Hi folks, as promised I will be sharing the adventures we had in Melbourne Victoria. We really have to thank the good Lord for providing us with the opportunity to get away from the hustle and bustle for a while and also to catch up with some very dear people in down under. I must say that between the three of us, Cherise probably had the most fun out of this holiday…she didn’t have to cook, clean and run after herself ha!

Jas will have a lot to share regarding this holiday…trust me…she had more than her fair share of “adventures”! I’ll leave it to her to tell her story on her blog. As for me, I’ll try and share my perspective on this holiday in a few parts:
1) Pre-departure;
2) Day 1 and 2 @ Knox;
3) Advantures @ Kyneton;
4) Back to civilisation;
5) Back to Singapore.

Okie dokie…so here comes Part 1….

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PRE-DEPARTURE
Since this was the first time we were travelling with an infant in tow, we decided to play it safe…very safe! We checked it quite early to ensure that we get the front seats so that we can get the bassinet (which we ended up not using) for Cherise. And since it was also our first time at terminal 3, we decided to go into the departure lounge early to have our dinner and check out if terminal 3 was worth all the hype.

Bye bye Singapore!

“Can we go in for dinner before baby wakes up please???”

Cherise fell asleep on the cab journey to the airport so she didn’t get to see the exterior of T3, but like she always does…she woke up as we were having dinner!!!
For a moment we were worried that she’ll sleep all the way till boarding time.

We had dinner at Brewerks and thanks to our friend Teryn who works at T2, we managed to get a discount off our bill. And that was not the only discount we got, we basically raided the DFS perfume store and utilised her staff discount to the max. I basically completed MY holiday shopping at T3 – my new 32 GB IPOD Touch…only to find out that it is not compatible with my current OS urgh!!!!

Anyway, T3 is HUGE!!! Shops and restaurants galore, they even have foot reflexology service! Basically, you can literally spend your whole evening there and you won’t get bored. Well…if you are bored of T3, simply hop onto the sky train and visit T2. Basically the 3 terminals are connected in the shape of a horse shoe so transit passengers will find it a breeze to hop from one flight to another. In this area, I think Changi International Airport has got the formula right. My only complain is that for such a “Titanic”, the baby care facilities are in terrible lack. The last I counted, there were only 3 diaper changing rooms/nursing rooms, of which NONE were on level 2 where the restaurants and foodcourt are. I guess the good people in the building committee do not have any children cos’ EVERYBODY knows that all a baby do is eat, sleep, cry, poo and pee!!! Which means that there is a very high chance that when you are eating, your baby will let go a number 2 and you will need to change his/her diaper. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that the baby facilities there are no good, in fact I think the diaper changing rooms there are very well equipped (I’ll do another review of baby care facilities soon). I’m just saying that it is not adequate at all, I mean the least they could do was to install a diaper changing station in the toilets.

Anyway, here’s a picture of the wonderful auntie Teryn who helped us get the discounts at T3.

And here’s the happy family moments before boarding…
Cherise is looking quite stoned cos’ she’s actually getting hungry and sleepy…but we could not nurse her yet cos’ we needed her to nurse upon take off…

The flight itself was a testimony of how God answers prayer. On the way to the airport, we asked God specifically to allow Cherise to nurse upon take off and landing. We also asked for God’s presence to calm her and cause her to be settled throughout the flight. Since we were in the business of asking boldy, we also asked that God provide us an empty row so that we don’t have to squeeze with strangers and Jas can nurse Cherise in privacy. As always, God is a prayer answering God. First, it was not a full flight, thus we were able to have an empty row of 3 all to ourselves. Secondly, not only did Cherise nurse at the appropriate times, she also slept throughout the entire flight! The biggest miracle was that she slept in the infant carseat that we brought along! Now, all of you who know our little princess will know by now that she HATES sitting in the carseat, but not only was she contented playing in it, she slept so peacefully…totally unaware of the few pockets of turbulance that shook Jas quite a bit. Thank God indeed!

Here’s a few shots of Cherise in her own “capsule”.

So the basinet that was provided served only as a storage space for the pillows and blankets ha ha.