A girlie’s outing

 

We have been planning this for some time and finally, we finally materialise our outing!!!

We originally wanted to go and do our nails before heading down for a good hi-tea. However, due to the unforeseen circumstances (my nails broke a couple of days before and my girl friend bit off almost all her nails…… kekekeke), we decided to do some mama shopping before heading down to our hi-tea.

Did a little bit of research and decided to settle down at The Marmalade Pantry @ Ion Orchard.

My first time to Marmalade Pantry was actually to try their dinner with a few friends and I kind of like their exquisite pasta menu. Only thing is that their prices are slightly higher than usual but I guess the ambience kind of compensated it.

This is one place that i really feel in love with and been telling myself i want to go back for the cakes. :-)

  We ordered the afternoon set which comes with a choice of tea, cupcake and the platter.

Look at our gorgeous platter!! Yummy, isn’t it? Haha

My Elvis on the right and Her William on the left.  

This is my good buddy and friend and half boss and role model mummy of 2!!!

 

We had a good time chatting everytime we get together, probably because we have quote a lot of things in common, like both of us are mothers, we came from the same sec sch and JC, hence have some common friends, now both working in the same company and both are finance persons….. so we kind of never run out of topics to chat..mOst importantly, she is one friend that I feel very comfortable sharing things with, be it work or personal.

It is God’s blessing, that I met her again in the current company. Makes the stressful working life happier to a certain extent. :-)

Bosses and Friends and colleague make important influence to one’s happiness index in a company. Agree? :)

Looking forward to our next outing. Time to start planning. :-)

we are on the papers!

After waiting for 3 decades, we finally have a chance to appear on paper.

And the star was none other than…. our precious son, Justin Tay!

Because of his hospitalization policy and the kawasaki that he suffered last year, we were selected by AIA for this project.

Many people ask me: Wow, so now do you get free premium for the next 20 years, since you are advertising for AIA?

My answer: Haha.. that’s my wish, but AIA has not fulfill that wish.

I guess the main takeaway of this project: FUN and more FUN!!!

Last December, on one of the saturday, the whole crew team came down to our place on a saturday morning.

Had 2 hours of professional make up and hair styling (Haha.. ya.. nothing fanciful done to hair cos they wanted natural look).

Thankful for the good makeup that covered up our eye bags and wrinkles!!!!   YAY!

And then, we had 80 shots taken at the playground underneath our house, and 80 shots taken indoors…….

It was tough job. Because basically Justin always get distracted by the playground!!!
So it was super tough to get him to focus on the camera and smile, at the right timing and right angle! :p

By the time we went upstairs for the indoor shots, he was already tired and grouchy.. so you can imagine another round of coaxing and bluffing and tricking before we finally finish the task!!!!!!

And so, after 2 months or so of editing and all the newspaper artwork (which did not bother us at all…)

We finally saw the final product on the Today Paper on 6 March 2012.

This was the best photo taken out of the 80 outdoor shots.

 

Thank God for the great experience and all the fun that we had.

Looking forward to the next publishing in the Mother and Baby magazine in May. =))

A short biz trip to Melaka

After the gruelling presentation on Thursday (Yesh, it’s finally over!!!), I had to make a short 2D1N business trip to Melaka with my treasury manager.

I got to know about this trip almost one week exactly before and according to my FD, i had little to prepare for this trip. It was more of a getting to know the finance team at the Melaka team to facilitate the taking over of the a few ledger in a few months’ time. So for me, it was a pretty less stressful trip this time round.

So after the presentation which ended at 1pm, we had a quick lunch and wrap up of the necessary before our car came at 230pm to pick us up from the office. Even though we were both pretty exhausted from the presentation, but we were both chatting and “gossiping'” all the way till we reach Melaka!! Quite a good time of catch up and chatting with a dear friend. In Singapore, we barely got time for this type of chit chat time as we were both super busy in office and off work time are all given to our kids!!!

Finally we reached Melaka and checked in to our hotel at Hotel Equatorial Melaka. Our Melaka FD helped us booked the club king room and the room was a lot bigger than what we expected!! My jaws almost dropped when we checked into the room. The room had a huge bed, a side table, a small dining area and the bathroom was huge!!!  I seriously think that the room was good enough for a family of 3!

The view from my room.. I wish i had more time to enjoy the pool!!

My club room. Too big for one.

The spacious toilet.

After exploring the room and settled down, we both went down to the business lounge. They serve pre-dinner cocktail and this was covered with our room package.

Not a bad place to chill and relax. Simple tea time snacks.

We were supposed to go for dinner. But after the snacks, we were kind of full up.

Thus we decided to go to the nearby shopping malls. Visited the Makotta Parade and Palawan Shopping mall.

The 2 Libra-ians were very good at shopping and within 15 mins, we both left the first mall with a pair of heels!!

We finished looking around the 2 malls in 1 hr 30 mins…. actually we were just more of window shopping cos both of us were already exhausted TTM.

