Proud moment

My princess made me so proud today.

There was a storm raging when we got to the pool, half an hour early, before our class was due to start. So we got there ok but the first class couldn't proceed as there was lightning and the lifeguard was blowing the whistle to get everyone out of the pool.

So while we were waiting for the rain to die down and for the lightning to stop flashing, there were a few friends of princess' and they sat down to play some games. Halfway through, one of the mums bought them packets of Twisties to share and my girl came up to ask me for permission to have some, and I said no. I'm a strict mum when it comes to snacks (junk stuff like crisps), sweets etc and I don't like her getting into the habit of consuming them. The same goes for aerated drinks. So, I was distracted chatting to the coach when she asked, and just waved her off. She didn't protest but I didn't think too much of it. A few minutes later, I turned to look at the little group and realised that she was indeed being very good and while the others were snacking, she was just sitting there amongst them, not touching the stuff. It impressed me a lot that she didn't push for it, and it softened my heart watching the poor child exercising self-restraint amidst the temptation, so I relented and told her she could have a little. After a couple, she asked how many more she could have and I said two. That was that, end of story. No pestering whatsoever for more. So it is something that I'm proud of, for her having the responsibility to seek my permission first, and also exercising self-control.

Oftentimes I try to teach her stuff like not to take sweets from strangers etc, but I don't know how much of it gets processed in her little brain. Kids love sweets and it takes lots of self-restraint to say no to a sweet dangled right in front of their little faces. Just the week before, at Halloween, we visited Harris the bookstore and they had the staff dress up in their Halloween outfits, going around with baskets and handing out sweets. I was quite a distance away from princess and she came up to where I was and asked if she could have a little sweet. She said the man from the store offered her one and she said no to him. I told her it's ok, she could have it. So she went up to the counter and asked him nicely for one. On our way out, the same man offered them to another little kid, but she too said no. I laughed to the man and said, all these kids are very well-trained. And I think as parents, that is something that is very important that we ought to impart to our kids. And I try to teach her through the story of Snow White and ask her questions like, did she know the apple was poisoned when SW accepted it? Did it say on the apple that it was filled with poison? The same goes for sweets or stuff that strangers might offer you, so never accept anything from strangers.

An Indian Feast

We spent a couple of hours this afternoon with KY, her aunt, and her cousin, Z, from Oz. We walked around looking for some place to eat, which offered both meat and vegetarian, and were hounded by this tout from a restaurant across the road to Mustafa's.

We decided to just try out this certain restaurant because a)it was convenient b)we were not very familiar with which was good.

The first dish was Lollipop Chicken - what a cute name! This was very delicious. It tasted very much like Tandoori Chicken, only more moist and much tastier. And very tender too.

Mutton Mysore (I'm really not a fan of mutton so I only had a teeny piece)

Ghee Thosai (you can really taste the buttery sinfulness of this dish)

Masala Thosai

Mutton Curry

Can't recall the name of this thosai. It's with green chilli and onions I believe.

Garlic Naan for Z

Mixed Vegetable Curry

Prawn Curry

After lunch, we popped over to Mustafa, to look for some Nightingale Diaries which we were told, carried the widest range. Unfortunately we had to leave them to continue shopping while we headed to swim class. I did not carry any umbrellas with me today because when I left the house, it was hot and sunny. Who is to know that on my way to swim class, I saw a massive and black cloud hovering above. We made it to the complex just as the first raindrops started and were very lucky indeed as minutes after, the storm began. We played hide n seek with the lightning and thunder and had to wait around each time the lightning came back again. I couldn't wait for the class to finish to put an end to my misery.

Thank you KY, for the lovely lunch. We'll fix a date again for next year when I have more time in the afternoon to go to Mustafa's. ;)

Madura's Restaurant
115 Syed Alwi Road
Singapore 207683
Tel: 62941268

Birthday Party

We were invited to a little tea party for a very special girl who turned 3 last week. Why she's special? She's the only girl in a family of 5 brothers! And really we hardly meet her so it was nice to finally do so and most of the kids who turned up were friends of her brother. Haha. Her 3rd brother, N, used to be a classmate of Princess' but has since moved on to another school. We have kept in touch with the mum though. And we do include them in parties and gatherings. It was really nice of her to have us join in the celebration. Unfortunately no boys were allowed so there were some protests, and also her brothers were all whisked off to grandma's. :P

Little MM loves ponies so it was basically the theme of My Little Pony. Erm... mummy, just realised the table setting was all Disney Princesses. Hehe.

The pinata part was really funny. As it was a very quiet affair (there were no boys, get it!), we basically just tore the pinata and let the girls catch the stuff. Within were lovely mini little ponies and some stuffed toys and very pleased that there was not a single sweet in sight. I love this mummy already. :D

This is the very huge 3D cake which the birthday girl picked out. Expensive taste, I tell ya. And our party was really very small so everyone had to bring home a portion of cake.

