Elle & DN

My sister has the cutest dog I swear. See?

Okay, I know it looks like Elle has no legs in this pic, but she really does! Look closely and you'll see her little paws. And believe it or not, she IS standing up in this pic. LOL. I love Elle and her short, short legs. DN and DS love Elle too. She's like a walking pillow. So soft, so quiet and so nice to squeeze! In fact, (I'm sad to say) DS can now say Elle's name (air-yeeeee...) but still can't say Mummy (she goes MAAAaaa...) or Papa. Humph!

DN : I love you Elle!
Elle : Er... right back at you dude. Where's my food?

Elle : Hey, what's that on your chin? Rice??
DN : mtfhffphttt...!

DN : *bounce*bounce*bounce away* BLEAH!
Elle : Humph. No more hugs for you!

Jump Hair

I've been meaning to write about this for the longest time because it's quite, uhm, interesting.

When DS was born, she had normal baby hair. Not too much, not too little, very soft. From the looks of her, I had no idea her hair would soon grow a mind of its own and do its very best to defy gravity. Now that I look back at her old photographs, I should have guessed. The signs were all there!

See?!

DS - 1.5 months old

Initially, she looked kind of okay. It was just the hair on top that was reaching for the sky. And it was kind of pyramid shaped too, so she even looked... cool. And honestly, at that time, I didn't really notice the hair. I was sleep-deprived remember? Not much oxygen in the brain.

Over the next two months, the pyramid had time to grow. And it became... "curly". Okay lah, still quite cute since she looked like Tin Tin and I like Tin Tin. She had already started losing hair but as you can see, it was only on the sides. The top was still going strong!

DS - 4 months old

At six months old, DS was almost bald so I thought, "A chance to start afresh!" (although tufty still reigned supreme). 

DS - 6 months old

It kinda went downhill from there. Or maybe UPHILL?!

Yikes. Who let the baby stick her finger into the socket?!

After a while, DS stopped channeling the Tin Tin vibes and went with Krusty the Clown.

Someone's obviously been dipping into the durian stash.

Beware. Porcupine ahead.

When DS was 1 year old, she still looked more durian than baby. In the first few months of her hair-volution (haha), I was quite disturbed. I bought clips to tame the mane but it was useless. One clip did diddly squat. Two clips? Who are we kidding? She needed twenty to look human. When we went out, people would ask, "What happened to her hair?" or say things like, "Wah, her hair is so... cute! (read : Why does she look like a toilet brush?)" and give us advice like, "Put olive oil / Shave her head / Use less shampoo..." Bah... After a while, even DN starting calling his sister's hair "Jump Hair".

LOLOLOLOL!

But now, I love it! I love my durian baby and her crazy hair! I can't get enough of it!

Now that DS is almost 16 months old, her hair has all grown out and she doesn't look like she's from Fraggle Rock anymore. But after naps, she still can look a little, erm, frazzled!

Baking A Diaper Cake

When I first heard the term diaper cake, I was like, "diaper wha...???". And my first thought was, "Why would anyone make a cake in the shape of a diaper???" Mention "diaper" and I think "poop", "pee" and (god forbid) "leaking". The last thing I want to do is eat something that looks toxic.

Of course, I soon found out that you don't eat a diaper cake. You give it, yes sir-ree. And they are all the rage in the mothering world right now. I didn't know because they don't have those under the rock where I come from. 

So when my good friend got pregnant (we've known each other since we were 6... that's 29 20 years ago!), I knew straight away that I had to welcome her into this crazy world they call parenthood with a diaper cake. Never will her life be sane / normal / the same again. Hopefully the said diaper cake will get her so excited she'll forget that once she gives birth, there are no exchanges, and definitely no refunds.

So I trawled the internet and found the perfect diaper cake. Read : cheap and good. I pitched this idea to Funny Bee (who has also known Good Friend for like, forever) and she promptly said, "Since I am crazy and you are crazy and we have nothing else better to do... Let's make it!" And I said, "We are mad! Hokay!"

All this took place about 4 months into my friend's pregnancy. And what does that mean? It means, dear friends, that Funny Bee and I had 6 months to learn how to make a diaper cake. And what do we do? Of course, squat.

*sigh*

I soon came to realise that making a diaper cake consisted only of two parts. Part one was buying the ingredients. Part two was making The Darn Thing. Part one was easy and quite fun. Part two? Erm, excuse me... Need. To. Tighten. This. Loose. Screw. In. My. Head.

