The Apple's Diary!

Before the school holiday ends and using the long weekend opportunity, we thought of traveling to neighbouring country for a short getaway. I booked the train tickets online, thinking that many would have thought of traveling out too. Ha, plan aborted the last minute and we took off to Garden by the Bay to enjoy the last few days of Blue Danube. Agapanthus a wefie a selfie by himself We also enjoyed morning brunch at Cafe Melba at Mediapolis. This was indeed a good choice with the spacious area outside the cafe and a bouncy castle for the children. We met up with the mummies group and the kids scoot away happily. Good food although on the pricey side, it was very filling and I liked it. eating chocolate ice-cream is the most happy thing for a kid! Play a game of tic-tac-toe awesome photo taking skill by Jon I also managed to take a cake class at ABC cooking studio, doing a Carre au Chocolat. I described the cake as chocolate...

Now that both kids are still in preschool, June holiday doesn't affect us much. We can only look forward to the term break at Berries, otherwise the boys go school as per usual. So in this last June Holiday before it has other significance, I try to inject some fun for the boys. They get to go playground and exercise their gross motor skills. It is quite unfortunate that they only get to go playground infrequently because normal week days would be too late. Weekends are filled with enrichment classes. They love the beach too so on a rare Sunday morning, we skipped Church to bring them to Palawan beach for some diggings. And a nice yummy lunch to end off our beach adventure. It is quite routine that we will go Palawan Beach, followed by lunch at Singapore Seafood Republic in RWS. I love their dishes although it can be quite pricey. Pricey but fresh ingredients and only place which Matthew could finish one adult portion easily. We also w...

June is the month leading up to the grand finale for parents with kid entering primary 1. July is the start of Primary 1 registration and for parents' choice of school, this is the finishing point for parents who have put in hours and hours of parental volunteer, and some even move nearer to be within 1km for their top choice. For us, I have an alumni status to a popular neighbourhood school. The school itself is within walking distance, approximately 500m away from our current address. It has strong Chinese traditions and culture which I had experienced during my student days. Unfortunately, it has down sides. School is going for PERI upgrading and will be relocated a temporary holding site. This means it is 2 changes of buses to holding site for us. Besides that, Pri 1 and 2 will be in PM session during upgrading period. PM session is really troublesome and I have challenges in the "before school care" logistics. Strong Chinese cultural also means all students a...

This is the last year we can go on a holiday during the non-peak period, hence this year we will be doing 海陆空 holidays. Voyager of the Seas  For 海 (sea), we chose to sail with Royal Caribbean . Since we booked relatively early, we got to choose our cabin.  cabin #1694 So we picked a Deck 10 Junior Suite at the rear and it turned out to be wonderful, except for the vibrating engines at night. Looking in from balcony looking in from the doorway the sofa transformed into another bed shaded big balcony - Perfect! the tiny wash area Deck 10 was good because we were a level below the Windjammer restaurant, the swimming pools and the open deck. Taking a suite at the rear, meant we got a big balcony which was shaded. This proved to be ideal because we like to hang our wet swim suit and towels at the balcony. Even if it rained, we were sheltered. We boarded the ship on a Monday before noon and headed straight to the Windjammer ...

4 women - Tricia, Jenny, Wilma and Jane - knew each other since primary school. Their friendship spanned across 3 decades. They had gone separate ways for a while and somehow God pull these 4 women back again. They had seen how each other fell in love, fell out of love, eventually found the man they married. They were elated for each other when wedding bells rang and soon eating the red eggs from each other. They are so different, yet so similar. They went through the ups and the downs with each other. They held on to this friendship tight and gave thanks to God for preserving this precious friendship. However, they soon realised instead of getting more joyful with each year, their life went the other direction. With a tinge of regrets, they looked back at their youth days and wondered what mess they had got themselves into. Jenny is stuck with an alcoholic husband. She is holding back on separation because of financial difficulties and children's sake. The emotional abuse ...

It's the annual MindChamps Family Day. Ever since Jon started at playgroup level, we had been attending the annual event. Every year the teachers worked hard to prepare the activities and rolled it out with the champs and their families. It was hard work and most of the time, weather didn't help in such event. This year, instead of an outdoor event, it was held indoor at the Delta Sport Hall. Wow... that saved a thinking cap for bad weather plan and I soon realised that being indoor was indeed a much better venue. For the very first time, we actually stayed from the beginning (okay, we came in late and missed the morning zumba) to the end. We played all the games and stayed on for the photoshoot. Classes' banners Guess whose banner is who's? completed all 6 stations - our 1st ever This year's choice of an indoor venue couldn't be better. Being indoor and confined to the sport hall also meant that the kids could run wild and parents need...

This Straits Times article caught my eye. " Mums have meltdowns too, let's just move on. " by Clara Chow. Since Good Friday weekend onwards, my 2 children weren't behaving well. I mean they have usual tantrums and fights but the past 2 weeks were a new level of growing up. They fought very badly with each other, scratching each other, biting each other and the younger one started to use his legs to kick his brother. But nothing has quite prepared for yesterday, the biggest meltdown ever by the youngest one. The triggering point was a "No" to the library because the timing didn't allow a trip to the library after their Berries class. I proposed an evening trip which was refused. So there he stood and not inching any step. His father was starting to be frustrated and just huddled him into the car. The entire drive home had him constantly scratching me and even biting me. It was mayhem. By the time peace had restored, both myself and the husband ha...