Colbar - off the beaten track

Nic first went to Colbar months back, with his church friends, and has been raving about this place to me. Oh the good food, the wide variety of beer, the relaxed atmosphere, the beer… and did I mention the beer? Haha!

I’m not a beer-drinker. Never could stomach that bitter taste! But hey, since it was our wedding anniversary, I figured what better day to let Nic enjoy a good meal?

A bungalow. Located off the beaten track. Cement floors. Ceiling fans. Mismatched tables with various plastic chairs.

And yet there is that certain charm to the place. Kampung charm.

And we reached early, so managed to snag a table, and by the time it was just past 7 p.m., the place was really getting full. Expats, locals, the old, the young, the wanna-be-young. Quite a large demography of people in the place.

Nic loves the wide selection of beer, and  while this bottle was a random choice out of the fridge, he loved it!

Food-wise while it didn’t sing, it was good, hearty, home-cooked fair!

We ordered the Chicken Curry. Curry reminded me a little of japanese curry (with the tinge of sweetness). Tender chicken!

 

Hainanese pork chops! Loved-loved-loved this dish. If you make your way here, don’t forget to try this. The deep fried pork chop retained its juiciness. And the bits of deep-fried potato hit the spot! Comfort food for me!

Nic also ordered the Marmite Sandwich – his childhood favourite! I am not particularly partial to the saltiness of Marmite, so I wouldn’t say this is my favourite thing, but well… Nic loved it!

Non-airconditioned place. And I never thought I could say this of any alfresco dining area in humid Singapore, but it was a cooling dinner!

Tip if you plan to eat there: They don’t accept reservations, so make sure you reach by 6.45 latest to book your seat!

Colbar (short for Colonial Bar)
9A Whitchurch Road, Wessex Estate

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Just the two of us

As parents, sometimes we need a break. A break from the kids, the cleaning up, the washing up, the feeding, the kiddish chit-chat… And what better excuse can we have than our wedding anniversary? The day we drink a cup of coffee an reminisce the days of when we were before they came about. Hahaha!

Well, we decided to dump set aside our work for the day and left our boys behind, and spent the day relaxing and spending some time together!

Our first stop was this idyllic and calm location…

Located at the Chinese Swimming Club, we enjoyed an hour-long traditional Chinese massage at the FIL Spa. It’s been too long since my last massage, and this reminded me to make a more regular appointment!

We planned to proceed to House at Dempsey to try their high-tea but alas! The manager advised us to try to walk in at 2.45 p.m. as the reservations were already full, but by the time we reached it was too late. No yummy vintage tea party! Sigh… We settled at Jones The Grocer’s for some chow before the movie.

The hugest scone I have even seen. Bigger than my palm, and it smelt and tasted divine, especially paired with the creamy butter and sweet jam.

Nic tried the beef pie, which was pleasant enough for a small bite.

We enjoyed the slow pace of life. Not having to eyeball my active almost-four-year-old. All. The. Time. Nor having to entertain my baby boy. Or having to feed them. Or having to gulp my meals down whenever I was with them. Or the grains of rice or strands of noodles splayed all over the table.

Yes. Life without kids.

We’d almost forgotten how that was like.

Today was a good day, and a good reminder!

We were, before they came about. :)

Oh, and don’t forget – the Art Holiday Workshop giveaway ends this Sunday! So if you haven’t participated, do go over now!

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11-4-3

The significance of these numbers? Well, for Nic & I, it represents 11 years of courtship, 4 years of marriage and 3 years of parenthood!

11 November marked our 4th year of marriage. And to kick it all off, we both decided to pamper ourselves for the day. Movie, then catching the Voyage de la Vie show at Resorts World Sentosa… it was such an awesome (and very tiring) day!

 

We went to Vivocity for the movie, when our eyes got caught by the gorgeous Christmas decorations up for sale at Tangs, and we found our wallets ensnared by a black 7-foot tree, gorgeous lights and some baubles! Felt so good to get some nice stuff to personalise our new home!

After the movie Unstoppable, we then boarded the Sentosa Express and made our way to this resort island.

 

And after grabbing a quick bite, we made our way to see the show!

 

Some shots we took while waiting to enter the auditorium…

An awesome show! More shots coming up soon…

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Lunch With My Buddies

I have some awesome friends in my life. We’ve been friends for so long it seems kinda surreal. They’ve seen Nic & I through (most of) our courtship days, were right there with us through our wedding preparations and the actual 3-day affair itself, helped to scrub our new house where we were enjoying ourselves in USA after the wedding… The list is pretty endless. Of course, apart from the hard work, they’re also a source of great fun and laughter!

