Living to eat

Mountain boy is truly enjoying his solids experience. Before he started on solids 2 months ago he was at the 25th-50th percentile, now he has shot up to the 75th percentile!

Because he loves eating so much, i really enjoy cooking and preparing his meals daily. The freezer compartment that was used to keep my frozen milk has been replaced by cubes and cubes of multi-coloured frozen puree.

He is always cautious with the first bite, he'll never open his mouth too widely for that. If he likes what you're serving, he can wallop 3/4 cup in less than 10 minutes. But like any other kid, he constantly needs to be distracted especially towards the end of his meal.

So far he has tried the following in chronological order:

1. Carrot
2. Baby Rice
3. Pumpkin
4. Peas (which i have stopped because it gives him gas)
5. Sweet Potato
6. Apple
7. Pear
8. Oatmeal
9. Banana
10. Prunes (Organic and dried naturally)
11. Avocado
12. Potato
13. Wheat Flour
14. Cinnamon
15. Beetroot
16. Egg Yolk
17. Spinach (which gives him a rash, but don't know if it's a coincidence)
18. Millet
19. Papaya
20. Cauliflower
21. Brocoli
22. Butter
23. Beef loins
24. Rice
25. Tomato
26. Cheese (I use Chedder and made a yummy cheese sauce to drizzle over vegetables)

My SIL introduced the Rafferty's Garden series and we've been hooked ever since! The ingredients are MOSTLY organic, and the rice cereal has no added sucrose or sweetener. I've tried so many of their products and i think the packaging is great for travelling.

He is also in love with the vegetable puffs (top picture: far left) from Happy Baby. He gets crazy eyes when he sees the bottle. Only thing I don't quite like is the non-airtight packaging. I always have to transfer the puffs into another airtight container to preserve the shelf-life.

Anyway here's a video of a greedy Mountain Boy mastering his pincer grip (pinching things with fingers).

10 Tips i picked up from a recent baby nutrition course and some mommies:

1. Try to pick organic even though the books don't say so. Organic fruits have more absorbable nutrients. Especially apples and peaches because the skin is quite porous.
2. Carrots are more nutritous when cooked. Don't feed the water from steamed carrots because it contains nitrates (which apparently gives u the blue baby syndrome).
3. Iron is very important for baby after 6 months because the body only stores enough iron for 6 months. Beyond that it is necessary to supplement. Some common foods high in iron are egg yolk (only introduce if both sides of family don't have egg allergies), red meat and spinach (but vegetable iron needs to be supplemented with vitamin C).
4. Feed DHA as early as possible. It is very important from brain and nervous system growth. Reduced ADD.
5. Add 1tsp of vinegar to stock. It releases the calcium from the bones (i learnt this from the mommies).
6. When feeding your baby fish, try to select a different type of fish each time. Because fish are contaminated with different poisons, so by choosing a different type u are reducing the risk of over contamination with the same poison.
7. When feeding chicken choose the thighs because it is higher in iron. And also try to go for free-range chicken.
8. When feeding salmon, choose the tail because it is the most tender.
9. When feeding beef/pork, choose the smaller loins.
10. If your baby refuses to sit on the high chair, don't offer alternatives. They will eat if they are hungry.

Favourite moment

I really treasure the bedtime routine with Mountain Boy. It's the one time that i know i'll have him to myself and he will have my undivided attention. Usually at about 630pm after Mountain Boy's dinner, I tell the ayi that she doesn't have to worry about him for the next 12 hrs. Mountain Man and i will take turns to give him a bath, do his massage, feed his last milk for the day, tell him a story (the same Thomas the train story every night), say a prayer and then kiss him goodnight before turning off the lights and leaving the room.

But in this usual routine, there is always some slack time after massage and before milk. We'll put him in his cot and just hang out in his room and spend quality family time. And you can tell that he enjoys being the host!

Here's what you've missed.

Dear Mountain man,

While u're hard at work, Mountain boy has been a good kid. He took a glorious 2.5hr nap in the morning, and a 1 hr nap in the afternoon. He finished all his porridge (like you he likes anything with tomatoes in it) and he popped many more of that vegetable snack thingies. He played, and laughed and was lovable as ever.

I had lunch with the mommies today and i shared with them that i was afraid that Mountain Boy would become a cry baby. He always whines when he "doesn't get what he wants".




After more in-depth analysis of the reasons behind his cries (thanks to the wonderful mommies), I've come to realise that i've been tempting Mountain boy with the wrong things to make him crawl. I've been using camera, handphones and dirty slippers, the things tht i don't want him to play with. So when he does crawl to the item, he'll start wailing if i take it away. So terrible of me. I've told the ayi that we need to stop tempting Mountain Boy with forbidden fruits!

This is the picture u took of him yesterday. He does look kinda angelic after his bath...



