for Heidi

SOME people have made it clear to me that I have been neglectful of the blog. Truth. I admit it, I have been and I have a renewed commitment to keep up from now on. As for now a little back-up posting is in order.



Last October, we had an amazing trip to Singapore and Bali. From Manila there is no direct flight to Bali, so Singapore started as a means to an end but was slightly thrilling in itself. Always fun to get two birds with one stone!

As always we were in a frenzy to catch our early morning flight. Nate offering to do whatever needs to be done is assigned the grab the baby bottles and fill them with hot water. At the airport as we make it through our 2nd round of security scans (with one more to go) I notice that the diaper bag is soaked and there is no water in the bottles. Come to find out he has forgotten to put the silicone insert in which make the bottles airtight and leak proof. Oh joy, three hours on a plane with a baby and NO bottles and what better, not too much breast milk left either! (The reason I tell this part of the story is to prove how amazing my husband is and what a fool I am.) I am SO angry with him. SO VERY ANGRY and I am mean and he feels bad enough as it is. But we survive surely as we always do and arrive in Singapore unscathed.

Singapore is clean and orderly and HOT and sterile and I love it. The taxi drivers are kind and smart and well-spoken and really act as tourguides for their city. We stayed at a great hotel off Orchard Road, ate fabulous food in Chinatown and spent time at a Hindu ritual in Little India. Took in the city at night while on the Singapore Flyer (the worlds largest observation wheel) which is a giant ferris wheel with enclosed capsules. We saw the iconic Merlion and did some shopping on Orchard Road and had a Singapore Sling at the Longbar at the Raffles Hotel its originating home.






All in, it was what I had planned for the day and a half before our flight to Bali or was it supposed to be our day and a half after our trip to Bali...

We arrived at the airport in Singapore with plenty of time to spare to get our flight to Indonesia. Looking at the boards for where we check in we notice that our flight is not listed. Strange because I am sure they would have emailed or called us if the flight had been changed, right? Nate pulls out the itinerary and (here I need to mention that I do all of our travel planning and booking) low and behold our flight was YESTERDAY. Seriously. I wanted to die. Well first I wanted to throw-up and then die. I went to the customer service desk. Yep, sure enough we had missed the flight and of course we are at fault so there is NOTHING they can do about it. Luckily (I use that term lightly) there is a flight leaving in an hour to Bali and it just happens to have 4 seats and I can buy them right there for a whopping last minute rate. Frantically I am looking online and calling the airline to see if we can get a better deal but no...the sales have already been closed as the flight is happening in 30 minutes. What better, because I had messed up on the flight booking on one end I had messed it up on the other end as well and my flight dates and hotel dates didn't match up and I got to spend the money for all new flights one way and extending the flights back to Singapore on the return flight. Now this whole time my lovely husband whom I have been so angry at just a few short days ago for something as stupid as a bottle is calm and cool and kind and not angry and if he is, he isn't showing me that. He is being nice and loving and soothing and telling me it could happen to anyone. (Hang head in shame here) Note to self: try to be more like Nate.


The whole flight I am just praying that Bali will be so amazing that we won't feel the sting of a twice paid for trip and guess what...it was SO WORTH IT! Rather than stay at a big nice hotel, we booked in a gorgeous resort that had individual villas each with their own pool. We had the bonus of being at a resort with a large pool and the benefits of the spa and room service and restaurant in addition to the feel of being at our own private villa without other tourists. We could have spent all our time lounging around at our pool, but we did a few touristy things as well. Holden enjoyed body surfing at sunset, we did a little shopping around Seminyak and made a trip up to Ubud for some amazing scenery and monkey encounters.