Fast forward to a week before Good Friend's due date. By this time, Funny Bee and I are shaking in our underpants, totally flummoxed by the gargantuan task ahead of us and preparing ourselves for the worst (i.e. presenting Good Friend with a plastic bag full of baby items that were supposed to be in a diaper cake). Each one of us had done the obligatory google search on diaper cakes, but nothing more than that. Funny Bee even found out that a cousin of hers MADE them to sell. Now, if only she lived in SINGAPORE! Grrr!

Finally, we decided to bite the bullet and just make The Darn Thing. No guts no glory, I say! So I found this video and gave everyone (we roped in another brave friend) strict instructions to literally, watch and learn. My morale was further boosted by another website that said I could make one in only 30 minutes. "Hokay!" I said to myself, "We're educated females. We're Singaporean. We can follow instructions. We can do this! Roar!"

And we did! *smug*

In 30 minutes 3 hours! *snort*

Looks simple enough right? Well, it took us about 1.5 hours of squabbling, rolling, unrolling, tying, squabbling, rolling, unrolling and squishing to get to this stage. That's the bottom tier and we've got a receiving blanket tied around it.

Why 1.5 hours? Well, let's just say we had grand plans that had to be scaled down. Our original base had like 20 rolled diapers in it. Too bad it was SQUARE! After much scratching of heads, we finally decided to be realistic and go with a 2-tier cake. And that meant that 35 of the 50 diapers didn't make it into the cake. Sorry fellas.

Presenting... our top tier! Another reason why it took us 3 hours to make The Darn Thing? We were so tickled by this we spent like 15 minutes taking pictures of it, and with it.

We wrapped the top tier in a onesie and a pair of pants to hide the diapers. As you can see, we went with a puppy theme and stuck with blues and browns. Yup, it's a boy. :)

We then filled the space between tiers with argyle babylegs in the same blue-brown combo and a set of travel-size toiletries for baby (diaper cream, shampoo, body wash, powder).

Finally, we added some toppers - a pair of baby socks, a stuffed toy-cum-blankie and a card. Ta-dah! Besides tears and sweat, it cost us about $97 for the entire cake, including leftovers (35 diapers, 1 onesie, 1 bath mitt, 1 babylegs). We probably could have gotten a nicer, professional-looking one for slightly less than that, but we had good quality stuff in ours. Plus, it was a ton of fun. ;)

I'm happy to report that Good Friend was very pleased and quite impressed with our efforts. Or at least, that's the impression she gave us!

Update : Good Friend has since given birth to a happy and healthy baby boy who, so far, is doing a pretty good job of turning her life upside down.

SNGS Fundraiser

I guess this post is really for SNGS old girls, but read on anyway if you're not because this post contains the phrases "banana milk", "lucky draw" and "white worms". And they're all connected. You got to read on to find out how!

I was in SNGS for 11 years, from pre-primary all the way to sec four. Yes! Pre-primary! In those days, some schools took students in at pre-primary (or kindergarten 2) instead of at primary one and SNGS was one of them. When I think "pre-primary", I always remember the uniform.

  Check out those pockets! So retro!

I loved it because it was SO comfy. And because we were virtuous little convent girls, we wore bloomers. Yes, puffy little blue bloomers under our dresses. I hated them things though and would rip them right off the minute I got home. God skipped me when he handed out poise and decorum.

Su Ling from Pupsik actually found the old school uniform tailor! Who still had a bunch of that original checked, blue fabric!! Who agreed to make a whole batch of them for sale!!!

So, if you're an ex-SNGS girl, go get one for your daughter / niece / friend's daughter / fun because there are limited pieces of these for sale and all proceeds go to the school's rebuilding fund. Just click on the button below to order.

When I think "pre-primary", I also remember our old school at Victoria Street, where CHIJMES now is, and that we shared the campus with CHIJ. I was there from pre-primary until primary two. I can still remember the school hall with its wooden floors and two big murals on both sides of the stage. I think one of them was a picture of two convent girls playing badminton. I remember the tiny canteen with wooden benches and twenty cent noodle soup. I remember the string of haunted toilets at the back, with one cubicle that was ALWAYS shut. And I remember giving that toilet a wide berth because it had to be the most haunted right? They locked it for our safety! (Why do I remember all these things and forget that DN has water play every Tuesday and forget to pack his swim gear? Argh!)

