(Dec 17) Trip to Port Dickson

A road trip to Malaysia with Ah Gong, Ah ma and Xiaoshu

The first day was uneventful. We drove for a couple of hours to KL and only checked into the serviced apartment in the evening. We did some shopping and turned in early.

The hotel, Hibiscus, at Port Dickson was stunning. We stayed in one of the villas that looked out into the tranquil sea and we even had our own swimming pool in the villa.

The festive mood

Dinner was Japanese food at one of the malls.

We ordered a lot of food but food was really affordable. We were bursting at the seams and totally satisfied.

The next day! Took a boat out to the corals to feed the fish. The water was murky so we did not see many fish.

Headed to the farm after that. The children never tire of feeding animals.

It was an eye-opening experience to be so up close with an ostrich. We could touch its feathers and even its muscular thigh under its wings!

They were really greedy birds, so this one followed us closely and wanted more snacks. They would peck at the grains in our palms but it was not painful at all.

Went to another park called the Dinosaur Park. Nothing fancy, our Singapore Zoo had better exhibits. But tong was thrilled as usual, maybe he could be a paleontologist in future? ha.

Well, we could probably guess where papa got his dramatic genes from...haha..

All of us took the carriage ride, wondered if we had been too heavy for the little pony.

Jun went for a dip with ah gong while the big ones went to the water theme park with papa!

The oldest (technically ah ma was older than ah gong by a few months) and the youngest ones in the Tay extended family.

What a relaxing swim.

 

The trio lazed on the humongous floats. Jie's favorite was the seashell.

Ha, she was pretending to be a pearl. Our little precious pearl.

The zany flamingo and the one who was lounging on it. Or was it the zany human?

And we had the crocodile hunter.

 

They were sliding down at such speed. These daredevils loved these adrenaline-inducing things.

 

Not papa's cup of tea actually. He actually got injured while playing on one of the smaller slides. He challenged tong to slide down as fast as one could, rolled himself into a ball, careened down the slide and flew off the protection barrier to land hard on the sand. Ha.

Okay, the kids LOVED this place, we would possibly come back again, perhaps with the cousins in future!

(Nov and Dec 17) What we were up to during the Dec holidays

The little rascal had become a true boss baby, often terrorizing his siblings who willingly indulged him in his whims. One of his favourite tricks was snatching whatever gor gor was eating or whichever piece of snack gor gor had chosen. The ever dutiful gor gor would always oblige.

Free playtime at the newly renovated Bukit Panjang library. There was a dress-up corner so jie jie dressed up as a bride.

Her first ever report card. Well, we did not expect Xun to top the class, it caught us by surprise. Well, mama actually felt pressured to give jie jie more work during the holidays so that we could maintain the lead. Of course, jie jie was dismayed, she was reluctant and had a sulky face and "earned" a dressing-down from mama.

mama talked to Aunt A about it and she gave this sagacious advice that xun is doing well as she is not put off academic learning as a result of being forced to in early childhood. Instead she could follow her interests and learn through play. Well....I supposed if this worked for jie jie, then we could continue till she reached a point when she needed additional help, and we could look into enrolling in tuition centres.

The ever compliant jie actually came to ask me when we were starting the assignments one day. Bless her little soul. She was a most obliging and dutiful girl. I told her I had thought about it and decided that we would not do extra work so long she could keep up in school.

Hurray, jie received a $20 Times voucher and use them to buy a surprise animal egg for herself and the brothers. Would you believe it? Xun squealed when she opened hers and got exactly what her heart desired - a unicorn! A rare one too. Jun was thrilled to get Hudson the husky, he had a thing for little puppies. Tong remarked that it would be so cool if he got the dragon. And he did! GOSH. Out of so many possibilities, they got the ones which they wanted in the correct order!

God was so good to us : )

On an ordinary day, we bumped into Xiaolongbao at the amphitheater. The munchkins had grown from being babies to toddlers with  big personalities now.

Ha, the boys were in the matching tiger tees again. 

River Safari

The joy and light in my life

At River Safari. Maybe tong would really be a zookeeper or work with animals someday? He had such an ardent passion for animals.

 

The zookeeper asked if anyone knew what the iguana ate and tong answered correctly that it ate leaves. I would have never guessed that. Tong did retain a lot of those knowledge we read!

GBTB with Jj and Jay

If only we lived in a wintry country, we would be able to have a cozy fireplace too. Ha, sorry, nope, I hated the cold weather. If one of you ever studied in another country with winter, I would NEVER visit during that season.

Growing taller and taller

Dazzling displays

Did I see three cute little Christmas trees?

Where should we go next?

Hmmm...I forgot what they were asked to do...were they supposed to be shouting out to customers?

Never failed to take a photo on this lion sculpture. Aunt Val commented that Jun was a very photogenic baby. He looked adorable and cherubic in every photo, that cheeky one.

T-Play

Checked out this newer playground with Sera who was in love with Jun and only wanted to play with him. She did not even want to hang out with Xun and Tong.

Ha, see how they stuffed their shirts with balls?

Gigantic Pikachu at Hillion Mall 

It was so cool.

On the train to City Hall to meet papa at his office

It was snowing, snowing, snowing here.

What a cute little merlion!

Birthday dinner for Ah Gong at a zi char place in the East

The boys were up to no good as usual.

Take a bow!

 

 

Merry Christmas!

Went to Jurong East and saw this Transformer car look-alike

Woah, what a cabaret-feel!

I remembered we had a photo of Xun snuggled under a pillow too. Well, I supposed this inclination to cuddle under soft things ran in the siblings.

papa bought this infrared BBQ set, he liked fanciful gadgets, such as game consoles, cooking equipment...anything to do with technology

The very first time it was being used! It was good for an intimate setting of 10 people, all could sit round the table and chat while waiting for the food to be ready.

It felt like the holidays were gone in a blink. As I was typing this, it was already 8.28pm on 31st December. We had just finished our dinner. The children were playing on the ipad in ah ma's room. 2017 had come and gone in a glash. I did not feel like we did a lot during this holiday, we did not have as many playdates as we used to, we did not go to any mall for the Christmas show...it was a rather quiet and subdued period of time...well, still, a toast to 2018, we prayed that 2018 would bring greater blessings. And surely it will, because we have a good God.