My exploration in life… (diary for baby!)

I dropped RACHEL’s baby bag yesterday (27 Nov 06) and caused us quite a scare; this was how it happened:

After my ritual of sending YEN to work, I returned home and found EDDIE and HUIJUN around.  They were about to move the personal computer in his room to their new place, and EDDIE asked if I was free to help.  If I could help, then they would be able to carry more.  How can I turn down my brother’s request?  So I went along and ended up having breakfast before parting ways.

I came home and asked mum if she was interested to shopping / window shopping at SPOTLIGHT @ PLAZA SINGAPURA.  I knew that she wanted to go there as she lamented a few days ago on how expensive it was to get balls of wool for knitting elsewhere and how much cheaper it would be at SPOTLIGHT.  I wanted to browse there too, to see what they had.  So we went out bringing RACHEL as there was no one at home to look after her.

We bought mum’s wool and some bedsheets for her bed that would be delivered to our new place.  Other than the shop we went to, I noticed there were a couple of other shops that could interest YEN and I.  Made a mental note to return to the shopping centre soon.

We had found out that CARREFOUR had christmas trees for sale, and at reasonable prices too.  I finally managed to get one of our own.  RACHEL can look forward to her first Christmas, with a proper tree and all!  =)  EDDIE and HUIJUN were having their food tasting prior to their big night last night set at 7pm - it was a little past 4pm when we paid for the tree and we rushed to return home to change up.

It was in the rush and chaos that I lost her bag.  I was trying my hardest to fit the tree and her pram at the backseat of our small MARCH.  In the midst, I put her baby bag (a cute one that YEN loves) on the roof of the car while I adjusted the items.  And I forgot about it - the car left level seven of the car park and was leaving the vicinity of the roads leading out of the shopping mall when we stopped at a traffic light.  It was there that a car stopped by our side and tried to pass the message to us - that they were behind us and witnessed the bag dropping off the roof whilst we drove down the car park.  RACHEL’s bag - had her bottles, diapers…  wait!  My wallet was in it!  And so was my mum’s!

I made a turn back to PLAZA SINGAPURA immediately and frantically searched for the bag - running up and down the circular tracks of the car park leading down from level seven were we were parked.  I couldn’t find it, and told mum to go to its information counter, while I made a last attempt to search for the bag visually while I ran down.  The search almost ended futile until the information counter finally told us it was found.  Thank goodness - my credit cards and money was all there!  Most importantly - RACHEL’s stuff was found!  =)

Our princess gave us a torrid time during food tasting - she cried and cried, only stopping periodically to take breaks.  Can’t blame her - she was up and about most of the time while she was out with mum and I until the dinner, and she was understandably tried.  I just hope that she won’t cry like this at EDDIE and HUIJUN’s customary dinner!

I am studying (though a little too slowly) for the paper on Friday on Motor Learning and Sports Psychology.  They used to be two separate examinable modules.  Its a little crazy as both areas are relatively heavy - to squeeze them compact and to study both areas at the same time?  I can only hope to pass while escaping a C grade.

I look ahead and am in great anticipation of my family shifting into our new flat in less than a month.  The renovation is not extremely fast, but perhaps things (our furniture) are done at the workshops at the back-end and we can’t see them, yet.  At least a coat of paint has been painted on - our new flat looks colourful enough.

We’ll be able to move in before Christmas.  Or rather, we MUST move out of our current flat and hand over the keys by 18 December.  We are prompting (not forcing, but gently nudging; but, does it make any difference??) EDDIE to move his stuff over to his own new flat little by little to avoid having to rush when we need to evict from our place.  It’s not easy for him too, really, as he is preparing his own customary dinner next January as well as some plans of his own I will not disclose now.  A little consolation is that I’ll be for hire after this Friday until the start of the new semester in January (P.S. I charge exorbitant rates!).

YEN and I are (well, at least I am!) thinking of getting a Christmas tree for our new home in our first Christmas there.  =)  It’ll be our first ever own tree!  Some way to mark RACHEL’s first Christmas!  And I’m looking at going around bargain-hunting and getting quite a few things for our home once my examinations end.  It’ll be quite a Christmas to look forward to!  =)

I attended PEIYUN’s customary wedding dinner at MARRIOTT HOTEL last night and was pleasantly surprised to find my table seated with almost all my ex-classmates.  This brought flooded us with the many many things we used to have laughs over in the past, and at least this part of our lives hasn’t changed until now.

