Many, many updates...

Before the end of Chap Goh Meh (the 15th day of Chinese New Year), must update the blog!

Mummy lost count of how many things or incidents to be jotted down and blog about En En and Zheng. Well, about mummy too...

Too many things happen before, during and after Chinese New Year. Mummy just not so determine like last time to blog so often. Oh yeah... one of mummy's THIS YEAR resolution is to blog more... hopefully able to get there.

Let's start with En En

Characters

En En is now no longer the shy and timid little girl we once used to know. Ever since she goes to nursery school, she is now talking louder and clearer, mix well with her peers, responding well to questions we throw to her and also reasoning.

She is VERY INTERESTED in ANIMALS! PHDC programme from Astro no longer her favourite and guess what's her favourite channel?? ANIMAL PLANET! No.556... gosh... She LOVES documentary film! Well, it's good that she's learning alot from the animal world.

Health & Diet

But, still a very terrible picky eater and of lately we notice she will vomit out her food if she feels pressure from us scolding her or raise up the voice tone when talking to her. She seems weak after attending school... probably due to lung allergy too. Gosh, my girl been confirmed having allergy and from our monitoring for the past 8 months, she has reaction towards room temperature changes.

The other problem is and still is CONSTIPATION! She refuses vegetables and fruits, that's the major culprit. We are still trying to give her variety of food selection but she's not even interested to taste them. *Sigh*

Zheng

Weaning

Started trying to wean 3 days before CNY, but only wean him off McB for afternoon nap! It's so terrible and difficult as Zheng is a very strong will boy. He is the type that you don't give me nen-nen, I don't want to sleep! On top of that, he cried non-stop for 1 hour with annoying screaming and cursing in his own words that only God knows!

Some methods used to wean him off from direct feeding:-

(THE FAIL METHODS)

- Mummy tried to substitute direct feeding by expressed breast milk in milk bottle. Guess what?He threw the bottle back to us!

- Then we tried to carry him in arms to calm him down and he hit us so hard with his little strong palm!

- Already passed his napping time, he got even fierce and angry... he insisted to have McB! Mummy never give in, therefore must be very determine, no means NO! Poor little fella kept on crying and screaming. Mummy offered other drinks and food to make him forget about McB.

(THE SUCCESSFUL METHOD)

- Feed him full with solid food before nap.

- Never drag his naptime pass 5/6 hours from his previous sleep time.

- Quiet envinroment and no playing with En En before nap. (Yes, they will get crazy when playing together)

- Insist him to sleep on tummy while patting his back.

If all the above successful, Zheng in fact will go into his dreamland in less than 10 minutes! Really a blissful moment for mummy... LOL!

Speech:

1) "Open the door!" Even ask mummy to Open clothes for nen-nen *roll eyes*

2) Able to call everyone in the family including close family members from daddy's and mummy's side... eg. Gong Gong, Po Po, Yi Yee (mum's sisters), Jiu Jiu (mum's brother). He is able to mimic almost every sound we told him for almost 80-90% accurate on pronunciation!

3) "Bei1" (in mandarin means Cup)

4) "Xi1 jou" ( in mandarin means Wash hand)

5) "tuok tuok" (supposed to be zhou4, means Sit)

Motor Skills

Since 14 months old...

- Able to put his arm through the shirt when mummy is wearing him a shirt

- Able to hold on mummy when wearing pants while lifting his legs one by one at the same time.

- Able to throw ball from above head

- Able to lift up daddy's laptop that weigh 3kg with both his hands! A Strong baby...

- Able to walk up and down the staircase with one hand leaning on the wall

- Able to use cup or small bucket to pour out water into another one ( well, in the bathroom...)

- Able to hold a pencil or pen and draw on a paper... JUST TO ADD - When En & Zheng having pen or pencil in their hands and no adults in the room, they made their master piece ON THE WALL!

Mummy

- Put on 2kg within 1 week of CNY... blame it on the cookies and non-stop feasting...

- Rejected the job offer

- Confirmed on job with music center

- Started a mini customizable handicraft online business (so far only 1 customer... haha!)

- Still hook on Farmville! Bad mummy, bad mummy,...

Happy Chinese New Year!

Just want to wish everyone who celebrate Chinese New Year, GONG XI FA CAI!!!