I also remember playing in the school field, holding hands and going to the toilet as a class, taking naps during school time on raffia mats and getting a tetrapak of milk every day. We got four flavours - chocolate (woot!), plain (eew), strawberry (double eew) and banana (HURL!). Every day was like a lucky draw - which flavour were we going to get that day? And because it was UHT milk, our milk was always served at room temperature. Now I can deal with chocolate milk at room temperature, but banana??? *shiver shiver*

Even Funny Bee, who now drinks like a litre of milk a day, couldn't deal with the banana milk. In sec four (I think), she admitted to me that she used to hide her tetrapak of banana milk in the bin where the raffia mats were always stored. One day, the teacher found the little stash which had started to smell a little funky. Funny Bee did what any other six year old would have done. Nothing. And I just found out from another friend that she used to leave her banana milk in her bag for days, until there were white worms.

Looks like I wasn't the only one who didn't get the poise and decorum hand-outs!

Well, no points for guessing which school DS will be attending. I know she'll have her own basket of poignant memories like I do. Sigh... if only I could sneak DN in somehow!

Lion-pee-dee

There's something therapeutic, and calming, about fixing a jigsaw puzzle together as a family. But after about two minutes, I realise that DN is more of a hindrance than a help.

Me : DN... you are a liability!
DN : No! I am not lion-pee-dee. I am Ong Der Nen!
Me : -__-"

Dances with Wolves

Do you remember Dances With Wolves and Kevin Costner's butt? If you do, then you're probably a 70's baby or older. High five! Do you know, I actually remember watching it with my BFF? It was after our Sec 3 exams and we bought circle (yes! CIRCLE!) seats at Capitol Theatre. I can still see the ticket auntie scribbling our seat numbers down in the ticket booklet with that red peel-away crayon. Remember that?? And I think our ticket cost $4.50 or something crazy like that. Good times, good times.

In the movie, Kevin Costner was christianed "Dances With Wolves" because he, erm, danced with some wolves. There was another dude called "Wind In His Hair" who apparently ran (or rode his horse??) really fast and always looked like he was in some Sunsilk ad. There was a "Smiles A Lot" too. Poor chap sounds like a Care Bear though, haha! And don't get me started on "Kicking Bird". Quite an unfortunate name for the tribe's Holy Man, if you ask me.

Anyway, the whole Sioux indian naming thing got me thinking. Wouldn't it be cool if my kids had red indian names? We'd be the coolest parents when registering their births, they'd be the coolest kids at the playground AND they'll never get called on by their teachers during lessons. They'll thank me for that. The only problematic situations I can think of are:

• when I'm pissed off with them (what a mouthful!)
• when I'm trying to shout warnings to them (by the time I call their names, it'll be too late!)

PF and I had great fun thinking up names for them and have narrowed it down to three for DN and three for DS. You help me decide which ones to go for.

Ong Der Nen or...

1. Whines Too Much
2. Still Fits In Bumbo
   
3. Wants Plaster On Every Mosquito Bite (see pic)

Ong Der Shyen or...

1. Sucks On Toe
   
2. Squeaks When Put Down
   
3. Flips Over And Cannot Flip Back

Big toe en route to mouth

For PF, I think these are very apt.

1. Watch TV Ignore World
2. Writes Complaint Letters
3. Must Buy Wife More Presents

And these suit me I think.

1. Shops Online Again
2. Not Agile Anymore
3. Too Much Bak Kwa
   

What's your red indian name? ;)

Say cheese!

Disclaimer : DN did not learn this from us. I repeat, DN did NOT learn this from us.

I thought I'd better put that up there first, lest you think PF and I pose like camwhoring teenage girls named Apple and Prada who shout "Kawai-ne!" at each other in encouragement.

Recently, DN has been brandishing the V-sign whenever we take photographs of him. Very amusing. Sometimes his V-signs look like rabbit ears...

 

... sometimes it looks like he's pressing a pimple...

... sometimes he gets others in on the act...

... sometimes it looks like he's making a bad sign - in New York...

... and London...

... but almost all of the time, his fingers are pressed right next to his temple and, if I may biasedly say, he looks rather cute! 

 Everyone, meet Gucci Ong.

Stop moving already!

Honestly, I don't have that many pictures of DS. It's just so depressing and frustrating taking picture after picture, only to have them all turn out looking like these. In the wise words of LY, "machiam The Ring."

Take one!

Take two!

Take three!

Taking pictures of a constantly vibrating baby was clearly not challenging enough for me, so I decided to up the ante (oh, just a little) and try taking pictures of said vibrating baby AND her 10-poses-a-second brother who by the way also tormented me by vibrating non-stop when he was a baby.

