Dinner at Italiannies, 1 Utama

A few days before Christmas we met up with some close friends at Italiannies. Jemima was their 5.5 yo daughter and Elyas their soon-to-be 3 yo son.

Great good, great time, and Vic eats normal spaghetti now. Only William who refused to nap in the afternoon had been grouchy because of fatigue, and after trying to hard to sleep whilst we all continued with our dinner, he finally dozed off.

Some pictures to enjoy...

How come she doesn't look too happy with her spaghetti beef bolognese?

Flying kisses (for me?)

With the same hair length and style, and both in jeans, people think they look like twins at certain angles.

Christmas 2009

As with previous years, our Christmas are always simple.

On Christmas Eve, we headed back to Seremban to spend dinner with Gong Gong Popo, Yee Yee, Yee Jiong and cousin Grace at this nearby restaurant which serves very reasonably priced but great portions of chinese food. After a sumptuous dinner we headed to CityPark to enjoy the night air and for the kids to burn off some energy.

Big jie jie with cousin Grace and brother William

Cheeky boy with the pomelo hat

Vic on the swing at CityPark

William goes down the tunnel slide

William screams with joy as he plays on this

We went to church on Christmas morning, thereafter we had an exciting time preparing home cooked Christmas luncheon within a short span of time. The menu was Western, with Virginia ham, back bacon, chips, poached vegetables with special brown gravy, deep fried chicken and homemade pork patti and old cucumber soup. I hope I didn't miss out anything.

Yummy home cooked food

Christmas lunch - Victoria's combo meal

This is a historical moment of truth. Vic tastes her FIRST egg-y dairy ice-cream after more than a year of "puasa" PTL!!

Ma Ma Yeh Yeh have this electric bumper car in their house. William was initially scared of this as it can move when on, but later got addicted to it.

Thereafter it was the traditional present opening time! The kids now have a vast collection of Tonka cars and a fire station, and Vic received a Thomas & Friends playset from daddy mummy. This year we were more prudent with our gifts for the kids for obvious reasons.

William relaxing on Yeh Yeh's big leather chair with his present.

Christmas is definitely a time to spend with family, relatives and close friends. So much food too, that it's not surprising that if I should have any new year's resolution, it would be to trim down my waistline.

But of course, the true meaning of Christmas is always the celebration of Jesus' birth 2000 years ago.

Victoria is not all that easy to handle

Lately I tested Victoria on spelling. Words that she once used to know how, she has suddenly forgotten. Maybe rusty, like they say. I teach her again. I spelt out for her and then asked her to repeat after me. And this little girl just went on a freeze mode. No amount of raising my voice or repeating myself or threats will get her to spell.

Then there's been a few nights that she just wouldn't sleep, despite not napping the whole day. And that got us mad. I can't remember how many times we gave her warnings. She can lie on the bed with her eyes open for an hour just staring into space. And the clock continues to tick. But to Victoria, she's like on freeze mode again especially when our repeated warnings fall on deaf ears.

And then naturally she wakes up late, sometimes at as late as 11am and then dilly dally, lying on the bed for another 15 minutes or so which I just leave her be and continue with my own work. When I think she should be really to get up, I ask her to brush her teeth and then she doesn't. The whole process of cleaning her up in the morning, changing her clothes and getting her downstairs for breakfast can take up to 1hour, depending on who attends to her, but nothing less than half an hour. Doesn't that just makes your blood boil?

Sometimes throughout the day she does not do what you tell her. Like most kids I guess, but I don't understand why she hears but doesn't follow. She knows and she understands but chooses to do otherwise. I am by nature not a very patient person, but with the kids I dare say I improved a lot. Sometimes I think I am not cut out to be a stay at home mom. Maybe I do better in the office. But then I remembered there were times when I was working and I thought I would be better at home.

William is getting more assertive now, knowing how to stand up for his rights or insist on what he wants, and he does bully the sister at times. He takes risk, HIGH risk by free falling sideways or backwards whether or not there is someone near him, and he does this on our bed or even on the day bed. He is capable of climbing up and down the stairs himself, and sometimes this cheeky boy will jump from the last step of the stairs down. Haiyooo... the more I say NO don't do it, the more he laughs and does what I say no. I am thinking, is this the beginning of more ruckus, havoc, heart-stopping stunts to come?

And God, if we should have a third child, can I please, please have a girl? (One who loves to wear dresses and skirts?)

Holiday Pictures - Part 2

The view from our room

William in his cot

Swimming like a fish in the water, but ONLY with a float. Her ol' faithful pink fish float "bocor-ed" and he pestered Daddy to part with RM20 for this float bought from the hotel shop
Yeaaaahhhh!!!

Vic went "shooting" some other kids in the pool and made herself some friends

Happy with his little watering pot, ball and scoop.

