rain

it rains a lot here. i guess we're in monsoon season.

in the morning, it seems like it will be a fantastic day. and then when 3pm rolls around, it's almost always thunder-and-lightning-raining. i can't speak for the whole island though. it's the wierdest thing. i feel like i'm at universal studios, on that ride where it has the pretend rain and then at the appointed place abruptly stops. that's how it is when i go to pick up ty from school. it's raining so hard, even on the highest wiper setting i can barely see out the window, but every time i hit ang mo kio ave 1, boom! not a drop on the ground. it's bizarre.

best mexican food in singapore

we haven't tried too many mexican places here. i've only been to the one at dempsey hill. steve's been down to one at clark quay. honestly, i didn't even want to go here that night. why drive all this way, just to get disappointing food? ask steve. good food = happy mamma. i'm glad he dragged me to cha cha cha's at holland village.
first off, they had this:i hadn't even tasted the food, but at the very least knew i was going to have an enjoyable dinner. even on mute, it worked like a charm.

the chips and salsa were major. the perfect amount of heat, salsa-ing on my tongue. and the chips were fresh!
very unorthodox, we were able to get some salsa to go.
(not a very appealing photo, but only shown because) they had white meat. pure white meat chicken in a tasty chimi!
homemade churros. but eat quick! the ice cream melts fast.
we have found our mexican food heaven. the world is a good place.

little india

a stroll down little india

fun view from the vegetarian restaurant we ate at. i can't believe i'm saying this, but i've found that some of the best food here is vegetarian.
rice platter complete with banana leaf.
jessie and gage
it was so good, they tried to give us three. :)
freshly squeezed apple juice.

fish spa

it tickles.
as my new friend, laurel said, "it feels like a dog is licking your toes."
it feels like tiny little electric shocks.
it definitely is worth the experience.
$10 for 1/2 hour :: qian hu fish farm






they also had tons of other cool fish and tours. i'll bring the boys back for sure.

orchids

i love orchids. they last forever and are so cheap here! can you believe that my first plant lasted two months before i swapped it out for another whopping $12 plant? {those glove socks always make me shudder a little}

singapore zoo

i've never really been a zoo person.
i don't know.
my poor kids, i guess it's never been fun for me to go look at the animals.
i wasn't expecting this experience to be any different. but...it was!

and even though it was deepavali (a national holiday) weekend and took forever to get in, it was great! there were tons of people, but also tons of zoo too. the layout is an open concept and it seems like the animals are so close to you. it's pretty neat. we hardly scratched the surface of things to do here on this visit.
the boys loved it!

looking at the alligators below. i love how there is a life preserver just in case...
token mom + flamingo picture
getting a better view of some monkeys







my favorite photo of the day. those faces! these kids crack me up.i can not believe i didn't get one shot of the water park there. it is incredible! i'll be sure to snap one the next time we go. :)

tay guan heng

when i pick ty up from school, we don't have a lot of time to do things. i never want to waste the opportunity to go check something out when i have the car, so i found out about this cute little shop about 5 minutes away from ty's school.

handmade from joss incense or cinnamon bark dough, this is a dying art. the bark is playdough like, and they make the most intricate and beautiful figures.

they are known popularly for their nativity sets. as my holiday decorations are pretty sparce, i decided to get one. i'll post a better picture when i get it, just in time for christmas.
but they also make many other replicas from Chinese mythology and opera.
they even let ty and rhett make some christmas ornaments.


a great place, with friendly people and a memento from singapore that i'm sure to love for years.

navarathi night tour

soaking in all the culture here.
went on a tour with our ward a while ago to learn about indian festivals. there are lots of holidays going on, it's hard to keep them all straight. one thing is for sure...there's never a lack of something to do.



ate some traditional indian food. the place was a buffet, so you could try all sorts of interesting and yummy food.
we even got to go back into the kitchen to see how naan and tandoori chicken is made.

we visited two different hindu temples.

worshipping and festivities in full swing



even caught someone offering a coconut. later, at the indian culture night, i learned that the coconut is very sacred. they believe that the coconut is the sweetest form of natural juice and the white flesh inside represents how they want to be, clean and pure. it even has three eyes (ever wonder what that red dot in the middle of an indian woman's forehead means?), which is their form of having a spiritual eye. offerings like this are very common and are done to represent their commitment to being good.