We got 2 little Tarzan & Jane hopping around the house non-stop since the CNY's eve... guess they are excited for the celebration... LOL!


Rou En decided to take photos with one little animals of her cousin sister... named Sugar. Mummy got her one lovely post here...

The up-close look of Sugar...

En En couldn't help and giggles at last when Sugar tried to climbed on her neck...

Have a wonderful holidays!!!

p/s: Before mummy forgot, HAPPY VALENTINE too!

Surprise?

Mummy received a job interview call last week for the position of a purchaser. Was quite surprise since the application was about 2 years ago, before having Zheng.

Went for the interview yesterday and was unable whether to go back to the workforce after knowing that already been shortlisted. A huge commitment and sacrifice must make for the job and then feel so heavy to leave my little ones again. On the other hands, mummy already contacted back the music center to start a part time job which gradually will turn into full time. Headache!!!

So, the decision? Still uncertain... there are pros and cons ... must think carefully tonight... Another sleepless night...

My first pair of shoes!

Looks like "kar-kiak" (in hokkien dialect, is an old wooden shoes wore by traditional chinese ladies) to us but it's En En first pair of "high-heels"! Eww... 4 years old on high heels doesn't sounds nice to mummy though...

Well, she chose this pair of shoes on her own and insisted daddy to buy for her without looking at other. Ah Mah said En En gave excuses such as " this one cannot wear, this one leg pain after wearing" to those shoes that she didn't like. Now, she is real good at giving reasons and excuses.

She's happily posing for mummy to take her photos with her new shoes on...

Still looks big on her, maybe fit better by the end of the year after she grows more...

En En was getting naughtier and more brave to speak out whenever she's not happy with something or someone after attending school. She started to tell lie and denies on something bad done by her. A couples of days ago, she hide behind the door with a crayon in hand and drew up to the wall!!! Mummy caught her and guess what she said? She claimed that it's Zheng who drew the wall!!! Unbelievable that she's lying and look at the height of the "masterpiece", it's really impossible for Zheng to draw so high...

We taught her to tell the truth and admit that she has done something wrong and to our surprise, she was firm with her lie! She was very firm on her speech - saying that she's not the one who drew on the wall even she was still holding the crayon!!! Arrgh... mummy cannot stand it and brought out the small cane and asked her again who did that mess... Ah Mah was also shocked that this little girl was so firm and steady when telling a lie!

After many many times asking her to admit what she did wrong then only she admitted with an unwillingly face. Kakak got to clean up her mess on the wall and she was banned to use crayon for 2 days! Starting to feel the challenge is growing bigger in bringing up a stubborn little girl...

Why always sick before CNY?

Including mummy too... blame the weather?? We all seen doctors and having medication now. The worst must be En En, she's coughing so terrible and vomit after her non-stop coughing most of the time...

Any advise?

Flu?

Mummy is not feeling well with little bit of stuffy nose and sneezing in hot sunny days! Zheng starts to cough today... En En not so much on coughing and running nose now ever since she got the symptoms last Thursday. She was coughing at midnight till vomit continuously for 2 nights!

If Zheng get worse, will probably bring him to see doctor. Mummy must take some Chinese medication as well called Ying Qiao but need to buy from the chinese medication hall tomorrow. Hopefully able to sneak out from the house without the kids...

I don't want to go to school!

Lately En En is getting very naughty than before. She will answer us back in opposite or reversely to make ones angry. When we told her she can't do A,because will cause B to happen but she will told us she LIKES B. So, whenever she said she likes something, she's going to do it or want to have it no matter what.

Yesterday morning, she refused to go to school no matter how we sweet talk her or bribe her... none was successful. At the end, Ah Mah, Ah Kong, Zheng and mummy got to accompanied her to school and that was 1 hour late!!!

She was not friendly and gave us the long face when she reached school. We pretended to stay there with her but in fact went back after she went in class. Teacher Alison told mummy En En was doing fine, just like her usual self and there was no sign showing that she hates school at all!

Well, probably she was upset for the past 2 weeks when mummy dropped her to school but went off before her break time. She expected to see mummy there during her break but always disappointed. In fact, she was crying during her first week in school but getting lesser when she was in her second week. Still, she doesn't seems happy to be alone, without any family members in school.

