Celebrating Hubs Birthday

This year his only request was to share a bottle of wine with me at Langkawi at our favourite little place - Mare Blu @ Perdana Quay, Telaga Harbour Park. We've been here once on our last trip and this trip, going back to Mare Blu tops our to-do list.

We like the food and ambience here. Highly recommended for anyone visiting Langkawi.

It was already dark when we got there and we missed taking nice pictures of the marina at sunset.

The rows of dining place faces the marina and you can see some very beautiful (and expensive sailboats). Here's one, right next to our table :



Mare Blu


We brought our own wine and paid a little for corkage. We had Taylor's St Andrew, 2000 Shiraz from Clare Valley. Palatable and just nice for our dinner. Not to complicated and not too intense. Just nice.

Service was superb. They decanter-ed the wine for us.

I ordered a fish and chips for Amber, specially fried with breadcrumbs only, minus the egg. The chef did a good job.. not too thick a batter.. I so hate those fish with thick eggy floury and oily batter. This was just perfect :

I forgot about the tartar sauce but she didn't take it anyway. The fish was moist and tasty, hubs and I finished half of it. Half a portion for Amber was already too much.

Our appetizer : mozzarella with grilled tomato and zucchini slices. Yumz !! Did you know Langkawi produces their own cheese, esp mozzarella? No kidding, drive along Langkawi island, lots of 'kerbaus' all around the island.

Needless to say, the salad appetizer was as good as it looks here :)

She ate her dinner without complain and didn't even ask for tomato ketchup !

And..... my platter.. fillet mignon, medium rare with mushroom sauce.

Excellent and perfect ! We were thinking of our fillet mignons on flight to Langkawi . LOL !!!! Really, no kidding, we can't find a place in KL that does a better job than Mare Blu.

Another view of my fillet mignon.

Mine was done medium rare.

and hubs.. rare.. Hubs is really fussy over his steak and he sings praises for Mare Blu, asking any of his friends who visit Langkawi not to miss this place.

Kachingg !! Happy Birthday Hubs.. from your little family.

Complimentary tiramisu.. on the house..

Again.. Amber gets to blow the cake.. and sings the birthday song with hubs and not without telling me again ...

Amber and Papa blow birthday candle.. Mama, you cannot because it's not your birthday. Only Papa and Amber CAN !!

hmmmmppphhh.... she's trying to make me jealous ;)

Telaga Harbour Park, don't miss this place if you go Langkawi.. It's along the same row as The Loaf.

Langkawi 2010

We went for our yearly sojourn to Langkawi, just in time to celebrate hub's birthday.

Langkawi is a yearly destination for us. Some might find it boring in this little unexciting island but we love it's peace and tranquility, fresh air, good food (and cheap too) and absolutely nothing to be stressed over here. No traffic jam, no queues, never rushing for time except when we were late to check out and rush to the airport because moi overlooked our flight departure time.


Up, up and away...

Amber was very excited to go 'sit aeroplane' and then she asked the darnest thing :

Papa,, why the aeroplane have wings can fly but still need pilot to drive the plane ??
Papa.. why the aeroplane wings don't move like this wan (makes the wings flappaing movement)

She in the 'why why tell me why' stage now and nothing stops her curiosity. I am smarter than hubs. I chose not to seat next to her.. ha ha...

Upon arriving Langkawi, we rented a car, Proton Wira auto for RM140, 3days 2 nights. Good deal and we have been renting from the same guy for many years.

We drove to town, did some shopping, had lunch and ice cream. As usual, I was reading ingredients of the ice cream and found this ice lolly for her :


Amber fell asleep in the car on way to the hotel. We checked in to Langkawi Lagoon. This is our 4th stay here and it'll be the last. The hotel did not do any upgrading works and it kinda look exhausted. I'd like to try other new hotels or refurbished ones.. there's just too many hotels to choose from.

Some pics of the hotel :

pool ...


beach..

the villas.. and .. nope we didn't stay there :(

sunset, by the pool ...

Since Amber took her nap in the car, she refuse to allow us to nap, keep pestering us to go 'swimming'..

We went to the pool and then beach. The hotel has daily activities at the beach and that day it was 'fishing day' ...

So what's up ? I saw ppl peeping into the pail :

they caught a jellyfish.

Amber was busy digging for crabs then..

Hotel guests we invited to cast the net to trawl in some 'fishes'. Hubs and I didn't bother, we didn't think there's much to catch anyway.. but some other tourist found it a novelty and tried their luck.

