YIONEUNOICHIEIN1

Yah, the title may look gibberish but the super observant can quickly discipher the meaning behind it all.
Cutie Charlotte is 1 year old!!
A year ago, Cutie was torturing Darling inside her tummy. She refused to come out on her calculated 9 June birthday and decided to stay 2 days more. It happens that Charlotte’s birthday is the sum of Darling’s and my birthday.. Darling’s birthday is 6 Dec while mine is 5 May, so Charlotte decides to come out on the 11th. Lolz. Darling had to go in and out of the delivery suite a few times, undergo a few rounds of the uncomfortable cervix assessment and the anxiety of childbirth before Cutie decided to make a grand entrance. And what a REAL GRAND entrance involving almost everyone on call that night at the delivery suite! She wants everyone to be present on her birthday, so decided to make it a CODE GREEN emergency caesarian entrance, getting nurses, gynaes, neonatologies and paediatricians all around to receive her! A year on…. she is still as attention seeking as the start! Haha. She grabs the attention of everyone with her presence, be it in a good or bad way. She can amaze you with her motor skills (suddenly standing up when you least expected her to, and then walk towards you unaided!), she can suddenly utter gibberish and start clapping when she sees something interesting, she can dash towards a corner of the room only to pick up a strand of hair to lick, she can cover her mouth with her little hands and break out in a howling cry that can make you think she was trained by a Korean drama actress. Yup, that’s Our Cutie Charlotte and she turns 1 year old!!!

We decided to have a celebration for Cutie a few days before her actual birthday as her birthday is on a Thursday. Darling has been planning for her birthday party in March and April, spending hours browsing through numerous websites and images of 1-year-old birthday parties happening in Singapore for ideas of theme and venue. She shortlisted this cafe which fits the bill of being in a central location and “specialises in birthday parties for babies and kids” and it won awards being a child-friendly restaurant. EatPlayLove Cafe is a cosy cafe situated in Kampung Glam area, near to Bugis, located in the Aliwal Arts Center. It’s a Thai-fusion cafe with vintage decorations and dedicated areas of the cafe for kids to do craftwork while parents dine. We didn’t personally visit the cafe and the FB pics were all we had to decide this IS the cafe we want to hold Cutie’s important milestone birthday party.

Cafe settled, next up is the theme. “Sesame Street” was the initial plan since Cutie loves her Big Bird and Elmo hand puppets so much and there were so many kids party photos with the Sesame Street Theme. So we spent a few weeks browsing through google images, getting ideas on decorations etc before we felt that Sesame Street may be too “common” as a theme. We wanted something more personal, more special, more Charlotte. So I decided to put a search on Disney princesses. I wrote down a list of Disney princesses and decided to analyse each princess’s characteristics and see which one will fit our Cutie Baby the most. It is a very interesting research I must say, haha as I realize that each Disney Princess does indeed has 1-2 unique characteristics. There’s a few comparisons online done by other like-minded people which I can look through and it makes my job in searching for a fitting theme easier. Alice emerged as the leader with many characteristics similar to our Cutie Baby! Alice is a curious little girl who loves to explore the world, sometimes not realizing the dangers involved. She has no fear of the unknown and the unknown made her more curious to explore and experiment. She is rebellious of sorts, going against public opinion, wanting to do things differently. She can be feisty, going against authority, even speaks back at the Queen! Alice dares to try weird concoctions and food, resulting in her growing and shrinking, while Cutie will dash towards scraps of paper, strands of hair and never hesistate to put them into her small mouth and shutting it tight. There were elements of Alice in Wonderland that we find coincidental to Cutie as well, such as cats and 10/6 on the Mad Hatter’s Hat. Alice loves Cats and there’s also a Chesire Cat that she talks to a lot in the story. Charlotte, likewise, will get all excited when she sees the stray cats at the void decks. The price of the Mad Hatter’s Green hat is 10/6 (ten shillings and sixpence) while Cutie’s birthday is 11/6, the 11th of June. The Alice in Wonderland theme fitted Charlotte almost too perfectly we feel, so decided on this theme!

Theme settled, the next important thing is the cake! Again, Darling is the one with the connections to this wonderful artisan baker whom her friend engaged. She was impressed by her friend’s child’s birthday cake and wanted something as amazing, if not MORE spectacular! The cake has a moving component, something we though we will only see on Food Network’s Amazing Cake challenge. Well, this friend of hers managed to get her child a moving cake. How can Charlotte get something inferior?? Cutie deserves the best! So we decided to engage Jill Patiss to be our Cake designer. This will be her first Alice in Wonderland themed cake as well, so it’s equally exciting for her. We had to come up with important elements of the story to be incorporated into the cake. Darling searched the web, finding similar designs to show Jill Patiss, hoping to inspire her creativity. We never saw the cake’s design blueprint and the first time we saw the cake was at the actual birthday party itself!

