Alycia's First Dictation

Alycia had her first dictation 2 weeks ago and her second dictation last week. There were around 40 words in each of the dictation. She fared quite well in both the dictations and had several careless mistakes. She has to learn not to be so excited and jump the gun and learn to think before she writes or do anything. That's how her careless mistakes always happen.




Do you think this dictation is too difficult for 5 and 6 year olds?

Cool Website For Parents

I have long been wondering if it is necessary to feed my 3 girls with supplements and vitamins. So I did a google search today, got my answer and also stumbled upon this website by Neslac EXCELLA Gold. This website by Neslac is called Excellence Begins Young (EBY) and is a very useful site for mothers with young kids. One of the sections that I find very useful is the expert’s corner, a place where mums can get answers with regard to their child’s nutrition, development and everyday growing up activities. Another section that mummies would love is the flash cards section. Here, there are colorful flash cards of simple words that come with audio in 2 languages – English and Mandarin in easy to digest and fun method for mums to teach their babies simple categories like shapes, colors, fruits, etc. I tried it on Baby C and she loved them.




For first time mums especially, they will find the Child Development Tracker at the EBY site very useful. This section allows you to see your child’s milestones at the different stages of their growing life. There are also useful tips on how to help nurture your child’s milestone, eg. activate your baby’s mind with nursery rhymes and much more.

For Facebook fans (which I am beginning to get hooked on!), there will be a link for users to go to Excellence Begins Young Facebook Page. Here, there is an application for them to create Fun Photos for their kids. The first 1,000 to create the photo for their child will get the photo printed, framed and delivered to them. I’ve just created Baby C’s photo and will accessories it soon! Wait there’s more. Another interesting Facebook application is a fun quiz called “Is My Child An Abraham Lincoln Or Gandhi?” I tried the quiz on Sherilyn and the results showed that she is emotionally adventurous like Christopher Columbus and an intellectually decisive leader like Abraham Lincoln, LOL!

Other interesting sections at EBY include a section on informative articles (nutrition, child development, etc) and a recipe section with healthy recipes for toddlers. Go check out this website and bookmark it. It’s free to use this site!

Fun Ways Of Learning To Tell The Time From The Internet

Alycia is still not very good in telling the time, especially when the long hand points to other numbers other than 12 and six. It's partly my fault. I haven't been teaching her how to. I have been too Baby C-centered for the past 18 months.

Anyway, I did a google search on websites that provide games to teach kids how to tell the time and found a few websites with very interesting ways of teaching time-telling:

http://www.teachingtime.co.uk/clock/clockres.html

http://www.teachingtime.co.uk/draggames/sthec1.html


http://www.apples4theteacher.com/clocks.html








But Alycia wasn't very interested in this game. She prefers other educational games from Starfall.

My mil recently bought Alycia and Sherilyn each a very nice watch from Hong Kong. I think the watch would be a good motivation for them to learn how to tell the time. I'll just have to make them go to these interactive time-telling websites more often to get themselves familiarize with the clock. Learn to tell the time or no Starfall for them both!

Pediasure Liquid

This nice mummy sent me 2 bottles of strawberry-flavored Pediasure liquid which she bought when she was in Singapore recently. She said it was for Baby to try since Baby is currently drinking Pediasure powder. This is currently not available in Malaysia.





I gave some to Baby to try and diluted it with some water as it was a little too sweet but she hated it! It was torturous both for her and me during feeding time. My maid and I had to crack our heads to find things to amuse and distract her while we shoved the spoonfuls of milk into her mouth.

When nothing worked, we brought Alycia's scooter into the house and let her ride on it. That was the best 'distracter' and she finished all her strawberry flavored Pediasure, which was only 2 ounces... and it took us almost an hour to spoon-feed her, looooooooooong sigh!








After that, I didn't want to put Baby and I through another torture chamber session. I gave Alycia the remaining milk, which I had mixed with some chilled Marigold HL fresh milk.

Once again Rachel, thanks very much for the 2 bottles of milk. That was so thoughtful of you to send the milk to Baby C.

Gosh, it's terribly stressful to feed Baby formula each day - 3 times a day. I can't wait for her to grow up so that I can be relieved from this torturous back-breaking, hair-tearing, nerve wrecking, skin-pulling chore!!

Animal-Shaped French Toast

Feeling lost on lunch ideas, I made french toasts for the girls with wholemeal walnut bread and eggs. Then cut them up into bear shape with my cookie cutters.



That's how Sherilyn ate them - with kaya slathered on the toasts, topped with cheese.
She loved them.


Baby didn't quite like the french toasts and would only swallow them when fed together with soup. She prefered to eat the carrots from the soup.

Random Pix

Baby's first party at Sunday School. She gobbled down a serving of cheese sandwich on her own and wanted to eat the junk food that her jie jies were eating but of course junk food would have to wait. She has years ahead of her to feast on junk food!



