Kueh Sarlet

I tried to make kaya spread last week but it was quite a flop!! It was so green that no one dares to eat it!! It had too strong of a coconut taste but I did not want to throw it away.

As the kaya reminds me of the nonya kueh with kaya & glutinous rice, I googled and found a simple recipe to try.

The rice was really quite easy to make but I needed much more kaya!! See the thin layer of kaya!!The taste was quite yummy & the colour very pretty was well... definitely will try again!!

Perfect Weather for Picnic

A dear old friend was very kind to still want to celebrate my birthday & I chose to do a picnic at Botanic Garden. The sky was a little dark in the afternoon & together with Ezra, we prayed for a good weather & God was so so good... He gave us the perfect weather... cloudy with breeze... so perfect for picnic!!We had a simple spread of bee hoon, chicken nuggets, sotong ball, eggs, veg sticks, corn & drinks.After our yummy food, the kids had a good time playing games, balls & even had a hand in throwing the boomerang!! Sean threw & it hit a teens head right on his head!! oops... Thank God he was ok.It wasn't before too long that the night starts to fall & we quickly tried to light the candles but the wind was so strong it was difficult yet comical to see how all the adults & children tried to block the wind. Before we can finished singing the birthday song, the candles were blown out!!

Its was a very enjoyable evening out with good friends... Thank you Iris!!

A Special Day for a Special Someone

17th July is a very special day for someone special to me, so I did a plan for this special person. It was suppose to be a day out with activities like tour around boat quay in the junk boat, up on the Singapore Flyer and ending with a sumptuous buffet dinner at Ritz Carlton.

However, instead of activities, she requested for a day of relaxing. So with some last minute booking we finally manage to get a spa session.

We both took half day, so Viv went home to pick Ezra before coming to pick me up at office. We went to Marina Sq Swensen for lunch and Viv got her birthday special from Swensen. After that, we walk around a bit before sending Ezra home.

Alone by ourselves, we make our way to Afone at South Bridge road for our spa session.

Ezra's Day Out!!

As I writes this post, Ezra is out for a movie with his Uncle Brian & Aunty Lai Kuan!! They were very kind to bring him out to catch Ice Age 3. They took the MRT to PS for the 3.45pm show.

When we confirmed this outing, Ezra was very excited!! I had to go thru with him the 'drill' of what to do, what to eat, what he cant eat! hahaha

He finished his lunch real quickly, took his nap at 12.45pm & got up at 2.55pm!! He called me when he woke up, asking to speak with Uncle Brian. When we got home, he was all dressed and ready to go!!
Son, enjoy your time & thank you Uncle Brian & Aunty Lai Kuan....

A special Saturday

We had a lazy sat morning & walked to a nearby coffeeshop for breakfast while Ezra cycled. Jac needed to buy some casual shoes so we went to Pedro at Anchor Point. Since, its Anchor Point is so near my in laws place, we asked them out for late lunch at Xin Wang Cafe. Jac mgt to get 2 pairs of shoes!! Nice?After that my in laws wanted to go Taka to do more shopping. We went along as well.. We got Ezra a Hotwheel track since he has lots of hand me down hotwheel cars. Jac being a big boy, he wanted toys as well. He chose some kind of gun which cost almost $80 but I was not too happy abt it!! In the end, he 'downgraded' and got 2 mini guns so he can play with his son!! They wasted no time to try their hands at it once we got home!! My mum was supposed to over to my place for dinner & we invited our in laws as well... In double quick time, we mgt to whipped out this spread!! It was a very special meal to have both our parents to dine together.

Ezra & his Keith Kor Kor

Keith came & stayed with us for a couple of days & Ezra 'stick' to him like glue!! From the moment he wakes up, he will go over to Keith's room, peek under the door to see if he is awake & do that until Keith steps out of the room!! Once his door is opened, Ezra will waste no time & hang ard in his room. Ezra would go "Keith kor kor, keith kor kor, KEITH KOR KOR!!" When Keith goes out, Ezra will ask him "Keith kor kor when are you going?" Ezra would run to the door & check when he hears any noise from the corridor!! He wouls return disappointed "Mum, its not Keith kor kor!!" Once Keith comes back, he is stalked by Ezra!! It was so funny to see how he interact with Keith.

