sethho

May - not sure if I mention this before - love your 'lazy' door to your MBR and your swinging door to WiW/MBR toilet Reminds me of those martial arts drama with 'ji guan' leading to secret rooms or compartments

Don't worry - its never easy with kids, but I have faith in you! Mostly, kids need attention and trust from their parents - just make sure you fully engage him, esp when he is insecure or emotional. Letting him socialize more with other kids his age will expand his 'familiarity' space (i.e. family, schools, and friends) and help strengthen his character to maturity. Oops...sorry for being so preachy... my wife will now tell you how naggy I am

I know what you mean, sleek. But you accomplish one thing most parents fail to do - time spending and proper communication. One thing I learn from child care that most parents fail to do, because they usually have to multi-task, is to look them at the eye for proper engagement when communicating. Mostly, parents and teachers just shout (when multi-tasking) for attention, which not only hurts their vocals+health in the long run, but establish the ground that the child should only really respond to shouting and/or 'threats'. From May's description of your kids, you are doing a fine job!

Haha...don't let Ader near them. She loves to play with other people's kids and not let them go home Oh ya, you had house warming today as well right? Congratz on unpacking and finalizing everything!

Hi Ely1 ~ Love your cat - the eyes are so mesmerizing! Makes me wanna get one since no plans for kids Next is your cow hide rug and clock - uber cool! Following that - a girl gamer! Will get WII for fun and exercise with my wife in the interim, until I can fully corrupt her into online gaming I followed your thread 2 weeks ago till I was overwhelm by my own renovation and shopping ~ Congratz! 1 more week to the finishing line! Lighting is my biggest headache now... nothing we have seen is "love at first sight" and still contemplating cool/day/warm light distribution. You definitely have good taste (and super online shopping 'talent'), would appreicate if you (or anyone) have any good advice on sourcing for lighting to share

Thank you sleek! ~ 2nd forumer to sign in and congratulate us ~

Thanks again May Just received confirmation this afternoon... only 2 items have been rejected: 1. Hacking of MBR toilet wall - I guess they are assuming we intend to extend the toilet floor space. We have to highlight it is just a basin at the vanity area 2. New doorway entrance to MBR - There is a pretty low beam (barely 2m from ground) at the new door way which we are prepared to customize for a 'shorter' door....not sure why this got rejected. We will investigate with our HDB officer. Just glad we got indemity to start earlier, or else we are not able to start on May 23. Andrew promise us 2/3D by this Thurs...will post when we get them!

Ok going off now to decide on tiles and to take pic before hacking starts coming Mon. Wish me good luck on HDB approvals for all the hacking and constructions!

Continuing while looking forward to any good advice on my lighting dilemma... Here is the hacking and constructions required (visible on the original floor plan) for the overhaul RED - Hacking Walls between living room and kitchen Storeroom MBR toilet wall Original doors and frames in the new MBR All sinks and W/Cs GREEN - Construction Leveling up of floor to extend dining area (approx 4ft extension) Wall in study/guest room Vanity area - to fit shower area into MBR toilet WiW - over where the storeroom is originally at BLUE - New Doorway New doorway for MBR toilet New doorway for study/guest room to MBR toilet (purpose: air conditioning, prevent moisture to seep in, reduction of noise from compressor, etc) New doorway from MBR to MBR toilet New MBR entrance The reason why we have the MBR in the originally common room is obvious - we can hack off the storeroom for a bigger space to fit in the WiW. (NOTE: to all potential husbands out there, DO NOT LET YOUR WIFE WATCH THE HEINEKEN COMMERCIAL IF THEY HAVE NOT SEEN IT!) We compromise by having a new doorway from MBR to the MBR toilet, while allowing study/guest room to have easy access to it as well. This created a box in area, which is perfect for smokers not to dirty other parts of the house, and will also be where we have our aircon compressor to reduce noise pollution. The other benefit is that the WiW and study room will not otherwise be more humid. Of course, there are some disadvantage that we have to live with as well... Like the new MBR is narrower (2900 vs 3200), especially so when we try to fit the bed and TV console. So we had to customise a suspended TV console to make up for the space - we still would only have barely 50+ cm walk space between bed and console though If you like to DIY a bit, you can get easily get a wall shelf from IKEA and work with your carpenter to install and tweak in a wiring box to hide the cables, switches, etc. It can be extremely sturdy just by adding silicon seal along the wall and that also prevents possible laminate warping. Here is one that I like:

