Blessings from Above

with god's good grace, we enjoyed a beautiful afternoon out at pasir ris park with our friends - it was also claire's 1st picnic (its virtually impossible to get dh to go for picnics coz the weather here is just unbearable but i believe when we visit oz in july, we'll be able to enjoy many beautiful afternoons lazing at the many parks with the nice weather!) there were a total 9 mummies with 8 toddlers-in-tow... noti aunty leo decided to take her 'off' day and leave JK at home instead of bringing him along to join in the fun! we each brought along some food and drinks to share... enjoy the photos! my contribution - fried beehoon with leo's absolutely delicious & healthy sandwiches what's a picnic without junk food? Its such a nice day, Mummy! seated from the left: kieran, joanie, jordan, claire with clarisse look on in the background. claire seated with jordan boy jesse: what shd i do with this ball? malcolm: i'm go...

you brush your teeth, brush your teeth, brush your teeth... our little princess is learning about personal grooming now - other than combing her hair, she is also able to brush her own teeth.... :)

our little princess finally took her 'first' unassisted steps today! we're so proud of her! she is officially promoted to a toddler now! :)

our usual weekly meetup - except that there were only 4 of us today - jane & kaizer, me & claire... we enjoyed a delicious & wholesome lunch @ cedele, vivo city and look how much fun kaizer & claire had... :) hey kaizer, this looks fun... let's try pole-dancing! hehe... why don't i just sit here and let kaizer work those muscles? ha ha ha... you wish! come help me!

i've been meaning to get some form of playdate going for some time now but trying to co-ordinate the dates/timings of a group of adults & their babies is really no joke! different schedules, different nap times, different meal times and so on... our usual weekly meet ups center mostly around the adults since the babies (& toddlers) have to spend their time either on the high-chair or stroller or walking (& falling) on dirty restuarant floors so i thought it'd be great to give the babies (& toddlers) a change of environment occasionally (Read: clean floor, plenty of toys/activites w/o worrying about getting HFMD) nevertheless, we finally got it going - today claire and i invited some friends over for a dip in our pool - i'd like to believe that they all had fun - but as usual, i'm too lazy to whip out my camera so i've 'stolen' some pictures from those who came... haha... enjoy! the host with her pooh float little cherelle in claire...

our little princess wishing her grandma a 'happy (grand)mother's day!' with a gentle peck on the cheek...

the advantage of having a 'flexible' work arrangement allows me to spend as much time as possible with my little princess - she has always been my priority and will always remain as such and of course, it also means that i am free to take her anywhere, anytime! i'm actually becoming rather lazy in the photo-taking so despite the fact that we've been to quite a few places ( jacob ballas children garden , gogo bambini , singapore zoological gardens , etc) we hardly have any photos to show! i really have to be more diligent in whipping out my camera! hehe... to enjoy photos of our zoo trip, please visit aunty jane's blog thanks to aunty leo, we had a chance to attend a playnest trial session @ julia gabriel last weekend. before attending the trial, i wondered if 1.5hrs was 'too long' for claire to sit through... and surprisingly, she did rather well and i believe that she really enjoyed herself (possibly because she took a long nap before that and thus w...

another month and still a joy! we visited the zoo today together with a few other friends - here's a photo of *grumpy* Claire with her 1st baby friend - Kaizer! they first met when they were two or three months old.

Claire has her own pair of shades now - how cool does she look eh?

many thanks to all the kind words and support from all you dear friends since my last blog entry - i'm fine, really! just needed to get that out of my system - anyway, i've figured that since i've bfed her (more than) a full year, there's really no harm giving her some other source of milk. we bought Karihome's full cream goat milk today from the local supermarket and i'm going to mix that into her cereal for some meals (i think daddy only realises today how much $$$ i've saved him for bfing for a full year - a small tin of Karihome costs about SGD24 - of course there are cheaper alternatives but only the best for my dearest one!). :) i'm also so very glad to have my happy, smiling baby back - seems like her cold has left her (please stay away for good - i don't like you coming to visit at all!). See her megawatt smile now that she has recovered! and hey, her appetite also came back - i managed to give her half a bowl of cereal this morning and ha...

