Apple Watch Review [Newbies perspective after less than 24 hours]

Posted in Online Shopping, Our Thoughts, Reviews by jahbella

I guess as the techie of the family, it is only befitting that I should get the newly released Apple Watch as my birthday gift. :p Ok no, its also because I have a sweet husband who knows that I love gadgets especially Apple gadgets. Ironically I have been so busy that I haven’t really had the time to keep track or really read about Apple’s latest product. Which also meant that I only read about all of its functions for the first time, 2 days before the watch was delivered/gifted to me.

So now that the watch has been in my possession for slightly more than 12 hours, I will attempt to review this watch from the perspective of someone who has been using it for less than a day.

What are some of its better features that immediately ‘grabbed’ me within the first 24 hours? What are some of the features that could potentially come in very handy once I get the hang of the watch? And who knows maybe we will have a ‘longevity’ post in a couple of weeks or months on what are the features that I still find useful months down the road.

The Apple Watch was delivered in a solid brown box which looked like I would open it to find an Apple Strudel inside but well it weighed a ton so probably not. I opened it to find a nice white box (typical of the Apple packaging) that was longer than your 15cm ruler (ermm how long was this watch going to be). The watch came in a default M/L length with an additional strap (S/M length) which I later replaced.

To configure your watch, you just had to make sure that you had the Apple Watch app installed on your iphone, switch on wifi and Bluetooth and follow the instructions on your iPhone screen, easy peasy!! Setting up your notification preferences, favourite people to call, apps to appear on your watch etc was done very simply through the Apple Watch app.

Now that we have ascertain how easy it is to set up. Lets talk about what I think are some of my favourites features from a new user perspective.

Apple Face

I love how easy it is to customize the watch face. While I would admit that I have not fully explored this function. I have been able to change the look and feel of my watch just by switching between certain in-built options during my initial exploration.

I also later found out that I could further customize certain ‘parts’ of each chosen face eg. colour of the watch hand or whether I need the day to be indicated. A far cry from my first generation Pebble Watch which was definitely not as interactive and intuitive. I mean yes, this is an Apple watch after all and therefore as intuitive to use as an iPhone.

Health Tracker/ Pedometer

I love the Heart rate monitor (don’t ask me why I need it) well I just do! And also love the calorie counter/ pedometer and exercise tracker. I like that there are simple functions that are working in the background and reminding me when to stand up (if I have been sitting for too long) or how many steps I have taken. No need for a separate Up by Jawbone. Potentially I think the exercise tracker might come in very handy when I start using it for cycling trips but we shall have to wait and see if that feature will be easy, accurate and seamless to use.

WATCH

Well yes I guess at the end of the day, this is supposed to be a watch after all. So yes I am super glad that I can tell the time and date with this but whats even more awesome is that I can tell the time of another city (all within the same view). Super useful during travels and when there is a time difference. I will no longer have to repeatedly check my handphone for the time difference because it is all on my wrist! Oh yes and not forgetting the weather too! Below is just one view of the weather page, tap and you will find the % possibility of rain and the temperature.

Calendar

Yes, the calendar is going to be ultra ultra useful! Since my office calendar is synced to my iPhone and now synced to my calendar. I will get ‘buzzed’ 15 minutes before every scheduled appointment or class. I honestly think this is going to prove to be super handy for days when I am overwhelmed with classes and meetings.

Phone Calls

The Apple Watch has Siri installed and allows you to read your SMSes and reply to them either by standard default messages or by dictating your message. I have yet to try out if this Siri is any better from the one on my iPhone or if there are less errors in understanding my dictated message. The one thing I have tried though is receiving a call through the Apple Watch. Personally I probably wouldn’t be using it in public because its just weird to have someone on ‘speaker’ and allowing the whole world to listen in on your conversation. However I would say it probably would come in handy when you need to pick up a call as you are driving. The volume and sensitivity seems pretty good so I’m sure it can pick up my voice even if my hands are on the steering wheel. Good if you don’t have an in-built mic and Bluetooth in your car or for days when you didn’t bother to hook it up.

