It's All About Managing Time

Amber has tons of homework from her mental arithmetic class. She has to do a page each day. She's still a bit slow as she only started learning numbers at kindie and hence her writing is slow but I'd say she's doing very well.

How would you cope with homework everyday and with a kid who can't concentrate for more than 15 mins ? We had to split her 1 pager homework to 2 sessions and this :

We bring her abacus and workbooks with us when we need to go out. Hubs will help her with homework while he has his coffee.

I so *heart* to see her tiny fingers twiddling the abacus. Very cute !

MMRV Vaccination

We took Amber for booster vaccination last Saturday. She was scheduled for Measles, Mumps and Rubella (MMR) booster shot and Chicken Pox (Varilrix) the following month.

We're lucky coz now, a new vacinnation, MMRV - combining both MMR & Varilrix is out and that save Amber's butt from an extra jab. 4 in 1, they call it. My nephew just caught a very bad case of chicken pox and I wanted to get her fully immunized asap.

Her growth measurements at 4year 1 month :

height - 103.6cm
weight - 15kg
head circumference - 51cm

Dr Iean measured her growth charts and she's average for her height and below average for weight, at the lower 25% percentile.
Amber has always been a big baby and her allergy problems has pulled her weight down significantly. In fact she only gained 1kg from her last measurement on March 2009, at 2yr 11 months - weight : 14kg and height : 98.2cm

Dr Iean commented she looks skinny now and asked about her diet. I told doctor about her allergy treatment and he is skeptical of giving Amber the jab since she's allergic to eggs. The MMRV vaccination is not recommended for children allergic to eggs. We discussed and thought about it for a while and since she did not have any major allergic reaction from the first jab, she should be to take the booster shot.

I know the booster shot will not be easy and Amber is bound to have some allergic reaction, to what extent, I am not sure but I gather it should not be life threatening. Dr Wong, Amber's allergy doctor warned me, while Amber is under his treatment, not to expose her to eggs or else she will have a flare up, worst than before. Anyway, I made my own judgement, went ahead with the booster shot for chicken pox. I'd think not vaccinating her will pose a bigger risk of a full bloan attack.

As usual, she wailed like a baby, a baby you want to carry, hold and sooth but she quiet down immediately when the stuck a plaster on her. She likes plasters :)

I could see her sniffing almost immediately and then coughing. Gooey green goo running down her nose and mild temparature at night. We fed her lots of liquids, strawberries and porridge. After 2 days, she's ok.

Now, my next concern if I should get her vaccinated against H1N1, also not recommended for anyone allergic to eggs. I'll have to wait for our next visit to Tangkak and check with Dr Wong.

Selfish and Stupid

No one in particular.

But incidences with Amber I'd like to note down.

Selfish
-------
Fetching her from childminders, I was driving along a narrow lane, an inconsiderate car was parked very comfortably along the road, not being mindful of parking closer to the sides so other cars could pass.

This car, very selfish, park like that so hard to cross. Very INCONSIDERATE.

Mama, what is 'inconsiderate' (talking slow and pouring the word out slowly).
Selfish lor !
Why selfish ?
Coz he never think of other people when he park. You see, what if our car falls into the drain when we try to pass.
Huh ? Why he must sell fish wan ??
Uh-oh.. we are talking of 2 different things here.
No. no. not sell fish. He's selfish. Selfish .. hear me.. one is SELL FISH (speaking in a slower tone and emphasising the 'L') , the other is SELFISH.
SELFISH means not thinking of others. Like when Boon kor kor serves you fruit and your friends are all asleep, you eat all the fruits without keeping for them. You are not thinking of them right ?
yes
That's selfish.
But the man who sells fish at the market, 'he sells fish at the market'
2 different meaning, selfish and sell fish.
So, selfish is In-kon-see-der-rate ah ?
Yes, inconsiderate.
But if he park near to the side, afterwards his car fall to the drain HOW ? He is SELFISH ah ?
No, no, Mama don't want him to park so close to the side but just a little bit closer so we can pass.

Stupid
------
We've taught her stupid is a not a nice word to say, in fact a very very bad word and I think we've overdone it a little.

Mama, today Aunty Choo and Uncle Choo call me stupid
What ?? why did they call you that ?
Because I never listen
Do they call other people stupid ?
Yes, they call Yen Yen stupid also

I flare and overreacted.. you cannot call people 'stupid'. It takes a stupid person to call another person stupid (I know I overreacted on this one, then hubs stepped in and explained why stupid is not a nice 'name' to call someone)

So, Aunty Choo and Uncle Choo very bad ah ?
No, I don't think they mean to call you stupid.
Yes, they say me stupid. They very bad hor ?
Yes.
Mama, I want you to call police to catch them. They are bad people, they call me stupid.
uh-oh.. I don't know the actual truth but I trust the childminders parents in caring for my kid in their best ability.
Well, they might not mean to call you stupid.
Yes ah, they did. I want you to call the police OK ? (now, she likes to end her setences with an authoritative 'OK')
ok ok .. now go to bed.