Rou En, you are growing so fast and you need to learn to be independent. School will be your second home for the coming 20 years, perhaps. This is just your baby step in your learning life that everyone will go through... and so do you! In another 2 years time your little brother will be going to school like you. Mummy and daddy hope that you will love school and have fun too!

New Year Resolution

Normally I don't have resolutions just for the year... it happens to be, well... all the time until I achieve or fulfill them. Quite bad huh?

So here goes for this year (or started from this year :P )

- spend more time in the kitchen which I seldom do

- taking charge of my 2 kids daily life together as much as I can (since En En still stick to Ah Mah)

- blog more, get more paid post (it seems like quite hopeless nowadays), spend more time with my kids, knit less (how could this possible???)

- do scrapbooking! It's been like ages I never touch scrapbook, no even 1 layout about Zheng and he's approaching 2 years old soon!

- pick up my music lessons, go back to music education industry (yes, starts to work gradually...)

- wean off Zheng from breastfeeding when he's over 18 months old slowly (sooo reluctant *sigh*)

- involve in more charity works with MMPS, other mothers' group (I'm still a new beginner in this area), lend a hand for new mothers in any form of help that I could offer

- live a greener life by recycling more in the house... (which means spend less money)

- reduce time spending in Farmville! (sounds familiar??)

What else? I think I still have a list of them but never mind... I'll be very happy if I could complete all of the above...

Time for Cookies

This was happening this afternoon... preparation for Chinese New Year perhaps and mummy is in the mood to bake after so so long...

Did En En help out? Yes but she's only telling mummy this is not pretty that is nice which mummy was sweating to pump out the batter with the cookies pipe... Zheng was so interested to stand besides mummy to have a look when the mixer was working with a very loud sound...

Hopefully very soon they will join in the fun in the kitchen then we will have additional two little helpers... :)

IT'S YEAR 2010!

Oh dear... I just realized today we are entering to year 2010!!! I can hear firecrackers launched from Gurney Drive and just know that yesterday was the last day of 2009 when I was reading the newspaper...

Time flies unbelievable fast, kids are growing so fast and we are getting much older each year too. I have many new year resolutions for year 2010... hope that I am able to cope with each of them.

Last but not least, to all of you...

~ HAPPY NEW YEAR ~

The Most Adorable of year 2009

We are back from the trip!

Just arrived this afternoon from KL... was a hectic trip with two demanding young kids... Unable to meet with any blogger mummies as the little ones were not well throughout the trip. One got flu and one got mild fever... Anyway, it's their FIRST long (previously Alor Setar was the further they went to) and fun trip...

Fever

Zheng is having fever since yesterday. He's been given paracetamol 3 times per day but seems not working. The causes of the fever maybe due to he's teething, lack of water, eating too much nuts, biscuits and spicy crackers,... too many possibilities.

He's not sleeping well either as the whole night he's been screaming and fussing. Decided to bring him to the doctor later today. Hope he gets well before we have our trip to KL next Monday. *Praying*

We did the same thing!

Music Talent

Rou En @ 1 year 9 months

Zheng @ 9 months old

Introduced to toothbrush

En @ 19 months

Zheng @ 13 months 3 weeks

Being busy with broom

En @ 17 months

Zheng @ 12 months 2 weeks

Started to use sippy cup

En En @ 12 months old (but never success till today)

Zheng @ 8 months old

Whose baby girl??

Looks nice too in floral skirt and polka dots headband...

Bye mom! Rushing for a date now...

3 years and 7 months old

En En has many problems, well at least in mummy's eyes...

1. Eating habit:

- She still refuse to eat on her own, need only Ah Mah to feed her...

- Refuse to try on new food as she will give you that I'm-going-to-cry look when there are new food in her mouth which we insisted her to put inside the mouth and chew, if dislike just spit out! 95% of the time, she spits out!

- She takes maybe too much dairy food per day (3-4x milk, 2 slices cheese, poultry cooked in porridge are the main routine meals) which we think is also contributing to her constipation...

- Dislike vegetable and fruits, take in little apple ONLY! Another reason for constipation? Been thinking whether to give her Vitamin C supplement?

- Latest favourite is CocoCrunch, HoneyStar cereal to be taken for snack. At least better than biscuits for everyday intake.

