Christmas Presents 2019

This is the first year we bought Christmas toys for both kids. Meimei only made a Christmas picture so we can use it for Christmas greetings on WhatsApp.

The kids received a suite of toys - a bicycle and a baby stroller for 萱萱, a push car and a shopping trolley for 阳阳.

The bicycle from Toy-r-us is so much better than the green one we bought from Decathlon. More sturdy, hardier, and better dimensions so 萱萱 can ride it easier.

As for 阳阳, he is all over the new red Land Rover car. He is inseparable from it and have been zooming around the house on it.

Summoners War: Christmas Summons

I joined many folks for Christmas summons on the stroke of midnight. Every channel was flooded with continuous messages of players getting Nat5 monsters. I had about 50 mysticals and more importantly 2 blessed transcendence scrolls. So guaranteed 2 Nat5 with option to choose one out of two each time. Sweet.

First transcendence scroll gave Seara or Fire Beast Rider. I went for wind oracle of course for the speed lead. Plus its my first bomb unit so definitely to have for a difference play experience. The fire beast rider is a very good unit but I don't think I have the rune quality to make it shine.

The second one was an easy pick, Velajuel or Kumar. Naturally I went for the Archangel.

Super happy with the two summoning. Both gave me very good meta units. I've now obtained 3 times more Nat5 in a short 4 months compared to 2015 when I played for year and a half with only 2 Nat5 to show for. Jamire was great but Rakan was total crap back then. So yeah ... new toys to play with in the new year woot!!

Sunday Morning Fun: Playground, Ice-cream, Photos

What's a Sunday without a trip to the playground. And if you add on a detour for ice-cream, it's elevated to Super Sunday!

This is the first time YY has his own ice-cream. He loves it and I had a hard time prying it off her hands. Thankfully OO's being her good self and gave up her cone when I asked. That helped as a good example for YY to give his up.

There was a little festive photo fixture at the Heartbeat so we took some quick photos before reaching home.

Quick Sand Play Before Hillview

The kiddos had lots of fun with the sand at Gardens last month and we need to do it again ... just to see the thrilled smiles.

It was a short hour of play but they had a blast nonetheless. We managed to leave before noon and reached Hillview for lunch.

OO @ KidsZania

OO's school is closed today to make up for the Saturday concert. Meimei had planned in advance a trip to KidsZania for OO as a treat. Although I had work and was not able to join, I love the photos that Meimei took.

Pictures aside, the general feedback was that it wasn't really fun. The concept is nice but when you have to queue for 20-30 minutes for a station, it takes away the excitement and anticipation. OO got bored of it early after lunch and asked to come home. Makes sense .... where's the fun standing in queue and waiting silently.

Year End Concert 2019

We missed last year's concert which was a bumper. We were kinda cautious because OO froze in her first one and we were afraid it will happen again and scar her. 2 years on from that horrible experience, OO's different now. She was one of the best performer on stage.

More importantly, she seems to be enjoying herself, which is the most important factor. She has been dancing and humming the tunes for the concert for the past couple of months and there is always a smile on her face when she does it.

Summoners War: My First Mass Summoning Session

I've always summoned when I had 2-3 mystical scrolls since I didn't have good monsters and couldn't wait to get one to advance further in the game. Well that never really came through for me, which led to quitting. This time round I don't really bother much. They gave a few great fusion monsters and the Homunculus which made a lot of the content easier. So this time I saved up a bit for my first summoning session in Summoners War. 

I forgot to take a screenshot of my scrolls but I had like 150 mystical scrolls, 3 of each attribute fire/water/wind scrolls, 2 light/dark and a legendary which came from the world boss.

Based on the youtube videos I've watched it seems that on average one should get a Nat 5 in like 125 scrolls. So with the number I have I could maybe get a Nat 5 if I'm lucky. There's no guarantee I would get one .... and given the nonsense luck I have in this game I was not expecting any. I was hoping to get a couple of Nat 4s for skill-ups.

Well it turns out my luck wasn't so bad ... or it could just be the 'returning player luck' that Com2us does to make people come back to the game.

I got my first in about 50 mystical scrolls. It's one of the 'new' units for me since they didn't have Druids when I quit the game in late 2015. A quick check look at his skill set seems to suggest that he is a reviver. Hmmm maybe I can replace Briand with him.

Next Nat 5 came in the 100 odd scroll. This is one of my most coveted unit back in the day. I have a love hate relationship with it .... I want one but I hate all the arena defense that had one in them. Perna is just so hard to take out with its self-revive and it seems to violent proc always, multiple times to nuke all your monsters to death.

Overall this has been one crazy summoning session. Very hyped that I got a Perna and it's going to be the next monster I'm gonna focus on for rune-ing, skill-ups etc.