For the benefit of everyone here... Among all our purchase so far to renovate and furnish our new home, the first purchase is by far our best We got a rare deal from the local distributor of Omazz (Royal Franco) king size bed mattress at 80% discount as it was a display piece with some minor stains. Nett Price. Inclusive GST. Inclusive of delivery. Free mattress protector. So if you are also interested in getting Omazz/Lotus at an affordable budget, consider going to Park Mall to try your luck. Cheers!

We are in a dilemma for lighting. We wanted cool lights for all our L-box, which is planned for our living room and new master bedroom Our challenge is deciding between Philips screw-in type light-bulb for long term saving VS. PLC push/pull and snap housebrands that comes with ballast. Philips light-bulb only comes in day or warm colour, but does not have ballast which not only saves energy consumption, but also will not have the problem of 'heating' that reduces live span of the light-bulb and lamp. One alternative is to either install both day and warm light-bulbs into a single lamp to produce the mix cool lighting effect, OR alternate day and warm light bulbs in a row of L-box down lights VS. PLC down lights are mostly China made 'house brand', that can fit energy efficient light builds and use Australia made ballast. You can easily find GE or Ostram cool light builds anywhere. However, energy consumption and heat generation is still almost double from having 2 light bulbs + 1 ballast per lamp. Anyone can advice or recommend if it is worth while to invest on Philips $38 downlight, or leave it to chance for house brand PLC light to have the same life span as well, but with less savings?

Hello May! Thank you again for allowing us to visit your beautiful home Yes, Ader and I will be taking photo whenever we can to track the transformation!

I will post the photos of the original unit on Monday before hacking starts. For IDs/contractors, we visited 10 in total. In order of meeting up: Roy Tan from IR Design We had some difficulty finding his office because it is within a garage. We were pretty comfortable with him and he gave us very practical ideas. However, we decide to drop him ultimately because we are on a tight schedule and he came back with the 1st quote after more than a week. William from Summit Design Studio Pretty experience team lead that can visualize quickly what we require. He emailed us the 1st quote 4 days after our meet up. However, we were worried that the quality of work may drop since he was currently engaged in 9 other projects, while managing 5 team members with 3-4 projects each. Johnny Lee from A&D Interior Decorations Another 'lao jiao' ID who can advise us what can or cannot be done. He is very polite and customer focus like William. But the 1st quote was too generalized and he lump sub-totals for each category of work without showing the cost of each item. We are wary of hidden cost, so he was the first to drop even though he was the first to email us a quote. Rick Fok from Ideal House He score high in almost all aspect - comfort level, listening and understanding our need, patience and accommodation, etc. We were keen to engage him.... except due to over-budget, we had to drop him reluctantly What we also like is his attitude when we inform him of our decision to go with another ID. He wish for a good reno journey and offer to advise us anytime again Xavier from Habitat Interior Ok, he was late for our appointment, but he made it up by driving us to the next ID appointment. We had a feeling he may not be interested in our project, as he does reno mainly for condos. So I cannot really comment much. Edmund from DX Interior I had to travel all the way to Bedok Reservoir for the meet up. He did not seem to show much interest, so I did not expect to receive any quote... he has not email or contact me after our meet up so far Merane from Inside Living My wife and I like her attitude and attention to details. She even came back during both public holidays just to meet up with us. She is shortlisted within our top 3 IDs for consideration. We wished we have met her earlier so that we have more time to adjust some items to meet our budget. But comparing to the top 2 in our list (perhaps because of the time she spent on drawing out floor plan/lighting designs to the exact scale) we did not have time to look into the 3rd quote. Andrew from Designer Guy Due to conflict in schedule, we had only 10mins for a general discussion, before I pass on all the details to his apprentice for the 1st quote. 1st impression - very down to earth kind of guy who converse mainly in Mandarin. 2nd visit, with wife this time, we ended having a 3 hour discussion on Monday night He gets derailed at times, but with good info and examples. So we are still appreciative, even though it was really tiring. Due to his good attitude, "slow to warm up" comfort level and reasonable quote, he is shortlisted in our top 3 as well. Alan Tan from Aian Furniture & Renovation Contractor I shortlisted him immediately upon the first meet up. Another down to earth kind of guy, who is patient and works hard for his customers. His fame in RT and among house wives for quality workmanship is well known + his quote is very reasonable. 1st ID to offer Rewiring in his quote, that is not only lower than some sub-con, but also inclusive of gangs and decent design switches below $3k. Jeskel from RT!! Ok, I will leave this to my wife to comment. All I can say is, he is efficient in providing us a quote on the spot, at the end of our 2hrs discussion in the first meet up. I have to thank him here again for meeting up given such a short notice period. Feel free to PM me if you need any of the the above ID/contractor's contact.

