im coming out of the closet....

i totally HEART zac enfron! :)
17 again is warm and gives me a nice fuzzy feeling.
thumbs up to zac enfron. he really carry the role well and gives some good naunces on behaving like a middle-aged man. hehe.

and boy, can he dance and dunk!
oh, and totally totally good-looking lor.

小北鼻一岁半了！

if only weekend can be longer! :(
i really enjoy spending time with lil' pumpkin.

anyway, finally brought yz for his MMR jab this saturday.
1 day short of 18m, he weighs 11.9kg and stands at 86cm tall.
seems like he went through another growth spurt in the past few mths but the weight didnt catch up as much. :/

hmm...

the brave boy took the jab very well! pappy was holding his right thigh, nurse holding his left thigh and mammy hugging and trying to distract him with a toy.
but the little one just saw the needle poke in all the way and never even shed a tear!
even the PD said he's a brave one. heh.
there maybe a fever setting in ard 5-10 days time. *fingers crossed*

metro sale so ng family hitted the town later in the afternoon. :)

nowadays he likes to squat and pose when he sees me whip out the camera.
haha, so funny. look at his serious expression!


making funny faces in the mirror.
got this polo tee from H&M previously in spain. :)


trapped in pappy's iron grip.

much happier to be with mammy. hiaks.

baby says,"beware my knife!".
got him a simple cooking set and he loves going around cutting up all the vegs + fruits.
haha.

metro having 20% sale!! but i didnt really shop to my heart's content.

why?! cos silly us forgot to load the pram into the car.

so no pram for yz!!*gasp*

have to take turns carrying him and chasing him here and there. @_@

in the end, went for dinner and headed home soon after. haha.

and i got myself perfume from the sale!
been eons since i last used cos i always find it a hassle to put on.

and true to my words, i havent start using it yet! kept on forgetting about it.

@_@

sunday was spent lazing in the house till mid noon then we headed out to east side.

caught in a very heavy downpour so made a detour to my grandma house.

baby managed to take a quick nap there while i caught up with my mum. hubbi went to the car show room himself to find out more about honda insight.

after that, we made our way to vivo for dinner with hubbi's family to celebrate my mother-in-law's bday.

and i missed my 红星大奖. :(

though i got recorded it down but much prefer to watch it live. :P

vivo having a mini national geographic exhibition right outside tangs on the biggest baby in the world - baby whale , that is!

yz was pretty fascinated with the whale model. :)


are you puzzled by his mis-matching attire?! hehe.

he was wearing a really nice cargo pants along with his t-shirt and vest initially.

but he drank too much water and his diapers cant contain his pee-wee depite he had it on for only 3 hrs!
so the pants kena wet and the spare bottoms i brought out is his old trusty home PJs, haha.
that explains why.

haircut + sushi

decided to pamper myself a teeny bit yesterday.
hence, went for a relaxing head massage and trimming of my tresses! :)
tried reds salon and think it aint too bad.
somemore UOB got 15% discount.
still, haircut heng sway one. depend on the stylist.
but the shampoo guy was really good! his massage of my scalp and neck was *thumbs up*!


wah, they styled my hair till i machiam like an OL.
but i am lah! @_@

met up with the husband later for a simple dinner at ichiban boshi.
i can never get tired of sushi!
like NEVER. :)

ok, weekend is so nearing. im a happy girl!

gaudi - part 2

La Pedrera (Casa Mila), also known as the quarry is my fav. gaudi building.
from the outside, it looks exactly like its name.
like a huge stone quarry.



inside, the architechtual style is pretty gaudi-esque.
apartments are arranged in a circular arrangement with the centre of the whole buidling hollow to allow as much natural light in as possible.
delightful use of color and contours make the inside rather like a fantasy-land.
stark contrast to its solemn, bare and cold facade.


even the staircase uses stone-like columns.


model of La Pedrera housed in the attic

La Pedrera's highlight is definitely its rooftop.
Gaudi has desgined this with the idea that it provides a good space for the residents to mix, hold functions and enjoy the weather abit.
the steps break the rooftop to 7 different heights. very interesting.
and u get a good view of central Barcelona from here.
La Pedrera is on Passeig de Gracia (famous shopping street) after all! :)

the twisting shapes are meant to resemble rising bellowing smoke. pretty!

Parc guell next. how come we dont have such a recreational space in singapore!?

