Stacko Queen?

It's December and papa does not need to go to work early. Hence the little one has a little more time to spend at home. I can confirm that we do not have as much toys as my mother-in-law's hence she decided to improvise...

As papa says "I am the Queen of Stacko!!!" 8 cans of softdrinks!

Let me build another softdrink can tower! : )

Seven cans so far...

Eight! Just nice!!!

A day filled with activities!

Little gal woke up early today... Once at 6am and another time at 8am. Hubby woke me up and we headed off to East Coast Park! Our nice neighbour lent us some "beach" equipment and this did make the sand play more fun!

Reached there at about 9am and the weather was really good.

Papa and Mama got car, I got my own ride too!!!

It was blue skys and we were lucky to find a shady spot on the beach! :) This is little girl's third exposure to the beach and the sand. Her exposure was 4 months ago and her reaction was like she was feeling sand for the 1st time!

Did not want to scare her off... So put her on the mat to play first...

So when I lifted her off the beach mat and wanted her to stand on the sand, she held her legs in seating position! -__-" (sadly, did not get this really funny posture of hers) Resistance is futile, evil papa and mama took off her shoes and plonked her on the sand. She finally stood up and daddy covered her feet with sand.

It was quite funny to see her "escaped" feet on the sand in tiptoe position. After a while, she decided to get my support and pull out the other leg.

  

Without much progress in her playing... I took her for a walk down to the water. Yeah, she love the way the tides came in on her feet (mama got her pants wet... Gee...).

Maybe she thought water signify "washing feet" = end of play... So tiptoe-ing her way from the sand to the beach mat, she grab her socks + shoes, stuck them in our direction and went "NAH". She wanted us to put on the socks for her. 

 After our refusal to wear her socks, she finally got down to playing with sand.

 After a good 2 hours, we cleaned up and left for yummy prawn noodles along Tanjong Katong Road! *slurps!* The same evening, little gal had some play time with my neighbour's two boys. It's really great catching up with my neighbour and her sister while the little girl play with the boys cars...

Psst... this was after lunch, we were waiting for the A/C to cool the car interior while little one pace up and down this walkway...

MY FAVOURITE PHOTO OF THE DAY!

Check out the clear blue sky... :)

Dancing... YEAH!

Little girl is finally 15 months and this is a little dance to celebrate her 15 months.

She went into a dancing frenzy and was enjoying herself everytime the music came on. She was not interested in the educational bits that said "Bib" or "Diaper" or "Elephant". Hope you'll enjoy the clip as much as hubby and I enjoyed her dancing... (PS: please bear with the horrid singing and the very messy house... :P)

Little things in life...

I LOVE TO BITE STUFF

(reads... "everything I can get my hands on including dirt")

The little one has developed a bad habit which I am trying to help her kick... And that is biting or putting everything in her mouth. The most recent being a ten cent coin, the nose of the seal massager among others... Here are pictures of her being caught in the act!

The lollipop was a freak accident. She was on my lap watching Elmo sing her favourite "Elmo Song" and instead of the usual climbing up to hit the laptop keyboard, she sat quietly on my lap. I thought maybe she was tired already then suddenly she turned and pulled the lolly out. YIKES! The wrapper is broken!!! I wonder how much of the sweet she actually took... No more sweets until she is in primary school!!! :(

Monkey See Monkey Do (Using the magic mop)

Cute isn't it? She's been playing with the mop for 2 weeks already. Daddy finally had the chance to see it for himself and took a video... It was close to her zzz time and she insisted on playing with the mop. When she hits corners and get stuck, she'll scream until the mop moves again... *opps... check out my attire! GEE!!!*

I am FULL! I do not want more milk or milk with cereal! Please let me off!!!

Feeding milk to my daughter needs some creative direction because she simply refuses to finish the 150ml of milk! I am desperate because she is only taking a total of 400ml of milk a day. Is that considered little? I should perhaps ask the PD? Website says toodlers between 1 to 2 years should get about 600ml of milk...  So to get her to finish, I will mix the milk with cereal or rusk to feed it to her... In the above occassion, she was TOTALLY not interested! Desperate as I was, I gave up trying after 8 spoons of the cereal... And that was after hubby gaves me dirty looks saying that it was enough and that her little belly seem to be bursting on the seams... 

Memories of my 13.5mth old toodler...

It's been such a busy time for me at work... Usually it will be really late by the time she goes to sleep and I'll be dead tired too... 

At 13.5 months old, she is no longer a baby... more like a little adult and learning new things everyday to amuse me and hubby. Below are just some ratings of my little one's development...  
  
