Philips Smart Door Viewer DV001 Review

Decided to do a post on this because I reckon there are people out there who only wants a doorbell with recording function but do not want to change their whole lock to a digital lock. Of course I know the perks of a digital lock - convenience, sleekness. But I am still crippled by the fear that someone may figure out my password and break into the house. I can totally imagine my kids telling their friends/ strangers without knowing the implications. 

So after a bit of research, we settled on the Philips Smart Door Viewer DV001. Basically, you can sync it to your phone app and you can view on the go/ record when needed. The footage is clear and it does what it promises. It is quite a great deterrent for anyone who considers nicking away my stuff. After using it, I still stand my ground that it is pretty value for money given that it is only S$300+ after discount. It is also quite energy efficient, lasting a week without charging. The kids enjoy ringing the doorbell now. LOL! Feel free to message if you need more information. 

New indoor playground - Yooland

This feels so Aunty, but now I groupbuy quite a bit of the kids' needs. Well, mainly because it is cheaper. So apparently, even tickets to indoor playgrounds can be groupbuy now. LOL! Yooland recently opened in Westgate and my friendly neighborhood gb host was coordinating orders. They were selling at $28 for 2 hours and could be used even for weekends/ public holidays. It was quite affordable. 

Personally, I don't really know if they could survive because a much cheaper and wholesome option - KidsSTOP (you can read more about my reviews here) was just across 2 roads and there is a free playground within the shopping mall. But it definitely provided the kids with an alternative option and it sure looked fun and very clean (maybe because it was new). Let's just enjoy while it is there. 

Yooland's theme is futuristic and there were a lot of strobe lights elements incorporated in its play area. It does make the photos look a lot better. The area is quite big and incorporate some of the usual elements which the kids love such as kitchen pretend-play, hinoki sand pit (one of the more interactive ones) and dress up areas. Some of the more special items include the bouncing inflatables, lighted lego, giant hamster wheel and mobile vehicles. 

It was a lot of fun for the kids and the adults. Half of our time was spent during the peak and another half was during the lull period. I have to admit during the peak, I nearly went deaf at the hinoki pit. I don't think the kids fully split their time to the different stations. During the peak, they just went to whichever areas which was less crowded. 

Overall, the kids had a lot of good fun. They didn't entirely fully rotate through every station during the 2 hours slots. Guess that means...round 2? Haha. And yes, I took a lot of nice photos :)

KidsSTOP - Most reasonable indoor playground in the west

We went to KidsSTOP yet again. This is really one of our most frequent hangouts simply because of its affordability. The last time we went was nearly a year back (you can read our review here), this was the first time the #2 is going there with her brother. Saving hack: If your parents are senior citizens, they can bring a toddler that is less than 18months FOC!

Coming to this place with 2 kids honestly was havoc, I might have over-estimated myself. How I envisioned the whole experience was both my kids wanting to play at the same station...But most of the time they were at separate stations which were not within eye-distance. In the end, I spent most of my time with the younger child because my older kid was more sensible and could understand instructions better. Note to self, children have independent thoughts too...haha.

Something that was new for us was The Little Ant Kingdom. To be quite frank, I am not sure what was the exhibition occupying that space previously. But with this, the whole indoor playground experience is complete. My older kid spent quite a lot of time in this area...because new equals more fun! There was a nice slide, climbing structure, ball pit and lego building area. 

The toddlers expected me to join them in most of their activities. Even though this place was spacious, some of the corners could be quite tight and prove to be a test on my flexibility. If it is your kid's first time here, you could probably need more than 1 session for the kids to "properly play out" all stations to their heart content. My kids have came here a few times with their respective schools/ caretakers so they pretty much have their own favourites. 

If you are Singaporean, you must be careful when booking your slots because Singaporeans enjoy a huge discount! I almost failed to select the right category and had a shock at the price. We will definitely be back soon...for its biggest birthday party because the activities seem interesting and is something that is not usually offered by other indoor playground. :)

Saving Tips: Wink+ App

 

If you use the public transport quite often, you would have seen this pink QR code all around the train stations. To be quite frank, I have signed up for the Wink+ App for quite a long time back, but because the points accumulation was so slow (each scan is literally 1 cent) and the merchants were so limited, I don't even put much emphasis on it. I am definitely not going my way out to redeem an unwanted service/ product!