*wail*

due to my fear for flying, i was unfortunately unable to fall asleep much during my long haul flights to and from paris previously.
so what did i do?
i caught up with lotsa movies. heh.

1. Australia
2. Happy go lucky
3. Twilight
4. Kinky boots
5. Nights in Rodanthe
6. High School Musical 3
7. Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist

wah very shiok. what will i do without movies?!
7. is surprisingly very good. though i didnt feel much abt the music despite the soundtrack being raved about here and there.
Michael Cera is really cute in a dorky way. :)

4. wanted to catch this long time back. good as expected though brit kinda humour is never really my cup of tea.

2. where kinky boots succeeded, happy go lucky just doesnt work for me.
i totally hate the protagonist. her happy-go-lucky "charm" sure didnt work for me.
so irritating. like a male version mr bean. bah!

3. Robert Pattinson very handsome lor. waiting for borders to have some kick ass promotion, then i will grab the 4 books of twilight series!

6. im a closeted zac enfron fan now. anyone keen on 17 again?!

1. totally mediocre. not to mention soooo long. i finished watching it in 3 parts.

5. a mistake to watch this just before i touched down. think the air crew must be wondering why the puffy eyes.
very very predictable plot but still, cant hold back the tears lah. *sheesh*

goning to catch " revolutionary road" with jx n zm tonight. cant wait.
hope the movie lives up to the novel! :)

gaudi - Part 1

spain. can pee in pants when i think of visiting it in the past.
the land of goya, gaudi, paella and what-nots.
ranted so much about spain that i stuck spain o-lah(!) stickers on my luggage case for 5 full years! (i stopped doing so cos i ran out of the stickers which i got from a travel fair 7 years back in uni)
ranted so much about spain that hubbi (then-bf) gave me 2 tesco books on goya & gaudi during one of our anniversaries.
my fav. G&G. hiaks.
aiyah, you got the drift lah.

so i enjoyed myself fantabulously during the time in barcelona and madrid!
dream (almost) came true. :)
so what does one do when in BCN?
go on the gaudi tour, of cos!

Casa Batllo
this apartment is really exquisite and was said to be gaudi's finest.
but personally, i found it small and entrance fees steep like hell.
really, 16.5 euros per pax is steep right?!
we finished the whole thing in ard 30mins?


facade of casa batllo.
balconies resemble skeletal faces?
wall adorned with shiny ceramics and glasses of irregular shapes, like an underwater aquarium.
roof top seen from here looks like back of a dragon.


visit to the aparment in it.
wonderful huge glass panes allow natural light to enter the room from most directions.
almost no straight lines in the building. full of curves and such.

apartments are arranged in a circular direction with the centre of the apartment hollow.

to allow light and ventilation.

bright cheery mosaics decorated on most walls. :)


roof-top of casa batllo

La Sagrada Familia

when gaudi said, "my client is not in a hurry.", he didnt how true this statement is.

for the la sagrada familia's construction is still on-going till today! 125 years and counting..

the cranes in the background.
different shades of color as the completion period different mah.

the nativity facade

ooh, dont you love stained glass?!

meant to resemble a forest, the ceilings have flowers shape and the columns like tree trunks.

WIP - work in progress

let's see his 2 other works - La Pedrera (my fav!) and Park Guell next. :)

illuma & my new shoes!

ng family has no agenda for today. so i suggested dropping by illuma to take a look.

which is a mistake. @_@
many shops not opened yet.
air con too cold.
but we ate a yummy early dinner there still.
@ this cafe called "cheeky chocolate" which serves one of the best warm chocolate ive ever tasted.
:)



baby yz all ready to go out



the mandatory mammy and baby photo


caramel banana crepe.

and i wore my new shoes out today! very comfy to wear (but not when im carrying baby..)!
and guess what, my super nonchalent hubbi didnt even notice them lor.
*eyes blinking*
hahah.


me in my new shoes. pardon my messy foyer.

closer look of them. :)

and i cant believe weekend is officially over!

baby is drinking milk beside me now.

hopefully, he'll zzz soon after and i can watch harper's island with the husband later...

some new clothes & another baluku

was packing stuff in the storeroom last week and came across a box with some dubious clothings inside.
upon closer inspection, realised with horror that those are new clothes for baby, mainly given by others, that i packed away earlier on as they were too big of size then!
so quickly ran thru' the stash again and sorted out those which he can wear now.
into the washing machine they go and ready to be worn by this weekend! :)


baby pirate!


