WAT?? 31 Deg C?

It's been no more than 30 deg Celscius for the past week with lows of 8-10deg C each night. For the approaching cool weather, I've pulled my boots and jackets/pants/wat-nots out from their hiding place. AN's too!

BUT

It's 31 deg C now!

Wah biangz....

Don't be like that la..

Makeup Brush: Top Quality Dog Fur?

If ever dog fur can be made into makeup brushes, I think we will be very rich with our 2 shedding furkids.

The furballs on the floor I pick up every morning should be enough to make up a kabuki brush (not stiff like that but easily as jumbo as that). Just the morning, not even taking into consideration their fur on the comb and on the floor throughout the rest of the day.

Dog Fur brushes will be VERY soft and smell like oatmeal with a bit of pee (Maen always smells like pee, wonder why..)

hehe. Let me do a research on that 1st.

Photo Summary

It's been a while since I posted photos so here they are :)

Maen under AN's spell?

Or simply under her control?

Quite obvious huh?

Wonder what's in Maen's thought.

So near

yet so far

"Take picture ah?"

"Ok where do I stand?"

"Is this good enough?" (erm...photographer obviously not very skillful as usual)

Oops..something tells me I wasn't the photographer ;p

Papa and baby

Her in one of the swim suit we bought her before her 1st, one and only swim

Arrival of the stuff I bought online in preparation for the coming cold weather. The only beneficiary of the loot: Adrielle Nicole Liow Zu Er. Mr Liow insisted on taking this picture coz he was amazed by the thing I bought. A lot meh? hehe.

Before, the bear was a proposal gift. During, BM were wedding gifts. After, the baby is a marriage to..r.t..ure... gift. Ok, she's really a gift. When she's not eating, she's mostly cute and fun to be with.

Lately when we bring the camera out to take pictures of her, she will go "Cheese" and stay for the picture (we have to hurry tho. Her patience is as vast as the water in the toilet bowl only). hee. Quite cute. Ok, very cute.

A bored baby...

..is a good helper.

See what I mean? hehe. She was helping to brush fur off the carpet with the brush like she sees me brush BM's fur off their bed with another of this.

My fringe.
Sorry my eyes looked wierd coz I had some wierd looking eye makeup on. I was trying out a new colour I got while AN was sleeping. Very ugly I know, but the colour is very pretty!! Will do a swatch when I have time to. hee.

Fall fashion. Finally the thick clothings come in useful.

Since it's not that cold yet, baby can still get to put on dresses

A dress doesn't make a girl, a girl. So unglam.

Better?

Next comes some very exposed photos (what were you thinking? hehe. I meant the flash was too strong)

Father and daughter playing with stickers while I cook.

I stick on you.

You stick on me

Baby with her newly installed 'infra-red'
A clearer view of the new gadget

Accidental "Celebrity-hates-Paparazzi" Finger?
Sticker on the wall?

The artist

The more the merrier
Baby dozing off on the car today.

Once upon a time, she could sit still in the car seat. Now, she's learnt to escape. This is one rare time she fell asleep after contorting her right hand out of the harness.

Most babies drool but I do not remember AN ever drooling (unless we count blowing bubbles as drooling).

She must be really tired coz she drooled today!
Finally (a sleeping) AN and I. I like my fringe.

AN can be...

Besides being a little monster, she can also be:

...Sweet
While we were waiting for our drinks this afternoon at Starbucks, we took a sit on the couch. After we got them, Mr Liow led AN away (we were supposed to be going home after we got our drinks) and left me behind to follow them (I was busy putting some things back into the bag, or something).

AN walked off without noticing that I wasn't following and Mr Liow prompted her to go "bring mummy here".

She turned and walked back to where I was, took me by my hand and held my hands all the way out.

That felt good. This is probably the 1st few times I actually felt that she loved and bothered about me. Ok, I know she's just a baby but it did feel good this time. hehe. She doesn't enjoy holding our hands la, for some reasons.


