card-writing marathon

its really quite an amazing event that all of us were able to gather for an overnight in our team. we stayed over at dennis' lovely girlfriend, gwen's house for the christmas cards writing marathon. believe it, some of them has records of 100 over cards to write. *faints* Of course, the night was long and some of them fell asleep while writing. hehe.



towards 6am, we dialed for macs breakfast and had rounds of mahjong too. i really enjoyed the overnight as we seldom (really seldom) get to do this. for me, it kicked start a warm fellowship and rest for my block leave too.

happy christmas!

roots

on the first day of practice, we were all scared to death. plus he hadn't brought along any footballs. one kid finally spoke up for all of us. "Excuse me, coach. there are no footballs."
And coach Graham responded, "we don't need any footballs."
There was a silence as we thought about that...
"How many men are on the football field at a time?" he asked us.
eleven on a team, we answered. so that makes twenty- two.
"and how many people are touching the football at any given time?"
One of them.
"Right!" he said. "so we're gonna work on what those other twenty-one guys are doing."

Fundamentals.

You've got to get the fundamentals down, because otherwise the fancy stuff is not going to work.

living

began a new book yesterday evening. continued on my morning train ride today.

"...kids, more than anything else, need to know their parents love them. their parents dont have to be alive for that to happen..."

engineering isnt about perfect solutions; its about doing the best you can with limited resources.

Heroes Camp

Yesterday was a cool morning to begin with. woke up to light drizzles outside my window and quickly get changed to go to SSS for our bi-annually youth camp. i was excited to start my day at camp because i aimed to enjoy every single moment of the entire day.

i reached the hall and found philo distributing breakfast packs to the cg. i was blessed by her hospitality as well. its really nice to see my people at the start of the morning. went through the loyalty lesson on David by DanielC and Dennis. what led me to think further about the lesson:

what makes David so powerful that his mighty men follow him so wholeheartedly? whats so special about him?David expressed his loyalty to his mighty men too.

your friend's spirituality is your responsibility.

forgive easily. sometimes, i find that i am quick to correct the wrongs. in midst, i maybe too rigid and not done it in loving ways.

Gideon and i delivered the workshop on spiritual gifts. one of my camp objectives is to reclaim my gift of teaching. i have not taught for quite sometime and i really want to teach again and teach the Word more. thank God, the workshop turned out good & God blew my nervousness away! haha!

we had so much fun clowning around during Minilution rehearsal. it was so much fun doing something together with shirls' cg and the uls! :) did a tee for our beloved pastor that says: "i heart shirls!" *jumps* it was nice and encouraged to receive cards and notes from some of my people. i really really appreciate the words written on the cards. they meant so much to me and it always reminds me of why i am doing what i am doing :)

Pastor Jeff came and shared a lesson on the life of Abraham. some points he mentioned really struck a chord in my heart, kept me up to keep thinking about it.

moving from comfort zone to combat zone.

spiritual growth is being on new & unfamiliar grounds and thus need to learn new skills and abilities

daddy, mei and i

we went for our cousin wedding dinner just now. it was an outdoor dinner, very windy, thank God for the weather. some pictures we took with my samsung phone.

One Fine Day's Disney & Japan Launch

Heys friends! :) Check out my friend, Nicole's online shop:
http://www.one-fine--day.blogspot.com

Her latest Disney & Japan Collection has been launched! :)
pay a visit for your year- end Christmas shopping!
God Bless~

Giogio!

Last sunday, a few of us brought giogio out to bishan park for some fresh air. giogio is soooo cutteeee! there was an incident where a husky came near giogio and smelled him, giogio was so still and he didnt move an inch! he was trembling. hehehe. anyway, if you are wondering what was he wearing that day, it was an england jersey. heheh. so cute!

29 Nov 08

Here are some late photos from the hangout on 29 Nov. went for a jog at bedok connector park and off we went to have our late dinner plus a nice ice-cream treat *yums*

roy lovesss ice cream alott.

