Playground before Going to School

Every morning, her daddy will bring her down early to have some light fun before boarding the school bus.

That's provided she wakes up on time. :)

1st day to School after all the CNY celebrations

I nearly forgotten that Giselle has to wear traditional costume to school today. I had originally changed her to her usual uniform and realised she shouldn't be wearing this today and hastily swope it her CNY costume... Luckily still in time bun up her hair too and catch her school bus... Phew!

My Vain Gal....

Maybe she inherited some genes from me as I noticed recently that she loves dolling herself up... She began wanting to put nail polish like me when she saw me when for pedicure services...

Luckily I managed to find some safe nail polish without any toxics...hence, I don't mind to let her put on those nail polish when she requested for it... However, I told her no-no to have nail polish on her fingers at school...

Gathering at my house on CNY Day 2 :)

Since it was our turn to organise this yearly event for Adrian's relatives, we decided not to post-pone it anymore since next year I will be very busy with 2 kids in my house...

As usual, we had potluck with me in charge of fried noodles, fried chicken wings, and vegetables... Of course, I don't have the stamina to cook all these. Hence, I went to the coffeeshop near my block to order them... :) Besides these, we also contributed Kueh Pie-tees and Guo ties from the Margaret Drive Hawker Centre...

The crowd was still manageable... luckily had 2 maids from my in laws and SIL to help out... However, as I stood too long for that evening, I practically can't walk normally the next day... haha...

Nevertheless, Adrian and I were glad that everyone enjoyed the party, including ourselves... :) And our dear Giselle was happily running about the whole house, playing balloons and Monopoly with her neighbourhood friends....

Wishing Everyone a Happy & Properous CNY!

This was how Giselle will greet us on the first day of Chinese New Year every year... Every time I looked back at the CNY photos, will realise how much she has grown over the years :)

The special thing about this Tiger year is that Valentines Day also falls on the same day as Chinese Lunar New Year Day 1....

Same as last year, we went to take a walk at Carrefour before heading to our families' houses for CNY visitings...

CNY Reunion Dinner - Part 2

The food we eat at my in-laws' house was slightly different from my own family's as here we had bbq steamboat as well. Then YuSheng was included in the menu... It was quite a yummy dish as the yusheng were prepared by my SIL.

The last photo above showed Giselle's cousin, Zheng Ye. He loves playing with Giselle but just that he is a very shy boy. But as least can see he takes care of Giselle very well :)

CNY Reunion Dinner - Part I

Every year, I will start with having dinner with my own family at 5pm, followed by the 2nd dinner at my in-law's place at 6pm...

The most fortunate thing was that my grandma's house and my in-laws were only separated by 5 floors which means they stayed at the same block... Phew!

As usual, my mum will be busy from morning till evening, cooking CNY dishes for the New Year so that everyone in the family have things to eat... We really appreciate all her efforts and cooking.... :)

Is Mommy's Birthday today! :)

Yes, it is another year of more wrinkles for me... or another year "wiser"....

But this year would be a very different year for me because I am expecting another baby coming along in Mar. Wonder how am I going to manage on my own but I will try my best... :)

My birthday wish? Just simply my family will have good health, and World Peace!!! hahaha...

Today celebration was a very simple affair with just a buffet dinner at Traders Hotel as we had quite a few errands to run during the day for the CNY. I must say my family and I enjoyed the food from the buffet spread very much. They even served lobsters which I find very worth for the 1 for 1 price we paid. Hence for the 2 adults, the bill came to be about $58 nett in total.

My dear Giselle was very excited about my birthday today and kept asking when can blow candles and sing birthday song for me... That's really sweet of her :)

She did a card for me and I like it very much !

Her Daddy had ordered a sugarless brownie cake for me from cakeconscious :)

Hollywood Dino Exhibits at Jurong Bird Park

We need to clear the Dino tickets soon and hence we brought Giselle to the Jurong Bird Park for the Hollywood Dino exhibits.

The weather was super hot (at least to me) today but luckily we managed to complete the trail within 45mins... Giselle was excited and yet fearful when she saw the fake Dinosaurs... haha..

We ended this short excursion with a good break at the Hawk cafe where they served yummy Soya Sauce chicken noodle :)

Very Satisfied with her Yummi Yoghurt now

At Suntec City food court now :)

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Marble Butter Cake

I bought a fruity cake book written by Alex Goh recently and find some of his recipes and methods easier for a amateur mommy baker like me... :)

So I started with the least ingredients needed like a butter cake. The marble effect was done using some coca powder and milk with a separate mixture. The whisking method was quite tedious for me when I am using a handheld electric whisk. I had to whisk the butter and sugar till light and fluffy state; and also the egg white and sugar till stiff peak. The most challenaging part was also when I had to fold in the flour into the butter and also the eggwhite later on.

Of course, with my gestational diabetes haunting me now and wanting my family to have some healthier home-baked cakes, I reduced the sugar by about 40%. Fortunately, the taste was still very nice.

I would say this cake was quite a success minus the fact that the flour and eggwhite wasn't folded in perfectly...

Fashion Show

Bought some Chinese New Year dresses for her n she was having a fashion show yesterday

Since she has been asking me to put nail polish for her, I managed to find a non toxic, odourless, hypoallergenic n waterbased nail polish for her. She was so happy n kept asking me to put on for her.

A Meaty Pork Dish...

I was wondering what to cook for today's dinner and managed to think of this dish using minced pork. Basically I add some oyster sauce, five-spice powder, cornstarch powder to marinate it. Then I pan-fried them using a shallow frying pan.

Giselle's daddy said it goes very well with rice just that they were a little too saltish... Oops!

Choc Chips Muffin

I had some chocolate chips left in the fridge and hence decided to do some mini-muffins. You can see from the picture above that it really has alot of choc chips. Haha.. Luckily I reduced alot of sugar for the batter so as to balance out the sweetness...

Giselle, being a sweet gal, tried to help me scoop the muffin mixture into the individual cups :)

I noticed that some of the muffins did smile very nicely but some not... weird? Don't know what exactly went wrong...

Blueberry Tart to try out... :)

Was trying to do a tart pastry from scratch and found this recipe which I modified abit.. Wasn't too bad though :)

Baking Session with her...

Since still have ingredients at home n I don't have activity for Giselle, I decided to let her have another round of baking session.

We did chewy oatmeal cookies n I weighted all d ingredients for her to mix. As usual, she was very anxious to pour everything at 1 go into d mixture bowl.

Basically, it is a very simple receipe n kids love d cookies. One thing good about homebaked items is that I can control d amount of sugar into d cookies or cakes.