Wedding Cake course - completed :)

Yay! After 4 gruelling Mondays, standing on my feet for close to 6 hours each session, I finished my wedding cake course with Creative Culinaire - headed by Chef Judy. After all the hours of learning to hand make the flowers, I now understand why people charge what they charge for a price of the cake..it's def not the taste that matters but the LOOK..and the LOOK takes sooooo much time to create. Each petal lovingly hand moulded, pressed, stucked, coloured..the list goes on!

Have to admit that I prob wont attempt to make another cake - it's wayy too much hard work..but the course was a true eye opener and I actually really enjoyed the learning process. Chef Judy's an angel - she's very patient, extra bubbly and just a nice person to hang out with.

Did not manage to take a group picture with the class but here's my table mate : Margaret (who coincidently also works with HP - one of the many many depts) who helped me a great deal with the kitchen equipment and making me laugh with her "absentmindedness" :)

Babymooning @ Phuket

Just spent 5 excellent days having fun in Phuket. We called it our babymoon as it's kinda the last long trip Jin and I are taking while baby's still in the tummy. Phuket weather was initially drizzly but soon became very sunny the rest of our stay. Infact, I found it a bit too hot but I think the sun-tanners loved it!

Our 1st night, we stayed at the budget Seven Seas hotel as I wanted to be near Patong beach to stroll the markets. Here are pix of the room, hotel and our Honda Jazz we rented for 1000baht a day.

Since we rented a car, we decided to venture to Phuket town for lunch - we visited Tung-Ka Cafe, located on Phuket Hill. The hill reminded me a bit of Mt Faber with it's long winding paths - the restaurant was nested among the foliage with views overlooking Phuket town. Food was pretty good, we had a papaya salad with grilled pork (yummy!), tom yum goong and squid in lemon and garlic. Actually I wanted fish with lemon and garlic BUT obviously, in my haste to order, I read wrongly and instead of fish, we got squid which Jin got to finish as I am not much of a squid fan :P.

We spent the rest of the day in the new Jungceylon shopping centre where Jin got himself a 400baht facial and I took time off for a pedi and mani. This new shopping centre is quite well done - reminded us a bit of the US styled concept centres with it's open areas. Of course, no day in Phuket would be complete without our massages..Jin went to the luxurious Mind Body spa for his while I headed to a no name street corner shop for mine as Mind Body only wanted to do full body aromatherapy massage for me and all I wanted was a good ol shoulder massage :p

Day 2, we left Patong and headed north to Marriot's Phuket Beach Club, our home for the next 4 days. I have to admit that I gave Jin quite a hard time on his choice of accommodation as Marriot's located by itself , away from civilization - ie, shops, massage and food. However, our 2 bedroom suite with full amenities as well as the amazing gounds (swimming pools) soon changed my mind. We spent the most of Day 3 and 4 lazing by the pools, eating at the resort's restaurants, having smoothies, having beach massages and calling them back to the room for more massages and taking lots of tummy pics. All these coupled with Thai hospitality really made this one wonderful vacation!

This was breakfast at Siam Deli.

We called in room service one night as Jin wanted to watch the MU vs Chelsea match.

Dinner at the Andaman Grill - we sat through a time share talk by the resort and got complimentary eating vouchers worth 4000baht so we had quite a feast with Jin's sirloin steak and my Jumbo grilled prawns. YUMS! Check out our new hair cuts :)

Felt quite sad when it was time to go home..sigh, why must holidays always end so fast! :p..hopefully we can return in November when Lyn and family visits :)

A short reflection..

I spent the day working from home today and at 630pm, suddenly felt, enough of work, I need a break...and then it hit me, I have not watched TV for the longest time..I dont think I have seen channel 5 or StarWorld for the past few months..what has changed? I used to be such a tv addict, cant do without my amazing race and sitcoms - waking up at 7am and catching reruns of seinfeld while having breakfast..

My previous TV time has just been replaced..with baby on the way, Jin and I are obsessed with shopping boards buying her stuff..every night, we dutifully turn on our PCs and look for good deals..this week we got her a mosquito net and car seat..her 2nd cos jin says we need 1 for each car..and we dont even hv a 2nd car yet!!! and every week, i say enough is enough..no more shopping..but do I listen to me? :P

If it's not surfing, time is spent reading up on baby books and playing music to baby...she promptly moves each time music is played to her..even when she's sleeping..poor kid :D

Our lives already changing even with her still happily nesting in me..just imagine when she arrives...I think tt would def be life changing!

