We went to Universal Studios on Monday. This is the first time in history that Singapore has its own international theme park! How exciting! It's not as big as most in other countries but I guess it's proportional to the size of our country!

Over the past few years since we've had Sophie, we've been to 3 theme parks – Hong Kong Disneyland, Movie World Gold Coast and now Universal Studios Singapore. Comparing them, I think the first two are more suitable for kids under 7 and Universal Studios is more for older kids and adults. It's probably coz Sophie was more familiar with the the disney characters and Looney Tunes characters. US only had Shrek and Madagascar. Most of the shows were quite scary too. Mostly effects and monsters.

That said, we still enjoyed it very much. There were lotsa of shows like the Shrek 4D movie, a Monster Rock Musical, Madagascar characters dancing live show (the girls enjoyed it a lot). Sophie sat on only 1 ride coz she is still not big on rides. But Skyler who's almost 3 went on the carousel, a dinosaur ride and a shrek ride with her daddy. The guys enjoyed most of the roller coaster rides. Sue and I were happy just walking, enjoying the shows and sights and hiding in air-conditioned cafes while the guys went on their rides. It was so funny how the staff told us that if we need to rest, we could sleep in the baby's changing room! Apparently some pregnant women had fainted in the queues coz it was too hot! We had to remember to drown ourselves with water throughout the day.

It was really fun to go with another family coz we could keep each other company while waiting. Even on a Monday, we spent a good amount of time in queues. I think it's going to get worse during the school holidays! For the month of May, 3 of the rides are not available so they have compensated us by giving us a $10 food voucher and $5 retail voucher.

The kiddos have all grown up! They are all in preschool and speaking like bullet trains and very expressive and their personalities are all shining through.

But when it comes to taking photos, nothing's changed. They still can't sit still and smile at the camera all at the same time.

P/s R tried to hide his face with a bag coz he was tired and wanted to sleep in the pram but James snatched it away and he got a shock!

Meet Princess Towel.

Chris, my godson turned 8 last wk! He had a Star Wars party, complete with a Darth Vader suit and lightsabers.

Sophie also wanted. So we got her a towel and she was a princess.

I just uploaded a whole lot of photos we’ve been taking over the past two weeks. James sent his com in for servicing so I haven’t been able to upload photos/blog properly.

Here are some of the scenes from our daily life in Singapore that we miss much:-

The good ole kueh (cake) shop that serves local breakfast/tea and snacks.

Fresh seafood in the air-conditioned supermarket

Papa asking Sophie if she wants to eat frogs for lunch. Frog legs is a delicacy for Cantonese. It is used in stir fries or in congee.

We attended Dr and Mrs Maak’s (4th Principal of Singapore Bible College) 80th birthday dinner and they served the traditional birthday buns. Haven’t seen those in ages. It’s plain buns with sweet filling. This peach bun is served when older people celebrate their birthdays and it symbolises longevity.

Family reunions at the Hawker Centre with pink plastic table covers. Ooo the salty egg crabs were so good at this Ghim Moh stall.

Swimming at anytime of the day. Sophie insisted on swimming so Nyet found Em (Em’s 11)’s old clothes for Sophie to wear and in she went!

View from The Pinnacle@The Duxton, one of the newest local subsidized housing developments. It is 50 storeys tall, right next to Chinatown/CBD area. We were only at 25 storeys taking this picture.

Sometimes I really wonder who she’s taken after Neither James nor I am so flamboyant! She’s really into dancing and shaking the bum bum now.

Kwang How tried to test and trick Sophie with the "What do cows drink?" question.

She looked at him long and hard and said "Water".

And then he asked her, "Where does milk come from?" and she said "Cows".

And I asked her "What’s a baby cow?" and she said "Calf".

She sees them everyday. She knows. But it was so funny when Kwang How tried to trick her.

We live next to the library.

That is the coolest thing ever. It’s like having an endless supply of books, magazines and……. the latest thing is that you can borrow up to 2 DVDs/VCDs on your library card! You used to have to pay for a special membership to borrow the video and audio materials. Now it’s free! Woo hoo! And it’s just next door! 3 mins walk for adults and 10 mins walk for a pregnant lady with a curious 3 year old who stops to pick up plants and rubber bands (it was prob less but it felt like 10 mins in the hot sun).