Anyway, here's Mountain Boy pulling himself to a stand in his cot. He has been demanding to stand all day. He can do it over and over and over again, i wonder if his thigh muscles will ache tomorrow.



He stuck his tiny hand out to steal the bottle when i placed it there momentarily. Of course i had to make him reenact a few times to take a picture so he got quite fed up by the end of it.

Before he slept, we both prayed for you. I told him that you love him and that he is very lucky to have a you as his father! I am so sweet right...

Okay, see u soon. I am going to sleep now.

oo,

your wife.

I'm a big boy

Can't believe how big Mountain boy is already. He seems to understand that i am a special lady, not the ayi or some random lady on the street. He lights up when he sees me, and whines when i leave his sight. He knows how to manja and demands for my hugs and kisses. Its nice to be wanted for real. I love you too mountain boy!

he is mobile!

Time to childproof the house. Currently he crawls towards handphones, camera and slippers for some reason. He also pants and sticks out his tongue like a little puppy when he sees something exciting, super cute!

A cute baby is like a good handbag. They keep u wanting more!

Stockings

I've declared my passion for shopping time and again. If Moutain Man will let me, I may die with no money but a closet full of clothes, shoes and a bunch of useless things.

Speaking of which...I recently purchased on taobao (the china amazon) a pair of slimming stockings called "胖胖腿bye bye", for the non-chinese readers it means "goodbye chubby thighs". Apparently upon wearing the thighs will reduce by 3cm! see picture...

WOAH.... that was my reaction. I had to try. I still have about 3-4kg to shed after pregnancy so i do need a little help. The moment i hit "pay", the seller sent me a message asking me to view a video on tudou which will illustrate step by step instructions on how to wear the stockings. Naturally i ignored it because i figured, how hard can it be right??!

2 days later, the stockings arrived. I happily tried them on in front of Mountain Man but OMG, they couldn't even get pass my ANKLES! Hmmm.... Time to review the instructions, i can't be that fat.

Turns out that the video is 5 minutes long, and that is how much time it takes to put the dang stockings on. U can watch it if u're that free. For a good half hour I was on my back with my hips lifted towards the ceiling squeeeezing my butt into it. But fail... boohoo.

Upon giving up, i told the seller that i wanted to return the stockings. Not surprisingly, stockings cannot be returned due to hygiene purposes. She told me to do the following that MAY HELP- freeze the stocking for 2 days, take out and soak in vinegar water at 30 degrees temperature, wash with warm water and dry for another 2 days. She is obviously childless.

Looks like i have one more pair of stockings to bring to my deathbed. And oh yeah, a pair of chubby thighs too.

Disco anyone?

The three of us along with some friends decided to attend the inaugural Baby Disco at Club Le Zazou this afternoon. Imagine going to a tea dance with ur tots in tow. Sounds nuts but it was completely wholesome, pukes were mostly milk induced, not alcohol. And the only thing that made us high was the bubble machine. Whoever came up with the great idea of giving parents the opportunity to go "clubbing" with their kids is a genius.

This brings me back to one of my favourite stories. When i was around 18, i asked my mom if i could go clubbing with my friends. Not that i never been before that but i wanted to make it official that i was then "old enough" to go out and come home at 4am smelling like pub toilet. So one fine evening, my mother called and in the background i heard loud thumping music, " ELLA I AM AT cheenoys cheenoys (i think she meant CHINOIS CHINOIS) WITH YOUR UNCLE, YOU WANNA COME?? " I was dumbfounded, lost for words. NO. FUDGING. WAY. It would have been social suicide.

Anyway, i now know what was going through my mother's head . It's actually makes u kinda cool to go clubbing with ur kids.

Here's some nice pictures from today, Mountain boy enjoyed himself tremendously. Rocking to "Beat It".

"Shhh, I won't tell mommy u gave me a sip."

Now let me go nurse my hangover. Good night!

Papercut!

All the magazine reading and ripping has led to Mountain boy's first injury. Huge drops of blood were oozing out of his tiny finger and the magazine pages were smeared red. Mountain man and i tried to downplay his injury but actually i was really dying inside (okay maybe not so drama).

It's gonna be the first of many, i know.

My 7th month old Mountain Boy

As of today, i have decided to rename Tamagotchi as Mountain Boy. This baby is really every bit a mini version of his Dad, riiiight down to the fingertips. Sometimes i get very freaked out when i see them together, i call them the big one and small one for convenience sake.

Anyway, Mountain boy has been picking up new tricks lately. He will look at the objects we ask him to identify. So clever!

In this video, he recognises "mama and papa" on the poster! Although it's not the real mama and papa, i'm still quite proud of him.

Chao dao kueh (Updated with recipe!)