The entire journey from searching, negotiating, to actually getting the keys on May 18 feels surreal. TBH, my wife and I are still in fatigue after all the ups and downs through the journey. Visited 11x 3rm corner units within the estate of our parents over 3 months: met a greedy owner and encountered inexperience agent on viewing our 1st unit , but also gained an excellent agent who was very patient to meet our needs... found our 1st love that fits all our need in the 4th visit, but our cheque for OTP was rejected as the owners cannot come to a consensus after 3 weeks of consideration... spent a demoralized CNY + another month of searching because of the inflated expectation from the last unit we offered.... Finally found our love nest that is NOT a corner unit and its NOT within the estate of our parents. Hahaha...talk about 'who/what you end up with, may not be what you hope for'. But we love it! It's just 3 MRT station away from our parents, 10mins walk away from Clementi Mall, windy top floor with high ceiling, unique and only 7 other units per floor to ensure decent privacy, larger floor size vs most other 3rm corners we visited, and lower COV that we can save for our overhaul! The unique feature - it is 'eye' shaped 3NG with only the living room window facing the corridor. Furthermore, the standalone lift well has been 'abandoned' after the lift upgrade last year, giving us the option to buy the corridor access right beside our main entrance *SECRET PLAN* I always fantasize breaking a small hole thru the structural wall between the lift well for a fireman's pole and other implements for my super villian's secret lair!! MUAHAHAHAHAHA!!! ...but that is just a fantasy of my 'inner child'

Hi bro, please pm me lobang for Fanco and KDK fan. Thanks!

Hi Aron, email you regarding this promo for Mitsubishi Starmex Inverter Panasonic Inverter System 3. Any warranty and coverage...or is that under Service Maintenance Agreement?

After the shopping, we went to Sembawang Shopping centre, and we walked to Daiso. Buy a few cleaning items for our house and drove to our unit. We leave the items and went off with our place padlocked. Just MHO - most guys who gone thru NS can crack a number padlock easily within 5-10mins, so I recommend getting a roller type number lock instead.

Hi sheepz, Again, congrats for a nice place you can call home now I just got a resale unit in Clementi and will probably get my key in 2 months time - but I like to plan way ahead cos I have only budgeted $20-25k for renovation. I got some wild ideas to propose and also conventional ones to fall back on, so I will buy the floor plan after 1st Appointment. Kindly pm me the name of your ID from A&D Interiors and those contractors that gave you good results (i.e. carpentry, flooring, etc.). Thanks in advance! One trend I see after reviewing all the posting is... regardless how reputed a contractor/ID is, the quality of their work will surely suffer with more projects. So I guess my first question when asking for quotations will be to find out how many projects they have on hand - personally and overall for the company.