Digging a hole to release Tita. Victoria would rather play with the umbrella

Tita released back to his home

Look at William's "electrified" hair (btw, i think he's checking out a babe in a bikini)

My little sweet boy. William at 19.5months

Good bye Kuantan. Not sure when we will be back again this time.

Holiday Pictures - Part 1

Yes, we are FINALLY HOME!!! I dropped the maid off at our house and unloaded whilst William continued his afternoon siesta on his carseat, and then I left the maid there to clean up. As for William and I, we were off to pick Victoria up from her Yee Sok's house in Setia Alam, where she spent 2D1N with her MaMa. It's my first time driving there myself, and even with the GPS, I made a wrong turn... silly me! Thank God it was a Monday afternoon and there was no jam on the NKVE.

The house is clean now, all vaccuumed and mopped, wiped and floor mats and sheets changed. Daddy cleaned up quite a bit over the weekend in anticipation of our return, and also helped me stock up the fridge on Saturday.

So here are some photos which I promised, starting with JB and Singapore (5-7Dec)

Our room at The Grand Parragon, Johor Bahru. I'm not one who like to review hotel rooms unless they are really nice or the total opposite. In this case, I'd like to say this room is very, very small. This is before they put in the baby cot, which was later fitted in between the bed and the armchair.
The walk space between the TV and the bed is less than 3 feet. That's all there is to this room.

This is hilarious. The organizers use this oversized lady to entertain us in front of the new E class.

William's rare moments eating outside food. He indulged in the grilled salmon and attempted at the fruit cocktail but Mummy would not allow. Here he is helping himself to his jie jie's plate

William with his youngest uncle from Singapore. This uncle is slightly over a year older than William.

Pictures of our picnic at Seremban 2 CityPark

Yeh Yeh carrying William, with Vic beside.
Feeding the fishes.

All the well fed koi fishes. There's even some other species there, one of which is the "pak sou kong"
The big baby in the small brother's stroller
William was sooo happy here, he protested big time when we tried to pry him away
Going home

Oh and btw, during the picnic I realised that the coconut bun I bought for Vic turned out to be a spicy sardin bun. So I gave Vic some of the egg from the egg tart and contents of siew pau which we brought (she didn't eat the pastry as it contains margarine). As she dug into the egg, she looked at me and said, "Thank you Mummy for letting me eat this." I replied her that I remembered months back when she was still forbidden to eat this I had promised her that I will buy for her when she gets well.

Everywhere but home

Here... there...
Yes, we've been everywhere but home. From Kuantan last weekend, we stopped in KL for 3 days because Vic had to attend her 2nd last music lesson before her year-end concert (yes this little girl is more happening than mummy these days). We did a mini moving house to another place, and the maid vacuumed, mopped, swept, wiped, washed both our home where we went back only to get drinking water and other supplies, and also our temporary home in MK.

Simple Joys
Last Wednesday we came back to Seremban and have been staying at my in-law's home. Vic and William spent a day with their Popo and cousin Grace which they just love. On Thursday, Yeh Yeh brought us all to Jusco to eat Vic's favourite Una Don at Sushi King (to be honest, I think she's getting jia lak with this dish coz she sometimes just pour the miso soup into her bowl and everything becomes soggy and she ends up leaving behind half the bowl of Una Don). After lunch, I brought them upstairs and found a off-white dress for Vic which (all of a sudden) she's been bugging me to buy (maybe from seeing all the pretty dresses in the display windows of the bridal galleries in SS2). Then the kids headed to (like zombies on auto-mode) the arcade on the same floor. They are like fish in a water, just naturals and simply curious, excited and magnetized!

Then on Thurday night, cousin Theodore was back with his parents and Mama. This is where all the fun begins! Vic loves to be the big jie jie with the two smaller boys. They roll around on the mattress, sit on the electric toy bumper car, have their biscuit tea time together, play with cars and ball or just simply running up and down. With so much happening, you can guess that Vic won't take her afternoon nap, even after having promised me and making a deal with me.

Picnic
Yesterday evening we had a little picnic at CityPark in Seremban 2. It's a huge park complete with jogging tracks, a big lake with many koi fishes, children's playground, adult workout area, kite flying field and some other stuff. Vic used to patronize this area quite frequently before she was 3 and staying with her Popo GongGong. I will upload the pictures once I get the chance - I know, I owe this blog many many pictures!

Home?
Today we are suppose to head back to PJ - HOME. Daddy is missing us and so do we. But William woke up with a temperature and vomitted his morning milk feed out with some phelgm. We may delay our trip home so that William can rest with clean air, as our neighbor rushes to complete his front house renovation.

3 weeks into Victoria's school holiday and although we've been mostly away from home and without Daddy, I'm glad the kids have a great time catching up with their Grandparents and cousins. (Btw, thanks Yeh Yeh for housing us and letting us make a mess of the place ; ) )

Away away on holiday

We have been away from home for a week now but somehow it feels like a whole month to me. Well, yea, I do miss our PJ home, despite welcoming this change and break.

