Joyce's Birthday Celebration at Swissotel Stamford

Yesterday we had a birthday celebration for Joyce at Swissotel! Our plans were to have High Tea at Equinox, than check into our room at 5pm followed by an after high-tea party with the rest of the "San Ba Fu Nu Club"!

Yaya was supposed to join us but she had something on at the last minute so it's just me, Le bf and Joyce!

Joyce kept going "Wahhhhhhhh..." at the desserts. Hee! 

Surprise birthday cake!

She forbade me to sing loudly, so I whispered the song. So sad.

❤ HAPPY BIRTHDAY BESTIE! ❤

❤❤❤❤❤

Too bad the only pic of the 3 of us were blur. Hai. Lousy waiter.

We checked in and everyone else arrived! :)

We were upgraded to the Harbourview room! Woohoo!

Silly Le bf doing the bunny face grin.. ❤

Joyce playing with the Xmas decor that Nat bought for his Xmas tree! He ended up buying a live tree (yes, alive! OMG) and spent a bomb on accessories! 

Somehow even with bags and bags of shopping, he managed to buy the birthday cake that I instructed him to buy for Joyce. I gave him a budget of $50 and he went to his favourite shop to buy for her.. I think he went down personally to the shop which was out of his way to buy the cake. Wahhhh.

We hide the cake under his shopping bags, which is a blessing in disguise cos he had so many bags that Joyce did not suspect that one of them is the birthday cake. Hahahahahahaha! Then we sneaked off to the toilet to prepare the candles for Joyce while the rest are engrossed in watching "White Chicks" on HBO.

Pretty and yummy cake!

Queen gang!

The Party People (Nat is the photographer)

I dunno what Nat or Yaya said to make Joyce so giggly. Haha!

But a few moments later.. Yaya did something that's soo funny..

I really dunno what Yaya was trying to do but everyone was laughing like crazy and Joyce was hyperventilating.. doing her signature "hur hur hur".. Hahahahaha! We like to tease her and make her laugh uncontrollably. So cute lah!

Sing song time! This time she let me sing loudly..

(She was shy to let strangers know it's her birthday. Chey)

Make a wish!!

During my birthday party in October, we found out that there are many yummy food at the basement of Raffles City Shopping Centre and we bought a lot back.. This time we really whack again! Le bf stayed in the room and the rest of us went down and split up to buy stuff so we can gather the most food in the shortest possible time! Wahahahhaaha!

Our hunt ended and these are what we got!

5 potatoes from Potato Depot cos Joyce is a BIG potato fan.

It's not fair cos she's so freaking skinny even though she eats so much carbs!!

After eating, time to burn some energy!
We played some games and had picture taking session!

All the polaroids we took! Wheeee!

Below are some of my favourites..

After taking the usual "safe" group pictures.. we decided to imagine a scene and pose!

Pushing Nat off the cliff..

Finding a crazy man immobile in our bed.. LOL!

And of cos, the sexy bitches pose. Woot!

Don't we all have chio legs?

The night view was beautiful outside!

Only 3 of us are staying over, so the rest of the group left..

Initially was me and Yaya share one bed, but when Yaya went to bath, Joyce got scared of being alone in her bed and came over to my side to snuggle with me.. When Yaya came back, Joyce was too comfortable to move back to her bed.. So in the end I slept with Joyce and Yaya slept alone. Hahahahaha!

Last night, Yaya was super hyper and energetic after her bath!! Out of the three, I was struggling like crazy to keep awake cos I had to work from 6am-3pm than rushed to Swissotel for the High Tea and after party.. The day before I only slept for 4hrs, so imagine my fatigue level. I am getting older so it's getting harder for me to survive on little or no sleep. I was drifting off but forcing myself to stay awake to listen to them chatting and trying to join in but I think I doze off halfway. Major fail cos I used to be the last girl standing when we were younger and doing projects through the night.

