Midnight Indulgence

In anticipation of one of my fav persons in the world's visit tomorrow, I baked a simple yet delish coffee cake. And my oh my, was it delish or what?! It was soft and light and the crunch of the streusel complemented the cake perfectly. Thankfully I had most of the stuff needed except sour cream, so I replaced it with buttermilk instead, and an hour after I got started, this is what came out from my oven:


Look at that toasted walnuts, Hershey's milk chocolate chips and cinnamon sugar goodness on top of the cake..



15 minutes later.. one piece went missing



and ended up on my plate!



Recipe from Joyofbaking. Think I'll warm this up tomorrow and drizzle some milky chocolate ganache and caramel syrup for the chocolate lover. Hmmm.

Best Part of Parenting - Shy Chicken

Nia, while eating fried chicken: "Papa look, this chicken is malu (shy)"

Papa laughing, "Why is the chicken malu?"

"Nia ate the chicken baju, so the chicken malu!"said she non-chalantly while peeling off the crispy flour layer off the chicken and smugly tucking it in her mouth.

Papa & mummy : ROTFL..

Foghorn Leghorn ain't really a shy chicken I knw - I just love my looney tunes!!

Florence + The Machine - Dog Days Are Over (2010 Version)

Oh My Bottle!

I've not exposed the little one to bottle yet, we tried a few times when she was about 2 months old, but it didn't work. She has flatly refused to drink expressed milk from the bottle the few times I've left her home and went out to run errands, that my mum had to spoon feed the milk to her.

Guess what? Now, at 22 weeks, she wants a bottle! Why? because the che-che drinks milk from the bottle lying down next to her, and she's been trying to grab it all these while and suddenly a couple of days back she managed to wrestle the bottle from her che-che and was trying to put the teat into her mouth, when I dived in to rescue (the bottle) of course!

There goes my plan to weaning her from breast straight to sippy cup! Dang!

Yea, to avoid further injury (to the bottle and babies) I took out her bottle, that has been unused since the last attempt by mum, and filled it with some cooled boiled water and gave it to her. Look at the joy!

on my last post

OK, since someone actually asked what the hell am I babling about, let me explain. That was just some rambling my gf and I used to do for hours, on a daily basis, sipping our cuppa after dinner at Chinois on the Park. Yes, really. We specifically like to look at the couples around us especially outside, at the cancer-stick zone, and try to figure out what's going on. Ha ha. It's quite interesting all sorts of things we can come up with based on little cues we pick up from a particular table.

So, I was just thinking of that while writing that post, which is, obviously, inspired by my surrounding, no doubt! Here's to Miss E or shall I say, Mrs. S for all the good times at Chinois on the Park!

Somewhere Over The Rainbow -- The Wizard Of Oz (1939 Film)

A Green Eyed Monster

Everytime someone visits us and goes straight to the baby, someone else clams up and refuses to speak and sometimes become a tad too sensitive that the slightest thing seem to turn on the waterworks! Once my father came around and went straight to the baby and after a while handed the baby over to me and called for the older one and she just flatly refused him. And she stood firm by her decision. It took my father a long long time to coax her into giving him a hug.

Today, my sis came by and went straight to the baby. The older one asked for water, poured half of it on the mattress pad she was standing on (which I just let go) and held the cup to her mouth and stood that way for a good 10 minutes! Imagine that? Ten whole minutes. What resolve. What determination. Don't you think?

So finally when I asked her what she's holding the cup to her mouth that way for, she threw the cup away and started crying. Only then I realised that she was upset my sister didn't hug and kiss her and play with her first before the baby. My poor little green eyed monster.

mike zakowski - our fav monsters inc. character

This Love Hurts

I never imagined when they say "FULLTIME" mum, it really means round-the-clock-like-24/7-with-no-rest-whatsoever!

I've had days when I thought to myself I'd probably be a better mum if I was working and come home to spend 1 or 2 hours before their bedtime and leave early in the morning before they wake up. Like I used to, with the older one. Was I a better mum then? I guess I was. I was much more loving and tolerant and fun to be with (this is MY assumption, of course).

These days, if I wake up at 7 - 7.30am, I'd be able to clean & tidy up the house, do the laundry and have a cup of coffee, sitting down, like properly with a sandwich or biscuits or something. But if I slept in and wake up closer to 9am, I won't be able to do ANYTHING, that is, no coffee, no breakfast, no lunch, not even pee break until its 2 or 3pm when they both nap. That frustrates me.

Few days back one of those days when I havne't managed to get anything done, while I was feeding the baby, I asked her to grab a tissue so that I could wipe her nose. She refused to budge. I said it again and again AND again. She ignored me completely and carried on with whatever she was playing with. So I shouted.

