken of them, are always downloaded into my laptop's hard disk. They only get to see the photos once in a blue moon and it's always like 20 seconds per photo for them. I ignored the fact that kids always love to get a feel and touch of things at their own pace.

This portable printer is a genius, I tried bringing it out in my handbag complete with the ink cartridge and paper, it's a breeze. It only weighs 940g and the dimension is only 6.93 x 5.22 x 2.98 inches. The unit given to me comes with a power adaptor, but it comes with the option for a battery pack (which I will definitely get if I do get the printer) which really makes it all so easy.

The printer also comes with the memory card slots, as well as the Bluetooth function for your mobile phone. I just take out the memory card from PINKY and insert it into the printer's memory card slots, the photos just appear on the 2.5"LCD panel. There's even the information that photos printed on the quality Canon photo paper, is able to last for a good 100 years!

There's the Portrait Image Optimize, the Red-eye Correction, and printing speed is good at 47 seconds for a postcard size photo. I was going through the manual and found out it has the options for printing out on 4R size photos, name card size, and even Neoprint sizes! This is really good, if I use the Neoprint sizes which is a small label types of imprint, I can do a good deal of labelling jobs on my sons' water bottles, and books!

I'm planning to do a great deal of printing out our family photos on name card size photo paper so that a few of them can be inserted into hubby and mine wallets. Pinky is going to be busy helping me take more photos and Selphy is going to be busy printing out the photos since I am going to finish my exam paper this evening. There will be more time for me to experiment on them both!

Jurong Bird Park Outing with OMY.SG Team

2009-06-11T15:00:00.033+08:00

The six contestants together with the families, everyone flashing their Canon IXUS 95

(Oh my god, just look at my very obvious tummy, guess my tummy's 4th child wants to have a share in the photo taking too. And I'm only 3 months' pregnant)

Special Day, Outing to Jurong Bird Park
sponsored by OMY.SG and CANON

Alright, I'm counting my lucky stars, I'm one of finalists among the sixth selected bloggers in the

Selphy Connections Blog Contest!

Special thanks to the hardworking OMY.SG Team, Alvin and his lady colleague including the ever patience camera man. While we were enjoying ourselves, the camera man was busy capturing everyone in his video! They even helped take lovely family photos for us!!!!

I got to meet the other five finalists whom brought along their families and friends, I'm sure I would have a good time with the lovely pinkish Canon IXUS 95 Camera, complete with the deliciously pink Canon Selphy CP780 Printer.

Our family was at the venue early and we did some exploration, my 3 boys even got all mesmerized by a magician!

Take a good look at all the lovely photos taken by my PINKY!

(Alright, I have indeed given the camera a name, it's PINKY)

Christopher, Nicholas and Bryan are busy learning all about the printer.

The printer's really portable and easy to carry around in my bag.

I have been showing it off to my colleagues at work and they are impressed!

Even my elderly dad and mum are tempted to get one, we tried by printing out photos of their holiday trip to Taiwan and they were like WOW!Dad even praises mum that she looks lovelier than the flower in the photos! (he hardly praises her)

On Saturday morning in anticipation of the outing, our family planned to reach Jurong Bird Park well in advance of the appointed time. The park had a few interesting sights in store for us, with a pond complete with a swan, the flagship shop selling souvenirs, etc.

Picturesque corner at Main Entrance of Jurong Bird Park, featuring a African Waterfall Aviary

The rows and rows of cuddly soft toys, tempting my 3 sons and me, I had to take control of myself and resist the lovely white penguin.

The crowds at the entrance, tourists, locals, and staff of Jurong Bird Park

Surprises! Farid the magician approaches us and he is really good, my 3 sons were on Cloud 9 as he sprinkles his magic on them. I tried hard, but just couldn't see how he makes a third sponge duck appear on my our eldest son Christopher's hand. Then, he had Christopher sign on a poker card as a marking, he did some shuffling... Big surprise! He got Christopher to tab on the deck of cards, and the marked card appear on the top deck! More magical moments as he did some disappearing act with a simple red handkerchief. Needless to say, Christopher, Nicholas, and Bryan were totally impressed. The first time they ever came so close to a magician other than watching one on television programs.

The boys were reluctant as the magician had to take his leave, I expressed my utmost admiration and thanks to him!

The "Flap-bulous" Magical Moments - Another magical performance, our first venue as our assigned guide from the park brings us around.
Next is the Grand Show of the day at the Pools Amphitheatre, we all got good seats and lo and behold! The rest is simply breathtaking as we see all sorts of stunts and performances by birds flying near the sitting audiences.

There's just so many lovely surprises, audiences were picked randomly to take part during the show. With hands outstretched, a beautiful colourful feathered friend would fly over to the lucky audience.

After the show which seems to have ended too fast, our attentive guide brought us to another venue where the parrots were stationed. There's even a corner for people to take photos with the colourful parrots!

Grand Lovely Personal Favourite of our Family

THE PENGUINS

The penguins always manage to make our heart go soft as they are just so adorable but

they were enclosed and seperated from us by a huge viewing glass.The best is yet to come, read on...

MEET LOVELY PINKY, OMY.SG and CANON specially arranged for a close MEET-THE-PENGUIN session.

Yes, this lovely penguin is named PINKY, just like my camera!

Our group was given VIP treatment as a corner of the viewing gallery was closed off for us to meet PINKY!!! PINKY made a grand entrance, stunning and capturing everyone's hearts, all eyes were on him.

He must have felt glares on him as he just stopped in his track and paused!

The park keeper gently urged him on and finally had to carry him into the area which was sealed off for our group. All the kids were amazed at the close contact with a live PENGUIN! We adults weren't any less amazed and our hearts just melted.

Everyone went into high ecstasy over PINKY, everyone had their camera on standby to capture PINKY!

I took extra caution to switch my flashlight off so as not to send PINKY into shock... photos all came out lovely and sharp!!!!!)

PINKY was really shy, and he seems scared stiff as people crowd around him.

I waitied for awhile with my kids and then we approached it from a distance bit by bit.

The park keeper looking after the penguin glanced over at me and I asked him whether we could touch the PINKY lightly...

He said yes!!!! I thank him in gratitude, really wonderful, we could actually get a feel of the PINKY. My 3 sons were in CLOUD NINE again, I put their hand gently on the back of the penguin one by one and stroke PINKY as gently as possible.

Everyone around started to wait for a turn to get a feel of PINKY, all young and old were simply captivated by PINKY!!!! He's magical...

After the special PINKY meeting, we had to reluctantly bid farewell, my three boys were by this time wishing they could bring PINKY back home with them.

Making our exit, everyone gathered around to take more photos.

Suddenly, the video camera was facing me and I was asked how I felt about the CANON camera after using it

The verdict, this CANON IXUS 95 is simply user friendly, sensitive to motion which produces sharp picture on moving objects.

(comparing to my old digital camera, whenever I tried taking photos of my kids, I had to ask them to be still. Reason being, if they moved, the captured picture is blurish.)

PINKY is really smart, it senses the environment of each photo take with good supporting setting without me having to manually set it. All my photos turn out really natural and facial expressions were focused on with it's facial sensors capturing up to a number of 7!! I'm thoroughly impressed.

Another important factor, it's in my favourite color of PINK!!!!!!

We were told that it can be free and easy time, or we can go with the team for bird feeding session at the Bird Sanctuary.

Hubby and I decided we will do some exploration with the kids and let them decide where to go, so we thank the wonderful hardworking OMY.SG for all the lovely programs and effort they have spent on creating a memorable day for us.

Christopher loves owls after reading about them in story books, so we decided to visit the "WORLD of DARKNESS".

The OWLS here are really exotic and our favourite among them are the SNOWY OWLS!

I didn't take photos inside the exhibit as I don't want to utilise the PINKY's flashes and end up disturbing the peaceful owls...

Our family next stopped at the African Wetlands "ST LUCIA", heritage site located along the east coast of South Africa.

Egypt's famous expensive paper plant!!! It could be found in Jurong Bird Park, the product made from this plant is equisite, pricey and could last for hundreds of years!

Wow! If you haven't been to the Jurong Bird Park lately, you should bring your family down for all the wonderful exhibits there. You will be in for surprises just like us!
Love the photos taken using my PINKY camera?
I will be posting more wonderful creations from PINKY, be sure to come back for more.

Selphy Connections Blog Contest

2009-06-05T14:28:00.005+08:00

Alright, the nervous part is over, I was all worried about whether I would be the oldest "auntie" among the 6 selected bloggers. I never knew my blog would be good enough to get me selected at all, so it's a really pleasant huge surprise!

Last night's IXUS Tutorial at Canon's office, was really good. I arrived early and while waiting for the other finalists, had a chat with Alvin whom's doing marketing over in OMY.sg. He told me there's going to be interesting programmes for us at the Jurong Bird Park outing on Saturday. Wow! I'm already looking forward to it, trust that my sons would be buzzing with excitement.

After a while, most of the finalists arrived, I met two other interesting parents. Okay, so I wasn't the oldest there. Then there's two 小弟弟 and a 小妹妹. Alright, they are poly students, and two of the young boys are studying photography. Impressive!

We were shown to Canon's conference room, there's even a corner that works like a cosy living room, nice. Then, there's representatives from Canon and SPH, all are friendly folks. Soon, everyone's chatting and laughing away. We were each given a big bag containing the Canon Selphy CP780 compact photo printer and a Canon IXUS 95 IS camera. Wow, it's really kind of the organisers to give us a set each, complete with the photo printing paper as well. What I love most, is the lovely bright cheery pink that's shouting out to me. (ok ok, it's great for girls and mostly not for guys)

A bit into the contest, winner's the keeper of the lovely lovely set! Outing to Jurong Bird Park, trying out the camera and the printer. Following this, 2 weeks to blog about the products and our outing, follow by 4 weeks of voting. There's the Popular Choice Award (determinded by votes), Canon Choice Award (determinded by Canon Judges), and of course One lucky voter gets to win a set. So, that means I better treasure my lovely pink camera and printer before I return them if I lose.

I'm looking forward to the Jurong Bird Park tour, especially the meeting and touching the Penguin portion. We were told the penguin's name is Pinky! Wow, just the same as the color I love, PINK!!!!!! YipEEEEeeee!!!

I will write more about the outing soon, complete with lovely photos taken by my PINK camera. (alrite, i know it's not mine, but just let me imagine for the moment.)

Late Late Updates of Hong Kong Trip - Part 2

2009-06-04T23:21:00.006+08:00

The Big Iron Buddha Statue sitting high on a mountain, situated in Tai O

It's pretty high up here on the mountain, we had better cling tighter

Cool breezy air makes us feel so carefree

Daddy brought us to the famous Cheng Hwang Temple in Hong Kong, lovely garden hides within...

Hong Kong's SNOOPY WORLD

Canon Selphy CP780 Printer and Canon IXUS 95 IS Camera

2009-06-02T11:26:00.006+08:00

One of the finalists selected in the Selphy Connections Blog Contest!

A wonderful Monday morning when I received a phone call from OMY.SG that I am one of the selected to experience the new Canon IXUS 95 IS! A good start to the week and new month of June 2009.

There's a training session on Thursday for the selected bloggers to get to know the new Canon printer and digital camera, after which, we get to bring the goodies home for trial. I would have to miss my studies this Thursday night lesson to go for this lovely event. And on Saturday, the organiser has this really wonderful Jurong Bird Park Outing for us lucky bloggers to try out the new Canon camera with a special guided tour plus photo taking. We are even allowed to bring along our family members for the session. I'm just so happy.

