Big Bad Wolf Sale 2012

So.... last year at BBW I spent a lot of money. This year I told myself I cannot spent more than half of last year's budget. I think I did it. :)

This year's BBW sale was ok but children's selection was not as good as last year. I went a total of 3 times to look for good books and of course to redeem my next year's preview pass!

1st time - I took Reese with me for the Preview Sale. I was hoping Reese would distract me enough to leave early and thus spend less but my boy was such a good boy! He sat at corners and read for a few hours while I dug for treasures.

1st buy

2nd visit - Crazy me woke Reese up the next day at 6am and we went book shopping again! 

2nd buy

3rd and last visit - Yesterday after breakfast, hubby was kind enough to take me to BBW in hope to get a badge to redeem a preview pass for next year and we did it. Got even more books and even found a book that I was looking for since the 1st visit. 

3rd buy

Yesterday night we went to BookXcess to redeem the letter for next year's preview pass and we bought another 2 Horrible Geography books....

Our Adventure in a Week

December is a fun month. I have almost no work and able to take Reese to different places for different activities. Below are some of the activities and places we visited recently.

Kidzania (RM55-Child, RM35- Adult: Max playtime 5 hours)

Finally after months of its opening, together with some friends we went to Kidzania. It was madness because it is the school holiday season. Reese only managed to do 4 jobs. He had a blast and I paid Rm50 for 3 nice photos of him. We spent 5 hours in there and yet it was not enough. We will be going again soon in January when school reopens. It should be less crowded.

Muzium & Galeri Bank Negara (Free)

We visited the Children's Gallery which was quite fun. They have some well thought out activities for children. One of Reese's favourite was printing money! Then we went to another gallery and saw a vault filled with real gold bars and stacks of money. Not sure how many millions in there. In order to view the inside of the vault, you have to key in a passcode. The date when Malaya formed Bank Negara I think(1959).There are 6 galleries in all but only 5 are open to public at the moment.

Reese's newly printed money!

Printing Money

Money tunnel

Planetarium (Show RM6-Adult, RM4-Child and free entry with show ticket)

After visiting the galleries in Bank Negara, we drove to the Planetarium to catch 2 shows. The Solar Storm and Journey to the Star. Very cheap. Rm6 for Adult and RM4 for Child per show. Each show is only 25+ minutes and they are projected on a dome shaped screen. Really cool. In between the show Reese happily played at the antigravity booth with other kids. 

Trying out the toilet in a space craft and playing in the antigravity booth

Waiting for the show to start

Science Centre (Free for members, public is RM5-Adult and RM3-Child above 7 I think)

One of our usual hang out. Spent sometime playing and then to the resource centre. We also went to the Star Trek exhibition. For RM20 per adult and RM10 per child.... it's not worth the money. We are no Star Trek fans by the way. :)

The Star Trek exhibition

Reading more Astronomy books

Since we have been zipping in and out of KL town, Reese had a chance to look closely at some of the old Malaysian architecture. He drew this after he saw the Abdul Samad Building in town.

Singapore and Legoland

Haven't been to Singapore for a few years. It was good to go again and this time, we took full advantage of our 4 days there. Weather was quite good except for a few evening of short showers. We stayed at Ibis Hotel at Bencoolen. Very clean and nice. Staff was friendly and service prompt. They provide free parking for guests too. A great location, MRT is just a few minutes away and food court is around the corner. This trip was mainly for Reese and therefore kid friendly. My sister took us around over the weekends.

Upon arrival at Singapore using the second link we went straight to Jurong Bird Park which is very close by. A good place to bring children and our favourite activity was feeding the birds! SG3 for a small cup of liquid food to feed the birdies. The birds were very friendly and totally not aggressive like what Reese experienced the last time we went to KL Bird Park. 

After some rest in the hotel, we went to have authentic Chinese food from a restaurant run by Chinese nationals. The only good food we had in Singapore! This place was located in Chinatown and the menu was in Chinese. My dear sister and I had to rely on pictures and compare each Chinese character to tick what we wanted in the menu. :) Goodness, the portion was huge. The place was mostly frequented by Chinese from China. Some yummy food we had...

Black fungus fried with eggs and zucchini

Sweet and sour pork chop

Braised pig trotters 

Hotplate tau fu

Next we went to Marina Bay Sands. My sister took us around and got some pretty good view and shots of the surrounding area. At 9.30pm sharp, we sat at the open space and watched the nightly fountain show. It was quite good. We had TWG's macaroon while watching the show. :)

Yummy macs

Marina Bay Sands

Skyline of Singapore

Nightly fountain show

On the second day, we went to the Science Centre. The place is huge and very well organised. The staff was friendly and knowledgable. If you are a member of Pusat Sains Negara (PSN), you can request a letter from them to get free entrance tickets to the Singapore Science Centre. That will save you quite a bit of money. :) We had fun there. If given ample time, we can easily spend the whole day there!  We even went to watch the IMAX show entitled: Ring of Fire. SG9 (10%) discount per person. 

Tesla Coil demonstration. See the electric current?

Everything about microbes. They even have hologram images of different microbes on display

Having a feel of gale force wind!

Fire tornado demonstration

Pay additional SG5 to go on a laser maze. You have two tries. Fun.

In the evening we had dinner at Makan Sutera. It is suppose to have the best hawker food in Singapore but what a disappointment. Somehow, hawker food in Singapore is lousy. Everything is sweet. They use ketchup in making dried noodles! 

Day 3 we went to the zoo. It was a lovely day and we managed to see most of the exhibits including Jia Jia and Kai Kai the two giant pandas from China. We paid an additional SG5 each. Had lunch at the zoo and this time, KFC wasn't so bad afterall. Our previous experience was quite bad. Coleslaw tasted like durian!

Red Panda

Giant panda Jia Jia

'Elephants at work' show

Pony ride

SG5 to feed the giraffes

That evening, we went to Orchard Road to see the Christmas decoration. Disappointed.

Our little family and Reese and his only aunt

Some of the decoration

On our final day in Singapore, we went to the Arts and Science Museum. We paid SG15 per adult and SG9 per child to view the 'The Art of the Brick' by Nathan Sawaya. It was great. He uses Lego bricks as a medium for his art. 

This dino skeletal is made entirely of Lego bricks!

Puppet play

Next stop was Johor. Stayed a night in Skudai and the next morning we went to Legoland which was only 15 minutes or less from our hotel. Crowd was ok and we managed to sit on most rides and see the miniland before the thunderstorm. Got our Lego parts and drove home to PJ after that.

 First 4D experience

Reese and I took this roller coaster. It was also Reese's 1st. :) He was somewhat stunted.

Started raining at around 1.30pm and the rain was very very heavy.

Our Lego parts burnt a big hole in our pocket! RM400 plus.

Happily sorting the new bricks and parts 

See the whole living room is filled with Legos. Daddy and Reese are building a huge Lego city.