Are you coming? :)

24 Dec 2008 @ The Nexus Auditorium
Mandarin Service
07:30PM - 09:30PM

24 Dec @ The Rock Auditorium
Service 1: 2pm-4pm
Service 2: 5pm-7pm (with children programme)
Service 3: 8pm-10pm

25 Dec 2008 @ The Nexus Auditorium
"The Gift"
Family & Children Service
10:00PM - 12:00PM

Its my life musical

this picture is rather dark... a few of us went for Its my life musical directed by Lim Yu Beng. we sat at the first row and had some neckaches after it. hehe. nonetheless it was fun going for a play together. while watching the musical, couldnt help but memories of Teenage Textbook during my youthdays kept coming back... student days were fun!

mookie

i miss mookie. little miss mookie texted me a few days ago...
"...suddenly missed u greatly... ystday saw facebook updates... i wanna meet u up b4 ur big day. let me noe ok..."
she is none other than joey aka zihui. my ex-sheep who is with me during my central and west days. thinking back on our pioneering days, she is a faithful and consistent support in the team. currently, she is in the Hopekids ministry, influencing and impacting many many young lives for our future.

Yesterday had an enjoyable spt with my team. we met for some japanese food at cathay basement and it was really lively and active interaction that i had to repeatedly mentioned some same things over and over again. haha. at one point, yao turned to me and repeated what he has understood. funny mans. i feel like a naggy granny. *faints* After the meeting, we did our unknowingly usual practice- we stood around in circle and went on talking and talking. it was then someone would "heys, lets move people...", then we would inched forward bit by bit. it was not long before we paused in our steps and stood in circle to continue our conversations. well, it goes to show that we just had so much to talk and share when we see each other, i enjoy the fellowship times.

a long weekend, yay.

so touched

yesterday i went for an interview at one of Touch community centers at Ubi. seriously, i felt that God has orchestrated the interview for me, to encourage me and advice me through the center director. i was very totally blessed by her spirit and warmth towards me. i was very excited about the interview, not because i die die need to secure a second job. rather i am very keen to find out more details about social service industry and serving the needs of the needy. indeed, the whole trip was not in waste. i know that i need more time in prayer and getting my focus clearer on what He wants me to do and what i am passionate about. this interview serves as a step to make my focus clearer. i am very encouraged by Julia, the center director and Danny, the HR personnel. towards the end of the session, she even offered to pray for me! i was very touched. i was very touched because through that act of kindness, i felt God's love and hand directing my life. though it seems like a tiny incident in my life, but i am convinced that it totally mature my perspective towards work and my career direction.
something Julia shared that caused me to ponder further.
Faithfulness is satisfaction.
i began to slowly understand this statement bit by bit. its when i am faithful with any tasks given to me, it is having job satisfaction from it. job satisfaction doesnt come from solely the job title or job scope or job description! rather, it is from the person's faithfulness.

thank you, Mr J

quality

it was a casual, routine train ride with roy back to his house after our work for dinner yesterday. we chatted about our day at work, continued abit on our wedding planning as well. but it was only a short while before we decided to leave the wedding discussion to friday, we do not want to always talk about it, can be quite boring... haha. slowly, our conversation led to ministry and people. we talked about christmas services, caregroup, etc. he mentioned something along the line of building quality into people's lives. it really got me thinking hard. ministry is all about people. ministry is all about building quality into people's lives. i've been thinking throughout today about how i can build quality into people's lives. its not just about having fun activities alone or wonderful plans, rather, at every moment, every week, every day, i want to build depth in the relationships i have with people around me.
to sum it up, something i found at Hong Teck's blog encourages me alot:
Care group never fails to encourage me. Never once.I find that through the years of care group going, the extend of encouragement you get is directly proportional to the level of giving you did in care group.

anyway, i enjoyed today's lunch with angela. we've been trying to arrange a meet-up since last week. finally, today we lunched :) more to come.