Summoners War: First Tower Of Ascension (Hard) Clear

The Water Homunculus was the MVP here. Paired him with Tyron and I had super crowd control and Dots to work through the hard levels. I could even auto up to 60+ before I had to manual some stages.  Actually I wasn't sure if I wanted to spend time getting up to 100 in the first place since the reward of a legendary scroll usually means a Nat 4 for me ... its just the luck of my account. I've played the game for the longest time using Nat 3-4 that I'm used to it.

But yeah I made it and was rewarded ... as expected ... with a Water Brownie Magician. Which is pretty good and it's new for my account too. 

Helping With The Christmas Tree

Yeah it's Christmas and this year we have two little elves to help us with the Christmas decor. Hehehe. This is the first time YY has seen the tree at home. Again we didn't do alot of things last year because YY was still young. But now he gets to participate in all sorts of activities with everyone.

Special Contribution from YY!

YY @22 mths - TV Addict

"Big TV, Big TV!" shouts the little one. YY has learned that you can get the same 'Wheels on the Bus' videos on the living room television. And he watches only one thing - WOTB. It's hard to put him off the TV since OO watches just as much if not more. Actually YY doesn't fixate on the videos as much as OO does. But that's probably because he does not understand the content of the cartoons yet.

YY's First Time At Waterplay

The first time YY was here at the kids water-play zone at the Zoo he couldn't join in since he was still pretty young and still learning to walk properly. Now that he is running around on his own we were not going to deny him the joys of water-play.

But before we got to the water-play we also made sure the kids had the chance to look at the animals. We were pretty lucky and YY had the chance to pat and brush the hair of a miniature horse. He was rather scared though and was cautious in approaching the horse.

Once they were into the water-play it was total joy and chaos. Both were running around and wading in the water. This is so worth the travel and effort to get here.

Summoners War: Gunning For Lushen In Summoning Stones Summons

I had 150 summoning stones and they had Lushen in the rotation this week. I need skill-ups for him  and there wasn't really anything exciting in the next few weeks. Another consideration when I choose a rotation to summon is whether there are 3 stars monsters I might want for skill-ups or fusion. Why? Because I've never gotten anything good from summoning stones, not even the 4* I would like.

There was a couple of nice units this round - Stella, Lushen, Water Horus. I wouldn't mind if I hit any of them though I'm aiming for a Lushen. There is a martial cats and werewolves I could use for skill-ups too so this was a pretty good rotation. So off I went to do the 3 summons and lo and behold on my 2nd summon .... 

A Nat 5!!! A Fire Fairy King! I didn't know what to make of this unit so I googled it immediately and discovered that it was a popular unit due to its ability to 'snipe' opponents with his 3rd skill. Wow ... just wow. I suppose this is the returning player luck many people are talking about. Quit for a few months, come back and get new Nat 5 toys. Heh I don't mind Com2us throwing more toys my way.

Traveling For Work: An Uneventful Week @Subang Malaysia

I've been in Subang Malaysia since Sunday evening. I flew over on a Malaysian Airlines flight which was a mere 45 minutes. But there was air traffic congestion and the plane wasn't even at the gate when we were already in the waiting area. Because of that my journey took an extra one and half hour. The hotel is the normal fare but highly recommended since its close to the office. Traffic here in the mornings can be very bad if you are coming from the city.

The whole I was here it was simply hotel to office, office to hotel. There is a hotel shuttle to a nearby mall but I wasn't interested in going anywhere. Except for Thursday night when 2 of my colleagues brought me out for a drinks and dinner at a bar, I had all my meals at the hotel. I actually didn't mind it one bit. I prefer the quiet nights especially when I travel alone.

Finish the job and get home to family was the key goal. So yeah, its a quiet week.

A Silly Case Of Burning Oneself

I was picking vegetables out of the steamboat hotpot when I did the most silly action of tilting the thongs the wrong angle. The hot boiling soup flowed down the handle and I got an instant sharp burn on my palm.

It hurts like hell ... and potentially a problem since I'm traveling tomorrow. Thankfully Meimei immediately gave me some cream to put on to the wound to cool it down. I'm still going to have a hard time bathing and sleeping tonight but oh well its my own stupid fault this happened. And to think we always have steamboat at home ... how can I be so clumsy?! 

Summoners War: Water Boomerang Warrior

Summoners War has a nice event going on the past week to allow players to get the Nat 4* of their dreams. It looks like a repeat event but of course I wasn't here for the previous one. The promo page says it all in terms of the most popular 4* that people want.

Since getting back to the game I've been completing the fusions and trying to get all the relevant 3-4*. I have the Water (Talia) and Fire (Shaina) Chakram Dancer but no Boomerang Warrior to combo with so naturally I want a Sabrina.

Thankfully it didn't take long for it to pop on the monster list. It's gonna be great to see what the hype is all about on this 'Twins' thing. I hope I won't be disappointed.