...Cute
Whenever we go grocery shopping, she will insist on walking by herself. Once she gets to do that, she will not look back to see if we are with her. In fact, she doesn't care and will continue checking everything out while we hide, till WE find it tiring to play hide and 'non-seek'.

She seems to like it when I'm left alone with her and the shopping cart, coz she gets to go farrrrrr ahead of me while I try to push the cart as fast as she's walking (She takes more advantage of me than Mr Liow).

She then starts to bring me stuff which she leaves at my feet, and take off again to bring me even more stuff while I return those she brings to me earlier, back to where she takes them from.

It's rather amusing to see her 'shopping' so happily tho, despite being busy putting those items back.

...Concerned
Since she learnt to tell that the sight of a scar meant 'pain' (beside literally feeling the effect of pain), she's been stroking the scar on my collar bone and telling me "pain pain". While doing so, she'll be frowning as if she's sympathetic towards my 'pain'.

Without warning, she'll scrap the scar off my skin like she is supposedly doing me a favour. By doing so, the little scratch will start to bleed again and form another scar after it dries up.

And the cycle continues.

The scar on my collar bone will never heal at this rate she's building her vocab-bank.

...Helpful
I will put a foot in between B or M's moving paw and neck whenever they scratch to prevent them from doing so.

AN sees, AN follows.

Instead of putting her foot where it should be, she gives them a little kick -_____-" She thinks that each time I lift my foot up, I'm actually 'kicking' them. *faint*

...A Pack Leader (?)
She goes around snatching chew toys from BM while they happily chew on those toys. Baileys usually walks away with the bone in his mouth when he notices her approaching. Maen will let AN take hers away.

AN has learnt to command them to "SIT!" (sounds more like "SHIT!" everytime..).

Baileys, even if he has no need to sit for that bone, yet being ever so accommodating, WILL sit and wait for her to reward their obedience together with Maen.

She never does reward them, and walks away with the bone while the furkids stare at her blankly.

So, we are currently in the process of teaching her to give them the bone for obeying.
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I know I've been worrying too much ever since I became a mum.

It's not easy but I'm hoping, and trying to let go a little and enjoy the process of watching AN grow up besides feeling overwhelmed by responsibilities (the 'how-to-fatten-her-up', 'stop-the-toddler-mess', etc etc)

I need to trust God more than I think I do, seriously.

Ok.

An undergrowing baby

We brought AN for her 18th month checkup today and received some rather negative feedback about AN's growth.

She's 78.7cm tall, 8.2kg with head circumference (HC) of 43.4cm.

Her height growth is ok at btw 10-25% but both her weight and HC fall below 3%. She's a '3%' baby so anything along the 3% line is acceptable but it's not, now that she's below the line.

The Dr suggested I increase her fat and calories intake (which I've already tried to. Guess it's not enough still), recommended Pediasure which contains more calories/ounce and suggest I do not let her suckle as much as before.

Her 'suckling', in Dr Monica's words, is merely snacking since she doesn't suckle more than 10mins each time and that's when the hind milk (high calorie milk) comes in. And those mins of suckling only serve to fill up her stomach, and of course provide comfort. It's nothing much in the area of nutrition anymore, not like it was in the 1st 6 months of her life.

We were concerned how this slow growth will be affecting AN. Dr Monica said that these physical growth are very important in the 1st 2 years of their lives especially, that if her HC is not growing, it may mean her brains is not growing. That will be something of concern.

We'll be bringing her back in 6 weeks' time after making some adjustments to her diet (include more fats and calories in her food).

What could have not been right??

She has her own bottle of organic olive oil that I use to stir-fry/fry food for her. I bought the same organic olive oil margarine to add flavour to her food. If she's having the same food we are having, hers will be minced (esp meat) so that it's easier for her to down. I've been making sure her meals are higher in calories than ours even before this trip to the PD.

I don't know what I'm not doing right, or what I'm not doing enough..