Last weekend we made our way south to JB and Singapore. Daddy had a company event in JB on Saturday and we extended our stay by visiting his grandma (Vic and Will's taipo) some of his aunts, my cousins and their kids (whom we've not met for many many years) by spending a night in Singapore. We spent more time with relatives and didn't manage any year-end shopping, but that's no disappointment. It's always a great feeling catching up with relatives and seeing the kids play with their young (really young -the oldest 13yo the youngest 3yo) uncles.

The whole week we've been bumming around Seremban town, and Vic is the happiest whenever she's with her grandparents.

Today we left Seremban and arrived Kuantan for a short 2D1N stay. The weather, unfortunately, has not been welcoming. It poured the whole journey here, and God held the skies only for a good half hour for us to go down to the seaside to release our pet-crab, Tita back to the sea. To Tita - I hope you will enjoy riding on the waves again, digging holes and playing hide-n-seek with the humans. Be safe, don't get eaten by the bigger crabs and watch out for human feets. We enjoyed taking care of Tita the past few months, and the kids especially William have been always amused with the crab. (Just a note, when we released Tita, he didn't run away instead he did not move for a long time. Maybe he's been too domesticated, lol!)

I took some pictures but didn't bring my cable to download them from the camera. So will only upload the pictures later.

Victoria's Kindy Concert: Part 2

Victoria in her play act on stage. She waits patiently for the principal to finish her speech.

Mary and Joseph, acted out by Victoria and Gian

The angels sing

Victoria's skin prick test result

This is a happy post.

Last Saturday we brought Victoria for her pre-scheduled appointment with this immunologist from Pantai Hospital. This was her 2nd visit, the first being one to introduce ourselves to the doctor.

So last Saturday she was tested via a skin prick test on chicken, eggs, cow's milk, wheat/rye/barley, latex (connected with kiwi/strawberry/dragonfruit/etc), shrimps, tropical dustmites, international dustmites, pandan, mushroom and fungus (mok yue).

She aced them all - NO REACTION!

Although the result was expected as this only confirms the results in April this year at Tangkak (her other allergist doctor), the true test is eating.

On the way back, I asked her what would be the first food she wants to eat. She said chicken rice. We were abit hesitant since the rice has margarine which we know she was allergic to, but if we don't try, we wouldn't know if she's been healed. So I gave her a quarter of the chicken and rice. Her inner arm started to itch and became red an hour later. My joy quavered. But the consolation was I knew she could eat chicken as I have been giving her chicken a few weeks back, starting with kampong chicken then to the normal white chicken.

The next day-Sunday, we ate outside after church. She tasted a little of chicken curry laksa, herbal duck mee sua and nasi lemak with curry chicken.

On Monday, we tested her on egg. Yes, egg. Half a fried egg. No itch. No reaction. Truly, this is a miracle happening in front of me. This is the day that we have all been waiting for, for over one year, my brave little girl has remained patient, and persevered and faithful. After all the tears and prayers, this is it.

On Tuesday, I gave her half fried egg for breakfast based on her request. She is one very happy girl these few days, I tell ya. No reaction. PTL!!! For lunch, she ate shreded chicken wan tan mee - one of her favourites before she had to "puasa"

Why the rush in testing her with eggs? Well, initially I planned to test her on one food type each week, but we hasten the process with eggs because we needed to catch the current MAS promotion to book our tickets back to UK. (I will blog about this another time).

The next one month will be an exciting month, giving her a variety of food little at a time, to reaffirm the test results.

And each time, we say a prayer of thanksgiving.

The two little flers...

... have their days where they fight like husband and wife (Vic would stomp off and decide not to play or talk with William) and there are days when the two of them are soooo loving to each other.

The younger one would sit at the bottom of the stairs and ask the sister to sit beside him. He would go hug her, and she would insist on feeding him. He would throw his balls down the railings and she will happily pick them up, much to his amusement.

They can fight over the same thing or over different things like which DVD to watch. Sometimes, William would hit his jie jie on the head, or pinch. Most of the other times, Victoria would mumble something about William not loving her and she will sulk and make some self-pity statements.

But after all these, it's normally the boy who would make the first move to make up by hugging his jie jie back. (Good training, right?)

Happy bedtime shots...

... taken last nite of my soon-to-be 19 month old baby. He's a true darling in the bedroom whenever I put him to sleep.

Last nite he was laughing so happily that I couldn't resist not snapping his pictures. It all started when I wanted to make a phone call, and he decided to help me hold my phone to my ear, and then take it away all of a sudden. I entertained him by pretending to be shocked, and he burst out in laughter. What's so funny? Beats me, but like I said, he's a true darling.