My boys would definitely be jumping with joy, especially since it's the school holiday now, and their mummy will be having a chance to bring them to the Bird Park. This is definitely lovely news ever since I broke my Nikon camera last month, it has been devastating! I haven't been capturing moments of the children's special moments and just thinking of going to the zoo or anywhere, has been kind of handicap without my camera around.

Perhaps, I would be so lucky as to get a chance with the new Canon IXUX 95? There would be wonderful photos taken of the Jurong Bird Park Outing, I would get to win the camera and printer? Otherwise I would be so obsessed with the camera and printer to even part with them, that I have to try hard to save up for them.

It's going to be a lovely week ahead!

Finally it's Friday

2009-05-22T11:01:00.004+08:00

Well, am I glad it's Friday today. Nothing fanciful, nothing interesting, just a quiet uneventful day.I'm thinking of having piping hot steaming 小笼包, with sweet minced pork filling, lovely soup that actually flows out as your bite a small tiny hole by the side of the skin. The skin should be good enough to hold in the filling as you pick up using your chopstick and place it on your spoon. Many places are selling this delicacy nowadays, yet most of them doesn't pass the test. The poorly made ones come with skin that breaks as you attempt to pick it up with your chopstick, thus losing the wonderful sweet soup that are held within.

Hubby and I have this favourite stall that are just situated within The Beauty World Shopping Centre just at Bt Timah Road. The stall's right within the hawker centre right on the top floor of the shopping centre, it's not Ding Tai Fung nor Crystal Jade. Yet, the 小笼包 here is simply heavenly, the pork filling is fresh and sweet. You can even ta bao home and the little pieces are still wonderful, the skin works wonders and holds the filling just great.

Lay Peng my buddy at work is on leave today, feels really quiet around here... Luckily there's still Mr. Ang and Mr. Murugan around, otherwise it would be like dead quiet since most of the guys' overseas. Fair weather today, no rain and the sun's out.

Was talking to my colleage Sara from Beijing office, finally saw her photo and knew what she looks like. Really sweet and lovely, I'm someone whom's a sucker for photos. It's really kind of weird to be talking to someone or writing emails to when you never knew what they look like.

Things are kind of strange in the career world, I have been hearing like forever how who and who is whom's favourite or girlfriend, so they are kind of "shaking legs". This is weird. I am wondering why the hell are they even working and not just staying at home if they are really so "big shot"?! People have said to me, she's the girlfriend of who and who, so try to be nice to her, don't expect her to do her part. Goodness, just the other day, someone made another remark. "Do you know this person has got like 2 degrees under her, the favourite of some big shot, very capable, and blah blah blah... so this person does not need to do her job eventhough it's her work scope" Come on, yes as in the working world, such cases exit. But we do not have to condone every cases, I still make the so called "girlfriend of who and who" work when she is suppose to. Too bad.

The two notebooks I have got are under 冷冻, don't really have the need to use them since I have got my own notebook and hubby's got his office piece. Anyway, the Toshiba piece is simply too pretty to use, I still like in being kept under wraps in its packaging.

Given the men's TIMEX watch to father in law since his birthday's approaching, maybe I will just leave the lady's TIMEX watch alone and keep it in "cold storage" too.

Christopher's exam is finally over and it's much calmer at home without the stress of revising with him again and again, hubby can finally breathe. Nicholas and Bryan have been extremely naughty, wonder how long it will take for Nicholas to actually stop his nonsense behaviour.

Approaching Mid Year 2009

2009-05-18T14:35:00.004+08:00

Had a busy Saturday, sending our 小黑 for a thorough grooming job at Prospeed.

We were at the workshop by 9:00am as per appointment, and the job was done by 5:30pm on the same day. The result was stunning, all the acid rain markings, stains, and dirt were gone. From the outside to the inside, the engine and boot area all look brand new! The interiors of our car were steamed sterilised and smelling lovely. Prospeed definitely is professional, and all the staff were just so polite and service oriented. Winning the S$360 grooming voucher was simply wonderful. We felt 小黑 sure is much more happier after his spa.

Following the collection of our baby blackie after his spa session, we went to Patrick's parent house for a short gathering before going for our dinner. The restaurant was full, but thankfully we made an appointment a week before. However, the food were more of a disappointment. Perhaps we weren't use to the type of Teochew food the restaurant's serving. Just felt the food could have been done better. The person taking orders were too pressing, sales pushing all expensive stuff on the menu to us. There's hardly space for considering, this is even after I have told her to come back only after we are done discussing.

Sunday's quite a stay home affair, I am more prone to tiredness nowadays and the bed seems to be a huge magnet. Patrick said I'm just so lazy recently... But I just couldn't help it, hopefully I will get better soon. Though I'm tired, I still face difficulty finding a good sleeping position, thus, it has been making me more tired.

Major Happenings....

2009-05-05T14:25:00.005+08:00

Our house is all hyper with a happening, there's loads and loads of discussions going on. Pros and Cons all flipped out for analyse, dilemmas, etc.
Finally after a week's of "what ifs", "how", "oh dear", and all, our family's came to a decision. It sure wasn't easy. Things are going to be a lot more considerations and planning in the future for our family.

Things aren't all rosy everyday, there's bound to be ups and downs. Hopefully, our decision is going to be a good one.

Toshiba Satellite M300

2009-04-30T17:01:00.006+08:00

Wow, another pretty notebook won, it's the Toshiba Satellite M300!

Patrick hubby said a courier man phoned him today, that there is a delivery for him. And soon after that, the notebook was delivered to his office. At first, hubby was asking me about it, but I told him I had no idea since there's no letter or email prior to the delivery. He told me it's most probably a scam. I checked back, it's actually a contest we have entered over in MTV Switch Contest, we actually won the 1st prize!!!!!!! YIPEEEEeeeeee! Our green tip proposal has won for ourselves a Energy-efficient notebook powered by Intel@Centrino 2 Processor.

Now we have the Lenovo and Toshiba babies... Thank you to God for his generosity!

Opened up the packaging which is a normal looking carton box protecting the contents. Inside lays the Toshiba M300, it's cool! The keyboard's shiny and glossy, the overall design is just tech savy.

Patrick hubby said we are going to keep both laptops, the Lenovo S10 goes to Christopher our eldest boy.

My Lenovo IdeaPad S10 Skin Design Picked!

2009-04-24T17:17:00.004+08:00

I'm so happy, delighted, proud, and everything sweet. The organiser of the Lenovo IdeaPad S10 Skin Design competition, has picked me as the Amateur Category winner!
It's a really timely gift, I was just thinking of getting a laptop for Christopher and I'm informed that I'm one of the winner. Lenovo called me on my mobile to get me to send them my NRIC copy to verify my identity. Then, I'm dropped a email the next day to inform that my design has been picked! Yipee!!!! I'm honestly delighted.
Patrick hubby told me I must have interpreted wrongly, my prize must be a laptop skin, not a laptop. I told him it's true, the organiser told me my unit is brand new and a white set. I was hoping it would come in the skin I have designed, but they told me it's not included. Nevermind, I'm just as overjoy!
I'm going to try to collect the prize next week...

A kind soul is offering me US$11,000,000!!

2009-04-10T20:19:00.005+08:00

Hello dearest one.

It is good writing you today although we haven't known nor met each other before. It is true that this letter may come to you as a surprise. Nevertheless, I humbly ask you to give me the benefit of doubt and hear me out.

My name is Mrs. Nandalia Ryan from Solomon Islands. I am married to Mr. Tyler Dave Ryan who worked with our Embassy in Ivory Coast ( Cote D'ivoire ) for a period of 9 years before he died . We were married for 12 years without a child. He died after a brief illness that lasted for only four days.Since his death I decided not to remarry due to my religious belief . When my late husband was alive he deposited the sum of US$11,000,000 (eleven million American dollars ) with a Bank in Cote D'ivoire. Presently this money is still in the custody of the Bank in Cote D'ivoire. Recently, my Doctor told me that I would not last for the next Eight months due to cancer illness.

Having known my condition I decided to donate this fund to a church, organisation or good person that will utilise this money the way I am going to instruct herein.I want a church, organisation or good person that will use this funds to help the orphans, widows and other people that need financial assistance. Using part of this money to build companies and establish businesses that will create job opportunities for the jobless population. l took this decision because I don't have any child that will inherit this money . Moreover, my husband relatives are pagans and it had been their wish to see my husband dead in order to inherit his wealth since we have no son. These people are therefore not worthy of this inheritance. This is why I am taking this decision.

I don't need any telephone communication in this regard because of my ill-health since the presence of my husband's relatives are around me always. I don't want them to know about this development for security reasons.As soon as I receive your reply I will give you the contact of the Bank in Cote d'ivoire where this fund is deposited. I will also issue a letter of authorisation to the bank that will prove you the present beneficiary of this money. I also want you to always uplift me in prayer.

Any delay in your reply may give me room to search for another good person for this same purpose. Please assure me that you will act accordingly as I stated herein.Hoping to receive your response soonest.

Thanks and Remain blessed.

Yours sincerely,

Mrs. Nandalia Ryan

Wow, somebody's wrote me a email to offer me US$11,000,000!! That's a lot, in case you don't know, it's Eleven Million American Dollars!! Wow! That sure is a lot to make one's heart thump in excitement! Above is a copy of the email sent to my Yahoo! mailbox.

I told myself it's hardly got to real, how the hell would anyone want to give some stranger such a huge sum of money?

I wrote back with warm wishes and hoping she would not be suffering too much. Then this person wrote to me twice, hoping I would accept! Wow, this is really an extinct species, dumping money to stranger desperately?

Finally, she wrote to me, thanking me for hopefully willing to help (when I haven't said anything). The email asked me for my name, address, contact numbers and my photo. Honestly, I wish this person had been much more smarter. It's highly noticable that the first the email was sent through a Yahoo! Japan's email, subsequently it changes to Yahoo! Thailand's email.

I wrote to tell her I am really sorry that she is so sick and willing to trust a stranger like me. I am so touched that I am asking the Embassy of Ireland for help to arrange a visit to her!

Hopefully she will enjoy this last email of mine to her, and get so touch that she will not be able to email me anymore. Seriously, if you intend to scam, at least be much more smarter than the average brains.

Fairly wonderful weekends...

2009-04-06T15:01:00.006+08:00

From top left to right: Me, Bjorn Olausson, Ng Lay Peng

From bottom left to right: Pow Wan Fei, Benny Gustavsson, Ang Hock Seng

Here's a lovely photo taken of the few colleagues I adore, it was taken during our company's New Year dinner for 2009. Bjorn's our business unit's boss. There's my buddy Lay Peng, she's the executive secretary to Bjorn, my sister, my best friend in the office. She's also my senior (the extinct kind!), you hardly find your senior teaching you everything she knows nowadays. She's always doing many things for me, covering up for me when I'm taking leave and on medical leaves. She sent me lovely presents for christmas, birthdays, and even presents to my 3 little boys. Now, how many such wonderful buddy can you find from among your colleagues in the workplace? Yes, please envy me now...

I have finally completed the 2nd module presentation and report writing for my studies (after much stress). It's left with the exam next week and a week rest before the 3rd module starts! Hubby has been wonderful, he arranged for us to stay at Royal Plaza Scotts last Friday. It is a very welcome gesture, something for us to get away from our daily routine of stress. We made reservation for the S$168.00++ room package, it comes with breakfast for both of us at the lovely Carousel. Being corporate customer, we were upgraded to the Deluxe room and enjoyed the privileage of a late check out the next day at 1800hr. Hubby used his amex card and we were upgraded to the Club room. Overall, the stay was good, cosy room, there's a glass which actually links the bathroom to the room view. For privacy, there's the bind...

Our dream is to experience every hotels in Singapore, so far, we have accomplished only a few...

