10 Months Old

Baby Erin is now 10 months old.   Some updates about her -

1.  Weight - 8.9kg.

2.  She has 4 teeth already.  2 at the top, 2 at the bottom. 

3.  Recently, she BITES me during nursing.  Super, super ouch! When I say "baby, NO!" in a stern voice, her little face crumples and then Wahhhhhh!!!!!!

4. Acts like a little boss. See how she sits and sleeps!

5. She's still wriggly like a little worm.  See, she won't even sit still in her bathtub!  Typically, I need to pull her down to sitting position around 10 times per bathing session. Need to start digging out the rubber duckies already.

6. When she doesn't get her way, she cries with her face on the floor.
Such a little drama-mama. :-)

7. She knows how to wave bye-bye already.

8. I love it when she smiles!  But it's so hard to take a decent photo of her cos she hardly stops moving.

Elyssa's 4 Year Old Photoshoot

On the weekend of her 4th birthday, we brought Elyssa for her 4 year old photo shoot. We did the same for her first and second birthday. We skipped it for her 3rd birthday and I totally regretted it :(

This time, I bought an online voucher from MyDeal (RM38 only but need to add RM15 for soft copies).

No own photography allowed in the actual photo studio, but I managed to take these photos before entering -

Elyssa having her hair done
I suddenly visualised something when I saw that - her wedding day!!
OMG! Grow up slowwwly, ok?

Putting on the Finishing Touches

The Little Imperial Chinese Princess

She hardly smiled during the photo shoot tho. Either a mini smile or a very fake smile. Unlike the previous 2 sessions, all the "jiak! jiak! smile!" / bribery/ silly stories didn't work.

Well, we consoled ourselves that the serious look is her "playing the character". After all, an imperial chinese princess is not supposed to grin like a monkey rite? Supposed to be composed and serious mah.... ;)

We chose 6 poses in the end (topped up a bit of $$. Can't recall amount but total was still below RM80). They need some time to do touch-ups so we'll only get the printed photos and soft copies this weekend. I can't wait !

Cooking n Baking Bug

I've been bitten by the Cooking and Baking Bug!
Erin is getting bigger and I now have a maid clean up, so those are key contributing factors :)

From this weekend -

Mickey and Hello Kitty Cookies
Since the recipe I used called for refrigeration, I made the cookie dough on Fri night and baked them on Sat morning.

Sunday breakfast -
Chinese Styled Dried Prawns with Chives Pancakes using my Happy Call Pan

Dinner - Pork Chops with Eggy Tomato and Onion Sauce
Added broccoli for greens and Pasta for carbs. Used Happy Call for the pork chops and broccoli.
(Original plan was to eat the pork chops with rice, but my rice bin has been invaded by those pesky rice bugs. Yikes! Goes to show how often I used to cook. he he.)

Sunday lunch - Fried Organic Noodles
Had this with store bought Sambal Belacan. Yumz!
Mebbe I'll make my own next time :)

Sunday Morning Activity with Elyssa - Milo jelly
She just loves "helping" mummy.

Pooh, Mickey and Hello Kitty jellies
Super easy to make and I'm sure kids will love 'em!

Elyssa's Birthday Celebration in Kindy

Wednesday morning did not start off well for me. I woke up slightly later than planned cos baby Erin was feverish and wanted to nurse many many times thru the night. *yawn*. Anyway, I quickly got Elyssa ready then drove her to the kindy, promising her I'd be there later with the cake and party packs.

Came home and that's when my problems started - the night before, I baked the cakes in 2 separate tins, let's call it Cake A and Cake B.
Problem #1: the butter wrapper that I placed at the cake tin base somehow got embedded to the bottom portion of Cake A. So when I pulled out the wrapper, huge chunks of cake came out as well. Yikes!
Problem #2 - both cakes rose beautifully this time, which resulted in dome shaped cakes. (I should have sliced off the dome part but at that time I was worried that I might end up with not enough cake due to Problem #1).
I went ahead with frosting the cake which was an absolute disaster! The 2 parts just won't stay in place! I tried all combinations - A on B, B on A, invert A then put on B, invert B then put on A.

Bleah! The clock was ticking away. Imagine this - I was still struggling with a huge mound of chocolate mess at 8.30am and I was due to leave my house around 9.20am. I just couldn't show up without a cake! No way I could buy a cake either cos the cake shop opens at 10am. *stress*

In the end, I just slathered lots of frosting on both parts of the cake, decorated it, chucked the whole thing in the fridge, hope and prayed the whole cake won't collapse, went for a super quick shower (I had chocolate all over me!) then drove to her kindy again.

I reached her classroom just before their break time. Elyssa was thrilled to see me! By then, part of the top portion of the cake had slid down! I pushed it up and hoped that it would stay for juuust 5-10 minutes.

Ok, photos now -

Elyssa with Mummy's Ugly and Might-collapse-anytime Cake
I was a little worried what Elyssa and her classmates might say. But they just went oooh over the princess icing, the chocolate frosting and smarties. Kids! Bless them :)

Classmates singing "Happy Birthday" to Elyssa

They sang both the Chinese and English Version

Blow!

With Mummy in the photo
Elyssa couldn't wait to cut the cake. Luckily, the cake did not collapse. Phew!

Close up shot of the Chocolate Cake
After all the drama, it was actually a very yummy cake! Almost the entire class asked for extras. The interesting thing was the teacher taught them "besar and "kecil" for "big and small" just that morning. So, for the extra piece, the teacher asked the kids whether they wanted "besar" or "kecil", and they were happily shouting "BESAR! BESAR! " He he..... I was happy!!

