Emma sleeping

SO peaceful and sweet.

Here she hugs her Pooh and sucks her thumb.



My lovely sweet rambutan head darling baby...

Holloween

WE went to a fab party at Rachel's who decorated her house to the Wizard of Oz theme.

Z went as Glinda.

And here she is with the Wicked Witch of the West and Scarecrow.... eating candy, of course!

Happy birthday Grandpa!

Paper Z

ONE rainy afternoon, we made a life size poster of Z.

She did most of the drawing and sticking herself but of course mid-way through she lost interest and I had to finish up - and clean up.

New shoes - and an owie

LITTLE feet keep getting less little. Z has moved from the baby to the kid sizes.

With big girl running shoes, Z was super excited and despite it being an hour past naptime, she insisted on trying them out.

A quick run round the block and the very sleepy - thus clumsy - girl ended up with a badly skinned knee.

A rite of passage from toddler-hood into kid-dom.

Hope there are no scars - physical and mental.
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Emma's eczema

THEY grow out of it, don't they???

The weather has been too hot.

Sigh.

Poor baby.

Pool fairy

THE obsession du jour is anything to do with fairies.

Z constantly wants to dress in tutus, tiaras and brandish a wand.

Even in the pool, she dons her fairy frills.

3 Month Checkup

ALL happy until she got jabs in both fatty thighs.

It was quite painful, according to Dr B. I think she felt worse about the jabs than me.

Tough love.

Then an oral vaccine - her first taste of anything other than Mama's milk (not even water!!! Except for the time I almost drowned her in a bath washing her back - didn't realise her face was in the water!!!)

Anyway Emma really liked the taste of it. You could see she was thinking: Now what is this in my mouth? Yumm!

Weight: 5.84kg
Length: 58cm

At 2 months (16/9), she was 5.38kg, so she's put on a significant 0.5kg.

But as a comparison, Z was a hefty 6.5kg and 62cm at 3 months.

Dr B said Emma is at the 50 percentile and might be "petite". I guess the main reason for this: Since her feeding frenzy at 6 weeks, Emma's milk intake has decreased dramatically and is below what it should be for her weight. She is drinking about 700-800ml a day when before, when she was much smaller at 6 weeks, she was drinking 1200ml!

But anyway, nothing to worry about. Just musing.

Sandy Z

IT has been a while since Z was let loose in a sand pit.

Such joy.

Such fun.

Such a mess in my car!

The official passport photo

THIS is the best DIY passport photo I could come up with.

Anyway, it's de rigueur to have a bad passport photo right?

Emma's mohawk refused to be tamed and she is in "home" clothes, but at least her eyes are opened, she is looking straight ahead and there are no shadows.

Thanks to Aunty Janice who did a fantastic - and speedy - clean up job for me to get the online application in today.

This is a nifty little website that takes away the pain of cropping your photos to make it passport-worthy.

Check it out: http://www.epassportphoto.com/

Emma's passport

TRYING to get a photo of a wriggly baby is not easy...





Finally!



But I don't think her face is "full on" so it might get rejected. Argh!

Child Labour

NOW, if you want chocolate....

Fidgets

TO mark Childrens' Day tomorrow, Z's class got to spend the morning celebrating at Fidgets.

However, a parent had to accompany each child so I went along with Emma.

Z was fine to play alongside her schoolmates without me tagging along, so I had a latte while flipping through outdated Expat and Her World magazines (ahhh luxury!).

Em entertained herself with her shorts string and a tasty thumb.

Milk stash

My milk shake brings all the boys to the yard,
and they're like,
its better than yours,
damn right its better than yours,
I can teach you,
but I have to charge!

And this is accumulated only within the last two weeks!

Need to s.l.o.w.d.o.w.n...

Little Miss Sleepy

FOR the second time, Emma slept for nine hours straight!

She went to bed at 8.30pm and woke up only at 5.30am for a feed, then promptly went back to sleep till 7.30am!

Amazing!

Tuesday

EVERY Tuesday Kongkie and PoPo spend the afternoon with the girls.

But for the next few Tuesdays, they will be in Australia so the kiddies gave them extra cuddles.

With Z at SICC after dinner:






With Emma at home:




With the two girls - Z clowning around!

Baby wearing

I USED many variations of the baby sling to carry Z around, even after she turned two.

As a newborn, the Baby Bjorn Carrier Air was handy but I found it not to be particularly attractive. So I swapped that for a few funky Peanut Shell designs. And our helper found a reworked traditional wrap useful to tote Z around when she got heavier. As Z grew older, the very comfy Ergo proved most useful.

This time with Emma, I thought I'd carry on the tradition. I've dug out all the old slings but I thought it would be nice to buy one new one just for her.

So I bought the very pretty Market Sling in Cloud/Petal from Serena and Lily.

But even after studying the instructions, I can't figure out how to use it! Poor Em looks to uncomfy in it!

How come they make it look so easy?

Sunday Brunch

WHILE we pigged out, Em had a long nap.

She is wearing a new and very sweet outfit from Aunty Pat Ban which she already has outgrown!

Had a good chat with Uncle Roland over pancakes, roast duck, pasta, briyani, cheesecake... and diet coke. *Burp* He came here all the way from Sydney to watch the F1 race tonight.



Pretty maxi dress thanks to Aunty Cyn and Uncle Ches.