1. Pan Pacific Marina Hotel

2. Ritz Carlton Hotel

3. Carlton Hotel

4. Hotel 81 Chinatown ( we won't stay in another budget hotel ever again! )

5. Hilton Hotel

6. Royal Plaza Scotts

Sunday, I suggested to Hubby about going condo viewing for the Mi Casa which is just a street away from our house. We brought along the youngest (Bryan) since the elder two boys wanted to stay home. It was all bright and sunny at 10 plus in the morning. The condo is a project by Far East Organisation, their system is such that there are rows and rows of housing agents seated under the tentage waiting for viewers to show up. We were told the project is only officially launch next week and we are at the pre-launch. A ERA agent was assigned to us. He seems rather senior and experienced but honestly, I kind of pity him as he seems to be in a state of low morale and yet trying his best. I told myself to be nicer to him, hoping it will booast his morale in some ways.

In the showroom, there's a crowd, housing agents, viewers, bankers, and technicians (still fixing up the model of the property). Seems like they are launching the blocks of Mi Casa in phases, so as they go along, they add in the new blocks. Sales seem pretty good, we noticed that some agents actually hold access to different units, perhaps they are given the option or perhaps they pre-booked the units?!

From the show of the chart, it seems like units are going fast. Whoever said it's the economy recession now? Or perhaps people are striking lottery overnight and I have missed out the chances since I don't buy lottery? 3 room units going at estimation of SGD 790K (after 16% discount) are going fast, even more so for the 2 room units.

We were told that there's a 1 percent discount for residents staying nearby, and another 15% of discount for whatever reason. Hubby and I were tempted, but we told ourselves it's really not that worthy to pay such price for a CCK condo unit. It wasn't even freehold and if we get a second hand unit elsewhere which is freehold, the price could easily be SGD 600K now. So, we just went around soaking in the astmosphere of the showroom and other people excited over the units.

Just as we planned to leave, it had to rain, so we had no choice but to stray around.

Our overall vedict, our financial status now doesn't allow us to dabble in property, my 3 mischevious imps still need a large surface area to move around in. So, our current home is the best choice yet, they are having enough space to cycle and drive around in their motorcar...

Something about my current studies...

2009-04-01T09:03:00.003+08:00

Something distressing... one of my pet crayfish died yesterday, it's the biggest one I have caught to date. Then this morning, another big one died!! Wonder what's wrong with them, I have been getting home late these few days to be able to do anything. Hopefully the other fellows will be alright.

My part time studies are kind of tedious, especially with a deteriorating mind, it isn't easy. Perhaps as we human beings grow old, our brain cells sort of die off? Hopefully I would be able to get through the whole 20 months course wonderfully.

Currently, I'm into the 2nd module, touching on Management Processes and Organisation Behaviour. Guess what? Our group is doing Managing Stress in a Work Organisation! I am stress and so perhaps studying more stuff about what is stress, how is stress formed and ways to manage it, actually might help eliminate some of my stress? (Trust me, it doesn't work)

Instead of my stress decreasing now that I have gained more knowledge about stress, it's increasing. Stress from the report writing, preparing the powerpoint slides, and getting ready for the presentation. Date of submission and presentation is tomorrow, hopefully our group will be able to impress well enough to get a good score.

Lazy Saturday...

2009-03-28T10:05:00.005+08:00

This is to the chipping lady...

Goodness, if you are reading this, you deserve a treat of kuay teow from me liao...
(I let you choose ah, thin or thick noodles?)

I have been lazy putting up the photos from our Hong Kong trip.
Doing study projects with lovely team mates, having a discussion this Saturday afternoon.
(Kind of lazy...)

Hubby and I getting stress over Christopher's primary one studies...

Having a presentation in front of the whole class next Thursday and the presentation slides haven't even been done yet...

Week before my Holiday

2009-03-03T15:58:00.004+08:00

Time flies, it's down to the week before our family flies off to Hong Kong for our 6 days' holiday. The kids are all excited and counting down to the date of our departure to Hong Kong. But the youngest Bryan is clueless about how to count the dates and has been asking everyday whether we are flying off tomorrow.

After much fickle minded moments and checking on the various hotels in Hong Kong, we have decided on one. That is Royal Plaza Hong Kong, it is located in Mongkok. As our groups comprises of my mum, Patrick hubby and the three young boys, we have decided to go ahead with 2 rooms. I have the almost confirmed feeling that the hotel sales manager really hate me since I have been making many requests. Pardon my irritating behaviour since I have no choice but to try to ensure comfortness for the 3 boys and my mum. My requests range from the non-smoking floor, interconnecting rooms, king size bed for one and double double beds for the other, to how do we get to the hotel since our flight is late arrival... Thankfully, he hasn't decide to blacklist me from his hotel.

Our itinerary comprises of Disneyland, Tai O, Big Buddha, Shenzhen, Ladies Market, The Peak, famous temples and so on... (I'm already worrying about how much we would be spending)! Hopefully the boys doesn't get too tired with all the walking and sightseeing.

One thing Patrick hubby and I are looking forward to, is the lovely cold weather in Hong Kong now! We love indulging ourselves in air con temperature places, it beats being all sweaty and sticky in warm places. I bet my kids and mum would love the cold temperature too, still, we are preparing warm jackets for the kids to keep them warm enough (what contradictions right!).

I hope I would have time to take loads of photos from the trip and post them here (that is if I am not busy looking after the 3 little imps).

Hear me offload...

2009-02-24T13:38:00.006+08:00

Oh god, I seriously feel I have been bitten by the Laziness Bug.

I have been so out of touch with the following recently...
- Posting new entries in my blog
- Posting new photos in my blog
- Taking part in contests (that's why I haven't won anything for ages, it's becos I'm lazy)

Even I have been feeling so very happy just with the 1 week rest from my part time studies. Trust me, the test for my 1st module made me felt like a complete moron. Imagine the test was just a sheet of A4 paper and on it were 10 sentences. We need to spot the grammer mistakes and my mind went blank. I have wasted my life for the past 30 years... The 10 sentences look all fine to me!!! Oh dear... And the presentation test where 2 other group members and I had to present our report. We really sucks! Lecturer told the class beforehand that no one is to read from notes during the presentation, and we dutifully obey. We were given a chance to draw lots and ended up being the 1st group to present. The result, 3 of us panicking and forgetting what we were supposed to say. The rest of the other groups read from their notes in front of everyone. The lecturer said they were good. I learnt my lesson, for the next 9 modules, whoever told me I should never read from notes during a presentation, is deadmeat.

Tonight's going to be the start of Module 2's lessons. It's going to be 2 tiring days a week from now on again. I got to go for lessons twice a week after work and end up home only by 11pm.

Oh right, the past weekend was good. Saturday morning was spent with Christopher at school to take part in some handicraft session. Met with "ugly" parents, even doing handicrafts for the school community, people can get all kiasu. We are told to bring a pair of scissor, UHU glue and staples. I bought 3 pairs of scissors along and one by one were borrowed away by parents who don't bother to listen to instructions (they came empty handed). I ended up having to borrow from my neighbour parent who bought 2 pairs. Parents started to fight for seats, fight for things to do, fight for recognition... Christopher and I were early, we sat down and started to learn how to do the handicraft. Later, as parents started to crowd in, the teacher told us to divide into different stations for each stage.

I asked the teacher whether Christopher could stay with me and just do the weaving process of the ribbon since our station was in charge of cutting while another station is in charge of weaving. She is fine since he's young and other kids are running around. Another mother started to talk to Christopher and said since he can do it, so can she. If the teacher scold her for not following instruction, he should get scolded too. My goodness, I can't believe that a mature mother would say something like this to a kid. So, I told her I have checked with the teacher beforehand and got permission. She is unhappy and turn away. *sigh*

Finally, we finished our station's duties of cutting. I told Christopher we should be leaving as I saw other parents are fighting for a part in the last station of putting the ribbons on. This just shows how too many cooks can spoil the broth.

Returning home, we had a rest. Hubby was actually in a good mood, he actually brought Nicholas and Bryan out to the supermarket for grocery shopping. He returned with the 2 beaming boys, they actually bought some sweets too.

Around 2pm, we decided to go fishing for crayfish again and got my mum to go along. It was raining by the time we got there but we decided that it would be fine since it's drizzling. Heavy rain came and we ran for the shelter. Finally the rain stopped, we went all out and ended up with 50 crayfish! Haha! Really broke our record, it was a good catch, just took us about 3 hours. We were walking along the edge of the water and found a "giant" one on the grass, it is the largest we have seen, at about 25cm. Too bad it's dead, we wonder how it's landed on the grass, what a pity. But my catch wasn't too bad as I got a few of 13cm and one fat one at about 17cm with fairly big claws. We decided to release all the rest of the smaller ones back into the water. End up, we only kept 8 pieces of what we caught. We throw in one big netful and some Chinese students were surprised and ask whether they could have the rest. So, we gave the rest to them. We managed to get the newbies settled well into my tank and mum's tank.

The next day, Sunday, we decided to go in the afternoon at around the same time to see whether we could find any big ones. Mum got really lucky, she caught one huge mama and she's bursting with babies. There were hundreds of them. The babies were newly hatched and most of them dropped off and were crawling around in our container. We found some were clinging on to each other and were worried they might be biting each other. I told hubby I would keep a few of the babies and put all the rest back into the water near the seaweed patch. This way, there would always be crayfish for everyone. We did not manage to find any big one that day, hubby said that we should stop for a while to let the crayfish reproduce before I wipe them all out.

Hong Kong here we come....!!!!!

2009-02-19T10:20:00.004+08:00

Yes, dearest Sis, I read your blog frequently and I miss you very very much!!!
(I know you will be reading this too, don't wipe that smile off your face, I can see!)

Long planned and delayed trip to Hong Kong, trust me, it's really really tough to be going on holidays nowadays. Let me list you the reasons why...

1. Economy downturn nowwwwww..... in case you haven't notice
2. I have 3 kids, a house, a maid, a car and many more expenses to watch out for
3. Travelling with 3 kids isn't funny, it's like lagging along 3 huge uncontrollable bombs
4. Travelling as a big family is costly, air tickets, accommodations, tickets to attractions,
transports, food and beverages...

After much pestering and brain washing from Patrick hubby that we deserve a holiday break, bring the kids to take their first aeroplane ride, I gave in. Alright, I admit I would love to go to Hong Kong for a trip too. I can shop and bargain, I enjoy the lovely cold temperature there and everything. So, I agreed with Patrick hubby that we should just go and worry about the future later. By the way, we managed to brain washed my mum into going with us for the trip. She hasn't been to Hong Kong before and I felt strongly she would love the place.

The trip would be taking place next month in March, it's partly thanks to the great promotion deal by Singapore Airlines too. We managed to grap the 2 to go deal which means each adult costs a nett price of S$398.00 for the round trip while the kid fare is nett S$295.00. Now, we are racking our heads off over the accommodation, wondering over which hotel to book. We need a hotel that is clean, good to accommodate 3 in a room as we are going to book 2 rooms since the kids will need someone to look after.

If you are reading this and you have good recommendation or good hotel rates, please please do share with me.

We will be going for 6 days, covering the Disneyland for the kids, the ladies night market for me, and many many other places for Patrick hubby and mum. So we will be taking it at a relaxing pace since we don't really want to be dragging the kids and my mum around too hard. But Shenzhen would definitely be one place we will be going too.

More updates soon...

Back from long absence...

2009-02-13T15:45:00.008+08:00

Arrggghhh... I'm finally back after a long absence, been occupied with my part time studies of rushing through report writing for the project with a blank mind. It's one week of rest before the next module begins.