Language development: SLOW
- she's still blabbering baby language but sometimes will try to pronouce certain words (e.g. BBRRRIIIII while pointing to birds.) cannot believe that her first word is not papa and mama! 
Whoever who told me that babies who stick around older kids will learn to talk faster, THIS IS TOTALLY NOT TRUE!!!! 

Understanding Instructions: AVERAGE
She can understand 
- A stern "NO" will make her stop at her tracks, 
- "Give" and she will pass you the item, 
- "Throw" - she will take her soiled diapers and throw them in the bin
- "Go to Papa" - she will strut quickly in the direction where hubby is seated or standing

Understanding vocabulary: AVERAGE
- "Hot", she will immediately pause and not touch the item, 
- "Banana", a head turner! It's her favourite fruit, never fails to catch her attention and she will flash her most brillant smile if there's one in your hands. 

EMOTIONS
- Whine and demands to be picked up even if she happens to trip and fall (This has been corrected. When she whines, hubby and I will just tell her stand up on your own. After 2 days, she will pick herself up.)

- She begins to cry if you snatch something that she's holding tightly to. Using the word "give" will not garner reaction. (This is a behavior which hb and I are still deciding whether we should teach her about)

- Whines and pretend to cry if she does not get a mouth of the fruit you are having (to the extend that she will stare at you with the "Mama/Papa, PLEASE?" sad puppy eyes look. And if hb is hugging her, she will open her mouth wide and bend her head forward when the food is going towards his mouth)

WALKING: GOOD
- Walking is her favourite activity and something which she is best at. When we are out, she walks around full of purpose (as if she knows where she is heading to). Only thing is she will walk right into the legs of unsuspecting adults.  

SOCIAL SKILLS: AVERAGE
- She loves other kids. Especially those with balls and battery operated cars. (she chased after a boy who was on a battery operated car.)


OTHER WIERD ACTIVITIES SHE WILL PARTAKE: 
Pushing her own pram or even the super market trolley - 
Currently her favourite activity, even if it means bending down by the waist to push. And even if it means pushing a trolley that is filled with 3 packs of 5kg rice, 2 bottles of 1 litre oil, 18 tins of assorted tin foods and 6 packets of instant noodles among other things (hubby told me that she was actually using her strength to push the trolley when he let go and yes the trolley moved for over 2 metres... and if hubby did not stop her, she would continue pushing! SUCH strength at this age!!!).  

The 1st Birthday Party!!!

6th December (Sunday) was little girl's 1st year birthday party. We had to celebrate it one week early as my parents were going overseas and hubby and I each have a function to attend on the following Saturday and Sunday.

The Invitations...
The invitations were sent out to close friends (esp those with kids) and relatives (most of them were hubby's relatives from Malaysia). Hubby made an invitation card for me to give out. It was sized on 4R photo paper and folded into half. The invitations sent out via facebook and emails was an adpatation of hubby's card (see below). Thanks hubby for coming up with such a nice concept for the card! : )

The food...
We catered our buffet from DeliHub and it was a good deal as we got the 20% discount for booking a month early. Thanks to Jowinbaby for telling me. :) Good thing is no food was wasted, left overs were packed up and taken back by hubby's relatives...

The cake figurines...
Hubby suggested that we use the Slyvannian Family. It was something special other than the usual Pooh or Mickey/Minnie theme ( I wanted those usual theme, because it's easier to get party supplies). Originally, we wanted to get the mouse family. But we couldn't find a nice one, so we chose another rodent - the Walnut Squirrel. :)  We bought the outdoor table set and hence the concept of "Garden party with flowers" was born.

The cake...
This was my greatest worry because 1 week before 5 Dec, I was still in the midst of confirming the design with Pine Garden. Luckily for me, Shi Hui was helpful and we manage to confirm the cake's flavours, size and design.

The design was adapted from one of those in their catalogue. As I was crazy about bees and ladybugs, I requested for them to be placed on the cake... This is the best photo I could find of the cake... Until I get a better one, this is how the cake looks like...

The cake is 3.5kg (1kg on top, 2.5kg below). The top tier is Moutain Cat Durian flavour while the bottom is Chocolate Hazelnut crunch. No doubt that the cake did burn quite a hole in the pocket! But! All was worth it when the kids and adults Oooohed and Ahhhhed about how beautiful the cake was... And of course, the adults who LOVE durians raved about how fantastic the Cat Moutain Durian (or is it Moutain Cat Durian?) cake was! The adults who didn't like durian and kids loved the Chocolate Hazelnut crunch and even the icing (yes, they asked for 2nd serving. And they even asked me "Auntie, can I have the (alphabet) please?"). The kids also did not forget about those chocolate bees and lady bugs and the icing that were in cubes!

