As the year comes to an end...

... as I wrap up the Christmas decos and put away the Christmas tree,
... as I attempt to spring clean my house in anticipation of some new built in cabinets,
... as it dawned upon me that this is the last week of school holidays

Where did the time go? How did December come about without so much as a warning?

Time flies. This year has been better than the last in terms of less hospital stays, and more holidays! : )

2010 Highlights (as much as I can remember... I'm getting old - BIG SIGH)

January
I remembered how Vic showed much maturity by not crying, and totally adapting well in her new, big kindy.

February
CNY in Singapore.

Busied packing and preparing the itinerary for our homecoming to UK. This is the country where hubs and I fell in love and for that reason, our kids are named after the Royal Family. It is also this place where I left a piece of my heart behind some 11 years ago upon graduation, and this trip closes the chapter.


March
We all loved our stay in UK. Wish we had a permanent home in England so we can return as and when we like. Serious.




April
Vic turned 5 and William 2. This year, we kept celebrations very moderate and low profiled.

Maid No.4 was sent back to her country for poor performance and no initiatives. We rather go maidless than endure her silly antics for another day.

May
More take away food, less home cooked. More grumblings and naggings from Mummy as I attempt to recruit my young troops to clean up after playing. Vic lived up to my gynae's prediction again, she's my Little Helper - watching after little brother, wiping the table after dinner, chipping in wherever she can and whenever she has the mood. ; P

Aunty Ivy and Uncle Kevin from UK visited us. Our turn to play host to them albeit for only a few days (when will we see you again?)

June
Adapting to a maidless environment, and I have increased the frequency of part time maids to twice, sometimes thrice a week.

Still a unit, still surviving, but looking forward and praying for a good helper due end of the month.

End of the month, maid No.5 arrives from Cambodia - looked totally unlike her biodata photo, but pleasant and hardworking on first impression.

We also got our house and cars fumigated, and all general surfaces protected with Bactakleen


July
Life resumes back to almost normal. Maid learns fast, and I made some exaggerated moves and talked loud and slow to ensure accurate understanding. Kids seemed to like her too.

Like newbies in college, the kids put the maid through ragging once. I told Maid to play with the kids while I took my bath, and after 10 minutes, I heard the kids screaming in wild laughter downstairs. I did not check, but quickly turned on my desktop for some quick work.

After a while, I went downstairs to check, and saw that the kids have got the maid on all fours like a horse, and both kids, if I recall correctly, both kids were sitting on the maid's back.

William screamed, "Giddy-up!" and they all laughed, including the maid. Poor maid.


August
What happened?


September
What happened?


October
What happened? Oh ya, the past three months, the little boyboy who developed his speech late, started talking a lot lot more, and have became more adventurous and risk-taking by climbing door grills, jumping off the sofa, up and down the bed, two steps off the staircase.

William learned to tease his sister too, giving us fun "poke y'all"s and then irritating Victoria whenever he likes.

And of course, the 5D4N Phuket holiday.

November
Korea trip with cell group friends. This is the one holiday of all holidays I have taken, that left me tired out even on the first day... the itinerary was packed full, we saw many, did a lot and ate varieties.

Hubs hospitalised for a week after we got back as his throat infection and fever took the most of him.

December
Christmas and now we're heading to the new year. William is still nursing a bad throat infection (nothing to do with hubs') and the fever has gone after 4 days. Vic and William's stool are still soft and watery but not too frequent.

Keeping fingers cross for all pink health when we usher in the new year, and hopefully squeeze in a little mommy-daddy time.

Some crazy thoughts from me

I looked back this year, not too far back though, and some thoughts flash back as I feel regret over times that I failed myself as a parent. Yes, if you follow my blog long enough you may sense that I am a perfectionist at heart, and I have high expectations, and mainly result-orientated.

To Vic and Will, I am sorry if I have not given enough encouragement as a mother should, forgotten my daily prayers and didn't give enough hugs to you.

Yet. Parenting is not a job we can resign from. There is no performance feedback (except when you cook, and the kids tell you it's not salty enough) and the only result we see is when they become adults and maybe parents themselves.

I stopped making resolutions for donkey years already. Call me cynical or paranoia, but resolutions only make me feel guilty if I don't keep them by year end. I don't even recall them by February. But for 2011, let me say this that I want to learn the good things from my two wonderful darlings.

