Sweet Moments

*Phoo Phoo......Blow Cobwebs*

 

Haven't updated this blog for more than 2 weeks already! Various reasons actually. Have been unwell lately. Cough and flu for more than a month :(  So when the kids sleep at night, I tend to doze off as well. And of course, the longer I don't update this blog, the harder it is to "re-start" the engine.

 

So here's a quickie post to start things off again.

 

Presenting...... Sweet Elyssa and Erin moments:

 

Elyssa jie jie carefully feeding Erin

 

 

Reading books together at MPH 

 

 

Fooling around at home - they love their "same-same" pyjamas!

 

 

Sharing a cup of ice-blended coffee

(uhm....or more like trying to drink Daddy's coffee as fast as they can before Daddy wants it back!)

 

 

There are plenty more sweet moments between the 2 sisters. Love, love, LOVE moments like these!

 

But of course, for each of these sweet moments, there are probably 10  times (or 100 times?) of the "unsweet" moments. Ha ha.!  They do fight like cats and dogs A LOT!  Erin is at the stage where she wants everything jie jie has.  And Elyssa is at the stage where she doesn't really want to give in.  So yup, pretty much a standard recipe of lots of crying and wailing on a regular basis  ;-)

"T"

For Erin, the most important alphabet is "T". 

 

Example -

1. Ah Tong (= Ah Kong)

2. Tie Tie (=Jie Jie)

3. Toup (= Soup)

4. Too Too (=Shoe Shoe)

5. Took (=Good)

 

Ha ha..... I just love the learning-to-talk phase  :-)

 

 

" T's the best!!! "

 

 

Hospital Stay

After almost 6 days of persistent fever, Erin was admitted to the hospital recently.   :(

My poor baby!

 

 

On her hospital bed

I expected a wailing scene when the nurses poked her hand to draw blood and for the drip. But Erin was just so, so brave. She struggled a bit toward the end of the procedure (nurses took TWO vials of blood) but she hardly made a sound or cried. So proud of her!

 

 

Both hands with plaster and board

*Sigh*, so sad to see my poor baby like that. Nurses plastered her left hand as well to prevent her from pulling the tube from her right hand.  Surprisingly, Erin wasn't very disturbed by the boards. On the next day, she could even comfortably play games on the Ipad using her two free thumbs.

 

 

Her admission was around 11pm on Monday night. Still had fever on-and-off and it spiked again on Tuesday morning.  When the doctor came to check on Tuesday, she did not give the green light for discharge, so we had to stay on for another night.

 

Both hubby and I stayed in the hospital with her, while Elyssa stayed over at Ah Kong and Ah Mah's house.

 

Going for a walk in the ward

 

 

Luckily, she didn't have any fever on Tuesday afternoon onwards and on Wednesday morning, doctor said she could be discharged.  Yay!

 

 

Happy with her balloon

The tube was removed around 11pm on Tuesday. The 3 of us went downstairs for breakfast @ Subway the following morning and she happily chose her Hello Kitty balloon right after that.

 

 

And what was the diagnosis?  Nothing conclusive actually. Dengue ruled out. Urine results showed no infection. So, the general term "viral fever" was used. She was put on drips for about 24 hours with 1 dosage of antibiotic into the last round of drips as well as standard oral paracetamol every 4-6 hours.

 

A part of me still thinks the fever would have ran its course anyway and the hospital stay could have been avoided. But then again, I suppose it's better to be safe than sorry. (and hubby who's Mr Panicky would have driven himself crazeee with worry!)  

She said it!!!

Yay....... my baby can finally call me!  Ok, instead of "Mummy" it's "Ah Mee"  but that's good enough for me.  During dinner just now, she happily pointed at me and said "Ah Mee", Ah Mee" Ah Mee" in quick succession.  Yippeee Yay  :-)

 

 

I can't believe the fuss mummy is making about me saying "Ah Mee"!

 

 

Her other words:

1.  Eh Dee  (Daddy)

2.  Ah Tong (Ah Kong)

3.  Ah Mah (Ah Mah)

4.  Jah Jah (jie jie)

5.  Pohr Pohr (pom pom)

6.  Mine (mine = she says this when trying to take things from other people)

7.  NO ! 

8.  Toup (soup)

9.  Thoo (shoe)

10. I wa!  (I want)

11. Elvi (Elvis, our dog.  Either that or she's asking for an LV bag. keke)

 

A big improvement indeed, in just this couple of weeks. I think we're going to hear plenty of words from her very soon  :-)





Juicing

My latest craze is -- JUICING!!

 

I bought a second hand Hurom slow juicer about 2 weeks ago, and have been happily juicing almost every day since then.

 

I started off with pure fruit juices. My first attempt was a combo of apple, orange and pineapple. It was of course, very nice to drink but that wasn't my purpose of getting a slow juicer.  

