What can this 11th month old do besides messing up the house?

♥Mobility & Dextirity♥
She moves around the house mainly by cruising, or crawling on her knee (I thought she would not be crawling on her knee like Zara, but I was wrong).
Can stand unsupported momentarily.
She’s starting to enjoy walking about with her hands being held.
Her pincer grip is getting better, able to pick up small rice puffs for eating.
She likes to pick things up and place them in bottles, boxes, containers.
She is able to climb down from the bed, buttocks and legs first! Even stairs, with some assistance.

♥Speech Development♥
She’s really doing well, and her vocabulary is expanding. She likes to talk and express herself, some words are still not comprehensible (to us), but we’re understanding her more. Here are some of the new words she can say.
Zara : Zah-Wa
Jiejie : Teh-Teh
Daddy : Pa-pa
Banana : Ah-Nana
Bear : Beh-Beh
Park : Pak-Pak
Bath : Ba-Ba
Duck : Duck-Duck
Back (put back, come back) : Back
Biscuit : Kuht
Bird : Ber-Bert
Pat : Peh-Pek
Rusty (our cat) : Tih
Book : Boo

Every morning, when she wakes up, she’ll turn to check for Zara, she will point to Zara and shouts, “Zah-Wah! Zah-Wah!” Sometimes she’ll crawl to Zara’s bed and pat Zara and shouts some more “Zah-Wah! Zah-Wah!” (she normally talks in a shout like voice).

When I ask her, “Where’s Daddy?” If she could hear Daddy in the shower, she’ll shout, “Pa Pa! Pa Pa!”

Me? When I ask her to call Mummy, she grins and keeps quiet. 🙁

Another example of her talking :
When it’s time to go to the park, she’ll shout excitedly, “Pak Pak!”. When we leave the house, she’ll look up and point to the sky, and say, “Ber Bert!”; flapping her hands at the same time. When we reach the park, she’ll point to the rocking duck and shout, “Duck-duck!”, asking for a ride.

♥Other means of communication♥
She sign pain, but in her own way by fanning her face with her fingers, and frowning (she can even do this on demand).

She expresses her happiness by clapping.
She compliments the chef (good food) by cluthching  her fist with a little of her thumb sticking out.
She demands more of some thing, by tapping her pointer to her other palm.

She says YES by moving her head forward and backwards.

She’s also able to understand simple instructions like, “Give mummy the book, mummy read to you.” “Danger Zaria, come back.” “Cannot put in the mouth!

♥Food and Milk Intake♥
She loves eating. We give her 3 meals a day, and some light snack in between, such as rice puffs, fruits, Baby Bites.
She is still still fully on breastmilk, and I feed her on demand (she’ll come to me, and sign the milk sign, or sometimes, she’ll point to the study and sign the milk sign to whoever is handling her).

♥Sleeping♥
Unlike Zara who only stopped taking 2 naps when she’s close to 2yrs old, Zaria is occasinally taking only 1 nap a day. 🙁
She sleeps at 9:30pm (if she only took 1 nap) or 11pm together with Zara (if she took 2 naps on that day).
She wakes up at about 8am daily.

♥Emotions and character♥
She’s more clingy now, preferring me over most people. However, she only fusses a little before she allows another person to carry or handle her.

She shows her displeasure by crying, at times a bit dramatic by crouching on the floor and crying. However, unlike Zara who can cry for hours, she can be easily pacified.

She loves books, flipping them, pointing at the pictures, saying the names of familiar objects (“Ao” for cat, “Ah-nana” for banana etc). Sometimes even laughing when she sees a funny picture (e.g. a baby doing a funny face).

She enjoys Zara’s program occasionally, especially when there are lots of singing involved, and can sit at the sofa watching together with Zara; clapping her hands, and moving to the music.

She’s rather independant, we can normally leave her alone with some toys or books, and she can keep herself occupied.

Continue from here.