Letter to Emma at 9 and a half weeks

DEAR little Em,

In a wink of an eye you are already two months old.

Right now, I am amazed at how sweet and easy you are.

From seven weeks, you started sleeping long stretches through the night. On average, you were sleeping 6 hours, waking up only once a night for a feed. You hit the (sleep)sack about 8pm, wake up at 2am to refuel, and then immediately fall back asleep till 8am.



You don't fuss or cry, except when you are hungry or overtired. Oh! But you do often protest when we change your diaper - especially at night - as I don't think you like your bottom being mopped with cold water.

I had a bit of a crisis with your feeds at the 4/5 week mark. I couldn't seem to keep up with your ferocious appetite. You were guzzling 120mls of milk every three hours - waaaay more than a baby your age should have been drinking.

Things got so bad that I bought a tin of formula (E.V.I.L) but I held out for your 6 week visit to Dr Belinda so I could discuss how to proceed. However, when we got there, Dr Belinda said you had signs of eczema and that you might be allergic to cow's milk!

For two weeks I had to cut out dairy, shellfish, nuts and egg to see if your skin improved. Luckily alcohol and caffeine were not on the list!

Thankfully it did.

I have since reintroduced dairy into my diet but am still avoiding everything else on the list. Little spots still mark your face so I really hope you aren't allergic to dairy as that would make life very difficult!

Anyway, the tin of formula remains in the drawer.

And so I continued struggling to keep you well fed. Dr B said you were probably going through an extended growth spurt. You weighed in at a hefty 5.5 kg at 6 weeks, well up from your birth weight of 3.08kg.

Things have since calmed down, as have I. Your intake is more manageable now. The only thing is I am still producing milk at the rate you were drinking at so our freezer is full of milk. I think right now I have 30 120ml packs of frozen milk ready for your consumption!

So we're coasting. I can even go away for a long weekend with my stash!

All that milk has made you super squishy and cuddly. I love snuggling with you plus you have an intoxicating sweet baby smell... yummy!



You've started cooing and responding when we "talk" to you. You have also begun to laugh (silently) and smile more often.

Your big sister just adores you and if we didn't stop her would be constantly smothering you with kisses and big hugs. Fortunately for you, we have taught her to kiss only your body and feet to limit the spread of playschool germs. Everyone else - even the grandparents - have been told to curb their affections and not kiss you anywhere near your face (on Dr Grandfather's orders - not mine!).

So for now, it's only mama who secretly smothers you!

Both girls at 10 weeks

I WAS looking through old photographs to check out similarities between the two sisters when I stumbled on a photo of Aunty Janice with 10 week old Zoe.



Coincidentally, we bumped into her today while having brunch at the new Cafe Hacienda.

And since Emma is 10 weeks old, it was photo time!



What a difference three years make!

Cebei Haio and other Singlish phrases

DEFINITION: A Hokkien term describing someone as flirtatious and/or vain.

One of Z's great daily highlights is to look through her very extensive wardrobe to select her an outfit, even for the playground. But there is such glee when we are going kai kai and a"beee-yooo-ti-fool" dress is usually chosen.

I'm more of a jeans and tank person so I don't really know where she gets this from, my pink loving princess.

Her lips have been very dry lately and I bought her a strawberry chapstick. She has taken to carrying it around in her handbag and whipping it out at regular intervals to apply her "leepstik".

I looked up the definition of haio and found a Singlish dictionary online. Some words sure did make me laugh, especially when I thought of some perplexed ang mo trying to figure out the local lingo:

• Your Head: Mild curse used to disabuse someone of his or her erroneous assumption.
"She? Win Miss Universe? Your head, lah!"

• Whack: meaning to do something with reckless abandon.
"Wah he go buffet and whack."

• Ya ya Papaya: meaning boastful, or showing off
"Don't be so ya ya Papaya, I warn you."

• Havoc: Used to describe a wild child, or someone who’s promiscuous.
“Ah Lien is damn havoc one.”

• Vomit Blood: Literal translation from the Hokkien phrase "tor hwee", which is used to describe undergoing extreme difficulty, intense suffering or great irritation. "Vomit" is often pronounced "womit".
Ah Beng: "Yesterday, hor, I teach my son Maths, teach until vomit blood."

From: http://www.lumpar.com/a.htm

A bit of drool

SIGNS of a good nap.

Em's other cow

THIS present from Aunty Christina has really been a good babysitter.

It is from ELC and I think it's a cow...

It's very cushy and Em feels like she is being cradled which leads to looong daytime naps (and freetime for me!).

Thanks!

Matty turns 4

A DIEGO and Dora themed party was held at MyGym at GWC to celebrate Matty's 4th birthday.

Zoe had a great time as she is a little monkey and loves the gym!



Though at one stage she was a bit of a chicken little as the sky was falling!



During lunch, Z got to sit next to the birthday boy. But as Matty and his family were taking family pictures, Z thought she was part of the posse and started posing for the cameras!

Hi-5

SHE was dancing in the aisle and shaking her bootie.

D took Z to watch the new Hi-5 team with her buddy Sasha (and her Dad).

The highlight for Z was actually Hi-5-ing Stevie's hand after the show.

Cupcake dinner

SOMETIMES presentation really matters!

Tinkerbell

WHEN she woke up from her nap today, she decided she wanted to be a fairy.

Needless to say we got a few funny looks when we walked to the shops to buy sausages.