Ezra & his Keith kor kor watching a movie on his laptop.

LEGO

If you asked Ezra to pick up his favourite toy now, it would have to the LEGO!! When we moved to Potong Pasir, Jac refused to give up his old & assorted box of all kinds of lego pieces & brought it along with us. This treasure box has became a new past time for father & son. Jac will fix his toys, Ezra will join him. They would spent hours on this. See how careful Ezra was while fixing the lego!!!

Ezra surprised us with this creation!! Jac only gave some verbal instructions (cos he is busy fixing his own) Ezra fix it by himself. Not bad! He would fly & play with it, making all kind of funny engine sound as he moves the 'rocket'.

What a Day!!

Jac took a day off on the last week of school holidays & we brought Ezra out for some family time. We had a hearty breakfast of hotdog bun at home. After that we headed to the beach. Ezra wanted to play with sand so East Coast Park we went. Father & son had abt 1.5 hrs of bonding time building sand castle while I sit under the coconut tree reading my novel... that is life!! When it got too hot, we headed to Ikea at Tampines for lunch, again this is something suggested by Ezra!! He simply loves the meat balls. He had a total of 6 meat ball, 1 chicken drumlet!! I like the laska there. After our walk in Ikea, Ezra saw someone eating ice cream & he asked if he could have some. Look how much fun & enjoyment he gets from a simple cone of ice-cream!! We went to Giant for some supermarketing. We asked Ezra what would he like to do next & he said "I want to sit Singapore Flyer!" So off to Flyer we went, Ezra had a quick nap in the car ride there. Calculating the cost, we decide to get the Family card for 1 yr of unlimited rides. Ezra was really excited when we got nearer to the cabin. We were the only family in the cabin & it was so COOL. We played "I spy" with him, pointing out to him the different landmark and buildings. It was really a good ride. Jac wanted to have another ride in the night so we hang ard there til night fall. We walked all the way to the Merlion, told some pictures and really felt like tourists!!We were all so tired after such a long day but it was so much FUN & what a day it was!!

Visitors During the Holidays

Ezra had the most FUN during the past holidays with many many friends & cousins staying over at our place.

Week 1 - we had Nana & Nadine jie jie

Week 2 - we had Nadya. my mum came for dinner one evening & she bought the KING of fruits durain and the kids had fun munching on it!!
We had Anthony visiting us & we brought him to different places, walking the Southern Ridges. It was so funny, he came dressed in jeans & it was HOT!!
Anthony loved durains!! so we had a durain party just for him!! He was telling us the durains they get in Changmai were much bigger!!We had a casual CG gathering and we had a Wii time of FUN!! It was so funny seeing how different people controlling the remote during Mariocart game!! Some were super cool.... some no expressions... some turning the remote 180 degree... some screaming when their cart overturns!! But the ultimate must be Anthony who thought he was doing good being in 7th position until someone tape on his shoulders saying "Anthony, I think you are in that last quater!" He has been watching the wrong car!! What is a party without FOOD!

Ezra Unplugged

This a video that I captured of Ezra playing his guitar with his pretend mic. This was actually quite some time back, just never got down to post it. His very first proper performance. :p

The Making of the 3 Little Dumplings

As any movie, with the launch of the story of the Three Dumplings, it was quickly followed up with the making.

