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While driving past the railway station yesterday, we saw a bunch of vintage cars displayed and a small crowd gathered and wondered what event was on. A quick search revealed there was motoring heritage weekend called “Heritage Connects”.
We couldn’t not go, it was right on our doorstep!
That was why we went for mass yesterday so we could visit this morning. Nat insisted on wearing the plaid dress she wore for Gigi’s party and it went well with the retro cars. She was in a vain mood, posing with every other car!
One of the organisers invited Sasha to pose with any car she wanted and she went for the nearest one, she was a little hesitant of the stranger chatting her up but she overcame her fears and went ahead to stand in front of one convertible.
We bumped into our ex-neighbour Alex, his parents own the unit next to us. His son Ethan is 4, same as Nat.
There were some old-fashioned games one could try out, Nick tried to win some toys for the girls, but failed! So did I!
There was also a stall selling old-fashioned biscuits and sweets I remember from young….a wave of nostalgia hit me as I spotted packets of marbles, Doraemon chocolates and Hiro biscuit cake!
I regret not queuing for the free rides on the VW bus earlier, didn’t take note of the timings and by the time we wanted to, there was a 20 min wait and I didn’t want to hold the kids back from lunch so we headed to Great World for some grub and supermarket shopping.
R is for Re! Or Relaxing Retro Retreat!
Thanks to the prize I won at this year’s D&D, I had a free night’s stay at Hotel Re with dining vouchers to boot so I redeemed it for R.
The plan was to rest and recharge ourselves and that’s just what we did.
Checked in late yesterday after the boy arrived back from KL, had to lie to the kids we were working late because they didn’t want me to leave them alone.
After dumping the bags, we went down to Re!Fill, their lobby restaurant. My vouchers were worth $80 and since breakfast was already included, we used everything up for dinner. I ordered soft shell crab, we had a soup each, mocktails, he had wine, and I had cod for my main and a burger for him.
My lobster bisque was bland but the cod was alright, though a bit dry. He said his burger was not too bad.
Watched the ending of Thor in the room after dinner, the HBO connection was really bad though. We didn’t venture out and slept pretty early.
When we awoke this morning, we had a quick breakfast, the spread had a fair bit of variety despite being compact and then we took a short walk around Pearl’s Hill Park.
I have been wanting to check it out for ages since it’s so near home and we finally got the chance since it was at the hotel doorstep.
My legs were wobbly after climbing some steps to get to the top. There’s a city reservoir that was fenced up, I thought we would be able to walk around it but it’s not like a pond. There was a pond though, poorly maintained and full of algae…couldn’t see the fish through the murkiness.
There was a fitness corner and lots of really tall trees and you could see bits of the city but other than that, nothing much to make me want to come back and visit again.
We checked out after that and did some marketing at Tiong Bahru market before reuniting with the kids.
Mildred had come over with a cake for Mother Mary's birthday and the girls blew out the candles. Then we headed to town with both our mums, ending up at Island Cafe for lunch.
In the evening, fed the kids early and then we went for mass at St Teresa's before heading to Marina Square to jalan and eat.
My rascally niece turned 4 today and to celebrate, the Spicy Girls watched a play and had a little party at Membina.
I took half day to accompany Nat to “The Cat in the Hat” at SRT, along with Jeanette and Riley, Swana and Gigi, Kenny and Sarah & Kavi and Ananya.
Sat in the cheap seats, the play was very short, just over 30 mins so I was a little disappointed. But the kids had fun though I think Nat wasn’t very impressed.
Afterwards we took a walk along the river in search of ice cream for the kids but many outlets were closed. Ended up at Laurent Bernard Chocolatier where the kids satisfied their ice cream craving.
I ordered a coconut and hazelnut doublescoop for myself but couldn’t taste a damn thing thanks to the lingering flu. I heard the coconut was really good, all I tasted was sugar. Swana and Jeanette ordered some delicious-looking lemonades which I must try when I recover.
At Membina, I tried to take a quick snooze and it turned into an hour’s nap! Woke up just in time to see Gigi cut the first of her 2 birthday cakes, a Tinkerbell chocolate mint one, the kids played musical chairs before that. Sasha was determined to feed herself her cake and did a very good job of it.
