Dog of a day and other tails

We've had lots of things to do to keep us busy recently. Dress up like Super heroes Day where Alice went as Super Turtle and Felicity as Super califragilisticexpealidocious. Matt's been away to Japan, USA and Hong Kong and Macau in recent weeks but on the weekends we've managed to have good family times with bike riding at Pasir Ris park a highlight. Felicity and Alice both had their awards assembly and Felicity was awarded Superstar Actress of the class and Alice got Talented Artist. This weekend we invited all Buckley's friends to the dog party for Buckley's 5th birthday party. It was very muddy which the kids and the dogs enjoyed. Otis the big white dog turned browny grey - we laughed a lot at him until he wanted to come and greet us and proceed to shake his mud all over us.

Last night we set up our Christmas in preparation for the silly season. And in less than hour we collect Brittany and Tess from the airport for their Singapore stopover before France.  I think they plan to soak up the sun while they are here but considering its rainy season they'll probably get a little more soaked than they planned.

Birthdays and other celebrations

Cup Day - The office went out for lunch to celebrate. Almost as good as getting the day off.

The Australian High Commission was challenged to an afternoon of sport by the Singapore Sports Council. They chose the sports - table tennis, darts and soccer. It was held at the awesome venue of the floating platform at Marina Bay. I won both my table tennis games - singles & mixed doubles so the way I tell the story is "I beat Singapore at Table Tennis while representing Australia." I even have a medal! Unfortunately overall Singapore Sports Council proved they were pretty good at sport!

I brought along my fan club to cheer for the Aussies but my fan club  had their own fan club and were required to pose with many from Team Singapore.

Scary face for Halloween. The kids did trick and treating around at Fiona's condo. Felicity went as a mime while Alice went as "Ghost girl"

The loot they scored was obscene. Next year they are going with a small snap lock bag. Once that is full then that's it!

Felicity and I had fun decorating her cake as a piggy.

Universal Studios for Felicity Birthday. Lots of fun with family and best friend Eleanor.

Felicity unwrapping all the gifts! Thanks so much.

A week in our life

Our week:
Sunday night: Andrew arrives
Monday: Kids have play practice after school. Lucinda has "Social" tennis after dinner.
Tuesday: Swimming Carnival in the evening. Felicity picks up 2 Firsts, Alice 3 firsts and a second while Lucinda and Matt come in Third (ie last) in the parents swim relay. Lucinda goes to Book Club.
Wednesday: Public Holiday for Deepavali. Geocaching with Andy at Labrador park. Felicity spots a snake guarding the cache and runs flat out for 200 m screaming, abandoning her uncle and sister who are just looking perplexed and only a metre from the snake. All survived and ended up locating three caches but not game enough to find the one near the snake. Then we went to friends for a late BBQ lunch. Andrew leave for KL.
Thursday: Lucinda does Table Tennis practice after work.Matt goes off to Tap. Andrew returns from KL
Friday: Matt takes kids to early morning dentist appointment as Lucinda has to be in at work to get ready for the big day of the AustCham President's Luncheon and Business Awards. Andrew leaves for Melb.
Saturday: met up with other Avondale Families for a jog at Bedok Reservoir and a BBQ.
Sunday: Church and then Sentosa for the kids to try the flying trapeze. They loved it. Then a play on the beach. In the evening, Matt and Lucinda used free tickets to see a 5 Grand Piano Chopin concert with 5 visiting Polish pianists.  Pretty awesome.

This week is the International Schools Cross Country meet and both girls are in the team so we are hoping for some nice weather on Friday afternoon. We've been getting lots of bursts of tropical rain at the moment.

A quick update

Life has been fairly busy recently with the girls back at school and Lucinda having several work events last week that had her starting early and finishing late.  On Friday night I went to a farewell party at a Karoake venue.  It was basically a private room with pool table, xbox, food, drinks and a karaoke juke box.  It was good fun and with 4 mics there was some good enthusiastic singing going on. The girls are into rehearsals for their school musical - Cinderella Rockafella - and have also got into the computer game Minecraft. Instead of watching TV right now they are exploring a strange world, taming unicorns and constructing amazing structures, houses and minecart tracks out of lego-like building blocks.  I think it's better than just TV - certainly more interactive and they also are talking (and arguing) about stuff together.

On Saturday we took the girls 10-pin Bowling before seeing a movie (Dolphin Tale) and on Sunday afternoon we all dressed up in order to watch Toy Story 3.  Alice was Rex the dinosaur, Felicity was Jessie the cowgirl and I was a dashing Ken to Lucinda's "exercise" Barbie.  Sadly, all photo evidence was destroyed in order to protect the innocent.

Andy arrived last night for another visit and is staying until Wednesday evening.  I think we've seen him more regularly in his new "Australia-only" job with than when he was at HP!  Wednesday is a public holiday (Deepavali - Hindu New Year / Festival of lights) so we are thinking of some plans for what to do while he is here.

Scene Around Town

 So our girls haven't been around seen our town recently but I spotted one of them in an advert in the ANZA Magazine so they are still making their presence felt here. I also had my pic in the social pages of the Expat Living. I think the High Commissioner hangs around me because he knows that's where the photographers will be ;)

Here's pictures of the girls having fun in Pomonal. Thanks Elissa for the photos and for everyone who is making their time in Oz heaps of fun.

Missing them lots but it's good to know they are having a happy time.

Happy 40th Birthday Matt

We celebrated Matt's Birthday with a picnic in the gardens with a few friends and were forutnate to have Andy here for the day to help celebrate. Here's to the next decade of fun. I predict in about 10 years Matt might even look 40! Thanks for all the prezzies and best wishes from home.

A room with a view

I've been travelling the past three weeks and there has been a real variety of views from my hotel window.

First, I was speaking at a HP Partners conference in Sanya on Hainan Island at the south of China.  You don't really think of tropical island when you think of China but it was very hot and the Mandarin Oriental was a really beautiful five star resort.  I also spent two nights in Hong Kong near the airport but didn't take any photos out the window.

Week 2 saw me back in China after a day and a half at home.  This time to attend some planning meetings in Shanghai.  The taxi trip from the airport to the hotel was scary, doing 150km down the freeway with no seatbelts! The Grand Hyatt is in JinMao tower in the finance district and my room had a great view from level 67.  It was a pretty full week but I did have one evening to myself where I walked down to the river and enjoyed dinner while ships, ferries and barges cruised past.

Week 3 was a shorter one.  I didn't fly out to India until Tuesday night which gave me a few days to enjoy Christine's visit.  First stop in India was the Fortune Select Hotel in Gurgaon, which is outside New Delhi. My view from level 6 was of the metro station and nearby offices. I was involved in delivering a training class and we were there the day that a bomb went off at the High Court, killing 12 people.  A bit scary to hear about but not close to where we were.  That night there was a magnitude 4 earthquake but I didn't feel that either.

From Delhi I flew down to Bangalore to stay at the Fortune JP Cosmos.  Bit better standard than the Delhi hotel but neither could match either my China rooms or views.  After delivering our training day on the Friday, we flew out Friday night, arriving home in Singapore at 6am the next morning.