Our Ideal House (Our theme and colours)

The feeling, the thoughts, the Experience, and the Enjoyment!!!

Renovation is full of excitement, fun and anticipation from the time when you begin to fantasize about it, and eventually the design becomes a drawing, and finally the actual product! Your Ideal House!

An ideal house is not the most beautiful house or the most classy house but it is the house that you really want.

Your house may look plain or impractical to other people, but as long as it is what you had always wanted, then it is your ideal house.

And of course it is tiring as you have to monitor the process, frustration when things are behind schedule, disappointment when things do not turn out as nice as you had wanted, and even anger when you see that your parquet flooring has been damaged by your carpenter.

Our theme

We didn't really have a theme initially. We know there were comtemporary, elegance, zen, oriental themes etc. But none of them really suit us. Well, hubby and I are not really sophisticated people and don't really wish to spend alot of money on the renovation. But yet, we wanted to have something special and unique about our house - something really makes the house feels like our love nest.

Pooh Bear looking so cute and happy!

We have a Winnie the Pooh Bear at home. It is cute and it always look so happy. Both of us love this Pooh bear very much. Overtime this Pooh has became part of our family. Meanwhile, Hubby found on facebook a 3D design of a living room with feature wall being Winnie the Pooh Head and the furniture colour theme of red and white. I find the idea very unique as most feature walls are usually rectangular in shape. So we started from this concept of having Winnie the pooh's head as our feature wall.

With Winnie the Pooh feature wall as the main focus of the living room, the rest of the furniture including colour of the wall must complement it. By using Floorplanner.com, I changed the feature wall to yellow and the rest of the furniture to red and white. Hubby then suggested green for the wall colour.

With these, my ID then drew out a 3D design of our living room.

Designs for the rest of the house

Our ID showed us some picture of the kitchen and we decided to take one of the "standard template" as our design for the kitchen.

The first design was supposed to be more modern. But I don't really like it. I prefer more cozy kind and I suggested purple.

The first design

My preferred design

Some of my friends and relatives said they also had the same purple colour scheme for their master bedroom. Perhaps it is the more cozy and romantic colour? I think I made the right choice.

1st Day: Getting the Keys!!! HDB BTO

On 18 June 2013,

We finally received the keys to our new house. Our "ceremony" was simply to say "House owners are here. Other things please go away!" We then entered the house.
(We should have brought pineapple to roll on the floor. We did so only on the day we "officially" moved in.)

I suggest to bring the following items on your first day:

1. Fan
2. A chair/ stool
3. Toilet rolls
4. Masking tapes
5. Measuring tapes
6. Phone charger or anything that you can use test if the power sockets are working
7. Marbles? (to test hollow tiles and floor evenness)
8. Photocopies of your floorplan (to indicate the actual measurements)
9. A Number Lock (Important!!! so that HDB contractor can access your house to rectify the defects)
10. A camera phone
11. water/ thinner/ tissue/ rags (to attempt to remove any stains on the floor. There were brownish stains everywhere on our living room tiles. We got the HDB contractor to do chemical cleaning for us.)

Making ourselves comfortable

First thing to do: Open the mailbox! The "key" to turn on the water supply is found in the mailbox.

We had a hard time trying to turn on the water supply even with the "key". Our ID helped us to borrow a screw driver to unscrew a cap and then use the "key". I have no idea how to on the water supply.

Next: Check for any defects.

HDB will issue you a document to report your defects (HDB defect list) and the HDB contractors will then rectify based on the HDB defect list. Note that you can subsequently submit additional HDB defect list if you find additional things to report. We created our own checklist so that we would not miss out anything. 

Page 1 of our own checklist

Page 2 of our own checklist

Place masking tapes near the defect so that the HDB contractor can easily identify them. If there are too many defects on the parquet floor, you may wish to talk to them and get them to repolish the whole room again. Rather than trying to put masking tape everywhere.