This is the last bit of the trip. Bear with me as I don’t go on trips like these often, and I plan to record the trip in detail for my future reading/referrencing as my memory these days really suck!

♥Nov 9th (Fri)♥
Our last day in Shanghai and I was planning to do all the shopping needed on this day.

Our first stop was to change some money as we were running short of cash. Do you know that there’s no money changer in China (unless it’s black market) and besides hotels, the only place you can change foreign currency is from Bank of China and not any other banks? Also, not many shops and restaurants in Shanghai actually accept foreign credit cards; quite inconvenient for the tourists like us.

After getting some cash, we went to the Shanghai Science and Technology Museum (上海科技馆) in Pudong. Not to visit the Museum but actually to go to this shopping place opposite the Museum. This plazy houses lots of little shops selling counterfeit shoes, bags (Le Sport Sac mainly) and clothings, but it was quite dissapointing actually as the designs and items were the same in most of the shops. (What a contrast huh? 1 side it’s the Science and Technology Museum; directly opposite, it’s this place filled shops selling counterfeit goods!)

I bought a dress for Zaria and a pair of shoes for Zara (later I found out the quality isn’t really that good). That was all I got. Not a very fruitful shopping trip.

We then got out of the mall and walked about outdoor, where we could get a glimpse of the modern Pudong.

The modern Pudong : Dragon at the Science and Technology Museum, we caught sight of an airship cruising above; Modern buildings in Pudong; Century Ave (世纪大道); Old folks dancing outside of a mall, for some, they danced with their imaginary partners

It was then back to Nanjing and Fuzhou Road (福州路) for more shopping.

Brightly litted Nanjing Road; Last pic is a photo of our Motel which I took at 5:30am before we left for the airport

The thing I like about China in terms of shopping is the books, DVDs and CDs there are really cheap. Fuzhou Road (福州路) has lots of multi-level book shops. I was spending a lot of time there glancing at books and CDs. Daddy who doesn’t read Chinese, kept himself occupied by going through CDs so he didn’t mind the wait. I bought quite a lot for myself.

While glancing at books, I probably left my own guide book on the shelf and later could not locate it any more. Luckily, this happened on our last day of the trip, and I no longer need to reference it. Still, I was a bit upset because I like to keep my guide books as a remembrance/record of a trip. 🙁

Luckily too, we’d identified the restaurant to have our last dinner before the guide book went missing. We headed to an old restaurant Lao Zheng Xing (老正兴) on Fuzhou Road for our last meal in Shanghai.

Our last meal in Shanghai consisted of : Fried fermented or smelly tofu (臭豆腐); Toufu with crab roe; Fried local vege; Fish and turnip soup

♥Nov 10th (Sat)♥
We headed back to KL in the early morning flight.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Because I speak and read Chinese and Daddy doesn’t (he actually speaks passable Chinese but he didn’t want to do any talking), I had to do all the ordering, enquiries, directions asking, navigatitions, ticket purchasing, forms filling etc etc. Tired, you know.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

How are the people in Shanghai?
Besides my colleauges, I think most people are quite rude or maybe they are too busy to be nice.
When we asked for directions, it was never nicely told. They would be pointing impatiently and said, “那边!” “”There!”
When we were blocking someone’s way, instead of saying “Excuse me”, they shouted at us, “EH! EH!”, like it’s your fault for inconveniencing them.
In those lower end restaurants, waitresses were impatient you took time to order or checked out the menu.
You find spit every where. People smoke in restaurants!
Men who are alone get approached by pimps offering them female companion in the busiest street. Daddy was offered that service from a very decently dressed man when I was not by his side for 1min!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Do you wonder how Zara and Zaria cope?
Zaria was fine, as she’s used to us leaving her at home while we go to the market or bring Zara for her lessons.

Zara on the other hand was another story. The first 2 days, she eagerly waited for my return. When the door bell rang, she rushed to the door and happily announced, “My mummy come back already!”. When we called home, she came to the phone and said “Mummy, you bought me any surprise or not?” or “I miss you mummy. Are you coming home?” and then she’ll be sobbing.

