We bought Crayola sets for the children to doodle while I played at being Nigella again.

I used some yogurt in this batch. The taste is slightly tangy and the texture is light.

Love the colour!

For the girls - a layer of Hazelnut cream and then an explosion of colours. I wish I had captured Gean’s face on camera when I gave it to her. She practically squealed with delight.

For Big and the girls. Yes, the girls polished off two cupcakes each! As supper.

I am planning to learn how to make fondant and buttercream swirls for the cupcakes. That should be fun.

Big also made some cookies for us. I will bring some to work for teatime. Butter cookies with a cup of hot chocolate. Oh happiness.

I was on leave today and we decided to chill at Sentosa beach and go via cable car! As usual, we are blessed with good weather whenever we go on family outings.

Boarding at Mount Faber

Thankfully we all do not suffer from motion sickness and were able to enjoy the scenery without discomfort. It was a tad warm though.

The scenery!

**

We went to Coastes at Siloso Beach. It’s under the Emerald Hill group so we had the fabulous ICB pizza (prawns and tomato pesto!) and their famous grilled chicken wings. I brought the kids there sometime ago when they still had a sand pit in the pool table area, but now they have filled the sand pit with cement. And so the kids played by the beach.

Glorious weather and cool breezes by the beach. Heaven.

**

Sakae is situated beside Coastes so we sampled some of the food from their menu too.

Japanese cheesecake. Pretty presentation. The kids and Big told me my homemade one tastes much better which warms me deep inside.. *loved*

Yasai Tempura - quite passable. Just vegetables deep fried with batter.

Foie Gras pasta in cream/ tepanyaki sauce. Quite a hit with the kids.

Waffles with Walnut buttercotch and White chocolate raspberry icecream. From New Zealand Natural Icecream. Yum! We all loved it.

It’s very convenient to get eats from different restaurants as the food outlets are located within a stone’s throw of each other.

Two gorgeous bikini babes in front of us.. They were kissing at some point too. Hmm.. The guys will go, “the good ones are all taken!”

**
After showering the kiddos, we settled down for a family dinner at Coastes. It really has a beautiful and relaxing ambience….

Aaahh… I promptly ordered a ice cold Hoegaarden white, to which the kids squealed that “women shouldn’t drink beer” Kids.

Bwahaahahahaha!!!! They took a small sip, made a face and declared it “nasty”.

GOOD. That’s my evil “reverse psychology” plan.

La evil mother and her two poor kids. *excuse the bare face and messy hair because of the humidity and breezes.*

Fire burnt ovens - makes for fantastic pizzas.

One of the shiokest things in the world is to chill with your family, pig out on chicken wings and pizza, and chug some ice cold beer…

….in these surroundings. Shiok.

My girls and I.. and Big being the sweet photographer as always.

We brought the kids to Hort Park on Saturday and the weather was glorious, to say the least.

Beautiful bed of green to lie on

Reminds me of rice terrains

Nice application of recycling

Taken from KHA (a Thai restaurant located in Hort Park)

I love this pic! Big really captured the moment

This picture was totally unplanned! Check out Ger’s “chair attack” pose and my paikia look. LOL!

A happy one together.

Big’s angels

Flowers in the glasshouse.. Gorgeous!

Beautiful blooms of flowers everywhere.

Punjabi Dance of Love!

Ever seen a fat “Pole dancer”?!! Bwahahahaha!!

They cycled. We walked.

And the sweet man helped carry their bikes up the hilly terrains.

I love this picture. It’s so poignant.. Makes me think of them growing up and me letting go eventually..

Yikes!! I don’t know where she gets that leg pose thing from! I certainly never posed like that. LOL.

Another ER XIN pose she came up with. *faint*

That’s better, young lady!

Checking out the turtles. There are lots in the pond beside our house..

Happy girls!

This morning, Gean shared with me about a dream she had last night. To cut a long meandering story dream short, the gist was that she was “fighting” with a woman using some pieces of string [I am guessing in a playful manner, from what she described] when I appeared and killed the woman.

She said it very matter of factly and without any tinge of horror that her mother is a murderous fiend in her dream.

