For some strange reason, K is really wary of cameras… except the iPhone one, which he loves!

That very same evening, we were off to Tung Lok at Paramount Hotel for our very first reunion dinner – with my dad’s extended family. Thanks to my cousin’s awesome planning, the food was definitely the best ever I’ve had for a reunion dinner. The prawns were fresh and huge, the steamed fish was just the right texture and taste, and the scallops were huge and tasty! Best of all, the fried rice was served at the start (instead of at the end, which most Chinese menus tend to do), so you could savour your food accompanied by rice :) I like.

(All my cousins!)

Having had a full day of activities (K had Kindermusik in the afternoon), he knocked out at dinner. Thanks to my great planning :D (I had prepared a fresh set of clothes for him to sleep in), K was clean and comfy and managed to settle pretty quickly.

Sunday was quiet, with breakfast at the newly opened mall by our house (more on that another day), and ample naps during the day so K would be bright and perky for the big reunion dinner (with the husband’s extended family [dad's side]).

The dinner was at Long Beach (again); it was awfully disappointing this time round though because each ‘sitting’ was only an hour long. The tables were awfully squeezed (place was brimming at over capacity!), and the electricity tripped thrice in the short span of time we were there. The 8 courses were served all together (!!) and we didn’t even have time to take any pictures of our coordinated Hawaiian outfits :( Miserable. The mood was poor too, with a brawl breaking out between two diners over who would get a table first (?!). What a difference from the previous night.

Monday: The first day of the Dragon Year! We set off bright and cheery in the morning for my parents’ place.

Before heading to my in-laws’ for an extended family gathering – yes, with the same people we’ve just had dinner with the night before. On the bright side though, where else would you be able to get proper food on 初一 in Singapore? K slept through most of the celebrations, although he did wake up in time to be glued to the TV.

(Eyes glued to the TV before his nap; eyes glued to the TV after his nap – TV is a rare treat because we don’t have a TV at home.)

We reached home close to 6, giving me just enough time to whip up a simple dinner for K, before setting off to my (maternal) grandma’s house for dinner, with the extended family. It was the first time we were seeing this group of people in the Dragon Year, so ang-pao exchanging was a jolly affair, and K had a happy time playing with the ‘aunties and uncles’ (my cousins) that he meets every Saturday evening. Better still, the food (steamboat & noodles) was AWESOME!

The second day of the Chinese New Year – Tuesday: we decided to take it easy, having been exhausted from the day before. The husband was also recovering from a late night session of mahjong (after he put K to bed yesterday), and thus we spent a quiet morning at home. In the afternoon, we set off for my boss’s house.

K had the most awesome time there with the kids – mainly because they took the very expensive model sets (aeroplanes, cars, buses, and trains) as ‘toys’. There were at least 5 very anxious pair of eyes (the parents) watching over them warily.

In the evening, we went off to my (maternal) grandma’s house (again) for dinner – mainly because there was nothing else to eat around Singapore (we struggled finding food for lunch, and ended up with McDonald’s, for which there was a ultra long queue in the drive-in.)

Happy Chinese New Year to all!

P.S. If you would have noticed, we had coordinated outfits throughout the CNY celebrations (just like last year), and it’s really becoming a tradition that I think we should keep :)

Because we randomly won two “Sentosa noon play pass” tickets – which allows you to enter 4 attractions (out of 13 designated ones) of your choice – we decided to be tourists in our land!

The 13 allocated attractions weren’t great, and we struggled to even find 4. So we decided on the newer and (in typical Singaporean fashion) more expensive ones – Desperados and the Extreme Log Ride, and then the Tiger Sky Tower, and the Luge (which we took only in one direction since it led us right back to the Beach Carpark where we parked). We also factored in convenience, and these attractions were all at the Imbiah Lookout.

It was an extremely, extremely hot day though. And we were pretty glad to be back in the cool air-conditioned comfort of our car within 3 hours :)

The menu was rather limited (in my opinion, for a Jap buffet); a page of tempura, 1-2 pages on sushis, a limited selection of teppanyaki, 1-2 pages of others. But what matters is the quality right? Which in our opinion was great!