Alycia helping me distract Baby by reading to her while I hurriedly shoved the spoonfuls of Pediasure milk into her mouth.

I freaked out when Baby squashed the flash cards!

Everybody Loves Apam

.... including Baby!

Baby's appetite has not been very good lately. I think her body has been trying hard to fight off some pesky bugs - bugs that had bitten everyone in the family and made everyone cough with phlegm. She did cough a little but isn't really bad... like a few coughs in a day without any phlegm.

When hubs bought some apam from the pasar malam, I let Baby try a small pinch of the apam. To my surprise, she loved it. She kept screeeeeeeaming for more. But of course I did not accede to her demand. If I would allow it, I think she could have chomped down 1 or 2 whole apams!




Did you know that any unfinished apam bought from the pasar malam can be kept in the fridge and the following day, reheated in the toaster oven? They would taste as good as fresh! I tried that for the first time and the apam tasted really good and really crispy too. They didn't turn squishy or mouldy. I'm going to do that again.

Lunch At Decanter

We had lunch at Decanter after church 2 Sundays ago as hubs had a craving for American breakfast. Here's what we had:

Pan-fried mackerel fish for me...


Spaghetti Carbonara for Alycia and kakak...


Fried Hokkien Vermicelli for Sherilyn, the mai fun lover.... (shared with kakak)


Decanter breakfast set for hubs (which everyone had a share too)...


Another Decanter breakfast set for hubs (which everyone had a share too)...



Citrus cheese cake with passion fruit seeds and strawberry.


That was our second time to Decanter. The food there is good and priced reasonably too.

For 3 adults and 2 kids, the bill came up to RM92.70.

Decanter is located at :
67M Jalan Setiabakti
Bukit Damansara
50490 KL
Tel : 03-20950 3919

Hairdresser In The Making

Sherilyn my little vain pot loves experimenting with hair styles, both with her own precious locks and our hair. Whenever she sees us seated, her hands will start to itch and twitch and off she'll go to fetch a bunch of combs, hair clips, hair scrunchies and hair bands to practise her coiffuring prowess!

Here she is in action:

First she combed jie jie's hair, then attacked Baby's!


Check out her pockets...



... and I was the next target! Like real only.... coiffuring my hair! She wanted to do something more elaborate with my hair but I ran for my dear life as she was pulling my precious locks off my scalp. Not that I have thick luscious hair, my hair is shedding so much I am going half bald!

Why, What, Where and How

Sherilyn is one very inquisitive girl. She’s now at a stage where she will ask all the ‘where’, ‘why’, ‘what’ and ‘how’. She loves asking me where the food she eats come from, where people come from, what is this and what is that and even asked what a shrink tube is. Well, I’m not complaining as I know only smart kids ask these questions. But sometimes when she asks too much and talks too much when all I want is just peace and silence, I get really pissed off and just feel like asking her to shut up haha!

Baby Drinks Soy Bean Milk With Beancurd

Sick of it and never really liked it before, Baby is hating her Pediasure more and more each day. She kind of likes Marigold HL fresh milk but she is slightly lactose intolerant, so she will have loose bowel and purge after drinking cow's milk. So I bought soy bean milk and beancurd for her. She loved them. She has always liked tofu, even if it's eaten plain, without any soy sauce or seasoning.


Baby enjoying her soy bean milk + beancurd while watching tellie.



The beancurd that I buy is free from 'sek koa' (the coagulant used in the beancurd). The beancurd is coagulated using fruit pectin. The beancurd is super smooth and I normally buy sugar-free ones.

Funny Faces

Just say "Baby, make funny face" and Baby will obligingly and happily display some funny expressions:








Say "show me funny lips Baby" and she'll do this:

These funny faces expressions are priceless, as with her smiles, giggles and laughters. I yearned so much to see these faces when Baby was lying helplessly, in pain and in severe discomfort for 3 weeks in the hospital 5 months ago.

Meals, Utensils And Cutlery For My Kids

This is one of the easiest to cook lunches for my kids and they love it. I would stir-fry a big pot of minced meat or fish paste with veggie and add 2-3 eggs beaten eggs into the mixture, so that the sauce becomes thick egg sauce like the sauce for Cantonese style fried noodles. I omit the corn flour as thickener and use more eggs instead. I then deep freeze a portion for future quicky meals.

With the meat sauce, my kids can choose if they would like to have yee meen, green tea noodles, buckwheat noodles or other types of noodles. Just pour the hot sauce over the noodles and a meal is served.



This time, it's with green tea noodles. I also reheated some stir-fried chives with minced pork which I had cooked the night before and tossed in some toasted sesame seeds.


And this small bowl is for Baby. I normally give her Heinz ABCs, 123s iron-enriched pasta or green tea noodles and 1 tablespoon of the meat sauce. Baby eats very little, like a little kitten. Feed her too much or I'll see her regurgitated food shooting out after her meal, eeeekkksssss!