EatPlayLove Cafe is also doing the Alice in Wonderland themed party design for the very first time as well! So we had to come up with the colour theme we wanted to show the cafe as a sample. We brainstormed some designs by looking at similar parties done elsewhere and consolidated the ideas to give to the cafe. Gayle was the person in charge of coming up with the designs of our ideas and she did not disappoint. She tried to incorporate everything we asked for. The colours, the food labels, drink labels, banner designs, quote cards etc, hoping to make this party a success as well. We paid for the dessert table and decoration package and everything will be set up for us before the TEA PARTY started. This saves us a lot of stress, because I wanted us to enjoy the party together with Cutie and not to get stressed over unnecessary things. The final design was amazing!

Pictures speak a thousand words… …
The birthday dress was bought during one of the EXPO baby fairs and is very well matched with the headband and ribbon! Lucky Darling is good with matching colours… … if I was the head designer, it will be fashion disaster!

Birthday Girl getting ready for the Party!

The cafe has done many birthday parties over the years and Tristan is very fast in setting up the macarons, cupcakes, stands and arrow banners. They even have colour matched table decorations and balloons. The next picture will showcase the details of the decorations, matching the Charlotte’s ONE-derland Theme.
“DRINK ME”, “EAT ME” are classics from the story and we loved how the colours combined to give a cheerful vibrant atmosphere.

Gummies Tier. Personalized Birthday card. Water with the “Drink Me” labels. Cupcakes with the “Eat Me” labels. Giant flasks to hold mashmallows and Cookies.

No Disney cartoon has as many memorable quotes as Alice in Wonderland, so I selected these few quotes, 1 from each character of the story, to make the themed decoration more complete. Darling was very satisfied with the end result.

Memorable Cute Quotes

The centerpiece of the dessert table is Cutie’s Birthday Cake. It makes a superb dessert table decoration PERFECT. The cake is an amazing piece of art! The detailed elements of the Story can all be seen on the cake. The cake is such a joy to watch! Every part of the cake is filled with details that it’s almost IMPOSSIBLE not to have a Jawdrop reaction when you look at it. The girl on the cake was supposed to be Alice but we decided to let Charlotte own the cake by having her own figurine on the cake! Notice the dress of the girl’s figurine?? YES!!! It’s modelled after Cutie’s dress. Darling has sent a pic of Cutie’s dress to Jill Patiss so that she can create an almost perfect replica of the dress. We replaced the 10/6 on the Mad Hatter’s hat to 11/6, to reflect on Cutie’s actual Birthday. There is a revolving Tea party table as a cake topper with miniature cakes, teacups as well as a teapot. We were told that the entire cake is edible, except the battery operated revolving tea party topper. Lolz. We absolutely love this cake. Darling is absolutely delighted that this shall be the best cake amongst all the 1-year-old birthday parties she attended, and it will stay number 1 for a very long time we feel.

Mr Rabbit, Mad Hatter’s Hat, Caterpillar, Chesire Cat, Charlotte, directional signs, complete with a revolving tea party table cake topper.

Wonder how it all looks when pieced together?

The final setup of Charlotte’s ONE-derland Tea Party

The Tea Party is a success! Kids were entertained with the crafts corner. Adults have ample tables and seats to have a chit chat, catching up over yummy food. They can even have an eyefeast on the POWER cake. Almost everyone has a group photo together with Cutie Charlotte and brought home some cakes and cookies. Darling looks very very very happy and satisfied with the ONE-derland party and we get to keep all the decorations. Next time when Cutie is old enough to have her own room, we can use them to decorate the room.

On Cutie’s actual day birthday, we ordered a cake for the infant class to celebrate with the other classmates and her teachers. A pity we could not take leave to join her but teachers were kind enough to give us soft copies of the photos taken during the birthday celebrations.

Josiah celebrations

Cutie even had a birthday gift from the school!

Birthday Gifts from School and her favorite teacher Ms Angie

We also held another sing-song cake-cutting ceremony together with Darling’s family. The tart is super yummy!! It’s supposed to be a “snickers” Tart and it tastes exactly like a Snickers Bar! Lolz, super delicious. The cupcakes are Mint-Chocolate, which tastes like the “After-Eight” Mint chocolate.

Mini Birthday celebration on 11 June

She drank from a bottle called “DRINK ME”
And up she grew so tall.
Grow Curiouser and Curiouser everyday our Cutie Charlotte.