Then on the 3rd day onwards, she used a different technique to fight her feelings. She kept telling Tuyam she didn’t like me any more. She said things like, “Ask mummy don’t come back any more!” “I don’t like mummy.” “If mummy come back, I will put her in naughty corner!”. She refused to come to the phone when we called home. However my maid said occasionally, she would cry sadly for no reason.

Both girls were very happy to see us when we got home.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

What happened to breastfeeding?
I expressed 3 times a day when I was in Shanghai. Morning and night was easy, because I did it in our room. The afternoon session can be a bit of a challenge. I did it in the toilets at the Museums (which is cleaner); did it in a quite corner of a restaurant with jackets drapped over me; did it in smelly toilets in restaurants. The worse was in the Shanghai Airport nursing room. It was labelled a nursing room, but it was also a place where cleaners store their carts with all the detergent and mops. In the 30mins I was there, many cleaners attempted to get into the room, even male cleaners! I had to be really fierce and shouted at them, and then they stopped stepping in and waited outside instead. 😛

I should have brought my nursing cape, which would make expressing easier. 🙁

What did I do with the milk? After this experience, I didn’t want to store and bring them home. I drank them all. Yes! Every bit of them. I expressed, I drank. No wastage! Daddy said I actually had better complexion and I glowed after a few days. Haha. Belief it or not?

Ever have your children ‘interfering’ in a fight/quarrel debate you have with your spouse?

As Zara grows older, she becomes more ‘involved’ in the adults’ conversations and tries to include her opinion of things.

Sometimes, we speak in Cantonse so that she won’t understand and she will remain quiet; but when the discussion becomes a bit too out of hand heated, she’ll say, “Shhh.. Shhhhh Daddy.. Shhhh Mummy.” she actually helps to clear the tension that’s building in our conversation, and helps straighten my knotted brows.

Last week, the below happened :

Daddy was angry with some small fault of Jelly, our Filipino maid. He was giving a lecture to Jelly over dinner, and I was getting a bit annoyed (dinner time in the house always ended up being a time he reprimands the maids).
Me : “Next time I’m going to have my dinner earlier before you come home. So stress eating dinner like that.”
Daddy : “So, you think I should just shut up is it?”
Zara : *matter-of-fact-ly* “Yah, Daddy. I think you should shut up and just eat your dinner.”
Daddy : *jaw dropped for a moment* “Oh, Zara, please don’t get involved in this.”
Mummy : *stiffling a giggle* “See, your daugther also tells you to just eat your dinner.”
We never used “shut up” on her before, so I guess, she doesn’t know the ‘seriousness’ of the phrase at all. She probably thought Daddy was yakking too much, and ought to stop and have his dinner.  😛

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Can’t remember what I did, and Daddy made the remark.
Daddy : “Are you nuts or what?”
Zara : *Quickly went over to Daddy and told him*“No no no. Mummy is not nuts. Daddy is nuts!”
I was stiffling a laugh, thinking to myself, that’s really sweet of her to defend me.
Zara : *added* “Daddy is Nuts. Mummy is Bread.”
Me : Huh? (now, it doesn’t make sense)
Zara : *continued* “Daddy likes to eat nuts ma, so Daddy is nuts. Mummy likes to eat bread, so mummy is Bread.”
Me : *roll eyes*
Still, Daddy is nuts, not me, that’s the important point.  😛

Continue from here. (If you wonder how many more parts there are, there’s only one more left).

♥Nov 7th (Wed)♥
With an overnight bag, we rushed to the train station early morning to catch the fast train to Hangzhou (杭州). We got a first class ticket, the coach was really comfortable and it only cost RMB68 per tix. Daddy and I slept through the ~1hr20min ride.

