his birthday cupcakes

I decided to order cupcakes instead of a cake for the Lil Fella's 1st birthday...ain't they pretty? And they taste good as well!

thank God...

..that she loves to eat pasta Bolognese because :
- it's one of the dishes that I can actually cook! :P
- it's easy to cook and can be ready within 20 mins

while he was sleeping...

..I decided to snap some pictures of his lil fingers....(that's the only time I can get a decent picture - without the Lil Fella moving :P )

diaper for baby

(1 May 08 ) - this is the Lil Missy's favourite dolly. She calls him Kyan (after a friend's son). (Note : She calls Lil Fella's fav doll Keith - after Kyan's twin brother)
She decided that Kyan needed his diaper to be changed.....

his favourite doll

Sissy as it may sounds, this is the Lil Fella's favourite doll. He likes to grab its hair with one hand while sucking his thumb...

feet feet feet

(1 May 08) - Lil Missy, Baby Doll (Lil Fella's fav doll because he likes to grab its hair), Lil Fella's feet....

G.I. Jo

(4 May 08)
The Lil Fella's new G.I. Jo hair do...
He was looking down at the clips which the hairdresser's assistant threw on the floor to attract his attention so that he'd lower his head for the hairdresser to cut his hair at the lower part of his head...What a great idea that was...

surprise!

(2 May 08)
Lil Missy was taking her bath while I was on the lappie....then said, "Mom? Look? Surprise!!!" while she flashed a big smile....

aMused

(Photo taken on 3 May 08)
...by Mickey Mouse.

spot the baby

The Lil Fella was so knackered after playing in the play pen so he decided to take a nap instead...

*Post Edited on 14 May 08
The play pen is by Valco. It was purchased from The First Few Years and they are located at The Curve and Centerpoint, Bandar Utama.

more drumsticks???....

.... while stocks last...

- can't get enough of his chubbylicious thighs.
- his favourite dolly - he loves to grab the hair while sucking his thumb

his & mine

Lil Fella's feet on mine....
I'm sure going to miss his chubbiness when he loses his baby fat....
When the Lil Missy was less than 1 yo, I always made sure that she wears a pair of shoes when we go out - eventhough she couldn't walk then. As for the Lil Fella, I hardly ever let him wear shoes (except for socks) when we go out. Why? Because the Lil Fella keeps wanting to bite his shoes when he is in a sitting position i.e. in the car seat or when he's on the stroller. So what the heck eh?

diaper and baby

Lil Missy tried to put Lil Fella's diaper on her baby doll. After awhile, she gave up and said,

Lil Missy : Mommy? How come the diaper is too big for baby???

got drumsticks?

Wanna bite?
This is a picture of the Lil Fella's drumsticks taken on 29 Mar 08.

lil rebel with a cause

(Picture taken on 29 Mar 08)

....she didn't want to smile at the camera for me....
....she refused to change into her jammies the night before hence she slept in her denim dress the night before...
....check out the blue ink on her fingernails on her left hand... :)

according to her....

• sandals that are too small are in and she insists on wearing her old sandals (which she has outgrown) around the house!


• pen-scribbled toe nails are IN! Yee-ha!

his teDDy bear

The lil taukeh finds comfort in all his soft toys - none in particular. I just like how this picture turned out - with him looking down at his teddy bear and with the teddy bear gazing up at the lil taukeh...

say cheese!!....

....and we get this from her...






She was saying this when I asked the lil missy to smile....


lil missy : Nemo!??? Smile. Smile at mommy's camera....

yummy stars

and according to my 11mo lil taukeh....



...the stars on the musical mobile are oh-so yummy! He has a fascination for his musical mobile. He'd grab whatever he can grab and shake the whole thing until somehow, it falls apart like this......




And then he'd hook it up to the main body and he'd continue to shake it apart again...


There he goes again...

according to my 2y10mo girl...