He blows my blues away

Last week was down with fever and cough, so, not much happenings except a few good ones :)
Last Wednesday a few of us celebrated Jiali's 21st birthday @ a pizza place inside Raffles City.
Last Saturday Roy and i went down to Santiago for our gown/suit selection. it was quite a fun experience. i have never know that wedding gowns really weigh a ton! my designer who helped me was Amanda. we have also settled our studio shoot
to be around late december and we get to choose up to 3 outdoor locations too.

since i wasnt around at Sat service, i went for sunday morning service. Ps Johanes' sermon refreshed me alot. i realised since young, i worries alot. i have absurd fears for natural disasters while living in singapore and other fears. yet, i learnt that fears can rob us of many good things! it robs us of our joy, our relationships with people, our confidence to do things and even our potential of what we can be in God! i prayed in my heart that i will not fear, i want to have faith in all i do. i am glad that i can put into practice because on that same sunday evening, both roy's and my parents are meeting for a dinner at raffles town club. i was quite nervous about the meet-up. roy and i reached the place earlier and we prayed together to ask God to bless us a fruitful dinner time. during the prayer, i set my heart to abandon any fears or anxiety i have. God is good! :) He gave us a wonderful time together and both our dads were pretty chatty throughout the night. yesterday, another blessing came where roy was granted to take leave for the day of our studio shoot too.

160509

"keen"

my 1 year contract is ending soon. it has been quite busy at work recently as the HR dept went through some restructuring in the org chart. my first supervisor, also the one who hired me into HP left last wednesday. she was with HP for 13 years. my first few months at work was tough, she is a strict boss and has high standard of quality for work. yet, upon the news of her leaving, i pondered on the things she taught me, i was thankful that i went through it to learn. it is good for my character growth. i appreciate her patience towards me. moving forward, i just had a one-to-one meeting with my 3rd supervisor last friday after being restructured from my current 2nd supervisor to her. she asked me if i will continue in HP after my 1 year contract ends in Jan. i seriously need to seek in prayers. as much as being an adult is exciting, i still long to be a student, where things are simple, just study, no need to think so much. being an adult need to make decisions, decisions, decisions. thank God i have God. thank God mans.
yesterday's Rdmm was very fruitful, we talked about 2009 calendar and camp matters and 4 hours just flew past so fast! it was fun la, cuz we had our fun laughing and talking too.
i went to meet up with roy to look at levis jeans and a late dinner after the meeting. we have been so busy for the past few weeks that we couldnt meet and some wedding discussions and decision-making were abit lagged too. if not, we have to talk at wee hours of the nights to get things moving.
things been well at home too. i enjoy talking to daddy more and more, maybe because i know the date is nearing also. my dad's been a very understanding person and he always wish for the best for both my sister and i. i do hope to spend more time with him since our work schedules oftenly clash too. now i learnt to note down his entire month's work schedule and i planned my home dinners to be on his off days. so sometimes, i do go home for dinners to spend time with him :) its important to me.


24/7

a text from india

to sum up the whole of today, an sms from India brought about a smile.


it is always timely.

gwen, you did it! yahoo!

this post is specially for little gwen! :) a few hours ago, an sms came in from her saying she cleared her modules and even passed her final theory too! i was truly very happy for her!! i know how much she wanted it. she replied my congrats sms saying this: "its God man. wouldnt have done it without Him."
i look forward to celebrate her joy soon :) *jumps*

Biennale 08

went to Biennale yesterday. been wanting to go for it before it closes on 16 Nov. it was quite a relaxing weekend for me as i roamed the bookstore before meeting shirls for some yakun too.

we were trying to pose. hehe. shirls looks studious ar, ma chiam on a student exchange program arts tour.

ooo.... i particularly like this photo! its so oriental feel.

the big screen

as the christmas lights are up on the street, we will soon enter the last month of the year. to celebrate it, there are some movies i hope to catch them :)

Sky Crawlers. This award-winning anime is set in the near future where there is a group of humanoids called Kildren who are bred and designed to live as adolescents for the rest of their lives. For the Kildren, they realise that every day could be their last because they are engaged in a battle game operated by the adults, where it is seen as pure entertainment. Even though faced with this harsh reality, they decide to go about their daily lives by living it to the fullest.