Alice: “This is impossible!”
Mad Hatter: “Only if you believe in it.”

Believe in yourself Cutie Baby and You can achieve Great Things.
This is a land full of Wonder, Mystery and Danger our dear Cutie Charlotte, but Mama and PaPa will be with you every step of the way.

Happy Birthday Our Cutie Baby

Well, since my darling took a while to decipher the title…I shall provide the answer. Haha
YIONEUNOICHIEIN1
It’s the way to say “1” in different languages…
YI = mandarin
ONE = English
UNO = Spanish / Italian… coincidentally UN = French
ICHI = Japanese
EIN = German

Well, even more coincidentally, they all happen to be from the countries we have travelled to before!

First wedding anniversary with our bundle of joy

Parent-teacher-meeting…never heard that term for a very long time.

We enrolled Cutie in an infant-care center since Dec 2014 and we had the first parent-teacher-meeting a few weeks ago. So fast time flies, Cutie has been inside the infant-care for 3 months.

I remember back in late last year, we were still discussing the care plans for Cutie once we all start work. Shall we leave her in an infant-care facility? Or leave her at grandmother’s home? Or hire a domestic helper?

Cutie is not the “easy” baby to take care of as she needs lots of care. We are aware of these and thus were quite hesistant of sending her an infant-care facility, fearing that teachers may not pay as much attention to Cutie’s various challenges as required. Cutie has sensitive skin and would have an eczema flare inermittently, she has problems finishing her milk and she was very dependant on the traditonal bab hammock to get to sleep.

We finally decided to go with this infant-care center Josiah Montessori @ Aperia, which offered 1:3 ratio and has available vacancy.

The teachers did manage to wean Cutie off the hammock after 2 weeks and it did surprise us when Cutie actually can fall asleep at night with just some patting and song humming.

Sleeping on a rocker

Cutie is always the “On the move” baby and she loves getting on her feet and on her belly to explore new surroundings, new toys and new friends. Well, Charlotte means “Free Man” anyway, so she loves to roam around freely. During the parent-teacher-meeting, her main teacher showed me some of Charlotte’s on-the-move pics which were so cute!

Walking with assistance from her favorite teacher

Enjoying the climb during play-time

Cutie can sit down to play on her own too, sometimes enjoying a quiet moment with her books and sometimes interacting with other babies. There was even a pic with Charlotte showing her friend how to play a cube!

Sitting on a bumbo chair

Attempting to read

Teaching a friend how to play

Those were good moments in school but sometimes there can be lapses in Cutie’s care during the last 3 months there. On 3 occasions, Charlotte was handed back to us with very bad diaper rashes, even though she did not have diarrhoea. Never before did Charlotte had such a bad case of diaper rash. Darling would meticulously apply Desitin cream and clean up for Cutie over the weekend and ensure Charlotte’s buttocks were back to a clean normal state during the new week in school. However during the next weekend, Charlotte will again have an angry looking Diaper rash with bad excoriations. It’s so bad that Charlotte would refuse to sit down and cries whenever we change her diapers, it was that painful. Back-and-Forth communication with the teachers finally had them realize the importance of regular diaper checks and change. Hopefully Charlotte will have no more Diaper rash days.

================================================ Chinese New Year! Charlotte baby celebrated her first Chinese New year this year! Even though she didn’t manage to master the “Gongxi Gongxi” gesture, she still managed to collect her very first AngBao! Haha. She enjoyed the festival thoroughly as there were plenty of stimulation and interaction with adults and children. She was so high daily that she would jump around on bed and “talk” non stop even when her bedtime is way over!

Cutie’s makeover during Chinese New Year

Darling managed to dress cutie up for the occasion and gave her a 格格makeover. Hahaha.

Having cutie baby around in our lives have definitely brought more laughter and joy. Cutie baby is the ONLY ONE capable of making darling melt everytime. When darling is angry or sad, a smile from our Charlotte baby will lighten her mood every time. How I wish I have that power!

 

Many cheeky moments of Cutie

 

Today marks the our 9 years courtship anniversary and 3 years actual day grand shanghai wedding anniversary. The best years of my life so far. I’m sure there will be more years better than these 9 years coming along and I can’t wait to explore the world with my darling and cutie Charlotte. Next challenge is to go overseas with them!

Cheeky Cutie Baby

32.7.10.224

In case you are wondering if this is an IP address… nope.

Make an educated guess what the numbers mean and maybe u are right?