After eating cake, Elyssa distributed the party packs to her friends. (no photos cos I was helping her)

Happy Birthday Girl

Self-taken photo of Elyssa and I

Some of her classmates wanted photos as well -

3 girls and 3 boys. See how differently boys and girls pose!

After all the planning and execution, the party was over in less than 30 minutes! Hah!


Anyway, since I was on leave that day, I promised to pick her up from school (something she had requested before) and to bring her and cousin Justin for lunch at KFC.

The cousins at KFC

Elyssa kept saying "Thank You Mummy', "I am so happy" that day. It was an exhausting experience for me but definitely a rewarding one as well.

Happy 4th Birthday my princess!

Improvisation

Blur me forgot to pack the milk storage bottle to the office today!

Was wondering what to do with my precious 2oz, plus another 2oz that I will get from my afternoon pumping session - Go home and take bottle? (but quite far) Buy mineral water bottle? (but need to walk out to nearby shops) Drink it? (No way I'm gonna throw but still a bit "sayang" since I want Erin to benefit from my milk).

Looked around my room then saw a bottle of GNC Fenugreek pills that I just finished that morning. Bingo! Decided to use that. Washed a couple of times with hot water, then cold water to cool it down, then poured my precious milk into it.

My Milk Bottle for the day

Err....hope I don't end up poisoning baby Erin!

Gonna let her drink as soon as I get home. She puts all sorts of unsterilised things in her mouth these days, so this can't be that bad rite?? *fingers crossed*

My Monday Night Homework - Party Packs

My homework last night (Mon) was to pack Elyssa's party packs for her kindy's birthday celebration. Delayed celebration cos the kindy was closed for 1.5 weeks due to HFMD. I was sooooo dissappointed when I heard the news! Already submitted my leave for that day too. :( But what to do, life goes on.

Anyway, back to my party packs. First time doing it!

My messy work area on the floor

Party Pack Items
1. Angry Bird Stationery Set or Angry Bird Glitter Pen Set of 8 (assorted colours)
2. Winnie the Pooh notebook (assorted colours)
3. Some sweets as a filler.

The Completed Party Pack

I got clear plastic bags from Daiso. Tied it up with a ribbon then pasted Hello Kitty tags on top.
I think the tags made a big difference to the overall result! Did those in 15mins during my office lunch time :)
That morning, I also called up Elyssa's kindy to confirm the no. of students in her class. Decided to get their names as well, so that I could personalise the tags. (so that girls get red/yellow sets, while boys get blue/yellow sets)

3 packs down.....14 more to go. Started to get tired already. Aiyo.

Elyssa insisted on arranging the sweets

More Arrangement
She nearly drove me nuts cos she was YAKKING non-stop throughout the session.

And FINALLY....

Put into basket. Done. Phew!

I think I spent almost 2 hours - with Elyssa yakking away throughout. Had to stop a few times to carry & comfort Erin cos she started fretting. More stressful than anticipated! I nearly stopped at pack no 10, but luckily Erin was ok for a while so I hurriedly finished it all.

And yes, I was happy with the outcome!

So, that was Monday night's homework. Homework for today was to bake her chocolate cake and her vanilla cupcakes (done).
Tomorrow morning's homework is to make the frosting and frost the cakes. If I have time, it will be chocolate frosting for the cake and pink colour frosting for the cupcakes. If not, it will be chocolate frosting for both.

I have absolutely no idea why I "sendiri cari pasal" for Elyssa's birthday this year!! ;-)

Elyssa's Fourth Birthday Celebration

Elyssa is now FOUR years old!

Similar to her previous birthdays, we had a birthday dinner celebration for her together with our immediate family members. (but upgraded from 2 tables to 3 tables, since we have more pax now - more babies and more maids )

Similarly, we ordered too much food and totally forgot to take a single photo of the food.
Oops...... only remembered to take out the camera after eating. *burp*

So, here are some photos from the birthday song/cake cutting session -

Singing "Happy Birthday" to the birthday girl

Her "Special"Birthday Cake and Cupcakes
Why "special"? Cos I baked 'em!
That morning, Elyssa told me "mummy, I am sooo happy because you make my birthday cake".
Yay! that made all my effort worth it even tho the end result was no where as nice as a store bought cake :)

Blowing her FOUR candles

Our family unit

Cutting the birthday cake

Inside of the cake
Errr....a bit too fudgy. Maybe not enough baking powder? But passable for a newbie la! First time I frosted a cake.

Most important thing is that Elyssa enjoyed it!
Loved her chocolate mustache. he he.

2 other photos taken that night (totally forgot to take full family photo. duh)-

Ah Kong entertaining his grandkids

Elyssa receiving angpow from her Ku Jie

When we went home, Elyssa couldn't wait to open up and play with her presents -


Erin was very happy too! Happily playing with the packaging materials from jie jie's presents :)


Happy Birthday my Princess Elyssa!
For the past 3 years, on every birthday, I used to think "Oh, you are so big already". This time, it was different. I was thinking "Actually, you are still so small. Only 4 years old. Still a little girl". I'm sorry, Elyssa. Ever since baby Erin came along, I tend to think of you as a jie jie. And that you should behave like one. And I do get upset when you don't.
So, I told myself that night that I need to re-calibrate my expectations. And that you will always, always have a special place in my heart as my first born. And how I never knew I could love someone so much, until I had you. You literally changed my life for the better, on that Saturday morning 4 years ago. Happy Birthday, my princess.