And I don't like to use melamine or plastic bowls / plates to put hot food for my kids. Don't like the idea of my kids ingesting toxic chemicals leached out. No melamine or plastic cutlery too. They use ceramic / China ware and stainless steel cutlery.

Seng Kee Kitchen

Seng Kee Kitchen is one restaurant (coffee shop style) that we patronize very regularly. The hubs has his lunch there almost everyday and yet doesn't seem to get fed up with that place coz their roast meat (chicken, duck, pork, intestines) are one of the best in town and they have really tasty choy keuk and economy rice dishes too. Apart from these, you can order ala carte dishes.

We had dinner at Seng Kee the other day and here's what we had:

A very tasty plate of pork chop...

Tofu with seafood in claypot...




Fried noodles, specially ordered for Sher who loves noodles...


Stir-fried baby french beans and steamed eggs...


Steamed fish...


And of course their famous char siew...



And I had my favorite 'tun tan' (egg custard) with caramel which is not too sweet. This tastes just as good as the ones from Ipoh Old Town.

For 5 adults and 2 kids, the bill came up to RM100, which is pretty reasonable.

Seng Kee Kitchen is located at :

61A Jalan Desa Bakti
Taman Desa
Old Klang Road, KL
Tel : 7981 6136
This coffee shop is run by a couple from the Foodie Land Ipoh. That's why their food taste so good!

Samseng Girls

Remember I had just blogged about this school tent? Well, 2 days after my 3 rambunctious monkeys played with it, the entire tent ended up twisted and collapsed. The rods erecting the tent were yanked off!



Who says girls are more graceful? They are just as boisterous and choa loh (rough) as boys. Talk about gender equality!

Do You Cut Them Open?

I do! Call me cheapskate but when you cut the tube up, you'll find that there's still lots of toothpaste, hand lotion or facial foam lodged at the neck of the tube... which can last you for another week!






Do you cut them up?

Kon Cheen Har Loke (Dry-Style Pan Fried Prawns)

I cooked Kon Cheen Har Loke (dry-style pan fried prawns) the other day. It was my first time cooking this dish. My mil would cook this dish whenever she's around. Everyone in the family loves this dish, including my 3 girls, even Baby!

It's really simple to cook.

These are the ingredients :

1) Cooking oil
2) Chinese cooking wine
3) Soy sauce
4) Brown or white sugar
5) Spring onions for garnishing (I did not have any spring onions in my fridge, so left that out. The prawns would taste better if stalks of spring onions are cooked in the last step)

Method:
1) Heat up some oil in the wok
2) Fry the prawns for about 15-20 minutes or until the shells turn into orangy color like this:



3) Dish up the prawns

4) Then, prepare the sauce.
5) With the remaining oil left in the wok, pour in some soy sauce, sugar and chinese cooking wine and stir for about 5 minutes. Test the taste. Put in the stalks of spring onions (cut into 3-4 inches in length)
6) Pour the hot sauce over the prawns.


See the orangy color sauce? It's pure prawns sauce from the prawn roe. It tastes really yummy. iLikey!

You can also slice up some cool Japanese cucumbers for garnishing. Eating cool cucumbers would bring down the heatiness.

Easy peasy right? Tastes really good too. Hmmm, know what, I am really tempted to open a small eatery and dish up some delicious MSG-free homecooked dishes. But I think I will need a business plan consultant to help me in the preliminary set-up.

Lose Weight The Safe Way

Do you really think weight loss pills would successfully and safely help you lose weight? Ever since I read about the case of a Singaporean actress who lost both her kidneys after consuming a weight loss product, I never dare touch these products. She’s downright lucky that her boyfriend (who eventually married her) donated one of his kidneys to her. That’s what I call true love! Anyway, I am strongly of the view that in order to safely lose weight and keep your weight in check, you need to EXERCISE (no short cut ok!) and reduce your calories.

'New' Old Toys

Daddy had bought 2 tents (one in the shape of a yellow school bus and the other in the shape of a school) and a toy tunnel for Alycia and Sherilyn last year. When we moved to our condo a year ago, the 3 toys were moved to his office storeroom. A year on, the girls suddenly remembered that they had those toys when they saw kids crawling into a toy tunnel, which looked like theirs on Hi-5. They had badgered daddy to bring the tents and toy tunnel back and after much persuasion and reminders, daddy finally brought them home.

They had great fun playing their 'new' old toys. Sherilyn even insisted on sleeping inside her tent at night!






Camping inside their tent. Love to see their happy faces.

Never Bored Of Yee Meen

Whenever Alycia and Sherilyn see yee meen on the dining table, there will surely be happy shouts of "yay, maggie mee, yummy!" Even Baby loves eating it as the mee is crispy and tasty.



Apart from stir-frying the yee meen with meat, eggs and veggie Hokkien style (dry style), Cantonese style (i.e. with lots of thick egg gravy) is also a hit with them. In fact, Cantonese style is easier to prepare and I can cook extra portions and deep freeze them for future quicky meals.