While the hosts were busy with their guests and proceedings of the night, those at our table were busy laughing over jokes of the good old days.  Our night of nostalgia was brought about by EDMUND, CHAOXIAN, NELSON, WEILIANG, SHUNTIAN and JULIE.  I have to mention that there were three other guests at the table - XIANGKOON, who was never in the same class as I, his partner and this girl who was from badminton then, but I don’t think we ever spoke and I still don’t remember her name (apologies!).  The girl did catch up quite a bit with JULIE and SHUNTIAN, who sat by her sides.

It was great to catch up with them, especially WEILIANG - he used to sit behind me and who was one of the few who always sang along to the many tunes we knew in class.  Boy, has he slimmed down!  We seldom caught up with each other after we graduated and he went to Australia subsequently for his bachelor studies.  I used to offer the lack of time as an excuse for our not keeping in touch, but looking back now, perhaps among the few reasons that we failed to continue being the best of buddies was the differing of interest we had and priorities in life.  Perhaps I had a little inferiority complex too as he comes from a much better family background than I.

I just returned home after meeting the deliverymen at our new place to call home.  We now have the ceiling lights, hob set, sink and two mirrors, ready for installation.  Adrian’s father came along with a couple of his contractor buddies too, to confirm the furniture to be made and paint for the house.  It had been a morning full of stress when I spoke to them as I struggled to bring my ideas across to them, without actually knowing if they’ll work.  Well, we’ll know, soon enough…  =P

Amidst the re-test of the sports psychology test we’re having tomorrow (that’s another story), I am witnessing quite a few important events in life for some of my friends.  I glad I was invited to attend three wedding dinners this month (PEIYUN from secondary school, JUNJIE from polytechnic and ALLAN & JOYCE - ALLAN from Army and from whom I got to know JOYCE), and glad to have celebrated WEILI’s joining me in the ranks to become father to a child, with his son GIDEON saying hello to our world at the start of this month.  I met BOON PIN too (ex-secondary school classmate) when furniture shopping with YEN and glad that all has turned out fine for him too.  Time flies - the last time we spoke in secondary four was a good twelve years ago…  He is now father of one and he and his wife are expecting the birth of another one later this month!  RICHARD (ex-colleague from SAF) is having his customary next month too.  =)

But it’s not all a bed of roses in life; along with the joy come sadness - the father of a former colleague, YONG CHEE, passing away, this coupled with one of the parents of two of my good pals struck with illnesses…  I am inept and may not be able to do much for them; I do hope I can be of some help in providing my friends with some emotional support.  But this is life - full of births, separations, deaths and such.  It is important not to wallow in self-pity (like I once did after meeting the traffic accident a few years ago) and move on in life (which I am also thankful I was able to).  Perhaps we should remember that for every down in life, there is probably an up that follows.  If it (the up) doesn’t happen for you now, be patient.  How much lower can you go when you hit rock-bottom?  The only way to go from there, is upwards…

Our little RACHEL seems to be developing fine and maturing by the day.  I have been contend watching her grow while time passes us, and it gets closer and closer to time for us to leave our flat for a new one (in a little more than a month!), to EDDIE and HUIJUN’s customary dinner, to my second teaching experience in school, to RACHEL’s first birthday and graduation from NIE mid next year.  There’ll be lots more things spring up in between and much more after these.  YEN and I must always be on our toes to expect the unexpected in life and hopefully, be strong enough to weather the storms…

Our little princess has this t-shirt we bought her that says: "My elephant, my friend".  It is a cute little white tee with a very nice print of an elephant.  However, we are beginning to think that she doesn’t think very much of it - every time she puts on that tee, she can’t keep it on for very long, and vomits milk over it…  =(  Poor girl; poor elephant!

We were at my mum-in-law’s for a while last night after not having visited her for about three weeks.  We weren’t free one or two weeks and she was overseas the other.  I read that babies about six to nine months will start to recognise people and feel uncomfortable with unfamiliar others.  RACHEL sure seems to show a little of this when she cried whenever she discovered mum-in-law carry her, probably due to the long time they have not met.  Think my mum-in-law would probably feel a little upset…  We just have to let them see each other more!

