To the skin doctor...

Aver's rash took a turn for the worse. She had two fellow church member praying for her whilst in church last Sunday and we are totally grateful to them. It definitely is better than have those people who passed hurtful remarks. Just to name a few...

1) "AIYOH... look at the baby....tsk...tsk..." Auntie shaking head at the same time.

2) " So sayang... such a cute baby her face like that..." auntie decided that her fingers are clean enough to touch Aver's already pus-producing rash.

3) "AIYOH....why like that? eeee...." Aunties decided to continue discussing Aver's rash behind our back LOUDLY!

Oh yes, all these made me breakdown yet again. It hurts to see my own baby hurting like that and than have to hear such comments. Of course there are others who are concerned and they have the courtesy not to pass such remarks.

Sunday night itself, while I was busy trying to finish up on the girls' new year clothes I did not pay much notice to the slumbering Aver. When it was time to transfer the baby to the bedroom, I nearly fainted in fright! I thought my baby had died.

BLOOD... blood flowed from her cheeks and were all over her mattress, hands and shirt. Blood was still oozing out when I saw her. I broke down.... I cannot stand it anymore. To prevent her from scratching it, I held her in my arms the whole night through.

The next morning, we went to the government clinic to get a referral to the skin centre. Got the earliest appointment and thank God, it was today. I made the mistake of letting her sleep by herself on her bed and I woke up at 5 am to discover blood again. However, this time the damage was slightly less than the night before.

Here she is sleeping wearing a pair of socks to prevent her from scratching.

She is on antibiotics for a week and her medicated creams has been changed... and another visit will come in two weeks time.

Please if you are reading this, help us by saying a little prayer for the little girl.

So tired...

Look at how tired she is, sleeping whilst completing her homework.
She has been dozing off on her lunches too.
Kind of sad to see her in this state.
While napping, she will always wake up within an hour crying.
However, she does not even know it.
And after a quick trip to the bathroom, she crashed into her bed again.

My little bear...

looks so handsome HERE .
Gave my second faceless bear to Honeymeow and she totally fell in love with him.
Why is it a him and not a her... we don't know...somehow its a HIM.
Anyway, I know he is cute but I did not know that he is soooooooo cuuutttttteeeeeeeeeee!!!
So Honeymeow has insisted that I start making them for sale but because the pattern is copyrighted I can't.
But I just cannot get her nagging (don't scold me har...) out of my head, so will be attempting to modify the pattern.
Now, we decided that there will be 5 brothers to be borned soon in time for Valentine's Day.
Get in touch with her at honeymeow@gmail.com to reserve one for your dearest.
There will only be 5 brothers... so it is limited edition!

Aver's First Birthday Post by Honeymeow

Honeymeow had did a write-up on Aver's birthday and I must say she did a very good job... better than me.

You can go read it HERE!

Thank you Honeymeow for the pictures, the blog post and also the perfect complexion that I can only dream of.

Packed food for Ash

There are some really creative mums at a forum who work miracles with the food in their hands to create wonderful bentos for their school-going kiddos.

I, on the other hand, lack this creativity but due to the exorbitant prices of the canteen food in Ash's school, I decided to pack some food for her.

Hence, I will not shamefully call my prepared lunch boxes, Bentos, but just Packed Food.

Here are three of them that I had prepared last week.

07 Jan 08

Cornflakes cups and cherries

10 Jan 08

Seaweed Pork Floss Rice Rolls with Mini Mandarin Oranges

11 Jan 08

Tuna Seaweed Rice Rolls and Moulded Egg with Mini Mandarin Oranges

There is a need to plan and prepare the food the night before in my slumber state but I sort of enjoy the process of it.

Plus, I feel better that Ash is eating "good" food rather than the pricey not much nutrition canteen food.

It also allow her to save her pocket money for other uses (which I secretly hopes that she will not).

Crafting Weekend

Have not been doing much of my crafting and has been rather restless about it.
Since I did not wake up in time to go for church service on Sunday, we stayed home for most part of the day.
With that time, I pulled out my sewing machine and the outcome was these.

And I must say I am very proud of them and so want to keep them all for myself.
Anyway, the end products are availabe here.

So what do you think about them?

How is Primary One so far?

Ash has been in school for four days and so far still quite alright.
She has been waking up at 5 am and has been quite a good girl at that.
So far she has been able to get herself ready and her breakfast down in her tummy in time with no rushing at all.
However, when she hit home she is all ready to jump into bed and snooze away.
So after her quick lunch, she will go snoozing away.
That is the hard part... when to wake her up?
If I wake her up in a hour, she may not have enough rest.
If I let her sleep away, she may not have the time to practise her piano and do her homework.
And, she got her spelling list.
Coming Wednesday, she will have her first spelling.