When we arrived at the Hangzhou station, there were so many elderly ladies offering their help (accomodation? maps? directions?), but we just shook our head all the time. With the information listed on their website, we managed to take a bus from Hangzhou Train Station, walked for 10mins and arrived at Mingtown Garden Youth Hostel (明堂-杭州湖中居青年旅舍), located at West of Xihu (西湖), which is the best place to stay as it’s not as busy as the East (high rise and buzy streets on the East).

We had some problem checking in as Daddy left our passports in the Motel back in Shanghai. The staff in the hostel was helpful, although they could have rejected our stay; they called our Motel, requested the Motel to provide them with out info. Motel168 wasn’t very cooperative, in the end, we promised we’ll fax them our passports and Visas and they agreed to let us have our room (which was pre-booked by phone).

Just like what was written on the guidebook, and the website, the hostel is surrounded by lakes and gardens, absolutely beautiful! We have a room all to ourselves with ensuite bathroom (just in case you wonder if we needed to share our room or toilet). The room was very comfortable. Clean room, clean white sheets, beautiful pine wood ceiling and a window opening to the back garden. Best of all, it didn’t stink of cigerette smoke.

After our lunch, we rented a bike each, and started exploring the area.

We cycled up some slopes and visited the Dragon Well (Long Jing) tea plantation (龙井茶园). It was lovely, so green every where!

Then we rode through Xudi Causeway (苏堤), which cuts across Xihu from North to South (~3.5km), and then have dinner in Wei Zhuang (House of Taste) (知味观。味庄). This restaurant serves the best food that we’d tasted in our trip, every thing tasted so delicious especially the nice dainty dim sum dessert. Too bad I was running a flu, some of the taste were a bit muddled.

Bestest duck! A cold dish, but very delicious; prawn triangles; I didn’t like the fish (baked and accompanied with home made creamy sauce), but Daddy thought it was uniquely prepared; the dainty dessert : some pastry with lotus filing and chestnut stuffing rolls.

After the yummylicious dinner, we cycled another 5Km in the dark to get back to the hostel. This was when we could really feel the chill, but it was still bearable with just a light fleece jacket on.

♥Nov 8th (Thurs)♥
In the morning, we woke up to birds chirping outside our window. We had a simple breakfast at the hostel and started exploring the gardens around the hostel by foot. The gardens are actually very beautiful, with lakes and bridges and streams everywhere. We also took an hour boat ride (battery operated so we just needed to ‘steer’) at the lake, pretty relaxing.

Beautiful views around West Xihu

Some of the plants and objects I found in the gardens

Then it was time to check out. We left our baggage in the train station, and explored a bit of the old town. Things here are actually cheaper than Yuyuan, and I was really amused by the street food available. 10 fried scropions for RMB5 anyone?

We didn’t try any of these, but we saw quite a lot of people buying them.

♥A Chinese Medical Hall which has been listed as Historical Heritage in Hangzhou, they were giving away free herbal tea, which Daddy and I took two cups each.♥♥Street performer getting to work♥♥Xihu beer that Daddy took with words : Free From Formaldehyde (do they actually brew beer with Formaldehyde in China?♥♥Hangzhou station, people were trying to get into the platform to get into the train♥

We headed back to Shanghai on the 5:20pm train, and back to the smokey Motel168.

Yesterday was Zara’s actual birthday! I was meant to post this up yesterday but in the evening,  we brought her out for ice cream to celebrate and when we got home, it was “Mummy-finished-work-already-so-play-and-read-to-me” time for the 2 girls.

The girl is 3 years old now. See how she’d evolved :

Mummy and Daddy both love you very much! You are indeed very precious to us!
We may not be able to spend as much time with you now as before, but don’t think that with Mei-mei’s arrival, we love you any less.

continued from here

♥Nov 5th (Mon)♥
Breakfast was streetfood. Although breakfast was included in our Motel rate, it was lousy. Our Motel is nearby Yun-Nan Road (云南路) which has many small local restaurants. In the morning, lots of stalls are scattered along the street selling green onion pan cakes (葱油饼); You-tiao (油条) and other savoury and sweet pastries. I’m able to fill my stomach with just RMB2 or less, what a steal. Daddy on the other hand, has too much concern over the hygenes level of the food, he preferred having fruits (he’s the healthy eater at home).