i've been nursing claire for more than one year yet today, i relented and allow hb gave her a bottle of FM. today, i broke down and cried continuously - all because she has not been eating well. those who meet us regularly never fail to 'comment' that claire is 'not growing' and i believe many pple think that i'm starving her! for the record, she is growing - her height and weight has been increasing steadily since birth (albeit slowly) - there was only 2 periods that she lost weight: when we went to thailand during CNY coz she was too busy looking around to eat and NOW - she fell sick for the 1st time on Thursday - her temperature went up to 39.3 degrees celsius on friday midnight/sat morning but by sat afternoon, she was well again. unfortunately with the fever, her appetite that stopped by to visit us when she turned 10 months took off. and if you know how active this bb is, you can probably understand how hard it is for her to put on weight coz in order to...

finally got the photos for princess' party (from my friend) - unfortunately there aren't many. :(   I also added a couple of photos that we took after the party... and if i can find a way to convert the video, i'll upload the video clip as well. :)

My princess turned ONE! What an eventful year it has been! We love you babe! More and more every day! ps:// we are still waiting for photos from the party! hehe... check back soon!

its one week before our little angel's 1st birthday so we took some time off to bring her for a photoshoot... here are some photos have a look!  

we're left with 1 week to prepare for our little angel's 1st birthday party - so much to do and so little time! her birthday dress has arrived from US, together with her present from grandaunt (with a handwritten note to boot! see below... thank you grandaunt!)... i'm still waiting for the balance balloons to arrive though. :( today is little angel's birthday according to the lunar calendar and according to traditions, she should be fed 'mee sua' to symbolise eating real food and be seated within a circle of objects including wallet (rich!), ruler (teacher), pen (scholar), calculator (accountant), stethoscope (doctor) and so on... the 1st object picked up by the baby is supposed to be his/her future. if you are interested, read more . early this morning, i went to the market to buy chicken drumstick and 'mee sua' to cook for my little princess. i boiled the broth with chicken drumstick, minced chicken, onion, celery, carrot, broccoli, scallops and re...

claire's birthday bash is just 2 weeks away and i'm just about tying down the loose ends for the birthday bash. if you have been invited and you have not RSVP, kindly do so soon! if you have not been invited but wish to come, email me - i'll consider your request (haha!!)... ps: if you are thinking of buying her a present and have no idea what to get, can i suggest that you contribute to her 'Fisher Price Rainforest Jumperoo' fund, either in the form of cash or vouchers? :)

as the day draws nearer for us to celebrate princess' 1st birthday, i decided to put together some slide shows to commemorate the occasion... here's the preview... Make a scrapbook - it's easy!

over the weekend, we brought our little princess to a newly opened play gym to see how it compares to gymboree... take a look at her playing at the ball pool with her friend gladys. the new gym has more equipment compared to gymboree - unfortunately there were just too many babies and its a pity that the session was really chaotic and unorganised! perhaps the teachers were inexperience and thus were unable to handle the huge class size? anyway, claire had lots of fun as always, doing her own thing and exploring the place.

champion of the inaugural Baby Singapore 2008 Healthy Baby Competition (Category B : 6 to 12months), organised by Young Parents Magazine : our little princess Claire! can you see how natural she is, donning the crown and clinching on to her trophy? she wins for herself $300 cash, a $50 photography voucher and a hamper worth $138 (7 packs of diapers, some pamper wipes and a 'Mighty Saver' hamper from OCBC bank and princess also enjoyed her 2 seconds of fame on our local news... More photos below! and coincidentally, our darling turns 11 months today! countdown to her 1st birthday bash begins!

with the exception of last year, we normally go away during the chinese new year period as dh officially has no leave so we have to make use of long weekends to go away. we went to krabi a couple of years back and we absolutely loved it thus this year we decided to revisit. unfortunately the place has become very popular with tourists and is now as expensive as phuket. nevertheless, we still enjoyed the break and spent quality time together as a family and of course, it was our darling's 1st time on the plane. i'm glad she coped very well and i hope this means that she will be able to cope with the longer flight to down under in july! i have to say that thai food is absolutely delicious and i must have put on like 3kg in the ONE week that we were there! n our little princess enjoyed lots of attention from both the local and tourists - so many of them wanted to carry her! our little princess reciprocated the attention with lots of smiles and babbling! as always, enjoy the ph...