Quite frankly I've never been a huge fan of carrot cake. But i've started liking it ever since i move to China, cos i just crave for anything and everything not available in here! So my inlaw's inlaw had a very nice pumpkin cake recipe that is easily adaptible to carrot cake. Yummilicious!

Here u go fern!

Pumpkin/Radish/Yam Cake Recipe

Ingredients:

1kg pumpkin (remove skin and cut into small pieces)

1.2 litre water

Handful dried shrimps

1-2 Chinese sausage (or more if u like)

10 dried mushrooms (diced, and not the magic kind)

600g Finest Rice Flour

1 TBSP cornstarch

8 shallots

1 TSP salt

2 TBSP Sesame Oil

8 TBSP Cooking Oil

Pinch of pepper

Steps:

1. Mix rice flour, cornstarch, pepper, salt, sesame oil and soak in water for 1 hr.
2. Pan fry shallots in oil until golden brown. Add dried shrimps and fry for 3 mins, followed by sausage and mushrooms, fry until fragrant. Lastly, put in pumpkin and fry till soft.
3. Turn off fire. Add in flour mixture and mix well (Texture when u use pumpkin, yam and radish is different, the latter is more watery).
4. Transfer mixture to a tray/dish suitable for steaming.
5. Steam for 1.5hrs or until thoroughly cooked.

Easy right!?

Amazing Singapore Race

Did anyone catch last night's episode of the Amazing Race? I must say that i'm impressed with what Singapore has to offer today versus many seasons ago when Phua Chu Kang living in Lim Chu Kang (or wassit Yio Chu Kang) was part of the leg of the race. And also the totally irrelevant Suntec Fountain of Wealth.

Last night, Singapore was portrayed as one of the busiest port in the world and the teams headed down to ASL for their road block. The finale was Mega Zip on Sentosa Island and that looked REALLY cool.

I think STB did almost everything right this time. But someone obviously forgot to send a memo to all the taxi drivers-

1. DO NOT ABANDON YOUR PASSENGERS, ESPECIALLY IF A CAMERA CREW COMES ALONG WITH IT.
2. DON'T TALK TOO MUCH COCK. JUST DRIVE.
3. DON'T SPEAK IN SINGLISH. An uncle went.. "Where's the mega jeeep ah?" One lady answered, "upstair".

Sunday School

T attended his first sunday school last weekend. It was very exciting for mommy and daddy, especially when we learnt that we could just leave him behind with the teachers for 2 hrs free of charge. Something tells me we're gonna be more regular at church now, heck maybe even attend all the services! (Just KIDDING LA)

Anyway sunday school went well. Kids from 0-2 years can't sit through a 5 page bible story even, so T ended up playing with 2 other older kids. It's good also that these kids are not like him (black and white) so he gets a variety of "experiences".


Mountain man and i actually managed to leave the room for a good 15-20 minutes before he started crying. Well done dear!

Accumulating "stuff"

T's things are slowly taking over the entire apartment, every inch and every corner of it. He is barely 7 months and his toys are already more than my handbags.

Thanks to a friend, i received a wake-up call today. She shared this article on how parents can control this state of "stuff accumulation". Last thing i want is for T to feel a sense of entitlement and think that mom and dad can serve everything up on a silver platter. So from here on out, things are gonna be different in this household.

1. Be creative. How to make use of things that are already at home? How to make more out of the toys he already has?
2. Go out more often, experience new things.
3. Create an exchange program. Trade toys with other mommies.
4. Organise more play dates so he can play with other people's toys.
5. Hold back on buying new toys. Ask and ask again, DOES HE NEED THIS? WILL HE BE STUPID IF HE DOESN'T PLAY WITH IT?
6. Accept hand-me-downs. gimme gimme gimme!

It's not just money we'll be saving, this will also do good to the planet.

Farty fart

Besides squealing at the top of his voice, he has also learnt how to make "fart" sounds. I had alot of fun with him on this.

New Toys

T's into the "i wanna play what she's playing" phase. The laptop tops his list of favourites. He gets these crazy eyes when he bangs on the keyboard, he even waits for a reaction on the monitor. It's so funny to watch.

He also loves watching his own video clips.

Tearing up magazines is a close 2nd. He wants to rip out every page that is of interest to me. Tricky mommy now pretends to read books I want him to read. But he seems to know that i'm tricking him. Clever boy!

This ones just for laughs. He says... "GET ME OUTTA HERE!".

Passion for Shoes

I just recently bought 5 pairs of shoes for T and 1 for myself. What a colourful bunch! I love love love these new shoes.

Did i ever mention that my feet expanded since i gave birth? That's 50over pairs of shoes rendered unwearable. I've invested in a shoe-expanding device and i've managed to salvage less than 5 pairs so far.

So anyway, all the more reason to go shoe shopping.