Kids Arts Village

Today we visited the first kids arts village, which is part of the Singapore Arts Festival. If you have not caught it, you have until 5June to check it out. It is located at Esplanade Park, a short walk away from Esplanade, Theatres on the Bay. To learn more about it, read this link. Meanwhile, enjoy the visuals.

This art installation can be seen within Esplanade.

We were greeted by these colourful leaves at the park. They carry the thoughts of those who have visited the exhibition thus far.

While waiting for our turn to watch the drama, she decided to play on the blackboard.

We did some crafts with plastic. This is an octopus lantern made using a plastic disposable bottle.

Some very lovely decor lining the exterior of the craft room.

Cute characters made with wires.

Beautifully-painted pebbles.

Artwork that was seen in the scrapbooking room.

Outside the Esplanade, we came across these cute inflatables. Couldn't resist taking a photo. :)

Holiday home baking class

I had arranged for a cleaner to come in today. At the last minute, she did not turn up. I had no plans and thus did not know what to do. The intention was to go to the hairdresser's, but as it was still early in the morning, I decided to bake some muffins and cookies with my girl.

During most of her school hols, I like to occupy her with activities. While looking up cooking classes for kids, I found a lot of them tend to be very highly-priced. The stuff that were interesting, she wouldn't like to eat them, and the basic ones were too boring. I thus decided that I should teach her on my own. My cousins are already on the list for the next couple of weeks. Their mum wants them to pick up some cooking and baking skills and I've been arrowed to teach them a lesson or two. Once it's not done in my house, I'm happy. :D Did you already know I hate cleaning? Well, I really do. Cooking and baking is fun but cleaning and dusting, not my forte. I clean because I need to, not because I want to.

So well, having recently done a volunteer session of baking with the girls at school, I had a tub of yoghurt leftover, and not wanting to waste it, decided to let her bake using the recipe I had gotten from here. I did not follow the recipe, just used it as a base. Oreo was the substitute for Nutella and peanut butter.

Here you go, princess' first muffins all done by herself except that I had to help her place and remove tray from oven. Mummy's fault that it was too brown as I had set the oven to bake fan-forced. Yikes!

There was plenty of time left so we decided to bake cookies as well. The girl had requested for soft and chewy chocolate chip muffins and I remembered watching Anna Olson on tv one time, making just those cookies. A quick google and I found it easily. I did not cut down on sugar and am glad that it was just a nice sweet. However, the Valrhona dark chocolate chunks I had used were a bit bitter, they are fine once you get used to the taste. I suggest sticking to the original recipe. It is perfect as it is. Crispy on the outside and soft chewy on the inside.

When we were finally done with everything, a big thunderstorm started and we got stuck comfortable at home. In the end, we didn't get our hair done, but we spent a most enjoyable day at home doing nothing. :)

Ingredients

• 3/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1/4 cup granulated sugar
• 1 egg
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 2 cups all purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons cornstarch
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 8 ounces bittersweet chocolate, cut into chunks

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 F (I used 165 deg C)
   
2. Cream together butter and sugars until smooth. Add egg and vanilla and blend in.
3. Stir in flour, cornstarch, baking soda and salt. Stir in chocolate chunks.
4. Drop by tablespoons onto a greased baking sheet and bake for 8-10 minutes, until golden brown around the edge.
5. Let cool slightly and enjoy.
   

A dream come true

In a couple of hours, we are setting off on a holiday to the place of my dreams. It's a childhood wish of mine to visit this wonderful land that I've seen so many pictures of and heard so much about. Blame it on my dad who went on a holiday to Japan when we were young and brought back with him many souvenirs, pictures and stories of his trip. It became for my sis and I a dream which we would like to fulfil one day. That day is here. Thanks to my wonderful hubby who agreed to this trip instead of our usual home visit to Ireland.