Twilight. When Bella's mother remarries and sends her to live with her father in the little town of Forks, Washington, she meets the mysterious and dazzlingly beautiful Edward Cullen - a boy unlike any she's ever met. Intelligent and witty, he sees straight into her soul. Soon, Bella and Edward are swept up in a passionate and decidedly unorthodox romance, for Edward is a vampire. But he doesn't have fangs, and he doesn't drink human blood, as Edward and his family are unique among vampires in their lifestyle choice. To Edward, Bella is that thing he has waited 90 years for - a soul mate. But the closer they get, the more Edward must struggle to resist the primal pull of her scent, which could send him into an uncontrollable frenzy.
"I was born under unusual circumstances." And so begins "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button," adapted from the 1920s story by F. Scott Fitzgerald about a man who is born in his eighties and ages backwards. A man, like any of us, who is unable to stop time. We follow his story set in New Orleans from the end of World War I in 1918, into the 21st century, following his journey that is as unusual as any man's life can be - a grand tale of a not-so-ordinary man and the people and places he discovers along the way, the loves he finds, the joys of life and the sadness of death, and what lasts beyond time.

With a budget of US$80million, "Red Cliff" is the most expensive Asian-financed film to date. The movie is based on historical records of "The Chronicles of the Three Kingdom" rather than the novel, "Romance of the Three Kingdom". In the early third century, the land of Wu is invaded by the warlord Cao Cao and his soldiers. The ruler of Wu, Sun Quan (Chang Chen), calls on the rival warlord Liu Bei (You Yong) for help, but their two armies are still badly outnumbered. However, the strategists Zhou Yu (Tony Leung) and Zhuge Liang (Takeshi Kaneshiro) see that Cao Cao's army is unused to battling on the sea. With 200,000 men, Zhou Yu and Zhuge Liang defeat Cao Cao's army at the Yangtze River.

daniel and huimei

we are missing roy in this picture *aww*. took this photo after our dinner at shokudo today. more than just the food, the time spent was very fruitful, its very encouraging to fellowship and share about our lives. they are very encouraging and sacrificial couple :)
tomorrow is wynnie's second exam paper. lets pray for her.

5 km run

the day after Freedom ESS, a few of us went for the Great Eastern Women 5KM fun run. it was organized by debster who signed us up for the event. nearing the event, all of us felt that we were crazy to pay to run. nonetheless, money paid, goodie bags collected, we arrived on Padang field on 26 Oct morning.
we took these two pictures after the run. felt so shiok. sharlene and i went around to hunt for giveaway jellies, bananas and mineral water.

yay! i ran it :)

How

Mary said to the angel, "How can this be, since i am a virgin?"
(Luke 1:34)
remember the angel's answer? "Nothing will be impossible with God" (v.37)
How is never a problem with God. when he puts something in your heart to do, he goes to work behind the scenes to ensure that it happens. in the meantime, we are to remain faithful to him and focused on the vision.

If you dare to dream, God dare to give.

Freedom!

last weekend marked another breakthrough in the youth service programming team. i am so proud of my team who worked super hard in the weeks of preparations.
it started with Stomp- "examination in progress, silence please". clangs and bangs from peter, ruiz, yihui, yushan and jeremy. it was really entertaining and fun to watch yushan hit the metal bin. aloy, huiy and their mm team did a super nice ipod clip playing the different songs from various radio stations. most would still remember the classical piece done by yaoguo, so soothing. daixuan and qianjin sang their hearts out to the tunes of fly me to the moon and huang jin jia. qianjin really memorize the chinese lyrics like mad man! *claps claps* few would have known that our musios can dance too! :) the dance was so entertaining and fun to watch. the whole music team did "Smooth" and many were wowed by the instrumental solos. how can we forget about beatboxing by jason and drum sparring by walz and lee. these images are still fresh in my memory as i blogged.
many many thanks to Philo and gang for the invite cards and the publicity clip. the things on the invite cards are all assembled together for the photoshoot! woww~
thanks to Eevoon, Carmen, Yong kang and their team of ushers, we have seen both services fullhouse. yay~
the list goes on.... our Media team! :D Thanks for the full mobilisation of volunteers. you guys came for rounds of practices and rehearsals to take care of the details and all.
there are just so many people i wanna thank for making the services a great success. Thank You, all of you :)

some smses of encouragements...