We started with a stroll to HuaiHai Road (淮海路), which is like our Bukit Bintang. Lots of high rise and super big department stores.

Around Shanghai :
♥Maple Leaves♥ ♥A muriel outside a toy shop, I thought this looked like a work of a Malaysian Cartonist♥/span> ♥A sign appearing in all underpass “Beware of Slip  – Shouldn’t it read : “Beware, slippery” or some thing else♥
♥Sun Yat Sen former residence (孫中山故居)♥ ♥Daddy slurping some grass jelly/cincau in a Taiwanese cafe. He loves this♥
♥Seafood available on Yun-nan Road. Can you spot the cage of exotic birds with another cage of snake above them? (I can imagine the stress these animals feel)♥

We visited the Shanghai Museum in the afternoon. It was quite good (it was more to make me feel good that I visited places other than the malls).

Items which caught my attention in the Museum

♥Nov 6th (Tues)♥
We were off to Zhouzhuang (周庄), one of the most famous old water township in China.

We initially wanted to take a bus to Zhouzhuang and do our own walking, but it so happened that the next available bus came with a tour guide, and we only had to pay RMB5 extra. It helped to have a guide, as we were able to know what is famous in Zhouzhuang and the history behind the town.

♥Lunch at Zhouzhuang : The vege tasted something like a cross between water cress and choy-sum; the prawns small but sweet; the omelette was fried with local white bait; and dish in the middle is steam Ba-yu (巴鱼) which translates to Palm Fish as the fish is the size of the palm, only available in Zhouzhuang♥ ♥live Ba-Yu, a fish which is not fully evolved from a reptile, so they have lungs. Emperor used to eat only the lungs as a delicacy (LB, any for you?)♥ ♥Famous pork knuckles (for sale everywhere around Zhouzhuang, all claimed to be ‘original’)

Zhouzhuang is made famous internationally by a famous Chinese painter Chen Yi Fei; old bridges, waterways, boats, willow trees lining the walk way. No cars are allowed in the town. However, recent years, the place has become very commercialised with everybody trying to push their wares to tourists visiting the town.

Cobbled street, water ways, boats, bridges are all famous sights in Zhouzhuang

That day excursion was good, not too taxing for Daddy, and we were able to take naps on the bus journey (~1.5hrs to fro).

When we arrived Shanghai, we rushed to the Wang Bao He Restaurant (王宝和酒家). I have a few team members who are located in Shanghai, and my boss suggested we meet and have a team dinner. Since it’s hairy crab season, we went to the most famous crab restaurant in Shanghai, and had the ‘crab banquet’. There were like 12 or more dishes all prepared with something from the crab or to compliment the crab. And the final dish was a hairy crab each. It was a very expensive dinner, costing RMB550 per head. Fuyoh!

These were some of the dishes I managed to capture. The rest ended in the stomach

It was a good meeting with the team members, all of whom I’ve met for the first time.

As for the Hairy crabs, I still find Malaysia’s crab the best! I’m not so much of a crab roe/egg person I guess.

The birthday party preperation started quite a while back, thinking whom to invite, what food to serve (cook? cater? fast food?), what cake to order, what should be included in the party pack, and how to accomodate all the people in our small house.

Last Friday, I woke up at 6am from Stress!
I got changed, and went to the wet market to buy some of the ingredients still missing from the dishes that we’ll be cooking for Zara’s birthday celebration.

We had about 40 guests. 12 kids, and 28 adults, mainly family and the neighbours whom Zara has been playing with. The party was last Saturday, 4 days before her actual birthday.