In the meantime, my home tank is bursting with activities by the blue crayfish Patrick hubby and I have caught, not forgetting my mum. There's about 100 plus of the cuties we have caught, ranging from the baby sizes to the bigger sizes... Mum's home tank is holding about 30 of them while our home tank is holding 50. We have given a few away during our "prawning" trips, mainly to cute little kids whom haven't manage to catch any... Patrick Hubby has bought 2 reds from the shop and they are growing great with the blues.

Alright, all of a sudden, we are bitten by the prawning bugs which got us all crazy and obsessed. Sometimes we actually visualised the whiskers of the crayfish when we are sleeping!! Oh my god!

Haha, the smallest range from 3cm to the biggest at 16cm. We are feeding them lobster food pellets and bloodworms. Our tank has a block of wood and stacking rocks to let them hide in happily eventhough sometimes they fight. Now we have taken precaution to cover up the tanks with a net as the biggest one actually managed to make it's way out of the tank one night. Now, our tank is place in the living room which is quite a distance from our kids' room. The guy actually found it's way passed the kitchen, our study room and to the kids' room to pull on our maid's hair! She had a bad scare!! But it was initially when we started rearing them, now my maid's even capable to grab hold of them from the back as they wave their claws around.

There's been a few cases of molting, we actually found an empty shell one morning... what a pity we have never been able to capture the whole process. I told hubby they must be shy and only molt when the light's out at night.

新的一年，新的出发！

2009-01-12T13:50:00.005+08:00

Alright, let me try to get a post down in mandarin (eventhough my mandarin sucks!).

新的一年，可有的忙。。。

三个小可爱，老大 Christopher 要上一年级，老二 Nicholas 要上幼儿园K2，老三 Bryan 还在家里称王（因为他才快要三岁）。经过一番辛苦，紧张的为 Christopher 报名和为学校做了56小时的义工（minimum is 40 hours, but i did more because I'm kiansu!). 我们很辛运，他被入取了！！（谢天谢地）

经过了紧密的圣诞，新年，就是我们的华人过年！好像有点太快了的感觉，使得有点喘不过气了。

今年又有我自己的 Part-time studies, 一个星期两堂课，又兼 Project... 希望我可以做的很好。

最近，我突然爱上了到 reservoir 的 fishing ground 捕捉小龙虾 (so called lobster or crayfish)。在最初的时候，老公Patrick 和我可是一只都捉不到。现在，我们可是捉到一共有30只大大小小的。而我们也有了一位好友 Rick 和我老妈的长参于。收获也抱括一条 soonhock鱼，一条 catfish鱼。有趣的是，我们昨天还发现了一种可爱的鱼，BumbleBee (超像 nemo).

Guess what, we have got a new tank kindly sponsor by a buddy friend Rick, he has lobang for fish tanks and managed to get us one that is 2ft. We shifted our lobsters of various sizes to it and added in a block of woods plus stones for them to climb around on. We caught one pregnant lobster over the weekend and it's bursting with eggs underneath... Hubby and I did not notice anything at first and when it was put into the tank, we saw all the tiny red eggs it's carrying! Lucky we managed to saw that and have since shifted the mama to a seperate small container to let it stay by itself.

Two of the red lobsters we had actually mated last evening, hubby was all excited upon discovering them in action after we had our dinner. One of them forced the other to turn onto its back and it grabbed hold of the claws and hold on to it dearly with the rest of the 4 pairs of small legs... (interesting discovery).

I think there's ten over of them in the tank now... We were back at the fishing place on Sunday at 6 plus in the evening. I found only fishes and caught a few of the baby lobsters, just as it was turning dark, I discovered a really huge lobster with big fat claws but my net was too small to catch it in and with the sky turning dark... I have to give up and head for home. (wat a waste)

Let me take some photos when I have the time and post them here.... : )

Contest Junkie - Mr. Dallas

2009-01-05T11:45:00.004+08:00

New Year 2009, my first gift of the year is very lovely, well thought out and unique. It's a really sweet surprise, I received it on a Monday morning (5th January 2009). Don't be surprise, it's because I was actually on leave today since I still need to be around to guide my maid around on how to bring the oldest boy to and from his new primary school.

The postman came and left me a registered parcel, surprise surprise, I found Contest Junkie Mr. Dallas' name on it! I opened up the package and found this lovely golden flower embossed box, on the box, it wrote " 富贵满堂", meaning good fortune and prosperity to the family. Find out more about Contest Junkie's second trip to China in Year 2008, he's having loads of fun in the winter land of China! http://cornflict.blogspot.com/2008/12/cornflict-giveaway-beijing-trip.html

Opening up the box, beatifully laid out in the yellow silk cloth, are a pair of dragon engraved chopsticks. There are two lovely painted mandarin ducks too, they are the chopsticks resters!

Noticed the chinese wordings on the cover? It wrote that food is the basic for human beings, and many other really lovely well meant verses.

A close up on the mandarin ducks and the dragon engraved chopsticks... really lovely...

I didn't know Dallas is going to be getting me something for the trip, plus, he's already sent me a lovely Christmas card for year 2008. Something you might not have noticed if you haven't been to his site frequently, he's a really young chap whom's still studying and already managing a blog that is huge on loads of traffic and contest links that are updated almost daily. Truthfully, I wonder how he gets all the contests' details daily. Oh ya, he's even been featured on the newspaper if you have noticed. A lot of achievements for a young lad like him...

I love gifts and surprises, but for one that is well thought, unique and with a lovely meaning behind it, that is not what you would always get. My first surprise gift for Year 2009 and I got this, it's really sweetttttt.....

HAPPY NEWWWWwwwww YEARrrrrrrrr!

2008-12-30T13:31:00.004+08:00

恭喜发财，身体健康，万事如意！

(Gong Xi Fa Cai, Good Health, May All Things go Your Way!)

To all dear lovely friends, the New Year 2008 is soon coming to a close, let's us welcome Year 2009 with open hearts and hope that everything would be smooth sailing, everyone's health is at its' best and so on!

Guess what I have been up to recently? Something unglamourous, shocking and truly strange...

Hubby and I have been going "crazy" prawning, in case you don't know, it is prawn catching. We have been at reservoirs' legal fishing spots to catch prawns and baby crayfishs / lobsters, we have managed to get a good catch of about 20 crayfishs / lobsters so far. This is shocking becos we have never been into fishing, I am still twitching and don't even dare to touch my own catch! But, somehow, it's just so fun that we are hooked on it crazely at the moment. We have even got a guy friend of ours into this new found hobby. His aquarium is full of the baby crayfishs peeping from into the wood pieces he had provided for them to hide in. Hubby and I have got 3 little fish tanks to keep ours in.

We have got 2 red ones and 2 blue ones (with a red streak on each claws) living in one of our bigger tank, while the rest of the babies are residing in the other 2 tanks. I will post of photos of them in here soon.

Just the last trip, we ventured down to Kranji Reservoir at around 5:30pm and found that on the other side where the nature reserve is, people are digging for la la (clams) in the low tide mud. I persuaded hubby and our friend to go take a look at what the crowds were doing, found them having bucketfulls of la la. But if you are as scare of earthworms (big fat red ones) as me, complete with yucky sinking dirty mud, then forget it. By the time we were through, our feet were just so dirty and covered in mud, I felt all squisy seeing big fat red earthworms everywhere on the mud!

The walk was still great, I found many marine lifes along the mud which is nearer to the water edge, seems like corals which actually opens up into a flower... Then, there were a lot of horse shoes (a kind of crab) around.

If you like such stuff, bring your family or friends down. Be sure to check up on the low tide timing and be extra cautious not to venture out too far.

It's Christmas Eve, following by Christmas Day...

2008-12-24T10:50:00.004+08:00

How's everyone of you?

It's Christmas Eve and Christmas Day the next,

have you bought all the necessary gifts?

I have been busy preparing for my colleagues, friends and most importantly, my three little sons. Finally, it's time for me to take a short break.

I wish all of you Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Love,

Eileen

Nothing in life is perfect, I am trying to be strong each day...

2008-12-23T10:13:00.005+08:00

A lady walks into Tiffany's. She browses around, spots a beautiful diamond bracelet and walks over to inspect it. As she bends over to inspect the bracelet more closely, she inadvertently breaks wind.

Very embarresed, she looks around nervously to see if anyone has noticed her little accident and prays that a sales person doesn't pop up right now.

As she turns around, her worst nightmare materializes in the form of a salesman standing right behind her.

Cool as a cucumber and displaying complete professionalism, the salesman greets the lady with,

'Good day, Madam. How may we help you today?'

Very uncomfortably, but hoping that the salesman may just not have been there at the time of her little 'accident', she asks,

'Sir, what is the price of this lovely bracelet?'

He answers,

'Madam, if you farted just looking at it, you're going to shit yourself when I tell you the price.'

How many times have I been sad, as in real sad, this year 2008? I know that nothing's perfect in life, it's the salt and pepper occassionally that will make you appreciate your life better. I have a family, my husband and 3 lovely kids, including a house, a maid and a car... There is my career that I can't complain much about in this gloomy economy, friends both good and bad to balance out each other...

Okay, it's Christmas Eve tomorrow and I'm feeling really down. Something happened, and I am very very upset right now, I need to find someone to talk to, but I can't seem to find that someone. How many colors can you see around you? I can only see a shade of grey. 我的世界是灰色的，一片黑暗的。

My life has dropped to a the deepest of the deep, just the other day, someone was still sending me something about whether it's possible to cry when you are underwater. Yes, I am certain it's possible.

Bringing You WINTER from Sundsvall

2008-12-17T09:54:00.004+08:00

Snowy white winter, so very magical and mysterious, I am going to save up very hard to spend at least a week of winter in a snowy white country! My boss sent me some photos of his hometown Sundsvall in Switzerland, now it's winter and snow is everywhere, this will be so till March 2009.

Look at the all the white snows covering the trees, it's freezing cold and animals such as the porcupines, the bears, the snakes, all are hiding up somewhere sleeping.

Look at the moon! White as the snow, hanging up high in the sky, shining down. It's so so magical.

During winter time, the daylight is short, darkness approaches so quickly that it sort of turns people lazy and depress. Sort of makes you felt like going to sleep early and no mood to do any other stuff such as shopping and taking a walk in the dark out on the snow...

All the snow needs to be clear away, especially when your car is cover fully in snow, one needs to ensure it's not going to freeze your engine. Walkway needs to be clear too, so that one could travel around.

Alright, it might not be much fun for people whom lives in such countries where months of the year are spent getting all freeze up and not able to travel much with all the snow. But I still love it! Just like how my boss love our sunny island and getting all sun tan to get his skin damage! haha!

He hates the part of ensuring the house is equipped with well working heat insulation and heating system during winter, wearing thick clothes and having problems with laundry (the part in getting them dry), being stuck at home most of the time when everywhere is covered thickly in snow, day turns to night so fast that it makes him depress... haha! That's the different pespective of views when each side of the penny thought that the other side is always better.

2008-12-16T10:52:00.006+08:00

It's December once again! The lovely month of the year which is just great for a escape from our daily slogging at work. Are you thinking of escaping to a quiet relaxing place which allows you to leave all the stress which you have been carrying for the past one year?

I am thinking of doing just this, a voice inside me is telling me to escape, break loose from the daily timetable of reporting at work lifestyle. I'm dreaming of a lovely sandy beach complete with gentle blue sea for me to take a dip in. Just like a hermit crab, relaxing in it's own world.

Green palmy trees surrounding me as I relax, birds chipping away and the bright sunlight shining down on me. So Zen and Calmy on the soul.

FRIDAY!!!

2008-12-05T14:49:00.004+08:00

Yes! It's good old friday, my favourite day of the week, and Monday's Hari Raya Haji which means that it's going to be 3 days of rest away from the office.