In case I get you guys worried, AN is active and behaving normally. She's also learning well and fast. Mr Liow tried to assure me that she's basically ok and not to let myself worry over this weight issue (albeit being a little too insensitive in his tone).

So, it's much higher calorie food she'll be having from now on. And I'll be weaning her off my bxxxxt.

It's not going to be easy. She's chanting 'mem mem; as I'm typing this. I'm ignoring her pleas and she is telling me "side" which she actually meant another bxxxxt (I'll tell her "change side" when she's done with one). Then she ran to the sofa and told me "sleep" (when she gets to suckle).

I feel drained....

For her, it's so like trying to quit an addiction....

Overview of some main events.

Finally found time to blog, while sitting at the toilet bowl (again?). Have learnt to multi-task as such.

Let me see...I shall post some of the more memorable events of the past week.
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Incident 1
Everyday is the same, except that I get busier with an increasingly mobile baby who's also getting smarter. She's able to open cabinet doors we've managed to keep closed till few weeks back (with heavy duty rubber bands fastening those door knobs), climb in and out of her playpen (without falling as of now)...basically she's everywhere and at times, where she shouldn't be.

There was a day she went to play with Baileys' lau sai (and with no change to his diet whatsoever, I have no idea why he lau sai that day...).

I heard her whine a little and saw her running towards me frowning. She smell VERY much like lau sai when I hugged her and I saw her smack her lips in disgust. At that very split moment, the only thing that came to mind was "did AN eat sai?? Lau Sai at that!". I was already worried about the lau sai, wondering if he had worms in his system or something (can't be tho...he's on heartworm prevention that also prevents worms...*pulls hair*)

There were traces of poop being dragged on the floor. Either Baileys stepped on it accidentally while leaving the toilet, or AN went to dig her finger into the sai and drew on the floor with it.

Her finger showed no sign of poop BUT it stinked REAL BAD.

I washed her all over and prayed hard that she won't start throwing up or convulse, or ... just not to fall sick *crossed fingers*. Mr Liow assured me that she probably didn't eat it. I checked both BM and all 8 paws were purrfectly white, so it couldn't have been any of them who messed the poop up. AN is the only culprit left.

Thank God it's been a week or two and she's still alive and well *phew*. So is Baileys. hehe.

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Incident 2
I think I'm going crazy.

AN has this habit of sweeping my hands away while I feed her. With training, I've gotten better at avoiding her sweeping hand but there had been countless time when I wasn't paying attention and she managed to sweep the bowl of soupy food onto the carpet. Most times a spoonful of food and other times, the WHOLE BOWL AND ITS CONTENTS!

Once, twice, three times...soon it was almost every other day that I had to do serious cleaning up coz wet food landed on the carpet.

It happened again last Friday and it was almost as if I was overpowered by anger, I picked her up and threw her onto the sofa.

:(

She was watching Little Einstein while she did that and even when I threw her onto the sofa, she was still humming and waving her hands to the music.

At that moment I felt my heart aching... : ( I was like one of those nasty nannies caught on tapes for abusing kids under their care. I was doing that to my own child?

After feeling the pain, I felt angry again (for whatever reasons..that's why I feel like I'm going crazy..). I had to clear up te HUGE mess and she decided to get off the sofa to step around it.

I threw her back onto the sofa again. This time I think I scared her and she started to cry but in a matter of seconds, she was attracted by the Little Einstein program again and forgot about the commotion.

Took me a long time to pick up the porridge, piece by piece (I swear there were thousands of pieces of mushy porridge bits all over the floor), and there was soup on the carpet which I had to dry.

AN made several attempts to get off the sofa but I shouted at her to stay up there. I believe I really frightened her coz she started to cry. At least it sounded to me like she was frightened.

There were mixed emotion in me. Both that of extreme anger, and pain that I literally 'threw' her away. Even as I think of that now, I felt terrible...

