I didn’t know that Jurong Bird Park has a water playground until this advertisement pops out on my blog. Coincidentally, I also saw the 30% off Jurong Bird Park adult and child entry tickets on Deal.com.sg. So, I immediately purchased 3 tickets to bring our boy there for some fun.

We went to Jurong Bird Park last Saturday. It has been raining for the past few days, but we decided to take the risk and proceed with our plan. Spare clothes, towels and umbrellas were all packed up, and we were ready to go!

The journey from our home in the North-East to the Bird Park in the South-West took slightly more than an hour. Thanks to the heavy traffic along PIE, the poor Husband was tearing his hair out in frustration trying to navigate the road traffic.

Alas, we reached the park at 1pm and the weather was still good. Much to my surprise, the parking rate here is amazingly cheap. It’s only $2 per entry, I just couldn’t believe it.

The highlight of this trip is certainly the Birdz of Play – the newly opened water playground. Before we head to the playground, we did a brief visit to the birds in the park. Little Edison was delighted to see the penguins, flamingos and parrots.

Our boy was super excited to see the huge playground and water playground. The dry playground is divided into two sections – one for younger kids 4 years and below, and one for older kids. The water playground is next to it.

After one hour of playtime, we felt a light drizzling rain. So, we stopped our activity and went for a shower. There is a main children shower area, but it is unsheltered. There are also shower rooms in the toilets. The toilets are clean and new. There are also lockers and baby-changing room here.

We went for snacks at the Ben & Jerry outlet – just next to the playground and patiently waiting for the rain to stop. After the rain stopped, we proceed to visit the other attractions in this park. By this time, our boy was so exhausted and fell asleep on his stroller.

All in all, it was a fun day despite the rain. The Birdz of Play is indeed very fun for the kids. I like the park because it is less crowded as compared to the Singapore Zoo. But I also expect that they will have a surge in visitors soon after the opening of Birdz of Play.

Here are some pictures to share:

I love those penguins! So cute!

Colourful parrots…

The flamingos, lots of them!

Little Edison making funny face!

The highlight – Birdz of Play!

Little Edison & I walking to the playground

Playground Fun Time!

At the water playground finally – look at his smile!

Slide, Slide, Slide!

Splash, Splash, Splash!

Giant Flamingo… I love Birdz of Play!

It’s the start of school holiday this week. The Husband is planning to bring us for a short holiday in November. Both of us have difficulties in taking our annual leave in December because 1) V will be serving his reservist for one month, and 2) my office has a planned shutdown in end Dec – week of Christmas.

We wanted to go to somewhere near, simple, short and hopefully, without the need for applying leave from work. So, the idea of going for a weekend cruise immediately came to our mind. We went for a cruise vacation on Star Cruise Virgo a year ago, and we really felt like going there again.

Unfortunately, the price has increased so much in just one year’s time. The package price for a family of four on a 2N weekend domestic cruise costs a whopping $1800! With this price, I’ll rather buy three air tickets and fly to Hong Kong. So, we scrapped the idea of going for a weekend cruise.

I told V that as long as we’re together, and with our dear son, anywhere is a good place. Any time that we get to spend together as a family is precious to me. He is most happy to hear that. We can reserve our resources to plan for a better holiday next year when our schedule permits.

So, we brought Little Edison to Sentosa Island last weekend. Together with our parents-in-law, we planned for a picnic at Siloso beach. Little Edison is so thrilled to swim at the seaside and play on the sandy beach again.

What he like most about the beach are 1) when the waves washed over his little feet, he will laugh with joy, 2) when the waves pushed him backward to the shore, he will shout with excitement and 3) he can play with the sand, draw them with his hands and even roll his body on them. The sand on the beach is so clean and fine.

But there is just one thing that he hates about the beach. Guess what? It’s the shower facility in the public toilet that is not equipped with water heater. He just hates to shower in cold water.

Little Edison and I at Siloso Beach – fantastic weather! 

My MIL, Little Edison and V at Beach Station Carpark

Little Edison after a swim and a refreshing shower (in cold water)

The holiday weekend just flew by and before I realized it, it’s already Thursday now. Another weekend is coming soon. No wonder they coined the phrase “time flies”. Do you agree? How did you spend your holiday weekend?

As for me, a good part of it was spent on doing house chores – ironing, washing, cleaning etc. I gave my car a good wash and vacuum cleaning – it is now almost completely sand-free. Let’s hope that the weather will be nice this week and my car will remain clean till this weekend.

The old clothing in the wardrobes has been archived to make space for new clothing. Yay! And I managed to declutter my ironing pile and got to the bottom of my ironing basket. Believe it or not, I found my favourite top at the bottom of my ironing basket!

We brought Little Edison to the grass and sand at the East Coast. The weather was fantastic when we reached there at 5pm. Our boy ran and jumped around in the sand. When he was tired, he sat down and got into castle building action.

I sat on the mat, munched on an apple and watched him play. V was busy taking these pictures.

We enjoyed our outing in a very easy and laid-back manner. It was a day filled with simple pleasures – for all of us.

Two weeks ago, on the Deepavali public holiday, we visited the new Punggol Waterway which was officially opened by PM Lee on 23 Oct 2011.

We didn’t know the exact location of the park, so we drove around Punggol Town leisurely to look for it. There wasn’t any signboard that shows the direction to this park, but alas, we managed to locate it near the Punggol MRT.

We parked our car along the road and walked over to the park. Much to my surprise, the park was quite quiet and some of the facilities like water playground are not opened yet. Many construction works are still being carried out despite its official opening a week ago.

We took some photos here and left the park for lunch soon after. We will be back again, for sure, when all the facilities are opened.

Punggol used to be a fishing village surrounded by pig and poultry farms. Today, it is gearing up to become a new and exciting residential town. We recently visited the show gallery of A Treasure Trove – a new condominium project in Punggol Central and we like it a lot.

There are many other new residential projects at Punggol now. We’ve been patiently waiting for the launch of Watertown too (hopefully the price won’t be too far from A Treasure Trove).

We like Punggol, and that’s where our future dream home might be.

Apart from the special check-in counters, there is another VIP treatment for the World Club guests. That is the buffet breakfast!

The buffet breakfast for World Club guests will be served at the World Club Lounge located on the 24th floor of Tower 1 and 28th floor of Tower 2. This is a private dining area for World Club guests only.

All the guests from the Standard and Deluxe Rooms will enjoy their buffet breakfast at the First World Café. I heard that the café can be quite crowded especially on peak seasons. There are over 6,000 rooms in First World Hotel, and the amount of guests can easily hit 10,000!

In the exclusive World Club Lounge, you can dine with comfort. The place is very cozy with comfortable sofa seat, wooden flooring and views of the theme parks. However, the food variety is quite limited. You can choose to have your breakfast at the First World Café too, if you don’t mind the crowd.

Buffet Breakfast – noodles, dim sum, pau, rice, porridge etc..

V asked, “Want to eat char siew pau? Not bad la.”

Little Edison counting fingers after having his breakfast

World Club Lounge

After breakfast, we went to the Jungle Gym – an indoor adventure playground in Genting operated by Pedas Springs. It is very similar to Amazonia in Singapore. The entrance fee is RM28 for two hours. So, our boy had another hour of fun before we returned to our hotel and check-out.

Jungle Gym

He can never get enough of ball pit!

Climb, climb, climb…

Jump, jump, jump…

My favourite shot!

Our coach left Genting at 2pm. After a super tiring 7.5 hours journey, we finally reached our home sweet home at 9:30pm. Nonetheless, it’s still a nice short vacation for us. I truly enjoyed every moment of my time there with V and Little Edison.

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