Little Baby C, oblivious to all the fun going on around her.

Brownie Cheesecake

This is the reason why I had to bake twice yesterday. The first was for the brownie which was to be cut up to be mixed into cheese mixture. I then spent another hour baking the full cake. When slightly cooled, I made a ganache to go over. The reason being that my springform tin was rather big and I had no tray to make a waterbath with. Therefore, there were cracks on the surface of the cake which was not so pretty but really, it didn't turn out that bad. This is a very rich and sinful cake, best to be cut into small slices to serve. It is a recipe which I doubt I will be churning out regularly. It's a lot of work, first to crush oreo biscuits into crumbs and then make a base, next to bake the brownie part, etc. It isn't a pretty sight but it tastes great. You have to be a fan of rich cheesecake to enjoy this.

Ingredients -

3 packet of Philly cream cheese
4 eggs
1 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla essence

For the base, I didn't follow any particular recipe. I used biscuits from two regular packs of Oreo biscuits and removed the cream within. I then crushed them and melted enough butter to hold them together and freeze till set.

Method -

1. Cream cheese till smooth, add eggs one at a time till well mixed. Add sugar and vanilla essence and blend well.

2. Bake in 180degC oven for 45-60mins.

Let cool and refrigerate to set before serving.

Note - Always line the springform tin with aluminium foil to prevent the butter from seeping out under, which is what happened to me and I had a smoky oven. Lesson learnt. :P

Chicken Macaroni Soup

Was down with a flu the past few days. Oops, just reminded me I need to go take my anti-biotics. Be right back...

Because I haven't been feeling that well, I was craving for some soup dish and that's what I made for dinner last night. Got a piece of fresh chicken breast from the market in the morning and made a stock with it together with 2 cobs of corn, half a brown onion and a stick of carrot. Boiled it for a couple of hours and had a delicious soup base, full of sweetness. After having shredded the chicken and removed the corn kernels from the cob, I boiled the macaroni and added fishballs and green leafy vegetables to the broth and seasoned it with salt, pepper, light soya sauce and a dash of sesame oil. Garnish with cilantro, spring onions, and fried shallots, it was ready to serve. Hubby had two servings and princess enjoyed the whole bowl of it. :)

In the past couple of weeks, I was really not in the mood to do much, and especially lazy to cook or bake or practically do anything at all. I think it's the combination of my body pains and also maybe the onslaught of the flu. I'm glad that I have started cooking two dinners this week and one lunch yesterday of fried bee hoon, and to top it all, I baked twice. One was for brownies and the other for cheesecake. Rather pleased with myself that I accomplished all that. And glad that my pain is almost gone. It was truly a depressing time for me not to be very mobile, cos I love to be on the move. You can hardly find me at home. Glad I am up and about again, although I try to rest as much as possible while little one is away in school in the mornings. I am, however, looking forward to the next few days, primarily Thurs, Fri and Sat. Can't wait to meet my friends again to catch up and see how much baby C has grown. Apparently she's crawling now and we haven't had much time to visit her in the last few weeks. So I'm looking forward. :)

As I told the doctor, this week is a busy week for me and I have no time to even fall ill, so she prescribed the anti-biotics. Have a lunch appointment with KY today and look forward to a great shopping trip and a yummy lunch. Can't wait to get out of the house with the renovations going on at the neighbours. Yikes! All that drilling!

Orientation

We went for the P1 orientation last evening. From what I know, our school seems to be the only one who holds it on a Friday evening. I'm not sure of the reason for it, but I really find it's a bad timing. It's scheduled to begin at 6.30, so even though Princess has her dinner pretty early, around 6 or sometimes 5.45 if I finish cooking earlier, it was way too early to be eating at 5. So when we got to the bus interchange, we managed to buy some buns for her and her daddy. However, there were a few glitches along the way which did not allow her to eat anything, such as the fact we didn't know the shortest way to walk over. So we had to go a longer way which took a bit more time but we did get into school just a few minutes before 6.30. So poor girl didn't get to eat dinner till 10pm. She did have a piece of bread after leaving class at 8.30. She's made a friend in class she says, so that's great. :) And there's also one bearing the same name as her.

We submitted our forms which were sent out to us earlier and proceeded to send Princess to her class to meet with her form teacher and classmates. We were to leave her there for an hour while we made our way to the school hall to listen to a talk and filled up forms etc. What I was really surprised to see was that she wasn't the only tall girl there. She's 6 but she really looks like 9 in terms of height, so great that she doesn't stick out like a sore thumb. :) We were joking last evening that when she reaches Secondary school, she'd be looking down at mummy, and I am not short to begin with. ;P

The other thing is that I didn't know that the teachers have been switched so I had told her that it was one teacher but it turned out to be another. Well, but good thing is she seemed quite nice.