First Day of Primary School

Ash's first day of primary school... we are all excited.
We (as in parents) set our hand phone to wake us up at 5 am so that we have ample time to get ready for school.
At 5 am, Superpig went to wake Ash up.
In her slumber state she mumbled,"I am going to pass urine on your hand..."
Was quickly ushered to the bathroom to do her business and for a quick morning refreshing shower.
Then there was breakfast and it was time to go wait for the school bus.

School bus came a little later then the company had claimed to arrive.
While waiting, Ash said,"I forgot to brush my teeth."
With all the excitement of getting her ready for school we totally forgot the most basic morning routine.
Once she is in the bus, we hopped into our car to meet her in school.
In school, it is the usual hustle and bustle of school assembly and the girls are off to their classrooms.

And Aver was happily sleeping away.
Parents loitered around in the canteen which was beside the Primary One classrooms.
I don't deny that we did the same thing.
While the teacher was trying to organise the pupils, mark the attendance, collect their books and so on, our Ash were looking kind of bored.
She whipped out her storybook and started reading and reading and reading.
She was told to keep it away by another teacher and she did.
But in less then ten minutes, she took the book out and continued reading.
Then came the most exciting part for all anxious parents - recess!
Older girls came down to fetch these newcomers to the canteen to buy their food.
Was lucky that Ash and her 'big sister' chose to sit rather near to the barricade that was set up.
Yes... barricade ...which is necessary to stop over anxious parents from rushing up to their daughters and start pampering them.
Ash happily munched away at her chocolate chip muffin.

Once she was done with that she went off with her 'big sister' to explore the rest of the school.

Seriously, she looks so cute in that uniform....according to my mum, she looks just like me when I went to school.

I just hope that she adjust well to the primary school environment and also will behave herself.

Out of job!

Think I am out of job.
Hate it... cos I knew this would happen before the school closed.
Even asked that it to be confirmed whether I am still able to continue with the special arrangement but was told not to worry.
Was told to remain status quo as the P is ignorant and cannot be bothered with such issue.
Today, I decided to ask and was told that have to confirm with the P again as she is rather...

Hate it because I knew it would happened and was all prepared to look for another homebase job.
An ex-colleague and good friend even called me to tell me that there was an opening in a company which I can give it a try.
However, I could not because I was told to REMAIN STATUS QUO.

Now for the next 6 months, we will be financially challenged!

I hate it!

I wish I can do more to help out Superpig but I can't.

The little hobby business is not doing well as I did not put in a lot of effort and with the two princesses demanding my attention, I have very limited time to run it properly.

GOD HELP ME, HELP US... please....


If anyone is reading this, please leave some encouraging comments as I really need some now.

All about 2007 Christmas

December went past in a whiz with a whirlwind of events.

Drown amongst the many projects to complete for each event, I totally have no idea what actually happened in December.

I know that it is a must to take some Christmas-sy pictures with all the Christmas lightings.

However, that was not done at all as there were the continuous rain and when it did not rain, I was to worn out to get out of the house.

Then there were the presents to prepare as there were some requests...tissue cozies.

Then there were Christmas cookies to bake for Ash's music teachers and abacus teacher but that was not done at all.

Then there was the Christmas log cake to bake for the Christmas get-together that was replaced with a simple cake with Christmas decoration.

Then presents to wrap.

And finally the Christmas get-together.

Now, I am nursing a overtired body, mind and soul.

But before I can really rejuvenate... I need to prepare for Ash's first day in Primary One.

I am an irresponsible mother!

A few more days to Ash's start into Primary One.
All so exciting, so much to do...

and i lost her school exercise books.

Was labelling the books for school and then I realised that there were no exercise books.
I definitely paid for them.
I definitely took them home.
But I just cannot remember where I put them and I searched the whole house and I cannot find them.

Now Superpig got to go all the way back to her school to buy a new set.

What is wrong with me?

Aver's First Birthday Celebration - 16 December 2007

Aver turn one today.
Had a birthday celebration.
A special thank you to Pam (Honeymeow) for taking photographs for us.
Photos can be viewed in Aver's blog...

Here... I am going to talk about this past year.

Birth of Aver was smooth and really quite easy.
Taking care of Aver can be a challenge as she does not really like to take naps.
She was expected to be a big size baby like her sister but she did not live up to the expectation.
People around were always commenting that she is small for her age...but she is healthy and active so who cares what they say.
Then came the rashes... the coming and the going of the rashes really makes me quite upset.
However, with constant prayers and medication, I am very sure that it will be cured.
Aver wears me down with her constant need for my attention but she always made sure that she will give me her sweetest smile when I need it.
Aver loves her sister, Ash.
She follows Ash everywhere she goes and always get excited when we go to school to fetch Ash home.
A year... a very tiring year but yet a very fullfilling year.
A year... I breastfed Aver for a year and am willing to go on.
A year... I promise the next year will be just as fun as this year...