Today I was the first to wake up though, cos I am used to waking up early for work.. also there were loud music playing outside and I wanted to find out what's going on.. Opened the curtains, went out on the balcony and saw there's a lot of people! And the stupid DJ was playing Gangnam Style nonstop. Wah lao.. 

Went to bath and woke the others to get ready cos we are going for breakfast! :)

Had buffet breakfast at Fairmont's Prego restaurant. 

Our room rate did not include breakfast, but I used Le bf's FAR card for the discount! For 3 people it's 33% discount instead of 50%. The discount is actually based on the cardmember eating for free. Meaning if there's 2 people, than you only pay for 1 person = 50% off. If there are 3 people, the cardmember need not pay, that's why it's 33%. But with the discount it's worth it! Bill came up to around SGD90 plus taxes for 3 people. ^_^ There's fresh fruit juices and you can even request what combination you want!

The selection was not bad too.. Chinese, western, Eggs station, etc.

Then, we went back to our room to pack up and wait for Le bf to come.. he went to church so he joined us around 11am.. Yaya had to leave for a wedding lunch so it's just the 3 of us.. Guess what we did when we checked out? YES! EAT AGAIN!

Joyce wanted to eat Sushi Tei so we went there for lunch! This girl refused to let us pay for our share lah! Haiyooo!! But thank you for the lunch treat girl! That's 2 times liao!!

View from our balcony, Day & Night

The stay was good! And we enjoyed ourselves a lot I had a good rate with the hotel as I am a member under the Travel Agent's scheme. Yes, working in my line has got some perks (not a lot, but better than nothing..). Actually we feel that Fairmont Hotel is better, but unfortunately they are sold out.

Glad that we had a proper celebration for Joyce this year cos we don't seem to have one for her every year due to something that crops up last minute and schedule conflicts.

After lunch we went to do some shopping before Joyce cabbed home and Le bf and I went back to his place. Love the random things he do like kissing me or stealing hugs from me when no one is looking.. He's so sweet. Love him lots!

Happy Birthday Joyce!

So happy to meet up with Joyce to celebrate her birthday with her! 

Yaya couldn't make it, so it's just the two of us.. *kiss kiss* Haha! We went to Ion Orchard's Taste Paradise for Dim Sum lunch! Eat until cannot walk.. I forgot how much she like to order and after a while say "I am full liaoo.." Wah lao this woman is worse than me. I have to stop her from ordering too much (And I am notoriously known for over-ordering myself).

It's nice to spend time just chatting and catching up on each other's lives cos due to work schedules and all, we don't really have the time to meet up as often as we like!

We're going to have a proper (but belated) celebration for her at Swissotel this Saturday! Staycation with the Queen Gang! Woooooo!!

Thank you Joyce for the treat! Love ya!

Equinox High Tea & Christmas Tree Hunting

Met up with Nat for lunch at my favourite Equinox at Swissotel. I love this place for many reasons! The service is good, the view is good and best of all.. if I dine with Le bf or someone else, I will get 50% off the total bill! Super good deal! 

Many thanks to Le Bf who signed up for the DBS Black AMEX Card just for the Feed at Raffles (FAR) card for me. Both his credit card and FAR membership card are permanently in my wallet cos the rule is you have to use the DBS Card + present the membership card for payment. My income doesn't qualify for that credit card so I can't apply one for myself and I didn't want to have a supplementary card from him (cos women need to be independent yo!), so I just took his card and use it for my own -- actually what's the difference between using his card and getting a supplementary card from him? I also don't know.. Hahahahaha! Well, since his card writes "Brendan Chew", I always make reservation under "Mrs Brendan Chew" so the staff won't question me when I use the cards. Heh heh!

Actually I've been here many times with Le bf for high tea and lunch because it's really a good deal! Some of the waitress already remember me by name.. "Hi Mrs Chew! Welcome back!". Ehh. "Hi....!"