Oh yes and no more missing calls while my handphone is in my handbag because now I would know that someone is calling me even if I don’t pick up the calls from my watch.

Camera

While the Apple Watch does not have an in-built camera (I heard that that’s in the works for the next generation?) but it is able to control your handphone camera. Think handphone on selfie stick and not needing a separate Bluetooth clicker device. I guess this has some potential especially for ‘professional’ selfie stick users but this family still needs some figuring out in that area. So some potential there but not sure if it would be that useful for us.

So my verdict or impression of the Apple Watch after using it for less than 24 hours? I would say pretty decent and it has far exceeded my expectations. Honestly I didn’t expect much from the watch, perhaps because I had owned a Pebble Watch earlier and was abit ‘disappointed’. But of course Apple is not Pebble and for a 1st generation Apple Watch, I say it ticks most of the boxes of what I would hope it could do. I’m still contemplating if I would like to ability to tap on it and perhaps the answer will be more apparent to me in a few weeks/ months time but for now I’m happy with my Apple Watch!

Ok going to play with my watch now..:)

JahBella’s Mummy

25Jun2015

Tips on moving with kids – How to stay sane through the move and How to prep your kids

Posted in Our Thoughts, Parenting decisions by jahbella

So yes, we completed our big move recently (with one more in the pipeline) but we are all good for now and so I would like to take the time to reflect and share some tips on how we survived our move with kids. Some of these tips were serious points of contention between me and Joel when we couldn’t agree if we should attempt the move in that way. While others were mistakes that we learnt from. 🙂 So here are some of our tips on how to sanely get through a move with kids and please read till the end if you want to find out how we prepped the kids for the move. 🙂

1) Always hire a moving company to relocate you. If this seems like a no-brainer then I would go one step further to say, hire the moving company to do your packing for you! This worked wonders for us because we only had to pack away our personal and essential items (and trust me even that takes awhile). The movers did all the heavy stuff like packing up our storeroom, kitchen, wardrobes and all the knick knacks which would have taken us weeks!!!! And yes you don’t have the luxury of packing up over weeks and living out of boxes or suitcases if you have little monkeys children running around…:p

It would have taken us 10 times as long or more to pack our kitchen…

2) Always move on a weekday when the kids are in school or childcare. Yes while it might be tempting to save a day of leave and just do it over the weekend. It will be a lot less stressful if the kids were out of your hair and you didn’t have to think of which kid has to come with you or when you need to get lunch for them. If you don’t have the option of school or childcare then get help from someone to babysit but bottomline is try not to have them around as you are making that physical move (i.e 9am to 5pm)

3) Prepack a few days worth of clothes, fresh towels, PJs etc, as if you were going away for a short holiday or staycation. Live out of that suitcase the night before the move and for how many more days you forsee the unpacking to take. This is especially important when you have kids because kids can’t live out of boxes full stop. They will not appreciate you, opening boxes after boxes to find their favourite stuff toy or that school uniform that they need to wear to school tomorrow.

4) Try your best to be present when your movers are packing up for you and then be as specific as possible when labeling the boxes. This is also applicable if you were packing on your own. Trust me a box that says Storeroom versus a box that says Storeroom – Shoes, makes a world of a difference. Especially when you have 20 boxes named store room which have been moved into your new storeroom and you realize at 10pm that 1 of those 20 boxes contains shoes which you need to wear to work tomorrow. Happy searching indeed!