April marks Johnson & my birthdays. In case you didn’t already know, Johnson is Jayvon’s godpa. Cos Johnson says so.

And Melvin is Uncle Wii. Long story, but just so you know… Uncle Wii owes Jayvon a wii. Just so you know.

Anyways, we met for lunch at Vivocity’s No Signboard Restaurant. We were all a little confused as to the cuisine for the day, so in the end we ordered the usual dim sum and 1 chilli and 1 white pepper crab. Yes. For lunch.

Jay and I were the first to arrive. The rest filtered within the hour (cue deep sigh here), and so we settled for some fried rice first, to ease Jay’s hunger pangs.

It was pretty yummy! Boded well for the entire meal.

Here’s some of the dim sum we had. Not all the pictures are in… I was also busy eating it up too! Haha!

Char Siew pastry… I liked this!

Har Gao. Hmm… I don’t remember eating this though! Haha!

Mini-egg tarts. So-so. I prefer the ones at the Tung Lok Restaurant at Paramount Hotel.

My favourite dish. White Pepper Crab. No Signboard is one of the few? only? places in Singapore that has the white pepper crab version, rather than the spicier black pepper one. It was so delicious, and smelt so good… Unlike the black pepper version which I feel can numb your tongue pretty fast, this white pepper version is not as spicy and tangy. In fact, Jayvon loves this! He ate most of the pincer meat!

We ordered the chilli crab as well, which was pretty okay, but honestly,  my heart is still with the white pepper version.

We were really really stuffed. There were plenty of other food that I didn’t have time to take photos of, like their mee goreng (nice!), siew mais, char siew paos, carrot cake (I liked this!) and much, much more!

Can never forget the cake… and we also managed to wipe this clean as well.

Jayvon’s eyes cannot leave the candles. Haha! He couldn’t wait to blow them!

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2 Lies & A Truth

Over the weekend, I went for Nic’s company retreat – all the way to sunny Malacca! Will blog more about that soon. (I do still need to prepare for my AGM, ya know! Haha!)

Anyhoooo, on Sunday night, the bunch of them gathered in our little suite, and we play many fun games… one was “2 Lies and A Truth” – each of us had to write 3 sentences about ourselves, with 2 of them being lies and 1 being the truth.

Seemingly, I had the “obvious” advantage seeing how no one (I mean, apart from Nic of course) knew me. Some of his female colleagues even lamented that they knew so much about each other this game was a foregone conclusion.

Well, I always love a challenge so I decided to write three sentences that would stump even my very dear hubby. Whom I know for more than 10 years. Whom I’ve dated since 2000. Whom I married in 2007, and had a baby boy with.

…

And yes, I even managed to stump him! Woohoo!

See if you can guess which is the true sentence!

#1: I love all kinds of fruits, especially rambutans.

#2: I’ve coloured my hair all sorts of colours before, including green.

#3: I’ve been to quite a few countries in the past, including Korea.

Tell me your guesses! It doesn’t matter if you’re wrong… I mean, even Nic got it wrong. Hahaa!

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Nic’s Birthday (part 1)

Nic’s cell group celebration, at the Baba King restaurant last night after service. No shots of the food as I didn’t bring along my camera and my blackberry doesn’t do well in low light areas!

Here is one of our recent family shots!

“Very nice”… was the conclusion by my little prince at the end of the festivities, and indeed it was!

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Anniversary Dinner at Modesto’s

One of the definite disadvantages of having a baby is…

Indigestion.

I kid you not. If you are a parent, and you have no idea what I’m talking about, then it means (1) your baby’s too young or (2) you seldom have meals with your baby around. Whenever we have family dinners together, it is usually a scoop-and-gulp affair for either Nic or myself… whosoever is the one feeding Jay!

Now that he can feed himself, it is definitely an easier (and more enjoyable) dinner affair, but still  - there is no rest with a bouncy almost-two-year old boy.

So long meals are a luxury of our pre-Jayvonian days, and times when we can have a proper meal are few and far-between, but always much-cherished!

Nov 11 marked our third year as a couple! Thanks for all your kind wishes. Up to the day itself, we both had no concrete plans as to where we would have dinner, Nic simply arranged for his parents to meet us at Orchard area, so that we would dump leave with them in their good care whilst enjoying a nice dinner by ourselves! Oh, the lengths we go to have some “date” time! Haha!

Well, we ended up having dinner at Modesto’s@Elizabeth, on the recommendation of Jaydee. We really over-ordered! Haha! Check out our great feast…

Garlic bread – this came in six HUGE slabs! Totally yummy!