I finally got the confirmation this week, that I'm confirmed entry to the course which I have applied for. The lessons are going to be twice a week and in all, it would be for 20 months. The company's sponsoring me for the course, I'm going to be bond for 6 months, that means I would have to work for the company for 26 months, I hope nothing bad happens during this period to make my life unbearable. Really grateful to my business unit bosses' support, they have been encouraging me to go for it. Hope I don't fail the exams and disappoint anyone. It's going to be tough since my brain cells seem to be deteriorating rather badly nowadays. Haha!! Alrite, perhaps it's my 3 sons whom have been taking all the calciums and brain cells from me over the past few years?

It's highly likely and logical...

Oh, I'm feeling so sleepy, been yawning away since after my lunch hour... the sleeping bugs are going round, Lay Peng is feeling sleepy too. Perhaps it's cause the office is just too quiet? Most of the guys are travelling except for Pow and Janetud, so it's only 4 of us at our business unit section.

Later after work, I still got to attend the 1st teambuilding session at the institute, following by another session tomorrow morning... Agrrrhhhh, already feeling lazy just imagining myself taking the mrt downtown again to the institute on a weekend morning. It feels so much like going to work.

Counting down to Christmas 2008!

2008-12-02T09:10:00.005+08:00

Christmas 2008 is approaching.....

Hubby and I were at IMM's Giant supermart over the weekends and we came across Christmas Trees that weren't too costly... We bought one at the height of 70 inches at $12.99. Plus a box of blue and silver decors going at $26.90 and musical flicking lights at $23.50. We were thinking of giving our 3 little boys something to remind them of their childhood christmas, since hubby and I did not have any christmas tree in our homes before.

The kids were excited when we got home, it took quite a while for me to get the tree standing up, pulling at the branches and trying to make them look bushy... (I'm already dreading the job of keeping it after christmas and was telling hubby perhaps we can keep it till Chinese New Year to hang red packets!). The 3 kids were gathering round and trying to help, I told them they could help hang up the decors after mummy's finished struggling to pull out the branches in making them look like a tree.

I choosed to place the tree in the living room, but Christopher asked me why we can't place it in our other living room which is just outside our bedrooms... kids will be kids, always having funny ideals, I had to tell him that it wouldn't be the centre of attraction if it's kept in the living room away from the main door.

Finally, I'm done trying to make the tree look bushy, it's time to put up the decors. The 3 boys were all excited and started to hang up the stars, balls and everything else. The result, the tree ends up looking like a grape tree, with 3 to 4 balls hanging together at the tip of one branch. Hubby and I had to laugh, the kids were all happy and proud while mummy started to tell them that some parts of the tree looks bare and they have to adjust the "grapes" to look more spread out and even... haha!!

Finally, all decors and the lights were up! We switched on the power and WOW! Everone loves it, the kids were very happy and they asked me where's the presents to put under the tree... Luckily Hubby and I purchased advance Christmas gifts for the 3 of them, and they were allowed to place them under the tree : )

A little about my Company's 2008 Dinner

2008-12-01T13:16:00.007+08:00

My colleagues, my joy, this is one family I have been with for one year three months. Alrite, there's Bjorn, Lay Peng, Pow, Benny, Ang, Nelson, Murugan and Janetud. Year 2008 year end dinner was a joy and lovely evening at Orchard Hotel's Lavender 2 ballroom on 24th November 2008. What makes a good dinner would comprise of whom you are dining with, and in this case, I have the joy of sharing a table with people I love.

Lay Peng was my best buddy in the office, this is a rare find. Especially considering she's my senior whom's been with the company for ten over years.

She's always guiding me along, patient, kind, wise, lovely, pretty and everything. How often is it that you could actually find a buddy whom treats you like a sister in the work place? I am appreciating her alot and one of the factor that makes me looking forward to each day at work, would be her and the other great guys in our business group. Haha, I am getting all sentimental on a Monday afternoon. This is so strange, perhaps it's the powerful lunch I had just a short while ago and the chicken rice is doing something funny to me??! Nelson, whom you won't see in the photos here, is my boss in charge initially...

But well, things kind of change and following, there's some reporting changes in our work. Oh well, anyway, he's still my boss. A kind bespectacle teochew man who is always busy, with piles of paper on his work desk... Something funny too, he's got about 4 - 5 suitcases in his room, each is designated for which countries and length of stay he would be on a business trip. I remember one of my 3 sons asking him why his room is so messy when they were visiting me in the office one day. Haha, kids would be kids, so frank and innocent.

Then, there's Mr. Bjorn and Mr. Benny, two swedish men. Mr. Bjorn is our business unit's vice president and Mr. Benny's our senior inspector. Both are rare men whom doesn't womanize, rare because to me, all Ang-Mos are flirts and womanizers. Haha, sorry!!! Opppppps.... Benny's very cute, he's sometimes shy when I tease him about his Singaporean chinese gf, he's sweet becos he's always offering us lovely sweets from Sweden when he's back from his home trips. There's the unique black swedish sweets which taste salty!

There's Janetud, a Thai nationality whom is firm and sometimes joke with us alot, a good homely guy. Pow and Ang is really good uncles, they took good care of me and Lay Peng, always stuffing us with food such as you-tias, han ji beng and cakes... I'm seriously getting so fat. Murugan's an Indian and he's seriously funny too, he can do serious stuff of yoga, bending over into half, touching his forehead against his knee caps. Perfect and wow!

Wednesday - 26th November 2008 (One more month to Chirstmas)

2008-11-26T14:35:00.004+08:00

It wasn't so bad a week after all, 无惊无险, it's mid week already. Look at the above cuties, I just received email from xin.sg that I have won them! Wow, to win in this contest, there is spamming involved (the more entries you sent in, the more chances of winning). I actually thought I did not spam much???! Anyway, most probably not much people like the cuties as much as I do.

I love the dog bone crayons and the watch, haha, aren't they cute?

More more prizes for me please!!!

A very tiring Tuesday Yawn Yawn

2008-11-25T09:02:00.005+08:00

I am super tired today, my eyelips could not bring themselves to be lifted up today, and I see eyebags! A late Sunday night from attending the Channel 8's 45th anniversary event, following by a company annual dinner last night which ended at about 2200 hours, it proved to be a stress. My face features are showing the after effects symptoms already.

Dinner of 5 tables was held at Orchard Hotel's Lavendar 2 ballroom, with a Chinese wedding going on just at the opposite Orchard Grand Ballroom. Kind of a bad arrangement as the reception is just facing our ballroom and guests are a bit confused as to whether the settings of standing tall tables with peanuts and drinks are for which side of the guests.

The dinner was good, with courses of dishes such as cold dish comprising of tempura prawns / fish cake scallops / baby squids / jelly fish strips / thin slices of tender roasted duck, thick sharks fin soup with big chuncks of crab meat, big fresh scallops on simmered veggies, big dry scallop too on another dish, steamed fish, E-fu noodles and so on. Services were good, our plates were changed after each dish, serving staff were pleasantly polite. One bad point would be the E-fu noodles, it was badly done and soggy with gravy, look really unpleasant.

Another highlight of the night, the lucky draw prizes which were a disappointment. With 18 prizes going from a pair of movie tickets, 4 tickets to the Singapore Flyer, $30 voucher to Ben and Jerry Ice-cream, F&B vouchers to Taiwan Porridge and $250 Starhub vouchers, etc. I am totally thankful that I have won much better prizes elsewhere.

The washroom for the ladies, it was lovely done up and well maintained. We brought along 2 cartons of red wine and they were finished up by our guys, quite a few were tipsy so we guessed most of them would be late in reaching the office the next day. Atmosphere were great, everyone were joyful and enjoying themselves.

Today, I ended up really tiring and hope I don't doze off... must go for more tea and coffee to brace myself up eventhough they don't seem to have any effect in keeping me awake even when I took them before sleep...

Blue Monday!

2008-11-24T08:38:00.002+08:00

Oh my god!!!! Monday, and first thing I open up my office email to check, I found I have won a pair of JJ Party's tickets from Our Voice Box which was sent to me on Saturday, 22nd November 2008. The party was on 23rd November 2008, I missed it!

Agrrrrrhhhh.... so sad! What to do, at least I went to attend the Channel 8's 45th anniversary celebration on 23rd November 2008, which was yesterday. Loads of fans from where we were seated at the upper viewing gallery, they were blowing the whistles, screaming, shouting, waving their favourite actors / actresses posters! Lovely high power atmosphere from all their high powered energy... Hubby and I felt young again just by sitting among them.

Yesterday was Sunday, it's been a sort of unlucky encounters with a rather rude uncle in the morning at the NTUC supermart. He was grumbling away that I am blocking him when I was standing in line at the queue right in front of him, oh please, I stabbed him back real hard in response to his english, that if he can't queue, better stay at home and sleep. He was so angry, next I proceed to open my wallet and flash out my stash of gold credit cards as he was paying money and realised he didn't have enough. Then I said loudly, no money then still want to buy things! I was really angry at such rude people whom actually tries to rumble away in english, I sympathise with his wife whom was with him trying to ask him to shut up and have patience.

Over in the evening, at mediacorp, we were queuing to get into the studio. Then 3 aunties suddenly stood next to me and tried to squeeze in with us at the queue, I was really shocked. I stared daggers at them and told them to queue but they ignored. Aggrrr.... perhaps my face display a sign that said, please cut queue when you see me or I will be upset!

But overall, hubby and I were in at the studio and enjoyed the great show put up by all the very capable backstage staff whom were changing the back drops and props at every advertisements! The actresses and actors were ever so lovely and entertaining!

Weekly Updates - Week 47

2008-11-17T13:09:00.003+08:00

Today's Monday, the super I don't like it day of the week...
Monday - Unbearable, dragging myself to work day
Tuesday - Teeny itshy bit of feeling better than Monday, still unbearable though
Wednesday - Whole lot better, getting the mood to work already
Thursday - Resigning myself to work already, feeling loads better
Friday - Opps, just when I'm feeling better at work already, I'm looking forward to weekends

Past Saturday have been good, Patrick Hubby suddenly got this weird feeling of doing up a small celebration with good food at home! He decided on fried chicken wings, fishballs, sushi rolls, spring rolls, curry puffs, fried prawn ball, etc... I asked our dear sis Chean Pin to join in the fun! Concidentally, she's suffering from serious loss of blood and stomach cramps since her aunt's visiting her for the month. Poor girl, anywhere I forced her to join in, we picked her up in our car with Bryan before going off to the supermart for mass purchase of all the necessary ingredients...

Over at the supermart, we went round with our trolley sourcing high and low for the ingredients. We lugged all the stuff home, with Chean Pin still suffering from her yucky symptons. Me and hubby proceeded with the necessary preparation once we reached home, we got Chean Pin to relax in our room with the kids screaming and jumping around her. Hubby decided to warm a bottle of chicken essence to give to her in case she faint, we still cannot figure out why she's so skinny. Whenever she goes out with our family, my 3 sons look overfed whenever they are standing together... people must be gossiping we are horrible dad and mum whom gave all the good foods to our sons while the daughter is deprive of good food and works like a cinderella at home!! She's alarmingly skinny to the bones, you could practically snap her hand in two like a stick.

Hubby was really good today, he took care of all the frying stuff while Chean Pin and I settle the sushi roll stuff. We had luncheon meat cut into strips / japanese cucumber / tuna / carrot strips / egg / etc. Chean Pin did most of the rolling up while I was in charge of the cutting part. I got her to pack some home for her dad and mum.

Finishing with the cooking, hubby proceeded to do food presentation, ensuring all food were arranged nicely on plates before laying them on the table. The kids were excited and started to gather around, we proceeded to gobble up the food. Great day, relaxing at home with your lovely family members round a table of piping hot food.