.....nail painting is done by using color pens!:)

I had my toe nails painted in nail polish and the lil missy was quick to notice that my toe nails were coloured. So off she went to grab her color pens and decided that she too wanted to have coloured toe nails....

and coloured finger nails...

and during bathing time, she'd insist that I not wash the color off!...."Mommy...don't wash off the color ok? Ok Mommy??"

5 random things about me

This is a tag from Sweet Miracles.

5 things found in my bag

1. My wallet
2. My handphone
3. My car keys
4. Lip Gloss
5. My office tag

eh? no tissues! :P

5 favourite things in my room

1. My walk-in wardrobe
2. My tv - so that I can watch tv before i sleep :P
3. The quilt my mom and I made for lil missy
4. The colour of the walls in my room - green
5. Lil Taukeh's baby cot - a constant reminder what wonderful kids I have

5 things you have always wanted to do

1. Go to Australia! I haven't been down under!
2. Organize all my digital photos!
3. Clear up my store room
4. Organize all my digital scrapbook layouts and print them out
5. Can't think of anything else at the moment...

5 things you are currently into

1. Photography
2. Digital Scrapbooking
3. Trying out new dishes for the lil missy
4. Setting up my official site for my online store
5. Bob hair cuts

5 people you want to tag

1. Darien & Denisha's mommy
2. Lil J's mommy
3. 2littlefella's mama
4. Little Chumsy's Mommy
5. Irfan's mommy

and this is what you get for a RM35 dress from Bangkok?

Okok....I don't think it's the price that matters since alot of people buy these dresses from Bangkok really cheap and sell it at retail stores for a higher price. So anyways, I hand-washed this dress (which I totally love by the way) for the first time. Didn't even soak it and found out later on when the dress was half dried on the clothes line that the colour ran to the white bits of the dress. (Notice the petals of the flowers in the picture? They are supposed to be white - not reddish or pink...) Then I remembered what Eva said. She told me earlier on that to lock the colours in, soak the dress/cloth in salt water. Ok...so this is a bit too late for that. So anyways...since the damage has been done, I am open to any suggestion which will help me get rid of the red stain from the white bits. Eva suggested that I soak the dres in salt water of which I did. I noticed that the red stains on the white bits went away. I'll check again when the cloth is fully dried. Angie! Peggy! Anybody! Help!:P

my assistant

While I wfh in my study room, the lil missy will be busy pottering around, finding ways and means to entertain herself. She saw me operating our printer/copier/fax machine and decided one day that she wanted to photocopy a copy of a pen! I gasped at what she did and she looked at me and gave me that cheeky grin of hers....

what's for lunch?

Because the nature of my job allows me to work from home (WFH), some have asked me what I do for lunch. At times when I don't cook Maggie (heheheh..) I cook pasta. Here's Macaroni and Bolagnese. Sasha? Hungry or not?

blardy taxi driver

While getting cabs at Bangkok, we made sure that the taxi drivers use their meters so that we won't get conned. Most of the time, the cab drivers will tell us up front whether they're using the meter or not when asked (before we get into the cab). When we were trying to get a cab to bring us back from Suan Lum Market, the guy who manages the queue at the taxi stand at the market got us a cab and confirmed with the taxi driver that he was using the meter. So we all got in. After 30 secs, the blardy driver said to us :
driver : 100 baht
us : no.....use meter
driver : 100 baht
us : NO...use meter.
driver : No....100 baht. No meter.
us : No. Meter!
Then the driver signalled to drop us off by the side of the road.
us : No 100 baht. 70baht
driver : 70 baht, 70 baht, 70 baht, 70 baht??!! (pointing at each of us)
us : NO!
Then the driver stopped by the side of the road and we all got off the cab. We weren't worried cause at Bangkok, there are taxis all over!
Within 1 min, we managed to hail for a cab which uses the meter.
How much did we pay for our trip in the end? 490baht! Pfttt! Padan muka to the first taxi driver!

all girls' trip to bangkok

So it took me 1 week to recover from my all girls' trip to Bangkok. Yea! 1 week to recover. *sigh* age catching up and all.
So last thursday, the day that all 10 of us were planning for since Oct/Nov 07 arrived. We bought cheap Air Asia flights to Bangkok for 3 nights 4 days. The purpose of our trip?
- s h o p p i n g
- and to party with a hen friend since she was engaged to be married

8 of us flew from KL to Bangkok.
Another gal flew from Jakarta and met us at Bangkok.
And another gal flew all the way from Germany to Bangkok.