Little miss-something

Victoria is a...

1. Little Negotiator

She negotiates on almost everything. We have moved on from her crying aka lau gai days just because she cannot get her way, and she negotiates on a deal we can both agree on. For example, this little 4.5yo negotiates with me when she wants to wear her socks. She reasons as she negotiates. Just because once when it rained heavily in the afternoon and I didn't want her to catch a cold, I suggested she wear her socks and long sleeve (she used to, until I "trained" her to stop) during her nap. Thereafter, every time it rains in the afternoon, or ABOUT to rain, she becomes happy and is quick to ask me if she can wear her socks. If I say no (just to be difficult), she tells me it's raining and she's cold. Then I pretend to have some concerns about her not taking it off after she wakes and she "promises" to do so.

Just the other day she was having her early dinner before her music class. She kept telling me she couldn't finish her dinner and initially I ignored her. She was rather persistent, and continued saying, "Mummy I cannot finish, how?" After some time, she realise that's not leading to the answer she wants to hear, so she tried a different tactic. I was surprised when she suggested to me to keep her dinner till after music class and she "promise" she will have it all polished off!! I hesistated. Then she yelled, "promise or not? You trust me?"

OK OK.

2. Little Complainer

Yes, she complains. About small things like why the maid didn't help her with xxx, that she doesn't have 2 sunshades in the car just like her brother, that she cannot watch her Snow White DVD, that she doesn't want to eat her vege and yesterday she got scolded for complaining about having too much to eat! Thank God her complaints are not the same everyday and these mainly depend on her mood.

3. Little Helper

My Victoria is forever my little helper, exactly what my gynae has "prophesized"! She loves to watch the maid cook and willingly extends her hand in whatever we ask her to do. Sometimes, she makes uncalled for initiaves by washing the plates with the Dettol Handwash (because that's the only soap that she can use). She loves cutting garlics and even asked to cut onions too but of course that's a no no. We give her a butter knife and chopping board to cut the garlics and she happily chops away. Yesterday evening whilst I was taking my bath, I suddenly realised that I had forgotten to put a new towel in the bathroom. And guess who came to my rescue? Victoria! She came upstairs to complain to me that Daddy didn't let her watch her DVD but allowed William to watch his Donutman instead, hoping that I will overturn Daddy's decision. Haha, of course that didn't happen. Instead, I got her to bring me my towel from outside. She even asked me, just to be sure, "What colour is your towel?"

4. Little Miss Perfect

When it comes to Heh Heh (remember her favourite doll?), she must dress Heh Heh in the way that she wants. The doll wears a complete set of long sleeve, long pants (both rolled up), diapers (sponsored by William), socks and mittens. Sometimes Heh Heh is also wrapped up in a white nappy cloth just like a newborn. And how is she super miss perfect here? She insists that Heh Heh's mittens must be tightly worn (I don't know why she can't do this herself) and will bug you until you do it for her.

Victoria's Kindy Concert: Part 1

Today is a special day. The four grandparents and cousin Grace made their way up from Seremban early in the morning, to come to see and support Victoria at her annual year end concert. Victoria plays Mother Mary in a short play on Christmas. They children were all dressed up in biblical costumes and they were all very sporting.

Proud mummy with Vic holding her doll (named Harry whose role is Baby Jesus)

After the play. Peeping through...


I want to note here, that hubby and I are very proud of you, our little princess Victoria. It's such joy to see how you've grown into a matured little girl and with mixed feelings I see her enjoy her time with her kindy friends. This is because next year Victoria will join a new school in preparation for Primary One.

Waiting for the children to walk in. William.

Mummy with my two wonderful children

I was worried that Vic will not be able to wake up early in time this morning. Last nite I tried not to talk too much about her concert for fear she might get too excited, but casually mentioned that she should sleep early so she will have no problem waking up early. This morning, before William (normally the first or second to wake) or I open our eyes, I heard hubby and Victoria's voice.

Vic was pretty cool at kindy. Didn't see her nervous at all. William watched for a while, then tried to sleep but couldn't, I think he was just excited with all that is happening around him.

After the concert was a little makan to fill the little (and big) tummies. Truly a wonderful concert, a wonderful day (we attended a gathering in the evening, will blog about this later) and all praise to God. I will post up more pictures on the concert itself after I receive the official photographs as the pictures in my camera came out too blur and with red eye effect (the little kids do look rather scary with the red eyes, haha).

Good friends. Victoria, Amanda and Chloe.

Another good friend, "Angel" Alena. They play together most whilst waiting for the mummies to pick them after school.

Victoria with Yuriko.

And this is with "Joseph" played by Gian. The two of them held hands during the play, and after the play when we told them to smile for the photographer, they were playfully stepping on each other's toes. Hhmmm...

-to be continued-