It has been almost 11 weeks since my last entry about our Cutie Baby Charlotte, and a lot of interesting developments have taken place. =)

Sitting independently

 

“Sit @ 7 months, crawl at 8″….the old saying passed down from our parents’ time…..Cutie does not seem to follow that and she is more like Sit @ 6th month, Crawl + stand + assisted walk @ 7. She is developing motor skills quickly and I am so looking forward to the day we can UNLEASE her in the park and let her run wild! I may have to source for rare materials to clothe Cutie before setting her loose, by royal decree from my Darling, les Cutie suffers any injuries. Of course Cutie has to be clothed with fairyleather infused with magical energies, wears a helmet made from  adamantine, dons a mithril vest, finally completed with knee and elbow guards made from Spidersilk….Now where can I find those materials…..Any ideas?

Cutie has grown bored of just flipping and rolling around (she only does that when throwing a tantrum), now she wants to grab hold of anything to assist her standing up. The world looks different from a higher perspective and she is enjoying that. We occasionally indulge her by lifting her up on our shoulders but we have to limit that if we still want to keep our hair…YES she pulls hairs! She can sit fairly comfortably on her own, leaving her hands free to play with toys or her favorite piano gym.

Cutie and her Piano play gym

 

She can play on her own but she definitely prefers a playmate or many playmates. She will grab every opportunity to “Eh” an adult to play with her. Her small cutie head will follow you when u walk pass and then she will assess….if she fancies your company, she will either “eh” you over or she will start to crawl towards you…but if she is lazy to do that, she will just cry. She loves to just stand and bounce…she can just stand and bounce all day without feeling tired!!! Small bundle of energy which can be expanded beyond capacity… The solution??? The Fisher-Price Bouncer! Yeah!

Always wanting to stand, bounce and be entertained

Cutie in Bouncer, talking to Big Bird

 

 

Cutie is in childcare now for the last 6 weeks and she seems to be enjoying her time there. Teachers will be around her all the time and she is surrounded by other babies and cheerful people, singing songs. She feeds more regularly in school surprisingly and hope it helps with her weight gain! Well, with school and other children, there is bound to be viruses floating around and Cutie has been in and out of a cough since the start of Jan…missing a few days of school due to fever but she still remains cheerful most of the time. So, we kinda accepted that falling sick is part and parcel of school and it may be beneficial for Cutie in the long term by introducing her to the common viruses in the community, building up her immune system database. Nonetheless, we can see that Cutie is happy in school, as she will readily jump into the arms of her favorite teacher Angie every morning and reluctantly let me carry her away from school every evening. Haha. Hope she develops more inter-personal skills in school! I want our Cutie to be a sociable, adorable, smart active baby!

Cutie went for her KKH checkup in early Jan 2015. Her weight was 6.44kg, which maintained her at the 25th percentile but we are glad her height is at the 50-75th percentile and head circumference at 50th percentile…does that mean she has more potential to be intelligent?? We sure hope so! Hmm…now Charlotte looks so puny next to her ~7.8 kg cousin Joshua who is just 4 month old!!

Charlotte has started eating solids and Her masterchef Mummy spared no effort to create nutritious purees for her! Every week we would raid the supermarket in search of yummilicious stuff to make her puree. Currently she has tried brown rice, wholegrain cereal, millet rice, pumpkin, potatoes (Her Favourite!!), tomatoes, threadfin fish, sweet corn, carrots, beetroot, tofu, Kale. Fruits she has tried apples, bananas, orange, avocado (her Ex-favourite), Strawberries (Her favourite!!).

Nibbling away at her Favourite Little Strawberry

 

Darling has been wanting to try this with Cutie during 1 of our super-market trips and we eventually did it!!! (After a massive wipedown with several pieces of baby wipes…)

Cutie shopping for her “MumMum”

 

Yup, she enjoyed it for a while because the metal pieces are cold cold to the touch but after 30 min, she wants out…maybe she wants to push the shopping trolley!?!?

Charlotte has brought much joy into our lives and it’s amazing just to see how she’s learning new things and achieving new milestones. There’s never a dull moment in our lives now that Cutie is in the house! Of course, Poor mummy is often tired out by caring for her and coping with her busy work…Cutie is a bundle of energy which takes a long time to use up and takes a short time to recharge. Haha maybe they are made that way so they can ever-ready to learn from the fast changing world.

Mummy is still recharging but Cutie Charlotte has finished her Charge Cycle and ready for more activities!!!

 

Darling and I celebrate our 5th year wedding anniversary on the 31st Jan and I am indeed blessed to have 2 angels in my life now!

“Hold my hand as we celebrate our new lives together” The wedding quilt cover is still relevant for Cutie and us!

