I must have been repeating my ‘key messages’ to Nat too often…

There are times when Nat will willingly sleep in his own room with one of us accompanying him. Usually, it’s me. Recently, he chose tehpeng. Mummy me of course “felt jealous”! When I asked him why doesn’t he want mummy to sleep with him…

Nat :: Mummy, you got baby. Your tummy getting bigger.

Right…this is what I tell him to prepare him that there will come a time I won’t be able to sleep with him, cos he tends to kick quite often in his sleep. Heh.

Of course, there are still nights he wants to sleep with us. Strangely, co-sleeping has never been on our agenda since he was a baby but now that he’s older, he chose to sleep with us!Other than space, sometimes, he wants my bolster too. When I tell him that’s mine…

Nat :: No mummy, must share!

LOL right!? It’s really using my words back at me!

And speaking of kicking in the night..the other night he was more rampant in his sleep-kicking and I got irritated cos I was woken up, I kept pushing his legs away and in a slightly irrtable (hey, it’s 3 am la!) tone told him – stop kicking mummy!

Nat :: I’m soooo sorry mummy

Complete with the woeful, Im-really-sorry-I-didn’t-mean-it tone. My heart softened and I felt bad for being irritated.

Then, the next moment, his leg came a-kicking again. Zzzzz.

拿他没办法…

Currently, Nat’s favourite bedtime activity went from storytelling about Cars or Toy Story to stories “about me”.

So we have been re-living our trips to Hk & Bali, and fun activities such as NDP parade staycation and recently, we added the YOG men’s diving prelims to the story bank.

We enjoyed ourselves at the Diving prelims. We cheered for the Singapore diver. Even Nat went “Go Singapore!”

And of course, the funniest thing was when he shouted out: He’s wearing red underwear!  (the red speedos worn by one of the divers….)

I’m not a sports-person but when the YOG rolled around, I found myself watching the news highlights on YOG News Channel every night and was really impressed by the youths’ determination and their sporting efforts. Which really deserved to be commended and supported.

Even Nat was rather enthralled and he will go “Watch Olympics!” when we switch channels.

Ask him about this favourite sports & he will say : Boxing and that kicking one.

He meant taekwondo. Erh…ok.

As usual, by the time we thought of getting the tickets to some of the games, the tickets were kinda sold out. Thanks to DC family who gave us their diving tickets as they were double-booked for another event, we had the chance to be at an Olympics games.Which is quite an experience, don’t you think?

I was telling Nat, at bedtime just now while telling the Oylmpics story , that the (Youth)Olympics happens every four years. And that he will be 7 years old at the next one and it won’t be held in Singapore and we can only watch the games on TV…

For the closing ceremony, we timed our drive home back from my mum’s, took a longer detour and was rewarded with the fireworks bursting out in front of us overhead over the Sheares Bridge. Traffic was crawling, but we didn’t mind.

Now, if you ask Nat about the Olympics games, he will tell you “No more Olympics!”

And so 12 Aug marked our 10th year together.

We went to work as usual (work is just mad for both us these days). We didn’t plan anything nor go for any fancy dinner.
In fact, I even had to work late and he had to pack dinner from my mum’s for me.

That’s how our life is. No need for fireworks, excepting catching them at the NDay Parade (at the Swissotel this year).

I’m grateful. I’m happy. I’m loved. I’m contented. I’m blessed.

We had a really good chillax time in Bali with friends. There was nothing much on our agenda, other than food. We kinda planned our day around food and chilling (or trying 101 ways of jumping into the pool) by the pool in the villa.

By night, we sat and chatted by the pool and looked at stars. Beautiful. We even spotted shooting stars! (Yes, by last count, I wished for 3 Birkins!Hahah).

It felt as if we were back in the good old days of “chalet-ing” with friends…It’s our first trip with friends in a long while and we are really thankful for eye_deas and bw and their partners for accommodating us and a toddler who could get abit cranky at times. Really appreciated them entertaining Nat.

And I loved that I had some time out to read! There was no Internet connection, or rather, we didn’t pay for it. And so, we just did what we do before Internet came along – watch movies, play ipad games, chill by the pool with music and drinks etc etc.

And yes, my appetite really did get back in time! It started from a pre-flight meal of pizza hut, then a $10 chicken sandwich on board Jetstar…And went on to…

:: On our night of arrival, the rest decided to head out in search for supper and found a gem of a place – Teh tarik and prata shop (murtabak!) located near our villa. It was so good, we went back again and again, packed back to villa every day for supper and tea.

:: We chilled at Cafe Wayan after Ibu Oka Babi Guling. And we chilled for a good 2 hours, with drinks and dessert. “This is life”, I proclaimed!