Photo credit: http://smg.photobucket.com/user/SD7681/media/moving.jpg.html

5) Always take leave the day after you move and this also means, do not move on a Friday! Kids are not fun to have around the house when there are tons of unpack boxes stacked up to the ceiling in your bedrooms, living room and kitchen. And unless you were living in a relatively empty house before (we were living in a toyshop) or you move at superhero break neck unpacking speed, there is no way that your house will be ‘unpacked’ and freed of boxes during the first 24 hours of the move. Yes, so take your leave and get cracking! And after that if you think you need to recover from the move then take another day of leave again. :p So my recommendation is that a move with children would require you to take about 3 days of leave 😉

6) Ensure that the kids rooms are the first rooms which you make live-able again. If there is 1 thing which you absolutely must accomplish/ clear/ unpack/ get ready in the new house whilst moving, make it the kids room. This will give them a place to hangout when they come home and not have the boxes in the way or they in the way of the boxes. This also helps with the emotional part which I am going to touch on next.

This was the initial set-up which we tweaked again days later but at least we got it ‘up and running’ the first day…

Now that we got the logistical nightmare stuff out of the way. Lets take abit about the emotional side of things. If your kid is 0 to 2 years old like Bella, she will unlikely be too affected by the move. So long as she sees the same usual faces (family members) and given her same comforts (pacifier, blankie, stuff toy etc – that is why it is important to pack them personally into your suitcase). Kids of that age should pretty much bounced right back (literally) and she would probably never ever remember the ‘old house’.

Kids who are older than 3 years old (like Jah) might find it abit more of a shock to their system and might possibly get emotional about things. The way to deal with it is to prep, talk, listen and prep somemore. We prep Jah very very early on when we knew we were going to move even as early as when we were marketing our place for sale.

He was told why strangers were coming to his house and his room to look around. He was told that it was necessary if he wanted to move to his new house. We ‘sold’ him the good things about the new house and the exciting changes we could make to his room. He talked to him, we ‘prepped’ him and we made sure we listened to what he had to say. Not that there was another other option but the moment he sounded unsure or apprehensive about the move, we listened and we addressed and tried to steer things towards the positive. We also got him to reassure us back that he understood what this move etc was about.

Things got abit tricky for us as we had to do an interim move and then had to explain again why there was an interim move and then we named our rental place, the ‘ temporary house’ so as not to confuse him. This helped give him some clarity on what to expect and he was prepared and actually really excited about the move.

Upselling the fun stuff! :p

Before the movers came to pack things up in boxes, we prepped him. The night before the move, we prepped him. When he was leaving for school on the morning of the move, we prepped him and reminded him that he would not be coming back to this house after school tonight. I think as adults we sometimes get so caught up in the big things, the obvious things, the great move that we forget it might be confusing for the little one to go off to school from one house and then to never return there again. There can never be too much prepping, at least not for this. :p

Which brings me back to some of my tips about labeling boxes well and taking leave to unpack quickly because the faster you revert to some semblance of normal life for them and allow them to be surrounded by familiar items (clothes, beds, toys, bed sheets, blankets, utensils) etc, the faster they adapt to the new ‘shell’ or environment.

We are really fortunate that both our kids took very well to the move. In fact, I am amazed at how forward looking Jah is. When asked if he misses his old house and whether he would like to say goodbye ‘Punggol’ House as we pass it on the expressway. His response was, “no, no need to say good bye to Punggol House mummy, its Hello! Temporary House!” We are really glad that they have transitioned so well and I would like to think some or all of that prepping has help to ease the transition and I hope these tips will help you and I again for our next move….Until the next move 🙂

JahBella’s Mummy

23Jun2015

Carnival Fun @ City Square – Good Ole Fun In The Park [Media Invite]

Posted in Media Invite, Weekend activities with kids by jahbella

We recently visited City Square Mall again so that the kids could try out some of the rides at its Good Ole Fun In the Park Carnival. Honestly we have been spending quite a lot of time at this mall, given that one of Jah’s favourite shop is at this mall (haha care to guess which one? :p)

The kids especially Jah was ecstatic when I told him we were going to a carnival. I’m not quite sure what he really imagines a carnival to be like but I suppose the word carnival just appeals to him. He was also really excited to know there would be bumper cars as well and insisted that that was THE ride for him.