Take photos of where you have placed your masking tapes so that you can  compare after HDB contractors have rectified your defects. 

Masking tapes everywhere

After hours of checking and putting masking tapes, we tried to summarise and write down the defects we had on the HDB defect list and went down to the BSC (Building Service Centre) located at the void deck of our neighbouring block.
( BSC is a temporary (think 1 year) office set up by the HDB contractors.)

At BSC, we submitted the defect list and indicated the number of our number lock. (If you do not have a number lock, you may have to come down to open the door for the HDB contractors when they come down to rectify your defects). It happened that the supervisor was also around that day so we brought him up to our unit to explain our defects.

In our case, the HDB contractors were very efficient. They took less than 1 week to rectify all the defects.

Last step (if you still got energy): Take measurements of everything and indicate on your photocopied floorplan.

You will need this measurements so that

1) You can buy furniture of the correct size:

     - space for sofa

     - space for your bedframe including your bedside table
        (take note positioning of socket plugs near your bed may affect the positioning of your bedsize table/
         the size of your bed)

     - space for your dining table

     - space for bomb shelter shelves.

     - the window frames (length x height) in order to give the estimated measurements when you ask for
        quotation for curtains/ blinds

     - space for fridge (this depends on how big is the kerb that you are making for the fridge.)

     - space for your washing machine/dryer. In our case, the laundry hanging device when retracted does not 

        allow us to stack up the dryer on top of the washing machine.

measuring the height to place washing machine and dryer

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2) Compare the actual measurements with the quotation of the measurements given by your ID. Also compare the actual measurements with the final invoice given by your ID. The quotations by your ID are based on floorplan and will not be the same as the actual measurements. Any difference in measurements means a difference in the price you are paying. 

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3) You may also wish to indicate all the powerpoints and light points on your floorplan. Consider whether you need any additional powerpoints, or relocate any powerpoints. Your dining light is supposed to be directly on top of your dining table. Your living room light is supposed to be directly on top of your coffee table. 

In our case, I forgotten that we have a light point in our service yard and did not buy enough "hamburger" lights. We shifted the dining light point slightly but we did not shift the living room light although it was a little off position. 

In our case, there are 2 light points in each toilet. 1 is the usual ceiling light point to put your bulb or "hamburger" light. The other is hidden inside the "grille" used to hide your water pipes.

LED strips created "Hotel romance" in the toilet. 

Note that any fixing of light, additional light point, relocation of light point, relocation of power socket, TV point, eternet point will be added under electrical charges in your quotation. 

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Sourcing for Interior Designer and Ideas for Renovation

• RenoNation.sg: 
  
  Website offering free quotation of various Singapore ID companies. Note that most ID companies will prefer to meet up and have a discussion than simply emailing you their quotation. 

• Find IDs companies on  Facebook
  
  We got some of the ideas from the photos posted by the ID companies.

• Joining BTO Project Facebook Page
  
  One of our BTO residents set up a group page. Some of the flats have gotten their keys and they provided alot of insightful ideas, help and technical knowledge to us.

• Floorplanner.com
  
  I used this software and drew the floorplan so that I could imagine the wall colours and the positioning of the furniture. This software is able to give you the 3D image from the 2D floorplan you have drawn.

Getting a Maid for Elderly

All my siblings are married and my parents are staying alone. Dad was hospitalized the third time. First two times were because of strokes and the third time was because he fell down.

The hospital suggested that we should get a maid. 

We got a Myanmar maid.

COST of a Maid

Agency fee costs $1100. The maid would be getting a loan of $2660 from us to come over to Singapore. This amount would be deducted from her monthly salary of $400 and 4 off-days compensation of $15.40 per day. 

However, as the maid needs to have some money with her to call home or buy daily necessities, we will be giving her $31.60 per month. She will be getting her full salary 7 months from her date of employment.

