Feb 26

Feb 26 A Magical Weekend

Feb 2023

If you had asked me what I remember the most about my childhood or early years, my answer might sound incoherent to you. A bit of this and a bit of that. Even though the incoherence is not a measure of the quality of childhood, it has certainly made me wonder if I want to hear the same response from Daniel when he has grown up himself. Definitely not.

I am fixated by the idea that the answer should always be thematic when someone recounts his or her childhood. “Boardgame nights with my parents!” or “Hiking trips around South East Asia!” are some of the responses I envisioned as the ideal ones.

I believe that when the response is thematic, it helps with and reinforces the recollection of the childhood memories. In the same vein, I hope that with good memories comes greater sense of gratitude which is essential to passing it on to the next generation. (I mean, these journal entries are also in the same effort to help Daniel remember his childhood better in the future too).

With that said, time is always so precious for working parents like my wife and I which means that weekends are the most valuable opportunity we have to bring our parenting goals/vision to life.

My strategy to strike a balance between my parenting vision and the constant lack of time is to plan each weekend as an adventure on its own. More specifically, an exploration of Singapore’s neighborhood playgrounds and its surrounding eateries.

From a childhood development lens, play time that involves a wide range physical motion and sensory play (think of sand) has its benefits. From a parenting lens, these new discoveries (as opposed to stick to the same routine always) and weekend planning strengthens my relationship with my wife, our family bond as a whole and most importantly, it gives us (aka working adults) a source of motivation to push through the week when we have a plan lined up for us on the weekend.

I must say that this consistent effort to scan the island for new play areas and hidden eatery gems is slowly paying off. Daniel is putting up little to no resistance to school as he has joined the bandwagon called, “Let’s look forward to our weekend!" with his mama and papa, and some time nearing the weekend, he would ask, “Papa, we are going to ……..” with an expectation for me to fill up the blank with our next adventure.

Alright, enough talking and lets bring on the photo sets and video.

This weekend, we started off by returning to Play @ Heights Park, a truly wonderful play concept area that comprises of a sand, water and conventional slide play areas.

A view of water play area from one of the HDB flats, flanked by the sand play area to its right and the slides to its left.

I wish I had taken a photograph of the camera I used here - all wrapped up in plastic just to get that precious shot up close. A+ for papa’s effort.

The last time we came here, it was during the rainy season and hence, very little crowd. But this time round, mr Sun has invited all the little ones out to play.

Including this little jumpy bunny.

Did mama and papa get wet in the end too? How can we not.

As I was taking a shot of the water play area downstairs, the patterns of the flats across me caught my eye. So I stole a shot of that as well.

Supposed to have a play-date with baby Hanan that same evening but it was postponed. So we carried on with the plan ourselves as we had already promised Daniel.

I am honestly unsure why he laughs so hard about this pose. Is Daniel making a reference to something?

Children needs to run, climb, fall, sweat, laugh and cry. That’s the epitome of childhood.

Button-nose family.

On the next day, we swung by Aljunied to Happy Ave to check out this playground that we chanced upon a few weeks back when we drove through the area. I kid you not, it is called a happy place.

The more sand, the better.

No weather is too hot or too wet for our family.

I have observed that Daniel has extremely good balance and control of his body’ CG. I hope he will continue to master his movements through all the play.