The new sports hub

We visited the new Sports Hub last Sun. The place is huge. The major draw to us is the Kallang Wave shopping mall and the new National Stadium. The Kallang Wave mall was not fully operationally. Most of the shops are still under renovation and we are not able to access to the 2nd story. So there are limited restaurants or food options. Nothing much inside the mall except the main centrepiece of the rock climbing which is quite impressive but I don't see a lot of people participating. It reminds me of the one at Orchard Central. 

One thing to note is that to get to the National Stadium, we have to climb the long fleet of stairs up. The escalators and lifts are not functional yet. So we have to carry our baby stroller all the way to climb the fleet of stairs. It was very tiring. Not stroller or wheelchair friendly at all. It was most inconvenient for those with kids and old folks. I saw many old folks were struggling to climb up and down the stairs. The sports hub management should have been more thoughtful about this especially it is new opening. Maybe when the lifts or escalators are functional, it could relieve the situation. However one design flaw is that there are limited shelter to the national stadium. Imagine having to climb the fleet of stairs under the hot sun. 

The National Stadium was quite amazing though. It was huge and with a powerful ventilation system I think. We are walking around the stadium and we could feel the breeze from the stadium. It was linked to 3 MRT stations: Stadium, Kallang and Mountbatten and within short walking distance. 

Our googie was happily exploring the place running around. There is also a playground near to the indoor stadium on the 2nd level and she was having loads of fun. 

Verdict

There is not much reason for us to go there again unless we have participated some events at the Sports Hub which I think very unlikely. The place looks nice with lots of walking area. However there are limited shelter and not stroller friendly. Most of the people are hiding inside the shopping mall cos the heat was too unbearable. So it defeats the purpose of having those facilities too. Such design might be feasible in those temperate countries but not here. In Chinese it means 好看不好吃。 

Googie exploring under the hot sun

Flaxseed oil for little bb!

to augment little bb need for higher fats n oils in her diet! especially rich in omega 3 6 n 9!

BB's first birthday!

Belated blog after months of inactivity: We celebrated BB's first birthday at the UOB's bungalow at Elias Rd, Pasir Ris.

Initially we thought of holding it at one of those commercial kid restaurants / playhouses and even site visited a couple of them but in the end decided to take a week's leave to have a little time out (visited the zoo, birdpark, east coast park..etc) and also to prepare for her birthday.

The UOB bungalow has not changed for well over a decade - same furniture, same paintwork, same fixtures..etc so looks quite run down. But what it has going for it is space, plenty of space to accommodate everyone. We had to do a ton of cleaning by ourselves as well so all in its quite a tiring exercise.

We rented a car for a week to help on this and thank goodness because of the amazing amount of stuff and multiple-lose-count-of trips we had to make to ferry stuff between our home and the bungalow!

We designed, bought, printed and made the decorations ourselves - an amazing amount of work as well but more than glad to make our BB's birthday memorable!

10.5 months meal schedule

Here's what our 10.5 months bb meal plan.. subject to her appetite!

29Dec13-4Jan14 (7 days)
8am	Early morning milk (ml)	210
9am	Breakfast	Cereal + Blueberry/Banana + eggyolk + leftover milk
11am	Mid morning Breast milk (ml)	210
1pm	Lunch	Brown rice Porridge + fish + vegetables + carrot/puree
2pm	Afternoon milk (ml)	210
4pm	Afternoon snack	Blueberry / Banana / puffs
5pm	Mid-Afternoon milk (ml)	210
7pm	Dinner	Potato + Pumpkin
	Fruits	Pear puree
9pm	Night breast milk (ml)	120
5Jan14- 11Jan14 (7 days)
8am	Early morning milk (ml)	210
9am	Breakfast	Cereal + egg yolk + leftover milk
11am	Mid morning Breast milk (ml)	210
1pm	Lunch	Pasta + sweet potato puree + brocoli
2pm	Afternoon milk (ml)	210
4pm	Afternoon snack	Banana / puffs
5pm	Mid-Afternoon milk (ml)	210
7pm	Dinner	Brown rice Porridge + fish + Brocoli + sweet potato puree
	Fruits	Plum puree
9pm	Night breast milk (ml)	120
Total milk intake (ml)		960

Ikea Baby Gate

We also purchased the Ikea Baby Safety Gates to close off our kitchen from the wandering BB. Sounds great in principle, but we removed it and kept it in our storeroom as it's just too inconvenient and narrows the kitchen entrance unnecessarily.

We simply use furniture such as the swing bed and dining table chairs to cordon off the living room along with the sofa.

Update - 18th May 2014: Turns out this is useful after all, as little BB has a tendency to wander into the kitchen and we started getting used to this by now!

Having her own character

She is also starting to develop her own character and having an incredible liking for mobile phones and tablets. She just can't have enough of them and given an Ipad long enough, she could actually (perhaps by chance??) launch her favorite kids songs app! We are trying to keep her screen time to a minimum, trying to focus her on physical toys and adventures instead. She indeed belongs to the mobile generation - born with a mobile phone, so to speak!

A quick note on the swing chair and cot beds - since October / November, when we realized that she could sit up and even stand, we quickly lowered the beds and started strapping her in the chairs to prevent any accidents.

Bb first Christmas

Bb first Christmas! She's learning to walk and vocalising trying all kinds of sounds! Weight wise is gaining ok as well, getting closer to the 50th percentile. But she is very active, healthy and happy. That's the best indicator of healthy development!

We ended up buying those foam puzzle mats to provide additional cushioning. However, on hindsight,

- Don't buy those with alphabet letter cut-outs. You will spend a lot more time trying to find, sort and fit them in every time you remove them to clean the floor.

- Buy as large pieces as possible. The smaller the foam tiles, the more time you end up fitting them together.