"service was awesome. esp the performances. seamless. really can see the effort ur team put in. my visitors and leaders enjoyed it. thanks for the hardwork."

"well done, team, for the relevant and awesome service todat. keep up the great work! better stuff to come in 09! =)"

"just want to let u know dat i think minops really did a great job on freedom. i was talking to my leaders n we all were saying how much it blew not only our visitors but even our people's expectation. and u know how hard it is to impress the old birds. i think u guys really outdone urself. this ess was the best i've seen! just want to affirm u and ur team doing a fantastic job! rmb, the best is yet to be! may God anoint u even more!"

here's the lady behind the successful project- Veron! she is the project IC of Freedom and she worked very hard right from the start to the day itself, she danced and keyboarded.

taking pics with the nice props and decor! :) many thanks to Yiyou and her team.

Freedom Team! 3 cheers for our Savior! :D

Lord, amen, the best is yet to be. Grant my team and i your wisdom and strength to serve you. Onwards!

opportunities

our tendency is to pray for miracles. but in most situations, it is more appropriate to pray for opportunities. instead of praying "God, pls change that person.", pray "God give me an opportunity to build character into that person..."
it is looking for opportunities to work alongside God.

yesterday, after i read the above lines, i asked God to give me an opportunity to encourage a person, and He did :) its an exciting partnership.

Waiting is a fruitful thing

Nehemiah also had his desert experience. this was a man with immerse leadership ability who awake everyday to do a job that tapped little or none of these skills. can you relate? do you wake up everyday to circumstances that have absolutely remotely to do with the vision you sense God is developing in you?

this really blew my mind off. and i must really thank God that day in and out of HP can get really routinely dull. yet, i have learnt new administrative skills that can help me to be more efficient in my ministry work. very often, whenever i step into the office i'll always have this question, what is your plan for me here, churning out reports and tabulating data for analysis... i want to have a changed perspective. i know i am learning something new, that can be useful for the future.

the need often seems so urgent it seems foolish to wait. but God is sovereign. keep that in mind.

more to this life

i am so excited to start my reading on visioneering by andy stanley. it was once mentioned that reading books on vision or thinking about vision is quite a dangerous act to do at night. it can give you sleepless nights and keep your eyes wide open, and your heart bubbling with excitement.
just only from the introduction is a short abstract that i would like to share with the readers of this blog:

vision will prioritize your values. a clear vision has the power to bring what's important to the surface of your schedule and lifestyle. a clear vision makes it easy to weed out of your life those things that stand in the way of achieving what matters most.
without vision, good things will hinder you from achieving the best things.
without vision, there is no relational, financial or moral compass. consequently, they often make foolish decisions.

the above para kinda "jumped" out at me when my eyes went through them. rightaway i was reminded of the current sermon series going on- priority living. vision and priority go hand in hand. His agenda must be my first priority. i am bought at a price, the price that no one else can ever paid.

before "oyazumi nasai", Eph 2:10, "For we are His workmanship..."