 

Pretty soon, I got my veggies in! 

 

Fruit &Vege Combo - carrots, broccoli (yes, broccoli!), cucumber, turnip, lettuce, orange

 

 

Elyssa helping with the juicing

 

 

As expected, Erin didn't want to be left out!

 

 

Juice from above combo

Both girls gulped down their portion and asked for more :-)

 

 

Another Fruit & Vege Combo - carrots, celery, broccoli, organic sweet potato leaves, turnip, green apples and oranges.

 

 

Green juice from the combo above.

Hubby and I were pleasantly surprised with the taste but both girls refused to touch it

 

 

Here's a more "potent" combo - bitter gourd, carrot, celery, sweet potato leaves, turnip, apple

 Verdict : bitter but drinkable!

 

 I knew Elyssa won't touch the combo above, so I asked her to pick her own combo of 2 fruits and 2 vege.

 

She picked this for her personal combo : carrot, sweet potato leaves, orange, apple

 

She drank it all up !

 

 

Didn't take photo of the rest, but so far, I've also added - yellow zucchini, lemon, pomegranate, spinach, guava and Japanese cucumber.

And here's my take after 2 weeks:

a) Adding any leafy greens makes the juice a lot less palatable  :(

b) Thumbs up for carrot, celery, turnip, yellow zucchini and cucumber

c) Adding bittergourd makes the juice bitter (ahbuden!) but lemon helps a lot

 

On weekdays, I make these juices after work and I'm really glad to add on all these fruits and vege to the daily diet. Once, after being stuck in a particularly horrible traffic jam on the way home, a simple juice of celery and green apple made me feel much better :-)

 

 

Oh, I've been making nut milks with my juicer too. There's a lot of negative studies about cows milk (hormone injections, not meant for adult humans bla bla....). A bit worrying since we drink a lot of  cows milk in our household. Not going to go for a drastic change of zero cows milk, but I like the idea of having an alternative milk in my fridge :-)

 

 

My first attempt  - creamy, nutty, Almond milk with some added Milo.  Yuh-mee!!  

 

 

Cashew nut milk 

Made 3 rounds so far

 

 

 

Really loving my juicing (and nut milk) journey so far :-)

Erin is TWO years old!

Oh my, oh my......my "baby" is 2 years old already??????   I can't help thinking she's still a leeeetle girl!!!  

 

For her 2nd birthday, we had a simple birthday celebration for her at home.  And as with current tradition, of course I had to bake a girl for my little princess.

 

Ta daaa.......here's the birthday girl with her birthday cake.

 

 

"That's MY cake!"

She loved her cake.  *Grins*

 

 

Clap Clap during birthday song

 

 

Blow!

 

 

The 4 of us

 

 

Inside of cake
Simple butter cake with chocolate cake. I was happy when I found the M&Ms and Kit Kat decoration idea from the net. Practically fail-proof!  Ok, not healthy at all but what the heck, birthdays come only once year!  And as expected, kids loved it. (ahem....even 70+ year old Ah Kong was "caught" munching on a Kit Kat before the cake was cut. Haha!)

 

Party food
Got lazy and tapao'ed everything this time. This neighbourhood restaurant even loaned us the serving trays.

 

With some of her presents
Didn't manage to get a smiling photo



Cousins playing after dinner
I didn't even bother trying to get everyone in the photo this time. Practically an impossible task ;-)

 

Opening presents

Jie jie seems even more excited than birthday girl ;-)  

 

 

Birthday hug from jie jie 

 

 

My dear princess Erin....you're TWO years old already.  We are all still waiting for you to talk properly.  Though sometimes, daddy and I think it's your ploy to make us believe you are still a little girl.  And by doing that, Yes, you do get away with murder sometimes!  Ah Kong still insists that you shouldn't get scolded because you are far too young. But from your actions, your responses and your gestures, we know you understand and comprehend a lot of things.  So, we will wait until you are ready.

Mummy doesn't update your milestones diligently like for jie jie last time, but rest assured, mummy loves you LOADS and LOADS!  Happy 2nd Birthday!

 

 

 

Teacher's Day Gift

---another late post--

 

Similar to last year, I decided to bake something for Elyssa to give her teachers on Teacher's Day.

 

I baked Chocolate Chip and Macadamia Cookies this time.

 

Cookie Box for her class teacher

 

Single cookies for her other teachers

Thought it look a bit plain, so I added a simple ribbon loop at the top.

Supposed to be 2 in a pack, but I burnt my first lot of cookies  :(

 

 

Back View  : Simple thank you note from Elyssa

No masterpiece cos all were done in < 20 minutes. No time to even colour.

 

A bit rushed to do things on a weeknight after work, but glad we managed to pull it off  :-)