Sophie and I have been hiding in the library once a week since we got back. I get my weekly dose of magazines (for free!) and she gets to browse all the books (for free!). Plus free aircon! Now she even gets to borrow DVDs like Little Einsteins, Dora, Ni-Hao Kai Lan, Bindi etc for free! Now only if we had more time to read and watch.

For Singapore homeschooling parents, the local library is such a blessing and good resource! They’ve got most of the good books that are recommended by Sonlight and Five in A Row.

I’m not sure if it’s just the heat but I’ve been feeling really tired.

Past few nights I’ve been in bed by 9ish, which is super rare for me. In fact, I’ve been falling asleep faster than Sophie! Swollen feet, eczema flaring up, stretchy tummy and achy back, all part and parcel of this pregnancy. I think Baby No. 2 is a little bigger than Sophie was coz I don’t remember being so heavy until the last month with Sophie.

But all in all, I thank God that it has been a pretty smooth pregnancy so far and real thankful for all the good food that my in laws have been cooking the past few days!

This was Sophie after 10 mins at the playground. She looked like she just had a shower. Nowadays, her hair is perpetually drenched!

"Can we go to the library now, Mummy?"

Ok I tried. I tried to bring Sophie to the playground to run around. The previous trip back (May 2009), I couldn’t bring myself to go downstairs even though the playground is just below the block of flats where we live. It was just TOO HOT. But this time round, I felt so bad keeping Soph in the house. So I thought I’ll bring her early in the morning and then hop over to the library next door to cool off.

We survived about 15 mins and had to get a lime juice at the library cafe and breathe for a moment.

One of the best thing about being a mum is to dress up your own kid. It’s like having a doll!

Except that when they grow up and decide that PINK SPARKLY SHOES are the prettiest things they’ve ever seen!

Yes we have moved into the dark… no… pink… side.

We went wild at Cotton On Kids in Aus. Sophie is like a Cotton On Kids ad – almost everything she wears esp her casual stuff are from Cotton On. Well, because for 5-10 bucks I get a really decent soft t-shirt with nice prints. There’s NO WAY I can get that kinda price even here in Singapore. Esp not for trendy prints and designs and most importantly, soft.

In the end, we made a compromise. The shoes were 2 pairs for AUS$15 so she got to choose the sparkly pink ones and we chose an understated match everything super practical black pair for everyday use (I wanted blue patent coz I love patent but James says matte black. Alright… )

On a side note, one of the things I love about coming home is looking through all the stuff that we left behind. It’s like Christmas all over again – oh! I didn’t know I had this/that?. Anyways I found this lovely trendy blue jacket in Sophie’s size and thought that my PILs got them for her BUT then I found out that it belongs to James! And his mum made them! Oh my! They are SO CUTE! Vintage some more… must keep must keep.

From Left: Mothers and their Babes (Mum, Me, Sophie, James, James’ mum, Sis in Law JY, Niece Janice and Bro Kelvin)

We came back in time to celebrate Mothers’ Day with all our mums! It’s so so good to be with family again. Dad’s coming back from Brazil in a couple of weeks and James’ dad was taking the picture.

We had seafood dinner at Owen Seafood Restaurant at Turf City, one of our fav seafood haunts.We had bamboo clams, chilli crabs, drunken prawns, steamed ta pin (my goodness it was SO good! I haven’t had steamed fish for so long!), baby abalone, and stir fry veggies. Let me say it again, it’s so so good to be home.

I know I say this after every trip. Nothing really beats traveling on SIA. Seriously. They are actually nice and concerned. Esp if we travel with kids.

Here’s Sophie giving them a thumbs up, esp for the fact that they have a screen for her and lovely food and toys. She was SO excited about the TV screen because we flew Qantas from Auckland to Brisbane and she was really disappointed that there wasn’t one. Actually…. I was even more disappointed haha coz I thought she’ll be entertained throughout. But thank God she was happily eating and playing with her toys for the first part and slept the rest of the 2 hrs. Phew!