Caesar Salad – loved the bread crumbs & bacon bits.

Cream of mushroom… full of pureed mushrooms!

We also ordered the pizza (Seafood-something) which was divine as well. The prawns are as succulent as they look.

Modesto’s signature pasta! Yes. It had a steamed crab on the top! I am not normally an olives fan, but the taste of this pasta was g-r-e-a-t!

Our complimentary dessert – Tiramisu. I tell you, it is kudos to the chef that after my carbo-infused and diet-busting dinner that we managed to polish off half of this great slice of cake!

The pictures don’t do the food justice.

Fabulous dinner aside, it was an enjoyable and glorious TWO HOURS of dinner. Talking, laughing and having the time of my life with the man of my life. :)

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Happy Anniversary to Us!

Yes, it’s my wedding anniversary tomorrow. Three years of being married to the most wonderful man in the world!

But no, I will not be on leave cos he is on course and can’t get away. Ah well, we’re planning a Jayvon-less dinner though! Haha!

But, more on us in another post.

Here’s a quick inside peek into working in the church office… great staff welfare. If it’s your birthday that week, you’re given a fake cake and a placard to be displayed at your cubicle for the world (err… the staff at least) to greet you and be nice to you. For anniversaries… this is what you get:

 
Once again, happy anniversary to Nic & I!

*cue the whistles and blowhorns and cheers*

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Daddy Graduates From Bible School!

After five long and gruelling months, with hardly a good night’s sleep, what with balancing work, school, baby boy and wife… I am so proud that Nic not only graduated from the School of Theology, he obtained 2nd place for the Best Academic Performance Result! Woohoo!!!

It is really his area of gifting – doing well in studies! Hahaha! Congrats darling! :)

Trying to upload the photos onto Facebook, but FB’s a little bit laggy now, so here are some of the photos!

Following the graduation service, we went to White Sands Hong Kong Cafe, and taking advantage of the fact I had my gorgeous Canon EOS450D, I decided to try food photography. It turned out pretty good (if I may say so myself)!

 

四季豆 or Four Seasons Beans… one of my faves!

Prawn Paste Chicken… Yummy & juicy! Jay loved these!

Prawn Dumpling noodles. Very yummy as well!

And was it any surprise? After such a fun-packed day, Jayvon took more than an hour to get to sleep… And could hardly wake up this morning to go for service again!

Well… SOT has been an eventful period for us all, and I am glad Nic not just survived, but thrived through this period! Phew!

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Another Date Night

It is getting to be a routine! Once again, we dropped Jayvon off at my parents'-in-law place and Nic & I trooped down to Vivocity to enjoy some alone time!

This time, we decided to watch Monsters vs Aliens, which turned out to be a great choice! We also decided to splurge on the 3D-version.

What a hilarious movie!

I must admit, we decided on this show, as well… frankly there was no other offering, and I really wanted to catch a movie. The only other movie option was Terminator-Salvation, which frankly does not appeal to me. At. All.

So there we were. With our funky 3D glasses. Surrounded by many children. Many children.

Regretting it by the minute. Especially after coughing out $13 A SEAT. To look like… well… idiots… I was mentally sighing even as I took in the popcorn (which was strangely blander than the last time we ate it!)

And then the movie started.

And gosh, it was really funny! I loved the jokes (hahaha… “convenient truth”!) and the cockroach-scientist and B.O.B.! Totally hilarious!

Of course, being a cartoon, there is the predictable storyline and good-triumphs-evil ending, but it was an enjoyable movie. After my Night At The Museum 2 outing, which I felt was tired, this MvsA movie, while no heavy-weight, is sure a fresh and fun movie outing!

The 3D? I wasn’t too hot about it. We were sitting three rows away from the big screen, so it did give my stomach a mini workout at times! But it sure added to the overall entertainment value!

Entertainment value (out of 5 stars):

Storyline:

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Daddy & Mommy’s Movie Outing

What an eventful Sunday. After service, I brought Jayvon to his grandparents place (at the f-a-r west… Bukit Panjang!) for them to spend some quality time with him. Met Nic there, and we went to grab a quick lunch at Changi Airport’s Popeyes (yes, all the way BACK to the east side again), before attending the Wedding Co-ordinator training course at 3 p.m. It was a fun time, and when it ended earlier than expected, we decided to grab the opportunity to catch a movie. One of the rare, rare, RARE times since Jayvon-ian days! Hahaha!

We decided to rush for the 5.30 p.m. show at the new Filmgarde cinema at Iluma, and watched Night at the Museum 2.