Hope there will be more happy days ahead for all of us!

 

 

And Finally… Yes 32.7.10.224, it’s the age of Cutie Baby Charlotte on this day… 32 weeks ie 7 months 10 days ie 224 days. Did you get it right? =)

Anniversary Post

18 March 2006 — the day My darling held my hand to cross the road. The first day we became “officially” in a relationship.
17 March 2012 — the day my KungFu gang and I raided Darling’s house and grabbed her as my wife, the day we walked and danced down the aisle of Grand Shanghai, along to the Tune of “cha-cham-bo”.

17-18 March 2014 — Today… I shall announce to the rest of my friends, I will be celebrating Father’s Day and Darling will be celebrating Mother’s day. Yup!!! We are going to be parents soon! Very Soon in actual fact. Haha. 9 June 2014.
I shall release the rest of my pregnancy-related posts today.

Darling wanted to keep it a secret, so I have to quietly write the posts and patiently wait for the chance to release all the juicy insider news to all our friends who read our blog! Tagged under “Cutie Baby”…go check them out!

A special mention goes out to my ex-colleague Poi Chin. She is actually the FIRST friend to find out the news! Hahaha, really amazing, just by looking at Darling’s face from a picture I posted on FB! Apparently she noticed a “pregnancy glow” in Darling. Sorry Chin, I have to bluff you that she is not pregnant then coz it’s supposed to be a secret. But I salute you Chin!!! May you have good luck in your quest for a Little one too!!! Don’t keep it from me too long ok!

We had to bring forward our gynae appointment with Dr Goh from next week to today due to some unforeseen circumstances…some spotting for the last few days, but no pain. Cutie Baby is still kicking hard and strong too! But we decided to just let Dr Goh have a look for reassurance.

Well we have another chance to see our Cutie Baby! Today is her 28 weeks and she weighs a healthy 1.45 Kg. The bleeding is likely from Darling straining too much at work (poor darling been walking around too much), Her placenta is low lying but should be moving higher soon by the next visit. So reassuring to hear that!

Cutie Baby is growing well. She really loves being “sayang-ed”. Everytime I rub rub Darling’s tummy, Darling will feel Cutie Baby “swimming” over to the side I am rubbing and huddle there. We can really feel a hard ball curled up on the side of Darling’s tummy being rubbed! This only started during 26-27 weeks I think. Haha, We are both very amused by our Cutie swimming to and fro inside Darling’s tummy. Nowadays when she kicks, we can literally see Darling’s tummy vibrate! What a strong kicker or boxer or header…whatever. Haha, CUTE!!!

Shopping for Cutie Baby has began since the last Expo fair in Feb and the Taka fair in March. We ordered a lot of bibs, jumpers, hairbands from Qoo10 as well. Exciting! Darling can’t wait to doll up Cutie baby! She is even starting to look out for Cutie baby’s 1 month celebration clothes!

Now we are looking to get a cheap and good baby carrier as well as a cheap and good Diaper Bag. I just ordered from Taobao, hopefully it will arrive in 1 piece.

I love you My Sexy Darling! You do not look fat at all! I think you are really Sexy with your pregnant curves!

Ok, I will be the pregnant wife in our next life, carrying our baby! We will take turns ok!

I love you my dear! Thank you for being there for me all these years. Let us look forward to many happy days to come, together with our Cutie. She will be coming out to this world in 83 days time!

First year Wedding Anniversary

Today is the first year anniversary of our wedding. 17 March 2012, we walked down the isle of Grand Shanghai, waving to the crowd while they are cheering us on…the memory is still fresh in my mind.
Tomorrow is the 7th year anniversary of us being together. 18 March 2006, after dinner while walking home, I asked if she would mind allowing me to be the first man to hold her hand as a boyfriend…she said yes and the rest is history.

Memories are past events but they are happy events. The aim is not to hold on to past memories and pretend everything is going to happen just like last time. We will grow old, we will have new directions and new encounters in life, all these are part and parcel of life but the only thing that shall and MUST remain constant, is US holding each other’s hands, cheering each other on, creating new happy memories together.

I am not a good husband, I lied to my wife, I lost control of my emotions and shouted in front of her. I attempted to boast of my almost negligible contribution towards doing housework…

In this anniversary special, I shall attempt to re-visit the happy memories of the past 1 year, hoping to add on more new memories.

First up is Our Spain-Portugal-London honeymoon! Darling and I had many firsts during this honeymoon…First LIVE soccer match, First Bull Fight, First Europe trip.

Nou Camp

Spain

Madrid strawberry Bear

Having tea

Segovia castle

Sagrada Familia

Toro Toro!

