Happy 10th Birthday, Anders

His birthday always coincide with the Term 1 school holiday, thus it is not easy to invite friends to his party as most would be off for their own holidays.

 

This year he had a few wishes for us to grant:

1. Catching a movie with his best friend
2. Play date with his few good friends at kids Amaze
3. Special meals with the family

 

Yes, all these were full filled and he had a great time with his friends and families.

At every birthday, I felt a sense of accomplishment as he reaches the 10^th milestone. He has not been an easy child, very temperamental and emotional and many times can set me to edge of tearing.

I know I had to embrace all these with an open heart and mind, it’s easy said than done but I know I WILL HAVE TO DO IT. 

On this special day, I wish my son – Happy 10^th Birthday. 

 

Happy 11th Birthday to Anthea!

It’s her 11^th years old birthday and she had plans for her celebration. In the afternoon hours, she wanted to go shopping with her good friend and then joined us for dinner.

 

Yes, 11 years had gone by in a swift and each time we reached a birthday milestone, it felt like I just delivered her yesterday.
 

Her growing years had been a memorable one for me as she has always been MINE girl. Always showing me her LOVE and appreciation openly and never failed to disappoint me in her academic achievement too. She has high aspiration and I could only give her my best support and encouragement.

 

On Saturday, 6 April 2013, we had a simple family dinner with my in-laws. She had wanted to have western and thus we booked ourselves a table at Sun Ray’s Café. It’s a small café situated outskirt of Serangoon Garden. The food was surprisingly very palatable. We had mushroom soup, pasta and some meat dishes.

Mushroom soup

Lamb Rack

At the end of the meal, we had a simple Birthday Cake celebration for the birthday girl. All her younger nieces were singing different version of the birthday songs for her, we even had a Korean version…thanks to K-Drama…haha.

 On this special day, I would like to wish my LOVELY girl: Happy 11^th Birthday and a good year ahead.



Happy Birthday Anthea

Happy 9th Birthday, Anders!

His birthday falls within the March school holiday, so he had the whole week to celebrate it.

We had asked him how would he like to celebrate it and he said he wanted to invite his usual gang of 4 but it was not possible as Bryan would be away for his holiday and Nicole had changed to a new school and it was not easy to invite her. So the only ONE left available was Ryan.

So we had a simple family dinner and invited Bryan along. Dinner was at TCC and it was a great choice as the food was delicious and we had a 50% discount off total bill as it was my birthday month too.

After dinner, Anders requested to play his favorite arcade game with Ryan. They had great fun at the machine. Then we proceeded to MacDonald for a simple cake cutting celebration and had our dessert at the same time.

Each birthday we celebrate for him meant we had reached another milestone – he is not an easy child to bring up. There were many occasions that I had teared because I felt that I had failed as a mother in disciplining him. But I know I cannot give up on him because if I do so, he will be a goner forever. So no matter what happen, I have to be there for him.

So on this special day – I just want to tell him: “Happy Birthday Anders, Mommy loves you very much!”

 

 

Happy 40th Birthday to Daddy!

Adrian was on oversea detachment for 2 months – end April to end June 2012. The last trip he went was sometime in 2006, when I still had my faithful helper, Siti, with me. So I didn’t felt too stressful handing the children and housework during that time.

Now it’s a different scenario, not only did I have to handle all the above alone and to top it off – I was suffering a major backache issue. So there were lots of worries and tensions on my part. But thankfully to all the families support and the children well behaved, we went passed the 2 months in quite a swift. I was glad when Adrian arrived Singapore on 29 June 2012.

The timing was perfect and we had a family birthday celebration cum homecoming welcome for him at the Prego, Fairmont Singapore on the Saturday evening.

Simple dinner cum birthday celebration but important thing is we are a FAMILY again. Till his next trip…Happy 40^th Birthday to Daddy!

Happy 10th Years Old Birthday, Anthea!

Time seems to pass so fast and it really sometimes felt like she was just born yesterday.

It has been 10 years since 2002 and yes, she is celebrating her 10^th years old birthday this year.

As she has a few good friends and make the decision to just invite them for a simple tea cum birthday celebration at my youngest brother in law condominium function room.  

Her celebration was hold on Sunday, 8 April 2012, and she invited Shan Ting, Tina, Rachel and Venice to her party.

We prepared some simple snacks and drinks for them and they had pizzas/sushi and crackers for tea. After tea, they rested a while before having the birthday cake.

Then in the evening around 5pm, they went to the swimming pool for some water fun.

Seeing how she had grown from a baby to a toddle and now to a child, I am just glad that she is always happy and blessed with good health.

It had been a great 10 years for me too with a mixture of every different type of feelings through her growing years.

On this special day, my only wish for Anthea is: Be Happy and live life to its fullest! Happy 10^th birthday to my babe! 

