Kidzania

The boys in the family have not gone to Kidzania before so I planned a family outing there as a final hurrah for our year-end holiday. So, off the six of us went! I still hadn't recovered from my week-long illness so it was a struggle for me to last throughout the physically taxing day. However, the eager smiles of my four darling children made my sacrifice all worthwhile! Here are some super adorable photos of Joram trying his hands at some of the jobs.

Joram activating his bank card

Willing Hearts

We continued with our family tradition of giving back to our community for Christmas as our heartfelt thankfulness towards Jesus. This year, a CG mate planned the trip down to Willing Hearts' food kitchen. A pity, Joram and I fell sick so the both of us could not help out in the end which resulted in Joshua going with the older three to do lots of packing for the organisation. Another sad thing was that our family also did not manage to do our annual Orchard Road Christmas lights tour since the family organiser (me lah) was bedridden. A "silent night" for us indeed...

First Ice-skating

This is Joram's and his second sister's first ice-skating experience! *applause* It was quite challenging to watch over 4 kids and actively guide TWO young newbies at the same time and I'm thankful that God protected all of us from any harm. In fact, I was already tired after making sure everyone was wearing their skates properly. *sweat* We rented two penguins for the younger ones and those skating aids were pretty heavy for me to handle too...

The older two had prior experience so I left them mostly to fend for themselves. Joram and his Er Jie took some time to get used to moving around on skates with the penguins. My youngest boy was really quite the daredevil and required very little supervision after the initial tentativeness despite my expectation that he would need more assistance than his older sibling. Naturally, both of them required a short break at halftime due to the unfamiliar exertion. I'm so glad that towards the end of our two-hour slot, they could do without the penguin although Joram looked more like he was "ice-walking" rather than ice-skating! ROFL You can check out the video below to see what I mean. :P

So exciting!

All geared up and ready to go!

I can skate by myself

Left to their own devices

HomeTeamNS Pool

I originally wanted to take the kids to the Laser Quest again at HomeTeamNS. However, they are having a corporate event today, so no walk-ins allowed. Instead, I brought them to their swimming pool. It was nothing fantastic but the kids still had fun making up their own games especially since we basically had the whole water playground to ourselves. 

Since the water was so shallow, my elder daughter took the chance to master floating on her back. She tried teaching her sister but to no avail. Sadly, the boys were simply too scared to try. In fact, my older girl seemed to be the bravest as she was also the only one willing to go under the huge water bucket when it tipped over and emptied its contents.

Our tickets
Not really worth spending the $9

Hiding within the water "shield"

Joram was thrilled with the
police and fire department
theme of the playground

Floating along...

All dried up and ready
to cab home and bathe

ECP Bike Trip

After training just riding around in our neighbourhood for a couple of months, we experimented letting Joram ride to a coffeeshop a few streets away with Joshua to buy dinner. It seemed that he had developed enough skill and stamina for longer distance. 

Thus, we decided to test him out at East Coast Park where the route is quite straightforward and easier for him to manage and focus on endurance. It turned out pretty well. He could cycle all the way from the bicycle shop to the Bedok Jetty and then back again, albeit much slower than the rest of us. He definitely clocked more than 5km.

We were there with another CG family and we especially enjoyed the company. I prepared some simple picnic food for dinner and the children had fun together at the Marine Cove playground afterwards.

Here's a short clip of Joram riding the rented bike. I took the video one-handedly while I was cycling behind him. It was truly a test of my balancing skills and dexterity! *sweat*

Picnic Dinner: Coloured rice-balls,
seasoned corn, sausage octopus/crab,
scrambled eggs and braised broccoli