Happy Bday, Lee

4 days more and i'll be running the 5km fun run at the great eastern women run event. i'm so not prepared for it :( for this week, i shall be more disciplined in my diet. *veggies, fruits, veggies, fruits, veggies, fruits....*
on a cheery side, i got to know a new friend last weekend, she's angeline and also a dancer. during our convo, i found that she learnt 7 years of ballet and she stays very near me!
its fun hanging around my people during the Freedom rehearsal on sat night. i was hovering between asia room where aloy and huiy were doing some filming and nexus stage where clangs and bangs could be heard. its really exciting and i look forward to Freedom services this weekend :)
i shall claim this verse in this week's prayer:
Haggai 2:9 "the glory of the present house is greater than the glory of the former house... and in this place i will grant peace..."

ladies special

stew

its been so long since i really look forward to lunch time at work. whats for today's lunch? the signature dish of chef evelyn teo - chicken stew! last night roy and i popped by gourmet chef''s home and found shirls, pris and eve having a fun time watching the tv. for the first few minutes, while eve frantically looked for the house keys, we were much entertained and amused at the laughter sounds from shirls and pris. it was a great time spent! anyway, back to the stew. i wanna say a big big Thank You to dearie eve for the chicken stew! :) she's such an encourager and big blessing in my life. Thanks eve! *hugs*

when boys meet girls

this is my mpc class. we are soon approaching the end of the entire course. it has been fun learning together and doing discussion sessions during the classes too. our final class will be on "Wedding Planner" and we all have our own homework to prepare for that last class... :)

so grateful

a recent incident has reminded me about my obedience to God. principles that were taught to me during my high school days like: obey even when we do not understand yet... trusting that God has a better plan... were refreshed in my mind. i struggled for awhile to fully know in my mind and heart that God has a better plan and i ought to trust Him fully. i must say that in this learning, true obedience is when we are faced with struggling between two choices. we struggle because of our carnal self in our desires battling with the grid of God's Word in our minds.
on the eve of last weekend, we had made up our minds and the weekend's mpc lesson and sermon served as an affirmation of God's faithfulness and His promise of providence in our lives.
i want to thank our leaders for always guiding us and giving us their love and trust. we are really blessed that we can go to them should we have any questions or situations in our relationship. afterall, a relationship grows most in a community.
friends who have been encouraging in us and praying for us, we appreciate you alot.
God, continue to be the leader in our together :)

TGIF

Thank God Its Friday! :D Fridays always have the happy magical feeling at work. when you walk towards the office lift, your steps feel alittle lighter than usual. when you enter your work area, its much easier to greet your colleagues with a smile & "good morning!". i'm one of the fortunate ones who has a radio in our tiny work space & usually DJ will go something like, "...today's friday & weekend will be here soon..." when the clock strikes noontime, you know that there are only a few more hours left to knock off. not sure about the rest of the world, but when the time has come for me to exit office, most of the times, the most tempting thing for me is to go back to sleep. haha! well, so far, there has only been once that i went back home for a friday dinner. other than that, i'll brace myself up for dinner+shopping+movie+chillout or occasionally events in Nexus. there are different views of people on how to spend fridays. some would think that to have maximum fun is to party till wee hours, some would just head straight to their pillows (perhaps due to OTs on a friday, poor thing). i guess TGIF can be spend with meaningful people doing meaningful things :) i look forward to later.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

i've been pondering on a verse in my quiet time this week.

Isaiah 22:22 "i will place on his shoulder the key to the house of David; what he opens no one can shut, and what he shut no one can open."

once again, TGIF

yes

011008
12:01am
do you remember what i told you the last time we were here?
"can i ask you a question?"
*a brown box appeared*

"yes"

God is faithful. remembering Romans 8:32...

a gift from heaven

i want to shout many many thanks to God for blessing me with a new handphone - samsung i780! :D i am totally thrilled, excited and happy about this gift. as we are on a save and scrap campaign, roy and i prayed together for a new phone for me a month plus ago. it was really tempting to buy it 3 weeks ago when i saw the hp deal at a pricing. however, i decided to wait and not spend the money on it. till last sunday, we casually walked past PS Starhub and was given the samsung promo flyer. the phone that i wanted was on sale for zero dollar without any trade-in. i know this is it. haha. debbie accompanied me yesterday to get the new phone. i was prepared to pay for the sim card charge, but later realised that the sim card charge was wavied off, as part of the promo deal! wahhhhh... God is really kind to me! deb and i went to makan at ajisen. roy joined later, great company, great hp. hoho! i'm quite a noob, as roy helped me with the contact list transfer. thanks roy and deb!