March Birthdays/School Holiday cum Universal Studio Fun

It’s the month of March and it’s month of celebrations. Yes, we have many March birthdays “babies” in our families. My Mother-in-law, my eldest niece, Anders and myself.

We celebrated my birthday with a sumptuous buffet dinner at the Asian Market café located in Fairmont Singapore. Thanks to my SingTel Red Rewards point, I managed to redeem 4 complimentary meal vouchers for 2 adults and 2 children.

It was a really enjoyable dinner and after the dinner, we met up with the extended families in Sentosa Island for the Crane Dance show. It the quite electrifying to see the entire laser displays.
I had an enjoyable day on my 41st birthday.

The school had its first term break from 10 to 18 March 2012. Since we were not planning to go oversea for vacation, we decided to do a local weekend stay-cation. Once again, my MIL had kindly given us her hotel room complimentary stays for 2 nights at the Fairmont. So we were back to our nice & cozy hotel room for 16 to 18 March. We were upgraded to its Signature Room.

In celebration of school holidays and Anders 8th years old birthday, we decided to bring Anthea and Anders to the Universal Studio Theme Park on Sentosa.

On 17 March morning, we took a taxi from the Fairmont to USS and arrived around 9.45am. We joined the Q of people whom were all set for a fun day at the park. When the park opened at 10am, everyone was very excited and started to go in different direction for the different rides.

Adrian suggested we began with the Transformer ride and it was a really thrilling ride. All of us enjoyed it very much. Then we proceeded onward with the different rides – Jurassic Park, Return of Mummy, Shrek 4D show and many more.

We had a fun filled day at the day and finally left the park around 4.30pm, before leaving the place, we went for the 2nd time ride on Transformers, as requested by the children.

We went to Hotel Michael and met up with Uncle Hong Thong and families as they were also doing a local stay-cation in sentosa Resort World hotel. The children joined in the swimming fun at the Hard Rock Hotel. After an hour of water play, we went to shower and went back to the hotel room for a quick tea break.

Then we left the Sentosa island and went back to our own hotel room. The rest of the stay was simply rest and relax and we had a great family bonding time.

Anders birthday falls on 22 March and we told him to have a simple celebration with his few good friends at home. It was the right decision, they had an amazing time, talking and playing with one another. After the party, Anders said “mommy, I am very happy and glad to have the celebration at home. Next year, I also want to celebrate at home.”

Yes, it was indeed a memorable birthday’s celebration month and we had a great time together.

Happy 9th Birthday to Anthea !

Last year she had a Macdonald’s Party with her classmates. This year, she wanted a buffet lunch at Fullerton Hotel. After some discussion with Anthea, we finally decided on a birthday lunch at Ellenborough Café in Swissotel Merchant Court hotel. Much thanks to the Raffles Feed card from my in-laws.

On Saturday, we arrived at the hotel around 11.45am as lunch was booked at 12 noon. When we arrived at the hotel, both Anthea and Anders said: “oh…is this hotel, we came here for wedding before.” When we asked further, both said: “it’s Uncle Terence wedding.” We were quite amazed as they could still remember it was my youngest BIL got wedded in May 2008.

We were seated around 12noon and started our buffet lunch. Both anthea and Anders had a great time with the food selection. We had an enjoyable family lunch. At the end of the lunch, we decided to just have some photo taking with the birthday cake and keep the ceremony till dinner with the extended families. Anthea had chosen the Oreo Cheesecake off the cake counter from the café.

Seated beside us was actually a group of people attending a wedding lunch. This brought back very good memories for Adrian and me. We shared with the children that we had our ROM Lunch at the very same venue and area, back in Dec 1999. Now Anthea is already 9th years old.

We went home for a short rest and Anders had his swimming lesson in the late afternoon. Dinner was organized at the east coast seafood centre. We had it at Little Red House as Jumbo was full and the crowd was massive due to a heavy downpour in the evening. It was an enjoyable dinner and we had the cake cutting ceremony after dinner. Anthea shared her birthday cake with the families.

As it was still early, we decided to adjourn for another round of dessert. Original intention was Gelatore at Siglap Centre but the place was gone. So finally we ended up at Xin Wang café which had all the selection of cold/hot desserts. We ate desserts and chatted away happily, sharing our updates of the week. Around 11pm, we called it a day and Anthea was very happy that her special day had turned out to be SPECIALLY HAPPY.

Wishing my dearest Anthea – a Happy 9th birthday and May your wish comes true.

Happy 7th Birthday to Anders

Anders had expressed his intention to invite his classmates for his 7th birthday celebration. As he just started Primary 1 and I am not too familiar with his classmates parents, so I told him we should celebrate his birthday in school so that all his classmates can be invited to the party. He was agreeable to the idea and with this – I started the Party Planning.

The 1st step was to get his form teacher approval and arranged the party at recess time. A few emails correspondences with the form teacher – Mrs. Phua and we were all set for the party.