Portugal Belem Tower

Big Ben

London Tower Bridge

We followed soon with our Part 2 Europe honeymoon at Italy. Shopping paradise for darling. And we conquered 1 Wonder of the World…

Colosseum

Mouth of Truth

Florence Duomo

Leaning Tower of Pisa

Milan Duomo

Gondola in Venice

We celebrated my birthday at the beautiful St Regis, thanks to darling’s recommendation.

St Regis birthday dinner

We watched only 1 musical last year at MBS as there isn’t any nice ones after Oz and the Lion King.

A Chorus Line

After which came our Part 3 Europe Honeymoon in France. We got to see iconic structures such as the Eiffel Tower and Lourve and iconic Mona Lisa.

Half Timbered Houses

Le Mont Saint Michel

Icon of Love

We saw the MBS Harry Potter exhibition.

Harry Potter

We celebrated Darling’s birthday at the Lighthouse @ Fullerton.

Post dinner Merlion shot

We visited the Gardens by the Bay this year, really quite a world class garden, well planned and beautiful.

Cloud Garden

Gardens by the Bay

Last but not least, we had a wonderful Italian Dinner at Buona Terra on Valentine’s Day.

Valentine Dinner @ Buona Tera

The year has been fruitful in terms of travel experiences and lots of firsts with darling. I hope to create more of such good memories with darling.

A year on, after a few bad quarrels, I have seen darling getting more and more impatient with me. Even though we are quarreling less, the main root of every quarrel remains constant…ME…
I need to change, I promised I will change but have not been able to do so.
I vowed to
i. change my bad habits of trying to prove myself (due to low self esteem and low confidence)
ii. not to raise my voice at darling again
iii. tell my feelings to darling more
iv. answer darling’s questions straight to the point
v. Any other things which can improve our relationship

Darling has not been happy today because of me.
I do not wish to be the root of darling’s unhappiness…
Worse of all, I do not wish to be chased away by darling…

Today is our anniversary darling, even though it may not be a happy one, I hope that we can re-live the memories 1 more time.
I love you.

You are my first love, and my only darling.

I love you.

http://vimeo.com/avpsg/weixian-zhiwei

Romantic dinner by our very own Punggol Masterchef

This shall be my first entry of this year!
When darling first mentioned that she will create a special menu for us on a special day, I have started to wonder when that SPECIAL day will be! Darling never fails to amaze me with her creativity and culinary prowess and this special day dinner is no exception.
Today Is THE day. A special meal from a special person. I feel so blessed.

Darling paid full attention to details, right from the table setup.
She even went to get fresh flowers and DIY a centrepiece for the table!

I sneaked a peek into the Masterchef kitchen n BOY what a sight! Looks like it’s going to be a seafood extravaganza!

Entrée coming up…
Fresh giant hokkaido Scallops grilled to perfection, on a bed of baby asparagus, topped with black truffles, pea sprouts n parmesan cheese, drizzled with lemon butter sauce.

Appetizer
Using Pumpkin, carrots and mushrooms combined with fresh local lobster, darling created a beautiful bisque! That tasted wonderful as well!

Main
The main dish is Freshly caught King Grouper loins, lightly grilled, complemented by sauté mushrooms n onions, served in a bed of baby asparagus. The dish is then completed with lemon butter sauce

Dessert
Wholesome chocolate pound cake drenched in yummy Hersey’s chocolate fudge

The whole meal is complemented with Glacier wine

Thank you darling for the wonderful n sweet dinner. I am loving every moment spent with u! I’m indeed the most blessed man in the world to have u as my darling!

I love you!
Ok, now to wash the dishes…

1 year on and I still love you!

Today is the 1st year anniversary of our marriage! A year has passed and many things have happened within this 1 year. Some stay the same but some changed for the better.
1) We have both grown 1 year older (but this time we both aged a year together as man and wife)
2) Darling completed her double slam of the nursing degree and her advanced diploma in intensive care
3) We still quarrel at times but made up everytime
4) We still go out and enjoy good food together
5) Darling still poses as my model for my photoshoots
6) Darling has tried really hard to control her temper (Thank you Darling!)
7) I have tried to minimize my silly mistakes… tried to be less selfish (but still failed terribly, sorry darling, but I will try)
8 ) We still enjoy looking at our ROM photos and Venus Photoshoot pictures.
9) We still laughed at the silly videos we shot during our mini-honeymoon at Bali last year
10) We still loved each other deep down in our hearts and cannot live without each other.