Chean Pin had to be packed off home at about 1830hours since she's not staying due to her visiting aunt! No choice, hubby and I drove her back home after we stopped over at Salvation Army's Family Thrift Store. Tons of stuff there and first time we visited, hubby is wary of that place which might be filled with fleas since most of the stuff are donated by people. But I assure him that the stuff are cleaned up properly and we are just going to take a look. Many stuff there, imagine a knee lenght winter jacket with lovely fur trimmings around the cap area, going only for S$30!!! Wow!

Sunday, lazy lazy stay at home day, hubby and I only went out of the house to buy breakfast. And in the evening, when we decided to go pack dinner home, the car wouldn't start! Agrhhh! Hubby was in a really foul mood, we proceeded to walk to the market and he grumbled away about what could be the problem and how is he going to be absence from work when it's a Monday the next day.... But by the time we are having dinner, he's starting to feel better, and he decided to apply for leave to stay home so the car technician guy could drop by to check on the car.

(The next morning....) technician came to check, luckily it's only the battery problem and not some costly faults! *sigh of relief*

Back on my feet after a war against Fever!

2008-11-14T16:01:00.004+08:00

Yes, I'm recovering well enough in time for the weekends... though I still have a little throbbing headache someplace in my brain. Hope this wasn't as a result of perhaps my brain being burnt from all the high fevers going on.

It's been a rather uneventful week saved for little glintchy stuff... How many times in our life must we meet with poor souls whom doesn't have the slightest ashamed of themself stuff? I was on the train this morning and as usual, it's packed like sandines, irritating people with huge ugly bags shoving into other people and acting as if "It's only right"! Hubby was on reservist for 2 weeks and I have been taking the train to and fro work (back to days of the "before we have a car").

I was lucky I managed to get a seat when someone seated near where I was standing, alighted. And on two mornings, I encountered a lady shouting away "Please move to the centre". I looked and trust me, she's most probably blind or desperately in need of a pair of thick thick glasses, the train's practically filled with people right to the brim of the door and she's asking people to move to the centre of the train so she could get herself in. I can understand and forgive the train driver when he made announcement since there are cases where people just leave the train empty in some areas and love to stand next to the door and even in geniune cases of "packed sandines" trains, the poor driver can't possibly see for himself. But the lady is definitely unforgiveable, totally authorising and rude from the loud command of her voice, she should do self reflection on this. This morning, I overheard a little girl's voice saying just the same stuff. Perhaps her mother lost her voice from shouting the past few days and this is her daughter assisting her now...

Good and Bad things come together

2008-11-12T15:01:00.007+08:00

This week started off good enough, except by Monday afternoon, I was getting all cold and freezing in the office. I thought the airconditioner was on too strongly, but my bosses were all feeling warm. That was when I knew I was sick, freezing and trembling away, with a terrible margarine throbbing away in my head... I forced myself home on the mrt, travelling through the neverending 14 mrt stations before getting off and walked in a blurry state home for 15 minutes.
Hubby packed me off to the doctor that evening, the 3 kids follow suit as they were down with flu too. All 4 of us at our usual family clinic, I actually asked the doctor once whether he's considering giving our family a membership card for the countless times we have actually seen him. Doctor declare me at 39.5 degrees high fever, I felt totally wasted and awful. The fever came and go, I would be shivering with cold under a thick blanket one moment and the next I would be sweating away, this cycle went on for a few times till this morning. Now, I'm still feeling goggy, perhaps from the effect of taking nothing except for a piece of bread and water since Monday...

This morning, I came in to the office, switched on my computer and found the Rednano Laptop Skin which comes free, have arrived and I can collect it anytime... then Xin.sg dropped email to informed that I have won a pair of Concert passes to Y2J 神木与瞳 for this coming Saturday 15 Nov 2008 performance at the Lunar Asian Fusion Bar! Coming in to my blog site, lovely Quachee told me that I have been choosen to win Ken Lyen's CD!

Thank you to all whom actually tries making me feel better eventhough I'm feeling rotton from all the fever and cold stuff...

Madagascar - Escape to Africa

2008-11-05T17:12:00.004+08:00

Are you an adult whom watches cartoon?

Then you have to catch hold of MADAGASCAR - ESCAPE TO AFRICA!

The movie is wonderfully done up and plotted, I was at the preview over in Cineleisure last night having won a pair of tickets to it. The official release date of the movie would be 13th November 2008.

Hubby brought along Christopher and Bryan to fetch me from work before we proceeded to Cineleisure for dinner before the movie's showtime at 7:45pm. There was only a pair of tickets, so I have decided to shop around with Bryan while Christopher is accompanied by his dad. I was hanging around outside after they have gone in, and the lovely organisation actually still have leftover tickets since some winners did not show up. I was kindly offered to go in with Bryan. Thank you, lovely lady with the sweet smile and kind heart.

We were blessed to be in the theatre, the cartoon movie was wonderful. Adults and children were all immersed in the movie! There were laughter, the movie managed to tickle the funny bones of both adults and kids. My sons actually love it, the seatings at Cineleisure was so comfortable and spacious.

All the animal characters in the movie was so lively and funny, we ended up loving all of them. There are movies which only capture the hearts of the children, yet this movie cleverly capture the hearts of both young and old.

My Applauses, complete with my hubby whom would give a cartoon the miss, yet he loves this movie too! Our kids are now singing "Move it, Move it"! Haha!!!!

Got watch it, it's really good movie.

Year 2008 - Two months to Year End Countdown

2008-11-04T10:43:00.006+08:00

Have you ever sit back and reflect on the daily stuff that might have happened to you or people surrounding you? Most probably, we haven't, I myself for one am already so busy with juggling a full day work and getting back home in the evening to spend the bit of the time with my kids... Why the hell would I care about reflecting back on past incidents?

Everyday news reports, television dramas, things happening around us...

As year 2008 approaches to an end soon in less than 2 months' time, occassionally, thoughts have been creeping and crawling from somewhere deep of my mind.

1. Eversince I started my working life after school, I have been "FORSAKING" my friends. This is even more true when I started my family, I found myself with neither the heart nor the strength to make time for my friends.

2. I'm growing old, the clock is ticking away and I realised that I haven't been going for regular facials!! OMG! That's really horrifying, I would looking like a forty years old by the time I reached thirty years of age (which is soon)?

3. I found myself behaving like an army officer back at home, shouting commands and discipling my kids in a loud unladylike voice?!! More OMGssss....

4. I found myself dressing more like an auntie at home when I'm not working, just think, t-shirts and shorts most of the times!!! Ugly color fainting t-shirts!

5. I found my eyes shagging and getting smaller, while the eyebags are like growing in sizes!
Arggghhhh!

6. My S$300 plus hair cut once every two months are decreasing and I'm getting lazy to keep lengthy hair!

7. I have been guilty of not exercising at all for at least 4 years! My only exercising would be walking to and fro home & MRT Station, standing for 14 MRT stops in between home and office, that is if hubby doesn't drive me. Other exercise routine would be walking while
shopping and marketing... okay okay, I know whoever is reading this now, are shaking your head in disbelief!

8. The uncountable number of times I have cursed at drivers in another vehicles for the sudden swering of their vehicles, their tailgating my vehicle and many more.

9. The uncountable number of times I have been grumbling about evil colleagues in the office! Trust me, I am forced into this, from the many little unbearable stuff they are doing, I have tried my best to ignore and ignore.

10. The fact that I always felt that my money is never enough! Why does the lottery luck always goes to other people while I'm filthy poor?

11. I have been dropping my handphone countless times, and it's protesting by shutting itself from me whenever it's sulking. And the worse part, it's still a year before my mobile's contract is due for an upgrade in order to get a new phone that doesn't sulk.

12. The goldfishes I have been rearing, are dying and dying as I replaced them. Why can't I just get goldfishes that last and grows up to be like the huge fat babies as in the aquarium shop?

Are you still reading up to this point? If you are still reading this, I really appreciate your patience in letting me pour my fustrations onto you. Think I have much more than this, but rain is not working that good now...

I need to be doing more reflections.....................

My Dear Little Sister, Ms. Teh Chean Pin

2008-10-30T21:17:00.015+08:00

Today, let me do a formal brief introduction of my little sister, Ms. Teh Chean Pin.

She's so adorable and have been babysit by my family since she's as small as a month's old, I will go dig out some of her baby photos for your viewing pleasure sometime soon.

This is Chean Pin, now she's all grown up....

(She could be auntie act cute)

(She could be so innocently cute)

Time flies, she's in secondary school already, and even took part in the School Superstar Contest 2007!

Let's go through some of the photos available, enjoy!

(Can you spot Chean Pin among the contestants?) (Finally, her turn to go onstage)

(The grand stage, Chean Pin's first national competition!)

(She's just so beautifully cute and adorable)

Yes, I know you are enjoying and laughing or giggling, but Chean Pin must be cursing away under her breath....

I'm going to find one weekend to dig out all her baby photos and post it here when I can find the time!!!!! HAHAHA! So so evil!

Wet Rainy Morning - 30th October 2008

2008-10-30T10:19:00.004+08:00

Yes!! I am finally going for further studying, yes, it took me at least a year to really pluck up the courage and made decision that my brain should be working agan after having left school for an estimatin of 10 years.

I pray that my brain is not rusty, my mind is still able to concentrate. It just seems like my brain is not working as good as before I had my 3 sons. It's going to be a 20 months course into Human Resources, twice a week's evening lessons are going to be keeping me busy after work. My boss have agreed to sponsor me for the course, it's going to be a bond of 6 months after the course end in Year 2010!!! Well, at least I save on the course fees, let's hope I could make my mind and brain work really hard and don't flunk any of the exams during this period.

FAMILY

Oh dear, recently my 3 sons seems to have some sort of rashes... I have tried antiseptic cream, baby powder and given them more bath than usual, but they just don't seem to go away!!! And kids being kids, reminders telling them not to scratch doesn't work well. Let's just hope they would be fine soon.

How I wish I could have a holiday soon, but judging by the economic crisis recently, it's best I put the plan aside. Money would be important during this period, just in case there could be an unforeseen retrenchment in the company. With 3 kids, it's really hard to be travelling overseas too.

WINNER of the 60" LG LCD TV

2008-10-28T09:41:00.004+08:00

Winner of an LG 60" Full HD Plasma TV is ........

Nicholas Yap

Congratulations!!When I called Nicholas, he couldn't believe he won the humongous TV. I was expecting 'ultra high' reaction but there was none. *disappointed*Nicholas explained that he has never won anything in hs life, even at his company's Annual Dinner & Dance, so he doesn't know how to react. hahaha......

3 other consolation prizes will be given to the following contestants for their correct answers to the NHB posts. Each wins a one-year Individual Pass (worth S$60) sponsored by National Heritage Board.

Cavin Song

sweetots

The Young Businessman

________________________________________________________

The so very lucky winner of the grand 60" LG LCD Television set is out!! WOW!! Congrats to Nicholas Yap, he is sure one lucky guy. And he's an accidental reader of EastCoastLife's blog, out of the 383 entries received for the contest.

I have been very lucky too!! :) I'm the proud winner for the 3 consolation prizes!!! YIPEE!!! I have won a 1-Year Individual Pass sponsored by the National Heritage Board which is worth S$60.00!

For more details and exciting articles by blogger EastCoastLife, do visit her blog page.

Final day tomorrow to the LG 60 inches LCD TV Prize

2008-10-24T21:54:00.005+08:00

Just back from dinner at Carousel with hubby dearest, I showed him about EastCoastLife's collaboration with LG to give out the LG 60 inches LCD TV prize. As always, hubby felt my luck is never good, he told me I better save my time and stop dreaming. But you could see his interest in the eyes lor.... haha! Okay okay, I'm like a pig head sometimes : )

Just let me dream about the lovely grand 60 INCHES LCD TV hanging in my house tonight, I would be jumping with joy, hubby would be at a loss for words in disbelief, my 3 kids would be admiring the huge screen in awe. Their cartoon characters would be many times expanded and best is, I could hang the TV high on the wall, save from their bicycles banging into my tv console!!