1. I want to laugh as much as William, smile as generous as him and proclaim love freely like my boyboy.
2. Forgive more, like Victoria (she has a big heart I know) and build my patience like how Victoria is towards her food allergies.

Happy New Year everyone!

A silent Christmas

Two days before Christmas we left PJ for Seremban with eager heards to celebrate Christmas and just simply family time with the grandparents. Tai Gong, Aunty Maria and 5th Yee Por from Ipoh, and relatives from Malacca will be joining us and Popo Gong Gong, together with Yee Yee, Yee Jiong and cousins Grace and Andrew for an extraordinary Christmas Eve dinner.

On the way down to Seremban, Daddy got a call that he must return to work the next day ie Christmas Eve, and therefore he will be missing both the Eve dinner, as well as Christmas luncheon with Mama Yeh Yeh.

Victoria just recovered from a slight purging and flu, but William came down with high fever that night, and the next day, his health suddenly plunged even more with a terrible dry cough that didn't sound good.

Christmas Eve - Kensington Restaurant, Seremban 2

Before Daddy left to head back to KL, we decided to let the kids open SOME of their presents first. Traditionally, this would be done after Christmas luncheon on Christmas day.

The ultimate Buzz Lightyear - can fly, got laser light and can talk, one!

Dinner was fun with so many relatives around for the first as previous years, it would just be a smaller group of the grandparents, Yee Yee's family and our family. We had a booking with Kensington. William didn't touch his favourite carbonara pasta. He didn't eat much at all, and was rather "lau gai" towards the end of the dinner.



His fever came back very high, and refused to be sponged. Thank God he took his medicine very very obediently the moment we got home. Middle of the night, William's fever came back very high again, his cough seemed worse. I sponged him from 4-530am.

Christmas Day - Agape Church, Seremban

William lost his voice on Christmas Day. He talks much lesser and when he do, he's whispering.

We attended celebrations at Agape, feels at home just to be back. (Hubs and I used to attend this church quite regularly in the early days) People looked the same, don't seem to have aged a bit in this place ;P

Feels weird not having hubs by my side.

We had luncheon booked at Pizza Italia, a very nice Italian restaurant runned and owned by a local lady married to a Italian chef-hubby. Their pizzas are marvelous but for Christmas, I decided to go for their highly recommended grilled wagyu beef steak.


For Victoria, the lady boss has pre-agreed to cook an allergy-free carbonara pasta dish for her, with organic farfalle pasta that we provided her a week earlier. I thought William would love this dish too, as well.. I mentioned carbonara is his favourite. But my boy boy was sick, and he protested when I put some on his plate. Again, he hardly touched his food except for the home made salmon soup.

On the way home, William slept in the car earlier than his usual nap time.

Yeh Yeh bought coconut water and William later finished 8oz.

William and I tumped a lift back to PJ in Yee Sok's car, whilst Victoria and the maid followed Aunty Maria's car also heading back to PJ.

Christmas Dinner - home

Home in PJ again. Hubs finished his morning duty, although work is not completed. But great to be together again.

For dinner, we had to cancel plans with Tai Gong et al because of William's health, but let Victoria joined them. For just the three of us and the maid, we ordered simple big wok ("dai chau") noodles - Cantonese yee mee, Singaporean meehoon, fried rice and deer meat fried kuey teow, put on a DVD and then had dinner in the livingroom. : )

William's appetite came back, I guess it's natural that he should eat more since he hardly ate anything the whole day. He polished off all the porridge and ate some of the kuey teow. Felt happy to see him eat again.

Boxing Day - home

The night before William's fever came back very high but this time refused to be sponged. I managed to get him to swallow the paracetamol, and then as his cough deteriorated, we had to force him to take ventolin. Even Vic woke from all the commotion, and we all slept back by 7am.

I went to the market to stock up for the week. When I got back, hubs rushed to our normal paed to take a number but discovered that the paed was sick, so we had to find another paed on a Sunday morning. For any of you parents who have tried this before, you would understand how hard it is. Finally, we found one through recommendation, a Dr Chan from Damansara Jaya.

The doc started William on Augmentin antibiotic for one week, prescribed Tusidex for his cough and said to continue with Paracetamol and Ventolin. I bought coconut water for the family.

Still very quiet in the house, because there is no screaming, jumping, climbing boy! Vic slept till 12noon!

In the afternoon, hubs left for work again. We invited Tai Gong, Aunty Maria, 5th Yee Por, Uncle Morgan and his wife over for a simple home cooked dinner.