Next morning : Mama, remember to call police, Aunty Choo and Uncle Choo call me stupid.

arrghh.. what should I do ? to query the childminder would seem so trivial.

Steamed Omelette & Fish Paste

My mom's cooking is the best. I love her simple, no fuss and minimal ingredient cooking.
I'm going to note down all her dishes I loved so much and hopefully one day, Amber too, will cook it for her family. Oh.. that's also if google and blogspot still exist.


To my siblings, Poh, Choo and PC, I'll be doing up a series of mom's cooking. Hope it'll rekindle your fond memories of her and perhaps you should start cooking too !



Today, I'll start off with Steamed Omelette and Fish Paste.



Very simple ingredients : fresh fish paste from market and eggs. I'm too lazy to make the fish paste from scratch this time but if you would like to, recipe's here
Please check with the fishmonger if the fish paste has been seasoned. Most are preseasoned. If not, add some salt, pepper and sesame oil.


Fry a large omelette on non stick pan.


Spread fish paste over.


Roll it up and steam for 15 minutes.

Slice and serve. Tasty, wholesome and healthy. Hardly any oil at all and packed with protein.

I had it with tomato sauce as a kid, but now, I prefer it plain.

Sewing Monster's blog.

I did my first online shopping. Yay ! Finally ! I was skeptical about purchasing items online but when my own blogger friends started the little biz online, I couldn't resist

Sewing Monster has some really amazing stuff. She's been secretly sewing in her free time and
accumulating pieces and pieces of sewn jewel before she finally decides to sell it online. I like to sew too and I know how much effort it takes to put a piece together.


I bought a gunny bag from Sasha Tan's SEWING MONSTER's blog a couple of days ago and I receive the package this morning. Fast eh ?

My new bag, perfect for my weekend use.

I was lucky to have booked this bag. Sasha told me, my two other friends, Barb and Annie was also eyeing on this bag.. LOL ! Barb and Annie, sorry.. I beat you to it.

Good stuff at the Sewing Monster's get snapped up fast, do check out the items and if you like it, don't wait, place your order fast !


Nice right ?

American Breakfast ???

Over the long weekend last week, I was feeling a little bit 'rajin', wake up early, well not that early, slightly past 8am but the hubs and Amber woke up late and that leaves me lots of peace and time in the kitchen to prepare a sumptious breakfast. Hubs brother was with us too and that made the effort worthwhile.

I was inspired by the breakfast I had at Fitfor2, Bangsar Village 2 one Sunday morning with mamapumpkin and Annie Q. I thought it was the best breakfast ever, scrumptious toast, fresh coffee, tangy fresh orange juice and everything else nice and warm.

So, rajin-rajin, I tried my hand at 'American Breakfast' ala .. .homestyle with whatever I had in my kitchen :


sliced avocados, roast potatoes, pan fried sausage, baked beans and scrambled eggs.



Attempting to make it look nice, I had the toast standing. Hubs reason was the toast won't get soggy so fast. This is hubs and BIL's portion

My portion :

Less carbs, more tomatoes and 1 sausage. I'm not a fan of sausages !

Nice ? ... and I forgot to take pics of the pot of English tea and orange juice. Haih... otherwise even nicer (perasan betul) !!!

My fav item on the breakfast platter is the sauteed cherry tomatoes. So sweet and succulent. All I did was drizzle some olive oil on a non stick pan, slip in the tomatoes and saute with lids closed for couple of minutes and sprinkle some mixed herbs.

Going back to the sausages, I got them at Isetan pork and cold meat section. They have the widest and freshest range of cold meat. I was asking the assistant what's the difference between sausage and frankfurter ??? She looked at me blank and answered : Pork or Chicken ???? Haishh.. I said never mind and just walked away, sniggling. That's the kinda service from our local supermarkets now, most of them hire foreigners and I should not set my expectations high on them.

She Loves Dogs

Amber loves dogs, especially small dogs kept as house pets.