There is also a monthly levy to be paid to the government via Giro. As Dad is above 65 years old, we need to pay only $120 under the FDW concession. (See Ministry of manpower; Maid Levy). The amount will be deducted through the employer bank account vis GIRO. We applied for the FDW concession through the maid agency.

I also applied for the Foreign Domestic worker Grant. (Note the difference!!!) As Dad is suffering from dementia and is unable to perform some of the daily tasks (e.g. bathing, walking) on his own, the Centre for Enabled Learning (CEL) actually "reimburse" or "subsidize" us $120 per month. (i.e. we pay $120 vis Giro to Ministry of Manpower and CEL pay us $120 as a grant.) (See Information on Foreign Domestic Grant).

However, note that the Foreign Domestic worker Grant requires the maid to undergo a CEL certified training course and that course costs about $100-$200 which the government also has a grant of $200 per annum. Luckily, Dad was transferred to Ang Mo Kio Community Hospital which is CEL certified and they conducted a 2 days training course for my maid. So I don't have to send my maid for a separate training. There is also a functional assessment form to be filled up by the doctor before Dad is being discharged.

Procedures

• Choosing a maid Click to search for maid

The link allows you to search for your ideal maid from various maid agencies.  Please do not tick too many criteria otherwise you may not get any results.

You can click your preferred maid to find out more.  The Bio-data is quite complete and interesting. 

You can of course get the agency to help you short-list the maid. 

Types of maids: There are New Maids, Maids (Nursing trained), Ex-Singapore Maids and Transferred maid (already in Singapore now, waiting for new employer). New Maids being the cheapest. If you are in a hurry to get a maid, you may wish to get a Transferred Maid.  

We chose a new maid. It took us about 1 month to get the maid. See below for the timeline.

• Employer and Sponsor

My mum is considered to be the employer since the employer must be staying in the registered address of the maid. However, if the employer is not working, a "sponsor" (guarantor) is required. My brother would be the guarantor. 

• Documents required include: 

1. The ICs of my dad, the employer (my mum), sponsor (my brother) 
2. The birth certificates of the sponsor (think to prove the relationship that he is the son)
3. Past 3 months salary of sponsor and his spouse 

You may also need to provide the sponsor's occupation (where and what does he do), sponsor's spouse Full name, NRIC, DOB. 

• Applying for work permit

To apply for the work permit for a maid (foreign domestic worker), employer would have to complete a e-learning. 

Click here for information regarding the e-learning

Strangely, the website is actually Singapore poly website. You would need to register first. After 2 days, a mail will be sent to you and you will then have to complete a long e-learning. 

• Other things to take note:

1. Do check with the agency whether they allow maid replacements and how much it cost. In the event of terminating the maid, what is the procedure and how much it cost. 
2. You may wish to have a telephone interview with the maid.

• Duration?  The Timeline

• 12 March (Tue): Went down the maid agency to find out the pricing etc.
• 13th March (Wed): Emailed the agency to confirm our selection of the maid
• 16th March (Sat): Employer and Sponsor to sign agreements. (Saturday because my brother was only free on that day)
• 17th March to 23rd March: E-learning and submitting pending documents to agency etc. 
• 26th March: Agency submitted the application for work permit
• 30th March: MOM approved the work permit. Agency called to confirm that we would be getting the maid on 9 April.
• 5th - 8th April: Agency sent Maid for health checks and in house 1 day training.
• 9 April: Go down maid agency to pay the $2660 Loan, employer to sign formal contract and collect maid.

So in total, it took us about 1 month to get the maid!!!

After the maid arrives...Procedures

• Getting the maid trained 

As mentioned earlier, the Ang Mo Kio Community Hospital actually helps to train the maid in physiotherapy and other daily needs like transferring him onto a taxi, bathing etc. Our maid could not understand instructions in English but luckily there were nurses from Myanmar who can be our translators.

• Calling back home...Myanmar

We bought a M1 1818 overseas call card for her. It costs $9 each but the call duration is only 23 minutes if calling to Myanmar.