Am I excited? I can't say I am exceptionally excited about it, because it is after all, my first trip to a land where the people speak a language different to what I am used to. Secondly, I planned the whole itinerary on my own, not having been there and not being familiar with the city. Hubby asked me earlier if I knew how to get to the hotel from the airport, and my reply was, err, we'll find our way there, and isn't that the fun part about travelling? However, I am looking forward to meeting up with cousin and family who have gone on ahead of us. From the smses exchanged, it seems like they have already been busy with lots of shopping. Oooo, can't wait!

Week 2

Can't believe that week 2 has passed by in a flash. Contrary to what I expected, I did have time to myself this week, albeit whiling my time away at Thomson Plaza while Princess was attending classes, but it was better that than nothing. Today, I said goodbye to the mall after spending 5 whole afternoons in a row there. I will have fond memories of you, dear mall. :) I remember the days when Yaohan was there so many donkey years ago, when I was just a child. Places such as Goldhill Plaza, Thomson Plaza - the 'in' places then, where my dad would take us to so very often, are forever edged in my memory. It has indeed been a very long time since I set foot in Thomson Plaza, but I felt transported back in time when I arrived there on Monday this week. It's like time had stood still. I have no visual memory of the place but it seems that everything in it seems to have remained the same. No refurbishments seemed to have been done to it and you could say it emits an old world charm.

My initial impression was that, oh, I hope I'm not going to be bored here, but far from being bored, I discovered some lovely shops. I love the toy shop and the Lego specialty shop, the stall that sells factory overruns, and not forgetting the countryware shop. I spent my time at Popular browsing the shelves of books, visited the NTUC Finest there and went down the aisles discovering the Eco-friendly products, the organic stuff etc. There are many eateries there too, and lots of places where one can have a lovely tea break. I even had the pleasure of the company of two of Princess' friends for lunch, as well as that of my cousin, nephew and baby niece on another occasion. We had lunch at Pizza Hut, and I tried the nasi goreng at Jonkers' Peranakan Food and had ice-cream at Swensen's while waiting for class to end.

We had an interesting weekend prior, followed by a visit to Universal Studios on Monday after classes, which I will try to update with photos soon. We also managed to squeeze in an outing to Forest Adventure with the nephew. Glad we went for that. :)

Next week is free and easy week, which means lots more free time to plan playdates. Bronze swim test will be held in the last week of the holidays and we are looking forward to a birthday party to end off the holidays before the girls return to school.

I hope to have more time to make some bentos next week as I have just received some new toys. I also found some 'toys' in Daiso which I have yet to use. :D

March Holidays

We are at the end of the March holidays and it has been a fabulous one! Spent 3 days at ballet helping the girls tie their buns, and just pottering about, lending a helping hand where help was needed. It was fun for us both, catching up with mums we seldom get to meet on a weekly basis, and the girl had lots of fun being an 'assistant' helper. She's been there for 3yrs now so she knows how to work things (such as the dvd player), and what to do (help girls polish shoes, sort out their character skirts) and she got to meet her many friends from other grades. But she also was helping herself constantly to all the sweets, biscuits, lollipops, marshmallows which were laid out on the tables for the examinees. I couldn't control her. Sob sob. So for three days, she just gorged on those. :( We're so happy and relieved that the exams are over. No more 3 times a week classes, meaning our Sundays are free now, and so are our Tuesday afternoons. Yippee!!

I'm glad for the break. She hasn't mentioned or thought about school or her classmates. I'm very happy that she's put it behind her. I also feel more at peace now. I do hope that when she goes back to school, she doesn't have to face the bullying again. Trying to look on the bright side. :)

Yesterday was a lovely afternoon spent meeting up with ex-Sec school friends. We went for the Swensen's 1-for-1 promotion and between us 3 kids n 3 adults, we spent $50. A real deal!

We had dinner at NYDC at Wheelock Place last evening as our original plan was to pick up a new Nintendo DS to replace her old one. However, after charging it up, it was working again so there was no need to buy a new one. We still went down town anyway and had dinner there.

