Nostalgia.

As I stepped into my parents home, I felt a sense of peace.

I missed those days when I felt loved. Secure. Cared for. Protected.

nostalgic christmas memories

Christmas was so special then. We celebrated it in a big yet meaningful way.

There would be a big Christmas tree with lights and pretty decorations in the living room.  Late November to Early December would have us setting it up as a family and putting up the decorations. In those days, we had pen pals, sending letters through snail mail, with flat, lightweight gifts inserted in the envelopes for our overseas friends. Mom would take me gift shopping for my friends and for the people I cared about.

Christmas eve would be with our church friends. Me and my sister would go carolling with the other kids in church.We went from house to house, dressed in white, dressed like angels as we sang carols in our hosts’ homes. They would give us really yummy refreshments during the breaks. Some even gave us Christmas turkey.  Ok, we dressed like angels but were real terrors in the bus as we travelled from house to house, screaming and throwing confetti at one another. Our form of partying.

My parents would spend time with their friends. We’d meet for the midnight church service, counting down to Christmas day. Reflecting on our lives.

Christmas day itself, we would exchange gifts and celebrate with a late lunch. Maybe dinner. It was a season we really looked forward to.

I took a day off from work during the December holidays to bring my kids to see their grandparents. My parents.

The Christmas tree stood proud in the living room, beautifully decorated with lights and ornaments.

Little decorations peppered the neat and very well kept home.

Peace. Warmth. My kids love it there. The ambience, homeliness is special.. that special touch my folks bring.. fond memories.. relived again. In my parents’ home.

Valentine’s day. Love is in the air.

Teenagers holding hands. Puppy love. Sweet.

Maybe it will last. Maybe they’d outgrow each other as time passes by.

An elderly couple with snow white hair, walking hand in hand along the street. Enjoying each other’s company in silence. Having spent a lifetime together, there isn’t much left to talk about. Just spending their remaining time together is enough.

That’s love. That’s how I want my marriage to grow into.

My parents are like that. Their advice to me is that marriage is about compromise. It takes to hands to clap. When one is angry, the other patiently keeps cool, each yielding to the other in turn. Keeping the peace. Building a marriage that lasts.

The other day, I went to a hawker center, to a stall mended by an elderly couple. They looked content as they busied themselves cooking and serving customers without breathing a word to each other. As if each knew what the other thought.  They worked in tandem, harmoniously in that tiny space. So used to each other. At peace.

The food was the tastiest I’ve had in a public space.. for it was cooked.. with love.

Zsa Zsa Gabor was a legendary beauty. She was born in 1917. So many decades later, at the age of 93, her physical beauty may have faded yet to her husband, Prince Frederic von Anhalt, she is still the apple of his eye.

The elderly couple, still in love, still caring for each other.

On August 16, 2010, Zsa Zsa Gabor fell unconscious. A priest was called to read her last rites just before she blacked out. She is still bed ridden, and was cared for by her loving husband.. to the point that he too collapsed from exhaustion.

Love. Caring for your loved one selflessly.. often at the expense of one’s own welfare.

Romance. Not exclusive to young couples, in the bloom of health.

The love between Zsa Zsa Gabor and Prince Frederic von Anhal.. a lasting love that defies age.. stands the test of time.

Now that is true romance.

Real love.

That’s what marriage is really about.

We’re all getting fat. To remedy that, my husband decided to bring us all for a hike up Bukit Timah hill. That in spite of my son’s fear of monkeys. (They attacked the little one once because of the bag of fruit and nut he was clinging on to.) Those critters may be cute but they can be very aggressive.

It was 6pm when we got there. Realised that

Kids freaked out. Hubby insisted we go all the way up to the summit for our picnic. The walk seemed longer than normal. To lighten the mood, my husband played catch with out kids. Or rather, he teased them and got them to chase him up the hill.

A few tantrums, squabbles, bottles of water and chases later, we were at the peak of the hill. Our favourite place. Air’s fresh and cool up there. Peaceful.

We spread out the mat, had our snacks and drinks and made our back down the hill.

