Goodbye 2017, Hello 2018

Happy New Year 2018!

Feels so surreal.  2017 over and done with already??  Where did all the time go? 

I do wish I have been more dilligent in posting their updates!  Both girls are growing up so fast.

Random sisterly shots:

Helping to make their breakfast - Choc chip muffins 

Playing with Giant Bubbles 

 

Playing with Make Up

They love this particular Watsons pharmacy cos there are many makeup testers   

Happy with their Cookie Names! 

Say Cheese!

Just walking together..

Uhmm.....more make up 

They alternate between being best buddies and being worst enemies. Some days, they can play for hours and hours together - make belief play, dress up, legos, barbies, dolls, drawing etc.  On weekends when one wakes up earlier than the other, that one will somehow try to "accidentally" wake the other up too cos it's more fun to have a playmate.
Yet there are days when they start squabbling the minute they see each other.  I guess sisters will be sisters!

2017 also marked the last year of Erin being in kindy.  I mentally marked off each major kindy occasion of the year - sports day, concert, grand graduation and then her last day of wearing kindy uniform.  When we bought her Primary 1 uniform/shoes/socks/bag for her pre-orientation session in end Dec, I couldn't help getting all teary thinking "my little baby is growing up so fast!!"

Overall, I must say 2017 was a good year indeed. Work part was good too. I survived 2 years in my current position! haha. Things did get a lot better after the first year. And it is extremely gratifying that one of my recognised strengths at work is something that comes pretty naturally to me. (as opposed to other strengths that typically comes with loads of hard work!)

As with any year, there were ups and downs but definitely more ups.  Family, career, health, friends etc etc.... plenty to be grateful about!

Looking forward to an awesome 2018 ahead  :-)

Paris Day 8

Last day in Paris.  Airport transfer scheduled around 4pm so we only had half day. 

Packed our bags for checkout. 

Last breakfast 

Not too bad - we managed to clear up all our food items. Milk, eggs, oranges, ham, vege, bread. 

Erin wanted a photo with her soft toys 

Some final house photos - 

View from Kitchen

I like this corner!

View from Dining Table 

First time we opened the patio door actually cos it was cold! 

Girls at the balcony 

From the back - Monet Garden.

How I love our little yellow house!

We saved some bread pieces to feed the ducks 

More feeding at the main lake 

After checkout, we made a quick visit to the Kids Room

Chatted to the friendly Spanish coordinator while the girls were engrossed in their Lego.  

Took a shuttle bus to La Vallee Outlet Village Mall.  Not too sure what to expect.  Maybe we'll be done in less than an hour. Got our 10% voucher from the reception area and off we went.

La Vallee 

Not particularly crowded that day 

Gucci Outlet

It was practically the only store that had a queue. When we arrived, there were about 10 people ahead of us so we thought why not. Queue got a lot longer while we waited. 

The "can we go now?" look  ;-) 

Cos we ended up spending more than an hour in the store! 

Got my first Gucci !!

I've always said I don't need branded bags....... but just couldn't resist. Outlet prices already lower than retail, we had additional 10% coupons (2 coupons given per passport) and then there's VAT refund. 

We had to stop shopping cos the girls were begging to go back.  Elyssa kept saying "Mummy.... why do you need so many bags??????" and kept trying to close my eyes so I can't shop anymore. Hahahaha. She says we all need ONE bag, ONE pair of shoes etc... I do hope she is this adverse to shopping for herself when she enters her teens!!

Final stop before we left La Vallee.  After one week, I finally had my first macaroon in Paris..

@ Laduree

I know can easily get back home but I just wanted to have it in Paris  :-)

We ordered 6 macaroons (Euro 2.10 each) and 1 chocolate eclair (Euro 5!!) and used our 10% coupon. Macaroons were soooo good!  Eclair was disappointing. 

Took shuttle bus back to hotel.  Had to repack our luggage -  to fit in our new shopping stuff (heh!) and also to keep all the bulky winter outerwear.   Luckily girls were kept entertained in the Kids Club so we could repack and get ready for our long flight home in peace.