Lunch has more selection and you also get to choose a main dish that's cooked to order!

Some cold dishes appetizers

Love the salad bar~~ 

Very rare to see anchovies and fried bacons (not the bottled types)

Sashimi (which I don't eat)

Sushi platter

My favourites are still the desserts! 

Everytime I come there will be some variations so it's not boring at all. :)

Shiny shiny chocolate cake!

This is one of their specialty cakes and I noticed it's only available for lunch, not high tea.

Fondue station and icecream!

I like it that they don't use the fountain cos that wastes a lot of chocolate and it's difficult to wash, which means the hygiene level is very dubious. Their ice-cream are mostly gelato and it's nice!

Nat's main course is Salmon!

I always choose the Duck. Safest choice.

Christmas trees are everywhere! 

So we decided to go and hunt for Xmas trees for Christmas!

We went to this ultra dodgy shopping mall called "The Verge".

Cabbed there from Swissotel and it's only around $4++ cos it's very near. It's located near Tekka Mall, Little India. It's dodgy cos most of the shops are closed, the toilets stink like hell, the escalators are boarded up mid level and it just looks... dodgy.

Only saving grace are the shops on the top level selling Christmas trees and decorations!! I bought some purple ribbons and pearl birds to put on Mama Chew's Tree (pictures soon!) cos her favourite colour is Purple!

Afterwards we hung out at Starbucks in Ion Orchard and chit-chat for a few hours before Le Bf came over to meet us and we went for dinner together. I had fun today! ^_^

Wei Hao & Annette's Wedding at Sentosa Beaufort Hotel

Le bf and I attended his cell group leader Wei Hao's wedding today at The Sentosa Beaufort Hotel! He is Le bf's cellgroup leader since 2004! Long long time! Annette is also a member of the cell group, so we know both the bride and groom! Well, Le bf introduced me to them a few months ago.. hee!

 

The prettiest and most creative wedding invitation card I've ever received!

Done by the bride herself! 

 Inside of the card with a hand-drawn map!

Centrepiece table that welcomes the guests 

Well-wishes tree!

 Write your well wishes for the couple and hang on the tree!

 I love all the decorations and stuff on the table! :)

 Red dots are places where the couple visited together..

 Dinner Menu

The food is good, but I hate the fact that the server will plate the food into individual portions on plates before serving us! That's not atas! That's irritating! I want to choose my own food from the plate please! We are Chinese, not Ang Mohs! Grrrr!! Most of the time they just throw away leftovers from the main plate cos they underestimated the amount to kiap onto the smaller plates. The servers are mostly young interns or part-timers who don't know what they are doing! Shocking standards for a posh 5 star hotel!

Wedding favours

Group picture of our table!

Picture at the stairs with the flower petals and lamps.. Small touches everywhere that shows the creativity of the bride and bridesmaids. Super nice! :)

Nex with Nat

Nat came over Nex to meet me for lunch (he cheong here from his office) at Bibigo! We shared a Pork Rice, Ginseng Chicken and Glass noodles! Yum yums!

Then we went to DessertStory for dessert cos Sogurt only had boring fruit flavours and I only like their Red Velvet Cake & Chocolate flavours.

Afterwards, Nat cheong back to his office and I went home to nap and do my household chores..

Later, he messaged me and said he want to meet me for dinner! Wahahahahahaha! So we met up at Nex again and went for dinner at Din Tai Fung!

I was still full from lunch, so we shared Xiao Long Baos and a bowl of soup.

But there's always room for desserts no matter how I full I am!

Went to Lenas for the yummy MOF icecream!

This is my No 1 fave! Brown sugar and soft serve! Yums!

It's a miracle our tummies didn't explode.. Hahahahahaha!

We spent a few hours chatting and catching up.. It's nice to just sit and relax with Nat cos he's so easy to talk to! And we share a lot of common interests so there's always stuff to talk about. :)