Mini refurbishment - Day 2 to Day 4

Day 2 continues and it is also the start to my body ache! The whole house was literally turned upside down as the days passed when the 2 painters moved from room to room.

I was told that the paint these days are not as easy to achieve the same colour as the ones you see in the catalogue so it takes minimum 3 coats to have almost the same effect.

I also learnt that both Nippon and Dulux only mixes the paint colour when it's being ordered so even if you order the same colour code a few days later, you might run into the chance that the colour code is slightly different with your first batch.

It was dusty when all the furniture are being shifted and covered during the painting days and I had to find ways to keep the boys in the most safe place during these days. In one of the afternoon,  they get to dine in my bedroom for the first time in their lives!

I had to order KFC delivery as I don't have access to the kitchen

Happy with their popcorn chicken bucket rice

Can't wait for the weekend to come so we can arrange for all the deliveries to happen next week.

Mini refurbishment - Day 1

My school's induction has been postponed to mid-dec so today is the start of my house refurbishment period..

The only task scheduled for today is to hack our 12 year built-in study table and bookshelf to give the study room a whole new look for our growing boys.

Before

It took us 2 days on Saturday and Sunday to run through our stuff parked in this area and threw some of those that were of little sentimental value to me. . A same area like this is enough to kill us!

In total 5 big boxes and 6 A4 boxes

 The guys have changed their schedule to my place to the afternoon so I took the opportunity to clear out my cupboards while waiting for the kids to get off from school.

Thankfully,  a charity organisation happens to be collecting old newspapers and used clothing tomorrow so this works perfectly well on my schedule.

What I have accomplished in 2 hours (including cleaning up all interior cupboards)

To discard

Clothing for donation

After

Finally. . The table and cupboard were removed. . Left with the attached lamps which will be taken care by an electric technician.  After vacuuming the whole house and mopping,  my day 1 work is done.

Little accident in school

Today I am officially jobless (again, haha) but had made plans to drop by the school campus to get my laptop configured before my training programme in 2 weeks time. So sometime near noon, we got a call from the school and we knew something had happened to one of the boys.

True enough,  Ethan had a minor accident in school where he was pushed by another child from different class and fell flat on his head which resulted in a big bah lu ku on his forehead.

Poor child looked like it was really painful by the time we went to general office to pick him.

Bump turning blue black by night

The school called us in the afternoon asking about ethan's condition and also told us that they found the child who knocked him down.

I think it's probably just one of the childhood accident that he will remember by..

Halloween night 2014

We decided to visit woodlands grove this year to soak into the Halloween atmosphere.  After we had our dinner and sent my mil back home, it was already 740pm. The journey to woodlands took a bit longer than usual due to night traffic and probably some people have also planned their night there.

So by the time we reach the venue, it was so near 9pm and we saw most kids departing the area with their pumpkin buckets. The boys and girl (kimi) were wondering if there were still treats left for them to collect and we had to prep them mentally that there may not be many houses left with the candies.  Nonetheless,  they had a bit of fun seeing how the rest have dressed up for the night.

My sis-in-law is still as sporting to make an effort to dress up

Even the dog has a pumpkin bag

With Hercules

The kids didn't get many treats ( 2 sweets to be exact!) and they were fairly tired after the 1 hour walk. So I guess they will not pester us to bring them for this Halloween event next year!

Why I stopped blogging...

It has been a while since I last blogged.. a few reasons:

1) Part-time work
My part-time arrangement with my existing organisation got a bit out of my control. Eversince I was tasked to take back on as a team lead role, I have been working even in the afternoons and evenings when I am back home (so technically these services are rendered to the orgn for free)! I even had to prep myself to write the presentation speeches as I was expected to do senior mgt presentation despite my part-time status.

2) Preparation for my interviews
I have to do lots of reads to prepare for my prospective career switch.. and they turned out to be helpful eventually as I passed those few rounds of interviews.

3) Term 3 exams
I squeezed time to go through conceptual points with the boys during their term 3 exam weeks.

4) Driving
Given that potentially I may need to drive in my next role, I have been taking time to practise every weekend.

Whilst I must say that I have been squeezed for time in the last 2 months, and I honestly think the boys don't have my attention at home, but at least, I am still there in the house for them when they need to speak to me.. it's still not so bad after all. Nonetheless, since I am changing my job to a 3 day work week come Nov, hopefully the new arrangement works out better for the family.

One of rare pictures

I realised we have done fewer snapshots of the boys as they grow older. Usually I will make a point to take more pictures in our outings and overseas trips and rarely we take shots of them in usual weekend meals.

So here are some of the rare shots taken recently:

Enjoying their mango kachang

In their all-time favourite jap place

Periods without TV

During their free time, I try not to get the boys hooked on tv programmes and cultivate an interest in reading,  drawing, playing music or do other plays (current favorite is some imaginary stories they build while lazing on their beds).

Ethan is the more diligent boy lately as he often picks up books to read in his spare time (which were intentionally placed out there in the living room within their line of sight). It helps if we don't get the tv switched on often at home - a BIG cooperation is required from their father!

Caden on the other hand prefers to fiddle with his lego and do drawing instead.. possibly he gets really lots of written assignments from me during the weekdays. 

So basically,  we try to watch selective programmes during their rest periods. When I am cooking dinner,  they get to catch up on children's programme on okto.  After dinner,  if there are no revisions required,  we allow them to watch some other programs from animal planet, news, etc. During the recent school holidays, they get to follow the Chinese drama series "world at your feet" which I find it less contentious and fairly appropriate for them to understand the spirit of working hard and teamwork (the current screening of chinese drama series is definitely a no-no! ). I hope this interest in reading is kept strong for the next few years!

After dinner, on a Saturday night

During school day, one afternoon

At a closer range -and actually he fell asleep!