Tried a couple of rounds, not much luck, this guy above only brought in 2 miserable fish, about 2 inch length fish. I didn't think this activity was good as they'd probably almost killed the fish when releasing it to the pail. I jokingly told the GM, ' your catch of the day is not enough to cook a meal lah ! '

The villas by the sea is really nice, only if we can afford it. On our first stay at this hotel, the staff brought us to see one of the units, apparently Tun M's, a double storey unit kitchen, living hall and study rooms. Pure luxury !

Amber loves the beach, sun and sea a lot. Just like me.. :)

more to come .. on Langkawi

Happy Birthday Amber

Amber turned 4 on 22nd April.

What did we do for her birthday ? Read on :


Eng Teck sook sook (BIL) gave her a battery operated bike.. a huge one.. watch out.. here's comes the superbiker. Cool eh ?

Every other year, I plan for something 'big' , only to scale down as her birthday draws near, coz I'm either too lazy or tired.. *lol*

On the eve of her birthday, I tried the magical egg-free, dairy free recipe, Barb sent me. Thanks a lot Barb, I finally made a dream cake for Amber and chocolate flavour too.

I improvised a little, substituted cold water with cold unsweetened soya and I added a few tablespoons of strawberry jam for extra flavour. For icing, I used dark chocolate blocks (dairy free), soya milk and a spoon of margarine.

Here's how it turned out :

Texture looks good but I used Knife cooking oil as recipe requires vegetable oil. The smell of Knife oil doesn't quite jive with chocolates. My next batch, I'll use margarine, I'd think that'll work better with this recipe.

Baked them into little cuppies. As it was eggless, I was very very worried, the cake will not rise well. Staring at my oven for a whole 15 mins before I finally see the cake rise. ***phew**

And this is how it looks :



Add chocolate ganache for icing and top it up with sugar paper and decorated with 'hundreds & thousands', I think it looks very appealing to a 4 yr old :



Nice or not ?

Thanks to sugar icing and nice boxes available at the bakery shops now, baking cupcakes is a breeze.

My very limited decoratives :

Then I baked a batch of the 'real thing' with eggs and milk to giveaway to friends and cousins who showered her with gifts :

I cooked a simple lunch for the kids, fried instant noodles with chicken breast and abalone sauce (msg free) and decorated it with my very limited bento skills and accesories :

and peach konnyaku jelly, reduced sugar :

and party packs with chocolates, jelly, mamee, twisties.. .. .. the kids were set for PARTY !!! (small party la..)

Paik Ling gave Amber a HUGE lollypop. Thanks Aunty PL !! Amber can't have that much sugar and I kept the HUGE lollypop, gave her a mini Chuppa Chups instead. She didn't protest.. *phew* but she pretended to 'lick' the giant lollypop.

She also receive many pressies and beautiful clothes from cousins, Yee Yee, Aunty Sharon and a birthday card from her school :

In the evening, we had dinner with Yeh-Yeh and Mah-Mah. They had ordered a big marble cheesecake from Secret Recipes. Hubs and I had to find a way to stuff her full so she'll not eat any of the cake. Crafty eh ??

We fed her porridge, kuih lapis and mango sorbet from New Zealand Naturals before meeting the inlaws for dinner @ Mdm Kwans. Hubs ordered a huge fried chicken leg for her :

Her birthday cake. It was a Ben 10 cake and I swear when I chose it from the catalog, there was a Ben 10 picture and not the ugly monster like this :

Anyway, birthday girl did not complain.. so I really shouldn't

I tricked her and told her I'd give her the "best" part of the cake .. the sugar paper !!

And she had the whole piece ...

Uhhmmmm... yum yum yum... no protest, she didn't ask for the cheesecake.

and that was her 4th birthday celebration!

Hubs birthday was a day after hers, she kept saying.. I blow birthday cake with Papa. You cannot blow coz not your birthday yet !

hmmmpphhh... as if I don't know..

hmmmmphhh.. the way she said it was exactly like how a toddler will argue with 'I don't want to friend you' tone..

hmmmphh !!! Amber ! oh Amber !

and what was our gift to her ?

We took her to LANGKAWI !!!

To amberong - 23 April 2006

emailed - end May 2006
event - 23 April 2006
---------------

Hello Amber,

On morning of 23rd April, Sunday, they did a blood test on you for your jaundice and Dr Yong Sin Chuen examined you again before discharging us. You had slight jaundice, nothing alarming but we just have to sun you a little at home each morning. Your previous day's blood test result came back and you are 0+ve, same as mummy.