The celebration, and like EastCoastLife's relatives and friends, mine would be visiting too and admiring upclose at the huge LCD set. I would be the proud owner of something which I don't think I would ever have the courage to fork out the money to buy it with.

My elderly mum and dad would be able to see better the television programme without having to strain their eyes out.

Haha, it would be good to just dream of owning even if I don't win it.

Good luck to everyone and Double of Luck to myself : )

LG 60 Inches LCD TV

2008-10-24T15:25:00.004+08:00

Folks, let's countdown to the closing of the LG's contest set up by Ms. EastCoastLife for the grand 60 inches LCD TV set!! How many of you here have posted your entry to her? I just mailed out mine this morning, hope it reaches her without going MIA (missing in action).

Let's see, maybe I can dream about winning it...

I would be pinching myself to see if I'm dreaming, I would be running to hubby with the good news and he would be saying it's another scam, just like the time I told him I won a pair of Formula One tickets. Only my 3 little sons would be asking me how big is 60 inches, what is it like and so on... at least, there's the 3 little imps to humor me at times when I desperately need someone to.

Let's see, I have won some stuff recently:-

i) Movie Tickets
ii) Survivor Kit by a Cable TV Show
iii) A pair of Padang Grandstand Tickets to the Singapore Formula One 2008
iv) S$200 Takashimaya shopping vouchers from AIP Survey

Perhaps my luck would be good enough to win more stuff? In this economic downturn, it really helps to supplement my family which comprises of 3 little boys. Trust me, they wolf down food like there's no tomorrow, perhaps they thought their mum and dad are money printing machines? haha! Okay, just trying to make you laugh. But trust me, my 3 little boys are like little ants and they are hyper sensitive to food and knows when I'm opening the fridge or cupboards for food. :)

EastCoastLife / LG Contest

2008-10-24T11:03:00.005+08:00

I finally completed the answers and put them down in writting onto a white A4 paper, now it's safely sealed in an envelope ready for mailing out to EastCoastLife.

For you pals out there whom have not done so, please do so by 4pm this afternoon! Visit her blog and find out more http://eastcoastlife.blogspot.com/2008/09/eastcoastlife-is-giving-away-60-lg-hd.html

How's it going for everyone else? Guess what, I had a tough time finding Question 9, and then I saw it at the corner of my eye. Guess I need to have my eyesight check soon. Perhaps my perfect eyesight is failing me with the constant glaring at the computer screen from morning to evening five days a week?!!

During the reading through of EastCoastLife's blog, you would find many interesting points in her life. The interesting events she's been to, the friends she's having and setting up a Kampong Spirit Lifestyle. I'm ashamed that I have hardly at time with 3 boys and my work on hand, friends are fast dimenishing in my life...??! *sigh*

Haha, I love the one about her and Elmo having a tea session, BRAVO! Good photo that cheer me up of her acting out as the "lazy girl" with the bread hanging round her neck. I will be following up on her blog frequently.

GOOD LUCK TO THE WINNER!!!! Cheers!!!!

2008-10-23T09:22:00.003+08:00

Wow, I came across this interesting blog spot of Eastcoastlife, she's one writer whom expresses her views freely and appears to be a really joyful person.

Just a while back, she started a contest to give away a 60 inches LG LCD Television Set! What a giver, she believes that giving is a joy. Don't believe me? Visit her BLOG and you will be convinced!!!!!!! She's pretty too, it's hard to find someone who looks good both outside and inside nowadays.

http://eastcoastlife.blogspot.com/2008/09/eastcoastlife-is-giving-away-60-lg-hd.html

Perhaps I might be lucky enough to win the prize for my family? Pray god I am in the luck, house desperately needs a new television set.

News Update

2008-10-03T10:20:00.004+08:00

Friday, finally another day before the weekends, the favourite day of the week.

Our family was kind of busy last week, we had a great 2 nights stay at Hilton Hotel's executive room. The kids were simply excited. Each night costs S$1,050++ during the F1 period, if boss hadn't been unable to make it, I would never have to chance to afford such expensive accommodation in my life time.

I won a pair of Padang Grandstand tickets, but decided to get it off since I am not really a great fan of the event.

It's been busy weekends as my parent's house are undergoing new coats of paint, so I have been working my arm / neck / body muscle very hard. Could hardly lift my arms at all after each weekends of painting the walls and ceilings. Finally, 3 rooms were completed, next would be the living room, the balcony... *tiring*

More updates would be in place soon...

Updates Updates...

2008-09-11T15:13:00.003+08:00

Let's see, I have been talking about the Mid-Autumn Festival, the mooncakes and so on...
It might shock you, but after some calculations, my family have actually consumed 2 boxes of snowskin mooncakes, 3 boxes of baked skin mooncakes!! Well, what to do, there are 3 young boys at home whom always seem to be hungry. Like for instances, they could have just finished their dinner, and still continue if you place biscuits / sweets / cakes / ice cream / etc, in front of them. Since mooncake is something sweet and the look is fanciful, definitely they are fancinated by it.

The weather continues to be looking all bright and sunny, no more gloomy and wet weather for now. I finally put my hands on the steering wheels again! The last was when I passed my driving test 2 months ago. Patrick hubby finally found the courage to let me lay my hands on the car for a short drive around. Still, my driving skills definitely need more polishing up. And I don't think I would ever learn how to park the car. I must find time to go back for further refresher course with my instructor.

During lunch yesterday, my colleague Lay Peng and I went to the Popular bookstore. I came across this book that is really wonderful about making mooncakes! There is baked skin / snow skin and even jelly mooncake receipe!!!! Wow! And it's selling for S$9.90, I am still thinking whether I should get it... maybe I can try making mooncakes on next year's mid-autumn? But it's like 12 months away... Or perhaps, I could use the receipe on other moulds such as winnie the pooh or hello kitty shape, to make cute jelly? Let me consider...

At work, things aren't exactly smooth... I have been asking friends and contacts whether they would perhaps be thinking of getting Formula One tickets? But no luck : ( I am wondering how it's possible to find a buyer for the Stamford Grandstand tickets I am holding... I am selling the tickets at the original prices of S$998.00 per piece, but guess it's too costly for just any person to get for the event...

Well, there are never a smooth sailing path, but things will eventually work out someway or another...

Lovely Sunny Week after a week of RAINS...

2008-09-10T17:20:00.005+08:00

Sunny!!!!!

Finally, it's sunny, the sun is out after a week of rains and storms... I was thinking it would never end, the wet wet feeling of walking in the rain, your shoes getting wet and perhaps earthworms getting stuck to your legs. The house full of damp clothes that just can't seem to be dry. My clothes are finally getting crisp dry under the sun.

Family

It's life as usual for the kids and my work. The Mid-Autumn Festival is approaching [14th September 2008], lovely occassion for people to find excuse of stuffing themselves silly with mooncakes. There are all kinds of mooncakes, jelly mooncakes / snow skin mooncakes / baked skin mooncakes / etc. The list goes on, there's all sorts of fillings too, fruits / bird nests / ginseng / lotus paste / salted egg yolk / durian / ice cream / cheese / chocolate / mango / yam / yogurt / curry / sambal prawn and lots more. I have been buying for my parents, in-laws, my workplace, etc. It's a period of spending money again. But trust me, after a while, you just get sick of the mooncakes, they are forever too sweet from overdose with sugar.

I have been catching up with friends recently, this is rare since I have been keeping to my family life and work life. It just seems that after 3 kids, time for friends just seems hard to find. Imagine that for 5 days a week from Monday to Friday after waking up at 7:00am in the morning, getting ready for work and leaving the house to return only at 6:30pm in the evening. You find 3 kids screaming "Mum" at the door once you step in, there are hardly time for friends and anytime else. Saturday and Sunday are times for the marketing and the kids since you often feel the guilt slipping in after neglecting them for 5 days a week when you are at work.

Anyway, back to my friends Christine, Daphne and Agatha : )
Christine is a long lost buddy whom I haven't been able to meet with for 2 years eversince she followed her husband to France for his work. But now they are back and we managed to meet a few weeks ago just with her screaming my name when she saw me and I as usual just walk blindly around... thank god for the arrangement of us banging into each other with luck! I truly miss this buddy, she's my pal eversince our school days. What follows are a string of sms and lovely dinner that have us catching up.
Daphne is another pal from my ex employer of the past. She's given birth to her 3rd child!!! Finally, I'm not the only one in my friends group with 3 kids :p Haha! I carried her baby girl whom just turn 1 month of age at her celebratory party, a very lovely child.
Agatha, my lovely gal pal, also just gave birth to her 3rd baby!! Haha!!!!! A very lovely baby boy, I just visited them at the hospital too. Now, I have 2 buddy to form a gang of the motherhood with 3 kids. Trust me, having 3 kids is a big deal in this age of time. Everyone is trying to struggle with only 1 kid and are always shock when I told them I have 3.

Okay, that's the current updates for now, I will try my best to be back with more updates from time to time.

Cheers!!!!!!

A Horrible Week

2008-08-21T11:22:00.004+08:00

It's been a horrible week as my title said!

I am so sick I can't feel my limbs, can't think straight, no mood for anything.
My nose is so blocked, I have been using like 2 boxes of Kleenex tissue, yet the yucky fluid is still there. From all the sniffing, my nose are sore and red, flanking pieces of dry skin from all the rubbing are just so unsightly.

Medicines doesn't seem to be working one bit, I feel so tired, yet when I had difficulty falling asleep. *sigh* Hope the virus goes away soon, my fingers have been busy at getting the flanky pieces of dry skin away from my nose... I look so so ugly.

Got a medical leave from work yesterday, back in the office today and trying to make myself in forcus. I really don't want to spread the virus to my colleagues, but I can't stay away from work long either... Hope they don't blame me.

Dark Gloomy Day - 19th August 2008

2008-08-19T11:21:00.004+08:00

I'm sick, no mood for anything or whatsoever, no appetite and my nose is sore from all the rubbings I am having with tissues.

It's a bad bad flu, serious running nose, signs of a sore throat is appearing too. Oh god, I can see the dryness around my nose that is causing peeling. I am trying loads of water, but it doesn't seems to work. The medicines just doesn't seem to be working too.

Nights of waking up to drink water have been making me look bloated! Argh!!!! Okay, okay, I'm complaining, but I just feel so irritated! And I have always had bad reactions to flu medicines, I feel my heart jumping faster than usual and being so restless when I am just so tired. I feel myself waking up countless amount of times last night when I feel so tiring that I think I will die.

Still got to pull myself to work, I don't want to be seen using up the medical leaves when it is only August now, still 4 months to end of the year. What if I fall even sicker than now, I would have no more medical leave to apply then.

Office have been in a bit state of a chaos as usual. Guess this is unavoidable when there are different business units sharing the same space and getting use to each other takes quite a bit of a time... let's just pray that things would be working out good as everyone tries to get along. *sigh*

Okay, time to sniff out my nose again, think I have used up at least 2 boxes of tissues!!!

Wet Rainy Days in Singapore

2008-07-14T14:18:00.007+08:00

That's it!
I have been observing that it always rain just after our car was given a quick 10 minutes wipe when we are lazy or just after a major sweating shampoo wash... is this just a coincidence or what?!! Just last evening, Patrick and the maid did a major bubble bath and wiping for the car, and after that, there's a light drizzling for 5 minutes. Just plain Horrible!