Take one!

Take two!

Take three!

I love challenges.

NOT!

(DS looks lecherous in the last picture. Grrr... I give up!)

DN's First Haircut

DN definitely takes after me when it comes to hair - we both don't have enough. When he was about 4 months old, his hair started falling out and even though he looked like this, I still refused to shave him bald. Every hair was so precious! And so, for the past 2+ years, we've managed to get away with not sending him to the barber's. DN's grandmother has been serving double duty as granny and barber.

But last weekend, we decided to try a proper hairdresser. It was one of those $10 places where you pay via a vending machine. Not bad at all! Here's a "before" pic of DN looking really shaggy. Check out the hair around his ears. It really was time for a haircut!

DN had this funny look on for the longest time.

For 10 bucks, you also get your head vacuumed. Hoho.

DN before...

... and after!

Rather spiffy, if you ask me!

Mr Cable

I can't find my camera cable. ARGH. I have looked everywhere - bags, office, desk (yes, it's a "place" to look because PF's desk looks like this, minus the car), floor, drawers and in assorted nooks and crannies, but I just can't find the elusive, blasted thing! This is very unlike me because I always "put my things back where they belong" (years of a mother's threats nagging conditioning encouragement does that to you). The problem now is, I'm pregnant, so I can't remember where that place of "belonging" is. The bigger problem is, this is not the 1st pregnancy.

And that means a lot of things...

• I lost memory cells the first time round.
• They didn't come back.
• I'm losing more this time round.
• And they're not coming back too!

I'm getting stupider and stupider by the minute and those fish oils sure ain't helping. -___-"

I've got a few things to blog about too (DN's first proper haircut, Our family stay-cation, Planning for DN's 3rd birthday party), so me not being able to find the blasted cable is really getting on my nerves.

It's been missing for about 2 weeks, and after some active searching, I decided to just leave it be, hoping that Mr Cable will just walk up to me and tap me on the shoulder one day. Okay, add "delusional" to the dem-pregnancy-books-don't-tell-you-about-these-PERMANENT-side-effects list.

Mr Cable! Where are you!?

Snail Mail

I don't think there's anyone on this planet who doesn't like receiving letters or packages in the mail. (except bills of course) What's even better than receiving a letter/package is not knowing it's coming and then a nice surprise lands in your letter box. Sweet. But what's worse is knowing that something is on its way, and opening the door eagerly when you get home everyday, hoping to see a package on the floor because it's been almost two weeks and why isn't it here yet, arghh!

errr... I'm not saying which one happened to me...

But here's the package!

I squealed when I opened it. *squeak!*

And immediately set about "decorating" the room. Here's the "before" shot...

... and the "after" shot. 

An Overdue Hot Date (!)

Once you have kids, your social life just goes to the dogs. They ravage it like a piece of meat, throwing it into the air, blood splattering all over the ground as they rip it to pieces, swallowing it hungrily like starving beasts. Me? Bitter? Noooooooooo...

My sister gave me a voucher for a birthday dinner at Pierside Kitchen LAST YEAR because she knew that PF and I stopped "going out". We finally snatched some time away last week. We had no choice because I was set to leave in a few days and the voucher was going to expire in December! (There's nothing like an expiring voucher to get a Singaporean off her butt eh?)

I'm glad we got our butts moving because we had a wonderful time laughing, cam-whoring and basically being mountain tortoises. I think our last nice dinner (alone) was 2 years ago, at Kuriya, the day before I gave birth. If only I had known eh? ;) Kuriya would have had to drag me, with legs kicking no less, out of the restaurant.

Anyway, I would recommend the Pierside Kitchen for a nice "reasonable" dinner. We shared a set dinner for $100 and ordered an extra main. The set included an appetiser, starter, main and a dessert. Look!


Before dinner started, we were welcomed with one of these. I've forgotten what they're called. It was crab meat with romaine lettuce, cheese and a slice of, erm, crispy bread!

Parma ham with fig and walnut toast, sweet onion and wild rocket, apricot and tomato chutney

Maine lobster linguini aglio olio with sweet basil and chili


(PF's main)
Slow roasted Tasmanian rack of lamb with Jerusalem artichokes, toasted walnuts and crispy shallots, confit of kohrabi
(My main)
Oven roasted miso cod with minted pea puree

Red plum and water apple strudel with bourbon vanilla ice cream and sour prune sorbet (seng buay!)


PF + June cam-whoring

We were so full, we rolled out of the restaurant. Full, but happy, and holding hands. :)