Uncle Jeremy came to see mummy and advised me to breastfeed you as much as possible and recommended to supplement with formula - Snow P7 if breaskmilk was not enough. He said I'm well enough to be discharged.

We were discharged from the hospital in, afternoon. It's actually your papa's birthday, so both your birthdays are very close together, only one day apart. Sometimes I wonder maybe you are god's gift to papa for his birthday.

We went home, picked up some stuff before going to Kong Kong's house where we'll be staying for 2 weeks. Papa set up the baby cot for you and I tried nursing you. Mummy was very worried as you don't seem to be getting enough milk, so we gave you some water and Snow.

This is your first night at Kong Kong's home. GrandAunt Chee Looi came immediately to see you and they said you are very 'cute' !

Bye for now , my dear....

To amberong - birth

emailed - 7 May 2006
event - birth

-----------------

You are 2 wks 1 day old today.

Mummy has not written to you in a loongg looong time. My love, you have finally arrived.
Mummy and Papa was looking for another caretaker for you. Since your discharge from the hospital, we have been in Kong-Kong's house for 2 weeks and y'day we moved back home.

OK, let me tell what has been happening since your arrival, you certainly took a long time to arrive, mummy was in labour for almost a day from admission to Labour Ward C219, Pantai Medical Center at 8am on 21 April 2006 for induction at 8am. The midwives, Uncle Jeremy and Dr Damo - the anaesthethist was very supportive. Mummy panicked when I had not dilated , I hopes I was not forcing you out. Papa prayed to Kuan Yin and I prayed too and after a short nap past midnight, mummy felt contractions and the nurse told me you are on your way !!! That was abt 4am on 22 Apr 2006. The nice midwife ( I cannot remember her name ) was so good to me and I was afraid she'll be off shift soon at 7am. She assured me you'll arrive by then ! I started pushing after 5 am and papa was supporting me all this while ( but i think he was very very afraid but excited to see some little hair of yours popping out ).. Uncle Jeremy came in slightly past 6am and in a while you were out at 6.18am !!! Actually mummy saw the clock above me when they took you out for cleaning and test, the time was abt 6.13 am but Unc Jeremy noted your time of birth as 6.18am (good number .. hahaha). He heard papa calling you 'Amber girl' and thought your name was hamburger !!! That's how your nickname 'little hamburger' came about.

They put you in my arms right away, you were very slippery, and very warm. Not crying yet but your mouth was wide open. Mummy cannot descibe the moment to you but papa had some parts of it on video for your viewing. The cleaned you up, had the apgar test done (you scored an 8) and brought you back to mummy but we were very tired and engrossed with sms to inform everyone of your arrival (they have been calling from australia, singapore every where the night before) to check if amber has arrived. You were snorting with phelgm and very alert. looking left and right, around the room.

They took you away for a bath and paediatric check soon after and 2 hours later mummy was in the post natal ward C328. You smelt sooooo nice, looked so gorgeous,so fair, soft and baby when they brought you in. Lots of people visited you, Auntie HT, Yeh Yeh , Mah Mah, Uncle Chee Keong , Uncle Michael & family, Koo Ma & family, Choo Yee Yee, Yee Cheong, Ah Keong kor kor and all of Papa'e Yee Yee's. Later at night, Auntie Wai Fun, Steve , Norman and Kein came to visit you and us. Everyone's very excited to meet baby Amber for the first time

You spent your first night with us. Papa was sleeping on the deck chair...you were calling for us every hour and there's once you were crying, we didn't want to adhere to your crying, was afraid of spoiling you.. and later we found out you pang sai !!! It was your first meconium 'sai'. Very happy to see your black gooey 'sai'. Mummy was trying very hard to breastfeed you but I could not see any milk at all. Was getting worried that you may end up hungry.. Lots of other people visited you on Sunday, Uncle Leon, Auntie Ei Leen, Auntie Junice, Uncle Keith, Uncle & Auntie Jackson. Everyone just wanted to see you.

Mummy going to bed now, it's 11.30pm , 7 May 2006.

Hugs and kisses a plenty from Papa and Mummy

To amberong - 20 April 2006

Hi my dear baby,

You are due tomorrow on 21st April ! but but there's no sign that you'll be out yet. Are you so comfy in my tummy that you want to stay on longer? Mummy and papa are very worried that your long stay may be detrimental to you. Dr Jeremy has advised to 'induce' you out tomorrow. Please don't be surprised or shocked and let's work together to make your delivery as smooth as possible k ?