It has been a Hun family tradition to make Bak Chang. It is a very time consuming project and much preparation was needed. The meat, mushroom & dried shrimps need to be marinated & stewed the day before. The rice had to be soaked the night before and fried with onions and garlic in the morning. The salted eggs had to cleaned and the leaves had to be washed and soaked. It was good that we had quite a few pair of hands and each took some to do. All the sisters gathered at my mother's place and started the to make the bak chang in the morning. We made abt 140 pcs this year. The finished bak changs before cooking in a big pot of boiling water for 3 hours!!
I had always like nonya chang so I tried to make some of it the following week. Besides the nonya ones, I also make some chicken meat ones so my helper can eat as she is a Muslim. Nonya chang is not as nice so there is much room for improvement....

A Famosa Malacca

This is a super outdated post but better late than never!! Our family together with the Tongs (Alice) & Lows (Iris) set a date for our short getaway to Malacca at A Famosa where Sean's company has a bungalow there. 22 May was selected after much careful and adjustment to every adult & children's schedule!! We met at 2.30pm Esso station & travel up together. I have driven NS highway a couple of time but this one is the fastest... 140kmh!! Thank God for keeping us safe!!

We finally arrived at our bungalow abt 6pm, a nice BIG house with lots of space for the children to run. We even mgt to set up a table tennis table in the hall & the kids played table tennis in comfort(air con). Each family has a room and the bigger girls had a room to themselves as well. After a quick unpack & shower we all headed to Cowboy Town for dinner, parade & carnival games. Dinner was ok, parade was so so & carnival games was.. what can i say.... One of the highlights of the parade was the fire eating... it was quite interesting and entertaining. We ended the day abt 10.30pm & went to bed only abt 11.30pm... it was a super tiring day for me!!

The next day was spent at the Zoo. It has a pretty interesting concept, Safari. We were taken into the Safari in a caged up truck. I cant say that the animals were roaming freely but more of sleeping (stationed) at specific enclosure. But it was an experience for the kids. The children had pretty close encounters with the animals but they really were not the nicest smelling. Ezra would go "Mummy, why sio smelly!!" "Mummy, it is so smelly, I dont want to go inside"

We caught every animal show in the Zoo. The All stars show, the bird show, the elephant show & Wild wild West. The elephant show is pretty good, the elephants were playing basketball, football, they danced with hoops & even gave 2 volunteers a back & front message!! I enjoyed the Wild Wild West show best. The very typical girl gets bullied by baddies, good man shots baddies, red indians come riding into town!! They were lots of gun shots & even fire which made the show very exciting. You can see Ezra covering his ears most times. We than took a bamboo raft to Monkey Island where some monekys were roaming & climbing the trees freely. Ezra was initally afraid of the animals ride but aft seeing the girls going for it, he requested. We went for the elephant ride & the camel ride. Elephant was safe but the camel ride was quite terrifying cos it was quite high & it feels like the camel is falling to the sides with his skinny legs!! Can you see my scared expressions!!

Ezra enjoying his ice-cream on a hot hot day!!

After the whole day at the zoo, we went home for a quick shower & headed out to Malacca town for Nonya dinner... Yummy...This pic was taken by Ezra

After dinner we took a stroll down Jonker Street which was PACKED!! I was so worried cos we have to really looked aft the kids & make sure they dont wonder off somewhere! The older girls bought a few toys & such which made them very happy while we came home empty handed. Ezra got quite comfortable with Uncle Tong & even went into his arms to pose for pictures. We were all so tired & got into these brightly decorated trishaw back to our cars!! All the kids knocked out in the car ride back & by the time we got home.. it was abt 12.30am!!

The 3rd day was a relaxing time hanging ard the bungalow before we head back to Singapore. The only boys on this trip Clement & Ezra kicking some football. Clement is really good, he was able to throw the ball & kicked it!! The kids played with bubbles and tried to fly gliders on the mini hill!!While driving home, we made a bad decision by not making a stop at Pagoh thinking that we just started the journey but we forgot to check the fuel!!! Our fuel thank almost went dry & we were praying very hard that it can last til the next stop. Really cant imgine what we can do if the fuel runs out while on the high way!! Thank God, He was so good....