We had our anniversary dinner at Little Bali in Gillmore village on 29 Jan 2011 as the evil ward sister declined darling’s request for morning shift on 31 Jan 2011. Well, at least she gave darling a morning shift so we can celebrate our ROM anniversary in advance, so I must be grateful… … Evil Ward Sister… ….
Ok, I was searching through the Net for suitable places to dine in when this Villa Bali came into the picture. We have thought of holding our ROM there previously but somehow the theme don’t match so have to give it a go.
We went for our Mini-Honeymoon in Bali so I thought of recreating the Bali experience with our own Balinese hut, having a Balinese BBQ dinner together under candlelight and surrounded by lush greenery.
The sky cried with joy? It has never stopped raining since the start of the day, and it continued to rain even when we reached Villa Bali. Maybe Heaven is giving us the romantic ambience? Heehee.
The whole area is really secluded and gave us a feel of being away from it all, entering into a world of our own. Tea candles led us to our very own Lesehan. There is even a heart shaped decoration at the entrance to our Lesehan.

We decided to play around, take some pictures before ordering the food, take a look at our Lesehan!

A view of our neighbouring hut

Darling getting ready for the feast

Next we were served with our welcome drink. We both chose the alcoholic cocktail “Bali Cooler”, surprising cooling and not much alcohol taste.

We can’t wait for our dinner! We are both famished!!
While the kitchen is busy with our orders, I kept darling busy with video footages from our ROM in Shangri-la Waterfall Terrace! Haha, uploaded into my iPhone of course! The wonderful iPhone….how can I do without it?

interim entertainment before food arrives...scenes from our ROM

Another scene for memories, Ring Exchange I think...Can u make it out?

Ok, food finally here!!

stuffed chicken wings

We also had the Thai Fish cake but no pictures here… …

After the appetiter come the soup. Darling ordered a Tom Yam soup while I ordered a Soto Ayam soup.
The Tom Yam soup was shiok but the Soto Ayam as “so-so” only lah.

What’s next after soup??? Hmm….let me think… Salad!
Yup, we ordered the Thai Mango Salad and the Pomelo Salad, check it out!

Thai Mango Salad

Pomelo Salad

After the sour and sweet and spicy salad, our appetites are tickled! “Gu-Chi, Gu-Chi” Loz, lame…..

Time for some fooling around before our main dishes arrive!!

Our Champagne

Cheers to everlasting bliss and happiness

As requested by Darling

Relive Bali with a flower on her ear

Here comes the main dish…Behold, the Mighty Jimbaran BBQ seafood platter! Featuring tiger prawns, red snapper, Nasi Goreng, mussels and Sambal Sotong!

Our main course Jimbaran BBQ seafood

another view of our giant BBQ seafood platter

We can get quite drunk with champagne….haha we cannot walk straight after drinking a few glasses….

Darling pours the champagne...wasted that there's no glass tower

Yam Seng!

Semi-Drunk Darling

Semi-Drunk Dar Dar

Can you make out the heart shape?

Semi-Drunk Darling started playing with the rose…..peeling off the petals 1 by 1……”Dar Dar love me…Dar Dar love me not….Dar Dar love me….”

Darling asking the rose if I love her, Lucky it said that I do!

Dessert came shortly but we are both full from the dishes before and bloated from our amateur drinking of champagne..haha

Our dessert Pisang pepe

Brownies dessert

We made our way back at 12+ AM. Since it was raining, we had difficulty calling for a cab. Very Kua-Zhang leh, I was put on call waiting for the longest time! We grew impatient as darling still have to work the next day. So we walked out to the main road, under the same umbrella. Well, the cab along the streets were not as hard to find leh, we managed to find 1 within 10 minutes! Maybe the taxi driver saw Darling cute and sweet!

We arrived home late that night… but truly enjoyable!

I hope I gave Darling a memorable first ROM anniversary.

I love you Darling!

Sleep liao lo Lover babies

Happy 4 years 10 months Anniversary!!

It is our 4 years 10 months anniversary together today!!
This time round, there is no cake and no fancyful dinner, just the 2 of us spending quality time together =)

We went for our long awaited jog after a long rest period (the last time we ran was on 3 Jan 2011! OMG!). We are going to train hard for our first 10 km!
Check out our progress! Hope we can run faster each time and hope we can conquer new areas together.

Our running route

Distance covered

Our average timing

We had delicious “Gong Bao” frogs with piping hot porridge for dinner and did a tour of the festive market at Chinatown! =)
It is an anniversary well spent as we can have time to ourselves, holding hands and bracing the crowd at Chinatown together! Haha.