:: Metis (the foie gras!) was absolutely yummilicious and worth every IDR we spent. It was our first dinner and it was a high benchmark to match. In fact, we were joking about booking the next cheap flight out, just to eat the foie gras!;)

:: Though we had breakfast in-villa, we opted to venture out for food. Kopi-Pot was a great discovery, introduced by our friendly driver (highly recommended!). I am still thinking of the banana pancakes! *slurp* Our next breakfast haunt – Klapa – was great in terms of view, but low in terms of food (by the last day, we had many many good food liao!)

:: We came to a conclusion that places with good view doesn’t necessarily equate good food. La Lucciola was one such place. But then again, we were benchmarking against Metis. But hey, Nat enjoyed his fish&chips, & that’s all that matters to me!

:; Before our night flight, we managed to head down to Seminyak for dinner at Ultimo. It was a good choice! The food was great and certainly very value-for-money. Definitely a good foodie note to end the trip.

And with this, I shall let the photos tell the story…

There’s this CD of children’s songs (which we bought from Mothercare) which both tehpeng and myself will definitely list it as one of the “most-utilised” item we’ve ever bought for Nat.

For some reason, the whole repertoire of songs will calm Nat down, during car-rides and when he’s fussing since he was a wee one. So, we had the songs in our itunes/iphones which was really useful for our travels. I remember having to play the album for Nat, during bedtime on our first trip to BKK. I remember having it on repeat mode during our long roadtrips while in Melbourne. Yes, we even burnt a copy along for the rented car. Even for some car rides in SG, Nat will request for it. Before he could speak, he would fuss and would only calm down when we play the album. So much so, tehpeng has to title it “A Old Macdonald” just so it will be top of the playlist for easy access!

And now that he can speak, he will ask ” My song please daddy!!” in enthusiasm before we set off.

Last night, he surprised us all by singing along to almost every single song. For some songs, he knew part of the lyrics. For some songs, he knew the beat, he knew the instrumental parts and would make the appropriate sounds. It was really too cute. Made me realise, all this while, he’s really been absorbing everything going around him, in his quiet manner.

At bedtime, I was singing “Jesus Loves me” and you know what? He knew the lyrics to that too!

Then I sang the “Wise man built his house upon the rock” and he knew the lyrics too (ok, only the last few words of each sentence).

It was enough to make mummy tear. I mean, my boy is (almost) all grown-up!

Interesting that babysis got into ACJC, like me and actually, every other cousin in the family.

And even more interesting that she joined Dance as ECA. I laughed (or grimaced!) that I was from the pioneer batch. The days when Dance was definitely not as happening an ECA as it is now, it seems.

Back then, we only performed during school concerts (like CNY, Teachers Day when half the school usually ‘pontanged” and the other half were forced to sit through it…huhhuhhuh). I think we had a Dance concert of sorts, and it was themed L’Passion or something like this, according to my fuzzy memories. I remembered those days of leotards and tees, practicing weekday and Saturday mornings in the then spanking new dance studio when the swimming complex was opened. Full length mirror for us, instead of practicing in the hall.

Well, I definitely can’t do a (almost) split or those backward bend anymore!

Flashback to today, the dance team seemed to be really popular. For one thing, there are definitely more guys! HAH!

Anyway, on Friday, it was the dance concert and the whole family trooped down in support, on its opening night. My dad was joking that he’s got to be the oldest parent around. As for me, it was really flashback being back in school…

It was nat’s first dance concert too and though I was hoping he would do something embarrassing like call out “YI YI!” loudly when he spotted babysis, he did nothing of that sort. He didn’t fidget either. He paid rapt attention and was really enthralled and entertained by the movement on stage.

We all had a bit of a problem trying to spot babysis – they all look alike – tall & slim with makeup on…it takes a mother, aka my mum, to recognise your own daughter. Haha.

I bought a bouquet and had wanted nat to go on-stage to present to babysis. Alas, no such chance.

I love one-pot dish. And for some reason, I didn’t realise I was a fan of fishhead claypot, till greentea mum made it and I realised I do like it, in fact.

Only homemade ones though. Hah.

I bought some frozen red snapper fillets, so I tried making it yesterday,with some slight variations using this recipe. Namely, sans claypot. Hah.

Instead of Chinese mushrooms, I used enoki mushrooms. I didn’t put in any tofu, and I added pumpkin and cauliflower. I also used chicken stock.

It tasted yummy, if I may say so myself. Of course not the same standard as what greentea mum made.

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Unfortunately, Nat didn’t quite like it. So, I supposed it’s a failed dish…

Today for lunch, I made alphabet pasta to go with the leftovers and it was a hit with him!