We shopped so much at Bangkok until we dropped! We were knackered by evening and could barely drag ourselves out for dinner.

We shopped at :

• Platinum Mall, Pratunum - highly recommended mall to shop. You get wholesale price if you buy 2-3 pieces and it does not have to be of the same design/colour/size.
• Siam Square
• Chatuchak Market - highly recommended if you have specific stuff to buy like kitchen utensils, paintings, straw bags etc. If you want to go there for experience, 1 hour is more than enough. You can't cover the whole place but the heat will kill ya!
• Suan Lum Market - Smaller version of Chatuchak Market
• Siam Paragon/Centre/Discovery - these places are similar to Pavillion. All the branded stuff are here. No point coming here unless you want to look-see...
• Plaza MBK - didn't shop much here cause like I said, just shop at Platumum Mall for clothing and that's enough. There's Boots here so some or more like one of my girl friend went goo-goo-ga-ga at the Boots here. (We don't get Boots at Malaysia)

The food we had during our trip were excellent! We ate at different places/restaurants..

• We had lunch at a restaurant at Siam Square - opposite Novotel - forgot what the name of the restaurant was.
• T&K at China Town - it's a seafood place. Looked as though we were at Petaling St. Food was yummy and dirt cheap! (RM220 for 10 of us and we had loads of food - 2 fish dishes, 2-3 prawn dishes, tom yam, crabs, noodles, oyster omelette, veges etc)
• After dinner at T&K, it's highly recommended to have the Tong-Yuen at a stall opposite T&K. It's served in some ginger concoction. Those who didn't have room for Tong-Yuen had 5 balls!
• -Cabbages & Condom, Sukhumvit - a very interesting place and nice ambience. The owner believed that condoms should be as readily available as cabbages sold in the market to promote safe sex. We each got a condom instead of after-mints before we left! How hilarious!

We partied at The Sheraton at Sukhumvit. Our hen did all that we asked her to do i.e.
- go up to a guy and intro herself and get his name card - she managed to go up to a French guy in less than 5 mins!
- sell 2 condoms (we got from Cabbages & Condom) for 500 baht - she did this in less than 2 mins
- go up to a guy and ask him to dance - she picked up a lawyer who happens to own a law firm btw in less than 5 mins!
- go up to a hot chick, and invite her to dance sexily with her on the dance floor - she picked one up within 10 mins!
So you see..this hen was good. On top of that,
- the French guy then came over and offered her a glass of champagne
- the guy she sold the condoms to bought a bottle of tequila for all of us!
- the bar manager bought us a bottle of champagne!
Quite a lucrative hens' night out dontcha think?
Since the hen was still up and sober, we decided to bring her down with :
- a flaming lamborghini
- a couple of tequila pops
- a couple of glasses of champagne

Boom. She's out.

We carried her into the cab. When we got to the hotel, sat her on those trolleys the porters use to transport lugagge and wheeled her into her room, and laid her in bed. Before we left the room, we all surrounded her and took a group picture!

Mission Accomplished!

timeout

I was nagging at the lil missy on the way home from MIL's house one evening because she was being very naughty at MIL's house before we left. I went on and on and on in the car and the lil missy just sat quietly in her car sear at the back. Expressionless. She was looking out of the window...I on the other hand was looking at her on and off via the rear view window. In the midst of me scolding her, she said :

Lil Missy : Mom?
Me : Yes....
Lil Missy : Look....bird..(looking out of the window)..so many birds...

I was like ???????
Ok...timeout.

and before i sweat the small stuff..i think of this...