As you can see, the little one just recieved 2 angpows from Ah Tai and she's not letting go! I guess she must be wondering why everyone is "crowding" around her.

The door gifts...
Hubby and I spent an entire afternoon hunting for special door gifts. I had already planned to give the kids things that can be eaten. While walking around Bugis, we came across these nice little Disney Pooh PVC jars (there was Pooh - purple, Piglet -pink, Tigger -yellow and Eyeore - blue). There were those strips of paper inside for folding stars. And since it was within our budget, we bought 16 of them (luckily, we bought extra because we realised that it was just enough for the kids). See this was when I told hubby that if we chose the "Pooh" theme, then the PVC jars will gell nicely (oh well too late to change anyway...).

3 days before the party, I sat in the living room packing in the goodies which included : 1 mini lollipop, 1 Ferror Rocher,  1 pack of Neon Gummy Worms (hey it's a garden party lor...), 1 small pack of Healthy Times Organic teddy Puff and 3 pcs of Healthy Times  Organic Arrowroot Cookies (It's flower shaped! Maple or Vanilla Flavour packed in a small zip lock bag.)

The kids were excited! Especially the older ones who were in kindergarten because the strips of paper provided entertainment and they started to fold "stars". Even the parents join in the fun. Too bad I did not take a photo of the kids and parents folding "stars"...

PS: The kids also got to choose water-on-tattoos! :) Bee or lady bug. Hubby found them at the party store while we were getting the birthday candle and banner. These were originally for the kids but the adults wanted too! Too bad the some of the lady bugs got wet and there were only a few left. (You can see the photo below, the kid on the right side of the photo has a "bee" tattoo on her right arm... the gal on the left had one too but hers was covered by her shirt...) :P

The main part of the party ended and the tradition begins... Little girl ate her chicken drum stick with one leg stepping out of the door. It signifies 出外不愁吃.

And of course the "Dah Ku" ceremony where she steps on the super sized ang ku kueh. To me it signifies a life with progress while my hubby's grandma says it's a ceremony to ensure that she grows well and safe. I can't seem to find photos of this part... After the ceremony, little girl gets to wear her first pair of shoes. The "old people" believe that babies should not wear shoes too early (i.e. before 1 year old) else they will "run away". I do not know how true. But hubby and I picked out a new pair for her and it's cute pink Disney Baby shoes!

Photos (posed) with the birthday girl
PS: The balloon deco was proudly put up by hubby and I the night before. Thanks hubby for blowing every single one of them and of course a pat on my own back for tying them together into flowers. :)

A BIG THANK YOU! 

Sadly, I missed taking photos with many of the guests and not to mention my own family (sobs...). I was too tired and the whole party was too big for me to handle. Perhaps if I ever have such a huge party, I will call for a professional photographer to take photos of the entire event...

I have to say a BIG thank you to:

Hubby - for being the only photographer (and entertainer to the kids - teaching them how to fold stars). And putting up with my naggings on invitation cards, invitation list, etc. And of course, the brain child for the cake figurines which I love too (since I was looking for something special too... although it's difficult to pull it off).

My parents - who came super early with our breakfast and helping me get the "chicken drumstick" and prayer items for the day. And of course sponsoring little girl's Ralph Lauren red dress (which I got from the US store when they had sale) and the pair of shoes...

My sister's boyfriend Jeff - who came with the much needed stools and of course a video camera. ;)

My grandma + aunt - Who also came with the much needed stools too and entertained Xi En when all the guests have left.

AND ALL THE GUESTS!!!
Who came despite busy schedules (like going for another party and rushing to mine, coming to my party although brother was getting married, coming all the way from Malaysia, dropping by despite busy wedding celebrations - you know who you are!) to celebrate with us this special occassion.

And on behalf of little Nicole - THANK YOU for the generous gifts and ang pows!!!

NOTTI MUMMY!!!!!

You might wondering what inspired this particular entry... Well, the mother of little girl, yes me has been up to no good again.