Finally completed my English assignment yesterday (think I did not put in enough effort into it; it was a little slipshod) and took the EAPP test the same morning (that I hardly prepared for).  Hardly finding enough time to complete work with the renovation works and furniture buying to look into at the same time.  I really hope I can do enough to pass my exam in a couple of weeks…  =(

The past week had been hectic and interesting for YEN and I, but sadly, not academically.  Now that most of my lessons have ended (which means examinations are very near!), I only went back to NIE on Monday and Wednesday, for Netball on both days and a course named "English for Academic and Professional Purposes".  We did not have lessons for English this past week, or I would have gone back on Tuesday too.

It was the last practical lesson on Netball play on Monday, and the course rounded-up with a written test on game play and coaching methods on Wednesday.  The feedback I had from MS CHANG, our instructor, from the Wednesday before this past one was that I was "okay" generally on the skills part, but just not "proactive" enough.  She went on to elaborate by explaining that I normally waited for play to come very near to me, before I made a move for the ball.  This was the same for offense and defense (I wasn’t challenging the attacker enough for positions when I played defence).  So I challenged myself to take up the "Center" position on our last practice on Monday when we played amongst the same gender for the first time in the course (we normally played mixed games) and were told to pick our own positions.

It was the first time I played "Center".  Guess I never did want to take up the position as it required the most running.  I do not feel flattered by my fitness level, and normally chose to shy away.  But since she advised me to be more proactive in game play, and it was the last practical lesson, I thought of giving it a shot.  It was amusing that I found YONGSHENG playing as the opposing Center.  After the game, we thought I did quite well at the first half of the 5-minute game we played as I continued to limit his moves and game.  But I became anonymous in the later half as fatigue set in and he became a lot more imposing.  So finally, no more netball lessons until 7-plus or 8 plus at nights!  =)

YEN decided to return home on her own on Monday night via MRT (due to my late netball lessons), and was unfortunately stuck at QUEENSTOWN MRT as it was reported through the radio that someone laid dead on the MRT tracks at CLEMENTI, and train service had to be halted for a while.  I found out of her predicament only after the lesson and went to pick her up as soon as I could.  Found throngs of people waiting there for public transport services at the bus-stop she was at.  We are glad that she was safe, and we are blessed enough to be able to afford a car and that I could make my way down for her when I could.

Have been spending a lot of time on planning for our new home since collecting the keys to it.  Time for planning for our flat at the expense of for assignments and studies maybe, but at this moment, I feel that there is really this need to get the plans up properly so that renovation work can follow soon.  This new flat is the first one that YEN and I have, and probably the one that we will stay at for years.  I want to let YEN and RACHEL have as good an environment to be in.  Spent a lot of time taking measurements, scouring the Internet and magazines for design ideas, and finally devising our own ideas.  Drew quite a few drafts to get YEN’s approval / agreement and for the contractors.  ADRIAN has been quite a bit of help too by introducing his dad, now semi-retired contractor, to us.

Think rolling the pineapple works, a little - at least for now.  We bought a 4D ticket on 26 Oct when we were at HDB Hub after collecting the keys for our new flat.  I am not a compulsive gambler (at least not at 4D!) as I do not have any habit for making bets for periods longer than a month.  So we joked about making bets for our new house and used the iBet system.  For those of you who do not understand it, it is just a matter of telling them that you wish for iBet so that all possible combinations for the digits you placed bets on are "bought".  No extra cost to this, but iBet means that winnings are punitive.

I placed bets for the block and unit number of our new flat and did not think enough of it to check the winning numbers until last night.  I have never won anything from placing bets.  We joked about making winnings as there were some signs - bird droppings on our car on Wednesday and on me(!) on Thursday night.  Perhaps the old wives’ tale from my mum-in-law works, after all??

To our delight, both bets made winnings on 2 separate draws!  =)  But don’t be too happy, yet!  The gross winnings were only $32 for the starter and consolation numbers winnings, bought using iBet - $20 for one and $12 for the other.  This means that the net winnings were $14 - after subtracting the $18 we paid for the bets.  Ha…  but I sure hope this means a turn of things for us and that we remain lucky as long as we own the new flat!