I love you darling! =x

My One Love, My Darling

Exciting 2011

We are so looking forward to the new year countdown coz there’s so many things waiting for us to do in 2011!
1 ) Our first year anniversary as Husband and Wife on 31 Jan
2 ) Our search for ID during the first quarter of 2011
3 ) Our first 10km run on 27 Feb (NTUC U run)
4 ) Our stay-cation in Mandarin Oriental, tentative date on March 19
5 ) Our long due holiday in March-April, should be in Hokkaido if nothing goes wrong
6 ) The taking over of our love nest keys in May, if there are no further delays
7 ) The commencement of our renovation from May till Sept
8 ) Our second 10km run together, Sundown Marathon on 28 May
9 ) Our second holiday in the last quarter of 2011, somewhere in China
10 ) And finally the start of preparation for our Actual Day wedding in March 2012.

Exciting year ahead!

It’s been fixed! Our fastest decision ever… …

Yup, it’s been fixed! Our AD banquet venue has been fixed!
We are planning on having a 20 table banquet and have shorlisted a few candidates:
HOTELS:
1) Mandarin Orchard (Mandarin Court) with the wondeful theatre style layout), Food by Pine Court
2) Carlton hotel with it’s new Empess ballroom, Food by Wah Lok
3) Goodwood Park hotel with it’s nice Victorian style Tudor (smaller) and Windsor(bigger) ballrooms and of course the assured food quality by Min Jiang
RESTURANTS:
1) Peach Garden @ Hotel Miramar: The food quality is confirmed but the hotel looks lao-bok leh
2) Peony Jade @ Keppel: Food good, place nice but the problem with accessibilty and no bridal suite
3) Pine Court @ Mandarin Orchard: Award winning, nice oriental chic decor
4) Grand Shanghai : Food good, sevice good, decor good good. attached to Grand Copthorne watefront hotel

After collecting the studio shots that we took in our graduation gowns, we decided to go on a banquet hunting trip. Our first stop is the Grand Copthorne Waterfront @ Clarke Quay, to see Grand Shanghai. It’s a long stoll from Raffles place to the hotel but we had a good relaxing stoll along the Singapore River with a small breeze. Darling never complain too much of the walking distance….probably because she’s quite excited with seeing venues too. After a good 15-20 min walk, we arrived at Grand Shanghai and the place immediately made us fall in love. There is a dedicated drive thru up till the resturant door and the decor truly showsthe Shanghai glory. We were peeping through the glass doors at the wedding setup for tonight’s banquet when a friendly manager ushered us in. The manager quickly went through the hotel banquet packages! Pro! And even gave us a quick tour of the place…basically he talk non stop….haha just like when I was seeing patients in walk-in clinic, talking non stop and avoid unneccessary questions from the client.
Darling fell in love immediately…so did I. The packages are so attractive! There is 100% confirmation for car park and free flow of beer and mixers! 1 bottle of Red / White Wine per table….and there is 1 night stay at Grand Copthorne Waterfront executive suite FOC! It’s everything a couple can ask for. Then the bomb came… … there is 1 couple in front if us choosing 17 March 2012! What the heck, we are slower! We left our name with David and proceeded on to other venues.

After seeing Grand Shanghai, I crossed out Peony Jade and Peach Garden as both will have nothing to fight against Grand Shanghai.

Off we go to the Mandarin Orchard. The hotel looks posh and the mandarin court is at level 35 (although the view isn’t very nice…just buildings and a construction site). The ballroom is gorgeous too and looks spacious. The tiered seating makes it special. The walls are padded and there are nice chandeliers leading from the corridor to the ballroom. The round table looks smaller compared to the ones at Grand Shanghai, so can only seat 10 guests per table, unlike the 12 max at GSH. We liked the place as well! Really nice and cosy and special and we can have a movie themed wedding banquet too!

We had a break at Starbucks to go through the package at GSH, short discussion on the venues….Hmm….both darling and I feel like we should go for the GSH! Good food, within budget, good themed wedding, WHY NOT?

Stat, I made a call to David, sounded our interest, then David called up the initial couple to stess them…Haha, they gave up the date and darling and me got it! We have our wedding banquet venue! We bia the bus down, signed on the dotted line, paid ou deposit and there we are…..HAPPY and SATISFIED couple who got what we wanted.

We are the Grand Shanghai Bride and Groom!
“夜上海夜上海你是个不夜城
华灯起乐声响歌舞升平
只见她笑脸迎谁知她内心苦闷
夜生活都为了衣食住行
酒不醉人人自醉
胡天胡地蹉跎了青春
晓色朦胧转眼醒大家归去
心灵儿随着转动的车轮
换一换新天地别有一个新环境
回味着夜生活如梦初醒”