They didn't want to leave the Kids Club!  

Had a short snack of hot potato soup (so yummy!) from hotel marketplace and off we headed to the airport. Looooong journey home again.  7+ hours from Paris to Dubai, transit for 3+ hours in Dubai and then another 7+ hours from Dubai to KL.  Reached home super stoned past midnight.

Carry Pals for kids from Emirates Airline.  So cute! 

As I'm writing this, it's already more than one month since we returned ( so efficient these days! haha). I still missssss Paris!  Am extremely grateful we got to enjoy the awesome holiday.


-End of Paris Holiday-

Paris Day 7 - Disneyland again (3rd and final visit)

Last full day of our holiday.  Where did all the time go???

Anyway, only item in the itinerary today - Disneyland. Yay! 

Standard routine of duck feeding in the morning :-)  

Oh, how I miss this! 

Backtrack a bit. This is another standard routine

Holiday or not...there is always laundry to do!  ;-)

Headed straight to Walt Disney Studios.

Our Annual Passes

From the official Disney website, tic prices are Euro 145 (Adults) and 130 (Kids) for 2 day 2 park tickets- Disneyland Park and Walt Disney Studios. Our Annual Pass costs us Euro 139 each for unlimited entries to both parks. It's the cheapest annual pass so there are a lot of restrictions - no weekend entry, no peak season entry etc but it worked well for us. Not keen to entry Disneyland during peak time anyway! 

We went 3 times so happy to get our moneys worth. hehe.  Could have been 4 times but we were too jet lagged and slept the afternoon away on our first day. 

First ride of the day - 4D Ratatouille ride

One of our favourite rides 

Girls wanted another photo op with a Disney character.  We queued for Buzz Lightyear. Super long q.  While waiting, hubby when for one of those single rider rides.

Buzz Lightyear

Lazy... lazy.... instead of signing, Buzz stamped on their autograph book instead.  Maybe the costume made it hard to sign. (or mebbe "outer space" characters don't sign. haha)

To Infinity and Beyond! 

With a much bigger Buzz

Spotted some Scream Monitors

S-C-R-E-A-M !!!!! 

At one of the Monster Inc doors 

Went for a show - Mickey and the Magician 

This was good too! 

Spotted Christmas Goofy! 

Queue was surprisingly short. 

Big hug from Goofy 

Family photo with Goofy

After Goofy, we spent almost one full hour at the gift shop.  Aiyo! Told girls they could choose ONE toy each.  Elyssa was incredibly finicky!  She wanted the perfect toy and took forever...
Her final choice was a white Marie cat soft toy. Out of the zillions of stuff in the shop, both girls ended up with the same toy.

Went back to Disneyland Park 
Of the 2 parks, I prefer Walt Disney Studios.  Disneyland Park is nice but it's quite similar to HK Disneyland

Mickey's face  :-) 

And what was the first Character we saw upon entering Disneyland Park - Marie!!!  Girls squealed in excitement.  Hubby gave his "queue to take photo again??" look.  hahahah.  3 against 1.  No choice darling.

Big hug from Marie! 

Awww.... this Marie waw super charming!

She playfully kidnapped their Marie soft toys and wanted to hang them on the Christmas tree. 

Family photo with 3 Maries! 

Random photo with a cannon

BBQ Pork Ribs and Fries for lunch.  Yumz! 

We got a nice spot near the stage

Mickey Puppet Show performance during lunch 

Took a couple more rides in between. Then surprisingly stumbled upon 3 characters at a corner with hardly any queue. Yippee yay.  Got 3 character signatures in about 30 mins!!

Timon, Goofy and Baloo 

Before we knew it, it was almost park closing time. 3 full days in Paris Disneyland (Disneyland Park and Walt Disney Studios) but we did not even cover everything!  We did one final round of souvenier shopping before leaving.  

I got my Mickey!!

Yup, not for the girls but for me. There is a kid in all of us rite?? hehe

Good night day 7!