Alan's 34th Birthday

Hello hello to whoever is reading this blog! How are you doin' mate? Pray all is well with everyone of you.

I had initially wanted to this entry "Me and My Big Mouth" because of an incident you'll read later but decided that I should write some of my thoughts...

Yesterday was me birthday... yeah... I'm 34 officially on 6th Oct. How did my birthday go? Spent with me lovely wife. We had initially wanted to go to BotakJones (have you guys been there? I heard it's amazing!!! But the queue is really really long. But reason was because we had a late breakfast and needed to go downtown to do some shopping, and to cut the long story short, it didn't make sense for us to go back up to AMK - so we took a rain cheque and will head there another day)... Anyway, we went to Spaggeddies at Paragon, had the same dish I had last year. Food's still quite good but I think the portion seemed to have gone down... anyway, i'm a big eater. Been putting on some pounds. So, need to watch my diet. After 34, it's hard to cut down the extra weight.

Anyway, what Sally and I have established between the 2 of us is that we will do something meaningful on our birthdays (esp on our birthdays) but on other days (when opportunities arise). So, we make it a point to donate blood. We've done it a couple of times already. (I started donating many years ago cause my mom had to go through an op. Donated a couple of times regular after that but took a hiatus and I'm back again...). So on my birthday, we're back to the Blood Centre to donate blood.

Somehow or rather, I can't remember how - but I blurted out that it's my birthday. The next thing I knew - the team of nurses went to get a muffin - stick a candle on it, surrounded me and started singing "Happy Birthday" despite my countless "thank yous and nah, no need for a song". Thank God that were only less than a handful of people there. What an embarassing moment. Hahaha!

Well... me and my big mouth... hahah...

In the afternoon, Sal and I just spent a lovely afternoon walking together, have a good conversation over lunch, shopped around for presents for some precious people - just spending some time (away from kids) - on our own.

Went to cell in the evening and I took care of the kids today. And I had fun with fun. We just drew nonsense on the flipchart papers. I drew different stuff and let them guess. Tanya "Pi-Tou" Chia and Zach were such darlings... the two of them were just laughing... Megan (my precious) was just sitting there with them, doddling. Ethan and Megan Heng and Joe2 dropped in and out... No words could express how I felt when I was playing with them. Just doing silly stuff and watching them laugh (and I mean they laughed or rather cackled - hahah!) just brought me so much joy. In fact, at 1 point, Tanya, Zach and Joe were all sitting on my lap. (If I could afford, I would have more kids! the government will be very happy... hahaha!!! and so will Sally).

And the cell did a very lovely thing for me - celebrated my birthday by blessing me with words of affirmation. Got me to sit and took turns to tell me how I've blessed them and impacted them. I guess they were expecting me to cry (I'm quite a ham-pao) but I disappointed them (haha!). But seriously, what they said really really really blessed me and encouraged me. One of my top 2 love languages are words of affirmation and last night, the cell told me that they love me and supported me. I'm very blessed to have them in the cell and glad that God had given me the opportunity to walk with them this part of the journey. It is an awesome responsibility and I pray that God will continue to give me the anointing and capability to lead this cell, and help them reach each and every of their destiny.