Ash's Birthday - 14 December 2007

The party may be over but that does not mean that we cannot do a family celebration...just the four of us.
Enjoy the slide.

Take about safety

We know that in commercial building, it is essential to keep the emergency exits and stairways clear, without obstruction.

If you stay in a private estate, the estate management will ensure that the emergency exits and stairways are clear.

This is governed by our safety laws to ensure that in times of emergency, everyone has the ability to escape at the fastest speed or for rescue workers to enter.

However, if you are staying in a HDB... what is the rule?

Take a look at the picture below and decide for yourself whether you will be able to escape when there is an emergency?

All the items (except for the red bicycle) belonged to the new neighbour.

We cannot even get to the bicycle... (by the way, the bicycle never had its front wheel sticking out before.)

Anyway, the issue is here is safety...

A few months ago, the lifts broke down (all three of time... what is the chance of that happening?) and I had to use the stairs. Carrying Aver in the sling, I carefully made my way down the stairs.

It took me almost 20 minutes to reach the ground level.

Because the area around the stairs are cluttered with things.

I had to manoeuvre around the things and watch my steps hence the long time needed to reach the ground level.

Raining all the way

If you are in the same land as me, you will know that it had been raining for a few days already.

And many have trouble trying to get the laundry dried as we do not need to indulge in dryers.

In my household, I resorted to have a fan blowing at the clothes so that it will help the drying process.

And then... it decided to stop raining for just one whole day ... 13 December 2007... it was a rather sunny day.



When I opened the window and viewed downwards... clothes are out sucking in the heat from the sun.

Superpig's update

98 kg

I could literally put his jeans down to his knees without unzipping.

And...

He can pull it back up and wear it properly again!

Damn...

I need to lose some weight too.

Going on semi-Atkins, one carbo meal a day (as best as I can).

Ash's birthday party - 09 Dec 2007

Ash's birthday is on 14th December but we decided to hold the celebration on a weekend.

Hence we celebrated it on 9th December, Sunday.

Think you have read enough about me going on and going about the various preparation that went on, so today you will see for yourself the celebration enough.

I prepared the butercream icing the night before but my wonderful Superpig forgot to take a photo of me slogging away.

With the buttercream done, I store them nicely in the fridge and then sit back and think about the next day.

On the 9th itself, I got to kick myself out of the bed early... (okay, 9am is not very early but at least I tried.)

I started to bake the cupcakes, prepared Aver's breakfast, lunch and dinner.

I am glad that I begged my mum to come over and help me take care of Aver while I slogged away in the kitchen.

Once the cupcakes were ready and cooled, the creaming comes next.

After about an hour of creaming the cupcakes, I finally can rest my legs.

While I was in the kitchen, Ash enteratined herself...

I stood from 9 am till 1pm and my heels hurt very badly.

Think I seriously need to wear a pair of well-cushioned shoes at home too.

Once we gobbled down our lunch, it was time to pack all the things in the car and move on down to the venue of the celebration itself.

The rest of the evening, I will leave it to the photos to tell the story.

Enjoy...

Turned 32 - 07 December 2007

When I reached this date, I should be happy as it is my birthday.
However, I did not really feel good about it.

It got nothing with the age and everything to do with what I had accomplished in these 32 years.

I failed in my teaching career, leaving teaching in a very bad mental state.

Till this very day when I pass by the school I last teach, I still shudder in fear and anxiety.

Because of this mental inability to handle the stress I am and still not able to return to teaching full time. (Although it is partially due to childcare issues.)

Due to this, Superpig is put under extreme stress to bring in the dough.

Due to this, Superpig and myself have many squabbles and unhappiness.

I understand his stress but I fear another massive breakdown that will harm everyone in my family if I was to return to teaching full time.

Then there is the issue of my daughters.

I feel that I have not really taught them well.

Due to my constant dipping into depressive mood, I feel that both are badly affected.

So I felt that at age 32, I have achieved nothing and not worth celebrating.

However, as Ash's birthday party is coming up in a few days, I need to get the cupcakes baked the right way plus the icing.

So I kicked myself out of bed and started baking and creamed away.

Once that was done, Superpig suggested that we should go to the zoo since he had specially taken the day off.

So off we went to the zoo, with the rain clouds hovering over us.

Had a nice KFC lunch under the dark clouds and then God sent a little shower to shoo us to find a shelter to eat under.

After lunch, Superpig gave me a chance to do a little shopping at Compass Point.

Then we head on home to rest and watch a rented movie.

And to end it all, we headed to the airport for dinner with a few friends.

At the end ... I think I may have failed in certain areas I am not hopeless.

I look forward to a new day, to a new project, to a new skill that I may pick up and learn...

I am glad that I am still around when I reach the age of 32.

Happy Birthday to Myself.