Please keep me in prayers. I can't do it on my own..I really can't. Everyday is a test of patience. When communication breaks down (she understands what I want from her more than I understand her), she gets frustrated and cries (too many times a day for my comfort. It gets really nerve-wrecking, seriously nerve-wrecking).

Screams, cries, demands, tanthrums, mess to clear, stuff to pack, food to cook only to get rejected by baby, finally a moment of nap BUT she wakes up at the slightest sound and is even crankier than before she fell asleep.....these stuff take turns to happen every minute of the day. I'm already running on backup patience, and running low on it..

Please pray for me.

I know I still love her tho and I am never going to let anything similar happen again. I don't want her to grow up scarred...I am fearful.

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'Incident' 3
This is a good one tho.

Mr Liow woke up earlier at 9am on Saturday to help me settle Baileys and Maen (who wake up early at 7am each day to scratch on their baby gate to be let out).

Oh, I forgot to mention that their scratching adds on to my touchy temper lately.

It was a good rest for me on that day after their scratching ceased.

He tried to help around the kitchen by keeping extra utensils that were left to dry on the rack overnight.

I woke up to a neat kitchen that morning.

My day for once since a long time ago, started on a positive note.

That helped fuel me for a positive relationship with AN too.

He's also been helping me put groceries away after we return home with them, and helping me bring AN away so that I have that few minutes of personal time (TO PANG SAI! Or just to stare into space for a while)

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'Incident' 4
This is also a good 'incident'.

I met up with one of Mr Liow's colleague's wife, Joey on Saturday. The family will be leaving for Singapore 1st wk of December and she needed help with cosmetics, mainly MAC.

So, Mr Liow took care of AN while I was gone. In fact he took her out for the few hours, to the bank, and to Foothill Mall to shop around a little. She was asleep throughout the whole 'outing'!

I went out with Joey last week, bringing AN and AN was so troublesome Joey finally understood why I suggested we meet to go out during weekends, so that I could shop in peace with her without AN as a distraction.

We had a good time shopping and swatching colours.

And coz the weather had just turned really nice, we had coffee in an outdoor cafe, and had a really good chat.

She's a prayerful woman, which I realised after talking to her. She's also gone through what I am going through now, with AN. I told her what I did to AN that day and she confessed that there were also days when she had a little too much of her boy's nonsense and succumbed to crazy methods of dealing with her boy. She regretted to too heavy a punishment she metted out on him many times. I am glad she empathised with me.

And I realised she loves boots too!

Oh my, the more we chatted, the more we realised we had so much in common!

It's really a pity we did not get to know each other better much earlier (I 1st met her in..June? We did not really talk much then.)

That was a really nice break from AN, and it was really nice to find a friend with common interest, and most importantly, another prayer partner.

I thank God for a friend in her, and it's amazing how friendship can develope over a cup of coffee, and cosmetics. hehe.

She shared that for the 1.5yrs that she had been here, she found noone who would be interested in fashion, makeup, cosmetics and such. The ladies here would mostly be more concerned about which childcare centre to bring their kids to, which PD (baby doctor) is nice, which shopping venue is having sales etc etc.

She wanted to know more about makeup and when time drew near for her to start buying things to bring back to Singapore, she wished she could have a little help with products.

She shared that she was so surprised our 1st casual introduction led to THE topic of makeup, and thankful that our friendship has developed thus far, that soon. It was like the Lord did not ignore this seemingly insignificant wish she had.

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So, yup. This had been another fruitful weekend for me. Another one that I can be thankful about.

I've seen what havoc anger can create when I lost myself (and how I've hurt my little girl) and committed this senseless act to the Lord, I see the effort Mr Liow put in to help me off load a little, and I found a praying buddy at this part of the earth.

I am thankful.

I cut my hair

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/muse

1. muse
   1. A guiding spirit.
   2. A source of inspiration.

Whatever a muse is, it found me while I was passing motion (in other words, shitting). Without a consideration after I flushed my wastes away, I reached out for the scissors and started to snip.