Gean has a bad habit of saying “I got” to mean that she did something. Example:

Me: Did you torture the cockroach before setting Muffin on it?

G: I gotttttttttttttt.

Me: Did you iron all my clothes last night?

G: I gotttttttttttttt.

Anyway. I hate this “I got” business, so I’d always correct her when I hear it - with  “I did“.

Lately she’s gotten much better - only to infuriate me with the introduction of another class phrase - “where got?”

So I told her I have no idea what “where got” means.

That’s when she went,”Oops sorry, mummy. Where did?”

I was going through my elder dd’s homework yesterday and saw this worksheet marked by her teacher.

It was an assignment where she was supposed to fill in the dialogue by a cat burglar in some pictures.

First Picture
Burglar going into the house

She wrote: Wah! No one in the house sia!! Good, man! 

I, like, wanted to die on the spot.

I asked her, why did you write like that?! Since when do we ever speak like that?!

Her calm reply: He is a cat burglar, mum. Cat burglars talk like that.

I am ALL l “I don’t know what to say”.

 

Quick! Call the SPCA mata!
Child, 5, made to iron all clothes for mother

Shocking.

See? So poor thing.

Even though she looks very happy doing it. Take the lollipop out and look serious, girl.

Sigh. Cannot make it. Still grinning away. Not News Headlines material

Chocolate Fudge Cake from Secret Recipe. Very nice! I promised the girls to make their birthday cakes the next time (after the Kitchen Aid arrives from US).

With her classmates

Photos taken by Big who brought her cake and the Hello Kitty gifts for her classmates to school

Happy!

With good friends.

Gean -

I love how she is affectionate and will give me random frequent kisses and hugs.

I love how she will share things with her sister without being told to.

I love how she is not grouchy or cranky, and is still the sweet little girl that she is - even when she is not well.

I love how she snuggles up to me like a baby koala just because she likes the feel and smell of her mummy.

I love how she exclaims, “Mummy you are so pretty!” LOL

 

Ger -

I love how she squeezes out toothpaste for me every morning before she goes to school.

I love how she tries to be good “even though it is so hard”.

I love how she is independent, streetsmart and spunky.

I love how she is good at ferreting out bullshit in people.

I love how she loves animals and have a kind loving nature. 

 

My girls -

I love how they are good well mannered children, even though I may not be a full time stay home mum and spend 24/7 of my time with them.

I love how they are healthy and seldom fall ill. I’d like to think that it is because I have breastfed them, but really, it is mostly that we are so blessed.

I love how they are happy and well adjusted - through our divorce, accepting Big as another father figure, leaving our old home etc.

 

Big -

I love how he brings me to different food places to try (and disagrees vehemently that I am fat)

I love how he tries to surprise me with little things like

 

this Casio watch cum calculator which I had commented that would be useful on my buying trips (calculate currency).

Never mind that he had already installed the same function on my iphone. Another reason was because it goes so well with my rugged wear of snug tee, denim shorts and backpack ensemble when I go to places like BKK and HCM. In any case, I didn’t buy it because I know I will only wear it on some trips, and certainly not to work as it doesn’t channel my style at all. Of course he goes and buy it secretly to spring a surprise on me.

Just because I like teapots. I love bird and leaf motifs!! And this black/ white combo is so pretty and dainty.

I love how he gives me shoulder and foot rubs before bed.

I love how we can connect on an emotional and intellectual level.

I love how he is a good daddy to the children. Just two nights ago, he woke up in the middle of the night to check on Gean (she was running a fever) and to give her Paracetamol. And he coaches Ger in Maths, which I.absolutely.cannot.

I love how he wakes up earlier than me to make scrambled eggs and wheat and raisin toast for me.  

I love how he does the laundry so that I have time to spread my fats on the couch.

I love how he surprised me with this DVD usb player so that I can watch all the shows he downloaded for me in the comfort of said couch. It’s very cool - just plug the usb in it and it plays like a dream.

 

Techtalk and obviously all foreign language to me. Comes with Karaoke function too!

 

I love how we complement each other.