So we decided to call it a day and Go back to the room to rest, in anticipation of the long day ahead the next day. 

So back to the hotel room, we realised we had not had dinner!!!!!

And so, we ordered room service.  

I ordered a soup and a sandwich.

And i was shocked at the size of the portion!!!!

Look at the pictures and you will understand why.

Seafood soup. Yummy!! Finished every bits.

Manesto Sandwich. Resembles French toast but the bread was huge in size!!!

So I only manage to finish 2 of the 4. 

That’s the end of Day 1. Day 2 started at 630am and we started at office at 730am and worked all the way till 330pm before the car came and fetched us all the way back to Singapore.

A short and tiring trip. But a very fulfilling one cos’ we achieve most of the things we plan to do and met the people.

Foresee a few more trips to Melaka in the coming months.

2 more days.

Can’ wait for the presentation to be over on Thursday. 2 more days.

After that, will be a trip to 2D1N trip to Malacca before the weekend.

Plan to do so many things with Justin and Gerald.

Looking forward to a good 2 weeks break before my next project begin.

And i won the 2nd prize!

I never had much luck, especially in lucky draws.

Can’t remember when was the last time i won something in a lucky draw.

During the last D&D, i could almost smell the top 3 prizes, as I was the one holding the huge bowl with all the employees ID in it, while the MD was picking the lucky winners. I could see my ID swimming in and out of his fingers.. but just no luck.

So during the CNY lunch a few days back, I was totally surprised when my ID got picked for the 2nd prize!!!

Even though the prize is not really fantastic and definitely not useful for me, cos I don’t even drink XO,

but still, I think its a good sign to me that this is definitely going to be GOOD year ahead!!!

XOXO~~

12th anniversary of together-ness

12 years ago, on this day, we held hands for the very first time. And started dating.

And in the twinkle of an eye, 12 great years have passed and we are now already proud parents of a cute little one.

I thank God for an awesome 12 years, blessing me with a great man who is always my greatest pillar of support in all circumstances.

Like what Pastor Kong says, the man of the house is the spiritual leader, the king and the teacher of the household.

I truly agree with this statement and I think the one in my house has done a great job.  

Thank you Dear for the great 12 years and I am definitely Looking forward to the next 12 great years ahead!! ~~~~

Bye 2011, Hello 2012

This is definitely a very late post…been wanting to write a post on the last few days of 2011 to summarise the year 2011. But it has been such a crazy month in December and following another crazy busy month of work + festive holidays + deadlines + presentation dry runs etc…. and all these in the midst of desperately calling up child care centers, nursery kindergartens and any other available 2 or 3 hours lessons that Justin can go to in 2012.

Phew… a long list…. and I definitely do not intend to start my first post for 2012 with complaints and naggings. So i shall put them all aside for the time being now.  

Justin is now already 26 months old. How time really really flies. in the year of 2011, he has grown so much and also learnt and picked up many new skills. Now, his vocabulary is no longer limited to one word at a time. Many atimes, he is able to express clearly to us what he wants, even with his incomplete sentences. But I am extremely proud of him still because i do see children of his age are still not as expressive as him.

For that, i must really thank God for a great mother-in-law, who is not just our nanny and babysitter from Monday to Friday while both of us go to work. But she is also Justin’s main caregiver, tutor and entertainer. Hahahaha… quoting her, she always tells us that she always constantly got to think of what new things can she teach or entertain Justin when she comes the next day. I guess, all these can only be done with the great love of a grandma. Love is precious. And through her patient teaching, I see Justin learning new words almost every other day. I would not imagine what it will be like if its not her looking after Justin.

Anyway, time has come that Justin should start to pick up and brush up on his social interaction skills. I have called up so many different places. Sad thing is that most of them are full full full to the end of this year at least. Sigh… so its waiting list after waiting list. All i can do, look up to Heaven, pray to God to open a door for us.

Meanwhile, I guess its just more playtime for this little cute one at home. Hahaha

 

Totally in love with his cheekiness, even though sometimes, can be pretty unbearable too!! Hahahahha… contradicting huh…. hur hur hur….

The other good news at the start of 2012 is that I just completed my performance appraisal for 2011. Thank God for a good appraisal and if nothing goes wrong, I will be due for promotion this year by 2Q. I believe that all these are in the plans of God, just like how he has planted me in this company in 2010 at a most unexpected circumstances. The things that I have gone through 2011 are really bitter sweet. But through all the exposure, learning experiences and tough circumstances, I think I can proudly say that God has definitely made me a stronger woman than what I thought I was, at least in my own perspective.

The Bible says in Isaiah 55:8, “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways”.

I truly embrace this and I know that in the year 2012, Many many many greater things are yet to come. And I pray that God prepares my heart to be ready for all the upcoming challenges and mountains. Many things I am praying for to come true in 2012. God knows all the desires of my heart and I believe He is the only God who can bring these desires to reality.

I am letting Go, and letting GOD to reign, take control of my life.