Papa wanted to share the same birthday as you (or maybe you are waiting to share the same bday as papa) but looks like not. He's been very busy lately, so it's best you see the world on 21st as advised by doctor.

Mummy will check in to Labour Ward at Pantai Hospital tomorrow at 8am, they'll do the necessary procedure for me to be ready for your birth. Papa can't be with me in the morning but he's promised to be around from lunch onwards to wait for your arrival.

Mummy has been naughty and craved for McDonalds milk shake recently. One more milkshake today before your arrival ok ?

YeYe and MaMa bought a lot of herbs ane medication for mummy to consume after your arrival. They are also as excited and MaMa will pray to kuan yin to protect us and bless us with a safe delivery.

Your Ah Yee ( Poh Yee and Choo Yee ) are very excited too. Aunty Pearl got excited when she received my call yesterday, she thought I had delivered you already. Ah Keong kor-kor is also very excited and planning to visit us in the hospital. Ah Leong wanted to make you a card. So, baby Amber, we are all eagerly waiting for your arrival. Be Good and God Bless us both !

All the love from mummy and papa...

To amberong - 34 wks

Hello Amber,

36wks now ...

Mummy has created an email account for you. You are still in mummy's tummy, awaiting to see the world in about 4 weeks time.

Papa is working very hard to provide for us. Papa is very anxious about your arrival, be good and give mummy a good delivery ok ?

This morning, mummy woke up with red rashes on my legs and some mild rashes on my tummy. Papa was worried that it could be dengue but after checking with Dr Jeremy (he will be delivering you to the world :) ), he said it's not a problem. Rashes on my tummy means reaction to your urine !!! Mummy's asked to drink more water to flush out toxins and the rashes should be controlled.

I wonder what and how's the world for you in mummy.. you seem to be squirming and turning a lot each day by day. Mummy's enjoying this pregnancy very much and waiting for your arrival, please help mummy with a safe delivery and remember.....

mummy and papa loves you very much !

To amberong

Before I got hooked on bloghopping, I sent emails to my Amber. I created an email account for her when I was 36 wks pregnant.

I'm glad I did create an email account and she'd better thank me for grabbing the login id 'amberong' for it's really hard to get ones own name as login id.

Now, as I read back my mails to her, I recall back those moments of impending motherhood, the excitement of having a baby for the first time and how precious she was to us then. I used endearing words to describe her. She was 'my darling baby', 'my precious' and 'princess'. Now, she's the smelly fart, naugthy fart, cheeky fart, chow babeee, hamburger and all things BAD !!! Terrible huh ? MIL's maid calls her 'jahat' and her cousin sister is 'nakal'. What apt names for both of them. LOL !

Well, she should know how much we love her, despite all the bad names.

As her 4th birthday approaches, hubs and I reflect back the past 4 years with sweet memories. We have our moments of despair too, when she's ill, when she fell and lost her tooth, the blood, stitches and all or when we had to pass her from one minder to another like a football coz her babysitter was not well for a couple of months and now, her journey to be allergy-free.

Oh well, parenthood is never easy and bumps and humps are just part and parcel of it. We chose to be parents and it's our responsibility to give our best care and love our child.

Ok, back to amberong, I'm going to journal down the few emails I sent to her in this blog,

Of Lately ....

No blogging, no posting, no uploading. My laptop's internet connection went kaput .. zinggg.... gone ! Strangely, I can do everything else on the laptop except connecting to the internet.
My IT support is too busy to look into it, so it seems lah, and there's other more important stuff to do..

I really wanna cry, no internet during office hours is killing me. Worst than no coffee. Well, I have my 'stolen moments' too, that is when hubs goes out for appointments, I quickly jump on his seat and logout all his programs.. load my msn, gmail, blog, bla bla bla...

Ok,, before the boss is back, let's see, what's up lately ....