As I snipped, I was wishing that this was just another dream (I've had dreams which were sooooo real they get burnt into my memory like an actual event. There had been times I referred to them like they were real, only to realise that they weren't, after talking to people)

Didn't take me long and I was done. hehe.

Will take pictures later. I won't have a 'BEFORE' picture coz this hair trim wasn't planned for ;p

Real life remote controller + Weather change!

Even tho AN makes me busy everyday, it's kinda nice to have her at this age now, where everything's new experience for her. And she's ever willing to help me fetch anything and everything. It's like having a real-life remote controlled helper. hehe.

Not to forget, the weather finally changed for the better. I hope this weather change is final!

Colour Gallery

Some of the stuff I bought over the last few weeks. hehe.

These are my 'blushers'! (Mineralise Skin Finish).

For the benefit of Sunflower, I got (in order from top left, right, to bottom left and right): Petticoat, Soft and Gentle, Gold Deposit and So Ceylon
I don't know why this is upside down.. :( But anyway, from this angle (left to right): Soft and Gentle, Gold Deposit, So Ceylon, Petticoat (yes, it's really dry here. My skin is all shriveled up)
This is from my very 1st colour palette from MAC. I chose these colours without knowing them by name (I'll have to dig them out from the palette to get to know them). I can't rotate this too, so try visually rotating the palette above with the orange/pink/plum to your left and yellow/green/blue to your right.

(edited: names added and picture rotated)

The swatches on this arm are that of those on the left of the palette.

These are the 9 bridal colours on the left of the palette. hehe.

Very pretty. I can now understand why there are MAC addicts. hehe.

I've not crossed over to the dark side. I hope not to be. ;p

I didn't take any pictures of the foundations I stocked up on tho. hehe. Coz, foundations are foundations. My camera is just not good enough to capture anything special about them, even if there's any ;p

I bought empty palettes to depot my blushers so that I don't have to meddle with so many individual pots in the drawer (and so that I don't have to constantly be looking over my shoulders in case AN gets her hands on any of those. The drawers are within her reach!). Will take pictures after I've done that. Hope to get that done soon (AN's becoming more and more of a handful *shakes head*)

Leave of Absence

It's been a week since my last entry.

Been a busy week doing everything I've been doing, seemingly all my life: Washing, vacuuming, cooking, cleaning, clearing shit (both for the ones who do it on papers and her who does it in diapers) and chasing after the 2 and 4 legged.

I've also been hooked to watching this youtuber Enkore who's a makeup artist himself and posts LOTS of tips in youtube.

Click to watch: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fBrxJRKjWfY&feature=related (This is a link to priming before makeup. Check out some of his other videos if interested :)

I've gotten my mineralised blushers. It's actually called Mineralised Skin Finish. I just prefer to call anything I put on my cheeks 'blushers'. Have taken pictures. See if I've time to put up. They are pretty..., so pretty that the rest of my blushers will take a back seat for the time being. ;p

Seems like there isn't much for me to update after this week of absence. hehe.

Oh yes...I started to set up a new makeup kit for work when I get back. Mr Liow shows black face whenever we go out and I refuse to buy anything (wierd hubby hor? I thought most hubbys show black face if wives buy anything when they go out, no? But I like. hehe).

So, to make him happy, I've started to stock up on my MAC (and some other) stuff. From foundations, to colour palettes. The kit is expanding, slowly but surely. hmm...It's already quite an investment by now (and there are more on my to-buy list that I've not gotten).

Cross my fingers and wish that it won't take me long before I get jobs again *please please*.

I was thinking of trying for Mediacorp (again. I had no news the last time I applied). It's long hours I heard, and hectic. BUT I believe it's going to be fun. hehe. By then, AN will be 3 yrs old, at least? Else...I still have 1.5yrs here to thinking of what'll be next for me.

I want to go far, I want to excel. I don't like feeling helpless.

Just some random thoughts that I've pondered over the past week. ;)

p.s: I just noticed that this is another long post even though I didn't seem to have much to update. hehe.