During dinner time, Vic said she not appetite and body felt warm. Gave her med. William ate - phew! So now, I have two sick kids. Sigh.

Later Vic's condition improved and she had some mee sua for dinner. Yee Por helped me sponge her and together with Aunty Maria, Victoria's mood lifted.

Monday, 27th December 2010

Both kids woke up with fever, and I gave them a medley of medicine, with colors of pink, orange, brown, white and transparent!

William's voice came back a little bit, and he managed to down his oats for breakfast. Victoria had 3 bowls!

William had purging 3x yesterday, and once today. I suspect could be due to the coconut water, or the antibiotic.

As I write this now, my two kids are playing their new remote control car toy in the livingroom. William has been much more active today, on the rebound, and so is Victoria. His voice has come back a bit after lunch, and he definitely knows that by talking a lot more. : )

My Christmas Thoughts

Christmas was very different this year. Happy because of the festival that we celebrate, and the family get togethers. But could have been better. This is our first time spending Christmas apart, as a couple and it doesn't help that both kids are not well.

Some of the presents they kids got this year. As you see, they are mostly Toy Story merchandise - from coloring pencils, to water tumbler, pyjamas, scrabble, toys, lego and even puzzle!

Christmas happens in our hearts. Not the presents (this year we were very generous), not the food (but good food definitely helps), not the people (it's between ourself and God), not the place.

Victoria's JMC concert 2010

Hohoho! It's the time of the year again, for Vic's JMC concert which happens each time after the class completes a book. This is Vic's 3rd JMC concert in Yamaha. The previous time, the class didn't do so well and the teacher (and maybe some parents) were disappointed.

However, this round, everyone sang and played louder, generally put up a good show, albeit more polishing on the confidence part.

Here are pictures of my little girl in action. Note: It's always hard to get her to look or smile at the camera (something we have to work on)






No more music class for the next 3 weeks! : )

I smiled...

... this morning William was sitting on the toilet throne and his itchy hands as usual just have to touch something. He grabbed a small travel kit mirror and said "Hi" to his own reflection. I brushed my teeth and let him be, secretly fascinated.

Then I waited outside the bathroom. He kept saying "Hi" to himself and then laughed. Suddenly he said, "Hi, I'm Buzz Lightyear" to his own reflection. Hahahaha!!

... as I was working on my laptop during breakfast, this little fler approached me and said, "Excuse me mummy, I love you mummy" but I didn't respond, and he kept saying that until I picked him up and assured him.

... yesterday morning hubs and I were whispering in bed, whilst William was supposedly still asleep in his cot. Suddenly, he just jumped up (really jumped) and shouted, "Good morning mummy!!"

... William says things that touches my heart. He continues to thank me for everything, including the new mosquito netting that installed in our bedroom yesterday because he thinks it's for him. And then he thanks me for buying bread for him, for letting him watch TV, for letting him sit in front car seat, etc.

And then then he refers to Victoria as his sister now, saying, "Mummy, tell my sister to stop crying", "Mummy, William beat beat my sister", "Mummy, Kakak made my sister cry"...

Growing up

I realised it's been some time since I last blogged about what my two kids are, what they have been up to and the simple mundane things like their weight and height.

Well, I don't have their exact statistics to start with, but William weighed around 15kg a couple of months back at the clinic. That, to me, is quite surprising because I remember he was at 15kg easily 6 months ago. Seemed like he has elongated but not put on much horizontally.

Vic's weight has also stablised around 22kg. My two kids stand tall for their age, as you may have noticed that Vic is the tallest in her kindy class (but her friends at JMC are the same height as her) and many people mistaken William for over 3yo instead of just 2yrs 8 months that he will be soon.

As with many other siblings, they argue almost daily and hug less nowadays. Their playtimes can be very loving too, if only learn to share and sometimes they unite over food. William learns how to "gi gi gu ji gi" (take care of ownself first) now, by few incidents I see... eg Vic says she wants to eat the remaining cereals on William's plate that he is not touching, but when William hears that, he quickly gobbles up the last pieces for (I thought for Vic) himself.

Jealous? Well, not really but my boy boy is ever possessive. When Vic cuddles with me, he will come in between, seemingly to "share the joy" but end up pushing the sister away. Or when Daddy gets too chummy with Mummy, boy boy comes a long to remind us of his presence. ; P

Vic is getting ever more stubborn now and I'm losing more hair and getting more white ones. I just dyed my hair for the year end, to console myself that I can still look younger. I nag still the same, and wish more that Vic can do things on her own.