Wonderful news to share, I obtained my driving license, the much converted paper! On my first try at the scary driving test on 4th July 2008 morning, with a very very pressured mind, I proceeded with the pre test warm up which follow with the test. After the warm up driving lesson, my instructor parked the vehicle 139 at Lot 18, he told me that all test car parked at this lot have never failed to pass the test. I am still wondering if he is just pulling my leg or telling me the truth... We proceeded to the 2nd level where he told me to wait in a room with other test candidates, the metal chairs in the room was really uncomfortable as we waited like pigs being taken to the slaughter house.

About 10 minutes later, 3 officers came in, they proceeded with the drawing of lots to determine each candidates' test route. I drew test route 6, which needs me to go straight pass Teck Whye and turning in to Teck Whye past the Post Office...

Next, we were told to take a seat while waiting for the officer conducting the test. In a nervous state of mind, I heard my name being called, the tester did not wear a black sunglasses as I have imagined him to be. He is a elderly, rosy cheek man. The total difference from the stern tester I have been imagining for the past weeks. We proceeded to the car, he told me to relax and treat it as a normal lesson. Definitely, I must have look very nervous wrecked to him... At the end of the drive, he asked me to follow him to a room where other candidates have already finished and are getting their driving reviews from the testers. He marked me a demerit points of 10, and gave me a Passed!!!! Man, was I delighted! I thank and thank him, a very touchy moment for me. Thank you, God!

Patrick hubby tried out my driving skills on the night itself, he said I totally sucked and wonder how in God's name did I managed to pass the test. I told him that I just can't get used to our Nissan Sunny, since my driving lessons were always conducted via Honda Civic. Just another excuse...

I definitely needs more practices... *sign*

Bright Sunny Monday

2008-06-23T20:55:00.004+08:00

Finally, after a rainy weekends, seems like a mini storm has been visiting Singapore. Deafening thunders, bolts of threatening lightings across the sky and eerie wind hallowing away...

Finally, today everyone woke up to a bright sunny morning, a good start for the first day of school. At least the students would not have to get all wet on the first day of school, imagine sitting in the classes for hours with soaking wet shoes!

Wow, a good start to Monday @ work for me too, only bad thing is to see the technician and Accounts Manager coming to me about getting their copier again... Been pestering about how good their copier is!! I just can't get the point of how good a copier is if the end product of it's printout is going to be purple when it shows blue on our computer screen... my patient's running thinner and thinner.

Guess some people's concept of color just isn't quite there, I just don't understand what is the use of getting a printer that doesn't print out colors that are at least close to what we see on screen. No choice, have to just see how things go, anywhere the copier company's leaving a test set in our office for 2 weeks.

Another Monday [Fair Weather]

2008-06-16T10:41:00.003+08:00

Family

Saturday, woke up at 8:00 in the morning to get ready for breakfast with hubby and youngest son Bryan before going for my driving lesson at 9:50hr, I got to complete the practical lesson's final evaluation before my driving test on 4th July 2008. Youngest son Bryan just need to smile at you and your heart sort of melt, his two small white "rabbit" tooth are just so cute. His two older brothers are still sleeping away...

Hubby and Bryan decided to wait at the driving centre for me, so patient of them both, really touchy and very relived that I have managed to get past the evaluation lesson eventhough hubby have told me in advance that the instructor would always give a pass no matter what...
After the lesson, we went home and laze around, the 3 boys started their usual practice of running around the house with their toys. They ensure that they must complete the required noise volume for the day before they are asked to turn in to bed for their sleep at night. Rest of the days are pretty spent relaxing and catching some shows on the television.

Sunday, woke up bright and early @ 07:15 to make a trip with hubby to the market. 3 kids are still sleeping like a log, guess they play too much yesterday. We walked around the wet market and got enough vegetables and meat stuff to last us for the coming week. A decision to have our breakfast saw us sitting down for a meal of heavenly piping hot pig intestine / beancurd / pig skin / egg complete with the noodle. Finishing this by 08:15, we went to the nearby clinic to get a queue number for our domestic maid, her check up is due.

Got a number 4 for the queue, got to rush back home to keep all the marketing products before bringing her to the clinic for the check up. What a coincidence, my mum and dad happens to be sitting in the clinic when I reach there. Turns out there's a long queue and mum got number 12... I decided to bring mum in with us at queue number 4 and trying not to act obvious about it in front of other patients. Luckily the doctor is our usual family doctor and the counter nurses are very friendly with me.

Finishing the check up and bidding farewell to dad and mum, Sukamti and I walked home to waiting hubby and 3 kids at home. Turns out they are relaxing and talking about silly stuff that kids normally rumble about, complete with all the "Whys". It's almost 12:00 noon, the kids start with their bath and lunch of pastas. At about 2:30 afternoon, hubby and I suddenly had cravings for Xiao Long Pao, we drove to Crystal Jade at Jurong Point to satisfy our cravings. We ordered fried crispy eel, xiao long pao and another type of dumplings complete with a bowl of fried ribs noodles for hubby. YUMMY!! The trip ended wonderfully with a shop around at the toys r rus before our trip home.

Conclusion, a wonderful relaxing weekends! Luckily I did not give in to temptations of visiting the PC show, the thought of crushing with other people at the show is really disheartening.

12th June 2008, Fair Weather after a Stormy Day yesterday

2008-06-12T09:33:00.002+08:00

Fairly good morning, traffic on the road was good, perhaps it's the school holiday and a huge number of parents are taking leave from work to keep their kids company.

A quiet morning in the office, everyone's staring away at the computer screen typing away. A good start to the morning, received an email from an ex-colleague, I finally found time to pick up the phone and dialed her number yesterday evening.

Overtime, I found myself increasing the distance from my friends. Laziness is everywhere, I no longer write snail mail to my friends / no christmas or new year cards / no picking up the phone to keep in touch / etc. It's just work and the family that I am keeping myself occupy with. Perhaps with 3 little boys that are forever running around the house and competing to create noise, that I am sort of energy drained to do other things.

Things in the office are still working as per normal except for the occassional things that some people came up with that you would either find amusing or hair grabbing. Guess there's going to be some "clowns" whom can always be found in any company to "spice" up people's life! Luckily I have enough experiences to try to cope with such people.

Hope everything's going to be wonderful especially since the weekends are approaching.

A Horrible Week It's Been

2008-04-10T14:09:00.004+08:00

Life
It's been a bad week so far, today's Thursday, things have been going downhill since Monday.
My maternal grandma passed away in her sleep yesterday, 9th April 2008, in the wee morning at 5:30am.
Seems like she has taken a turn for the worse since Tuesday, 8th April 2008. None of the aunts whom are in Malaysia with grandma, inform of her condition for fear of false alarm. Only when grandma left, did they call to my mum in Singapore, and also to the rest of the other 2 aunts.
Grandma is at the age of 88 this year, just past her birthday a few months back. She's been only able to lie in back and unable to talk since a few years back, it's only when she has a really bad bed sore which just seems to get worse that she's taken a turn for the worse.
Mum was crying when she called me in the morning to tell me of the bad news. I immediately informed to my boss and colleagues about having to take urgent leave for the day, mum and I were soon on the way back to Malaysia.
We reached there almost 2 hours later at 9:45am, grandma's body was already back at her old home after transporting back from the old folk's home. A few aunts and uncles were there. Grandma had 13 children and many many grandchildren plus grand grand children but a lot were absent. Shortly into the afternoon, another aunt came, she cry and shout for grandma from the main road into the house which is build on a piece of land surrounded by plants and trees.
Later part of the afternoon, another aunt came, complete with her husband, son and daughter. They said they came to stay till the funeral is over. Everyone started to say how filial who and who is to have come.
I believe grandma lying at the altar, is very very sad to see and hear all these. When she was at the old folks home and sick, not much people visit her. The grandchildren can hardly be seen, but at the funeral wake, people started to show up. It is very very sad.
My husband rush over from his trip in Penang after alighting from his flight in Singapore, he told one of my aunt that he does not visit my grandma only after her death. He has been visiting to grandma as much as possible at the old folks home whenever we can while she was alive. This sounds untactful but it's the truth.
It's really disheartening to see people's true colours during such occassion.

Feeling of being sandwich!

2008-04-08T17:12:00.002+08:00

Awful feeling of being sandwich today...

I was called into the room this morning, a very very bad news was relayed to me. Vivien our HR manager have submitted her resignation last week, I am totally shock and tears came to the eyes. When I first joined this company, she was my mentor and I respect her very very much. I have always been grateful to her for giving me the opportunity to work in the company, the news is a bad piece for me. What a week this is, I encountered the MRT train knocking down a poor guy yesterday, and today, I have to receive this piece of bad news.

The news left me in a daze the entire morning, later, Lay Peng told me she had known about it since last week and have been crying. It is no wonder since vivien and her have been together for years before I came, I have only been with Vivien for 6 months yet I have taken the news quite badly.

Concidentally, the weather have been wet and cold. It has been raining hard since noon...

Hot Tuesday Morning

2008-04-08T09:18:00.003+08:00

On the Way to Work
2nd day to take the train to work this week, it seems rather warm this morning, I actually sweat from walking to the MRT Station.
At the Choa Chu Kang MRT Station, the crowd of people this morning are on their best behaviour, they actually made huge noticeable effort to stand behind the yellow line. But how long would it be before they actually put the unfortunate incident of the poor guy being knocked down by the train yesterday, and start to push their way beyond the yellow safety line as the train approaches.
There's the usual crowd on the train as usual, people carrying huge backpack on their back and pushing their way into the train. Or there's those carrying huge bags... Majority of these people felt their have bought an extra ticket for their bag as well. Sign... I was lucky to get a seat today at the Woodlands Station when a school boy alights.

Home
The boys are as usual going about their usual noise production, seems like young children forever have to accomplish a certain quota of voice volume in a day. Especially boys, they just can't seem to sit still.
My grandma in a bad health status last week at the hospital, seems to have gotten better and has been given the clear bill to be discharge. Hubby and I visited her over the weekends and she seems to be rather happy to see us, but we were told her bed sore has spread and are getting worse.
Hubby has been very supportive and driving me and my parents into Malaysia to visit grandma very frequently, I am very very thankful to him. Love you, dear : )

A Black Monday

2008-04-07T09:27:00.006+08:00

Tragic MRT Incident
I went to work this morning by MRT Train since hubby is travelling overseas, it will be for 3 days before he can drop me off at work again. A brief 10 minutes walk to the Choa Chu Kang MRT this morning, I can't find my Transitlink Card... After purchasing the temporary 1 way travel card, I found them in my bag!!
By the time I got on the MRT platform, it was about 7:59am.
The other platform's train which is heading towards Jurong East approaches, suddenly a loud thud was heard! Screams and shouts follow!!!!!! Someone was banged into by the train, the train screeched to a stop and the driver whom must be in shock sounded the horn. People whom are brave enough, approached to peep under the train, seems like a body was under it, the face cannot be seen.
I was really shocked, my stomach started to turn and the goosebumps on my back surfaced!
How could such a thing happen, it's the start of the week after a weekend of rest, such tragic incident should never happen! The victim had almost a zero chance of survival when the knock from the train was so loud and with the fragile body going under the train. Perhaps the victim have a family and young child waiting at home for him after his work today, was he push down accidentally from the eager crowds behind him as the train approaches? Every morning and evening, crowds can always be seen eagerly waiting along the edge of the platforms at each stations. I really pray that the victim did not suffer too much and have lost consiciousness by the time the train hit her before going down under the train, or at least, there are still a chance of him perhaps surviving the tragic incident?
I could not bear to look on further, in a state of shock, I could only manage to get into the approaching train at my side of the platform to go towards Novena for work.
God, please do help this poor soul.