It is only recently, purely out of  apps spring cleaning reasons, I reopened it and realised I had almost $50 in it. Holy Moly! As the points don't expire, before the kids came, I would sometimes be scanning this qr code while waiting for my friends/ family/ husband to arrive.  It is a little like catching pokemons just that you have to be kinda of thick-skin and survive a lot of stares. To accumulate the points faster, do scan those beside the advertisement boards which gives 2 points instead of 1.

In the new panel of merchants included a store near me and allows me to redeem useful toiletries. I managed to redeem this while only paying 50 cents. :D Generally, it is a more effective use of time if you are just hanging around and waiting for someone (way better than scrolling aimlessly). It does take quite a long time to reap the results. But if you wait long enough, you can accumulate enough like me...haha.

If you are keen to download the app, you can key in "94Z83I" to get 40 Wink points. That should give you a good headstart. 

Village Hotel Katong Review

Lately, we have been crashing a bit of staycations so we thought we will do a post about it. Katong has always held a special spot in our hearts, it is ideal for exploring if you ask me because of the variety of food available. The street shops are also very random, meaning there was more to see. If we had to do a staycation, that's where we would choose to be. 

We were extremely excited to crash my parent's staycation at Village Hotel Katong simply because of its location. It was right smack in the exciting part of Katong. There was also i12 katong in the vicinity which had an indoor playground. Some good finds we found was Cheeky BeeHoon (you must try it, it is really good!) and the original Birds of Paradise gelato. The Micro bakery despite its interesting exterior was a disappointment. 

The rooms at Village Hotel Katong were really spacious too. If you have kids like us, the biggest problem you would face is the pool. There is no kids pool and it was pretty deep. We had to swim with the children in our arms (the lifejacket float came in handy) and we had to be vigilant at all times. Still the toddlers had lotsa fun. 

There was a bath tub in the room so that was round 2 of water fun for them. Apart from that, we also like the fact there was a grocery store connected to the hotel. That means we could get our children's supplies quite conveniently. Overall, we thought this was a pretty value-for-money hotel. It was in a great district, with awesome food options and the room was spacious and clean. Nothing to complain and we would come here again!

Day out at the Zoo - New Kidzworld

There have been some poor reviews on the "new Kidzworld"...but my kids really enjoyed it. I think it might be because I never experienced the old Kidzworld before so to me everything is new. The reviews are true to describe the water play area to be basically sprinklers with very little structures. But I really like how clean the bathing/ changing areas were. 

The toddler did play at the dry playground which was more impressive in terms of structure but the weather was really warm and humid so he didn't last long there. (Sorry for the lack of photos cos I went to the petting area with the baby.) As for the petting area, we could only pet the animals at the end of the show. We spent really long at the free petting range with the goats :)

I really love petting animals. But it would be great if we could pet more than just the goats. This was probably the area we stayed the longest. It is true...when they say the kids will never leave it. My tip is save the Kidzworld as the last stop so that the children can enjoy other parts of the zoo. To set expectations realistic, my children don't really look at each animal for a really long time. 10 mins max at each animal with random babbling and questions. 

The longest arena we stayed was for the reptiles, maybe because it is air-con. Or my toddler really like the cold-blooded creatures...*shudders*. Another highlight would be the tram just for the ride experience. You can't really see much animals on the tram. I won't advise it to the mode of transport if you have a stroller because folding and unfolding the stroller to load on the stroller is exhausting. 

We did catch a show with the children. It was not amazing. The animals were really small so we could barely see anything and we are seated halfway away from the stage. And it was so hot :'( I am quite surprised the kids manage to sit through the whole show. For food, we chose to have it at Ah Meng Cafe. The food was very reasonably priced (20% off for Wildlife Reserves Members - free to sign up by the way) and the portions were huge!

The food at Kidzworld is more expensive by the way. Haha. But the reason why we chose Ah Meng was because it is on its way and I am quite tempted to give Breakfast it the Wild a try in future. Hope this review helps. You can read my past review here on other Zoo tip!

Ticket to Zoo: https://www.klook.com/en-SG/activity/141-singapore-zoo-singapore/

** Use the discount code "BABYNFAMKLOOK" for 5% Discount For All Klook Activities with min. spend of SGD50. Discount capped at SGD15.

Starbucks - Free Babyccino

Like a true blue kiasu, I recently realise the hack that my kids can actually get free babyccino if you order something from there (that's too easy for me). For parents who need to know the ingredients, it is basically a short-sized steamed milk with a drizzle of chocolate. You can ask for more chocolate drizzle if your child is a chocolate monster. At this rate, I am going to retain my rather benefit-less gold membership... haha. But I am a true Starbucks girl, so no complains!