Gimme A Break

We spent Saturday at a carnival held at an exclusive equestrian club, no less. It’s not a place you can just walk into any time of the day or night unless you’re a member.

So this was a special treat. The kids and I saw a horse-drawn carriage and we were so excited we couldn’t wait to ride it. The carriage was white and so was the horse, which gave it a kind of magical Cinderella touch.

We were all strangely quiet as we swayed to the rhythmic sound of the clickety-clock of the horse’s hooves on the tar road. This is a rare sound to us city dwellers. It’s a pity car tires don’t make this beautiful sound.

As we rode around, we met a lady on a black and white horse, and across the field, a polo game was in full swing. Such refreshing sights from what we’re used to seeing. No cars, only horses and more horses in the stables stretched into the distance.

At the end of our ride, the driver dropped us off near the pony patch. There was no waiting line so the girls happily got onto the waiting ponies. It guess it was only fitting that both the girls chose white ponies. It was, after all, as close to a fairy tale of a weekend as we’ll ever get.

• bid for cool prizes
• Forget New Years Resolutions. Play Games Instead.
• add another white elephant to the heap
• r.e.s.p.e.c.t
• depending on the rain

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My handbag is starting to look and feel worn. Yay!! This means I can officially go shopping for a new one. I normally don’t wait till one bag wears out to buy another.

But recently, due to my impulsive buying, I’ve ended up with several handbags that I have never used. I’ve been feeling somewhat guilty about this, so I’ve decided not to look at any more bags till this one wears out.

I’m not sure that was such a good idea though. It’s hard walking past gorgeous handbags with my eyes closed. But I have done well. So I’m thinking that maybe, just maybe, I should reward my good behavior with a Prada or a Gucci?

Hmm, sounds like music to my ears but I wonder if I’d still be in the mood to dance to that tune when I see my credit card bill.

• why writing a check can be stressful
• free resource for credit repair
• do you accept credit cards?
• trying to keep awake all night
• more activities = more alarms

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I don’t know if it’s the weather but I’m constantly running out of printer ink. I don’t print a whole lot – well, not enough for the ink cartridge to dry up so quickly anyways. So something must be pretty thirsty to be guzzling ink at this rate.

Frankly I hate it when I run out of ink and I need to print something in a hurry. I hate to say this, but I’ve never quite learnt my lesson not to wait till the last minute to print something out.

My last resort has always been to email my documents to someone at work and have them print stuff out for me. So far, they’ve been great about this.

But I’m just waiting for the day when they’re going to tell me they’re fresh out of favors . Then where will I be?

• more copies
• food, favors and fun
• a good pen
• the black hole… that was popcorn
• not an ounce

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These days, whenever my computer or my PDA acts funny, it’s like a trained reflex now that I start suspecting it’s the work of hackers and spammers right away.

I recently heard about Secure Content Solutions and how it uses data encryption to minimize the risk of intrusions into your computer or PDA.

It’s the kind of tool that only requires you to login before your computer boots up. From there on, it works transparently in the background to protect you against cyber evil doers.

Being this simple to use, I guess it’s good news for the ungeeky types. Ah, to be able to use technology fearlessly is definitely a good thing.

• besieged by wires
• reading the news
• why read the news?
• forget the news
• please, no more tools!

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We got invited to a family carnival today. It promised to be a day of fun and food but the kids were somehow apprehensive that it might turn out to be fun for the younger kids but not for them.

True, there was a fancy dress contest for the younger kids, and they showed up in all sorts of fancy get-ups. Spiderman was understandably the most popular with the boys, and witches on broomsticks were what a few of the girls showed up in.

Some of the toddlers were barely able to walk but you could see how excited they were about being all dressed up. They all looked so adorable I’m sure the judges had a hard time deciding the winners, I believe.

If you need to dress your kids up for one of these carnivals and don’t have time to be running around town in search of the right costume, Moon Costumes offers lots of choices and same-day shipping on most orders.

Yes, same-day shipping is a must if you don’t want to be hounded all week by kids wanting to have their costumes “now!” and won’t let up till they get all dressed up . Take it from a mom who’s been there.

This is a sponsored post.

• dressing up as your favorite character
• move aside, Johnny
• tubes are in!
• how to reduce back-to-school stress (2)
• great weather to be out

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One more week and my contract will be over and I will be free as a bird again. Woo-hoo. I can’t wait. I desperately need to get back to my schedule of dancing, working out and blogging.

Already I’m in a holiday mood as the kids start their semester break today. They just got done with their midterms and that takes a whole lot of stress off everyone including me.

The house is a-flutter with upbeat discussions about the upcoming movies, what new restaurant to try out and what’s going on at which mall. I have a shopping list that’s been building up for a whole semester.

We thought we were getting free tickets to both Shrek and Pirates of the Caribbean, but it turns out we won’t get to go to both. We’ll have to choose one. Duh! But which one??

• the footsteps of Pirates
• squid reminds me of Davy Jones
• popcorn monsters
• mall nostalgia
• switching to movies at home

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With all of the modern conveniences at our fingertips, you’d think life should be fairly simple and straightforward, right?

After all, there’s the microwave oven and the washing machine to do our bidding.

There’s the instant coffee waiting to be drunk right away, no waiting.

And if that coffee isn’t sweet enough, there’s all these other fancy gazizmos whose only purpose in life is to sweeten our lives.

Just when you thought life couldn’t get any simpler, along comes the charm of parenting modern teens.

Or when our computerized counterparts suffers a hangover Monday morning sending everyone and everything into a frenzy.

Or when someone stretches a long hand into our computers and wreaks havoc on our online identities.

For every simplicity, there’s a complexity, it seems. It’s what makes the world go round, no?

• yummiest coffee
• feeling listless
• caffeine withdrawal
• the making of kid talents?
• my morning out

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A friend gave us one of those sleep sound machines as a gift. It’s a really interesting little gadget that uses white noise as sleep therapy.

Counting sheep just got outdated, I guess. Ah, just as well, I was never good at math anyways. I tried it for a couple of nights and it worked great.

One of my aunts has an insomnia problem. So without a second thought, I gave it to her. I reckon she needs it more than I do. Of course, she was excited though it took her a few weeks to finally let the sheep go .

• where’d the sheep go?
• taking the headache out of gift-shopping
• wanted – more zzz’s
• floating off to slumberland
• brrrrr!

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I was supposed to meet up with my girl friend for coffee before she goes home to Scotland for her vacation. Since she doesn’t work and doesn’t have any kids, you’d expect her schedule to be much more flexible than mine.

She leads the most enviable social life of a jet-setting expatriate wife. She flies to Australia just to watch a tennis tournament.

She plays hostess and tour guide to friends dropping in from every corner of the globe. She has lunches and social events lined up for weeks.

While I run around town in my minivan, she trots the planet on planes, trains and cruise ships. What a sweet life!

Enough said. I’ll just go to my corner and sulk .

• Disney on water
• fake-’em friends
• a life I can only dream about
• runaround parenting
• merry-go-round

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May is Gold Month? I just found out going to reeds jewelers to check out some exclusive jewelry.

I love browsing jewelry shops, even online ones, and gawking at their beautiful designs. When I took the girls to shop for earrings at the mall recently, I noticed the designs are getting prettier.

The combination matte and shiny finishes are absolutely gorgeous. But wait, the hammered and polished ones have such a modern contemporary look I think I like those even better.

Enough talking, I’d better start saving if I want a piece of the action, um, I mean a piece of jewelry .

• jewelry to match
• happily occupied
• dreamy ice-creamy day
• easy displays
• a tricycle table beckons!

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