The preparation (chopping, peeling, seasoning etc), cooking and baking started on Friday. I did those that do not required time at the stove, e.g. cup cakes, coleslaw, grilled chick wings, garlic bread. Tuyam cooked the curry, fried chick wings, fried noodle and rice. We bought some Char Siew (Chinese : BBQ Pork) and Pizzas last minute, worried that there may be not enough food.

Heaps of cupcake baked. Items in Party Packs meant for majority of the kids (babies and older kids have different items) bought from Shanghai 

I baked, cooked, decorated the house, coordinated the re-arranging of the furniture, packing the party packs, confirming with guests if they are coming, etc etc. On Saturday, what did Daddy do huh? He was reading newspaper, when I was working hard at the kitchen and at the same time trying to entertained the girls. He stopped only when I gave him the icy cold stare, and told him to get some baloons blown up. He got the cheek to complain our pump is not the right pump!! Then when I nagged him, he said if I was so stressed out, I shouldn’t throw any more birthay parties at home! Grrrrrr! To give him some credit, he did the last minute shopping and picked up the cake and the pizzas. Oh, and he paid for most of the things.

We had way too much food when every thing was placed on the table (so buzy running around, didn’t even have time to take photos of the food), and lots of left over after that.

When the guests started arriving, we could feel the house was really crammed. We didn’t have enough chairs, so pepole have to sit on the floor.

All the younger girls were admiring Zara’s cake, ordered from A Piece of Cake, just like last year, but this year’s theme is Princess!!!

Zara and her friends from the neighbourhood

Zara and her favourite cousin, Sam (with Zaria looking a bit lost); Zara & Zaria with cousins; Zara making sure I didn’t burn the cake; Zara blowing her birthday candles

After cake cutting, it was game time. I got my two older niece and newphew, Ally and Nick, to organise the games and they did really well. With the help of Sam and Norman, the younger kids have a blast!!

I must really thank Nick, Norman, Ally and Sam for helping with the kiddos, and making sure they have a great time!

Here’s one for the family album

♥Oct 30th (Tues)♥
After all the late night ‘fights’ and ‘quarrels’ Daddy had with Krissflyer, finally we got our flights confirmed.
This time, only Daddy and I were flying, our very first trip away without the kids after Zara was born.

♥Oct 30th (Tues) ~ Nov 1st (Thurs)♥
With China colleagues’ as well as some other friend’s help, managed to find and book suitable accomodations for our trip.
Prepping Zara for our trip, telling her China is cold, not suitable for kids, I’m going for work together with Daddy so can’t take care of her etc etc. She got quite upset, but I guess what can she do to stop us from going?

♥Nov 2nd (Fri)♥
Daddy picked up MIL from her place. She’s been enlisted to help keep an eye on the maids while we’re away.

♥Nov 3rd (Sat)♥
Said good bye to the girls early morning and left for the airport. Zara’s eyes was a bit wet when I hugged her.

A long 5hrs transit in Changi, luckily, there is so much to do there.

Reached Shanghai at 10pm. By the time we got our luggage and checked into our hotel motel, it was already close to mid night.

Since kids are not with us, we chose cheap but clean accomodation, we stayed in Motel 168 Jingling Road (莫泰168金陵路). Everything is within walking distant, even the famous Nanjing shopping street (南京路步行街). For RMB358, we got a room with a computer. Ha! Room is clean and small, but it stank of cigerrette smoke (from other rooms)!
When I called the Motel and to reserve a non-smoking room before the trip, I was told, “All our rooms are non-smoking.” Non-smoking my a***! But for this amount we paid for, I can’t expect Datai’s service, can I?

♥Nov 4th (Sun)♥
Arranged to change to a room without a computer which cost RMB40 less.
After breakfast in the motel, with a map and my guidebook on hand, we started our journey.

The first few sights I took in after stepping out of the Motel

Our destination was Yu Yuan (豫园­). Gosh, there were so many people there!! It’s packed! It’s a shopping area for tourists and out-of-town folks, and the prices were of course tourists’ price.