To call, dial 1818 using any phones, followed by "1" for English. Then key in the code number indicated on the card, followed by "#" key. Then key in "95" for Myanmar and "9" if the Myanmar's side is a handphone, finally the contact number and the "#" key. It may take some time before you can hear a dialing tone. 

• Maid interview by MOM (for new maids only)

About 1 month after my maid arrives, we received a letter from MOM. The maid is required to go to Ministry of Manpower Services (at Potong Pasir) for a 30 minutes interview. The purpose of the interview is to ensure that she has adapted well to the new environment. 

• Health check-ups (every 6 months)

It was mentioned by the maid agency that we will have to bring the maid for health check-up every 6 months. Most of the clinics provide such services.

The Perfect Marriage - Love is Everything

"Wo Hen Xin Fu" is the msn nick that I used when we got together.

8 years into our relationship and 1 year into our marriage, I would like to declare "Wo Geng Xin Fu Le". This blog will be an online diary for me to remind myself how "Xin Fu" I am to have him with me , to marry him, to be able to see him everyday.

When I told a colleague that I was getting married, she said, "Welcome to the club! I believe women become mature only after they got married". I didn't understand what she meant then. Well, as our love matures, I also become more mature too.

Immature love says: 'I love you because I need you.'
Mature love says ' I need you because I love you'- Erich Fromm

"A successful marriage requires falling in love many times,                                 always with the same person"- Migon McLaughlin.'

After I got married, I became more in love with him. Especially after the things we went through. The way he was so caring towards my dad (who had stroke last year), the first time he cried infront of me when I said I would never be happy again (after I had a miscarriage), when he said he wished that I just have to play the game "Hay Day" everyday and don't work because I looked so happy (after I resign from teaching).

"Love is not only something you feel, it is something you do"
- David Wilkerson

Before marriage, I told him it would not matter if we could not have kids in future, we could adopt one - That was a lie. I love kids!!! I wish to have my own kids and I believed I would love my kids more that anything in my life including him.

However, he said he would love me more than our kids and I am everything to him.

After the miscarriage, he cried when I told him I would never be happy again. But when I saw his tears, I thought back and realized, why did I get married?  I wanted the "Happily ever after" with him and not because I wanted to legally have babies!!!

He taught me that when you love someone, you want nothing more than for her to be truly happy.

I realized "I forgotten" about him... about how much I love him... more than anything else and that I needed to get myself out of the misery of losing the child.

I want to be happy from now on, to smile for him, to live for him and to love him more everyday. The meaning of life is to be with him. To be happy so that he will be happy.

"The best thing to hold onto in life is each other"
 - Audrey Hepburn.

"We do not find the meaning of life by ourselves alone - we find it with another".

I enjoy doing everything with him - "Rotting on the bed", Watching the same dvd for the 5th time, going out for a date, sight-seeing with him, learning photography from him, doing stupid things together with him.

When you are in love, you always want to be together, stick to each other every moment. Well, my friend asked me whether I am more sticky to him or he is more sticky to me... I couldn't answer that.

"Love is being stupid together" - Paul Valery

"I love being married. It's so great to find that one person you want to annoy for the rest of your life."- Rita Rudner

We never really quarrel before... Why??? He is very sensitive towards my feelings and I communicate to him whenever I am not happy with anything. We are such a perfect couple. 8 years into our relationship and still enjoying honeymoon everyday.

Although after marriage and staying together, you get to see the flaws of each other. But when you are in love, you know that he will accept you just the way you are and vice versa.

"We waste time looking for the perfect lover, instead of creating the perfect love"

 - Tom Robbins

Why marry? Because you get to care for each other everyday, in every single way. When two become one, when you make decisions together and share your life together. 

There are hundred and one definitions of what is love. 

I fully agree with this one:

"Ultimately love is everything"- M. Scott Peck