really like this top from baby zara from my dear cousins.
they got 3 tops for baby as his 1yo bday prezzie.

not very sure but think this is from sister-in-law when they went australia last year?
the monster eyes can move up and down when yz moves but he's covering them up at the moment.

anyway, yz's upper lip has recovered pretty fast. still a little swollen as the cut was replaced by a huge ulcer now. *ouch*

luckily it doesnt affect his appetite much.

just need to ensure the food is pretty cool before feeding him.

the ulcer right at the entrance point. *shudders*

but he collected another baluku today!!!

went vivo today again so that he can play at the water place on level 3.

upon reaching, let him down to walk on the floor and the next minute, he walked right into a display window!

apaparantly, a too excited him didnt know its a glass window . *sigh*

didnt see what happened as i had my back towards him. hubbi saw and said he tensed up before the impact.

realised too late lah, still kena lor.

so his forehead was slightly reddish and swollen on the right side.

quickly went guardian to get zambak and applied on him.

by now left a tiny bruise (can see if you look at the photos above carefully), should be gone in 1-2 days time bah.

really hope no more bumps n bruises for him!

ok weekend is half gone.

this is bad.

the quirky, interesting, funny & not-so-funny - part 2

busker at la Rambla. where's the head?!

enjoyed the best weather at madrid. 22 degree celcius during the day. :)

interesting figures @ madrid

ah long carrying our (make it my) loot

nice decor for a wall!

same font somemore! really like our popular bookshop hor!

banco = bank anyway.

oh oh forgot to add, tyz was really cute when we were in the doctor's rm.
when i carried him and sat down next to the doc, he turned to hubbi who was standing beside us , indicated to the empty seat behind us and said ,"爸爸坐坐。"
after the doc has examined his wound and declared it should be ok, hubbi carried him while i continued talking to doc on his meds and stuff.
fearing that they were leaving me behind, he said to me, "妈咪起来！"
hehehe.

before leaving the room, we asked him to thanks the doc and he 乖乖 said, "谢谢安娣。"
which the doc promptly said, "哎哟，你现在讲话漏风了。"
LOL.

hope the swelling will be gone soon.
called back and mum said this morn it was pretty much subsided. good, keep it up!

my poor poor notti baby

TYZ has been getting very notti. he has been running around like a gush of wind while i shout myself hoarse asking him to slow down slow down.
see, he has only started walking 2-3 mths back but he is still not very stable when it comes to running.
and running he loves to do. @_@

and yesterday, he paid the price dearly for running without regards.
twice, somemore. *sob*

1) when we were about to leave our house for my mum's place (yz stays over for 2 nights every wed/thurs), he ran towards me (i was packing things at dining table) with his shoes on. and then *shoosh* he slipped and fell on his back, hitting back of his head.
ok, it doesnt sound as bad as this. in fact, recalling back, the way he falls is like those bigger kids, deliberately gliding over surfaces.
he fell on his butt (lucky cos this helps to break the fall alot) and can see that he was tensing his body and halting the fall.
i was almost certain he wont fall back further, but well, cant maintain the balance and the back hitted the floor and then the head. a soft "kok" can be heard.
still, painful for him lah.
quickly checked for bruises/swollen areas but find none. just a reddish patch.
which was gone in an hr time.

2) this is a bad one. he was alone in my mum's rm and he decided to run down from his mattress without holding on to anything!
he fell forward and face down onto the floor! upon hearing his cries, i quickly dashed in and scooped him and kept massaging his head (cos inititally i thought he knocked his forehead).
when SUDDENLY, i notice his mouth was full of blood!!!
apparantly, he hitted his mouth on the floor, his lower teeth cut his upper lip badly and it was now bleeding!
so distressed to see him cry and the blood flowing out from his mouth. :(
good thing is the bleeding soon stopped and he stopped crying. but his upper lip begain to swell up badly.

quickly brought him to see the GP downstairs and after checking, doc prescribed antibiotics to prevent inflammation to the wound. but in general, should be ok.
sigh. what an eventful evening.
my little notti boy is really a handful and im SURE he'll forget all these today and run around as usual!!
can only hope he learn to walk/run steadily soon.



see how bad the swelling is! taken while waiting for his turn at the clinic.

im a horrible shoe addict!

its barely 3 weeks since im back from the trip and i got myself 3 new pairs of shoes!
and the 3rd one is a secret from the husband. shhhh.....!
still trying to break the 1st pair in, so #2 & 3 gotta wait patiently in my shoe cabinets awhile.