Monkeys saw the bag of unfinished snacks in my older boy’s hand and.. after the last monkey attack, I wasn’t taking chances. Swung my bag like a sling to shoo off the monkeys and ordered my kids to go into the car. Monkeys here get very aggressive so avoid letting kids walk around with bags of snacks or plastic bags. Monkeys go for the smallest humans.

One way some moms show their love for their kids is to cook their favourite meals. I’m such a mom. My kids love pizza and sometimes I indulge them in home made pizza the way they like it. Lots of honey baked ham and oodles of cheese.

I don’t have the time to make the regular pizza crust so I use bread instead.

1. Grease pan with olive oil

2. Arrange bread on pan

3. Sprinkle dried oregano leaves on bread

4. Arrange honey baked ham on bread

5 . Sprinkle oregano leaves on ham

6. Arrange cheddar cheese on ham

7. Sprinkle morazella cheese over the works.

8. Grill 10 minutes

9. Slice and serve.

While kids are young enough to happily hang out with parents (teens tend to go through a stage where it is uncool to be seen with mom and dad), family holidays are a great way to strengthen the family bonding.

Holidays need not cost an arm and a leg. Take advantage of local attractions and be a tourist in your own country.

Book a hotel, chalet or hostel room near the main attraction and stay there with your family, like a regular guest there.

We brought our family to the newly opened universal studios at resort world sentosa.

For that, we bought the tickets weeks in advance to avoid disappointment. As we were planning to be out all day, we got the cheapest accomodation available, outside universal studios. Costa sands chalets, or huts with bunk beds for 4 people, no adjoining toilet. The hut was the size of a storeroom but surprising cozy due to air-con and company of my loved ones.

Here’s a photo of the hut we stayed in.

Then we took an internal bus for transport between universal studios and the chalet, saving a lot of money on accommodation as a result.

With budget hotels, prepare to rough it out. Take it as a family adventure camp. We had to brave heavy rain to get to the common toilets to do our business. My hubby and I did not sleep well in that hut and felt awful the whole of the next day. Maybe it’s our age cos our kids absolutely loved it. that hut was like a playhouse to them.

At universal studios, we went for all available rides and visited as many attractions as we could cover.

The Mummy rollercoaster was too scary for my ten-year-old but my twelve-year-old said that was the best ride he’d ever been on in his life!

Here’s the main entrance to that attraction. It’s a very long walk through the creepy pyramid to get to the queue for the actual ride. The walk itself was interesting, with replicas and special effects to add to the experience. Do remember to keep all your belongings in the locker before going for that one, but keep at least $3 in your pocket as you may need that cash to unlock the locker as the ‘free’ period is half an hour.

We ended up having to borrow cash from strangers in order to open the locker to get to our wallets.

Jurassic Park was fun. Especially the water ride.

They sell disposable raincoats outside that ride. Unless you are going straight back to shower after that ride, it is wiser to wear a raincoat as the final part of the ride would leave you drenched.

The dinosaurs you’d encounter in the ride are pretty realistic. Kids love it!

Oh and if you get lucky, you might meet the zoo keeper with his baby dinosaur. Technology these days is incredible. That dinosaur moved and acted like it really was alive.

Lunch was at Friar’s using food vouchers. Kids
loved the fries best. We went to the chalet for dinner at the budget eatery. Then it was off to the songs of the sea, another of Sentosa’s long standing attractions.

We played tourists to the hilt, seeing everything through fresh new eyes. Taking the monorail or train, the trams and stopping wherever something or other caught our eyes.

Lunch at Hard Rock Cafe was another fave for my kids. But their #1 vote went to the Luge. We bought single rider 3 round trip tickets for my kids who had a blast.

This budget local holiday ranks as one of their best so far. They actually want to stay in that hut again, though my man and I beg to differ.

Actually there were so many things we wanted to do but just didn’t have the time.

I saw many teens playing beach volleyball.

Others were surfing on artificial waves.

I’d rather laze around on the beach.

At the end of the day, it’s the company that counts.