- been keeping an eye for egg-free, dairy-free, yeast-free, sugar-free products. Doctor just confirmed, being allergic to cow's milk, she has to avoid everything dairy, including butter.
- when I tell people what she has to avoid.. everyone shakes head.. tsk tsk tsk.. die lor.. this cannot eat, that cannot eat. I shan't focus on the negative, I shall be POSITIVE and focus on what she CAN eat instead.
- been visiting almost every organic store in town, looking for special diet food. I'd say, not to bad, I found a couple of tolerable food, labeled 'May contain traces of egg and milk'. I should think they are free of eggs and milk and the 'traces' are very minute. So far, I've found and will introduce the following to her :

dark chocolates. Lindt. - most dark chocs like Cadbury do contain milk but not premium brands like Lindt. Only cocoa mass, cocoa butter and sugar

nestum cereal. plain cereal and fruit flavoured does not contain milk. Easy. I'll just mix with Isomil

peanut cookies & kuih bangkit - both butter-less. She's walloping my leftover cookies from CNY and these 2 are her favourites. When it's finished, I'll bake almond cookies with ground almond, olive oil and icing sugar. Almonds are a lot healthier than peanut

I found ICE CREAM for her... New Zealand Naturals fruit sorbet. Dairy free. She had strawberry last weekend, RM7 per scoop, very steep but worth every sen when you see her smile and that's PRICELESS ! Tomorrow is her birthday and she wants mango flavour. Wish granted.. with pleasure

I baked dairy free, egg free cupcakes yesterday. Many thanks to Barb who sent me the recipe.
I improvised it a little, added some strawberry jam, replaced water with unsweetened soya and it actually tastes good. Can't wait to upload the photos and blog about it. The cupcakes are meant for Amber's small party at the childminders and yes, tomorrow is her birthday. My little girl turns 4 tomorrow.

4 years of feeling itchy and scratching everyday.. I hope by her 5th birthday, she'll be cured.

She wants a BIG BIG cake and a BIG BIG present for her birthday. This years request is everything BIG and she's getting none. I've made small cupcakes for her and present is something intangible. Will write more later.. when my laptops up.

In the meantime, I must dig up her birthstory. I had it stashed somewhere in my gmail. Those days, I didn't know what a blog was and I journal-ed down my preg and early motherhood days in email to my daughter, hoping she'll read one day.

.... and I'm also busy hunting for dust mite free beddings and air filters. :)

Our Visit To Tangkak

A little update on our visit last week. We stayed over at PILs and left for Tangkak in the morning. While waiting for our turn, we were told it's about 1 hour wait, we hopped to the kopitiam few units away and had our rotikaya. Seems like the dimsum and fish slice noodles are popular there but we already had our breakfast, we'll keep that for our next visit.


Steamed roti kaya with thick sliced salty butter, Amber's favourite.. she specifically asked for salty salty butter.. and paired with hot Milo.. yummzz,

but... all are NO-NO now. :(
Highly allergic.. eggs, bread, milk, sugar ... the perfect recipe for 'ITCHY'



Ooh.. how she relish it.. sorry Amber, rotikaya + thick salty butter gotta go. Wait till next year.. just one year only , ok ?

While waiting for the doctor :



Amber actually cried when she saw the doctor, because we couldn't explain clearly to her what's to come, as we don't even know, we casually mentioned to see a doctor for her 'itchiness' but Dr Wong, is quick to warm up and is very good with kids, very patient and takes his time to explain, asked about our medical history, environment at home and in the office, etc to investigate the cause of allergy. Amber was alright after a while and sat on hubs lap, following instructions, holding the test tubes in her hand as told.


Doc will then test hubs strength while he's holding Amber tight and Amber will hold the test tubes. Hubs should resist his push and if Amber is not allergic to that item in the test tube, his strength will be able to resist his push.


And for elements that she's allergic to, hubs will not be able to resist his strength. Magic ? Seeing is believing ! After going through a host of tubes, we knew she was allergic to : eggs, milk, house dust mites and candida.


A friendly get-well handshake with Dr Wong

The elements that she's allergic to and level of allergy

Dr Wong practises homeopathy, he explained to us how his treatment works, he mentioned something like.. the energy from the allergens are transferred to a saline solution.. I was too in a daze, to fully understand what he said but more or less I understood.

Amber has to take 2 drops a day, once in morning and evening to reduce her allergy and in abstain from ALL food containing the 4 elements : milk, eggs, candida and house dust mites.



He allowed me to take pictures and later told me.. the response time after taking d drops is abt 3 wks and until then I am nobody and dont' deserve any attention...

Very friendly and a polite doctor and for anonymity sake, I'll pass the contact to any readers who email me direct.

Meanwhile I'll be blogging on Amber's journey to recovery. Freedom from allergy is not a distant dream after all.