The Bub in the Belly

It was quite a fun meet up and we got to meet some familiar faces (from previous meet ups) and some new ones too.

The next day, Ryan's friends, Brayden and Rou Ern, came over to play. Of course, their families came too!

Richard and I spent the earlier part of the day at the cinema (watching The Hobbit) and at the supermarket and deli picking up stuff for the gathering.

The gathering was, as always, a ball of fun for the kids. There was miniature tree-trimming for the three toddlers.


An impromptu puppet show about the story of the birth of Jesus.


Some fooling around with Shann, which sent the kids into peals of laughter as they chased her up and down the place.


There was food of course. Simple fare, given that there were only six adults among us. Richard whipped up our long-time specialty, fried instant noodles, and I tossed some spaghetti. We picked up some pork knuckle and rotisserie chicken from the deli (and I made a simple gravy for that), while Chris and Alicia brought the ham. There was chicken alphabet soup for the kids and I made some trifle for dessert. Shann brought a fruit cake, although we didn't get around to eating it.


Rachel yummed some of the spaghetti, together with the rocket and cherry tomatoes.




Not forgetting these two lovely cards from Brayden and Rou Ern which came for Ryan!



Christmas Day was another quiet day at home. We were quite tired from all the festivities and I'm still a little under the weather.

Ok, that's all from us. We are off to KL tonight! It's a spur of the moment decision! Yesterday, I was just telling a friend, Geraldine, that we didn't have any plans to travel during this time, and this afternoon, Richard said to me, let's pack up and go! Looks like I have to eat my words! We'll be back on Tuesday. Enjoy the last weekend of 2012!  

Haha! Actually, we were at the market for breakfast and to pick up some meat and vegetables for our kitchen. Yes, that's Ryan in the queue behind a stranger for the ATM in the last photo (I was queuing behind him).

I spent the rest of the afternoon studying while Richard cooked a soup for our lunch. I tried to put Ryan down for a nap but he steadfastly remained wide awake so we bit the bullet and set off for the playdate just before 5 pm.

The playdate was tons of fun for the children, as always. I do think that, everytime they get together, their friendship strengthens and they play better and easier together. Rachel was happy too. She was awake pretty much the entire time, unlike on the previous occasion we met up. 

I didn't take photos except for this one of Rachel. Chris handled the phototaking and gave us some prints on the spot. Chris and Alicia were wonderful hosts and they have a lovely place. We felt very at ease. The children were entertained non-stop and Alicia even prepared a vegetable-stamping activity for them - which ended up as a paint-the-vegetable activity instead, haha!


We ended the evening close to 11 pm and the moment we got home, I went back to studying. Only got to bed at about 3.30 am but my assignments are done! I can finally focus on Christmas!

Speaking of Christmas - here's our first Christmas tree shot taken at International Plaza after Shichida class on Sunday. Rachel is in the carrier, if you look very closely.


I spent the rest of Sunday afternoon cooking - something soothing and brainless after all that studying - and, in the evening, Ryan and I went to the playground while Richard and Rachel stayed home. Ryan has taken a fancy to climbing lately and it does scare me, although I think I have been able to hide my fear from him.


Here he is on the way home from the playground, looking very happy with his kick scooter and wearing the helmet that Ee Fann and Shann bought for him. Thanks very much for the helmet!

We celebrated Mother's Day a day early, with a small gathering with friends on Saturday. There was Ee Fann/Shann/Rou Ern's family and Chris/Alicia/Brayden's family, plus our little family. Three families hung out at our home from 5 pm till about 11.30 pm! I'm still amazed at how well everyone mixed and matched to stay happy for more than 6 hours hahaha!

The adults had their adult-time, the mummies had their mummy-time, and the daddies had their daddy-time. The three children (all three year olds) were together all the time! There was also a lot of "everyone together" time because the children's laughter and merry-making usually attracted the adults to gather around them. Everything flowed naturally and freely. It was a relaxed, stress-free, happy and fun event.

Er... not so relaxed that the children fell asleep of course! The photo above was taken when they were pretend-playing at going to sleep and watching the stars above.

But I'm getting ahead of myself here, let me start at the beginning. We started the gathering with a painting session for the children.



It was interesting to see the different approaches that each child took. You can tell which child painted which piece just by looking at the piece. We are hoping to get the finished paintings scanned and printed onto mini T-shirts for the children! It will be their "club" T-shirt!

The mummies exchanged home practice/learning materials plus little gifts for the children. I always feel so blessed to receive such goodies, prepared with so much thought and care.

What would a gathering be without FOOD right? As usual, we had more food than we could finish! The main attraction was the DIY popiah party package from Kway Guan Huat although the men turned their noses up at it, preferring to flex their manliness by devouring the Ramly burger patties which we brought back from Malaysia. So the men were more than happy to take charge of the grill while the ladies were more than happy to take charge of the popiah-wrapping.

We prepared the usual accompaniments for the burger - onion, cheese, tomato and bacon (although the bacon was ignored - I guess it would not be right to put bacon on a Ramly burger?). I made a big boo-boo - I forgot to pick up the buns for the burger!!! Which may have turned out to be a blessing in disguise as otherwise, everyone might not have eaten as much of the other food. The men improvised by wrapping the patty and its accompaniments in the popiah skin! There were other items for the grill - cocktail sausages, luncheon meat, corn, plus pork chops. I made some chicken soup with alphabet pasta for the children, oven-roasted some veggies and made twice-baked potatoes. The pork chops and roasted veggies were a little on the salty side (perhaps because I used sea salt instead of my usual salt, luckily I used my usual salt for the potatoes). Alicia brought a refreshing fruit salad and Shann brought drinks and little jellies for the children.