1. Finishing her milk at night
Talk about different strategies and techniques in tackling problem. Creativity is the keyword when it comes to getting my little one to finish her milk. Parenthood has became an art, difficult to understand and only creativity is supported! So when little girl refuse to finish 'x' oz of milk, I will pour the difference into a bowl with cereal or rusk for her to eat... For a few nights, I was able to get her to finish the cereal or rusk with milk. *YEAH!*


2. Forcing her to seat in the baby chair
I do not know if it is my expectations that's making her feel miserable. She does not like to sit in the baby chair. It's as though the seat heats up to more than 40 degrees celcius when she seats on the chair for a few moments. After about 6 mouthful of food, she starts climbing out from the chair. It's as though the chair overheated and she HAD TO GET OUT! It's frustrating but is it normal that once they learn how to climb and stand they will refuse to sit?

3. When I am busy in the kitchen... 
I always deem the kitchen as a place of danger and it's usually dirty (from all the cooking, etc). So there were a few occassions where hubby wasn't free to help me with little girl and I desperately needed to get things done in the kitchen! So TARDAH.... This is where little girl will be: 

Yeap... right inside a laundry basket!

Okay other than the last one, I guess I wasn't that naughty, was I? :) 

Milestone Developments!!!

28 October 2009 - hubby excitedly told me that my mother in law (MIL) said that little girl has started to walk without support and that she can manage about four little wobbly steps forward! : )

I told hubby I wanted to see little girl do her small stunt and no matter how my hubby coaxed her, she refused! But she showed it us yesterday! *YEAH!* Anyhow, I am glad that she is progressing. MIL said she will most probably be able walk by next month even before her 1st birthday. I sure hope that's true. I guess it will be fun the day she can walk on her own! But it also means time to spend more money buying shoes! :)

Other than that, she's started to point. When she sees something that she's interested in, she will point at it. But usually I am a bit slow to respond to her pointing! So next time she points, I shall make it a point to ask her what she's pointing at or bring her closer to take a look at the item!

Birthday Celebration - Have it or NOT??? *Hmmmmm....*

Little girl is now 10 months old officially! :) In another 2 months, she will be 12 months old! I have not decided if a birthday party is in order or should it be a small personal family affair... A lot of mommies have made thier plans and booked a place for the party. So if I want to have one, I have to start planning!

One Sunday, a neighbour invitied me to her daughter's birthday celebration. It was a small affair among some of her friends, close relative and neighbours... A neighbour who was staying on the same floor as us became the official photographer for the event!

The birthday party is in Aug (after national day) and it's been two months. Better late than never!

My neighbour was so facinated with my daughter that he took many single shots of her!

 
 
 
Some shots with the photographer's daughter. For some reason, my little girl allowed her to carry for a long time. The reason why I mentioned this is becuase during this period my girl will frown or start crying if held by a stranger! *hmmm....* Is it sisterly love then?

I thought these are pretty nice shots of my little girl with daddy! My curious little girl! Trying to push daddy away so that she can reach for the lens of the camera!

How can I not post a photo of her with me??? At this time, little girl is not not very proficient in standing so I had to help her else she'll be falling all over the place!

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
To end this post, a family photo shot (ok ok, it's not fantastic! But have to make do, since little girl was getting restless. It was 1plus in the afternoon, well beyond her nap time!)

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
PS: We were in red because it was post national day! And what better way then to wish my neighbour and her baby a Happy Birthday!

Developments...

It's been such a long time since I blogged isn't it? I have been trying for the past 2 weeks and it's pretty frustrating since I always fail to post it...

At about 8 months, my little one has been pulling herself to standing position and balancing herself in standing position by releasing her grip on tables, cot railing etc. She is able to stand without support for a few seconds. She can also slowly lower herself until she sits steadily on her bump...

She pulled me a special suprise performance this morning (age check: 8 months and 3 weeks)! She actually pulled herself to a standing position without gripping on the sofa... She also started to move along the sofa to pull at the bills which I have placed there. While pulling at the bills, I noted that her free hand was not holding on to anything!

Aren't babies an amazing lot? They can do so many things and learn so quickly. If we do not spend enough time with them, we will not be able to see these amazing feats!

I hope I can post her recent pictures and clips here soon...

Mama's 28th Birthday Celebration

Opps... I just exposed my age... Yeah, I am not that young to begin with... As with every year, my parents celebrated my birthday. Last year, I chose Tim Sum (because I had craving for it while little girl was in my tummy). This year, I chose New York New York at West Coast. I am not a fan of western cuisine but since I signed up for the membership, I thought of giving it a shot. The bill came up to a horrid $200 (luckily I had a $15 discount voucher). I got a nice BIG cup (as big as a bowl) as the birthday surprise.

Little girl had a ball of a time as she got to pinch salmon, toast and potato... And not to mention that she was attracted to the round brown creamy thing that was brightly lit with sticks that seem to get shorter by the second (Yes! It was my birthday cake).

