A very different birthday party and tree tops

It has been a party weekend really. We were all invited to Mia's son Alex's 8th birthday party on Sunday which was quite different. As Alex is a keen Taekwondo student they had the party at the studio where he traines. The trainer and his helpers put on lots of TKD-related games for the kids and it was really great. Raoul and Karl joined in happily and were very proud when they pushed the trainer until he fell backwards (pretend of course). Beatrice followed the pattern from trapeez and didn't want to join in, playing with two korean girls instead. She did finally though. And to our surprize on the way home all three said they wanted to train Taekwondo. (Well 4 actually) The trainer was really great with kids, so we might sign up. We had all dressed up but there was no champagne in sight this time. What a bad luck!
In the evening we walked to our nearby seafood place - very simple outdoors but very very popular which is a good sign. It was extremely busy yesterday due to father's day probably. But we had some lovely BBQ stingray and sour-spicy crayfish which was yummy. All too spicy for the kids still so they stick to fried rice.

Today we did a great big walk with the boys. Robert is going to start a new project soon and had a few days off. So we took a chance and went to explore a tree-top walk in the Kent Ridge park. There are some lovely views over the water and islands off the south coast. The walk is pretty but we didn't see a lot of animals apart from a small lizard that flew from one tree to another and some pretty birds. However when we got down we ended up at the Hort Park, that isn't even mentioned in our guidebooks and that was good fun too. It was like an exhibition of ideas for small gardens but also playgrounds and other outdoor ideas. Very nice. We continued to the main exit in search for something to eat. We got out at Alexandra road only to discover another treetop walk that leads to another park. So instead of lunch we followed that trail. It was a lot longer and harder than the first one and the boys started to get tired but we did it and got to the next park. From there they have recently opened another connecting bridge - the Henderson Wave - to the Mount Faber. That is quite an impressive footbridge, unique desing in wood and really the shape of a wave. That was exciting enough for the boys to find new strength and continue. And after we had crossed it there was no choice really but to continue all the way to the top of Mount Faber to where the cable-car to Sentosa departs. There we finally found a restaurant and had some nice lunch with well-deserved ice-cream for the boys. We were really truly impressed by their stamina. A lot of the path was in shade but quite a bit wasn't and they hadn't eaten a lot apart from a small snack along the way. It was 2 pm by the time we got to the restaurant having been on the go since just after 10 am. Judging by the map in birdseye view the distance was probably some 5 km or so but as the track was rather winding we guess we did at least 7K. Beatrice would never have made it! We got a taxi home from there and were so late that Beatrice was already here from school (5 minutes or so). We can definitely try some challenging walks with the boys again, like nature reservoirs where we hope to see some monkeys and more animals. Had a little swim here and Raoul was so tired he fell asleep on the floor without dinner.
Beatrice has her first wobbly tooth since 10 days already. She keeps eating carrots but it still hasn't come out. The toothfairy has to wait some more time.