Jin has been really great with all the baby stuff..he dedicately researches on everything before he buys..and he keeps buying and buying with soo much enthusiam..it's hard telling him to stop :). Last week, baby and I decided her daddy deserves a pressie too for all the pressies he has been buying her..so we ran out to Tangs one night when Jin was in Jakarta and bought him a Samsonite laptop bagpack for his day trips..came back and wrapped the pressie..this is what Jin saw waiting for him :)

Oh, saw a cream cheese cupcake recipe in one of the magazines the other day and decided it was easy enough to test out..happy to note : results were Yummy!

Here's baby and me at 28 weeks - we strolled out to botanical gardens for egg prata breakfast..I look huge..can I really fit in another 12 weeks? gulp :P

Silly me ;)

Last night, while getting ready for bed, I casually mentioned to Jin that Baby is 27 weeks now..and he just replied..you know what that means? it Means baby is coming very soon..and don't know why, his words just stuck a a cord and got me thinking - what? you mean jin and i wont have just US time anymore and we have to spread our precious time together with another little one? and that thought (which I attribute to a combination of hormones and a very painful swollen left feet) got me tearing up and then sob sob sobs...

Thankfully, after a good half hour, my senses came back and the mood swinged. Quickly apologised to the little one, told her how much we love her and how we can't wait to have her part of our lives..of course Jin had to also assure me that we will still have our US time..(yeah, like when baby goes to college :p)

Been meaning to put this up, but pregnancy forgetfulness to blame. Pix of baby girl's chromosoms! Got a scare quite early in the pregnancy when triple test came out with false positive results..the event's a bit hazy in my memory now but I do remember an extreme feeling of sadness and a whole day of crying..did not help that Jin was in Jakarta the day the call from Dr Chin's clinic came in. I was crying so much that I did not even see the needle go in to remove the amniotic fluid..thankfully so too cos I would have freaked out seeing how terrified I am of needles and I heard it's pretty BIG needle :D. To cut long story short, I insisted on paying extra extra for rapid test results (so instead of waiting 3 weeks, I got the results in 1.5 days..the things money can buy :p) and after the call with the results, everything was sunny again :).

Here's my personal version of the Mastercard Ad :

Amnio test with chromosom photograph: $1300

Rapid test results : $200

Feeling when found out that baby was OK : priceless

Food glorious food...

Now that I am in my 6th month with baby, my appetite's come back! I suddenly have mood to go out for long meals again and the cravings for hawker soup noodles have lessen. So last weekend, we organised 2 outings..one was dinner at Galbalti's, upper bukit timah where lin and ren yuh met us for some good ol pasta and desserts. The parma ham with rockmelon and stuffed portobello mushrooms were great appetizers. Mains, we had 4 kinds of pasta - crab linguine, salmon cream penne, meat ravioli and an aglio olio with herb sauce. Desserts, ren yuh could not decide, so we ended up with a pine nut tart, hazelnut choc tart and tiramisu. what a feast!

Feast continued the next morning - sunday brunch at B&J's dempsey hill. met up with jimmy, gail, kok kee and anne for sausages and burgers..I like this place for its chill out atmosphere and of course we finished our meal with waffles and scoops of B&J ice cream.

Last night, we met up at La Braceria, remotely nestled near 6th Ave for Neel's bday meal. We started with 2 appetizers, parma ham w mozarella and eggplants. I liked the eggplant dish a lot..well done with the cheese. For mains, I went with an order of portobello mushroom ..surprisingly dissapointed as it came with the 2 smallest portobello mushrooms i have ever had :(..but tasted yummy regardless and sides of asparagus with more cheese was good. Dessert, the tiramisu was out of this world..i am craving it again!!

Baby's 26 weeks now..she has been moving a lot and I now play her nursery rhymes every night before we sleep. Jin poofed at me for paying $18 for the mothercare cd but hey, he doesn't sing to her so I think the CD's a gd investment :)). We have been such shopaholics - every night one of us will be monitoring ebay to bid for dresses for her..I think this is going to be one dressed up baby :) I also bought a second hand baby swing for her as well as some cloth books..have to collect tomorrow. Changes in me : noticed that my feet looks a bit swollen..gulp!

Here's baby at 26 weeks..getting bigger :D