Children and TV

The daughter is addicted to Sesame Street. Every morning, when she wakes up, she walks to her cabinet and if it's not shut, she'll take out the cds and goes 'elmo elmo, papa elmo'. Until you switch it on for her, and she'll be so gleeful and really pays attention for at least half an hour.

And we will have a peaceful breakfast.

I'm not really pleased with this scenario, but I have no choice because I have to make the breakfast. Maybe I should assign my maid to make the breakfast, but like I said before, she doesn't get my drink right. Till December ... *sigh*

How much TV would you let your child watch a day?

Updates 3 - The kids

The kids have grown bigger and stronger and naughtier. Or you might say cuter. I'm not so amused but that's because my keyboard shift key is kinda stuck, and it's kinda annoying when I want to use it. Yep, the daughter got her hands on the laptop, and now we try not to use it in front of her. Then again, her reaction to laptops nowadays is to slam down the lid and 'mummy, stop playing with the laptop and pay attention to me!'

My cute 15th going on 16th month old daugher can walk, can almost run, and can't talk very well yet. She loves vending machines, because the one at the babyroom at a certain shopping centre gives out her favourite drink - Yakult, and whenever she sees a vending machine, she gets attracted to it like a drunken fly, and goes kult kult and starts fiddling with it.

During the lantern festival, we bought both kids lanterns - those with the lamps, and they enjoyed themselves very much. The son had a doraeamon lantern - he's into doraeamon currently, after the grandpa showed me some of the cartoons.

The daughter enjoys her lantern very much. See the brother's lantern in the background?

The hubby has bought a new toy for himself, a new Digital SLR camera. It's kinda hard to sort through a few thousand photos. :P That's what he's doing. Taking photos by the thousands. But the photos sure are well taken! I'm tempted to buy a new small idiot-proof camera, something which is easy to carry around, but after seeing what the SLR can do, I'm not sure ...

The daughter has 8 teeth! Now she has 10, her left molars just popped, one on top and one below.

The son and his bike.

Blogger's slow. More photos over at FB when I'm free!

Anyway, I'm starting the son on Kumon workbooks. Call me kiasu, but those stuffs are actually quite colourful and interesting, and the son isn't the most hardworking when it comes to doing work. One letter and he'll be full of stories, ranging from: hey mom, what is this person doing? why is this and that like this and that? or something like: my hands are very tired. i need to rest. And it's only one letter. While he can go on for hours fixing his lego. I'm actually quite impressed with this lego fixing. After watching transformers, he'll fix a robot with his lego and transformed it into a vehicle. cool!

Our lessons so far are rather relaxing and happy. No canings yet, and I try to keep my temper in check. Usually I'll let him off after one or two letters a day, or one or two numbers, and depending on his mood too. We'll do the writing while the daughter potters around the room, playing the brother's toys, after which I'll read them some books (usually three, since the son insists that a 3 year old boy needs everything in 3s). Sometimes I'll play a bit of the piano with my daugther accompanying me as bass, or sometimes she'll try to climb up onto the top of the piano. After that I'll get the girl to sleep first, then it's the son's turn. But I still have to build up on the discipline to do this everyday. ah well ...

Updates 2 - baking

The month of August and September to early October saw a frenzy of baking. Lots of baking.

First I made white chocolate cake.

Then I made blueberry muffins.

Then I made lemon sponge cake.

Then I made lemon sponge cake again.



Then I made white chocolate cake with dark chocolate glaze for PM's birthday.

Then I made Banana cinnamon loaf.

And finally I made the cheesecake. The one I've been dying to make for ages. Not that I'm crazy about cheesecake, actually I don't like cheesecake very much. But it was fun to make.

Hot from the oven.

So I finally close the chapter on my baking exploits. Till the end of the year. Maybe. :)

More photos if I can find them!

Updates 1 - Trips

I haven't been writing for a long time, but I just got sidetracked a lot. Mom went to Perth and she complained that she was bored to death. I told her why then did she go there for one whole week? *rolls eyes* And she bought me raw macademia nuts (when I specifically asked only for honey roasted ones). So what am I going to do with 1 and a half bags of nuts when they're going to expire end of this month? Mom got herself 2 bags of that too. She said her sisters all said the raw ones were better (of course they were also cheaper!). I guess I'll have to honey roast them myself soon.

Then the parents went Hong Kong & Macau after that and I was really left without any help. Parenting sure is a crazy thing. We'll talk about that later. Apparently they went to some nice high class restaurant, but they didn't enjoy a 100% of it, because there was no dim sum. The brother complained to me later that there wasn't any dim sum for dinner, and I went like huh, when was there ever any dim sum for dinner? And they ended up didn't order much because everything was like so ex. Yep, that is my brother for you. Such poor planning. *rolls eyes again*

I guess overall they had fun there, except that the parents were complaining that their hotel was so ex (holiday surcharge what, what did they expect, going during such times), and it was very crowded, and everything was very ex. *sigh* The brother who wanted to go HK to shop for stuffs ended up not able to buy anything. So what did he expect?! Quality comes with a price. My father complained that they ended up accompanying him through lots and lots of shopping but did not buy anything. Yep, that is definitely my brother. Hahaha. Good grief.

Be zen, I just listened and smile, and leave my thoughts here.

After that the parents went on a cruise. That, they had fun. I packed my son with them and he had fun too. And so did I, I'll write about that later. Yep, all the eat and sleep and casino and eat and sleep and doing nothing. And they're going again this weekend. Yep, the son is going too. *grins*

Hubby asked me if I felt guilty sending the son away like that, but I guess it's a break for both of us. He enjoyed himself and I could spend more time with the daughter. We went to have fun together and shopped together. Darn, my girl loves to shop too. You should see the way she chooses what she wants to buy. And her very pleased look when you pass her the loot in a shopping bag! Definitely like her mummy! :)

But at the end of the shopping trip, the son ended up with quite a lot of goodies. I bought him one sticker book, two pairs of chopsticks (the ones with the fingerholes), and a 'board' game. The daughter ended up with one toy phone only, and Auntie Min's present of the teacup set, which the son is now hogging it for himself. It's not that I'm being bias here, but whatever I buy for the daughter will end up with the son, and whatever I buy for the son will be what the daughter will like. LOL.

Parents are planning for more trips. China in November, Japan in Feb (CNY), maybe we'll close and go with them, and mom is planning to go somewhere in March. They have definitely been bitten by the travel bug. And me the sour grapes me who can't go anywhere will always complain to my mom that when I was still young and single, she didn't allow me to travel. Humf.