many faces of win

newflash all over singapore today: F1.
i managed to catch the entire F1 race on tv last night. its interesting how locals get all hyped up abt F1. it brought back old memories like the hype of how Hello Kitty was once THAT popular that people formed long queues in the morning outside Macdonalds. well, in recent days, news were quite gloomy due to the $ falling and spoilt milk. F1 race was quite a happy thingy.
i, seriously, am not a F1 fan. my knowledge of it only started, much thanks to the publicity and information on papers. the only faint memory was me playing Daytona in arcade during my sec sch days. it was thrilling, i remember.
though a 2 hour race, 61 laps, it sounded boring to me initially. however, after the first mishap happened to Piquet, i realised a F1 race can be very unpredictable. i watched on with much anticipation. after the race, one scene that still stay in my mind was the fuel line attached to Massa's Ferrari while he drove off when flashed green by automatic digi-light. in less than a sec, one of his crew fumbled forward but thankfully, managed to stand up quickly.
the importance of teamwork struck me. in many situations, when things get urgent or busy, how do we respond to our team players? and when mishaps happen, do we start to pin-point fingers? or we pull together as a united front to face the problem and handle the mishap with care? when the mishap happened, i could almost imagine the many thoughts that flew past Massa's mind- what happened just now? did i clearly see the green light? is one of my team members hurt? how many cars have drove past me? am i the last one in line?
winning is just a one moment glory, but it also came with many months of toil and hardwork together as a team to put the vehicle together, device strategy plans on pitstops and functions. the win belongs to everyone in the team, who work hard together towards the goal.
well, i do not know much about Massa' team after the race, but i believe that the one of the beautiful wins belongs to you who still believe in the best of one another that we have worked hard for it and therefore, celebrate the hardwork together as a team.

joy in little things

soon, weekend's here again. before i put on my partying shoes, i want to thank God for the joy i found in little things this week. i started my week with a goal: to find joy in little things around me.
i had another yummy home-cooked food at my darling aunt jane's house on monday evening. she is currently trying the tai tai life at home and getting her hands on new recipes too. her double boiled soup rocks. after a long day of work and meeting on wed, i had a good train ride with my 3 girls, voon philo jia. we were chatting while philo is on her drawing sketch. after a dinner with nicole and zinc, i trained home with my shepherd. i always wish serangoon station dont come so soon. another happy thing was that i bought 2 bags at a good price in a spree. cant wait to get my hands on them.
i really wanna give thanks because i know its a personal breakthrough for me. i dont want to be drown into the routine life of work, but i want to find joy in little things around me. experiencing small victories like this always give me the "yes!" feeling.
recently i've been feeling girly or maybe the girly feeling suddenly struck me.
haircare, facial care, nailcare, contact lens...
better stop snacking, hit the pool or road soon...
on a side note, i cant wait for sunday night too. (^^)

the Sim family

red roses, 8- course dinner, red velvet curtain.
yesterday annie got married to craigven at intercontinental hotel. annie is my eldest cousin in the sim family. my mum was the 4th daughter in the sim family.
ever since mum passed away years back, we seldom visit them except for big events like cny and weddings, most of them live in the west side of the island, particularly clementi.
whenever i see my cousins and relatives, it is a nostalgic feeling. i have fond memories with them when i was young. mum's eldest sister is also my godmother and i was babysitted by her during my first 2 years while my mum returned to workforce. during primary school holidays, mei and i would packed our clothes and stuffs in our tiny disney luggage bags and spent close to a week at my godmother's house. we played together with our cousins from morning to evening. sometimes, there might be movie treats from my xiao yi.
the sim family is a closely knitted family. since young, i always long to go together with them on family overseas trips, but because dad work shiftwork, we were always not able to join them for it. all i could gathered from their experiences were looking at the photo albums of the various countries they been to. through these years, our relationships are that of a distant relative type. each time whenever i go to visit them, i'll feel abit out of place or "mo sheng".
it was the same for last night too. yet, i went ahead to enjoy the dinner and also to initiate catch ups with them. God is good and i enjoyed my night. caught up with my cousins who were mostly just a few years younger than me. also met some long- distance relatives from malaysia too, when i only met them when i was a baby? well, afterall, my grandparents had 10 children. *gasp*
we will gather again coming dec for annie's brother, zhen hong's wedding. am looking forward to it. deep down, i hope to know them more once again as i know God is guiding me and has his plans for me to be in the sim family.