Only then she grabbed a tissue, let me wipe her nose, threw the tissue away then came back and sat down next to me and said, "Mummy, please don't shout at Nia" with the saddest face and huge puppy-dog eyes. I knew I just screwed up, like BIG TIME. I panicked. Something I seldom do. I didn't, for a few seconds, know how to respond to that. When I came to, I said to her, "I'm sorry for shouting at you".
Did she understand that I was really, truly sorry? What goes on in her mind when she said that to me? I'd really like to understand things from her perspective and wish she was able to tell me that but I guess that will take a few more years yet.

I still haven't figured out what is OK and what is NOT OK in dealing with toddlers like her. Reading tonnes of material on disciplining toddlers only making me more confused than I ever was. I miss the days when all I'd say to her were sweet nonsenses and she just cooed and smiled and later on, babbled gibberish back to me. I miss the time when she was the baby and all I felt was overwhelming love and nothing else. What am I doing wrong?

The Aftermath

So, the storm has hit on 24th of June at approximately 9.30am at DSH, thus delivering into our hands (straight from my cut-open tummy) a bouncy baby girl. Simultaneously confirming to the audience, that 1. her lungs are working fine and 2. she's gonna be our very own Mariah, our gorgeous little Ynez Sophia were handed over to us.

Staying true to her Mariah nature, she still continues to exercise her vocal chords, now more than ever, as she approaches the twenty-one week old mark. Aren't babies amazing? The one thing I'm grateful for with both of them is that they slept like babies (erm, like babies SHOULD) through the night from the second month on. Just that this little one tends to wake at least twice in the night for feed, unlike Nia who never did. .

So, I've been home since the storm hit, for the first month had mum staying with us preparing all the delish pantang food, together with my aunt who was looking after Nia since November 2008. Then my mum went back home and aunt and I managed the two until she decided that two is more than she can handle when I go back to work. With her decision to leave, we made a critical decision for me to stay home fulltime.

Boy, am I having fun or am I having fun? C'mon, guess! :P

The Lull Before the Storm

Holy mother of Cows! It's been almost a year! Well alot has happened since my last post..

In a nutshell:

1. I started on a fixed term project with an MNC in August last year, my contract ending Aug this year.
2. We cancelled Canada trip coz we couldn't get Nia to sleep over at my folks w/out me there.. and by the time we tried to get her a Visa it was a little too late. I know DC is pissed, havent heard from him since.
3. Our bunny Marbles died in January this year.
4. My BiL (hubz brother) passed away March this year.
5. I'm expecting No.2 at the end of June this year!
6. Hubz started on a new job January this year and hating it every single day (not the job but the people aspect of it, well some people)

Yes, dramaful times..
What I did not expect was to get preggers again so soon, despite hubz reminders on a daily basis that I'm not THAT young, that I should get it all over & done with as soon as possible. I, on the other hand, at the beginning of the pregnancy, was rid with guilt. That I'm robbing Nia of the attention and undivided love that was there exclusively for her once the new baby comes. Is this common among mums when they get pregnant second, third time around? I initially thought that it was probably a passing phase and I'll get over it, plus also I was still breastfeeding Nia, so I guess I was reluctant and nervous about the fact that I had to wean her off in preparation of latching another one on. How would Nia feel?
Anyways, I continued to breastfeed up to early second trimester, although in between I've tried a couple of methods to wean Nia off (unsuccessfully, of course), until my gynae told me to stop breastfeeding completely as he said since I had early labour scare at 30 weeks with Nia, continuing to breastfeed during pregnancy is not advisable for me, as it may lead to the same thing with this pregnancy. According to him breastfeeding makes your brains produce oxytocin which is the same hormone that helps contract the womb after delivery (hence they say breastfeeding helps you get into shape faster! Yea, right!). If I continue to produce oxytocin throughout my pregnancy, given my past record, it is plausible that I will have an early labour, this time it may not just be a false alarm like the last time!
So that day I went home and had a conversation with Nia. Actually I had conversations with her about it the whole day, that she can no longer breast feed, that she is now a big girl, she was gonna be a che-che soon, she has to drink milk from glass/bottle like the rest of the kids her age. It was SO difficult (for me) that I cried myself to sleep that night, but the same night Nia went to bed after a bottle of formula instead of breast milk. And it has been that way since.
Thank God for that.
I am now 34 weeks.. few more weeks to go before we hold our little girl in our hands.. Yes, it's a girl! Ha ha, so much for all the naming and planning, huh? We do know God will only give us what we deserve, and a girl is an absolute joy.. for now.. let's not think about the teenage years now, shall we? Allow me the next 10 years to prep myself for it..