The story of Ava has touched me in a way that has effected me tremendously (positively) and has given me a new perspective of motherhood altogether. I've learnt to not sweat the small stuff and before I blow up into a monstrous mom and nag about the what seems to be a ridiculous matter, like cleaning up a mess made by the kids....I think of Ava.

Live each day, every single day, with the understanding that one does not necessarily lead into the other.
Hug your family. Tight.
Put aside What Does Not Matter.
Tomorrow could be a completely new kind of normal.
By Sheye Rosemeyer

meal-time wars

These past few days, I've been having meal-time wars with my lil missy....Although she's 2y 8mo, I insist that she drink her milk three times a day and have her porridge twice a day during lunch and dinner. The reason why I still insist on her eating her porridge is because it's full of nutrition i.e. fish, carrots/pumpkin, veges. In addition to that, when we let her eat our food during mealtimes, she tends to segregate what she wants to eat and what she doesn't and she'd usually just end up eating rice! So mommy has put her foot down. We'll give her her porridge and then she'd nibble on whatever we eat during our mealtimes.

These days, I got to find creative ways to get her to eat or finish up her milk/food...
1.I let her watch a music video of her choice from my iPhone..(Yes, I got one and it's so cool!)
2. I'd tell her that she if she wants to go to school for bigger kids, she needs to finish her milk/food
3. I'd tell her that if she doesn't drink/eat her milk/food, I'd give it to the boy who stays behind our house! (LOL!)
4. I'd tell her that if she doesn't drink/eat her milk/food, she won't be able to press the lift buttons to go to the upper floors...
5. I'd tell her that if she doesn't drink/eat her milk/food, she won't be able to drink her vitagen or eat biscuits...

So what's a mom to do if her lil one refuses to eat or finish up her food but wants other biscuits? Solution : Get rid of all the biscuits and junk food in the house!

The Lil Fella, on the other hand is the total opposite! He wants to eat whenever anyone is eating!:)...It's nice also nice that he enjoys eating his porridge....Hopefully this won't be short-lived.

monster mom

Before I had kids, I used to comment that my neighbour 2 houses away was pretty much like a manic mom. She's a SAHM. When we bump into each other outside of the house, she'd always look very pleasant and composed. But what happens inside of the house is a different story. She has 3 kids - 1 boy about 13yo, and 2 girls in primary school. Every so often, we can hear her scream on TOP of her lungs - obviously frustrated and scolding one or all of her kids. I wouldn't know that. But yes, she's loud.

My neighbour who's staying at the house behind mine is the same. They've a toddler about 4-5yo. Every so often too, I'd hear the SAHM screaming at the top of her lungs - scolding her son. Each time that happens, we'd empathise with the lil boy....

Ever since I got two kids, I now began to understand why, shouting like a mad woman, is sometimes inevitable. I'm not ashame to say that I've not done it. In fact, I have. Many times. To the point that it's pretty scary when I think about it afterwards. I feel pretty helpless at times.....How the heck am I, a FTWM, supposed to juggle between a crying 8mo baby and a 2y 8mo toddler who's got her mind of her own when Hubs is out, without a maid and time is of the essence? It takes great perserverence and patience to not snap at Lil Missy when she's being difficult. Oh God. Help me to be patient...I feel like a Monster Mom!

how many gentlemen are there out there?

So my girl friends (MP, J, H and SL) and I decided to meet up for dinner at Monte's @ Bangsar Shopping Centre during the Thaipusam holiday yesterday. It felt good to be away for awhile and just be with the girls for a change....

Anyways, that aside, the food was great! The service? Well...let's just say that the people who work at the restaurant are pretty rigid....e.g. The dinner set came with tea/coffee...but I am not a tea/coffee drinker....

Waitress : Do you want tea or coffee?
Me : Neither. Can I have Hot lemon instead? (Water with lemon)
Waitress : No. Tea or coffee only. If you want lemon, we'd have to charge you for it.
Me : Huh? (WTF!) Forget it. I don't drink tea or coffee
Waitress : (looked at my other girl friend) Do you want tea or coffee?
The waitress didn't even bother to compromise. pffftt! This is what you call service....