Maybe I should blame myself for "babying" her. I cannot stand the dilly dallying and end up doing things for her eg preparing her toothbrush with toothpaste and sometimes brush her teeth still. I bath her whenever I can, because I think she is not clean enough if the maid or Vic baths herself.

Vic likes more girly stuff now (phew!) and it's only mostly because she sees her friends liking Barbie and Princess stuff. She bugs us for new water tumblers, got her new Strawberry Shortcake pink wallet with a security tag, and tells me she likes Princessey stuff. But mind you, the Ben 10 craze is NOT over, just died down.

As for loyal ol' William, he's still into Toy Story, and when we give thanks for our food, we hear a little boy's whisper, "Toy Story 1, Toy Story 2, Toy Story 3". Dare you forget to thank God for these that he mentioned, he will cry. Not that macho afterall, hehe. But yea, we thank God for what he whispers, but prays he does not get addicted to the extend of worshiping Toy Story.

Oh, though these kids get me so mad so many times, it's easy to forgive them and kick myself for saying mean angry words at them, especially when they come around to apologize, or when they see a hurried, upset Mummy and say, "Mummy I love you a lot" (William says this more) or "Mummy, I want to make you happy" :) William especially knows WHEN to say the latter, at the peak of my anger when Vic does something wrong (got potential in bodeking).

And boy does he knows how to complain too. When the maid tells him not to do something, or doesn't give him what he wants, he comes running to me. One incident last week got me bursting in laughter ie William was drinking his milk on the bed and Vic came into the room to help Popo make milk for cousin Andrew. I got off the bed to help Vic. Then the maid pops her head in to ask me something, at that point William stopped drinking his milk, and shouted, "Kakak, go do your work!! Shoot you!! Bang bang!!" And then the maid chuckles, and disappears.

I can go on and on about these kids but that might just bore you. Staying at home with them everyday sure bonds us, although sometimes I want to scream and run away. Next year Vic enters her final year of kindy. We chose to keep William home for another year.

If only we can keep them at this age forever.

Of birds and bees (NOT) and handphones...

Oh dear oh dear oh dear! I thought I have another 5 years before my little girl ask me this... and "ask" wasn't exactly what she did. She was close to demanding for one.

"Mummy, I want my own handphone. Then I can play my games and message my friends and call my friends..."

What the??? Does her other 5yo friends have handphones too? I doubt so. Not even her 7,8,9 or 10 yo friends from cell group. On the latter part, she's just saying lar. But on her request for a handphone, she told me more than two times already.

The inevitable has arrived. What did I answer her? Pray, tell me, people, what's the best answer to give? Should I google this?

Btw, I just said no. Not now. Period.

Korea: Food that we ate

Would you think that I'd write about my holiday and not about the food? Well, here is a compilation of the SOME of the food that we ate, in random order... marvellous, spicy, hot local delicacies!

My only complaint is that we always ate late ie past meal times like 230pm for lunch and 9pm or sometimes 10pm for dinner, and more food would have been better. :)

Forgotten the name... this I rank Top 3 - made with sambal-like soup and intestines, stomach, belly of the pig
On the left is sotong stuffed with something, and on the right is their local pork liver sausage
Syabu syabu... beef was very fresh and tender!

This is the safest non-spicy food for the kids. It's called bulgogi
Pizza Hut... hehe
Seafood Galbi
Before the seafood is cooked, just look at how big the crab and scallop is! I could almost eat it raw!
Dak Galbi - is a popular south korean dish, generally made by stir frying marinated diced chicken in a gochujang (chilli pepper paste) based sauce, and sliced cabbage, sweet potato, scallions, onions and tteok (rice cake) together in a cast iron pan on the table.
Pork chop - quite a common dish in Korea.
Cold noodle soup - naengmyeon
Pork Galbi
Samgye-tang, which is ginseng chicken soup. Go to Korea MUST eat this! The queue into the restaurant, at 230pm was still very very long down the block. Thank God we had a reservation made : ) Inside the chicken is a thick piece of white ginseng and pulut rice, a date and some other herbs.
Vic was very hungry at Insadong after walking around the shops, and others were eating. Fortunately we found this stall, they made sausages wrapped with fish paste and then fried till golden crisp! Only KW2000 and we have a happy girl!
Udon soup
Bibimbap - mixed rice with meat, vegetables, egg and chilli pepper paste