However that all changed when we got there and mummy ended up on the teacup ride with both kids. Don’t laugh! The teacup ride was quite high on the dizzy factor but we all enjoyed it! Do note though that they don’t exactly allow an accompanying adult to go for free and so the adult also has to pay for a ticket. Not sure about the other rides though but that was what happened for the tea cup ride.

Jah was tempted to try mummy’s favourite childhood carnival ride, the pirate ship but he was a little put off by the genuine screams of the little ones. 🙂 Maybe next time..

Highlight of the day for everyone was the Choo Choo Train ride..the ride that would go round the City Green thrice. The kids loved it when the train driver would honk at people to get out of the way. The last time we took this train, it was around Christmas and Bella was still a little clueless at 18 months old. But she throughly enjoyed herself this time around. While it was definitely a squeeze for the 4 of us to fit into that little coal car, it was really good fun and you can see from all our happy faces. 🙂

So if you would like to bring your kids down for some good ole carnival fun, head on down to City Green (in front of City Square Mall).

Good Ole Fun In The Park

Date: 29 May to 28 June

Time: 6pm – 10pm (Mon – Fri); 12pm – 10pm (Sat, Sun & P.H.)

Venue: Level 1 City Green park

Enjoy!

JahBella’s Mummy

19Jun2015

[Media Invite] Barney’s Jukebox Party ‘Live’ Meet and Greet at City Square Mall

Posted in Media Invite, Weekend activities with kids by jahbella

So if like me, you have two kids who are of different genders, you will know how hard it is to find an activity that is a perfect fit for both or a cartoon character that both adore or can relate to. Actually scrape that, if you are a parent with at least 2 kids, you will probably be able to relate to that anyhow. The constant competition to either go for the exact same toy or both deciding that they want to do something totally different for the weekend. :p

Have you seen our house? It’s like a toy shop because we basically had to cater to both their preferences. Kids 1 Parents 0

Which is why I get very excited when there shows or appearances by cartoon characters which they both love. Of course even better when they are free for them to catch. Yes I admit that I’ve had to exclude Bella from watching Peppa Pig Live because it was just not economically viable to bring both kids with 2 adults and pay top $ for good seats. We had to pick who we thought would enjoy it more and the jury is still out on whether we made the right choice.

So it was fantastic when we heard that City Square Mall had Barney and Friends over for the June Holidays! City Square Mall has always been known to put up a good show so we knew we wouldn’t be disappointed. 🙂 The last time JahBella ‘met’ Barney and Friends it was over Christmas and Bella was so much younger. This time around she knew all of the Barney songs that were played while we waited and she sang and danced along to them.

Oh my goodness!!!! I’m really going to meet him!!

The wheels on the bus!

Is that barney???!!!

The show seemed to feature very new/ original tunes which maybe I wasn’t familiar with :p If anything I wished that there were more sing-a-long tunes like the ones they played before the show started. But of course there was the all time favourite “I Love you, You Love Me” at the end of the show. What I do love about these character performances at Ctiy Square Mall is that they are always of a decent length. Not to short that you feel silly queuing or waiting for it and they almost always have some fringe activities to entertain the kids with before or after at their City Green (outside the mall). More on their Uncle Ringo Carnival (happening till the end of this month), in our next post.

So if you have not been done to City Square Mall yet for their latest show or if you are still wondering where to bring the kids this weekend, this might be a good reason to head down there. Take note that this is the last weekend it is happening!

Oh yes and don’t forget to grab your meet and greet passes for the show too! With a minimum spending of $60, shoppers can redeem an exclusive pass for the Meet & Greet session and a carnival ticket one hour prior to each show. Limited to 50 sets per show and terms and conditions apply.

Barney’s Jukebox Party ‘Live’ On Stage

Date: 6 – 21 June (Daily except Mondays)
Time: 1pm & 7pm (Tue – Fri); 1pm, 4pm & 7pm (Sat & Sun)
Venue: Level 1 Atrium

Smile! it’s still the holidays! 😉

JahBella’s Mummy

15Jun2015

And We are Back!!!!