Our friend Jen, kindly invited us for dinner at her home on Wesak Day. She knows Amber loves dogs and she has 3 Bichon Frise at home. One is the father to the other 2. I honestly cannot remember their names :(

Jen also prepared a sumptious dinner for us. Chicken rice, roast duck, drunken chicken, and steamed tofu. She knew Amber was allergic to eggs and steamed a separate egg-free tofu for Amber. Such a lovely and considerate host she is, and she makes a mean cocktail of lychee cranberry vodka cocktail. All these and I was too lazy to take photos.. :(

I did take some pics of Amber and the 3 Bichon Frise tho :

The dogs were napping when we arrived and when they woke up.. Amber carried them out of the room. Bravo Amber, not afraid of dogs at all. Hubs had promised Amber a pet dog when she's big enough to shoulder responsibilities to feed, bath and groom the dog. As for me, I'm keeping myself out of the deal, I don't want anything to do with his pets, my hands are full with housework !

Thanks Jen, for hosting us a dinner of warm homecooked meal and also helping to shower Amber.

Giant Avocados

Look at these giant avocados. It's 1.5 times bigger than the Australian variety.

MIL has a friend whose husband works in Sabah and brought back an avocado plant from Sabah. The wife successfully planted the avocado at her backyard in Tampin and it's fruiting heaps. We are the lucky beneficiary of the bountiful harvest.

I love avocados but Amber hates it. I tried all methods to coax her to eat, with honey, blended or mixed with other fruits but she absolutely hates it. She'll make the 'I wanna puke' look whenever I force a slice to her. I know I'm bad to force her food but if you daugther is underweight, you'd do the same too. :D

Hubs won't touch it either, unfortunately. I can't possibly eat all the avocados and I have frozen some of the fruits. I plan to cook curry chicken with it. I think since the fruit is so creamy, it'll make a good substitute to santan. Oh, I also made coffee with pureed avocado. Tastes good, thick and creamy. A friend gave me this idea many years back.


The fruit, sliced up.

The seed .. it's HUGE !

Avocado is a complete food and you can read more here.

It's really a surprise that such great fruit can be grown in our backyard. Perhaps someone should farm it in a bigger scale and we don't have to pay so much for imported avocados.

Kek Lapis Revisited

I started baking kek lapis again. Recipe is available at my previous post on kek lapis.

Now, I'm smarter, after all the effort of waiting for each layer to brown, I make a BIGGER cake. Almost the same amount of effort but you get 1.5 times more. Better deal, trust me, it is worth it.

And I got myself a new handheld mixer. If you follow the recipe closely, you'll know how annoying it is to mix egg yolk, egg white and butter , each separately. Now with a handheld mixer, I can mix them separately in separate bowls. Thank heavens for the handheld.




Then assemble the ingredients neatly :

A tray of eggs. YES ! 30 EGGS !!! This is by far the artery clogging cake.


a 12 x 12 inch pan

one bowl for the whites

another for the butter and a separate one for yolks

Then spread each layer thinly..

Final layer..

Cut and admire the layers...

Everyone likes this cake. It's worth the effort.

p/s

forgot

to

also

note

that

the

following

was

used :

3 BLOCKS of pure BUTTER !!

So darn fattening and artery clogging ! Muahahahahaha..

Now, would anyone still want samples ???

Wesak Day - 28 May 2010

On Wesak Day, we went to the Guan Yin temple at Jalan Ampang for prayers. Our initial plans to go Maha Vihara temple at Brickfields was aborted when we heard our PM will be there. I don't want to get caught in a 'no parking, people mountain people sea' situation.

Whenever we are back at my in laws, Amber will always bug Mah Mah when she does her prayers. Amber will want to light the joss stick, ask Mah Mah to carry her and place the joss stick on urns and she'll chant along with Mah Mah.. in fact, she's always looking out for praying time, waiting to bug her Mah Mah.

I told her we'll go to the temple on Wesak Day, she's excited and woke up '7cho8cho', and how I wished she'll wake up with such enthusiasm when it comes to school !

Lots of people. The temple provides vegetarian food for breakfast and lunch. Picture above is the entrance to the canteen. On festive dates and 1st and 15th date of the lunar month, the temple provides free food but devotees are encouraged to donate generously and do not waste food.
Not wanting to queue, we skipped this and lunch-ed elsewhere instead.

Hubs and I believe by instilling a belief in religion whilst she's still young, we hope she'll grow up to be a morally responsible person. Perhaps whatever we've missed to teach or guide her, religion will help.



Amber 'pai-pai'. She insist on praying to each and every buddha statue in the temple. I told her no joss stick or lotus candles. I believe we should preserve the environment and simple prayers is enough.

Praying to the 'thousand' hand buddha

Bathing the buddha

Some donations for the temple by some kind samaritans

We did our bit and put in a small donation to the temple.

Happy Wesak Everyone !