Annnyyyyway.....ok back to the topic. So when J arrived at the restaurant, she sat down and informed us as-a-matter-of-factly that she had a flat tyre and that we should all help her change it after dinner - of which we all agreed. So we yakked and ate and yakked and yakked...

So..after dinner, we headed to the car park to J's car. Might I add - we were capable of changing a flat tyre. We just wanted to see whether any kind gentleman/gentlemen will stop and offer his help to 5 ladies (not in distress by the way).....

So we all helped. Chucked our handbags into J's car, rolled up our sleeves (figure of speech) and helped out.
- took out the spare tyre
- took out the tools
- took out the jack
- unscrew the nuts holding the tyres to the car (ok so I'm not familiar with actual terminologies to use). This took a while cause the nuts were screwed on tight so seeing that I was the heaviest of the lot, I put my entire weight on the what-ever-you-call-it bar to unscrew all 4 nuts
- jacked the car up
- changed the flat tyre
- replace the tyre with the spare tyre
- screwed on the nuts
- lowered the car
- tightened the nuts

We changed the tyre in 15 - 20 mins, tops.

All this while, NOONE came to help us. ZILCH! Security guards came and passed....
When we were packing up a chinese security guard came up to us and said in cantonese...

Guard : Oh...if you girls are driving, you should know how to change tyre. If you dunno, you must learn.
J : Yea...yea....and you just stand there and watch .....

So how many gentlemen at Bangsar even bothered to stop to offer their help? Sadly? None. *sigh*....

pidgin english

My lil missy have been peppering her sentences with pidgin english - by ending her words/sentences with the words lah and hor. Ok ok so I'm guilty for using the lah word but the hor word? She picked that up from MIL.

lah
We were talking about 'The Lion King' cartoon which she watched over the weekend..... When she initially saw the cover of the DVD, she said that she was afraid of the lion and the fire.....after tricking her into watching it..she actually enjoyed watching the show....
So this morning, while we were on the way to her school......

Mom : Did you like watching The Lion King?
Lil Missy : Yes! I'm not scared of the lion.....The lion is scared of me...
Mom : (thought I had heard wrongly...) Huh? The lion is scared of Lil Missy?
Lil Missy : Yes, scared of Lil Missy...
Mom : Oh Wow! You must be a big lion!
Lil Missy : (sounding abit embarrassed) No-lah...I'm a small lion (suddenly feeling abit modest)

hor
Each time she uses the word 'hor', I'd interrupt and remind her not to use the word and would tell her that she sounded like a donkey. She stopped using 'hor' and have thus replaced it with the word 'right?' which sounds sooooooo much nicer! Phew!

finally, 8 months..

..after giving birth to my lil fella, I can finally...finally! fit into my skinny jeans except, of course for the kangaroo pouch that I am lugging around on the front! After giving birth to the lil fella, I seriously thought that I'd have to giveaway most of my clothes!
I couldn't fit into my slim cut work shirts.
I couldn't fit into my work pants/skirts.
It wasn't like that after the birth of my first child, lil missy.
So now, I'm hoping that it'd be easier for me to get into my wetsuit when I go scuba diving next......:)

what the lil missy said...

My 2+yo daughter these days have been picking up lots of stuff.....as the saying goes....GIGO (garbage in, garbage out). Last night, before going to bed, I had a pep talk with her cause mama (my MIL) said that she scolded yeh-yeh (my FIL) 'stupid'. I was shocked! Where in the world did my girl pick this up?

So going back to last night....our pep talk went like this ...

mom : Lil Missy, you CANNOT use the word stupid ok? It's a very vyer BAD word!

lil missy : ok. stupid and idiot.

mom : WHAT? Where did you hear that from?

lil missy : mama

mom : Mama said that to you?

lil missy : Mama said stupid and idiot

mom : Well the next time you hear mama use those words, you tell mama NOT to use those words ok? Those are bad words!

lil missy : Ok.....

Note to self - better get DH to have a word with MIL....