Around Yu Yuan Shopping Street (豫园):
♥Big red lanterns everywhere♥♥Multilevel Jeweler (do they have really so many different jewelry to sell?)♥
♥Famous Xiaolongbao Shop Nanxiang (南翔) : a 200m queue has formed for take away while we were there♥ ♥genuine juicy pao (so juicy you are given a straw to suck the juice)♥ ♥a man having his juicy pao♥
♥NingPo Rice Ball Shop, wasn’t able to squeeze pass people to enter the shop, don’t know what they were selling♥ ♥Having a black glutinous corn (which was rather coarse and tasteless)♥ ♥Good and Cheap Lunch at Xishi Beancurd Shop (西施豆腐)♥

Note : We are non-pork eaters, so we didn’t try the Nanxiang Xiaoloongbao or the street side juicy pao. 🙁

We visited the Yu Yuan Garden which is a 400yrs old clasical garden. I love the willow trees and the tranquility (just outside the wall, the crowds in the shopping street can be heard).

Yu Yuan Garden (豫园) :

After that it was back to the Motel for a nap, and at 5:30pm (which got dark totally), we went to The Bund (外滩) for a walk. It was nice, and although extremely crowded, the breeze we got and the view made up for it.

Dinner was the famous ShaoXin Chicken (绍兴白切鸡). It’s just basic steam chicken but the sauce was just so delicious. Daddy didn’t like it, so I was the one who finished the plate of chicken with a bowl of porridge.

We almost stopped a cab to get us back to the Motel, but spotted our Motel just a few steps away!! Haha.

Daddy was so knackered he almost wanted to go on strike and stay in the Motel the following day.

We’d started to make lumpier food for Zaria as well as introducing new food to her such as macaroni, noodles and spaghetti. No meat or eggs for her yet, and she’s still fully ‘vegetarian’ until she turns 1 (just to lower the risk of allergy).

She’s having 3 meals a day now. Breakfast is normally oat with fruits; banana or avocado. Lunch is mainly fruits but sometimes her dinner is cooked earlier, and she’ll have a bowl of her dinner for lunch. Dinner is always something savoury.

Here are some of the things we cooked for her :
Apple, broccoli, carrot cereal (cereals are always made using : brown rice, buckwheat, millet and quinoa)
Red spinach cereal
Cauliflower and potato cereal
Carrot porridge with mashed toufu
Carrot and turnip porridge
Purple cabbage cereal
Red dates and gooseberry porridge
Zucinni with cherry tomatto millet porridge
Beetroot cereal
(as shown in above photo)

Her favourite type of food is actually soup (ABC soup minus the meat; ‘pearl bean’ soup; herbal soup) with rice, noodle or macaroni.

Last Sunday I made fry spinach noodle for her, and she just loved it. We can tell she loves something because she’ll be shouting “mum-mum mum-mum” excitedly and impatiently throughout the meal.

The recipe :
~ 30ml blended boiled spinach (as the sauce)
~ finely shreded carrots
~ finely chop spinach
~ chopped shallots
~ small amount of cooked plain wheat noodle (or mee sua)
Fry shallots with small amount of olive oil until fragrant; stir in carrots and fry until soft.
Stir in noodle and chopped spinach until spinach is cooked.
Pour in the blended boiled spinach to coat the noodle evenly.

She loved it so much she even clapped her hands after the meal.

We used to worry that Zara was going to be a bit tom-boyish. She wanted only to wear pants or jeans previously. Bob The Builder was her idol, and she aspired to be a cow girl.

This year, she’s into princess, tiaras, anything frilley (yikes), if they are pink even better.
She would remind us to apply her face cream on her face, so that she’ll be ‘fair’.
She likes to put flowers behind her ears.
She wants to wear dresses or skirt even at home.
She’s always checking herself in the mirror.

She’s after all a girl.