Princess chose the snack bowl which held lovely crispy wedges with a soft centre, and some chicken nuggets.

Hubby opted for the ribeye which looked very lovely and the steak looked really moist.

I had a pasta dish called 'The prawn that got creamed'. What a cute name. However, I changed the sauce to suit my taste. Instead of the original full cream sauce, I requested for the chef to mix in some tomato sauce as I don't really like creamy pasta. The prawns were a letdown as they didn't taste all that fresh. Nothing to rave about this dish. It was just a tummy filler.

Dessert time!

Gummy yummy sundae was the princess' choice but she wanted only two scoops of ice-cream so we went for the mango/dark chocolate combination and requested for no whipped cream. There were supposed to be rainbow sprinkles over it but they must have forgotten them.

Hubby tried the Bailey's mudpie which was only so-so. You could hardly taste any Bailey's in it.

I am looking forward to today's plans. We are going to catch the movie 'Diary of a Wimpy Kid' this afternoon before having dinner with some ex-neighbours cum primary school classmates. We also plan to take a ride down the Singapore River on the river boats and am sure the kids will love that. It's something that I've been wanting to do for the longest time and it's great that we have the chance to do that with friends from out of town.

Poor girl went on a cycling trip to the East Coast Parkway with her dad this morning but threw up not long after she started on her journey. I believe she drank too much milo before she left, or maybe she's not used to the cycling. But anyhow, they had fun and she's raring to go again tomorrow morning. I did not allow her to take part in sports for three months, especially in those where there's the possibility of breaking arms or legs as she was preparing for her exams. It's a rare break from ballet class tomorrow, so best to make full use of her day. Classes resume next Saturday so it's a great time to sit back and relax, and maybe, hopefully do some assessments haha. But my best bet is that that won't happen! :P

Will try to take photos of our dinner this evening, hopefully. ;)

Enjoy the weekend!

Penang (Day 4)

On our final morning there before we headed for the airport, C took us to Kapitan for brunch. It was an Indian food joint and she highly recommended the briyani. Princess wasn't keen on the food at first but later agreed to have the banana prata. Unfortunately, they didn't have any pratas that day so she settled on white rice with some tikka masala gravy.

Hubby went for the tandoori chicken set with garlic naan.

C ordered the chicken tikka masala.

And I had the nasi briyani ayam (chicken).

After a tiring morning, she fell asleep in the plane and refused to wake up even though we were landing. Haha.

Thanks to C, I managed to go to quite a number of shops and also thanks for all the recommendations. These are the stuff I bought.

A variety of cake boxes. :D

This concludes my bumper post on Penang. :)

Penang (Day 3)

Before we left on our holiday, I had put aside one day for hubby and princess to spend the day at the hotel, doing fun things like swimming or playing games at Lil Rock or the Teen club. I didn't think it was fair to bring them around to shop all day. Besides, we had a gorgeous pool and facilities for kids. Hubby was very nice and agreed that he'd accompany her while C took me around to the bake shops, meet another blogger friend for lunch, as well as do some shopping.

For Lil Rocks, there is an acitivity plan for each day, starting at 10am for registration, followed by a cooking class at 10.30am, swimming at 11am, etc etc. I had enquired the day before and the person-in-charge told me that they make pizzas etc with the chef at the pizzeria right beside the Lil Rocks playroom. However, when hubby took her there to sign up for the Lil Chef class, apparently they were not prepared as they didn't think anyone would sign up for that. What a bummer. They told hubby to bring her back in 15mins while they prepared some muffins for her to decorate. Hubby was kidding that they'd probably grab a few muffins off the breakfast buffet and give them to her to decorate, which they did! They gave her some chocolate sauce and a packet of M&M's and that was it. Hubby felt that it was a bit boring but princess said she enjoyed herself so I guess that's what's most important. She did decline to take the muffins with her. All she wanted to do was play with the decor. Haha. I don't blame her, the muffins were not great-tasting.