#1 is from charles & keith. got it 2 saturdays back from vivo.
at very good deal. only $17.90 after 50% discount.
surprisingly quite comfy to walk in. minus a spot on my heel that threatens to develope into a blister if i walk too long innit. well, its rather the shape of my heel that is causing this than the shoes. hope it will make room for my bony heel soon!

#2 is from pazzion. got it last thursday when strolling alone at bugis waiting for my parents to reach with baby. me-time is not exactly a good thing when im faced with retail temptations!
no discout so it costed me $69. :(
i dont like getting things without discount. but this pair is blue (one of my fav color for shoes! to date i've like 4 pairs in blue?) and comes with some neat heels.
my previous pair from pazzion is not really a good purchase. after sometimes, the threads frayed out and i really hate that.

#3 is arturo chiang from stage. again, i was window-shopping alone yesterday at raffles city while waiting for the girls to reach for dinner. saw that this pair is going at 60% off!
usual price is $240 *gagged* but i got it at a steal at $96. :)
really comfy upon trying.
and hidden safely in the shoe cabinet. i hope hubbi wont see it yet. :P

A&A

the initial plan was to travel to avignon from nice and stay overnight there for 2 nights, and plan for a day trip to aix-en-provence the next day.
so while en-route on TGV (France high speed train) to avignon, i realised we'll pass by aix-en-provence 1st. so smarty-pants me thought why not we do the day trip now?!
im sure they have luggage locker at the trains and we can travel back to avignon in the evening?

bad mistake!
1st of all, the TGV station is a good 20mins away from aix-en-provence city centre. no prob, i've anticipated that and found the shuttle bus in no time. but waiting for the bus in the freezing cold with our full pack on us wasn't a really fun thing.

upon reaching the city centre, we dashed to the local train station only to find out there's NO luggage locker. *jaws drop*
so poor us got to carry our full pack with us. or rather poor hubbi.
yes, he actually helped to carry my bag in the front. at least 30kg+ in all. worse than his army days im sure. ha.

and aix is really small. at least for me.



the main street -Cours Mirabeau, in the city centre

ok to be fair, aix is really a nice small place with some decent shopping. but i think a day trip is really sufficient. i think im just grouchy cos of our bags. :(

enjoying simple lunch in one of the cafe along Cours Mirabeau

modern shopping centre

ok, so when its time to leave the place, we went to the local train station to catch a local train to avignon. ONLY to find out that there is NO train to there.

*gasp* we can take TGV direct but given TGV station is 20 mins away, im not so keen.

being ever resourceful, we took the 1st train out of aix to marseilles, a big city which SHOULD have direct trains to avignon right? hopefully, we were right. ..

and... we were right! *pheww*
there was one going out to avignon in 1.5hr time.

too short a time to take a look at how marseilles is, too long a time to wait around.

so... we went to...

feast on mac of cos!

finally, at around 5+pm, we reached avignon.
avignon is really interesting in that its the place where popes stayed in the middle ages.

back then, popes alternate between here and rome! till they decided that rome is the place to be, at least.

the city centre is surrounded by a wall!

in the courtyard of our hotel

totally tired out by the day, we turned in quite early after a quick walk up and down the main street of avignon which is just outside our hotel! :)

the next day we went to visit the palais des papes which is the palace for the popes.

it was quite bare inside. read that most of the stuff were looted or destroyed at many times in history, notably during the french revolution. still, it was a good walk in the morning for us.

interesting facade of building

next we went to the pont d'avignon. which is only halfway constructed. not sure why though.

on the bridge

avignon is also quite a small place to explore. we just walked around aimlessly alot and ate all kinda snacks along the way.
quite a relaxing time for us.

but even that was too boring for me. so i dragged the husband to some museums with me.

quite torturing for him im sure. hehe.

we went to this angladon museum which houses some neat pieces by sisley, degas etc. mainly impressionism pieces.

though i found a gem there, the pink blouse by modigliani!

but overall, very small collection here and at 4 euros per pax, not really worth it.

next, we went to the collection of lambert - which is mainly modern art.
i really think modern art is not for me. too abstract lah.

and hubbi was at best bemused, at worst irritated by most of the pieces there. ha.

this read:" are we evil, or we are evil?"

interesting huh?

next, we are going south to barcelona! *wee*