Of course, there had to be a cake! It had three candles for the three mummies, which were blown out by the three children three times!


Sorry that there aren't more photos to share, especially of the food! I was having too good a time eating and chatting with everyone!

Hope your Mother's Day was fabulous!

How was your weekend? We had a lovely one, hope you did too.

Saturday was peacefully spent lunching and shopping at Plaza Singapura. Spotlight was having a storewide 30% sale so, despite having popped in the previous Sunday, and again on Friday, I just had to go back again for the third time. We did our grocery-shopping at the hypermarket and came home to cook dinner.

Richard made a request for our stoved chicken, so that's what he got.


The rest of the night was spent at home, pottering about, doing various things.

Sunday was taken up by the usual classes - swimming and Shichida. In between we visited the ASA travel fair at Suntec City and, after Shichida, we paid a visit to Kinokuniya at Ngee Ann City. Coincidentally, Kinokuniya was having a 20% sale for members (we didn't know), so we went a little crazy with our book shopping.

Home for an early dinner, and then more pottering about, doing various things. Ventured out for supper and, after some more pottering about at home, plus some footie on the telly, the weekend came to an end. It was good - pleasant, stress-free and happy.

The usual group of parents organised a Chinese New Year get-together for the children on Sunday (5 February 2012) and everyone agreed to contribute in some way. On our part, we volunteered to provide the food and host it at our place. So for us, last weekend was a blur of cooking (with a little bit of art appreciation thrown in).

It seemed only right that we serve Chinese food and incorporate Chinese New Year dishes so the menu was yee sang, fried rice noodles (bee hoon), minced pork porridge, curry chicken, fried spring rolls, stir fried prawns in XO sauce, stir fried asparagus and chicken, egg foo yoong, koi fish-shaped agar-agar, and tang yuan (dumplings in ginger flavoured syrup). We decided to buy the first three and make the rest. I initially wanted to make the yee sang too, and had already bought some of the ingredients, but when I started planning the menu, I decided that I would focus on the other dishes instead and just buy a good quality yee sang (we ordered the salmon yee sang from Si Chuan Dou Hua).

So the day before, Saturday, was spent getting ready for the party, which for us meant going to the market to pick up some groceries and preparing the dishes that could be prepared in advance. When we got back from the market in the morning, I made the koi fish agar-agar. The moulds were made of very thin plastic and the first one was a disaster - the mould went out of shape when I ladled in the (too) hot liquid! I corrected my mistake and the following moulds turned out fine. I was very happy with the result!

These had fresh milk in the mixture, resulting in brighter colours.


These were without milk, giving a more crystalline appearance.


For lunch, we went into town. Richard did some banking while I picked up some extra plates, bowls and servingware. Then, we took some time out to go to the National Museum to visit the Dreams & Reality exhibition, which was a collection of mid-19th century to early 20th century works from the Musée d'Orsay in Paris. There were over 140 masterpieces including works by Monet, Degas, Renoir, Cézanne and Manet. Some of the highlights of the exhibition were Vincent Van Gogh's "Starry Night" and Alexandre Cabanel's "The Birth of Venus"!



Ryan was pretty intrigued with some of the paintings as you can see from the photos.


This was Cabanel's "The Birth of Venus". Absolutely breathtaking. Ryan was quite absorbed.



This was a Monet. Lovely.

When we got home, I started on the curry chicken. Richard helped me with that - he does like to pitch in and so I usually chop up and prepare all the ingredients while he does the work at the stove. I love curry chicken with potatoes and have been making this dish since I was about 14 years old. Actually, I think every Malaysian loves this dish. I made it less spicy and a little more creamy, as I wasn't sure everyone could take the heat. It used to puzzle me whenever someone asked whether the curry was hot - after all, isn't curry supposed to be hot? Malaysians never ask this question, but I find it quite common in Singapore.

Here's the curry chicken! We served it with bread and it soon became a dry rendang because everyone mopped up the gravy!


At night, I rolled the tang yuan - I must have rolled 500 of them! Ryan helped me and we worked until the wee hours of the morning, making baby tang yuan without filling and bigger tang yuan with gula melaka filling. Richard pottered around, tidying up the house, making sure all the cameras were fully charged and arranging the furniture.


The next day, we overslept and missed Ryan's swimming class! By the time we got out of bed, it was already half-past 11. I quickly chopped up and fried the filling for the spring rolls, letting it cool and drain. I made enough for 50 rolls.

The filling for the spring rolls

We went out to pick up more fresh ingredients as well as the fried noodles (which came with cabbage and fried chicken wings). Then it was off to Shichida class while Richard picked up the yee sang and the porridge (and dough fritters). After class and back home, it was a race to the finish! Teamwork was crucial - Richard went back to the stove to make the sweet soup for the tang yuan, while I cleaned the prawns, sliced chillies for the condiments, rolled the spring rolls, and marinated and chopped up the ingredients for the other dishes. Richard fried the spring rolls and cooked the rest of the dishes while I pottered around preparing everything else and setting the table.

We made it by the skin of our teeth - the families arrived just as Richard was cooking the last dish! I didn't have time to do a few things, like remove the price tags from our new plates/bowls, heat up the porridge and prepare a mini yee sang for the children (I asked Shann to do that by taking a small portion from the main yee sang, while I dashed upstairs for a quick shower). But that was all right. As long as the food was all there, our job was done!

Anyway, a new year and a new season is truly upon us now and I've run out of excuses to keep the Christmas decorations up. Chinese New Year is fast approaching so I need to shake off the rabbit and welcome the dragon!