What I am really very pleased with the school is that they are really concerned that our kids do not carry heavy bags to school and thus we are supposed to pack the recommended list of books for first day, which will be kept by the teacher in class. Wow, I'm so glad, as any parent can tell you, those books weight a ton and the poor little mites have to drag them to school every day. The advice was to buy a lightweight not big bag, as well as they discourage trolley bags as they do weigh a lot because of the trolley part, even with no books in them. Also, like KY's kid, they do not have English textbooks next year so that is another weight off. :)

They are starting single session the year after (2010), thus the enrolment has slowly been getting less but unfortunately we missed it by a year. I am looking forward to her starting school but I also know that once they start P1 they grow up so fast. And one other thing I'm very pleased is that she is in the yellow team just like I was in Primary school and she's very happy to learn that her aunt and godma were also in the same house. :)

Got to go now to do orders for books... ciao!

What happened?

The day started very well, with Princess waking up just after 8am and as we continued sleeping, she busied herself with her craft work outside and did some reading. I got up a half hour later and gave her some cereal.

So, as we got ready for church, she was all excited, looking forward to meeting her godparents and brothers in our church. I mean how often do they travel so far, over an hour on a Sunday morning, just to attend mass? It was really sweet of Al when he called last evening to say they will join us, even though he was only due for the baptism mass at 12pm. Naturally we were all excited. Princess was the first to be ready in her pretty dress and packed her bag with her drawing stuff and sketch pad. I make it a habit to take them along when we go out as it serves to occupy her while we are say, in the bus, or waiting for our food to be served, as kids being kids, they don't like waiting. It helps that she loves to draw.

Just before we stepped out the door, she mentioned that she should have covered her tummy when she was sleeping at night as she was having a tummy ache. So we didn't think much of it as she didn't make a big fuss. We even planned to go for Jap lunch after mass, at her favourite restaurant.

In the first part of the mass (she requested not to attend cathechism so that she could see her godbrothers), she was well and happy but halfway through, she suddenly told daddy that her tummy was hurting again and she looked miserable. I checked to make sure she didn't feel like throwing up. She assured me she wasn't. I mean the last thing I want is for her to throw up in church, with no plastic bag on hand. Tears started streaming down her cheeks at a certain point and I guess she wasn't well at all. Poor child. Once mass was over, we went home. I rubbed some oil on her belly and she said that her tummy was aching like the last time, a couple of months back when she had the same thing. I remembered that I still have the Colimix from the last visit to paed and gave her some of that. At the same time, I took her temperature and realised she was running a slight fever. She's having a nap now so hope she feels better tomorrow.

Kids are really unpredictable, one minute they are well and happy and the next minute, they are suddenly struck down by a bug.

But all in, I'm really happy to have my best friend beside me in church today, as well as her entire family. It felt good, and it brought me back to our younger days when we would occasionally go for evening mass together, seated side by side. Today being 'All Souls' Day', I know who was on your mind throughout, and I'm sure she was smiling down from Heaven and feeling so proud of you for the great mum and wife you've become, dearest Miss K. Know that you are very much loved by friends and family, and in all that you do, you are never alone. Thanks for visiting, my dear friend. And glad you appreciated the 'modern gadgets' of my church hehe. :) God bless.

Petits Beurres

Ever since I got my personalized cookie cutter set, I've been wanting to make use of it. Tartelette had posted about hers and how she couldn't find a petits beurre recipe that came close to the original, so she makes use of a shortbread recipe instead. For me, I have never tasted one but I decided to try out chocolate and zucchini's recipe. And I love it! Except that it was on the salty side. Is it suppose to taste salty? I have no idea. Maybe someone can enlighten me. But for my own preference, I would half the amount of salt to 1/2tsp.

Books

Picked myself up some books as I've finished all my books and have been feeling rather bored in the nights. There is only so much tv to watch and most times I end up on the Asian Food Channel and most shows are repeats. I find that Thursday to Sunday nights are the worse for tv entertainment. Why is it that way? Do the media people think that most people will be out partying so they don't bother to screen nice programmes?

I love to read in bed in the quiet of the night when Princess is asleep and hubby is on the pc. A lovely snuggle under the blankie in the aircon room - bliss. :)

And so, I was at Borders and picked up a little black dress title. I think these are so affordable and entertainment enough. I realised too, that I had a Harris postcard which entitled me to 25% off 2 books so off I went yesterday to indulge. :) Got princess a Rainbow Magic book which she was eyeing and for myself, I got the book by Elizabeth Noble entitled 'Things I want my daughters to know'. I was eyeing that previously but it was a bit dear and it came in hardcover which I don't like. I couldn't for the life of me remember the title when I was searching for it yesterday, but was lucky to spot it, this time in paperback and way cheaper, so I was happy. :) And while browsing, I came across The Little Black Dress series selling 3 for $25 (usual $10.65 each).

I also love reading non-fiction but I'm rather picky with those, as some might be a little boring.

Look at the title bestowed on me by my little one. How cute. :) Thanks B, for that.