This tiny hut with 4 bunk beds is fine for roughing it out and spending a little family time together. The room is air-conditioned, a major plus in this hot climate.

We brought our kids to Sentosa for a holiday.

For our accomodation, we chose the cheapest ‘room’ available at Costa Sands Resort.

You know the Chinese saying:

yi fen qian yi fen huo.

Tranlated literally:

one cent gets you one cent’s worth of goods.

We got what we paid for. A place to sleep in at night. Period.

Actually, it is pretty cosy. Like a playhouse to the kids. Clean. With fresh bedding. You make your own beds. My kids said it was just like their school camp. They loved it.

It would be ideal if you use that place purely to sleep in and spend the rest of the day exploring the island together.

Bring an umbrella for each of you as the toilet is a short walk away, outdoors. Flash downpours are common there.

Foodwise, it’s a great place for family barbecues. The resort even provides barbecue supplies in case you’ve left something out. Bring your own meat/food to barbecue though. It’s a great place for friends to bring their families, with each family taking a hut. That sense of community would be a great experience for today’s kids. Gen Y? Or is it Gen Z already?

Or you could always have local food at the coffee shop in the resort, which serves bona fide teh. (tea with condensed milk). My hubby had diarrhea from the mee goreng though, so be forewarned.

Breakfast is $3.80 for kaya toast and teh, or for a $5 breakfast set comprising of an egg, a small sausage, one cherry tomato (I’m not kidding) and generously buttered toast, with teh. Still, it’s enough to fill the stomach if you aren’t too big an eater.

I understand the chalets at the other side of the resort are bigger and the rooms are far better, but hey, we are kinda broke, so, the cheapest would have to be good enough. We had a great vacation through it all anyway.

This ride in Universal Studios is very scary

Great for a date if both of you can stomach it.

A totally cool family activity if you have teens and older kids.

The ride is totally unexpected. You’d go backwards, sideways and even free fall without warning. A storyline base on The Mummy movies ups the scare factor.

Fire and darkness may make it too much for the fainthearted.

You’ve been warned…

Father’s day is the 3rd Sunday of June.

I was surfing the net looking for ideas this Father’s day when I stumbled on this story. Of a father who gave up one of his kidneys to save the life of his baby girl.

Like any proud parents of a much wanted baby, Ghassan and his wife, Dena,  were horrified when in Oct 4, 2005, their 10-week-old bundle of joy, Liza turned blue.

The life of their little sunshine was threatened. She stopped breathing.

The paramedics resuscitated her and had her rushed to the hospital.

It was there that the consultant told her parents that their little girl had kidney failure.

She needed a new liver and a kidney in order to live.

By July 2006,  the little girl’s situation was affecting her heart. To save her life, her father donated part of his liver to his precious daughter. That operation was done in September 2006.

On May 1 2007, Ghassan donated one of his kidneys to his girl, so that she could live a normal life.

The full story at daily mail

My husband has been a hands on dad since day one.

My baby was up each night, milking the human cow. I was really exhausted but stayed determined to fully breastfeed my baby. He helped. Burping baby after each feed, singing o macdonald had a farm, in a falsetto voice, hoping to fool baby into thinking he’s mommy.

When I was down with chickenpox, he and baby stayed with my in laws while I stayed on my own hoping not to infect baby.

Baby cried for me all night and he became baby’s mattress. Baby slept on him for comfort.

Our second baby came along. Baby’s Papa doted on him all the same. As babies grew into kids who went to school, papa coached them both.

During my husband’s unemployment, he coached our kids full time and they topped their class.

He’d talk in his sleep.. disciplining the boys in his dreams. I smile to myself each time i hear his sleep-mumbles and strain my ears to listen to the tale in his dreamworld.

At this age, my kids see him as the scolding monster at times and punching bag at others, but as they grow up, I’m sure they will appreciate the underlying love that undergirds it all.

As kids reach their teens, boys need their fathers more than ever, as role models in this turbulent times. No one is perfect. My husband, flaws and all is their male role model.