On 22nd March morning, I went to collect his cake and headed to his school for the party. At 9.25am, the form teacher brought the children to the canteen and we started with the cake ceremony. After eating the cake, we had some simple beehoon with chicken nuggets, fishballs and dou fu for their main meal. We ended the meal with a bottle of Vitagen.

It was a simple birthday celebration and I believed Anders had enjoyed it with all the blessings from his friends and teachers. Happy 7th Year old, my dearest Anders!

女人四十！

Over the weekend, I celebrated my 40th birthday. Yes, it’s the BIG FOUR but I know I need to welcome it gracefully.

On Saturday, I had a birthday dinner with my extended families. We had a sumptuous Korean BBQ dinner at a restaurant by the same name. It serves Ala Carte buffet menu so it was a good treat for the family. I had a vanilla cake which was redeemed by using my own birthday cake voucher when I bought my membership with Care De Café.

After dinner, we adjourned to the Fullerton Hotel for drinks while waiting for my youngest SIL whom was attending a wedding dinner at the hotel.

The day ended around 11.30pm when we called it a day and it was a simple but fulfilling day for me.

On Sunday which was the actual day – I had a dinner celebration with my own family. My eldest brother brought us to a very nice restaurant by the pier. It is the Famous Crab King place by the Marina Bay Pier side. We ordered seafood dishes of fried mussels, salad prawns, steam crabs and fish. The food was delicious and the ambience was very relaxed. We also ordered a bottle of red wine for dinner.

To me, nothing comes closed to family time and having spent the 2 days with people whom are closely related to me meant more than anything.

Also having such a lovely family of my own, I can’t ask for more…: )

On this special day – I said to myself “感恩和知足“. Many thanks for all the love and friendship that I have had for these 40 years of my life.

Happy Birthday to Terence !

On Sunday, 24 October, we celebrated my 3rd brother in law birthday. As my MIL is an Ala Carte Member, she has meals vouchers which we could use at the Millennium Group. As usual, one of our favorite dinner place is Café Brio’s @ Grand Copthrone Waterfront and yes, its buffet spread is something that the families simply adore…: )

Usually for special occassion, we would dined at this cafe and like what my FIL comment :"it's an annual affair to eat here". Anthea & Anders were very excited about the Buffet dinner.

The spread was as usually good – the cold dishes even had Japanese Abalone with the usual fresh serving of sashimi, fresh oysters, cold crabs. The hot counters have mixture of western cuisine and some of our local favorites – hokkien noodle, chilli crab and seasonal vegetables dishes.

The favorite counter is none other than the Grilled counter – they have grills beef/mutton/prawns/cuttlefish ring and otah. Most of them were grilled to perfection by the chef in charge except for a few odd ones...: )

The children enjoy the food from all the different counters and the adults were also much busied going in and out of the main café to the grills.

We had an enjoyable dinner and when it was so called cake cutting time, I realized that there was no cake for the birthday boy…hehe.

Adrian said probably it was a buffet so no one thought of getting a cake…haha..: P

Anyway, both Anthea and Anders bought a birthday card for him and Adrian also gave him a birthday ang pow.

We wished Terence a very Happy Birthday and a good year ahead…!!

Kids in Charge & Happy Birthday Daddy

We had another sport-fun and indulgence weekends. Yes, it was the annual Kid’s in Charge event organized by Anders childcare – My 1st Skool. This year the theme was Sport and the event was held at Serangoon Stadium on 26 June – from 9 am to 12 noon.

In the morning we worked up early and had our breakfast. As Adrian was involved with the NDP, he could not join us for the event this time. We took a bus from our place to the venue.

Upon arriving, we saw the childcare teachers all busied escorting the children to the waiting area. Then the Guest of honor arrived around 9am and the “march passed” started.

After the march passed, the children were allowed to go to different corner of the stadium and play with the different sport. This will be our last time attending such an event. But somehow, I still like the one we attended in 2008 when it was smaller in scale and more personalized.

In the afternoon, we went back to rest before meeting our families for dinner at Eatzi @ Safra Yishun in the evening.

On Sunday, we had a Yum Cha lunch with the extended families. The original plan was to celebrate Adrian’s birthday at lunch but in the end, we decided to have the celebration at dinner time.

(aces family with our 1st niece - faith Tan)
My youngest Sister in law is doing her confinement and Adrian has been drooling for 猪脚醋and thankfully, my youngest brother in law invited the family over for dinner and Aunty ML has specially prepared the dish for Adrian…hehe.

So dinner was simple and yet sumptuous meal and Adrian ate till his heart was contented. I had picked up some tips from aunty and hopefully I can brew a good pot of the pig trotters…hehe.

After dinner, we had a simple cake cutting ceremony and everyone had a great time with the cake and also analyzing the World Cup results. : )