Posted in Our Thoughts by jahbella

I know that we have been rather quiet over the past couple of weeks and honestly its not because we were short of things to blog about. Rather it has really been quite an eventful couple of week with tons to blog about but I just haven’t been able to do so. I guess you can say it was partly due to the lack of time/ energy but also because I just needed to focus on our lives for awhile without having to think about what I ‘needed’ to blog about.

Ironically I am choosing to restart the engine now, just as we are heading back into the school term but I guess this also means I will be heading back into a set schedule again (perfect working condition for a Type A control freak ;))

So a quick recap of what we have been up to during our ‘blog silence’ weeks….

Bella’s 2^nd Birthday!!!!

Yes, we celebrated Bella’s 2^nd birthday (countless times over) at the end of May. Our little preemie baby finally turned 2. I was actually going to use the occasion to document and blog about my tough pregnancy with Bella and her birth story but well time just didn’t permit for that so perhaps a story for another day. 🙂 We did our customary birthday celebration in school however this year there was no special outing for the Birthday girl/boy since both siblings are now in the same childcare.

Bella from birth till 2…

And of course she had to be eyeing the cake 😉

We celebrated her actual birthday with a wonderful meal at The Boiler…our first attempt at having seafood with the kids! And I have to say we all enjoyed it thoroughly..yes even my picky little eaters! More about this, on the blog later 🙂

Wow! Another cake for me after that awesome meal!

I promise…no drooling on the cake..

Do you think anyone will notice if I finish the cake?

We closed off the long weekend with a nice little BBQ with the extended family and the kids got to enjoy a fun time with their Uncles, Aunties and cousins… So yes Bella blew out candles on 3 birthday cakes this year and I am still waiting to see who will eventually break the record with 4 birthday cakes…

Mummy turns a sweet 32! :p

Haha for all those who are frowning or shocked by the age giveaway…I really have no issues with revealing my age. So yes I turned 32 a couple of days after Bella turned 2. I would only like to tell Joel, I told you so! I told you so because I really really didn’t want to have to share a birthday with Bella or have birthdays too close together (but that girl was too eager!!). I don’t know…it kinda takes the special out of the birthday if you have to share it with someone else (perhaps I’m just mean :p) But I now totally sympathize with my siblings, the 3 of them had to share the exact same birth date all their life (and no they are not twins) haha…

In any case, case in point is the fact that Bella had 3 cakes while Mummy had well 1…I guess everyone had birthday fatigue by then…;p

No pix from my ‘surprise’ party..so heres one from my Peppa Pig birthday date with Jah

We moved!!!

Yes amidst all the birthday celebrations, test paper markings and me coming down with a horrible horrible case of antibiotic allergic reaction, hives, skin allergy, bad itch, rashes, swollen face, swollen ears or all of the above…(you can take your pick because the verdict is still not out on this one), we packed up 7 years of our lives in 1 place and we moved. J

The kids are really happy in our new dwelling and the transition could not have gone better. We hired a moving company to relocate us and we also got them to pack for us (phew! best decision ever). More on our blog later, on who we used and our review of them.

I would say this was about 1/5 of the boxes? It took 2 full truckloads to move us..

We started out like this..:) With an empty and echo-y house and now our hearts are full…

So maybe the above doesn’t really seem like much but trust me..it has been an overwhelming couple of weeks and I am really glad that we seem to finally be settling down alittle now (finally!) and getting back to ‘scheduled programming’ :p Apart from having to figure out what this dreaded itch, rash, hive thing is about..I am really glad that we are almost back to ‘normal’..well that is until our next adventure in a month’s time..travelling with two kids to an unfamiliar city on our own 😉

So yes you will be hearing more from us now…until the next post..have an awesome week! 😉

JahBella’s Mummy