This post is also specially for Adeline, Luther and baby Bryan: Thank you for the cute little denim jumper! I wore it with another top though... Enjoy the photos! And my little girl is 7 months and 2 weeks old today! (which means another 2 more weeks to 8 months! WoooHoo...)

Just me and the cake... My sister insisted on putting so many candles and not just 1...

Trying to take a photo with little one...

She's just too distracted by the candles!

Trying to get a family shot and little girl is just plain irritated that both the cake and the candles are out of her reach... She plain refuse to sit, stand and just want to bend forward to grab those bright little lights... LOLz

Serious looks can kill! Haha. Don't the 2 of them look so murderously adorable?

Little girl with her favourite man... Papa...

If you're not giving me the cake, give me those candles PLEASE!!!!!!!

Can you see a morsel of food just on top of her mouth?

Evidence of a happy yiyi - Yeap she got to carry my girl without fuss...

Well the picture says everything... Ah ma is super happy! She got to carry my daughter without fuss AND she disappeared with my girl when I went to Cold Storage to grab some stuff... -_-'' I think this is the best photo my mum has taken with little girl so far... Going to resize and transfer to her phone as wall paper. I bet she will show it off to her colleagues! :)

6 months and counting... :)

Little girl is 6 months old! And she spent the day at Junction 8. My hubby and I signed her up for the baby photo calander contest... I only got to know that it is a SPH calander after reaching the venue! There were loads of babies and toddlers as the contest was open to babies from 6 months to 2 years. A total of 12 babies will be selected for the calander. Seriously, I did not really read the application form... I only took it home and passed on the rest of the work to my hubby.

The theme for Sunday was animal theme. A lot of girls from the Dec thread of SMH forum offered to loan me their animal costume. So here's thanking Ivy, Rachel and Jlow for offering! My fellow forum mate and neighbour, Jlow passed me a pooh costume but it was too loose... :P

In the end, I got one from the push cart outside Carrefour (despite knowing that it is $7 more expensive than what I could get online) on Saturday evening. That night, I unpicked the ears and added cotton into the ears for more "3-D" effect. *haha* If you think I am crazy, you should have seen the variety of costumes that the parents had their kids in.

The event at J8 required one parent to go up the stage to parade the baby in front of 3 judges. The scoring will be based on how photogenic (there was a pre-stage photo shoot), smiley, cute and well-behaved the baby is. I guess my baby was too tired so she did not really smile on stage, she did however BEAM at me while in my hubby's arms (when she was not on stage- *oh well*). Anyway the bigger babies (who are almost 2 years) seem to have added advantage as they could walk up the stage, wave their hands, blow flying kisses at the judges and even shake their backsides! Oh well, I can only hope for the best... The results will be out in July... So till then... :P

Anyway, here are some photos of my little gal with papa, me... And her fellow friend, baby Ambrose whose mum is also from the SMH Dec forum! :)

Just reached J8 and we were queing for her number... :P

Single shots with Papa (Top) and with Mama (Bottom)

Top: Baby Ambrose: "I want my afternoon nap..." Bottom: Close up of sheep sheep & cow cow...

Babies with mummies... Ambrose is attracted to the light while my girl is distracted by Ah Ma...

Baby girl with Papa (before going on stage)... :P

On stage now... But where did the smiles go??? :P

Milk Spa...

My little girl had her most expensive spa the weekend that just passed... Why did I say it's expensive? It's because she is bathing in my breast milk - which is like the most precious liquid any mother would ever dream of giving their babies! Seriously, I would not waste my milk like this if not for the fact that I was taking a cocktail of medication for my bad cough. Have to thank Christine from SMH for reminding me that I should not throw and instead keep the milk for my girl to have a milk spa.

The milk is pretty mosturising (after heating up the milk in the pot, it forms a yellow layer of what looks like oil!) but sticky (most probably due to the sugar content - yes, breast milk is sweet). This time I got more inspiration from Chantalle on how to warm up the milk. Previously, I had left the milk until room temperature and added boiling water to make the milk warm. So this time round, it was very much easier! : )

I warmed about 5 litres of milk and it did not even fill up half the tub! I had no choice but to dilute the milk with warm water so that my girl could have a decent dip in the tub... :) Maybe next time I will warm about 20 packs of milk for her instead (thanks Chantelle for the tip!). My hubby took a video of her and I have yet edited it (It's a super big file so have to cut it before posting... do look out for the video!)

Here are some pictures of my girl enjoying the milk spa...

Updated (13 June 09)! Here is the video!