from left: mei, shuz, nicole, ada, nowell, serene (cousins)

live to praise Him

another sep birthday, mr phua! :)
happy birthday bao! we went to eat at ministry of food during the weekend and the desserts there are thumbs up! good! :D drop by a visit to try their red bean cum green tea ice cream dessert! others desserts are nice too. sharing the same birthdate as bao is seng too- happy birthday seng!
a big shout-out to my one of my long time girlfriends, evelyn- happy birthday too! enjoy your holiday trip k! :)

During the weekend, roy and i went for our mpc breakout session. i was pretty looking forward to it, wondering how will it be like. together with us, Joo, Gavin and Pearlyn, we went to our hosts' humble home at tampines. david and alice, our hosts from the family group, are married for 7 years with 3 lovely preschool boys. they met when they were serving in the adults group and now they are leading a cg in the tampines area.

upon reaching their place, we sat down in the living room. just like typical Hope setting, we quickly settled down in a circle seating. it is also the couple's first time to host the mpc breakout session, thus, the initial start was alittle raw, as we do not really know one another well. alice came along with drinks and snacks to warm up the session. well, this session is supposed to be a Q&A kind of session. we can ask anything about relationship, marriage and family and share our experiences. our conversation ranged from financial planning to staying with in-laws, from goals in a marriage to handling kids. there was one thing i was particularly very excited and convicted about. during the conversation, i actually had a question to ask the couple about church planting, little did i realise roy also had the same question in mind. it was then, a question about the couple's goal and direction for the family was asked. david replied that they have plans to move to toronto in 2 years time. i was delighted to hear that because honestly speaking, as i see their family, it is a comfortable place to be in and their 3 kids are young. yet, something greater has captured their hearts to do. i was very encouraged by their desire. after the whole time, roy and i talked more about this and we both agreed that it is so important for God's vision to lead the family. david and alice are one of the many families we have who are inspiring in their lives. i look forward to our second session together.

anyway, a thought i had today: time waits for no man. i want to learn as much as i can and apply the learnings. yesterday's ulm teaching was quite a long one. we listened to john c maxwell's Lifting others up. okays, all my thoughts are in a web. need to sort out first. till then :)

roy and i went to fetch his parents at airport yesterday. we headed out earlier just to spend some time talking and relaxing. believe it or not, now i begin to understand more whenever books/ instructors mentioned about communication between couple. as familiarity sets in, its often hard to find time to really talk during the routine- daily- stuffs. unknowingly, we might just find ourselves, yes talking, but content of the conversation is mainly about informing each other of schedules and other meetings or just exchanging information for ministry needs. halfway through a current book i am reading now, i began to take a deeper look into our conversation life.

i really appreciate each time roy initiated a walk or just ask about my day and how am i doing in my life. i appreciate that he gave me an airtime. its not just about finding out my schedule or other meetings only, but he hopes to know me more. i appreciated last night alot, its just less than an hour, but it was fruitful. we talked about our ministries, work and the recent things we learnt. one of which that i am encouraged by was on outreach: church planting derives from a constant life of outreach. it kinda blew my mind when he said that. how can i say i wanna go plant a church when my outreach life is dead? or not frequent or not consistent?

as he went on to share, this thought was stuck in my mind and i prayed a prayer to thank God for his life and being an example to me. recently, God also helped to inch his friendship with a friend closer. what blew me off also was the deeds that coupled with what roy believes.

the little steps of obedience not only build up our treasures in heaven, but more importantly, it builds up the character of a person.