Other adults started arriving, Aunty Diana made cutlets and I managed to get the rough list of ingredients from her so I can start experimenting soon. Ann brought her boyfriend Richie, they had missed the McDonald’s party because he was sick. He seems like a nice guy, those two are so cute together….ah, young love.
Gigi cut a second cake for the adults, this time a Belle one and the kids then played Passing the Parcel. For some reason, Ma boycotted the party after Swana offended her earlier in the day…she must have been really miffed!
To usher in Gigi’s 4th birthday, her parents decided to throw her a McDonald’s party at Queensway and there was an unofficial yellow theme, which of course I took seriously!
I was in a lemony mood and decided to bake some lemon shortbread cookies too, using a recipe from here and following the instructions for the lemon melt-in-your-mouth variation.
I overmelted and overbeat my butter though and my dough didn’t form properly, leading me to add extra flour to get the texture decent but losing some sweetness.
Decided to go ahead and try baking the batch, but because of my cold, I couldn’t really tell if they had any taste and added some lemon icing just in case. But the texture was melt-in-your-mouth, but could have done with more lemon flavour. Overall quite pleased.
Joanne and Rayhan came over before the party to hitch a ride, Sasha and Rayhan were so matching!
Aunty Sarda made it to the party, she’s really starting to get a bit more active, which is swell!
Aunty Susie brought her 3 Govinden grandsons, haven’t seen them in ages…they’ve grown so much! Lukey has a earring, Troy has put on weight! At one point, Nick was chatting with them and then Luke asked aloud who Nick was, only for his brothers to inform him Nick was his Godpa! That’s how long we haven’t seen them, they don’t even remember us!
The party itself was a bit chaotic, the facilitators from McDonalds were a bit flustered and stern, not very smiley as they took orders and I think a bit scary for the kids! Still the kids mostly behaved and listened to instructions. Nat didn’t want to take part in the games but I helped Sasha along, getting quite competitive to ensure she won prizes!
There was a Rapunzel cake from Bengawan which the little girls oohed and ahhh-ed over.
The turtle and fish pond provided some entertainment for the kids but there was a moment when Nat tripped and nearly fell into it, which totally freaked her out and that called our evening to an end!
The pumpkin is getting quite friendly, greeting our neighbourhood cleaner with a ‘hello’ and not shying away when meeting strangers. If I ask her to greet someone, she will wave and say ‘hello uncle”.
She’s picked a new trick…pretending to poop. She’ll put a ball up her shorts and clench with her thighs and say “I want to poo-poo, it’s already coming out” and then she releases the ball and laughs her head off!
She loves wrapping her dolls in their blankets, pushing them around in a toy supermarket trolley doubling up as a stroller. Such a little mummy she is, I think she can be quite nurturing. She’s started kissing away her own bruises and mine too. Also, she’s in that phase of trying on my shoes, pretending to be me, carrying my handbags.
I love how I’m number 1 to her now, I’m the one she looks for when she falls or wants to be carried. In fact she wants to be carried all the time now when we go out, realising how much better the view is from up there. We’ve stopped using the stroller for some time since she was walking independently but now she doesn’t want to walk!
We are trying to teach her how to share her toys and not grab things from others. She and Nat are constantly fighting over toys, she has a tendency to scream her head off if she doesn’t get what she wants and doesn’t listen to reason. And she’s stubborn about apologizing or facing the wall.
But recently she’s realised that she can get her way much faster if she asks nicely and has started putting it into practice e.g. “Please Nat-Nat, can I borrow the puzzle/bracelet/ phone etc”. And her sister will willingly share and once she’s done, she’ll return it and say ‘thank you’. She’s started repeating to herself, “I must ask nicely, I cannot grab things.”
I’ve been humming “If we hold on together” as a lullaby for months now and she’s been asking for the lyrics so I finally downloaded the song onto my phone and we’ve been listening every night. It’s her favourite song and she’s slowly learning all the words. Meanwhile Nat’s favourite song at the moment is Flo Rida’s ‘Whistle’.
Nat is constantly getting bullied by Sasha who sometimes pinches her or grabs her toys. Been trying to teach her to fend for herself instead of complaining to me. I keep telling her to just say no to Sasha but she’s not convincing enough when she does it which I think Sasha notices and preys on…rascal!