I watched the first Night at the Museum, and was amused at the campy storyline and cute animations (do you remember the dinosaur? It totally cracked me up!) and so we thought this would be a good enjoyable “fluff-y” kinda show.

Well, it was quite a “fluff.”

I wasn’t particularly entertained nor excited at any point, as it all seemed a bit “tired.” I guess it is a victim of its own success. The first instalment was fresh and exciting and interesting, and this second one which was basically a rehash of all things and creatures in the first instalment fell a distant second.

The only memorable point of the movie, for me, came at the ending few minutes of the show, featuring again – my favourite dinosaur! Of course, there were some high points and laugh-out-loud moments, but overall the movie failed to inspire imagination.

Entertainment value (out of 5 stars):   

Storyline:

Should you watch it? Well, maybe – if you’ve caught all the other (better) shows like Star Trek or Wolverine, and if it is on a weekday when movie tickets are cheaper! From how much we spent for the ticket, it is definitely not value-for-money for us!

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Dinner At East Coast

One of the luxuries of living in Marine Parade is undoubtedly having the beach a mere five minutes away!

Growing up in this part of the island, we even had a SONG for Marine Parade, something that made me strangely smug about living here! Hahaha! (I mean, do Bedok-ers or West Coast-ers have their own song?)

A song about Marine Parade? Maybe you think I am merely joking. I can still recall the melody! Haha! Here’re the lyrics:

Marine Parade is the place to be
With sandy beaches and the swaying trees
There’s nowhere else I’d rather be
Than Marine Parade with my family

We live in peace and harmony
One big happy family
There’s nowhere else I’d rather be
Than Marine Parade with my family

Well, I said we had a song. I never said it was particularly fantastic!

Anyway, back to my blog entry at hand! The three of us took a nice long stroll to the East Coast, to stroll along the beach. We walked towards the MacDonald’s at East Coast, and Jayvon was fascinated by the many joggers/walkers/strollers/dogs/fellow babes et al!

My prince was happily relaxing in his stroller, snacking on biscuits and grapes as we went along.

We then settled at the C.Nai Hong Kong Cafe, and enjoyed a scrumptious dinner! No photos of the food, as we were busy feeding the prince!

Here’s a picture of my handsome prince! Doesn’t he look all grown up already?

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Jay at the Singapore Zoo

We did it! We went to the Singapore Zoo this afternoon. One of our concerns was the scorching afternoon sun these few days, so I purposefully went over to get some sunblock for Baby and me, in anticipation of the hot day at the Zoo! Amazingly, when we reached at about 2.20 p.m., the weather was divine. The sky was overcast, and at times, a few fat drops of rain would fall, but due to the heavy foliage in the zoo, we were more or less sheltered. What a blast we had!

One of the first exhibits we went to was to see the pygmy hippo. And just before that, we saw this … ugly scary slow-moving right out of a Stephen King movie fish. At least I think it is a fish. And Jay was enthralled by this ugly creature! The scary funny thing? That thing fish was stationary in the water. Absolutely stationary. I didn’t even see a fin move. Till Jayvon walked away. And. The. Fish. Followed. Him. Shudder….

On to nicer animals… We practically walked through the entire zoo. I kid you not. I reckon we got our money’s worth, cos we took in about 70-80% of the exhibits!

Here’s some pictures!

Nic & I took turns to carry Jayvon around. Not because he can’t walk. But whenever we set him down, he’d always give me a mini-heart attack by reaching down to the floor and grabbing some damp leaves. And giving them to Nic. And taking more leaves… So for my heart’s sake, we just took turns with him. And it was great having a fellow burden-carrier. I mean, baby-carrier. Coughcoughcough…

Remember in my previous post, I was looking forward to the Rainforest Kidzworld!

As we entered, this site greeted us.

Daddy: ”Wah…”

Mommy: “You’re going in.”

Daddy: “You didn’t tell me it would be like this!”

Mommy: “I told you to bring extra clothes…”

Daddy: “Did you bring a towel?”

Mommy: “Of course!”

Daddy: “I meant for me?”

Mommy: “……… coughcoughcough………”

 

He enjoyed it… Until…

The giant elephant tank that would periodically fill up and splash like a ton of water did so. And the force of the splash (though Jay wasn’t that near it anyhow) “blew” him a couple of steps and covered him with cold drops of water. That was when he started bawling.

Ah well… Back to the animal exhibits then! To think I was still considering settling down at Ben & Jerry’s for an ice-cream cone! Hahaha!

2 1/2 hours later, arms aching and feet throbbing, we finally hailed a cab back home. Phew! What a tiring day!

Oh and our new domestic help’s here! *fingers crossed*

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