- She still use milk bottle though... Ah Mah was saying need to buy more and store *pengsan* BUT mummy and daddy insisted NO!

2. Sleep

- Lately she woke up quite early in the morning, she has 1-2 hours nap in the afternoon with Zheng together.

- She needs Ah Mah to accompany her to sleep ever since Zheng is here. Before that was mummy to be at her side but mummy noticed since pregnant with Zheng she's looking for someone who can attend her FULL TIME. She will cry whenever she realized Ah Mah is not in the room and therefore Ah Mah MUST BE at home everyday! Quite ridiculous but Ah Mah is willing to accompany her so mummy can't think of when En En will be independent? Maybe Zheng is more independant than her by 3 years old...

Mummy just recalled one conversation with En En.

(Mummy brought Zheng into Ah Mah's room one night whereby En En is sleeping with Ah Mah)

En En: Zheng cannot come in Ah Mah's room!!!

Mummy: Then mummy throw Ah Zheng out from the house, ok?

En En: Ok, En En (stay) together with mummy... (in a very soft tone)

Mummy: Huh?

Ah Mah: Still a jealous girl...

So, this is all about sibling rivalry. She never rejects her little brother but she will tell you she doesn't want mummy... Looks like she needs a very long time to understand that she and her little brother are equally loved by mummy and daddy, not only Ah Mah. How to make her understand? *Sigh*

3. Others

- En En now enjoy washing hands ever since she attended school before the holiday breaks. She will ask to wash hand and she wants to stand on a stool and do the washing herself.

- She knows how to use words like "Why?" "because" "so / so that"

- En En will tell us she's a good baby while Zheng is a naughty baby which is quite true. Di Di will snatch people's stuff, mess around the house, don't listen to what we told him but En En is trying to be as much obedient and yes to almost everything when it comes to disciplin.

- She accepts wearing skirt!!! She think she looks pretty in them now... LOL!

- En En loves to play with the colourful peg and her favourite colours are green, blue and yellow. There's a reason why only those colours since the peg has red and pink colours too.

- She's been assigned colours to everyone in the family:

En En is GREEN

Ah Mah is YELLOW

Daddy is BLUE

Mummy is PINK

Ah Kong is RED

Di Di Zheng is ORANGE

So, En En will tell us GREEN, BLUE and YELLOW are her favourite colours. Now you know what's the real meaning behind.

It's been so long...

Finally mummy's monthly friend visited mummy after 1 year and 10 months! Or exactly after 22 months! Muahahaa... One of the Benefit of BREASTFEEDING....

This Evening...

Amused with 2 kids at home while mummy was busy with more needle work... knitting, trying to replace Zheng's bibs from the velcro attaching to snap with thread and needle (by hands of course!) *grin*

First discovered En En did this...

Then, the little brother followed...

Then, Di Di took the plastic from En En...

And imitate his Jie Jie...

While En En was posing for mummy to take her pic with this on...

And...

Hmm... Guess this is how Zheng is trying to tell us he didn't like his food...

Brushing teeth BUT must be naked!!!

Today is the third night mummy accompanied and insisted En En to brush her teeth after milk, before bed. Of course she is still unable to brush perfectly on her own and mummy helps.

The funny part is En En insisted to be NAKED while brushing her teeth. She said:" Cannot wear clothes when brushing teeth!" Huh?? Everyone was puzzled and found it so weird with this little girl. Perhaps it's due to we first started to introduce her brushing teeth during her bath and that moment of course naked... it was in the bath tub. Or maybe she is afraid that she might wet the clothes when brushing teeth...

Okay, it is the same answer when we told her to wear swimming suit if go swimming. En En refuse to wear anything and rather choose not to go swimming if been asked to wear something while in the water! Confusing??

Another baby carrier

It's Mei-Tai!!! More about this carrier can be found here.

Mummy paid an annual fees for the Malaysian Babywearer group (go to the fund) and able to borrow (monthly) one type of carrier home for one month trial, how nice! So that to whoever that is interested in trying out different baby carrier, this is a good chance!

Mei- Tai is more sturdy and comfortable compare to one-shoulder sling. Even En En can go in as well but tying the 2 pairs of long strap is abit tricky. Very good for carrying toddler for long hours.