They hit the pool right after the Lil Chef activity and she made 2 little friends there. Here's the all-time favourite slide.

There's a pool which has sand at the bottom, almost like the base of the ocean. Very nice. She got to build some little sandcastles there.

After swimming and lunch, they played some indoor games at the Teen's Club which had the xbox, Wii, computers, etc. They also had pool & foosball tables.

Our plan for our last evening there was to dine at the Hard Rock Cafe. Pathetically, they did not have any available tables, even though we said we were guests. She said the reservation was full. Anyhow, I felt that the cafe was too small. They should really have made it bigger with the space they have. We could have pushed for it but we didn't, as the smell of cigarettes was overwhelming, and we had a child and baby with us. So we decided to dine at the Pizzeria instead. I couldn't bear for C to drive up and down all day, so instead of having her pick up hubby and girl from hotel to go town to eat again, we decided this was the best decision. I have to say I was really disappointed with the menu at the Pizzeria. Choices were very limited and they didn't even have a basic Pomodoro seeing that this is a family hotel. However, I did request it for the Princess, and the chef agreed to do it. My guess is that it wasn't as good as the one she ate at Jemputree since she hardly touched her dinner.

Banana milkshake for the princess.

Breadsticks to go with dips below. This was lovely.

Antipasto for C.

Seafood pizza for all to share.

Pomodoro

Crabmeat fettucine, although there were more prawns than crabmeat in there.

Calzone with ham & cheese if I'm not wrong.

Penang (Day 2 Part 2) - Jemputree

C was very considerate towards princess who didn't take too well to street food. Thus she suggested this place in town where it will be an awesome experience for the child and the child is us to dine on a treetop. It was a wonderful choice, not just for the experience, but also for the delicious food. The nasi lemak is to die for, and all the sedap sambal and rendang gravy, yum yum. The rice was the best I've ever tasted.

Hubby opted for an equally fiery Tom Yum seafood soup to go with plain rice.

This young coconut juice was for him to counteract the spiciness of the soup. Hehe.

C ordered an Ikan Bakar, which means bbq or grilled fish to share.

Cucur Ikan Bilis, anchovies fried in flour is one of their specialties and we all loved this dish. It was totally addictive. We (baby and kid included) just couldn't stop eating them. :)

Hubby loved this cucur pisang which we ordered two portions of.

Unfortunately we were more interested in eating than taking photos, so we do not have pictures of the place. You can check it out here for some.

Penang (Day 2 Part 2) - Penang Hill

Following our very heavy lunch, we made our way to Penang Hill. Tickets were bought beforehand for the 3pm trip up the funicular railway. This was the highlight of this trip for Princess as she had read about it in her book.

We got there a half hour too early for our timeslot and tried to get on the earlier trains but they were filled to the brim. I really wasn't looking forward to this trip but hubby reminded me that that was what princess wanted to do, and that it's boring for her to go round the malls, as much as it was for me to ride on this train. Oh well.

This is what it typically looks like in the cabins, with passengers squashed in to each other. There were only a few seats in the cabins and they were mostly given up for the elderly and the young children. The ascend up the hill felt longer than it should have due to the discomfort of having people squash you in, left, right and centre. And not to mention the heat. There was no ventilation whatsoever. I do look forward to next Feb when they close to make huge renovations to the railway. Apparently when it's done, the air-conditioned cabins can take up to 150 people per trip and there will be more seats in them.

Scenes along the way...

Are we there yet?

Finally, views from the top.

That's Penang Bridge in the background... awesome piece of architecture.

There was a lady up the hill who sold these grasshoppers for RM$1 each. We got two of those. Aren't they pretty?

Coming down the hill, we were cramped in the cabins for over 15mins with no signs of the train moving. For whatever reason, I have no idea. Verdict after the trip uphill... Me to hubby & princess: 'So now, which was more enjoyable? The trip up the hill or the mall?'. Their answers, 'The Mall'. I rest my case.