The coolest item on the buffet menu was the ‘shabu-shabu’ and ‘teppanyaki‘, which, as part of the buffet, was great value for money. The only thing was that you had to be seated outside if you wanted to grill your food.

Spent close to $100 for two, with taxes and all ($40.80 ++ per head for weekends). The sore point about the buffet though, was the lack of desserts :( Although we did get home and eat $3.80 cups of Japanese jelly!

Had the set lunch ($38++) on a quiet weekday, on the recommendation of several people. Keystone Resturant is set right in the Central Business District, although it’s tucked away in a quiet, cobbled lane.

The food was pretty average, meaning that it turned out to be quite a pricey lunch ($100), and the set – devastatingly – didn’t come with coffee/tea. :(

Random side note – ‘keystone’ is some architecture/engineering term, referring to a ‘wedge-shaped stone piece‘. In line with that, the food was served creatively on slabs of stone-like concrete. Pretty cute.

The ambience, while quiet and dim, was relatively business like, with tables lined up in neat rows. Not quite the place for a romantic meal.

In better news, AMEX platinum holders currently have a 50% of dining deal (for 2 diners, 35% for 3, 25% for 4 etc.). We just might make it back again :)

So we asked him what ‘d’ was for, and he said ‘dog’!! He went on to proclaim that ‘b’ was for ‘ball’, ‘a’ is for ‘perl’ (his version of ‘apple’), and ‘k’ is for ‘kick’ (complete with the leg movement indicating a kick)!

I just had to brag about document this online :D

The compensation definitely doesn’t commensurates with the dedication the organisation expects of its employees, and increasingly, “the other side” is beckoning. Have seen some interesting propositions in recent weeks, but nothing fancy enough yet; yet being the key word.

Maybe a migration is in order.

Despite pandering to K’s whims and fancies the entire night, the husband got up at 7am – together with K – to bring him down for a morning walk (+ fed him breakfast + showered him + read to him + played with him) so that I could sleep another 3 hours in peace. <3

For a Friday evening, it wasn’t awfully crowded, and we managed to secure the only table on the verandah. The menu had two parts to it – one full of Thai food (from the restaurant next door, that seemed to be a segmented part of Epicurious), and one with Western food. We decided to go with the burger and a grilled pork belly, with a tom yum soup (from the Thai menu) for starters.

The food was pretty average – tom yum was awfully salty, and came with two, yes, just two (albeit yummy) prawns. The burger patty was kinda mushy, not quite our thing. The next time we’re back around that area, we’re likely to try one of the other restaurants in The Rail Mall though – most of them looked a lot more populated than Epicurious, which I’m pretty sure says a thing or two.

Other than the awful time at work (even as I type this, I’m trying to ignore the gazillion emails in my work laptop calling out to me), the kid had his vaccination earlier in the week. For the seasoned parents, you would know that this means a slightly cranky kid for at least a week (for the uninitiated, vaccinations tend to put babies out of sorts – feverish and stuff).

On the bright side, Chinese New Year (we had so much fun last year) is round the corner, and we’re looking forward to an even better one this year! Felt so happy doing the cash tallies for this year’s angpows and summoning the husband to change the right amount of new notes.

Also, we had an awesome (although pricey) lunch with the parents at Carlton Hotel’s Wah Lok today, for which K slept through. Plus, we’re considering getting a new car! Ok, so maybe life’s not that bad after all!

And we’ve got Royce in the fridge. :)

Him: I’ll go for the mango grass jelly.

Me: (still poring over menu) oh… Err… Can you go for the watermelon grass jelly instead?

Him: You want that? Sure!

(Greedy) me: Yeah. Actually it’s cause I want to eat the sesame paste mochi, but I need the watermelon to quench my thirst.

Him: Anyway watermelon also good. It’s cheaper than the mango one.

<3